RotRL problem...


Rise of the Runelords


I need some advice guys. I was running the RotRL campaign as due to its popularity. There were 5 players: a cavalier, paladin, zen archer, sorcerer, and a ranger. They all started with a 20 pt buy, except the cavalier who accidentally did a 15... Anyways, they were going about thistle top, and had learned of nualia's existence. They were on her level and got caught up with the guisarme trap. The cavalier fell in, the paladin acro'd accross and then this is when things got hairy... They were arguing, and so obviously nualia heard them. She came out to get the paladin by suprise. Then in subsequent rounds the zen archer crit failed the acrobatics check to jump it and failed the reflex saves to get out go the trap. The trap then brought his current hitpoint count negative. Then killed him. The sorcerer cast magic missile every round. The trap killed him and his body joined the cavalier in the hole at which point the ranger destroyed the trap door leaving it dangling open. Then nualia splayed the paladin. And over the subsequent 3 rounds she had killed the whole party except for the sorcerer who ran away. Where do I go from here? Has this happened to other people?


never played or ran this ap.

however, I've tpkd in almost every ap except second darkness,

usually ends campaign.

i dont understand whose still alive? the sorc or the ranger?

in any case, why can't the surviving character sell stuff/go into debt to get funds to raise his party?

Hire some mercs, use some charisma skills get the backing he needs ad recover bodies.

Like wise, he's still a surviving member, so still knows the quest, he could simply organize a new adventuring party (roll new characters) and lead it on this quest.

I would suggest a better mix of character classes than what you had.

You need crowd control, healer, front liner and a trapper.

You either need an arcanist and a switch hitter depending on which character survived.

Encourage characters like bards, summoners and alchemists and you group will do better.

An inquisitor makes an awesome switch hitter.

Rage prophet would also be an extremely useful character.

I think you had too many redundant rolls in the party (ranger and a zen archer, cavalier and a Paladin)

Grand Lodge

Give me some background to the survivor.


Well, my group got killed by Gogmurt last week. Complete TPK.

GM had us roll up new characters, basically a group that had been send from Magnimar because Hemlock went there to ask for help. You could do something similar if you want.

If one of your characters survived and ran away, it's even easier. He could just return to Sandpoint and get some more adventurers as reinforcements before returning to Thistletop.

At this point, most of Nualias allies should be dead. So maybe have her raise a few Zombies, or add onother Yeth Hound or two to the dungeon. Just enough to keep the new heroes on their toes. It's kinda boring to just walk through an empty dungeon straight to the boss and kill her.

Grand Lodge

Giridan wrote:
Then in subsequent rounds the zen archer crit failed the acrobatics check to jump it and failed the reflex saves to get out go the trap.

According to the rules rolling a 1 doesn't automatically fail skill checks. It's possible that his bonus to acrobatics wasn't high enough to cross however large the trap was. If it was at least 3rd level the monk would get an extra +4 to jump because of it's higher speed.


I believe that's one of the tougher battles anyways in RotRL.

You could have them reroll new characters, or perhaps allow the sorc somehow to bring the others back to life.


Can you explain again how things went? with a little more detail this time?

From what i can understand:
1) Party exits room E2 and enters E3.
2) Cavalier was going first so the trap activates.
3) Cavalier loses the reflex to avoid the trap.
4) 1 round passes.
5) For 2 rounds the statues try to hit the cavalier.
6) Next round the ground opens to a pit and the cavalier loses the 7) reflex to not fall and falls to the pit.
7) Next round the trap is reseted (the portculises are raised and the 8) ground is in place) and the paladin jumps across.
9) The party justs stands there (the paladin 5 feet away from the nearest party member, cavalier inside the pit) and argues for however many rounds Nualia needs to finish buffing herself.
8) Nualia gets a surprise round and tries to hit the paladin.
9) Battle starts and the zen archer (for some reason) decides that instead of shooting Nualia he wants to try to jump across the trapped floor and get on the other side, he fails his acrobatics for the jump (nearly impossible*), lands on the trapped floor, activates the trap and loses the reflex save to avoid the trap.
10) 2 rounds pass where the paladin fights Nualia, the monk gets hit by the statues, the cavalier is in the pit, the sorcerer hits Nualia with magic missiles and the ranger does what exactly?
11) the ground that the unconsious (because he was brought to negative hit points by the trap) body of the monk falls into the pit that the cavalier is in and the fall kills him.
12) the same round the paladin dies from Nualia and the sorcerer keeps magic missiling her.
13) on the next 3 rounds Nualia kills the ranger and the sorcerer escapes.

Did i get anything wrong?
If not i have a few questions:
1) What was the party arguing about?
2) What was the status of the cavalier inside the pit?
3) What was the ranger doing for the 3-4 rounds while Nualia was in melee with the paladin?
4) Didn't the sorcerer had anything better to cast other than magic missile? didn't he had grease?
4) How did you manage to bring to negatives a full hp (~23) monk with four attacks at +8 for 1d10+4?
5) How did the ranger and the sorcerer managed to lose from Nualia after she was in melee with the paladin for 2-3 rounds while getting hit by magic missiles?

*the only way it could happen is if the zen archer has another archetype that gives up fast movement and has 3 or less DEX modifier and has no ranks in acrobatics OR is of a race that has less than 30 feet speed and has 3 or less DEX modifier and has no ranks in acrobatics


Pathfinder Maps Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

It happened. Don't retcon it, or you'll lose all sense of danger and adventure in future games.

Give the sorcerer some down time while he contacts the dead PCs' next of kin. Tell the other players to come to next session with new characters, if they wish they can be relatives or friends of their dead characters (or each other's characters!) with the same xp level and equipment as standard.

TPKs always feel bad, but IMHO they can be important for maintaining the sense of vulnerability and danger. Sure, if it fits the story, you can talk about recovering the bodies for raise dead. But many times this just isn't plausible.

Just think, if you'd been playing Call of Cthulhu, the surprising thing wouldn't have been the TPK, but the fact that you played for more than 45 minutes before the TPK happened.


If everyone had died, I might have suggested Deus Ex Shalelu. Or is it Shalelu Ex Machina? I can never recall.

Anyway, it all depends on what the Sorcerer's character wants to do and whether the other players are still wanting to play those particular characters. Here are my suggestions:

1)Sorcerer wants to rescue. Party wants to be rescued.
Players start out playing Sorcerer and his hired mercenaries. Other PCs found alive and awaiting sacrifice in Thistletop dungeon. Let players know that foes will not always leave them alive, but Nualia wanted a sacrifice for her ascendance ceremony and saved them.

2)Sorcerer is frightened and runs away. Player deems him retired. Other PCs want to keep playing.
PCs awaken in dungeon awaiting sacrifice, along with Sorc player's new character, who was captured by goblins a few weeks ago. Let players know that foes will not always leave them alive, but Nualia wanted a sacrifice for her ascendance ceremony and saved them.

3)Sorcerer and other players want to keep playing character, but Sorc not willing to rescue.
Deus Ex Shalelu. Shalelu rescues them. Sorcerer receives drawback relating to his fear. Nervous, Doubt or a simple -2 to saves vs. Fear, perhaps? The other PCs are scarred by their experiences getting tortured by the goblins and gain a drawback from that. Might I suggest Burned? Give them a chance to recover from the drawbacks later, either via a sidequest, RP or spending some gold on it. But not until at least midway through book 2 or so.

4)Sorc wants to keep playing, other players want to roll new characters.
This one is fairly self explanatory.

Wheldrake wrote:
TPKs always feel bad, but IMHO they can be important for maintaining the sense of vulnerability and danger. Sure, if it fits the story, you can talk about recovering the bodies for raise dead. But many times this just isn't plausible.

I agree that deaths should come with penalties(even if it's only the gold cost of a raise dead), but this early on in the game, I wouldn't force the players to roll up completely new characters if they still want to play these.


@Wheldrake
I might have agreed with you but in this case i am pretty sure that some (maybe a lot) rules mistakes were made, the reason i am saying this is that (having run RotRL) i can't think of a way that a group of 5 PCs would lose to Nualia of AE and her hound, when i played that part* my party finished her in two rounds with only one PC having recieved (A LOT of) damage.

*sure it was my own Nualia because AE wasn't out yet, and while i had my PCs be level 4 (instead of 3) when they faced her, the way i had built her; she was more dangerous than in the one in the AE


Here's a possibility: None of the PCs actually died-- they were just dropped to negative hit points. Nualia and her crew rescued them and healed them back to consciousness-- but only as prisoners to be used as living sacrifices to Lamashtu.

The PCs wake up imprisoned in Thistletop, without their gear. Go!

It will require some work on your part to figure out where they're being held, and how they can reasonably extricate themselves from that position, but it could be a really fun "jailbreak" adventure.


SPOILERS GUYS!

This should be in the AP forum, not general advise.


In general I always make the decision on whether or not the player continues with their character, their choice. Face it, between gods, and other forms of magic, there's a myriad way of bringing a character back to life.

What I do from that point though is make sure that if the character comes back, it comes with some sort of story/baggage. Poldaran points out some good ways to do that, but you can also use this to introduce some complication to the campaign ;).


A big party with no healer (primary or otherwise)?

It's the usual gamble no matter what adventure you run. Potions and wands of cure wounds can only take you so far.

In exchange, the offensive power you get can make most fights end much sooner, limiting the damage you receive.

Now as to what to do after a near TPK. There's no single correct answer, and it depends more on your group wants to do.


Kelarith wrote:
What I do from that point though is make sure that if the character comes back, it comes with some sort of story/baggage. Poldaran points out some good ways to do that, but you can also use this to introduce some complication to the campaign ;).

Indeed. I just named the laziest ways that I would do it.

Honestly, if it were me, I'd probably have them sometime in a later book having to deal with Nualia's fully grown demonic offspring at some later date...

Spoiler:
and it would bear a striking resemblance to one of the PCs. And before anyone squicks...it's worse than you think, unless your thought involved face huggers.

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

Giridan wrote:
Where do I go from here?

Luckily Darwin is alive and well in Golarion. A poorly built group willd iscover it via trial and error. Someone rolling up a Cleric for attempt #2? I'd have the Sorcerer step up and form a new party. Anyone have siblings?

Giridan wrote:
Has this happened to other people?

We've had TPKs, but not usually because of reasons like this. Things your group did wrong:

  • Lack of a healer. I've seen loads of people on these forums make wild claims about iron man adventurers not needing a cleric. Whatever!? There are 4 main roles in an adventuring group, if you're going to skimp, skimp on the rogue, always have a healer. Cleric, Oradin, even that Bard healing Archetype, but have one.
  • Critical failure on a skill check? That's not how skills work.
  • A 3rd level Paladin against a 7th level BBEG might be asking too much of the Paladin.
  • The Paladin was caught by surprise? He fail a perception? She sneak up on him? She has no sneak skill to speak of.
  • Presumably Nualia came buffed to the party per her writeup. Even unbuffed she's a beast at that level. I'm guessing the party was not buffed? Again, the lack of a healer/buffer seems bad planning.
  • Arguing in public while invading is a bad plan.


Haladir wrote:

Here's a possibility: None of the PCs actually died-- they were just dropped to negative hit points. Nualia and her crew rescued them and healed them back to consciousness-- but only as prisoners to be used as living sacrifices to Lamashtu.

The PCs wake up imprisoned in Thistletop, without their gear. Go!

It will require some work on your part to figure out where they're being held, and how they can reasonably extricate themselves from that position, but it could be a really fun "jailbreak" adventure.

I REALLY hate that sort of thing.

Better yet, just have the Sorc come back with a new group of guys for revenge. They had a poorly built group and used poor tactics.


Sorcerer goes back to Sandpoint, recruits more adventurers, goes back. Nuala is probably long gone, though, depending on what her plans are, so it may just be a matter of tracking her to the next step.

Digression:
I hate how PF requires someone to potentially play a class/character they don't enjoy because it's 'expected'. Even in an AP, the GM should adjust the flow/content of the game to fit the PCs capabilities, not the other way around.

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

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Zhayne wrote:
I hate how PF requires someone to potentially play a class/character they don't enjoy because it's 'expected'. Even in an AP, the GM should adjust the flow/content of the game to fit the PCs capabilities, not the other way around.

There's no requirement to have a "goalie" in soccer or hockey.

Choosing to not have a goalie might have negative consequences in your success/failure ratio.


The difference, of course, is that those are competitive games, while PF is not. The only way you succeed in PF is if you have fun, and if someone is stuck playing the cleric when they don't want to, and thus not having fun, they are by definition losing no matter what the outcome of the adventure.


There was an awesome thread around here somewhere about TPKs and what to do. Personally I'm against killing off players as, once the player loses their character their story ends and you lose the rich npc connections, character deeds, backgrounds, etc that each player worked to create.

Personally I'd have it turn out the PCs didn't actually die but are now at staggered/1hp, tied up, missing their items and about to be fed to the bunyip/yeth hounds/sacrificed.

They're now in a dangerous situation, they've taken a penalty (losing items) and this gives players a chance to continue their stories. Instead of fighting their way in they now need to sneak, steal, choose their battles and escape to play another day.

How I'd do it.

Grand Lodge

We had this sort of thing happen in a previous campaign.

We used the Pathfinder Society.

Why?

Pathfinder Society is made up of adventurers. They can show up randomly at places, for random reasons.

Basically, the survivor can meet up with a bunch of members of Pathfinder Society, and join the adventure. Venture Caption basically says "Go, explore, report", members join the adventuring party.

Now, they have a reason to be there, and a reason to work together, reason to know, or not know each other, and they can all be very unique PCs.

It works easily, and smoothly.

It even provides the DM with a number of available NPCs to randomly show up, and help/hinder/direct if need be.


@Zahir ibn Mahmoud ibn Jothan
Nualia is 6th level not 7th, yes her stealth is at -2 but then again the paladin might not have had any ranks in perception, coupled with the penalty for the arguing... it might very well be left up to the dice.
No as written in the AE isn't a beast.
While agree that a lack of a full divine caster hurts too much in most APs (including this one), how would it help the group in the current situation to have a 3rd level cleric instead of someone else in that party?

@Zhayne
If Nualia is long gone from Thistletop that means that a demon with class levels, a greater barghest, probably every goblinoid of the region, and maybe even a small army of undead is moving to torch Sandpoint.

@Deadalready
From the very little the OP have told us, some of the PCs are already dead from the battle.

Silver Crusade RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16

leo1925 wrote:
Nualia is 6th level not 7th, yes her stealth is at -2 but then again the paladin might not have had any ranks in perception, coupled with the penalty for the arguing... it might very well be left up to the dice.

Sure enough, I read that wrong somehow. She's 6th. Very tankable by a 3rd level Paladin with all of her buffs.

leo1925 wrote:
No as written in the AE isn't a beast.

Vs a 3rd level party? 18AC? 59 hitpoints? 2d6 negative energy channel? Ferocious Strike and Fury of the Abyss?

I stand by my assessment of "she's a beast."

leo1925 wrote:
While agree that a lack of a full divine caster hurts too much in most APs (including this one), how would it help the group in the current situation to have a 3rd level cleric instead of someone else in that party?

Two tanks (Paladin and Cavalier) and three ranged (Sorcerer, Zen Archer, Ranger)?

I think the Zen Archer or the Ranger could have been a Cleric. An Archer Cleric if you must, but still, a Cleric.


Zahir wrote:
Vs a 3rd level party? 18AC? 59 hit points? 2d6 negative energy channel? Ferocious Strike and Fury of the Abyss?

Indeed, as a solo encounter, this creature is a killer and is probably well balanced against a full party in good position to battle her together at the same time.

Unfortunately, what killed the party was the trap... By itself it seems to have killed 2 party members as well as separating the party...which was the key issue

When Nuala arrived, she could pick them out one by one and individually, they were no match to her...

Now for the Op 's question, he has different alternatives as explained earlier by others:

- imprisoned
- new characters
- imprisoned and sorcerer comes back with other groups
- etc

all depends on what players and GM want to do...


Kenji Elindir wrote:
Giridan wrote:
Then in subsequent rounds the zen archer crit failed the acrobatics check to jump it and failed the reflex saves to get out go the trap.
According to the rules rolling a 1 doesn't automatically fail skill checks. It's possible that his bonus to acrobatics wasn't high enough to cross however large the trap was. If it was at least 3rd level the monk would get an extra +4 to jump because of it's higher speed.

My group has a rule where if you roll a 1 you crit fail, roll again and subtract 20.


Giridan wrote:
Kenji Elindir wrote:
Giridan wrote:
Then in subsequent rounds the zen archer crit failed the acrobatics check to jump it and failed the reflex saves to get out go the trap.
According to the rules rolling a 1 doesn't automatically fail skill checks. It's possible that his bonus to acrobatics wasn't high enough to cross however large the trap was. If it was at least 3rd level the monk would get an extra +4 to jump because of it's higher speed.
My group has a rule where if you roll a 1 you crit fail, roll again and subtract 20.

Ok so a house is the reason why the monk failed his acrobatics check, can you please answer the rest of my questions?

Paizo Glitterati Robot

Removed some posts. Don't derail a thread that is soliciting for help and advice like this.


Nualia is a pretty common TPK, but it very seldom happens like this. Usually the doggies make half the party run away and meet the Tentamort or Lyrie while she kills the others. But in this case it was the trap and bad tactics.

As far as how to continue: the sorcerer survived, so gets to carry on. Other players can either roll up new PCs (plenty of options above) or be awaiting sacrifice, and while they're waiting to be rescued the player can run a mercenary or a bunch of 1W goons from Magnimar, who become NPCs again afterwards.


Giridan wrote:
Kenji Elindir wrote:
Giridan wrote:
Then in subsequent rounds the zen archer crit failed the acrobatics check to jump it and failed the reflex saves to get out go the trap.
According to the rules rolling a 1 doesn't automatically fail skill checks. It's possible that his bonus to acrobatics wasn't high enough to cross however large the trap was. If it was at least 3rd level the monk would get an extra +4 to jump because of it's higher speed.
My group has a rule where if you roll a 1 you crit fail, roll again and subtract 20.

Could you shed light on why your group believes this is a good rule? And what exactly is its purpose on a skill check? Was this introduced in a high level campaign to introduce a chance of failure for skill checks? If so I'd reconsider for groups of 3rd or 4th level. I think your own experience suggests how it can escalate the danger level. Often a failed skill check is but a minor annoyance but in some circumstances and especially for low level characters they are occaisionally lethal. Combining failed skill checks with tactical mistakes only makes them more problematical.

What is your players' attitude about the outcome? Are they unhappy? Were they attached to the characters? Are they willing to create new ones? Do they even want to continue? Are they interested in the "escape or be sacrificed" plot line suggested by several responses above?

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