Burnt Offerings Clarifications (GM Reference)


Rise of the Runelords

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Hopefully others can use this thread to clarify questions arising in this adventure. If you happen to see another thread, please link post a link in this one to try and keep things tied together (Maybe have a subforum just for the adventures, hint, hint Gary ; )

Anyway, my question: On page 27, entry B6: Ancient Prison, it says "If the alarm is raised". Maybe I missed it somewhere, but I didn't see anything about an alarm. Was this supposed to be in B1 (there's only a creature there, no description) or somewhere else (like B13)?

On a side note, awesome job so far! I'm a slow reader, but enjoying every little bit! The Glassworks, the Goblins, the aftermath of the Goblin Ranger! I wish I could think this stuff up!

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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The "alarm" in question is generic. There's no specific area in the dungeon with an alarm spell or an alarm trap, but the monsters can still certainly roar and gibber and skitter down tunnels to warn their friends if they want.


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Okay, I've got one.

Spoiler:
On page 44 to 45 (area D2) Bruthazmus the Bugbear is listed as having a 17 Str (which is a +3 bonus). But the rest of his stats seem to be written with +4 bonus, and he has a +4 Strength Bow. So I assume the 17 is a typo and he really has an 18 or 19.


On a related note: Since people are going to keep asking the same questions over and over (just change it to 18, in case you haven't read the other threads) how will errata work? Should we be submitting it someplace?

For example: Sinspawn is listed both as "Always NE" and "Always CE". I haven't seen anybody post about that, but I might have missed it. If everybody posts this stuff to the same place we can avoid repetition. Plus if there's an errata file we can just check that. After all, this is a book instead of a magazine, so it's theoretically going to be either available for a while or compiled, right?


Thanks, thug. I hadn't noticed my question on other threads, but I haven't had a chance to read all of them. There are a lot.


tbug wrote:

On a related note: Since people are going to keep asking the same questions over and over (just change it to 18, in case you haven't read the other threads) how will errata work? Should we be submitting it someplace?

That's what I hoped this would kind of do. I don't think the message boards are very good for these types of discussions. The only thing you can hope for is a "Errata" or "GM Reference" thread that won't be used or overlooked.

I did post a suggestion to the Website forum. Maybe a Wiki would be better, but you can only hope ; )


Michael F wrote:
Thanks, thug [sic]. I hadn't noticed my question on other threads, but I haven't had a chance to read all of them. There are a lot.

There really are, and I don't blame you for not seeing it. I'm glad I could help. I miss posts myself.

This is why I'm looking for some sort of official guidance to help us a) exhaustively report errata and b) avoid too much repetition.

Also, your misspelling of my nickname made me giggle. :)

Have a good one!


wow, until you put the little (sic) there, I didn't realize my mistake. You've been "lighting up" the boards lately, and every time I saw your alias, I thought "tHug" in my head.

Wow, I didn't know my Spot was that bad.


Ok, maybe I'm blind and can't see it on my maps, or any reference here on the boards, but the text refers to a couple of areas that I'm not finding.

Spoiler:
Specifically looking for areas C25 (Submerged Sea Cave) and C26 (Sea Cave). Now I figure that one is the northern entrance to C27 (Bunyip Lair), and the other is the southwestern one, but just curious as to which is which? Any suggestions?


rward30 wrote:

Ok, maybe I'm blind and can't see it on my maps, or any reference here on the boards, but the text refers to a couple of areas that I'm not finding.

** spoiler omitted **

I'm putting my money on C25 in the SW beachfront property.

C26 says "to navigate the churning surf leading south".

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Those two areas accidently got left off the map, alas.

C25 is west, C26 is north.


James Jacobs wrote:

Those two areas accidently got left off the map, alas.

C25 is west, C26 is north.

Pretty much what I was figuring, thanks for the answer though.

Grand Lodge

Dunno if this really is the right place to ask, but anyway I think it fits, so here goes:

On page 72 of Pathfinder #1 is that Xin-Shalast on the picture?

Dark Archive

Is there a map of the encouters for Initial Assault (EL1) page 11? If not I'm going to recommend using the GameMastery City Square Flipmat - Store link

I'm running the first session tonight of Burnt Offerings and it should be a blast.

Later

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Greg Volz wrote:

Is there a map of the encouters for Initial Assault (EL1) page 11? If not I'm going to recommend using the GameMastery City Square Flipmat - Store link

I'm running the first session tonight of Burnt Offerings and it should be a blast.

Later

There's not a map; unless you count the map of Sandpoint, of course.

Otherwise, the city square flipmat is a great choice for this battle.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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rpotor wrote:

Dunno if this really is the right place to ask, but anyway I think it fits, so here goes:

On page 72 of Pathfinder #1 is that Xin-Shalast on the picture?

It isn't. That's a picture of Runelord Alaznist's palace over the city of Xin-Bakrakhan, the city of wrath, at the height of the fall of Thassilon. Much of this city sunk under the waves, and the ruins that remain above water are known today as Hollow Mountain—no one really knows that there's an ancient sunken city in the Varisian Gulf.

The bridge you see going over to that mountain, by the way, is the far end of the Irespan, the bridge that started (and still partially stands) in Magnimar. It once served as a VIP "highway" to Xin-Bakrakhan's heights, since the only other way really to get up there was flight or mountain climbing.

Dark Archive Bella Sara Charter Superscriber

Dumb question: The runelord of greed is the main enemy of the campaign, correct? However, most of the villians in the adventure are affiliated with the runelord of wrath. Should the focus be on the runelords generally as opposed to the specific runelord being fought? With which sin will the skinsaw men be affiliated?

I worry about the bait and switch of the enemies. A similar situation happened in AoW, where Whispering Cairn seemed to indicate that the focus of the adventure path would be the queen of chaos/rod of seven parts, when in fact they were mostly a sideline. It seems like the runelord of wrath is a similar sideline from the campaign outline, but a large enough sideline to be a distraction to the players.


Sebastian wrote:
With which sin will the skinsaw men be affiliated?

Spoiler:

The Skinsaw are affiliated with Lamashtu (p 10, last paragraph of "Nualia's Story". Of course, Lamashtu was "imported" into Greed's holding by Lamashtu cultists.

Sebastian wrote:
It seems like the runelord of wrath is a similar sideline from the campaign outline, but a large enough sideline to be a distraction to the players.

I think that they've done a pretty good job showing the Greed Runelord off in the last part of the adventure. Bait and switch? Most likely, but I see a "greater evil" showing up sometime, possibly using Lamashtu to his own misdeeds.

I see three major antagonists at this point (Greed, hinted; Wrath, implied; Lamashtu, through Nualia). If the PCs don't play the "lotto machine", then Greed is laging behind (at this point, not really an antagonist until the find out more about the Runelords). If I were a betting PC, I'd say it's Lamashtu.

And a question: Would you show the PCs a picture of Thistletop on page 39? I don't know if I would, unless they managed to get down to the beach. It doesn't look like the view would be too accessible.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Actually... while a few of the villians in Burnt Offerings are associated with wrath, the entire dungeon in Thistletop is associated with Greed and Karzoug. Nualia and her henchmen aren't really associated with any of them, though. The way the campaign's built, the seven-pointed star (the Sihedron Rune) is the only "face" to the bad guys for a bit. It's a slow reveal for the PCs who and what is exactly going on, and the focus on Runelords doesn't really start till late in adventure #3.

The skinsaw men are actually cultists of Nogorber who are being taken advantage of by a lamia who's working for Karzoug; this is the same lamia who's grooming Nualia for greater glories (that is, until the PCs put her down).

To a certain extent, most (if not all) of the runelords are going to get a little bit of attention during the campaign, actually. Karzoug's the main menace, though, but he's still a Runelord, so I don't think that there's gonna be a problem with baiting and switching. Especially since nothing in Rise of the Runelords has the "baggage" that the Rod of Seven Parts had as far as nostalgia goes, with the exception of the seven deadly sins themselves. And since they ARE the focus... it should work out.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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tdewitt274 wrote:
I see three major antagonists at this point (Greed, hinted; Wrath, implied; Lamashtu, through Nualia). If the PCs don't play the "lotto machine", then Greed is laging behind (at this point, not really an antagonist until the find out more about the Runelords). If I were a betting PC, I'd say it's Lamashtu.

Lamashtu is certainly a close second; she's got a presence in several of the adventures, and is the featured deity in Pathfinder #5.

But again... until the half-way point, the runelord stuff is really subtle and minor, and the characters themselves won't really start learning about runelords till adventure 4 starts up. Until then, it's mostly the "introduce PCs to our world and have them adventure" show, with the runelord elements only really showing up in hindsight.

Dark Archive Bella Sara Charter Superscriber

Damn, James, are you an insomniac or a night owl? 3:30 am? ;-)

James Jacobs wrote:
Actually... while a few of the villians in Burnt Offerings are associated with wrath, the entire dungeon in Thistletop is associated with Greed and Karzoug. Nualia and her henchmen aren't really associated with any of them, though. The way the campaign's built, the seven-pointed star (the Sihedron Rune) is the only "face" to the bad guys for a bit. It's a slow reveal for the PCs who and what is exactly going on, and the focus on Runelords doesn't really start till late in adventure #3.

Thanks, that clarifies things a lot. Part of my confusion stemmed from my thinking the sidheon (sp?) rune was associated with wrath.

James Jacobs wrote:
The skinsaw men are actually cultists of Nogorber who are being taken advantage of by a lamia who's working for Karzoug; this is the same lamia who's grooming Nualia for greater glories (that is, until the PCs put her down).

I can't remember - did this make it into the module? I thought Nualia was just being lead by her goddess.


Sebastian wrote:


I can't remember - did this make it into the module? I thought Nualia was just being lead by her goddess.

OOO! OOO!, I know this one!

Check out page 10 my friend! It mentions that Nualia went to Magnimar and got the skinsaw men to help her hunt down and kill the father of her (mis-carried) child. Then the "mysterious leader" of the skinsaw men gives her some advice and the medalion.

No mention of a Lamia on page 10, but it rings a bell for some reason. It might be on another page or James Jacobs might have hinted to it in another thread or a blog.

Dark Archive Bella Sara Charter Superscriber

Michael F wrote:
Sebastian wrote:


I can't remember - did this make it into the module? I thought Nualia was just being lead by her goddess.

OOO! OOO!, I know this one!

Check out page 10 my friend! It mentions that Nualia went to Magnimar and got the skinsaw men to help her hunt down and kill the father of her (mis-carried) child. Then the "mysterious leader" of the skinsaw men gives her some advice and the medalion.

No mention of a Lamia on page 10, but it rings a bell for some reason. It might be on another page or James Jacobs might have hinted to it in another thread or a blog.

Thanks! I thought I remembered her getting guidance, but I didn't remember the Lamia part, which makes sense given your post.


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James Jacobs wrote:
(that is, until the PCs put her down).

What if the PCs seduce her and finally convince her not to purge her 'taint'? What? A horndog can hope, can't he?


In that case the lamia's probably going to be pretty irked that her disciple/pet project has been seduced away from her. Sounds like a story hook to me. :)


tbug wrote:
Sounds like a story hook to me. :)

Is there any other way to handle any of the numerous "…I do her…" scenarios?

Honestly, any one night stand is an immediate connection to an NPC. Romantic entanglements are…well…entanglements.


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CourtFool wrote:


What if the PCs seduce her and finally convince her not to purge her 'taint'? What? A horndog can hope, can't he?

Dude, you're nuts. I'm afraid the DC on that "Diplomacy" check would be very very high.

Her current boyfriend, Tsuto, isn't thrilled with the whole thing, and he has Diplomacy +8. But he only has 10 Charisma, maybe she's hoping to trade up...

But still, I just don't think it's possible. She's damaged goods. It would probably take A LOT of magic to set her right, just talking isn't going to cut it. A little charm person, maybe dominate person, remove curse, heal, geas? etc.

After all that, she's not even the same NPC. She's still a hot half-angel, but you couldn't even use the same artwork for her anymore if they got rid of the demon hand.

If you want the PCs to acquire an inconvenient girlfriend, I think Lyrie the wizard is a much better choice. It's a stretch, but workable:

Picture, if you will:

The PCs defeat Lyrie, knock her out, and take her prisoner. Even though she tries to fight to the death because the killed Tsuto. Who wasn't really her boyfriend anyway. She is dejected and forlorn, but the PCs are kind to her during questioning (like I said, it's a stretch). Then the whole Stockholm Sydrome thing kicks in, and she falls for one of the PCs.

So they probably have to take her to jail, but maybe she pines for the PC and asks him to visit her. Maybe she gets out, because they don't know about the murders in Magnimar, and the only other thing she did was toast a few goblins. So she gets out of jail and tries to turn over a new leaf and pursue a relationship with a good aligned hero. And she'll probably want her new boyfriend to get her wand and spellbook back from the party's arcane caster. Because you KNOW the PC won't pass up that loot!

So you wind up with a PC who has a Chaotic Evil girlfriend. And let's face it, in real life, we've all seen that before, right?


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Michael F wrote:
So you wind up with a PC who has a Chaotic Evil girlfriend. And let's face it, in real life, we've all seen that before, right?

They come in other flavors?


CourtFool wrote:
Michael F wrote:
So you wind up with a PC who has a Chaotic Evil girlfriend. And let's face it, in real life, we've all seen that before, right?
They come in other flavors?

I've heard rumors to that effect. I'm told LN is common (shudder). And if she rolls LG, what's the point, really? I suppose N would be easy to get along with.

I recommend the ever-popular CN (Goodish). Ready for a good time and probably won't kill you in your sleep after.


On page 66 of PF#1 in the Sandpoint section under #18- Cracktooth's Tavern..

Jesk "Cracktooth" Berinni is described as being a NG human male, half-orc expert... (Turns head almost 360 degrees).. Which one is it? Human or half-orc?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

GreenGrunt wrote:

On page 66 of PF#1 in the Sandpoint section under #18- Cracktooth's Tavern..

Jesk "Cracktooth" Berinni is described as being a NG human male, half-orc expert... (Turns head almost 360 degrees).. Which one is it? Human or half-orc?

human


James Jacobs wrote:
GreenGrunt wrote:

On page 66 of PF#1 in the Sandpoint section under #18- Cracktooth's Tavern..

Jesk "Cracktooth" Berinni is described as being a NG human male, half-orc expert... (Turns head almost 360 degrees).. Which one is it? Human or half-orc?

human

Thanks- i'm typing up an abbreviated directory for Sandpoint so every little bit helps.

Cheers- and .. Nice job on the first book by the way!

GG


Good catch Green Grunt. I'm doint the same thing, but I hadn't gotten to him yet.

I had a question about the Human NPCs:

How can we tell if they are Chelaxian, Varisian or Shoanti? Some entries state one way or the other. Also, the players guide lists common Varisian and Shoanti names. I've noticed that some of the NPCs use names off that list. I was going to compare NPCs I wasn't sure about to the name list.

I know that anyone in the noble families is Chelaxian (except for the Kaijitsus) Should we assume that most, if not all, of the townspeople who work in businesses owned by the nobles are Chelaxian?

What's the overall ethnic mix in the town, percentage-wise?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Michael F wrote:

How can we tell if they are Chelaxian, Varisian or Shoanti? Some entries state one way or the other. Also, the players guide lists common Varisian and Shoanti names. I've noticed that some of the NPCs use names off that list. I was going to compare NPCs I wasn't sure about to the name list.

I know that anyone in the noble families is Chelaxian (except for the Kaijitsus) Should we assume that most, if not all, of the townspeople who work in businesses owned by the nobles are Chelaxian?

What's the overall ethnic mix in the town, percentage-wise?

Most of Shoanti is Chelaxian. If someone's Varisian or Shoanti, we mention it. I'd hazard a guess that the ethnicity breaks down something like 65% Chelaxian, 30% Varisian, and 5% Shoanti, though.

We didn't list Chelaxian names for 2 reasons. First, we just didn't have room, and second, people from Cheliax are, in our minds at least, more or less "standard" D&D type guys and gals.

I believe we DID come up with a prototype list of Chelaxian names, and I suppose if I can find it I'll post it, but for the most part, Chelaxian names are pretty much "Standard" D&D names. There's plenty of examples in Pathfinder 1, of course, if you go through and ignore the ones who have names from Variasian, Shoanti, or (in the case of the Kaijitsus) Minkai names.


Hit a question with this item from the RotRLPG: Hide Shirt. In the description it says that it is light armor, but on the chart, it's listed as medium. I'd assume that the description is correct with it as a light. Then again, it is an additional +1 to the standard hide armor AC and other stats the same (excepting movement), so it could work be medium (with an error on the move rate.) Any ideas on this one?


Argh!! Hit another snag...

Spoiler:
Goblin Warchanter on pg12, listed with Exotic Weapon Proficiency:Whip feat. With a BAB of 0, how does it have this? Plus it also has Combat Reflexes feat as well, and as far as I can tell, it should only have one feat, not two.

No it's not a major issue, just trying to see which way to go on this one. Sorry to be a pest today, especially since I don't post that much in the first place. *grin*

Paizo Employee Creative Director

rward30 wrote:
Hit a question with this item from the RotRLPG: Hide Shirt. In the description it says that it is light armor, but on the chart, it's listed as medium. I'd assume that the description is correct with it as a light. Then again, it is an additional +1 to the standard hide armor AC and other stats the same (excepting movement), so it could work be medium (with an error on the move rate.) Any ideas on this one?

Hide shirts are light armor.

They are, pretty much in every way, better than hide armor. This is intentional, and sort of an experiment I wanted to try. The image of a barbarian wearing hide armor is iconic, yet the way hide armor works in the PHB means that few barbarians will ever wear it since it's medium armor and slows them down. Since we're no longer doing stuff that's official D&D... that actually opens up a lot of room to try to "fix" things that we think need fixing now and then. Hide armor is one of them.

Of course... then we had to go and mislabel it. Which made me say all sorts of words that these messageboards would censor if I wrote them.


James Jacobs wrote:


Hide shirts are light armor.

They are, pretty much in every way, better than hide armor. This is intentional, and sort of an experiment I wanted to try. The image of a barbarian wearing hide armor is iconic, yet the way hide armor works in the PHB means that few barbarians will ever wear it since it's medium armor and slows them down. Since we're no longer doing stuff that's official D&D... that actually opens up a lot of room to try to "fix" things that we think need fixing now and then. Hide armor is one of them.

Of course... then we had to go and mislabel it. Which made me say all sorts of words that these messageboards would censor if I wrote them.

sort of like the relationship of chain shirt to chainmail.

I like this armor, and yeah - barbarians might just use it instead of a chain shirt. Way to go Paizo!

The Exchange Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6

I'm unclear on why the sinspawn would have left blood on the rim of the pool in area B4. Any guidance? It doesn't seem like they've been preying on anything, and they don't seem to ooze blood.


rward30 wrote:

Argh!! Hit another snag...

** spoiler omitted **

No it's not a major issue, just trying to see which way to go on this one.

It's a class ability. Every member of that class has this.


tbug wrote:
rward30 wrote:

Argh!! Hit another snag...

** spoiler omitted **

No it's not a major issue, just trying to see which way to go on this one.

It's a class ability. Every member of that class has this.

*Smacks head* Yeah, I realized this after I was a little more awake. That's what I get for doing stuff just after waking up from a 30 minute nap at the computer desk. And I couldn't get back onto the boards to delete the message fast enough. Really need to get some more sleep than Pathfinder and children are letting me get.


Russ Taylor wrote:
I'm unclear on why the sinspawn would have left blood on the rim of the pool in area B4. Any guidance? It doesn't seem like they've been preying on anything, and they don't seem to ooze blood.

Spoiler:
If you read on into B6, you'll see that they fight among themselves, tearing and biting at each other enough to cause wounds.

Hateful little buggers.

Sovereign Court

I dont know whether im overlooking something, but what have you huys been using for maps of combat in sandpoint? There wasnt any i found in the issue.


Try this thread. The first set of links is broken, but the ones further down (At the DigitalDungeonCast gallery) work fine. And the maps the guy did are great!

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Mr. Slaad wrote:
I dont know whether im overlooking something, but what have you huys been using for maps of combat in sandpoint? There wasnt any i found in the issue.

There's the main map of Sandpoint in the Sandpoint article... My hope was that map would suffice, would give GMs a place to start when preparing their own maps. It's not a perfect solution. At one point I wanted a close-up map of the initial goblin fight... but we just didn't have time to order it (or the budget). Oh well...

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Russ Taylor wrote:
I'm unclear on why the sinspawn would have left blood on the rim of the pool in area B4. Any guidance? It doesn't seem like they've been preying on anything, and they don't seem to ooze blood.

Erylium's been doing that to create sinspawn, actually. The blood spatters are left over from her last batch she cooked up.

Liberty's Edge

Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Adventure Subscriber

Are there any plans to publish an updated map with the the areas that were left off added back on? PDF download?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Mr Baron wrote:
Are there any plans to publish an updated map with the the areas that were left off added back on? PDF download?

We might go fix the errors in the PDF once we get everything else in order. If we reprint Burnt Offerings, we'll absolutely go in and fix the errors. There's a chance those maps might also be reprinted in the upcoming Runelords Map Folio as well, in which case the errors will be fixed there as well.

So yeah, there are plans. Not sure how they'll be implemented yet, since it's pretty low priority behind things like "Get Pathfinder back on schedule."

Liberty's Edge

Michael F wrote:
A little charm person, maybe dominate person, remove curse, heal, geas? etc.

None of the 'Person' spells would work on her because she's an Outsider not a Humanoid. Not that it matters to me as a gm though. I see her as just being too alienated by 'normal' society to want to go back.

Liberty's Edge

*posted to the wrong thread*

Not sure how that happened. The forums are haunted, I tell ye.

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