Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant!

I will be running Rats 1 and 2 at Pacificon this weekend. I would be very appreciative if people could give me any hints on how to run this. I've read the thread, but if you have any extra ideas on how to make this awesome scenario go off even better, please let me know!

I'm already planning on using dungeon tiles for the first and last combats (got them mapped out finally!), any further tips on increasing the atmosphere?

I've looked over the combats, any ideas on how to make them as challenging as possible (but not necessarily deadly)?

How can I increase the roleplayability of the scenario?

Anything else I missed?

Thanks in advance!

Try to come up with or understand the existing motives for the NPCs.

Additionally, I have taken to having the dark folk talk as well. I've been using perception to see the light from the PCs or hear the noisy armored types and starting things off with a deeper darkness. I follow this up with something to the effect of "Only the children of the night shall pass."

This comes to mean that only dark folk, rat folk and others who usually venerate Lao Shu Po. So if the PCs want to try to negotiate their way through, go for it, but make it difficult (after all the Aspis agents did). The other issue is that they only speak Dark Folk...

I usually state that the PCs (and thus the Aspis agents) usually need to have a ratfolk escort to travel the Path. This helps with some RP with the captain, dark folk and dragon (she's confused why the surface folk don't have an escort. perhaps the little guy was eaten by some lesser danger?).

With Xiangnuer, I ask for the party's most expensive item (via detect magic). If the party's already pissed her off (maybe attacked but then surrendered?) I ask for everyone's most expensive item. Or die. :-) This has lead to some great moments of "player defeat," but in the end, even if they agree to give up the goods, I only charge them the gp value suggested divided by # players. Asking for gold and not shiny objects is lame. Also keep in mind, often the flail found on the dead npc is often the most expensive item in the party.

As has been mentioned, the gug encounter can be a killer depending on party and strategy. Use caution, but don't pull punches. Anyone willing to stand toe-to-toe with an aberration like that deserves a full-attack to the face.

I figured rather than bring back the other thread where I mentioned I'd be running this, I'd post it here.

Sadly, I failed in the promise I made to Kyle Baird that soon the messageboards would be filled with the protests of unfairness of both GM and author from a group of our local players who had all been brutally killed.

Instead, through both parts of Rats, I just nearly killed several characters (breath of life and that immediate action paladin spell that does a Lay on Hands were used to prevent a real death) and kept them on the edge of their seats the whole time. Even though they played up to 10-11 despite having only one level 10 (who, as the only one with Uncanny Dodge and who had the perception to act on every surprise round, always used his first action to disappear with his wayfinder and let the rest of them get eviscerated). To make matters worse, now the players are posting their incessant grateful messages in praise of the scenarios and the game with the audacity to claim the scenarios were "great fun". To quote:

"I wanted to thank [Rogue Eidolon] for running Rats of Round Mountain over the past couple weekends. It was great fun for everybody -- with lots of drama ("maybe you oughta grab the gnome and go," "I'm not the only r***** in the room," "oh my God, this is it, we're all going to die!"), and a chance for each character to shine."

As the final insult, they thought the inquisitors in Part 2 were the hardest fight of the series, and that isn't even from the part you wrote! I know I've let you down, Kyle. I am sorry. You can have one of my stars as an offering of contrition.

EDIT: I suppose in case someone didn't realize it, I should point out that this post is tongue-in-cheek before the edit window disappears.

Sounds like everyone had fun! Awesome!

As one of the players who played at Rogue Eidolon's table I can say it was immensely fun. My favorite adventures are the ones where we almost die but are able to turn it around into a victory.

Our party consisted of the following for the first part
Cleric (Pharasma) lvl 8
Cleric (Iomedai) lvl 9
Rogue lvl 10
Paladin lvl 9
Alchemist lvl (ok I forgot this one I think 7)
Fighter lvl 7
Witch lvl 7 (me)

The first encounter we were able to keep up light through the use of potions of daylight and brilliant use of dispel magic by our Pharasma cleric, which my witch foolishly chose not to copy on his turn. It cost a second oil of daylight but worked.

The optional encounter we were fortunate that the line up allowed us to keep the squishy caster protected as the party just killed the aberrations.

We found the centipedes when the witch sent his familiar ahead to scout and then burning hands his familiar and the centepedes. Then through the use of the fighters knowledge engineering and our rogues insane disable device we managed to clear the rubble. After which we rope tricked a nights rest before going on. (I swear we did not know we were almost at a dragon it just seemed like a good idea to rest)

For the dragon, the fighter negotiated a deal using the flail that was looted earlier but our Paladin decided that she could not allow this dragon to live. Did I mention that Paladins to horrifying damage when they crit on their first smite evil? Despite having half the party cut off by a wall of stone we were able to bring down the dragon. The finale was the dragon flying off with our treasure while the Paladin and the Gnomish Alchemist chased after on an air walked axe beast hurling freezing bombs after it.

For the second half we lost our cleric of Iomedai but we also had several level ups.

The first encounter with the rats was frightening. Due to our rogue turning invisible the Paladin was dead after the surprise round. The party was also in darkness, and black tentacles. Thankfully the tentacles failed to grapple anyone. Then the witch dispelled the tentacles, the rogue put up an oil of daylight. The fighter repositioned the Paladin with his whip next to the cleric who used a breath of life scroll I had provided at start of session. The alchemist then tore a huge chunk out of the rats as the witch was knocked into the negatives by the vengeful ratfolk. Then the alchemist got feebleminded(it is not a good session with Rogue Eidolon unless he knocks me into the negatives at least once) At this point the party had organized and we started pushing rats back. The cleric and the now living Paladin healed up the party while the fighter screwed over the rats ability to fight, throwing one rat into pit trap.

The second encounter with the crystal also had us scared. The cleric was almost turned into a tasty gemstone before my witch could break him out with sonic damage. Thankfully the fighter used dirty trick to entangle the crystal making it helpless.

The third encounter with the sonic aoe enemies also went smoothly for us. We survived the initial burst of damage and then the rogue popped his scroll of silence. In two rounds the Paladin killed one of them and the witch put the other to sleep.

For the final fight the witch looked through the alchemists potions and using his craft alchemy and his very high spell craft check and detect magic figured out which were buffs. Between the alchemist buffs on the paladin, and the fortune hex on the Paladin the raksasha (which the witch's raktavarna was able to identify as such)died in two rounds of combat from the Paladin. 1st attack on the charge did about 70 damage, and the full attack next turn did ~120.

Most fun I have had in PFS yet.

Summary

Great summary! Don't downplay those gugs though. They actually got enough hits to kill the paladin except that she used an Immediate action to Lay on Hands one last time and stay up.

Also the carnivorous crystal, in addition to nearly crystallizing the cleric, also made a 42 damage attack on the 7 hit point cleric, which the paladin took using Paladin's Sacrifice.

So I count that as three deaths averted with Immediate Action Paladin saves and the BoL scroll ^_~

But yeah, part 2 was a good scenario to have a raktavarna familiar--I had the Undying Empress berate the raktavarna for working with a human at the beginning of the fight (she figured her identity was known if the party had another rakshasa with them).

I will echo the statement that the inquisitors in rats II are by far the deadliest encounter I have ever run. Absolutely brutal encounter even without the Darkness or BT spell. The fight itself took nearly 2 hours and led to a permanent PC death and another user burning 32PA for a resurrection. After that fight the group as a whole turned tail and ran back to Absalom, and that was with me holding back.

I liked it but that fight was no joke.

After Kyle B running this for me at Gencon, I will FINALLY have the chance to run this myself for some locals this weekend. Looking forward to a cool session report!

Torture. Murder. Report.