The Half-Dead City (GM Reference)


Mummy's Mask

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Dark Archive

archmagi1 wrote:
Make the necromancer the boss from book 2.

woot! that's exactly the sort of flavor what I was hoping for ^_^

Let's say Nebta-Khufre was imprisoned in the underground tomb where he found the Mask, and the PC's allowed him to escape by digging him out.
Maybe if the PC's would've just left things alone, the whole adventure path would never have happened... Heh, I can work with that.

Dark Archive

Book 2 wrote:
Nebta-Khufre and his few remaining disciples were banished to the desert to die.

banished... imprisoned...tomato, tomahto - Only to be freed by my unsuspecting players. Mwuahahahaaa.


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Getting ready to run this over the weekend.

I've moved the roleplaying between rival adventuring groups to the wait before the lottery. Not only does that allow for more than one period of interaction with the Scorched Hand, but it will allow me to sow some seeds for the potentially deadly encounters (two of my players are new to Pathfinder). The other groups will talk about needing holy water for undead, scrolls of restoration for curses, two-handed weapons for constructs, fire/acid for swarms, good eye for traps, and so on.

Conveniently there will be street vendors selling last-minute goods to the adventuring masses right before the lottery for only slightly jacked up prices. I'll post more once we run it.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber

Has anyone statted out a 5th member of the Scorched Hand they could share? If everyone shows up my party is 6 players, if they happen to hit the Scorched Hand near full strength and with everyone at the session I'd like to have a 5th member of the group on hand to keep it interesting.


Our group talked mostly to Mad Dog and the halflings. They tried to exchange some words with the rogue-like crew, but got only intimidating glares in response. Velriana asked about the Erudite Eye to no avail. It wasn't a lot of roleplaying, but it will definitely help enforce these other groups as real once they meet in the Tooth and Hookah later.

I also have the prices dropping by 5% each day, so going back to rest is actually an interesting choice the PCs have to make.

As for a 5th member of the Scorched Hand, you might just give each of the current members another class level. Not sure how much work that'd be. You could have one of the "lone survivors" of a different adventuring group be that 5th member, so it makes sense if you've already introduced them into the story as only 4 people.

Scarab Sages

Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

I have a question about the akhat.

Does it heal over time if the party retreats and returns later? Is there any way for it to recover?

The description in the MM bestiary also says that if it's killed, it's absorbed back into the building. Does that mean it's permanently killed, or can it manifest again after some amount of time?

Scarab Sages

PRD wrote:
Cannot heal damage on its own, but often can be repaired via exposure to a certain kind of effect (see the creature's description for details) or through the use of the Craft Construct feat. Constructs can also be healed through spells such as make whole. A construct with the fast healing special quality still benefits from that quality.

I would say no, since it doesn't have any fast heal or regeneration. This was one of my beefs, as the lootable Akhat is now nonlootable after getting killed. They found his stone, but since they walloped him before he could retreat, the stone was useless and worthless.

Scarab Sages

Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

I had the same problem with it. Although I didn't interpret the construct rules as being relevant. The entry says it's an outsider, which doesn't get killed when their physical form is destroyed. Although I'm unclear on the details—I guess the native subtype means that it does die normally.

The bestiary entry seems really unclear to me, but I guess I'm reading:

Quote:
If an ahkhat is killed, its manifested body disappears as it’s immediately reabsorbed by its attuned structure.

...as meaning that the body is reabsorbed and doesn't leave a ahkat-shaped stone corpse sticking out of the wall, not that they are able to manifest again sometime later.

I wonder, since it has the native subtype, if you could also raise it from the dead? I'm not sure what would count as its body or remains.

Scarab Sages

Good points. No idea.


On my table, the ankhat was able to manifest again as soon as his current form was destroyed. That nearly made some of my players insane trying to figure out how to explore and still avoid him.
The ankhat was part of every single battle, and prevented them from resting inside the temple, he also would attack them when they were too distracted doing anything to the temple, such as disarming traps, opening doors, reading documents, etc.

In the end, they only found the stone after exploring the entire place. The one player pledged himself to nethys and was able to command the ankhat, so the temple became a safehouse inside the necropolis.


I'm running this book here on the forums and I just wanted to say how much fun I'm having! I have a 5 person party, so I've upped the difficulty of some of the encounters.

A few highlights:
The Eldritch Guardian's hawk familiar almost died to the sandling in the Tomb of Akhentepi. The fighter is wielding both Akhentepi's shield and weapon and asked if the brush with death could allow Akhentepi's spirit to inhabit the familiar. She eventually plans to get Improved Familiar to transform him into a Cassisian Angel.

Later, at the House of Pentheru, she stood in front of the granary doors and used the shield to hold the swarm at bay while the others peppered it with splash weapons.

Speaking of the House of Pentheru, I didn't realize how deadly it could be. The aforementioned fighter and the Daring Champion Cavalier both failed their save vs the opening haunt. The fighter went east and opened the doors and the cavalier double moved twice, moving east and north into the courtyard. He ended up "Leeroy Jenkinsing" the death dog, asp, and three skeletons.

They weathered the storm there, but as they were healing up I had the div cast a minor image of a person spying on them by the doors. They raced back to catch him, only to find the centipede (which I gave the advanced template).

I also gave the div a level of sorcerer (psychic bloodline to compensate for having no hands). He was just flying invisibly watching the battle and I had him use message to whisper to two of the characters: "If you go in the house the beast won't chase you."

The rogue opened the doors and the skeletons are sitting there waiting to attack anyone who enters. So now I had the invisible div whisper: "If you say my family name my guards won't attack you." If she falls for that and walks into the teeth of the skeletons (and triggers the haunt), I'm going to have the div start laughing maniacally.

Anyway, I'm having fun, and my players are too!

Grand Lodge

Rob McCreary wrote:
Ogrork the Mighty wrote:

I looked for an errata thread for Half-Dead City but couldn't find one so I'm posting this question here.

In the statblock for Wati (PF #79, p. 63), it lists "sacred site" as one of Wati's settlement qualities. However sacred site isn't one of the listed qualities in the Game Mastery Guide.

My guess is that it's meant to be "holy site" for the temple of Pharasma but this quality increases the spell casting level of the settlement by +2.

Wati's spell casting level is 7th (base 6th + 1 for the pious quality) so either sacred site isn't holy site or Wati's spell casting level should be 9th.

Thoughts?

Sacred site is a new settlement quality created for this adventure. Its rules are right at the bottom in the Notes section of the city stat block on page 63.

A bigger problem is that Wati is Pious.

pious wrote:


The settlement is known for its inhabitants' good manners, friendly spirit, and deep devotion to a deity (this deity must be of the same alignment as the community).

Pharasma is N

Wati is LN

Am I missing something here?

Shadow Lodge

From what I gather, the church of Abadar is probably more influential in the day to day running of the city than the church of Pharasma. Abadar is LN, so I don't see a problem.

Scarab Sages

mbauers wrote:

I'm running this book here on the forums and I just wanted to say how much fun I'm having! I have a 5 person party, so I've upped the difficulty of some of the encounters.

A few highlights:
The Eldritch Guardian's hawk familiar almost died to the sandling in the Tomb of Akhentepi. The fighter is wielding both Akhentepi's shield and weapon and asked if the brush with death could allow Akhentepi's spirit to inhabit the familiar. She eventually plans to get Improved Familiar to transform him into a Cassisian Angel.

Later, at the House of Pentheru, she stood in front of the granary doors and used the shield to hold the swarm at bay while the others peppered it with splash weapons.

Speaking of the House of Pentheru, I didn't realize how deadly it could be. The aforementioned fighter and the Daring Champion Cavalier both failed their save vs the opening haunt. The fighter went east and opened the doors and the cavalier double moved twice, moving east and north into the courtyard. He ended up "Leeroy Jenkinsing" the death dog, asp, and three skeletons.

They weathered the storm there, but as they were healing up I had the div cast a minor image of a person spying on them by the doors. They raced back to catch him, only to find the centipede (which I gave the advanced template).

I also gave the div a level of sorcerer (psychic bloodline to compensate for having no hands). He was just flying invisibly watching the battle and I had him use message to whisper to two of the characters: "If you go in the house the beast won't chase you."

The rogue opened the doors and the skeletons are sitting there waiting to attack anyone who enters. So now I had the invisible div whisper: "If you say my family name my guards won't attack you." If she falls for that and walks into the teeth of the skeletons (and triggers the haunt), I'm going to have the div start laughing maniacally.

Anyway, I'm having fun, and my players are too!

As one of the afore-mentioned players I just wanted to say' Yes! We are having fun! :)' I've played through the Half Dead City twice IRL but mbauers is doing a great job of keeping it interesting.

Seconding the House of Pentheru being a lot more lethal than it looks! My first time was a cakewalk (solo game with a paladin...) second time was harder (mixed party), this time has been crazy - although GM is playing our strengths against us very well! *Although we grappled the bastard!* It's a blast, and Akhentepi is giving me useful advice (when he's not napping! grrr...)

Scarab Sages

Mystic Lemur wrote:
From what I gather, the church of Abadar is probably more influential in the day to day running of the city than the church of Pharasma. Abadar is LN, so I don't see a problem.

The Wati article explicitly says that the Grand Mausoleum is basically City Hall due to the Pharasmin influence. I'm just guessing its an oversight on the design end that Pious requires the deity's alignment in the city. Or it could just be an exception, as the Wati article reads very much that the Nethys founded city that flourished under the economic eyes of Abadar was overtaken completely by Pharasmins in the wake of Shepses' consecration of the Grand Mausoleum.

While the necropolis is a heavy facet of the city, everything else about the city is completely compatible with Abadar. The city is a manufacturing powerhouse that supplies an entire country (one that is very involved with Death) with grave goods.

Scarab Sages

Say'ri Al Bashere wrote:
*Although we grappled the bastard!*

My group did that too, then drown it in a bucket of created water. Gotta get creative on killing stuff when you can't bypass DR.


I'm gathering notes together at the moment to start to run this AP on Friday. There's one experienced Pathfinder player and four others who are pretty new. They're planning:

Paladin
Sorcerer (Draconic bloodline)
Oracle of the Sun
Unchained Rogue
Bard or Alchemist

First off, this thread has been really helpful so thank you.

But my main reason to post is to ask after the Scorched Hand. I debating the idea of trying to have a talky final battle, rather than one concentrated on fighting. Has anyone else done that and what did you do? I know Velriana needs to die, but I was wondering if anyone had managed to turn the others?

Silver Crusade

Well. In my group, one of the players was controlling two characters at first, one of whom was a cleric trying to steal Khelru from what's-his-name. Then we got a 4th player, so the cleric decided to go be a "house boy" for the Scorched Hand. So when they confronted the Scorched Hand, Idorii had a knife to the cleric's throat, and Velriana made demands in exchange for his life. The players managed to bribe Idorii into turning on Velriana, and with some lucky rolls, Idorii straight up murdered her former boss. The two guys surrendered and said, "Hey, we just wanted to explore our sacred spot." And my team said, "Okay, then. You can have it when we're done."

Dunno if that helps you, but you can probably work in a hostage situation. I ran it with two other groups the straight combat way, and the hostage way was much more satisfying.

Silver Crusade

My group ended up talking through most of the battle with the Scorched Hand. I gave them a chance to meet various members while socializing in the evenings and they already wanted to be able to pull Kehlru and the others away from Velriana when it became clear what was happening. They were ultimately successful.

Shadow Lodge

There was some back and forth during the battle, but ultimately my group killed Khelru, subdued Idorii and Azaz, and forced Velirana to surrender. They brought them back and turned them over to the guards. The Schorched Hand were put on trial for (unsanctioned) grave robbing and attempted murder. As the leader, Velriana was hanged while Idorii and Azaz were merely banished from Wati.

Velriana will make her return in book two, while I'm saving Azaz, and possibly Idorii, for book three. :)


I ran the first session this evening and threw the Scorched Hand into the mix with the other groups waiting for the lottery to begin. Velriana sneered at the Gnome Sorcerer who went to say hello, as he was far beneath her station and she really didn't want to talk to someone at the very start of the lottery. Azaz came over to apologise and chat a little, but Khelru was sent to fetch Azaz after not long.

They seem to now be hung up on the group (the rogue even followed them to their first location, despite Idorii spotting her twice). I'm a little worried that I've somehow set this up to fail now... Anyone got any ideas for how I could get the group to stand down, or even use it to my advantage? There are a lot of opportunities here, but I'm interested to hear if anyone has any ideas too.

Scarab Sages

After your group goes through Tomb of Akentepi, just have the Scorched Hand hanging out in town, doing absolutely nothing for days, nay even weeks, aka ever how long it takes for the party to ignore them again.

Liberty's Edge

You can also toss the other groups in to the mix. If the Scorched Hand are the only ones who interacted with the group, it's likely the players would attach to them. But show off the other groups, give subtle hints and foreshadowings of goings-on with them as well, make them interesting too, and the players just might get distracted.

Scarab Sages

Or, even better, have nebta kufre and some of his (not yet zombie) goons shadowing the party, or have the silver chain gang with fake crews stealing lottery chits from groups.

Sovereign Court

My party had a TPK at the sandman in the manor. I took the opportunity to have Pharasma show a vision to their souls, feeding them some backstory and a little foreshadowing. (I know prophecy technically doesn't work anymore since Aroden's death, but since this one was originally given thousands of years ago, I justified it was accurate and can still be fulfilled).

Here it is, in case anyone wants to adapt it for their game.

Spoiler:

A Pharaoh lies mummified in his tomb, a golden mask covering his face.
A blue feather bearing a strange symbol divides him in three.
The funerary mask fades from the mummy.
The canopic heart jar also fades away.
The room goes dark as sand covers the tomb.
A cry full of frustration and loss fills your mind.
It slowly fades into silence.
Suddenly, a feminine voice, deep as the ocean, dry as the desert, speaks:

"The Pharaoh has arisen. He rages against an injustice, for ages born.
Much pain has he caused and much more has he in store.
He must be laid low, that his soul may meet its fate.
She must be raised up, an improper fate to expurgate."

They then appeared in the boneyard, where they were met by the unchained summoner's psychopomp eidolon. The eidolon told them Pharasma was sending them back to right a wrong so a soul that was stuck could resume it's journey on the river of souls. Pharasma then reincarnated them. They woke up in the Great Mausoleum with new bodies and no penalties from the spell (In my mind Pharasma knows a better version than mortals can cast). They still felt penalized for dying so stupidly because they lost their elemental-themed races (oread, sylph, ifrit) but they didn't have to reroll after session 3.

I then let them make some knowledge and profession checks to interpret some of the symbols they had seen, such as a the Eye of Nethys on the blue feather.

We're now halfway through book 6 and they have really bought in to the idea of being Pharasma's personal representatives. It has been a great motivator for their characters to feel like heroes, not greedy murder hoboes.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber

Has anyone prepared a handout, or the text of the handout, for the scroll described on p43 of the adventure that they would be willing to share? I'm referring to the scroll that describes the alteration of elementals and the keystone.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber

Also, has anyone prepared a printable sheet online for the Scorched Hand. I have the actual book but a printable sheet would make the combat smoother for me.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber
drsparnum wrote:
Has anyone prepared a handout, or the text of the handout, for the scroll described on p43 of the adventure that they would be willing to share? I'm referring to the scroll that describes the alteration of elementals and the keystone.

I prepared the following text for the handout, and pasted it below in case others find it useful:

We received the largess from his Father Djederet II to protect the sanctity of this Nethysian edifice. Using the generous gift, we completed transformation of Eres into the permanent dweller, an Ahkhat, binding it as body to the Sanctum. Now five stones of weight with material soul protect the countless stones of the Sanctum and the secrets contained herein for eternity.

We’ve secreted the keystone below near the Pool of Destruction, deep in the Sanctum where it can exert the greatest stability. My brothers selected me to control the keystone, recognition of my magnetism.

We now must maintain the integrity of our church so it can revitalize itself in the protection of our knowledge and secrets.

-Djedihepet, Sacrosanct Order of the Blue Feather

Liberty's Edge

We know Idorii doesn't worship Nethys. Who *does* she worship?

Scarab Sages

She's basically a thug. Gorum seems a bit too pronounced for the rogue levels, and Callistria doesn't fit the background. Her father avoided elven settlements, so I would toss the elven pantheon out as well. Bastet deals in deception and trickery and could work, particularly if Idorii wanted to connect with the Gods of her mother's people. Her father being a travelling bard, maybe she picked up some romantic ideals of the "noble" pirate queen Besmara somewhere along the way.

Of those two CN deities, I'd probably go for Bastet, simply because its an AO god to go better with the AP.

Shadow Lodge

Maybe no one. I mean, what have they ever done for her?


I picked up this AP a couple of months ago and I'm about to start running it with my group. I'm very excited.

One thing I'm planning on doing is giving my players time before the lottery begins to "check out the competition" This will give them a little more time to Role play and meet some of the other parties listed in the AP as well as some I've made up.

Another thing I've done is I added an encounter to one of our previous sessions and used one of the adventuring parties. (The Flickering Four) The Flickering Four tried to rob my players, but ran away before my players could take them out. I'm very excited to see my players reaction when they meet the Flickering Four in Wati.

I did this for a couple of reasons. One, it'd be fun and two, I think it'll throw my players off the trail of the Scorched Hand. Also, we tend to play with large parties (6-8 players usually) So the Scorched hand might need some backup in the temple.


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Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber

I've nearly completed DMing this adventure. I added traps that played out during combat to each dungeon for three reasons: 1) My party includes a rogue and an archaeologist bard so I wanted to reward them for having multiple trap disarmers, 2) My party is large (n=6) so I need to up the challenge a bit, and 3) I wanted traps integrated into combat to maximize excitement and prevent trap searching and disarming to become a conversation between the rogue and DM between combats.

The Tomb:
In the tomb of Akhempti I had a hidden Sandling in one room and a difficult to spot trap. When half the party moved forward the door closed and locked. This left the first half of the party to fight an earth elemental and the second half of the party to fight a sandling in two separate simultaneous combats. After the rogues team (the front team fighting the elemental) finished the elemental the rogue had to to work quickly to unlock the door to reconnect the two groups (the sandling side was having a tough time as the soft underbelly of the party). A close call but all PCs survived.

The House:
In the House of Pentheru I added a 40' x 40' room with alternating black and white squares (like a chess board) to the tomb section. On the opposite side of the room I had an animated medium-size construct in the shape of sphinx (with the haunted and ranged powers) prowl before a (false) guilded door. Hieroglyphs on the wall read "Knight Two Moves." Every square on the chest board that any of the 4 knights can reach in two moves from starting positions was actually a 5' deep spiked pit (perception DC 12; reflex DC 12 or fall and take 1d6 damage and need to climb out). In this way the rogues trapsense ability came into play as he had to identify the safe squares to stand. I also allowed a DC 20 intelligence check to "solve" the puzzle but none of the PCs made it. I allowed an appraise check (DC 20 from afar; DC 15 up close) to tell the gold door in the back was false and fake and one of my players made that check. One of my players later told me he (but not his character) kind-of figured it out and knew it was a chess thing. In the end the players popped into this room and needed to retreat. They next cleared the whole tomb, then rested, and took out this room on their terms.

The Temple:
In the Temple I've added a third trap in the basement before the final room. The room contains a hungry [the hungry template*] gelatinous cube with a metal coil inside. The floor is wired so that when the cube moves it creates an electric current that damages the party. Four fuse boxes line the walls. The party will take electric damage every other round (Reflect DC 13 to save for half) depending on the number of intact fuse boxes - 1d3, 1d4, 1d6, 2d6. The fuse boxes can also be disabled So the party can either kill the cube to end the trap (which stops the metal coil from moving) or the rogue/bard can work on disabling fuse boxes while the cube battle occurs to reduce damage from the electric trap. I've house-ruled these fuse-boxes can be disabled in 1d4 rounds with a DC 10 check, or in 1 round with a DC 20 check. I've not run this final one yet, so I can't say how it will go.

*The hungry template involves penalties to some attributes where the cube is already at a 1. I broke the rules and still added in penalties to the cubes stats as appropriate.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber
arick86 wrote:

I picked up this AP a couple of months ago and I'm about to start running it with my group. I'm very excited.

One thing I'm planning on doing is giving my players time before the lottery begins to "check out the competition" This will give them a little more time to Role play and meet some of the other parties listed in the AP as well as some I've made up.

Another thing I've done is I added an encounter to one of our previous sessions and used one of the adventuring parties. (The Flickering Four) The Flickering Four tried to rob my players, but ran away before my players could take them out. I'm very excited to see my players reaction when they meet the Flickering Four in Wati.

I did this for a couple of reasons. One, it'd be fun and two, I think it'll throw my players off the trail of the Scorched Hand. Also, we tend to play with large parties (6-8 players usually) So the Scorched hand might need some backup in the temple.

I have a large party too, and I had my party get jumped by a large group of down-on-their-luck explorers while the PCs were on the way to the House of Pentheru. After 2 rds of fighting where the party took the upper hand, ghouls came around the corner and behind the PCs. The party (i.e., bandits) offered the PCs a truce in exchange for amnesty. The bandits worked in "they doubted they would get such an offer from the ghouls." [Princess Bride Reference]

My PCs took the truce offer and together PCs and bandits beat the ghouls. After the fight my PCs reneged on their commitments and immediately killed all of the remaining bandits.

After the fight my party developed an elaborate code so the bard face can use one set of phrases to truthfully accept deals and another code for when he accepts deals he intends for the party to betray....this group should have a fun encounter with that eye-taker guy in the second book ;)

Also their code was so elaborate that one of the PCs blew it later in the session in the encounter with that Hezrou guy in the House of Pentheru, to much ridicule from all ;)


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook Subscriber
Jim Groves wrote:

I was inspired by a movie, so it is interesting that you said that. I was watching the Three Muskateers (2011) version with Milla Jovovich. There are some very cool traps in that movie, particularly in da Vinci's vault.

Now many people didn't care for the movie and there is a lot of anachronism, but if you set Dumas aside and just have fun with it, I found it quite entertaining.

I think your idea is great!

I've just started running this AP with my home gaming group and watching the panic rising with the water was just too much fun. Definitely a great moment for everyone, and I heard huge sighs of relief from the players once the water stopped rising.

Liberty's Edge

Sanctum of the Erudite Eye timeline.

Presumably it was built prior to -1599, because that is when Djedihepet (mummy in D20) was buried. The plague happened in 2499, about 4000 years later. So the Sanctum was around for 4000 years before the plague hit.

D19 has one wall unfinished and the priests were planning expansion. So they basically left one wall unfinished for 4000 years? This is even slower than the Sagrada Familia.


Just posting some stories from our campaign through Mummy's Mask. I only started playing Pathfinder this year (last I played D&D was in the '90s) and MM is my first attempt GMing. We use a heavily modified Hero Lab (since I learned how to code it) and Roll20 on a custom table with a TV built into it (last session I'd upgraded to Pro to use dynamic lighting and that went over well).

Anyway, the party ended up having 6 characters and we always use Gestalt characters. So I've been increasing the difficulty of all encounters usually by adding Advanced Template and sometimes adding a few extra enemies to the encounters. Also, I worked in a little homebrew Prelude that has resulted in everyone being a level ahead of the AP. I might need to tweak further on the treasure because I think they are having to scrimp a lot, but they seem to be having fun nonetheless.

Some stories:

Tomb of Ahkentepi:
This was both my and the party's first dungeon. They were unsure what to expect, and so was I. They are all very interested in the setting and the stories, so I often handwaved some of the Knowledge (history)/(local) checks just to give some of the backstory listed in the book that isn't explicitly stated. Like the story about his family's tragedy and his mistress's unfinished tomb.

Warrior Dolls: This was neat and kinda freaked them out when it first came up. I'd read in the Obits the hardness being a problem for a lot of groups, so I was all ready for this to be an epic battle. But in the first round our Inquisitor/Ranger wielding a falchion crit'ed the first one she hit for like 30 dmg, then cleaved the next one also killing it in the first blow. I'd increased the number to 3, so there was one left. It took them a few rounds just to hit that one, but it was far less harrowing at that point.

False Tomb: They have 2 trapspotters, so I knew that a lot of the fun of this room would be ruined. So I modified the trap activation. Since the rogue immediately found the trap, I decided that his disable only disabled the lightning arcs. Triggering the false sarcophagus battle also triggered the water trap. Even though I kept the trap broken, I extended the water duration a few rounds so it got up to 4 ft I think. I designated that the platform was 1 ft up, so they got a few rounds out of the water while fighting the sarcophagus. They did seriously think they were going to drown, so the 2 front line fought the sarcophagus, the rogue tried to push the water doors shut (futilely), and 2 other characters started searching the walls for secret doors. They found the one with the slave mummies and opened it, so that was cool. They did find the other one, but by the time the rogue could get over there to unlock it the water had stopped rising so the urgency was gone. Still went very thematically though.

House of Pentharu:
Even though they were level 3 for the House of Pentharu, they had a hard time. To be fair, I'd increased the difficulty to account for the higher level and Gestalt, but they also don't have a strong dedicated healer (closest are bard and oracle).

Haunts: These played out nicely and gave provided a good thematic atmosphere. I know at least one player that was very interested in the haunts and wanted to figure them out to cleanse the place. Unfortunately, RAW none of the characters have any way to speak with the spirits of the haunt yet, so were not able to figure out the proper steps to cleanse them. Perhaps because of the higher level or because of Gestalt, I did feel the Haunt save DCs were super easy. I don't think anyone in the party every failed any of them even though I changed their reset from 1 day to 1 hour so they triggered the front gate haunt both coming and going.

Giant Centipede: They chose to go left first, so this was actually their first encounter. When I presented it in Roll20, it was a big 'Oh Crap!' moment for them and I just about killed the Paladin. They survived, but were a little rattled as they started the rest of the exploration.

Eastern Courtyard: They chose to go eastern yard after finding the crypt in the western yard. This was tough because it was one combat after another. They pushed through, but had burned most of their resources by the time they entered the House through the kitchen.

Inside the House: They went down the east side of the house first (which was good based on their condition) and I described some of the flavor stuff. They were intrigued by the fresh corpse missing a head on the privy and that started all kinds of speculation. They hit the foyer and the guards, but only one party member entered range of the haunt by the door. After fighting the skeletons, they were pretty tapped out of resources, so decided to return to Wati, get more supplies and rest up.

Enroute to House Day 2: Sidestory, I have some homebrew planned for midway through the campaign which resulted in me requiring one player to play 2 characters, one of which is a gun wielding character. However, I didn't realize how expensive using a gun was in Pathfinder, and felt bad for him when battle after battle on the first day of Pentharu he would be reluctant to fire because each shot was 1gp. So I needed a way to 'gift' him a Wand of Abundant Ammunition, some alchemical charges, and a better gun. So I took the random encounter with the Flickering Four and added a gunslinger to the group to make the Flickering Five. I then prepped this encounter on the Skirmish in the Ruins map which I display to them every time they transit to or from a site in the Necropolis (so they never know if they will get an encounter and will be used to the map when the planned encounter comes up). So when they approached the group, Lirgala gave a diplomatic speech about how they saw the player exit the previous day after only half a day exploring and they must have found a lot of great loot to need to make multiple trips (this illicited a lot of jokes from the players since they actually left because they were getting beaten). She proposed they should share the wealth and let the Flickering Five join them. Then I had the dwarf pipe up and say he'd rather just fry them. Lirgala turned around and yelled at him to shut up, the barbarian just huffed and rolled his eys, and Virichi whined about how they should just go back out of the necropolis and let him research for another week or two before trying to come back in. This was a fun little RP as the players got to see how disfunctional this group was. Then I had the gunslinger pipe up and say he had his own agenda and that gunslingers were rare enough that there couldn't be two in Wati and he challenged the gunslinger party member to a one-on-one duel. My player RP'ed it out that his guy wouldn't engage in a duel and no matter how much I'd goaded him, he wouldn't bite. So I finally had the dwarf just start tossing fire. The frontliners took down Lirgala and the dwarf nonlethal, but the barbarian and the gunslinger needed to die. The first time he was attacked, Virichi ran for his life and ended up escaping. They ultimately took the unconscious Lirgala and dwarf to the necropolis gate guards who locked them up at the Precinct of the Left Eyes.

House Day 2: On day 2 they encountered the beheaded and Heshsharu. Both were great encounters. Heshsharu ended up putting 4 of 6 of them to sleep as soon as she got bored talking to them, leaving the oracle and rogue awake. Rogue held her off while the oracle went around trying to wake up the frontliners. After this battle, since they'd explored the first level, they went upstairs. They went into the small room first where they found the body that showed signs of turning into a vargoille. So things started to make sense. I'd intended on them following that around counter-clockwise, but they went straight for the master bedroom instead. Since they had already come and gone once, I decided that Imanish would go out that night and use charm person to find himself a guard to bring back. He then got him infected with vargoille's disease via a kiss, so by the time the PCs arrived, he was in the final stages of turning. However, when they opened the door they saw 5 guards all in final stages of vargoille disease because 4 of them were images. So they ended up burning a few spells and lots of actions trying to hit the fake ones until they could make their Will checks to disbelieve them. It was fun when the Paladin decided they were all fake and backed out of the room to fight the vargoille that had come out of their rooms hearing the noise, only got get an attack of opportunity from the one real guard and take a heavy flail to the back. I'd doubled the number of vargoille, so there were 4 of them. The heavy damage dealer got paralyzed from the first shriek for 3 rounds, but she was far away and the vargoilles couldn't get to her to kiss her. But they did manage to paralyze the gunslinger and kiss him before they finished them all off. I didn't feel like having Imanish show up again later, so I just had him fight the party as soon as his charmed guard died. It was all pretty epic and they were super worried about the gunslinger turning into a vargoille, so they immediately left to go to the temple to get cured up. Almost killed another with poison during the battle and the ranger/inquisitor had donned the dead man's headband and wanted to get the curse removed. So it ended up taking them 3 trips to get through the House of Pentharu.

The Exchange

Valdacil,

This sounds pretty darn good. My party of 4 struggled with the Sandman, but otherwise pretty good RAW. We play in person so they get a wall of text or two in email format between games, usually the PF journal in the back of the module and some collected information scrubbed from the pages and pages of backstory writes into these campaigns.


So I am preparing to start this AP soon and wondered if anyone had players question the fact that after thousand of years 3 parties enter the same tomb at exact the same time. I think it is a bit strange that Nebta-Khufre enters the tomb at the same day as the scorched hand and the players do.

Did anyone had this problem? Could there be an easy explanation, something I am missing?


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I don't think its odd at all. The player characters are waiting for the lottery to give them the Sanctum (not they they know that in advance), but so were the Scorched Hand. I think that all along they were trying to be (mostly) legit. Asking around to see if anyone else had gotten it, and offering to trade if they found someone with it. (Trading isn't technically allowed, but it would prevent other parties interrupting them, which is exactly what happens.) By their third and final draw, they still haven't gotten it, and neither has anyone else they've made contact with. So, giving up on being legit, they start their own expedition, but because it's now the time of the third draw, this is just when the players get the place for real. So the timing is necessarily close. Besides just adding flavor to the world around the PCs, that's one of the reasons why the scene in the bar with all the other groups is so critical. If the players get tipped off that there's another group interested in the place before they even get it, and those people come off as jerks, then it should feel inevitable that they find them there, rather than coincidental.

(In my game, my players decided that they wanted to trade with the Scorched Hand when they realized what they got. They thought that would make the two parties good friends... only they couldn't find the Scorched Hand to trade with, because the other group was already busy stealing their site.)

Nebta-Kufre, on the other hand, doesn't really need to have been literally the same day. A day or a few days before works just as well. The most important thing about his trip is that he got in and out (mostly) quietly, and got away with the BIG prize before either of the other two groups even got there. The timing of his finding the place being so close to the others is coincidental, but that's because it was a hard place to find. The item he's looking for is very well warded.

Scarab Sages

I like the idea that the scorched hand has been here recouperating after the statue fight for a day while khleru regained healing spells.


Leedwashere wrote:

I don't think its odd at all. The player characters are waiting for the lottery to give them the Sanctum (not they they know that in advance), but so were the Scorched Hand. I think that all along they were trying to be (mostly) legit. Asking around to see if anyone else had gotten it, and offering to trade if they found someone with it. (Trading isn't technically allowed, but it would prevent other parties interrupting them, which is exactly what happens.) By their third and final draw, they still haven't gotten it, and neither has anyone else they've made contact with. So, giving up on being legit, they start their own expedition, but because it's now the time of the third draw, this is just when the players get the place for real. So the timing is necessarily close. Besides just adding flavor to the world around the PCs, that's one of the reasons why the scene in the bar with all the other groups is so critical. If the players get tipped off that there's another group interested in the place before they even get it, and those people come off as jerks, then it should feel inevitable that they find them there, rather than coincidental.

(In my game, my players decided that they wanted to trade with the Scorched Hand when they realized what they got. They thought that would make the two parties good friends... only they couldn't find the Scorched Hand to trade with, because the other group was already busy stealing their site.)

Nebta-Kufre, on the other hand, doesn't really need to have been literally the same day. A day or a few days before works just as well. The most important thing about his trip is that he got in and out (mostly) quietly, and got away with the BIG prize before either of the other two groups even got there. The timing of his finding the place being so close to the others is coincidental, but that's because it was a hard place to find. The item he's looking for is very well warded.

Yeah I am fine with the scorched hand being there, its just that Nebta-Kufre on top seems a bit too much coincidence. I think I let him steal the artefact as soon as the necropolis opens.

Scarab Sages

Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
rashiakas wrote:

So I am preparing to start this AP soon and wondered if anyone had players question the fact that after thousand of years 3 parties enter the same tomb at exact the same time. I think it is a bit strange that Nebta-Khufre enters the tomb at the same day as the scorched hand and the players do.

Did anyone had this problem? Could there be an easy explanation, something I am missing?

My players did not.

The thousands of years isn't really relevant—until now it's been a crime to pilfer from these tombs, so only the mumia gangs are regularly entering the Necropolis.

Hakotep has slept. It's the discovery and awakening of Hakotep's ib that prompts the visions of Neferekhu that eventually kill her.That's when Nebta-Khufre becomes aware of and starts seeking the mask. All of this has been set in motion very recently, with everyone racing (in some cases, unknowingly) to get to the mask first.


So I've been running this book for my group and we're all really enjoying it. The lethality is just high enough to reward careful thinking while still being fun.

This week we had the face off vs the scorched hand, which was one of the better combat's I've run so far from a pre-written adventure. It ended with a bomb from the alchemist to Velriana's face, right as it looked like she might get the upper hand.

Now, the reason I'm here is because one of my players mentioned that he wondered how cool the boss will be, seeing as how this was already pretty awesome. Not wanting to give spoilers for the rest of the temple (they went in pretty much a straight line due to some good tracking), I just ignored the comment (one of the upsides to online GMing).

I'm planning on adding an encounter with an undead creature that has a nice "Bossy" feel. I was thinking about adding a mummy with a couple of minions, but it feels like that might make the first encounter in the next book less fun, as you'll have the same thing twice.

Anyone know of something that might fit? I was thinking about some type of large undead, maybe with a small horde of zombies?


Cairn wight Fighter 1

Spoiler:
Unnamed Hero CR 5
XP 1,600
Cairn wight fighter 1 (Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 276)
LE Medium undead
Init +3; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +14
--------------------
Defense
--------------------
AC 25, touch 13, flat-footed 22 (+6 armor, +3 Dex, +6 natural)
hp 44 (5 HD; 4d8+1d10+21)
Fort +7, Ref +4, Will +7
Immune undead traits
Weaknesses resurrection vulnerability
--------------------
Offense
--------------------
Speed 30 ft. (20 ft. in armor)
Melee khopesh +8 (1d8+3/19-20) or
. . slam +7 (1d4+4 plus energy drain)
Special Attacks create spawn, energy drain (1 level, DC 16)
--------------------
Statistics
--------------------
Str 16, Dex 16, Con —, Int 15, Wis 17, Cha 19
Base Atk +4; CMB +7; CMD 20
Feats Blind-fight, Exotic Weapon Proficiency (khopesh), Martial Weapon Proficiency (scimitar), Skill Focus (Perception), Weapon Focus (khopesh)
Skills Acrobatics -1 (-5 to jump), Intimidate +12, Knowledge (religion) +10, Perception +14, Sense Motive +9, Stealth +15, Survival +11; Racial Modifiers +8 Stealth
Languages Ancient Osiriani, Common, Kelish
Other Gear breastplate, khopesh[APG]
--------------------
Special Abilities
--------------------
Blind-Fight Re-roll misses because of concealment, other benefits.
Create Spawn (Su) Can rapidly reproduce, under certain circumstances.
Darkvision (60 feet) You can see in the dark (black and white only).
Energy Drain (1 level, DC 16) (Su) Foes hit by the listed attack take neg levels, gain 5 temp hp for each drained.
Immunity to Ability Drain Immunity to ability drain
Immunity to Bleed You are immune to bleed.
Immunity to Death Effects You are immune to death effects.
Immunity to Disease You are immune to diseases.
Immunity to Energy Drain Immune to energy drain
Immunity to Exhausted You are immune to the exhausted condition.
Immunity to Fatigue You are immune to the fatigued condition.
Immunity to Mind-Affecting effects You are immune to Mind-Affecting effects.
Immunity to Nonlethal Damage You are immune to Nonlethal Damage
Immunity to Paralysis You are immune to paralysis.
Immunity to Physical Ability Damage Immune to ability damage to your physical abilities.
Immunity to Poison You are immune to poison.
Immunity to Sleep You are immune to sleep effects.
Immunity to Stunning You are immune to being stunned.
Resurrection Vulnerability (Su) Can be destroyed by raise dead spell.
Undead Traits Undead have many immunities.

Hero Lab and the Hero Lab logo are Registered Trademarks of LWD Technology, Inc. Free download at http://www.wolflair.com
Pathfinder® and associated marks and logos are trademarks of Paizo Inc.®, and are used under license.


Currently running this campaign for a group of 4, all new to roleplaying games, and this is my first time GMing, so we have had a lot of fun with remembering and forgetting rules.

As the following account of my adventure is long, I'm shortening it into a spoiler.

fun times to be had:
Starting off was a little rocky due to actually having a group of 5, but after the tomb (and school ending) I had 2 leave and 1 join, along with some character adjustments after everyone got more experience with class rolls and the like, which I tried to explain with just a reality shift.

Of the two that left, one was the barbarian who rampaged in the bar and was imprisoned until he could pay back the damages, and the other was the paladin who knocked on the wrong door and got kidnapped by a bachelorette party, to be seen again briefly throughout the adventure.

Gaining the new player, I had her be part of the daughters of the desert party, but she wanted to leave due to bad party chemistry and I almost had a fight in the bar with Sigrun (who I made an actual ifrit).

Sadly, I have one player who likes to "call the ending" and so immediately was hostile towards the scorched hand, so I couldn't do much roleplaying there.

The house didn't have too much excitement. Even the Sandman fight was lame because the paladin found the flail and two hit it.

This is the point where I finally got in gear with GMing though.

My investigator, who has some ties with a shady market, likes to go off alone and found himself in the bar with Sigrun, finding out that her party left her because she was too dangerous, and there may have been a romance started there.

The paladin doesn't actually know who his deity is, but has a rat that whispers his spells to him, and I'm hoping to make this rat be part of the Forgotten Pharoah.

The ranger is looking for the guy who killed her parents who she thinks is an enemy of Sarenrae, but I have it so that he was actually sent by the church to quell the dangerous cult that her parents were part of.

Then the celestial sorcerer was chosen by Sarenrae for a purpose, and I'm still looking for a story there.

In the Temple, my party took out the div relatively easily (as I forgot about his gaze) but each got cursed, which they promptly got healed in town because they are lame.

They have been beset upon by a vengeful spirit (the Akhat) hurling pots and rocks at them and they have no idea what it is.

Then I almost killed the investigator with the scroll because the rest of the party left him alone to open the case as they explored the rest of the temple, only to have him be grappled and try to run to them because he couldn't scream.

Anyway, this is a lot longer than I had planned. They are now on the first floor of the Temple and are facing the door to the trapped corridor. I'm hoping that I will remember all the fun things waiting for them downstairs.

And for the actual reason I wanted to make this post:

Reading through the Scorched Hand persons, I kept thinking of the Fifth Element with Azaz, because it is close to Aziz ("Aziz! Light!") and then I notice that Azaz does, in fact, have light. So that will be my opening to that combat. Then reading the background fo Khelru, I found this gem:

Excerpt from the adventure path:
When Khelru first met Azaz, his heart skipped
a beat, and he wondered that the handsome young man
with eyes for him alone, but lately Khelru has felt stifled,
and he wonders whether Azaz is just going through
the motions of being interested in Nethys and the
Sanctum of the Erudite Eye to appeal to him.
Rather than being in love with Aziz, Khelru is
in love with his faith, though he does not fully
understand this about himself.

And so now I am curious if that name is not just a coincidence.


Going to start DMing this soon(Might make a full topic about my team's adventures). I'm a tad worried as the team line up is;

-Cleric(BLossoming Light Archetype)
-Monk(Archetyped or Unchained)
-Slayer(TWF)
-Fighter(Falchion focused, Generalist)
-Bard (Archaeologist Archetype)

I'm a tad worried about DR along with other problems later down the line.

As for changes, I'm mainly messing with the other adventure teams. "Mad Dog" Marrn saw a lot of changes, the Sand Scorpions have been retooled to serve as a link to a possible plot point and book 2, and a few new teams or solos have popped up. Also have drawn up 3 adventure hooks which I'll share if you want to slow things down before the Final Site or you can use it to get some more experience/cash ahead of the final tomb or book 2.

Smart Dog Marrn:
So the book says Marrn lost a few dogs to a Gelatinous Cube, but what if he didn't? What if he backed off rather than risk his furry friends who couldn't do much vs it. Well he'd have to alert the Church about not being able to complete it, which leads to no treasure. Brooding over a pint, the PC's come in being successful once again. And Marrn realizes that maybe "Half" the treasure is better than none as he moves to make a deal.

The Lost Team:
The PC's come back to the Tooth & Hookah to find a fellow adventurer drowning their sorrow. The PC's had seen this person before on the first day, maybe even talked or traded items or tales. This person had a party... didn't they? The weeping adventurer tells the tale of how their team was cut down and in cowardice fled.They can no longer stand the thought of being near a tomb but requests someone go and find some items from the dead team. A shield from the fighter, a book from the mage, and an armlet from the cleric;
the adventure would like to mail them back to the families of
their former team. To the treasure left in the tomb? "The dead,
the church or someone else can keep the damned stuff".

Sunset Rescue:
A 4 man team blundered in a tomb. A two part trap triggered, massively wounding their fighter while separating their mage or rogue. Before a plan could be made, undead made the 3 non trapped members flee. Now the leader needs to make a choice.
Retreat to save the life of his fighter, as whatever that spike had been was either magic resistant which leaked into the wound or diseased either of which will cause the fighter's death due to lack of healing nearby. Or attempt to save their stranded member with his Cleric's help. Option 1 might save all 3 but damn the 4th, but the 4th is a valued friend or important. Unable to make a choice, the sound of the PCs walking nearby opens up other possible choices

The last one could actually be done with the Scorched Hand, leading to some more interaction between the two groups before the final site. And what I myself plan on doing is linking a certain group from book 2-3 into one of these side missions if my players take them on.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber
MerlinCross wrote:

Going to start DMing this soon(Might make a full topic about my team's adventures). I'm a tad worried as the team line up is;

-Cleric(BLossoming Light Archetype)
-Monk(Archetyped or Unchained)
-Slayer(TWF)
-Fighter(Falchion focused, Generalist)
-Bard (Archaeologist Archetype)

I'm a tad worried about DR along with other problems later down the line.

As for changes, I'm mainly messing with the other adventure teams. "Mad Dog" Marrn saw a lot of changes, the Sand Scorpions have been retooled to serve as a link to a possible plot point and book 2, and a few new teams or solos have popped up. Also have drawn up 3 adventure hooks which I'll share if you want to slow things down before the Final Site or you can use it to get some more experience/cash ahead of the final tomb or book 2.

** spoiler omitted **

** spoiler omitted **

[spoiler=Sunset...

Damage reduction will be an issue until the fighter gets an adamantine falchion. The adventure gives an adamantine flail in the the second dungeon of the first adventure - make sure your PCs find that, and the fighter will need to make due with that.

For AoE, make sure they buy things like alchemist fire...have one of the other parties give your PCs tips on swarm fighting. You also may want to sprinkle these as treasure for your PCs. I find my party will never buy these but they will hold these if they find them.


drsparnum wrote:


Damage reduction will be an issue until the fighter gets an adamantine falchion. The adventure gives an adamantine flail in the the second dungeon of the first adventure - make sure your PCs find that, and the fighter will need to make due with that.

For AoE, make sure they buy things like alchemist fire...have one of the other parties give your PCs tips on swarm fighting. You also may want to sprinkle these as treasure for your PCs. I find my party will never buy these but they will hold these if they find them.

Yeah I might sprinkle some Weapon Blanch vials into the early game. Or weapons/ammo already treated but never used.


i just began running this for a group of 5 players, where 2 have never played RPGs before, and 1 member of the group is a serious min/maxer, who helped the others make their characters, so they have a crazy OP group dynamic (essentially by level 3 they all consistently have fast healing 5).

For tomb af Akhentepi i added the advanced template to all of the enemies, the only exception being the summoned swarm.

Do you guys have suggestions for what i can do once we get into the other books? because i seriously doubt that the advanced template will be enough by itself.

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