Need help tying it to Ashes at dawn.
spoilers...
OK, so I made the executive decision to not use the Aberrant Promethean as the final encounter. I didn't think the encounter would go well with the three person party - bard, evoker wizard, and barbarian 2/cleric 5 that I am GM'ing.
My plan was to have the Whispering Way turn Caromarc into a vampire. He is under the control of the vampire who created him and has orders to guard the tower and kill anyone who enters. Caromarc is resentful of these orders and what the Whispering Way has done, but is unable to resist the control of his creator. He wishes revenge on the Way, and is being kept from his wife by a fate worse then death. And now some trio of adventurers has come, stolen his wand for speaking with his wife, and buggered off!
The players first encountered him when he was pretending to be trapped in the misery idol. After a few minutes of questions, they freed him and were thanked with a level draining slam attack. The players were unprepared for a vampire encounter, and returned to the city to gather up supplies and info. My plan is to have the final encounter be a battle at the lightning tower with the PCs battling the vampire for control of the bondslave thrall and thus the beast. (Vampire Caromarc had the beast escape from jail and climb up to the tower.)
My big question is how do I tie this in with Ashes at Dawn? Should I have Radvir be the one who turned Caromarc into a vampire, or perhaps Ramoska?
When the PCs return to confront the vampire, should I keep him near the tower? The PCs are all flying around the area like they have Ride of the Valkyries blasting. I would like to have the battle take place around the bondslave and lightning tower but I'm open to suggestions - just keep in mind the vampire can't get much sunlight or immersed in running water. Any tactics that would make this an encounter to remember?
Also, I figured that Caromarc was an old aristocrat 4/alchemist 3/wizard 5. I'll post a build in another post- he has a crazy number of feats, skills, and abilities.
Well i wouldn't have made the changes u have but now that u have made them, but if u want to tie them in I would say radvir
As ramoska is a nasfurato and was just working with the way for money
Well i wouldn't have made the changes u have but now that u have made them, but if u want to tie them in I would say radvir
As ramoska is a nasfurato and was just working with the way for money
I was hoping to have Caromarc drop the name of the vampire that created him. If I use Radvir, wouldn't that kind of spoil the mystery of who is killing all the vampires? Or at least make for one hell of a coincidence? (I could be wrong, I haven't fully read Ashes at Dawn yet.) I was thinking that the "work" that Ramoska was doing for the Way was turning Caromarc into a vampire.
Are there any other vampires in the AP that could work as well? I'm open to any option.
EDIT: Opps! I didn't realize that Ramoska wasn't a vampire. Doh! Damn, it would have been cool to turn Caromarc into a nosferatu, but I have already had him level drain... Then again, I'm not sure that it would matter for the story to have a nosferatu create a vampire...
Well, I'm glad I asked! Any additional feedback would be great!
Yeah radvir would make it a problem for the mystery
Very few vampires side with the way
Pan what did you do instead
What about using....
** spoiler omitted **
That is the best I can do. I really didnt care for ashes at dawn and re-wrote that entire part of the AP when I ran it.
Good idea, I'll look into that.
Can you give me an idea of what you did for Ashes at Dawn? I have a CG good domain cleric in the group, and generally play alignment as black and white in my campaigns, so I couldn't blame my players for going full- genocide on the vampires.
|
I am not going to go into too much detail but ill give a basic summary of my re-write.
So the WW has the ingredients they need but are still looking for the whispering tyrant's descendant. While the WW are doing that, they hired the witches to start a fued between the vampires and the Esoteric order of the palatine eye. The WW promises to give the skull the witch sisters are looking for once they succsessfully get the vamps and order fighting. The witches are responsable for the vamp deaths. The vamps blame the order and start targeting their members. This allows the WW way to misdirect the two biggest threats in Caliphas.
The PCs ride into town and it all unfolded a bit like yo jimbo or fist full of dollars. The PCs accepted work from both the vamps and the order. Was a lot of fun. Meanwhile, they also had to discover what the WW was up to. The PCs eventually uncovered the plot and ran the witches out of town. (The Pcs recovered the skull and the witches will become a returning threat once the AP concludes. They fought a couple of times but the witches had no offense and too much get away ability.) Only to find out too late the WW had kidnapped the descendant and split town.
The PCs left town quickly to follow after discovering the real WW plot. They also got the vamps and order to stop fighting one another for the time being. (However, they did make enemies with the vamps and have full intention of ridding Caliphas of them after the AP concludes.)(I had a paladin in my game. He befriended the fallen paladin knight of ozem turned vampire. They had this awesome roleplay scene where the fallen paladin asks the paladin to help him face the sun becasue he hates what he has become. The paladin tried many times but always failed because he was too weak willed. Part of the reason the PCs are hell bent on killing vamps now. Also, gave them a good in with the knights of ozem during book 6)
I reused many of the characters in Ashes at Dawn to fill in the plot points and contacts. AA has Kendra with him as an insurance policy against the PCs. However, before leaving he took Kendra with him and replaced her with a wax golem (see book 5 bestiary). The PCs ate that up and still talk about that encounter; super cool monster!
That sounds like a real cool idea, and one that my party would get into. I have only skimmed Ashes, but I suspect I might lift some of your ideas!
Thanks again!
My group is only at the end of book 2 and since we alternate between CC and Jade Regent, it might be months or a year before we get to Ashes, much less Gallowspire.
OK, here is what I have so far for Alpon Caromarc, Old Male Human Vampire Aristocrat 4, Wizard 5, Alchemist 3 :
He starts off with the heroic NPC array with the human shoring up his weakest stat:
S 12 D 14 c 13 I 15 W 10 Ch 10
Adjusting his stats for age and 12 class levels, he looks like this:
S 10 D 12 C 10 I 18 W 12 Ch 12
Finally, we give him the whopping vampire bonuses:
S 16 D 16 C - I 20 W 14 Ch 16
Note I didn't want to power game or min/max, just come up with a simple and fairly consistent set of NPC stats.
Now the fun part, he starts his life off aristocrat 4, then branches into wizard (transmutation) 5, and alchemist 3.
This gives him:
Base Attack: +7
F +5 R +5 W +9 (F +8 R +10 W +11 after ability score and feat modifiers)
98 skill ranks 38 + 60 (Int bonus)
HP=111 ( 8 + (3x5) + (5x4) + (3x5)= 58+36(cha)+5 favored class wiz+ 12 toughness)
AC= 24 (+6 NA, +3 Dex, +1 Dodge, +4 mage armor)
Note: NOT included in any of these stat is a +4 to dex, -2 to Wis, +2 NA from mutegen. AND a +2 to a physical stat for being a transmuter
And feats:
Proficiency with all armor, shields, martial and simple weapons
Human: ???
1 Persuasive
3 ???
5 ???
7 combat casting
9 craft wondrous item
11 craft construct
W1 scribe scroll
W5 craft arms and armor
A1 Throw anything
A1 Brew Potion
Vampire bonus feats
Alertness
Combat reflexes
Dodge
Improved initiative
Lightning reflexes
Toughness
Note: I guess he took a level of wizard early in life to qualify for some of these feats. Any idea for additional feats? I would like to keep this core only, and not add too much complexity.
Alpon also gets 5 extracts and 8 bombs (exploding bomb discovery) per day.
He gets 4 cantrips, 6 first level, 4 second, 3 third level spells per day, school spells included. He aslo gets a casting of his highest level spell from his bonded object - his wedding ring.
Alpon also has all the resistances, abilities and everything else for being a vampire, but it is too much to list here.
I was thinking of having Alpon have almost no gear, since the Whispering Way would have mostly looted him before they left. I'm thinking that they might also leave him a decent weapon, and perhaps some armor, (instead of mage armor?)
Anyone have any additional ideas? A feat choice? Anything I should keep in mind when running this encounter? Any good ideas for organizing all this info into a coherent stat block I can use during the game? Will this encounter butcher a 3 person, 7th level party? The PCs encountered the count once, fled back to town and gathered info on vampires and got 2 deathward scrolls.