Haunting of HarrowStone (GM Reference)


Carrion Crown

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Hello, i just want to say this thread has helped me a lot, this campaign is my first one as DM and ive felt very good with the way ive run it and all the extra stuff that's added in to the campaign.

My problem. I'm running the campaign with three people on the medium xp track - and i think they might be to high in level/xp for where they are in the story it does not say what level they should be at certain points so im not 100% sure and it being my first time DM'ing i just wanted some advice.

They have cleared the first level of the prison, and started on the 2nd level and just killed the piper. I've done most of the extra haunt stuff, and added one or two encounters, nothing high just some extra skeletons in the restlands. They are not level three with about 7000xp, i know that some people here have said they groups were just under level 4 when finishing up and i think my group will be over 4 by the time they finish is this much of a problem? or will i have to start beefing up the fights in the next book?

I've also played up the Kendra angle where one of my PC's has become a love interest with her. i wanted to get peoples idea on what they did with her after the first book, does she go with the PC's to lepistad? any ideas or what you did with her would be very helpful.

Oh and one more - how did everyone play out the Father Carlton haunt? as it was written? or did you tweak it? i'm thinking about changing it up a little bit in regards to taking players out of the room i don't see this as a good flow of the game for my group.

sorry for the long post, any help would be appreciated.

Grand Lodge

I believe the adventure paths assume a party of 4-5 players, so if you only have 3, they should be a little above level if you're running it as written. Personally, I wouldn't worry about it unless you feel the combats aren't challenging enough for them. They may end up a level higher than what they "should" be, but that should be balanced by the fact the party is 1-2 people smaller than the encounters were designed for. In short, if ain't broke, don't fix it. ;)


what a shameee!!
its a careless issues and the paizo´s staff don´t fixed it, they missed all those points since the beggining and theres not a free errata for this adventure...

money was not enough?
theres a lot of questions aobut it. im a gm too and i was wondering to buy this adventure... now i prefeer write my own version, cause will be more awesome and the issues come to my hand and fixed with my own...

Shadow Lodge

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This was my wife's first big GMing/ campaign and she did just fine with running Carrion Crown through the first three books and it was pretty crazy awesome. Harrowstone was IMO the best of the three.

If a brand new to GMing person can use the book to turn out a great quality game, I don't think you have any worries about edit quality.


Lex Starwalker wrote:
I believe the adventure paths assume a party of 4-5 players, so if you only have 3, they should be a little above level if you're running it as written. Personally, I wouldn't worry about it unless you feel the combats aren't challenging enough for them. They may end up a level higher than what they "should" be, but that should be balanced by the fact the party is 1-2 people smaller than the encounters were designed for. In short, if ain't broke, don't fix it. ;)

Thank's for that, that was the approach i was going to take, nice to get some back up on it.

Silver Crusade

Appreciate all of the great reviews/suggestions given here. This will be our first Pathfinder campaign as well as the first one my group has done in around 3 years. Very eager to jump back into GMing.

I wanted to post an idea though to possibly help my with my groups lack of having a channeler and a possible way to breach any exp gaps I might run across. Towards the end of the HoH book, there is a section that describes haunts and what they do and how to stop them. I plan on typing out a short journal of the Professors to give to my players including the WW information at the end, a small story about each characters "tale" with the Professor, based on how they want to know him, and finally different investigations that the Professor has undergone and taken.

I figure I could use the hauntings listed in HoH for this and have the players piece together how these were handled by the Professor, then have small instances of these cropping up around town and let them earn Trust Points as well as XP for completing these. This would also allow for my group to have alternate ways of stopping a few things located in the prison.

Would this be a good idea for the campaign? Also would there be anything irrelevant to add into his journal that would crop up in later parts of the adventure?


Trinite wrote:
I specifically banned my party (3 PCs) from taking any clerics or paladins, so that no one member would outshine the others too badly in Harrowstone. I had a knife master rogue, a witch, and a trip fighter. The fighter died and got replaced by a monk who was much more effective in combat (his fists counted as magical weapons, so he could hit the ghosts).

New to the game*, so bear with me. How are the monk's fists counted as magical weapons? The only thing I can think is that he is a Monk of the Four Winds using Elemental Fist. Is there something I'm missing or is there something that is undocumented?

TIA

-ScottieK

*-New to tabletop RPG's, been playing RPG's since FFIII and Earthbound on SNES. No MMO's though.

Scarab Sages

ScottieK wrote:
Trinite wrote:
I specifically banned my party (3 PCs) from taking any clerics or paladins, so that no one member would outshine the others too badly in Harrowstone. I had a knife master rogue, a witch, and a trip fighter. The fighter died and got replaced by a monk who was much more effective in combat (his fists counted as magical weapons, so he could hit the ghosts).

New to the game*, so bear with me. How are the monk's fists counted as magical weapons? The only thing I can think is that he is a Monk of the Four Winds using Elemental Fist. Is there something I'm missing

Per the Core Rulebook, monks don't get magic fists until 4th level. In the APG, the feat Elemental Fist (which is what Monks of the Four Winds get at 1st level) says nothing about counting as magic. Since it is normally a 4th level benefit, this should not be read RAI or RAW as counting as magic.

Side note - that was pretty brutal to ban clerics and paladins, especially in a 3PC party. How do you expect them to deal with haunts?

Silver Crusade

Yeah that's pretty harsh right there.


Deidre Tiriel wrote:
Per the Core Rulebook, monks don't get magic fists until 4th level. In the APG, the feat Elemental Fist (which is what Monks of the Four Winds get at 1st level) says nothing about counting as magic. Since it is normally a 4th level benefit, this should not be read RAI or RAW as counting as magic.

Thanks, thought I was going nuts. OK, so the issue becomes, what is a 4th level monk doing in Harrowstone?

Sczarni

ScottieK wrote:
Deidre Tiriel wrote:
Per the Core Rulebook, monks don't get magic fists until 4th level. In the APG, the feat Elemental Fist (which is what Monks of the Four Winds get at 1st level) says nothing about counting as magic. Since it is normally a 4th level benefit, this should not be read RAI or RAW as counting as magic.
Thanks, thought I was going nuts. OK, so the issue becomes, what is a 4th level monk doing in Harrowstone?

Fighting the Splatter Man and the Lopper, mostly. It's a good idea to be level 4 by that point, especially for a 3-person party.

His fighter died against the Piper, so I had him roll up the monk at 3rd level with the same XP as his old character. They then hit level 4 in the basement.

It was indeed harsh of me to ban clerics and paladins, but the reason I did it was because if I hadn't, I was afraid that whoever played the cleric or paladin would have taken over the adventure too much. I wanted it to be a team effort instead of a one-man show.

And it went pretty well! They took out haunts using mostly the haunt siphons and holy water -- that is, when they didn't opt to either just avoid them or eat the damage and move on. They didn't find the haunts to be very fun, not because they were too hard but because they thought they were kinda boring. I don't think having a cleric would have helped.


Deidre Tiriel wrote:
ScottieK wrote:
Trinite wrote:
I specifically banned my party (3 PCs) from taking any clerics or paladins, so that no one member would outshine the others too badly in Harrowstone. I had a knife master rogue, a witch, and a trip fighter. The fighter died and got replaced by a monk who was much more effective in combat (his fists counted as magical weapons, so he could hit the ghosts).

New to the game*, so bear with me. How are the monk's fists counted as magical weapons? The only thing I can think is that he is a Monk of the Four Winds using Elemental Fist. Is there something I'm missing

Per the Core Rulebook, monks don't get magic fists until 4th level. In the APG, the feat Elemental Fist (which is what Monks of the Four Winds get at 1st level) says nothing about counting as magic. Since it is normally a 4th level benefit, this should not be read RAI or RAW as counting as magic.

Side note - that was pretty brutal to ban clerics and paladins, especially in a 3PC party. How do you expect them to deal with haunts?

FallofCamelot wrote:
Yeah that's pretty harsh right there.

I have to agree that is harsh in a game where undead and haunts problems at the start


I've enjoyed running this adventure, and am slowly regaining my DM'ing chops (after a long hiatus). I actually had Kendra end up joining the party as an NPC (we have a 4 man party) and they are currently exploring Harrowstone. I wanted to make her a little more proactive, her father's daughter so-to-speak, and more than a little curious about the circumstances of his demise.

I completely did away with the trust system and have just been using good old fashioned roleplay for interactions with the townsfolk. So far the Sheriff and Father Grimburrow are the only NPCs they have had regular contact with. Also, the sheriff deputized the party to aid him with his own investigations into events... further incentive. I'm having fun with this one.


My party wasn't very interesting in chatting up the townspeople. They talked to the same NPC's as your guys, Trollish, and not much more. I kind of forced them to talk to the mage and dwarven smith and innkeepers, but they really didn't care to chat.

The Exchange Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16

When we played this scenario, it wasn't quite clear why you would really want to talk to most townsfolk. It felt weird even trying because there was little interaction with them. I find it difficult to do much roleplaying or get chit chatty with NPCs when there is no goal in mind. Then again, I have the same issue IRL ;)

Sczarni

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Glad you're enjoying it, Trollish! My players mostly worked with Grimburrow and the Sheriff, but they also did some investigation with the Town Council members. They gained a lot of trust points, and so at the town meeting they were officially asked to explore the prison -- and then of course the fire broke out. :)

As for Kendra: I like her as a character. She's playing a very -- shall I say -- *prominent* role in my campaign.

Spoiler:
I think I'm going to actually make her the main bad guy, and Adivion a double-agent for the Esoteric Order who had been trying to bring down the Whispering Way from the inside.

Owner - House of Books and Games LLC

Dennis Baker wrote:
When we played this scenario, it wasn't quite clear why you would really want to talk to most townsfolk. It felt weird even trying because there was little interaction with them. I find it difficult to do much roleplaying or get chit chatty with NPCs when there is no goal in mind. Then again, I have the same issue IRL ;)

I chose a couple of characters to play up, primarily Zokar, owner of the Laughing Demon. When one of the PCs got cursed, they decided that it would be safest to put him in a cell overnight just in case.

Zokar caught wind of this (in a small town the bartender hears everything) and started calling him the Son of the Lopper. He even stopped by the jail and tried to talk the sheriff into letting him charge a copper a head for admission.

The PC was all for it, but Sheriff Caeller nixed the idea. On the other hand when they finished up, Zokar offered the PC 50 gold to have his portrait painted holding the Lopper's handaxe.

Zokar: You'll be immortalized for all to see! And I'll give you fifty gold!
Hido: Well, I don't know. I'm not sure I want my name spread around. But I do like gold. (The PC was a ninja :)
Other PCs: Not like we'll ever be back here.
Hido: Hmm ... well ... how about 100 gold?
Zokar: (with no pause whatsoever) Done!

heheheh

No, THAT won't come up again, I'm quite sure. Zokar has the painting prominently displayed over the bar in the Laughing Demon.


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So... I have a player who is guilty of looking up some spoilers from this particular adventure. Yeah, I know. That's not cool at all. But before anyone jumps up and tells me I need to kick this person out of my group, I've already had a heart to heart with the player about gaming etiquette and I'm confident it won't happen again. (And if it does, then the person definitely won't be invited back).

Thankfully the player didn't divluge anything to the other players in our group, or else I might be tempted to scrub the whole thing. As it stands, we're about to enter our fourth session of HoH, and everyone is really enjoying themselves, so I'm not about to cancel everything on account of one naughty player. What I'd like to do is make some changes to the plot, the encounters, etc -- so that one player's foreknowledge won't tempt them to metagame.

I have a few thoughts in mind.

:
Changing the Piper's minions to something other than stirges. The party hasn't encountered any stirges yet, and they've only dug up research on the Mosswater Maurader and Father Charlatan thus far. I'm just having trouble thinking of something else that could do his dirty work. Giant vampire bats?

And this...

:
One of the council members is in on the sinister goings-on.

I've thought about one of the councilmen being aware of what the WW were doing. It seems like quite a stretch to assume the cult were performing this massive ritual down at the prison without a routine passing patrol of the sheriff and/or his deputees noticing something amiss. What if one of the councilmen was 'on the payroll' of the Way (so to speak), and looked the other way while they extracted the warden's spirit. This councilman was probably a rival to the Professor, and it was he/she who convinced the insular townsfolk to be wary of the Professor, probably spreading rumors of him being a 'demonologist' themselves. The council member also directed the sheriff's attention elsewhere during the WW's ritual.

This would give the PC's a non-supernatural enemy outside of the dungeon setting, although they would have to gather substantial evidence to prove the councilman's guilt or face the possibility of being turfed out of town by an angry mob.

And this is the big one...

:
I'm seriously considering changing the main villain of the piece from TSM to... Vesorianna. Just reading the backstory to HoH, I really got the sense that the warden's wife caused much more harm than good when she showed up at the prison, and I don't think the guards were wrong to toss her in a room after she became hysterical and started causing problems (the elevator). But what if the afterlife has twisted her into a cruel spirit? Maybe she's already 'consumed' the spirit of TSM and is using his MO to lure the PC's to the prison? With the warden's spirit now gone, perhaps the only thing preventing Vesorianna's spirit from complete dominance over the area are the remaining four prisoners, which she will dupe the PC's into vanquishing before turning on them.

Alternatively, I've thought about Vesorianna being evil in her mortal life. It seems a tad disingenious to paint the warden and his guards in a heroic light when they routinely dragged prisoners off to a torture chamber for giggles. So what if all of the dark goings-on at the prison were the influence of the warden's sinister, domineering wife? What if she ran the torture chamber for her own twisted pleasure? What if she was the one who introduced the concept of branding the prisoners to her husband and his guards? In this version of the story, TSM becomes more benevolent in his afterlife - perhaps coming to terms with all of the terrible crimes he commited and simply reverting back to the spirit of Hean Feramin. Of course, that doesn't stop Vesorianna from playing the damsel in distress and attempting to get the PC's to vanquish TSM's spirit. It's up to Feramin to convince them otherwise. (And it's a toss-up whether or not my party would still want to destroy his spirit anyway for the crimes he commited in his mortal life).

Does anyone have any other suggestions? Or resources/links they can direct me to? (Besides this forum, which has already been a tremendous help). Thanks.

Grand Lodge

Spoiler:

Stirges? Leave em in - ain't gonna spoil things one way or another. Changing the instrument can be cool - make it a fiddle rather than a flute. Play flight of the bumblebees as the theme song during the attacks.

Vesorianna being evil? It could work but I personally don't like the taste of it - its just another monster/encounter to add before the end of the dungeon.

Councilman and WW? Some others have posted similar ideas and its a potential go getter. Having the town mob up due to someone stirring the pot is a episode 2 thing as well. It could help make ep 2 more fun (they can use the Kin to do the mob control and they feel they are ahead of the game) or it can be boring 'oh - ANOTHER mob with torches and pitchforks?'

Someone posted about the 5 coming in as haunts outside the prison - this could give you what you are looking for. Someone else posted the 5 visiting characters dreams until they sleep within Prot. from Evil wards etc. Failed save vs dream equals no real sleep rest and fatigue.

Sczarni

Metal Mage wrote:


** spoiler omitted **...

(This is about your 3rd idea)

Spoiler:
Man, that's so cool I wish I'd thought of it myself. They get to the Splatter Man's room, the bloody letters appear on the walls, they beat the haunt, the doors all lock on them, the "bossfight music" starts playing, and then -- out from the flooded oubliette -- nothing. Nothing happens.

Foreshadow it slightly by casually mentioning something about writing implements in Vessoriana's room when they first meet her. She's beaten and absorbed the Splatter Man long ago. She's actually guiding them to bump off the other major ghosts so that she can be the unrivaled master of the prison.

They've got to work out how to get out of the Splatter Man's cell,maybe with the roof continuing to collapse on them each round. But then there is absolutely no way for them to get out of the prison. They have to figure out for themselves who the final villain is.

And to make it easier for you, you can use the Splatter Man's stats for her.

Sczarni

Also, for other resources, here's a podcast about HoH that I found super helpful:

The Gamer's Guide to Pathfinder: The Haunting of Harrowstone


Metal Mage wrote:

And this is the big one...

** spoiler omitted **

Does anyone have any other suggestions? Or resources/links they can direct me to? (Besides this forum, which has already been a tremendous help). Thanks.

Spoiler:

1) Might not work if someone has Detect Evil.

2) Could be a War between her and TSM.

3) ^ the problem with it is that it could make avoiding the town invasion impossible.


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How #3 might work:

You could do a couple of things here. Increase the number of haunt siphons and have them able to "suck up a ghost" to keep them from rejuvenating, in addition to their normal use of sucking up haunts. Have Vesorianna imply that she can release the spirits from their torment if she is brought a symbol of the warden's office and the spiritual remnants of the five prisoners (in the haunt syphons). You could then have Vesorianna's ghost feed off the remains of the five prisoners, empowering her into something else (I have no idea what, a ghost is a pretty terrifying foe to begin with). The SplatterMan's bloody letter haunts could be a way that the Splatter-man is trying to communicate the cause of all the spiritual uprisings within the prison.

Cosmetic dungeon changes in case your worried about tactical player knowledge:

I would swap out the guard rooms on the basement level, changing the location of Vortch and the Mosswater Marauder. Take out the gray ooze and throw an Advanced Gelatinous Cube into the 10' hallway before the torture room (so you can pull the old,floating-skeleton/really-a-G-cube trick). On the top floor, I would change the location of the Piper's manifestation. If the player displays a tactical awareness of where a fight's about to happen, swap some of these things around. It depends whether or not the player in question has accidentally heard a few spoilers or has actually fully read the module.. a couple times.


Thanks for the suggestions, all. Some of these ideas have worked quite well in my game. (Especially that gelatinous cube!)


Does anyone have any idea where the flaming skulls in the Smoldering Revenge event go?

Page 25 says they start at the five locations marked on the map on page 18. My page 18 map is unmarked. Was that a mistake? Did I get a misprinted copy or something? And either way, what would the best placement of the flaming skulls be?


Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Hey Gluttony, not just your copy.

James Jacobs wrote:

Maps often, unfortunately, come in at the last minute, AFTER the majority of the edit passes on an adventure are done. When this happens, last-minute changes and additions to maps can get missed; that's, unfortunately, what happened in this case.

Which is why when I develop adventures I generally try to strip out any references to having monsters appear on specific areas or the like.

In this case, feel free to just have the flaming skulls come in through whatever windows seem good at the time. Same with the cell doors. Tailor things to match your party's skills; if they're doing really well, then have more cell doors open to let out more skeletons. If they're struggling, lock some skeletons up.


Ah, okay. I should have guessed that that was it.

Thanks for the reply.

Dark Archive

SO the professor....what was he a professor of? I have looked through Book One and can not find the answer anywhere.

Or did people just make up a specialty for him?

Thanks!!

Sczarni

DmRrostarr wrote:

SO the professor....what was he a professor of? I have looked through Book One and can not find the answer anywhere.

Or did people just make up a specialty for him?

Thanks!!

Well, if you think of Lepidstadt as being more like a Medieval university than a modern one, he'd just be a Professor, pure and simple. They didn't really have departments per se, though a particular professor might have an area of special expertise. From his background as reflected in the Campaign Traits in the Player's Guide, it seems that his specialty was something like history.


Trinite wrote:
DmRrostarr wrote:

SO the professor....what was he a professor of? I have looked through Book One and can not find the answer anywhere.

Or did people just make up a specialty for him?

Thanks!!

Well, if you think of Lepidstadt as being more like a Medieval university than a modern one, he'd just be a Professor, pure and simple. They didn't really have departments per se, though a particular professor might have an area of special expertise. From his background as reflected in the Campaign Traits in the Player's Guide, it seems that his specialty was something like history.

The player guide paint him as being good with multiple field of study: Magic, Religion(s), History, Biology, knowledge in general.


So my players are about halfway finished clearing out the prison. They have contacted Vesorianna, procured the warden's seal/necklace (and returned it to her), destroyed the Splatter Man and the Mosswater Marauder.

The Lopper, Piper, and Father Charlatan remain. My question is... Gibbs should now be free of his possession correct? Also, would the monumental desecrations stop since the Splatter Man has been neutralized? It seems to me that the element of time is no longer against the party because the head ghost has been dealt with.

Anyone have any thoughts on this?


Trollish wrote:

So my players are about halfway finished clearing out the prison. They have contacted Vesorianna, procured the warden's seal/necklace (and returned it to her), destroyed the Splatter Man and the Mosswater Marauder.

The Lopper, Piper, and Father Charlatan remain. My question is... Gibbs should now be free of his possession correct? Also, would the monumental desecrations stop since the Splatter Man has been neutralized? It seems to me that the element of time is no longer against the party because the head ghost has been dealt with.

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

My first inclination would be that the defeat of Splatter Man ends the possession and letter writing, but then the PCs might call it a win with half the adventure undone. Also per the flavor text, the big five prisoners are all fairly bad dudes. While Splatty is the architect of the mischief, it stands to reason that one or more might take over. Maybe the Lopper and the desecration would come with a bit more mutilation.

Grand Lodge

Well technically Vesorianna having the badge gives her control... win for the players.

If you want it all down, have her tell them that they need to weaken them by defeating them before she can lock them down.


Helaman wrote:

Well technically Vesorianna having the badge gives her control... win for the players.

If you want it all down, have her tell them that they need to weaken them by defeating them before she can lock them down.

I think this is basically true, while she can hold them at bay, she might not be able to just get rid of them.

Sczarni

Have the next night feature Gibbs chopped up into tiny pieces and sprinkled all over the monument.

And if they kill the Lopper and want to then leave, swarms of stirges descend on the town at night.

Basically, keep the danger going until they defeat all five ghosts. It'll feel like more of a satisfying victory that way.


For the research topics, I assume that if the party nail the DC 25 check first time, they get the cumulative total of 750 exp and all clues?


That works. Or you can limit it to only one clue a visit... though that seems somewhat artificial. Up to you!


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My group is almost through with this module and i thought id give my 2 cents on what ive learned through running it and things i wish i could have done differently. They have not yet finished harrowstone dungeon but anyways

The actual prison of harrowstone is filled with haunts, which in my honest opinion are mechanically lame. They drag on forever without a cleric they are obnoxious and they feel more like a trap that you need a cleric to disarm instead of a rogue. What should have been done or what you need to do as a GM is have a blanket DC for fear effects kind of like in ravenloft 3.5 setting

Ravenloft Fear System:
Will save, dc=8+1/2 HD of trigger+charisma modifier of the cause or EL+8= Fear dc and failing the dc by 1-5 means you are shaken, by 6-10 means you are frightened and 11-15 means you are panicked, 16+ you make a horror check and are panicked and this effect lasted for 5d6 rounds)

Horror: For those of you that dont have access to the horror system, a horror check was also a will save (example: DC 15 was a scene of torture or terrible agony, DC 20 was a scene of evil, cruelty and madness like "dismembered bodies turned into marrionettes) and this dc is modified by certain conditions like environment or relationship to the victem. Horror was similar to madness with either a mild, moderate or severe horror effect that usually had long term effects on your character with the exception of the mild ones usually were temporary.

On the first floor of harrowstone, just focus on creepyness and the overall atmosphere. Describe the dungeon to the best of your ability, keep it dark and grim. Ask for perception checks occassionally, and on obvious success let them hear things. Talking, panicking, seeing shadow people and if necessary ask for [bold]Fear[/bold] checks unless they are doing a great job roleplaying them.

Second floor of harrowstone: here add a bit more let the haunts do more than just be creepy. Keep the combat encounters up here but i would also keep the same with the first floor's environment this should be their first real taste of what the haunts can do.

Dungeon level: Here is where you pull out all the stops because it is the most dangerous part of the dungeon. This is where the meat of it happens where they will actually be confronted with the five prisoners and find the badge. Here let the haunts do things that could seriously hurt them, give them visions of them burning alive and such.

*A note on haunts as written: i dont like them because they are stationary haunts that function too much like incorporeal traps. Let the haunts be more atmospheric for most of it, letting them be organic and fluid throughout the prison. Assign some of them to certain rooms but usually taking up the entire room that they occupy unless there is a reason not to do it. Remember most ghosts should not pose a direct threat just scare the pants off your party. The real threats should be the undead. If needed add a few more undead to the dungeon to make up for lost experience for what would have been the actual haunts. Oh and dont feel obligated to activate a haunt every time a party member enters a room or delay it a bit for the haunts you do use. That way you cant have someone be the meatbag who takes all the hits. Maybe they dont manifest until shortly after entering a room or if they linger there for too long.

Example of Haunts:
DM: "The dimly lit hallway is littered from the rubble leftover from the fire. You can see the fire from your torch reflected in the charred wood. Make me a perception check"

Player: *rolls perception* "34!"

DM: "You can hear whimpering from behind the door"

Player: "Im going to go check it out" *he opens the door*

DM: "Here in this room is the feint smell of burning flesh. Several branding irons are scattered on the floor and an empty brazier lies in the corner of the room"

Player 2: "Creepy, I pick up the branding iron"

DM: "Okay" *rolls behind the GM screen* "You see the iron glow red hot and take 8 points of fire damage and you drop the branding iron on the floor, it looks as if it had not been used in some time. You look at your hand and you see the mark of the prison, branded into your hand where you gripped the iron."

This is my example of how i would run it, maybe i would leave out the stench in the room but the way this scene is written in the module, the branding irons fly around the room and attack the pcs as animated object encounter. Which 1) at level 1 is a phenomenal pain in the ass, and 2) just isnt very scary.

Example 2, would be if a player walks into a room by himself the door slams shut behind him him as if the slamming portal haunt were active, and the room erupts in flames and he gets to live the fire in the prison for bit. Here would be a great time for a fear check.

Example 3, seeing the professor walking around as a zombie could possibly warrant a horror check.

Sczarni

Ocule, I like your way of handling haunts. I have the same problem with them as you: they seem too much like traps.


I have a short XP question. I was having trouble figuring out which experience track to use, as it doesn't make mention of using medium until trial of the beast, so I originally had my player's on the fast track.

However, now I'm not sure what to do, they're currently sitting at roughly 5000 a piece (there's five of them), and in the dungeons they still have the Splatter Man and the Lopper remaining, along with the good captain, though they've cleared out most of the rest of Harrowstone (a few smaller encounters skipped that I'm fairly certain they won't reach, or XP for haunts they didn't actually defeat). The remaining encounters and story XP will net them about 2000 a piece. If I switch them over to the medium track right now, they will still be roughly 2000 xp shy each of level 4 by the start of the Trial of the Beast. Should I stay on the fast track? My only concern with that is that at the rate at which they gain XP they could very well start getting too high too fast.

Anyway, if anyone could give me some advice on the matter, I'd appreciate it.

Silver Crusade

Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

The APs assume medium track throughout their entire duration.


You could always halt their experience until they finish the mod. I think the mod assumes level 3 by the time they leave? I wouldnt sweat it if they are a bit short by trial of the beast. Have they done everything in town? THe research on the WW, Harrowstone, and the prisoners? there is a nice chunk of experience there. Also in the optional events, like the fire, apprehending gibs, the dream and zombies. I think level 3 is close enough if you cant bump them enough experience, or do a short side quest to make up for the exp missing if you want.


Lorok, I'd just swap them to medium and add some random encounters if make sure they make it to fourth.

Since there's five PCs, you could probably ectoplasmic spirits as adds to the Lopper's fight, and perhaps some other fights, without much issue.


Switch them to medium, and if it would put them at a level lower, ignore that. Don't punish them with a drop in level for your mistake, just let them stay at the same level they're at for now, with their next level being slightly further away.


I'm probably gonna switch tracks, and as for everything in town, they've done just about everything, including optional events, except for Gibs. It's actually funny, they're irrationally suspicious of Gibs, and automatically assume he's behind anything that happens in town, but have little reason to assume anything wrong.

They even went to his house as soon as the V went up, but they didn't really investigate him. They just showed up at his door and went 'Hey! Did you do these bad things you jerk?' 'No, f#!% off.' And that was it.

Thank you guys for the tips. I'll probably add a few ectoplasmic guys to the Lopper's encounter, assume they were other looters that have tried to explore the ruin over the years.


I got over the XP problem after TotB. I just TOLD them when they level, much easier.


I've got five players running on Fast Exp track. They were 5th by the time they reached Lepistadt and just hit 8 with "mission complete!" xp from finishing the book. Puts them a bit ahead of where they would be at medium but I'm fine with that.

Even if you keep to fast, you'll be fine. Your players will start books about a level ahead of where a normal party would be (closer to half a level, really). The game assumes 4 players on the medium track. Having 5 players on the fast track should balance out (assuming you don't change any encounters or bonus xp values). Biggest issue I've had has been treasure.


OK, so questions:

1. Does the daily trust point penalty (and I know it's a little flawed) start the second day of the adventure, or after the town hall encounter?
2. Does a 20 knowledge roll (player knowledge) get you the knowledge/exp of everything up to that level, or just the first increment (say the DC 15 paragraph)
3. Is the wall damage in the Splatter Man haunt based on raw damage or damage minus the 10 point wall hardness?

Thanks! really want to run this one soon.


1) I didn't bother with that model because my players spent time helping townsfolk daily (with the harvest, with healing injuries, with free performances)

2) Up to and including the level they hit. So a roll of 20 would get the DC 15 and the DC 20 information. It indicates they were especially successful in the search and found a great book. It also works as a question of more detailed or obscure information, so likely a book with DC 20 knowledge in it would also have the more common data of the DC 15 level.

3) I think it is straight damage, but I don't recall the details at this point.

The Exchange

Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

2. I just gave them the first bit of knowledge, but kept a "success level" up my sleeve so that if they only got a 15 I'd give them the extra 5.

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