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Chronicle sheets: So THIS is how factions will matter. Pretty sweet! I like it!I find the Conclusion section be even cooler, but I am, perhaps, a bit biased.
Feedback: The boons in the chronicle sheet are super cool, but I can see GMs being a bit confused on who gets what. From reading just the chronicle sheet, the first boon does not mention that it is related to Grand Lodge at all, even though reading the scenario it clearly states that it is for Grand Lodge members. Maybe in the future a specific call-out could be added as a reminder for GMs, like "Crisis Averted [Grand Lodge]: XXXXXX"
Venture-Captain, Michigan—Mt. Pleasant
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I'd like to point out to those of us running it, in 4-5 tier Holy Ahendile has an Aegis of recovery. So if she drops below 0, she's hit with a Cure Mod (2d8+3) Of course, by that time, she's probably already fleeing or about to start. Oh, and AoR is in UE, not APG like her stat block says.
@Carlos, you might want to add a spider swarm to your Shared Folder doc, the Accuser summons one before combat.
The viper in the drake encounter says that it has 5 hp, with a reference to the Bestiary p133. There it lists the hp as 3.
Which should we be using?
Developer
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As was pointed out to me, the faction notes section for #5-01 does not explicitly state that only members of the three factions receive their respective boons for completing the faction goal, but it should. Please keep this intention in mind as you prepare and run the scenario.
I will be certain to ensure such a clarification exists in scenarios going forward.
Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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As was pointed out to me, the faction notes section for #5-01 does not explicitly state that only members of the three factions receive their respective boons for completing the faction goal, but it should. Please keep this intention in mind as you prepare and run the scenario.
I will be certain to ensure such a clarification exists in scenarios going forward.
You should probably mention this in your clarification document (and thread) and in the thread for each of the other scenarios.
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Developer
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You should probably mention this in your clarification document (and thread) and in the thread for each of the other scenarios.As was pointed out to me, the faction notes section for #5-01 does not explicitly state that only members of the three factions receive their respective boons for completing the faction goal, but it should. Please keep this intention in mind as you prepare and run the scenario.
I will be certain to ensure such a clarification exists in scenarios going forward.
It's actually just #5-01 that ran into this problem; the other scenarios have the correct wording. Nonetheless, I'll mention it elsewhere.
Not quite CRobledo.
In the faction notes for the GM, it will clearly state the only the faction PC can obtain the boon. But the write up for some of the boons does not clearly indicate that the boon is only for certain factions.
It might be an idea to also at least mention the Faction leader's name in the boon, or simply add the faction name somewhere in the boon text.
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Mistwalker's got the meat of it. I read John's announcement as having to do with the GM instructions within the scenario itself; my request has to do with the text of the boon on the chronicle. Complementary, but different.
Of course, if the announcement was about both, then I'm already satisfied. :)
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In the interest of ease of tracking all the things that need to be tracked, I just uploaded this handy little document to the shared prep drive.
In the interest of ease of tracking all the things that need to be tracked, I just uploaded this handy little document to the shared prep drive.
Nice work, Jeff!
I encourage all you GenCon GMs to print this out for yourself to make your lives much easier. I'll have a version of it on my Kindle.
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The Grand Lodge boon does not grant anything now. Does this mean there is a scenario they will need to complete as well to get something for this boon? Or does it come due at the end of the season or something?
I assume it's like the 'Debt of the Kirin' boon on one of the scenarios from a couple of years ago: no use now, but possibly important in a future scenario.
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I am prepping this one now to possibly run it next week.
I'm not sure about how the monster stats are done. The fact that there are page references instead of stat blocks would not be such a problem if so many of the monsters did not also have templates that need to be added into their stats and that are on yet another page. It seems like I will have to prep stat blocks separately with the templates and other modifications included.
I am also a bit leery about some of the role-playing parts. I tend to strongly avoid scenes that involve NPCs talking to one another to any significant degree. This is because, in practice, it amounts to me standing there talking to myself in different voices while the Players watch. I tend to avoid this because it reduces the players to spectators and because it looks more than a little absurd.
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I'm not sure about how the monster stats are done. The fact that there are page references instead of stat blocks would not be such a problem if so many of the monsters did not also have templates that need to be added into their stats and that are on yet another page. It seems like I will have to prep stat blocks seperately with the templates and other modifications included.
It's already been done for you; go to the GM Shared Prep area, then to season 5 and this scenario. Carlos Robledo has done a PDF with the stablocks of all the monsters. There are other helpful documents too, like a mission tracking checklist.
It's good advice for any scenario to check that Google Drive area, as most scenarios have that sort of support available.
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That's very handy. I didn't realize that existed.
It's also not a bad skill to have to apply templates. The page references give both the page where the base monster is found, as well as the page where the template is. If I'm not mistaken, Carlos applied the rebuild template for all the monsters to the stat blocks, and that's what he's posted.
The first time I came across a monster like that and I had the time to prep properly, I did the rebuild myself, and compared it to the stat block that had been posted. It was a great way to learn how to do the rebuild.
As to the NPCs talking to each other, I plan to go no more than a few lines back-and-forth before "fading out": 'the two of them continue to argue in that vein for a moment or two. What are you doing now?'
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Not sure whether I post here or in the GM prep thread but...
The monster stat block is wrong for the young drake in the GM shared prep:
- The Young template gives +4 to Dex, so it goes from 16 normally to 20, not 18. All Dex-based rolls should be 1 higher.
- Con should be 11 (15 - 4), not 13. Hp are correct, but Fort save should be +4, not +5.
- Its natural AC bonus should be +1, not +3.
- Bite damage die should be 1d6 (down one step from 2d4). Tail slap doesn't have a -1 to damage. (Also, if all damage dice are reduced one step, the ongoing damage for entangled creatures would be 1d3.)
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Applying a template doesn't require any particular skill. It's simple math. It's just a hassle to do on the fly when the monster stats are on one page, the template is on another or in another book and multiple stats are modified. I'll just print the stat blocks out of the SRD and modify them with a pencil as needed since some of it also depends on how many players I have.
The plot had me baffled for a minute.
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Not sure whether I post here or in the GM prep thread but...
The monster stat block is wrong for the young drake in the GM shared prep:
- The Young template gives +4 to Dex, so it goes from 16 normally to 20, not 18. All Dex-based rolls should be 1 higher.
- Con should be 11 (15 - 4), not 13. Hp are correct, but Fort save should be +4, not +5.
- Its natural AC bonus should be +1, not +3.
- Bite damage die should be 1d6 (down one step from 2d4). Tail slap doesn't have a -1 to damage. (Also, if all damage dice are reduced one step, the ongoing damage for entangled creatures would be 1d3.)
Prefacing this by saying I haven't look at it to check your math, but could the -1 dmg to the tail slap be because of the -4 Young penalty to Str?
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Applying a template doesn't require any particular skill. It's simple math.
As a math teacher, I'll say that simple math is rarely simple. In this case, I found that I missed modifiers consistently for the first few times I applied them. Once it was damage modififer, once it was skills, and so on. I maintain that it's still a skill worth practicing.
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Applying a template doesn't require any particular skill. It's simple math.As a math teacher, I'll say that simple math is rarely simple. In this case, I found that I missed modifiers consistently for the first few times I applied them. Once it was damage modififer, once it was skills, and so on. I maintain that it's still a skill worth practicing.
well, I also work in accounting as an auditor.
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Prefacing this by saying I haven't look at it to check your math, but could the -1 dmg to the tail slap be because of the -4 Young penalty to Str?No, since it's a secondary natural attack which gets half Strength bonus to damage. It should go from 1d4+1 (Str 17) to 1d3 (Str 13).
Ah, ok... I wonder where they got that number then?
+4 with light crossbow:
+1 BAB
+1 dex
+1 for weapon focus
+1 MW light crossbow (the higher level tier has this, and I suspect that the modifier carried over when it was transformed into the lower tier).
I could be wrong on the last one, but can't see anything else at the moment.
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Spoilers below (but I guess everyone knows that since this is the GM forum...)
I have to say that most of the encounters in this scenario were a cakewalk for my players (low tier). The players were rather optimized, but I think the only encounter that could have been a challenge were the one with the river drake (because of swift move and breath weapon). But they were kind of lucky at that encounter and killed it pretty quickly - for some groups (with f.ex. no ranged support) it could have been much more difficult.
It's a shame that the bad guy (girl) at the end has to stand in the courtyard. If she had been on the roof with all of the X-bow thugs, that fight might have gone a little different. Standing in the courtyard made her go down -very- quickly.
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I have to say that most of the encounters in this scenario were a cakewalk for my players (low tier). (...)
I ran subtier 1-2 (APL of 2 with two each of level 1s, 2s, and 3s), and saw the same thing. The only damage the PCs took was when the sorcerer got hit for 4 points in the last combat. They almost always won on initiative and tended to kill things in one hit (level 3 shocking grasp crits and power attacking greataxe crits).
Most of it was the PCs rolling very well and me rolling very poorly (as usual), but I don't understand scenario writers' propensity for putting low-hp caster BBEGs standing by themselves! Casting mage armor and hoping for the best ain't going to cut it against optimized PCs!
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The combat was a bit weak. My axe is pretty tough, but he was nerfed with reduce animal. Smited the BBEG in two hits. With a surprise round charge and winning iniative that was the fight.
I loved being able to use handle animal to call off the gorrila and sick him on his buddies in the first fight though.
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I disliked the river barge encounters/docks encounter. The writer isn't clear what the razmiri vessel approaching them is: a barge, a ship, a cog, a carousel.
And the razmiri response is such that they really can't avoid combat.
34 diplo in a 1-5? Nigh impossible, check.
Wording in the text "if the pcs answer honestly , then x. If they lie, then Y. "
Shouldn't be written to meta game by the GM. It should be, "if the pcs fail a bluff check, and the razmiri think they're lying". Or just state that they're going to search the ship no matter how the PCs react.
Heck, one branch if the encounter logic tree , if the pcs do everything RIGHT at the docks, an NPC sneezes, and then the guards demand everyone get up on decks. These encounters aren't written as interaction, they're railroading the PCs.
One thing I did want to know: Can the Abacus take a PC's mount? It's listed as a no frills vessel. The below deck area isn't mapped, even though the PCs ship is a set piece for two encounters. But is it a big enough ship that it can take a horse standing on deck?
I assumed that there was at least enough stabling for 6 mounts below decks - Something similar to what was done on the Laughing Crow river boat in Quest for Perfection II.
The rest of the flip map that has the ship used for the Abacus has several decks, including a large cargo deck (I am assuming that there are no cannons :)).
Mounts on deck would increase Razmirian interest in their ship - if they can afford such nice mounts, they must have gold!
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The ship map that is being used is the pair of tiles from the Map Pack: Waterfront, not the flip-mat with multiple decks. I would hand-wave the question of mounts that are not class features, and tell the players that the Pathfinder Society has arranged for those animals to be sent separately and they will meet them in Mendev. Class features are trickier, since they're part of the build, and I'd allow them.
When I ran it, I used one of the larger ships from Map Pack: Boats and Ships (Specifically, the third one down in the right column) for the Faith Barge.
I would assume so, as it is the easiest and most logical solution to the keys for the manacles.
Personally, I removed the gun deck from the ship, as the adventure doesn't really address the lower levels of the Abacus. The flip mat made it easier to know where everyone was before and during the fights.
I don't know where you are getting that it is a no-frills ship. The description states that it is a modest craft. I took that to mean that it wasn't a huge craft, overflowing with features. When I ran it, I told players that the appointments inside were fairly luxurious, but not overdone - this also helped to convince the players not to try and take the Faith Barge - the NPCs were much more comfortable on the Abacus, and so would the rescues if they were found.
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I got no frills from "modest craft" and "crew of 5"
It might have a nice captains quarters and a place for the crew to bunk, but as the map didn't have a cargo hatch, I didn't think a horse could fit in it, just asking what other GMs have encountered.
Having a horse below decks means a boom to lift the horse out if they want to take it ashore, cavalier w/ class feature or not. The whole module is large mount unfriendly: ships, docks, inns, ladders.