My changes to Second Darkness ( spoilers)


Second Darkness


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Before running an adventure path I generally comb through the boards and have a look at what other people have done to add to it or change it. These are a great source of inspiration. I run a heavily house ruled version of the game, half way between 3.5 and pathfinder ( so heavily houseruled we have essentially re written the players handbook) with emphasis on minimizing the power spikes. We have played this for about 3 years and are on version 18 of our everchanging draft rules. However i pretty much just use the stats in the ap, the monster manual or a bestiary as I see fit. Most of this isn't important but I am putting it out there so if something I say later doesn't gel with the rules you will know why.

Also the group I run ap's with can only meet 2-3 times a year when we go away and play Friday evening to Sunday evening, generally finishing 1 book per weekend session ( although we got through 2 in the first session). We have been playing together for between 20-30 years.

In starting this ap I took heed of those who ran elf only campaigns and went with that. The players were told they would be members of, or associated with, the Shin'Rakorath which I described as being a private mercenary force heavily tied to the elven nation and a cross between special forces military and secret agents. I strongly suggested they be elves, though I said half elves and to a lesser extent gnomes were acceptable. I said that while they could be any race these were the best fit for a roleplaying sense. I advised against half-orcs or dwarves. I also said they should be mostly good but could be neutral leaning toward good, and I recommended against playing paladins and to go with more standard elven stereotypes to get the most from the game.

As part of the way I decided to assist in the immersion side of things I decided that the Shin'Rakorath ( or Rath as they were known for short) were
1. one of those need to know organizations - so not everyone knew about the drow, or the fact the Rath was the military arm of the Winter Council to start with; &
2. Would change the leader of the group depending on the type of mission at hand

I also decided that as a result of the dreadful events that occurred in the upper echelons of the Winter Council which precipitated the whole ap there would be some elements of the Winter Council that wanted to find out what Allevrah was up to, others just want to find and to silence her to protect the WC, others just maintaining business of drow hunting and secret keeping as usual etc

So first session off they went to Riddleport:
The mission leader was a Mierani forest ranger who had been involved in patrols to keep 'short lives' out of the forest. She knew of the Enemy within the Rains but not what it was. She had been in the Rath for less than a decade so a command mission was a sign of approval.
She was assigned a half elf fighter who had just joined the Rath as an associate member and who had spent about a year in Riddleport with his fathers human family a couple of years previously.
She also had a Mierani forest elven wizard who was an intelligence officer, who knew about drow and was tasked to keep the secret.
She had a Kyonin elf wizard and a Kyonin cleric. The Kyonin wizard was also an intelligence officer who knew about the drow.

Upon arrival in Riddleport they had two contacts, Kwava who had been observing the city from outside and a half Orc cleric of Calistria ( yes despite my suggestions as to race someone played a half Orc).

They understood that their mission was to track down a renegade elf who was working with the Enemy within the Rains and had come to Riddleport presumably to ally with one or more of the pirates there.

I mixed up how I ran the adventures but essentially followed the script. They could t figure out where this elf was staying in town, but people had seen her talking with the cypher mages, dealing with Cromarky etc. I threw in that they traced this mysterious elf to an inn located out of the city where she had stayed on several occasions. ( here I ran a shadow plane connection adventure to foreshadow the creation of the Armageddon echo). Eventually they found the lair but Despora ( wearing a hat of disguise) got away. They did find a barrel with rotting elven flesh in it ( she had also had recorporeal incarnation cast on her, which had expired), but thought nothing of it ( beyond eww!).

Because they were playing as elven secret agents they didn't get heavily invested in Riddleport, which was fine by me as I had just run crimson throne where the leaving of Korvosa was a bit of a sore point and I heard that had become an issue for groups not wanting to leave Riddleport.

Anyway they had some wierd notes seemingly about the Cyphergate and other stuff written in a combination of elven and some strange language ( under common) and were in the process of trying to figure out where she had gone when the meteor struck.

The children of the void went as expected. The high point for me was when they met the drow. After they killed the sentry drow and headed into the complex the Mierani elf intelligence officer stayed behind, then when he though no one was looking he poured acid on the drow faces to hide their elven nature and tossed the bodies into the sea. Unfortunately the others saw this and were a bit freaked out.

The first session finished with quite a few of the drow escaping ( inculding Despora again) and the intelligence officers explaining the secret of the existence of the drow to their companions and everyone agreeing to acid up the dead dark elves and feed them to the orca.


The second session started with the half-Orc player deciding to drink the cool-aid and switch characters to become a half elf fighter/ranger. Also another player who couldn't make the first session joined us,mhe played an elf rogue. So I explained this by having some upper level Rath that were visiting Crying Leaf scry the party, teleport in ( essentially about half an hour after the drow fight while they were tidying up) they took all the notes etc, left the rogue in charge of the next mission, tinkered with the half orcs memory so he would think they had fought hobgoblins and left. Before leaving they told the new leader to try and track & kill the drow, then return to Riddleport and tidy up any loose ends before returning to Crying leaf within a month or so.

Part of what I was trying to impart in my portrayal of elves was a lack of the sense of urgency, and a respect for individuals rights and the desire to protect elven lives.

So this next weekend was in essence spent tidying up loose ends. They chased the drow across the seas, eventually caught & killed them. They played around with the noqual and returned to Riddleport to extricate themselves. Then, just before deciding to sail to the Mierani forest, they returned to the island to deal with the ghost as they had promised. They went to where the wraith ( who i had toughened up a bit) was and the dice turned against them - 4 out of 7 of them died and became wraiths. The others fled the island and returned to the Meirani forest shattered at what had happened.

I am not sure why this took so long. I think it was because they kept failing. They nearly caught the drow twice but the leaders kept getting away before they eventually died. This weekend ended up being almost entirely off script as far as the adventure path goes. They had a couple of nautical adventures etc.


I have just completed running the third weekend and the party is only part way through Armageddon Echo. However this session was the first time they really got to be elves within elven society. Instead of adventurers or outsiders they were part of the establishment. This was the best session so far.

Now I wanted elves to be different from humans, ie not just humans with pointy ears. So I decided to again stress the longevity, the respect for life, the chaotic nature and the fact that they have no god of war.

So the party were introduced to Evianna who as mayor of Crying Leaf was the head of the bulk of the troops launching an all out attack on Celwynvian. To Khaerisiel who most knew as the head of the Rath in Mierani - which meant them and the new replacement PC's. To Shalelu, the head of the Mierani Forest rangers, an autonomous collection of scouts who worked with, but not for the Crying Leaf forces. There was no single leader although Evianna was in notional command. Part way through the battle I let them know that Khaerisiel had sent for a powerful Mordants spire elf wizard who was an ally of the Rath to come and help with the battle - he hadn't arrived by the end of the session.

She stressed that this was to be an all out assault, possibly finding and taking out all the dark elves in as little as a fortnight. The elven equivalent of a Blitzkrieg. She stressed that if anyone got badly hurt they should retreat back to base camp where the clerics would are for them.

The half elf fighter was put in charge of the party as this was going to be a war. More special forces than secret agents.

So the battle commenced, small groups of elves sneaking into the ruins taking out small groups of drow etc. it took the players a little while to get into the idea of no sense of urgency, chaotic command structures, preservation of life but they eventually accepted, then relished it as the elven way.

I played the drow as similarly chaotic, sneaky and interested in preserving life ( well their own anyway, perfectly happy to cut and run and leave a fellow drow in the lurch). I had the drow run off quite frequently so the Players really got into the value of an elf life ( the drow used zombies and left troglodytes, spiders and dretch to cover their escape)

I was heavily influenced by Joanna's posting of her experience with the battle- especially as to the bits taken from the article on Celwynvian. I had the party discover the recorporeal incarnation spell from the necromancers - they were suitably repulsed by the foul drow magic when the elven skin sloughed off (though i had a drow fighter rogue wearing the skin rather than a troglodyte). I had the necromancers being essentially here on their own frolic, and not co-operating with Nolveniss.

One combat the players loved was an encounter as they circled north of the city and were coming in they walked into some drow forest traps ( pits, springing spikes etc) and a small contingent of drow. I played the combat full of drow hiding in the bushes, appearing shooting a crossbow bolt then running off and hiding again. It had little melee and everyone felt it was a definitive sneaky elf v sneaky drow combat.

One players comment " trust a drow to bring a hand crossbow to a bow fight"

They also met a couple of elf scouts who had met and chased off a medusa ( the party later killed the three medusa) but had two of their number petrified. Initially there was some discussion about just leaving the statues as they couldn't restore them but following on the elven creed of preserving elven lives ( they still have five centuries in front of them) the party helped get them safely back to camp.

The ap set up to get into the Academy and then into the Arnageddon Echo seemed a bit weak. So I had Khaerisiel possessed by a shadow demon ( who lead the party onto the shadow road for a Babau, shadows ambush) and when he recovered he remembered that he had also sent Shalelu into the Academy. Sneaky drow trap! The party followed.

The party was repulsed by the beasts within and we finished the session at that point.

I feel the need to revisit why Vrock is there - such a powerful demon bound to wait until someone comes in then you are free seems lame.

The battle has taken 8 days so far. All the NPC elves ( except Khaerisiel ) talk about how rushed it is. The only thing that spurs them on to hurry now is the fact that Shalelu and her squad have apparently disappeared I to the Academy.

Anyway that's my experience so far. I hope it is useful to someone as i have found reading your experiences and thoughts useful. Probably won't play again until March. The players have really enjoyed getting into elven society. I am gonna have to work hard on the next 2 books to keep than elf society immersion going (book 6 is just a bug hunt). I am contemplating incorporating the dungeon magazine adventure about the daughter of lolth and the demon web into this adventure at higher levels but haven't quite worked out how.


I'm enjoying reading your posts WC.

I know there probably won't be another post for several months, but I'm interested in learning how your campaign progresses, so please keep posting!

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Very interesting take on the AP - did they interact with the librarian in the sphere at all?


YogoZuno wrote:
Very interesting take on the AP - did they interact with the librarian in the sphere at all?

They met him, but didn't interact with him much. initially they tried to discuss the drow and so on, but once they realized his knowledge stopped prior to earth fall they just asked about the identification of various buildings and the like.

Do you have any suggestions about how to get the most out of him?

They will have further interaction I expect once they enter the Armageddon Echo. They also saw the blacksmith ghost in the graveyard but too were caught up in hunting for the huecava's lair to follow.

All part of the stuff I have to make sure they recall when next we play.

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

The main thing about the librarian for my group was that as soon as they got into the Armageddon Echo, they went to the 'real' librarian as a source of information. They hadn't kept the working sphere (they'd turned it over to Eviana), but they still found it cool to be talking to the guy who ended up in their sphere.

Of course, my group also believed they had actually travelled back in time when stepping through the portal...


I am back and getting ready for my next all weekend session in 3 weeks time. The usual group is being joined by a couple of extra players brining the numbers up to 9 pc's so I am going to have to adjust the encounters a bit. More open plan fighting, increase the numbers and hit points of foes, less small group roleplaying or investigative stuff. This means I will change the emphasis of Endless Night, but I think I was going to anyway.

So here are my thoughts for changes to the rest of the path. I have no doubt some of this will change when the session actually starts but the main stuff will stick. My thoughts are a bit disorganised but I will try and put some of them down...

First the Winter Council, how it all went pear shaped and how they are now.
1. They were always secretive and focused on information gathering as that was the course of their greatest triumph - uncovering the impending Earthfall event.
2. About 50 years ago their contacts at Mordants Spire recovered some arcane secrets from an Aboleth residence ( the finding of this knowledge was assisted by Abraxas' servant Alistraxia)
3 Allevrah was in charge of investigating the secrets and they turned out to be about Earthfall, and to be plant a seed of corruption.
4. Hialin helped Allevrah when she needed it and was infected with the corruption as well, but with slower maturity
5. Initially Allevrah was going to use the Earthfall to crush Treerazer's army ( not the drow, she didn't really care that much about them)
6. 10 years ago Allevrah killed Auramesties - who was the principal liaison with the crown, amongst other things - and turned, and fled.
7. The winter council having lost it's 2 most active members fell into stunned depressive decline and have been that way ever since.
8. Meanwhile about 40 years ago Treerazer employed Quilindira to infiltrate the winter council.
9. She did this successfully and now is an advisor to Lord Villastir ( she hasn't been found out yet) - who is the commander of the Rath
10. Using her charms she had already effectively convinced Villastir to issue the odd order on his own - with the Winter Council going mysteriously quiet Villastir believes that he has to step into the breach ( this belief is partially ego and partially subtle manipulation by Q).
11. For the last 10 years the Rath has been going in more and more dangerous missions and losing a fair bit of strength.

So back at Celwynvian
1. I am not going to have the elf gate even exist in the academy. I don't like the idea of elf gates existing in the Darklands at all.
2. Instead the drow have their own version of elf gates - called the demon web which is partially a creation of Mazzmezz ( I am foreshadowing the Harrowing from Dungeon 84 here).
3. The demon web entrance is a distance from Celwynvian in the mountains.
4. Allevrah has all she needs from the Armageddon echo and has left for bigger things, but the drow use the echo to hide from the elven assaults and wait them out. If they could just nick off back to the darklands instead for a bit of r&r why wouldn't they?
5. The main drow that are left want to control Celwynvian, and do some more experiments.
6. So it is important for the drow to keep the echo gateway able to be opened. That's what the Vrock is for and why he was bound to the academy.
7. Q , who will take the place of Laveth in the Harrowing scenario wants to absorb the echo plane as part of her ploy to take over part of the demon web - so she wants the drow gone and the the heroes gone. ( she will later want to capture Perelir as a sacrifice to complete the harrowing.

In drow land
1. This will be less Vonnarc and more all in
2. Azrinae is hiring as their forces are depleted
3 Vonnarc is hiring potential Azrinae double agents to get a look at their books
4. From these sources the party can learn - the winter council has a drow informing mole ( but not who it is) that has helped the drow ambush the Rath ( it's Q) - allevrah has gone to the land of black blood - she plans to nuke Kyonin - they don't know how to stop it - she got the knowledge before she came here - she got the knowledge about how to nuke it ( and presumably disarm the nuke) by infiltrating the winter council.

The elf queen
1 Will not act like a ditzy goose but will enquire openly why Auremesties hasn't been seen for a while
2. Hopefully the finger will be pointed at Lord V ( an innocent patsy - if a bit annoying)

Anyway that's a fair bit of my planned big picture changes - I hope the party ends up rescuing Perelir from Q in the harrowing before going to the land of the black blood. And eventually replaces the now useless Winter Council : )

Now to work on the small picture encounters


Hi Werecorpse,

We're almost a year on - how has you SD campaign turned out? I'd love to hear. I really like your ideas for changing some of the overarching motivations and behind the scenes machinations. I'm thinking of maybe running this AP next (just finishing up RotRL Anniversary Edition, which we've been at for 18 months and has been a blast.

Like a lot of people I have some concerns about the way the AP kicks off and getting the PCs motivated to follow the story (at least enough to make use of the AP!). So I've been scouring these boards for ideas and lessons learned from others.

Anyway, hope you're still playing this with your group and would love to hear an update if you have time to post. Thanks!


I have made several changes to the Second Darkness AP in all 6 books.

Spoiler:
I have made changes to every NPC in the book by incorporating Pathfinder RPG rules since all NPCs were built using 3.5 rules. This typically beefed up most encounters by adding 1-2 class levels on each NPC. I also took advantage of the advanced players guide and ultimate magic/combat by using archetypes. I also applied the drow noble template to anyone with the last name Azrinae throughout the AP.

The following are changes I made by book.

Book 1: (1) Added the Pathfinder Society scenario "Cyphermage Dilemma" by changing the Tian cyphermage scholar to a Tian investor that Saul VanVancaskerkin wants them to rescue so that he will invest in the Gold Goblin. (2) Another addition was a trap placed on the front door of the Gold Goblin when the PCs go back to fight everyone. It is an animate object spell that triggers on the Gold Goblin statue and has it attack anyone trying to enter the casino (saul pays a local wizard to put it in).

Book 2: Not much was changed in this book other than switching from the 3.5 rules to Pathfinder. However, doing so turned the zombies from a CR 1 to CR 1/2 which allowed me to double the amount of zombies for the same XP (Made combat more exciting).

Book 3: (1) Replaced the Drider in the alchemists dungeon (I wanted a more dramatic reveal for such a classic enemy to be in book 4) with Grothluts since I have not seen enough Fleshwarps in the AP and it is something that should truely disgust the PCs. Also I made it so the Grothluts did not take a penalty to movement through the acid due to the acid resistance and their slimy exterior. I also made the alchemist an actual Alchemist instead of a Bard. (2) Ran the Set Piece found in Book 3 and had the ghost fascinate all creatures in the building (including the gray render) when combat occurs.

Book 4: (1) Informed the party that there was a second Aiudara key that teleported the PCs to fight in the Pathfinder Society module (Drow of the Darkland Pyramids). Replaced the quasit fight with Oronci and replaced the young driders with drow skirmishers and soldiers from book 3. I also replaced the demon inside the pyramid with a Balban demon (He can trample down the 10ft hallways). I have also changed the drider that fights with Jevana with two Babau demons. The scenario has them come back through the portal and complete book 4 as intended. (3) Gave Erdrinneir Vonnarc two Nemet Noktorian Ghoul wizards as adds as well as a Marrowstone golem (A gift from Nemet Noktoria to the Vonnarc family). (4) I added a Roper encounter to the Darklands escape section where he ambushes one of the PCs and who has to survive by having extended conversations with the roper or else be eaten due to boring the roper.

Book 5: Not much was added, except the standard changes from 3.5 to Pathfinder.

Book 6: (1) Replaced Denrelwe's drow soldiers with two Ghonatines. (2) Replaced the Aboleth mage with a veiled master as it made more sense thematically.

Book 7: Added "Rise of the Drow: Commander of malice" to the end of the AP to take the players all the way to level 20. I incorporated Alicavniss Vonnarc into the book and replaced the twilight daughter. I also swapped the Fiendish dinosaurs with the Titan fight and replaced the fiendish dinosaurs with a group of Demodands who worked for the titan.

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