Modifying Burnt Offerings (removing undead)


Rise of the Runelords


Okay I have spent the past few days reading through the GM threads and the community created thread. I looked through the forums and didn't really see my situation, so I figured I'd ask here. I need suggestions for what to replace the undead in the adventure path with. I am going to be modifying the path quite a bit because I am running it for a 5 and 7 year old, plus my husband (but really he is fine with whatever I do).

The 5 year old has stated that she doesn't like skeletons and undead monsters, though she enjoys fighting goblins and dragons. So undead is out. Any suggestion for a good replacement?

This is both the 5 and 7 year olds first campaign, but their character stats are super high (they are little) and they can hit fairly high. The group will be an Elf druid (GM played), Human Fighter (7 year old), Human Princess Wizard (5 year old) and Dwarf Rogue (house ruled rogue, played by husband).

I can't substitute with anything to scary, I have the beastiary 1, and I am willing to buy the pdf for one of the other (or even 2) if needed.

I am also completely redoing the skinsaw murder adventure, because I know it will not work with the kids, but questions about that one are for later.

So short question, what would you replace the undead with in Burnt Offerings, that isn't overly scary? Thanks for any help.


Hm.

Well, simple substitution would be the best solution.

Have you read the entire AP?

I think you'll have to change more than just Book 2. Large sections of Book 3 and even some of the basic campaign themes are rather R-Rated.


Well, you could always do something like animated objects. That way you can taylor them to your age group.

For example, you could make the skeleton in the tomb at the beginning of the AP an animated grve digger's shovel, or perhaps the lid to the old priest's tomb even.


Not yet, the full edition arrives either tomorrow or Friday. I know the basics because my husband and I ran the first two in the card game last year, and I know that skinsaw and the undead in burnt are not going to work as is. I figure I can look through book 3 and figure it out too. Fortunately the kids are young enough that some of it will go right over their heads, but yes I am aware that there are a number of themes in the campaign that need to be modified.

I like that idea of animated objects, that might work well.


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I play exclusively with my wife and kids (ages 3.5 and 10), and honestly when they're that young its more about what you don't describe then then what you do, frame the grauls as scary ogres living in the woods, leave out the other stuff and you should be okay, even book 2 can be done with just slight changes to descriptions.

the best advice i can say is just ask yourself "How would Disney do this? or if you prefer "how would Don Bluth do it?" as they get a bit older you can ask "How would The Simpsons do this?" never ever ask yourself "how would South Park do this?":p

hope that helps


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Yeah I was going with the "How would Pixar and all the lego xyz games do this?" as my general baseline for will it work for the small people questions.


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Also little things, like in RoW giving the party the chance to rescue the NPCs daughter did tremendous things for party morale, stuff where little by little (or lots and lots) they feel they're having a positive influence on the world around them, like having Titus Scarnetti eventually coming around (tho not until after the beginning of book 4:)

edit: and ramp up the treasure, kids love treasure! my wife and daughter don't even sell a third of the jewelry they find (buts its so pretty! i'll find somewhere to wear it!" is a common refrain in our party:)


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Thanks Captain Yesterday, both your posts help a lot, and yep I know they both adore treasure, we did the beginner box and they loved finding all sorts of shinnies.

All the 5 year olds spells actually are gold colored because she wanted to turn everything into gold, well I guess she remembered the story of Midas we studied, but I got her to agree to gold colored spells instead.


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i would switch undead in the first book with goblins if possible, my kids were the opposite, they love goblins, finding them utterly adorable in their own sort of way:) but they have no problem cutting down wave after wave of skeletons and their ilk:)

the second book just needs to be reframed as a murder mystery maybe, cut the ghouls out entirely, maybe with some evil cultists or something, The Misgivings might work as just a really spooky haunted house:) just haunts i mean

Grand Lodge

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Biggest rewrite will be needed for Skinsaw Murders.

A ghoul is a CR 1 creature, and the first part of the adventure goes up against

MYSTERY:
Aldern Foxglove who has turned into a ghoul.

My suggestion would be to instead have the BBEG be changed instead into a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde sort of villain. Rather than being all rotten and corpsey, have them be feral and unkempt. Just remove the ghouls, and keep a few animated objects "Infused with anger."

The haunts might be a bit intense, both for scariness, and in how much they can brutalize the party.


Thanks everyone, I'm getting some good suggestions here.

The Exchange

Honestly, all you have to do is re-skin the undead creatures in the module. You don't even have to change their stats. House rule that channel works on the remorselessly corrupt (undead by another name).

so I don't give anything away:
Just describe the skeletons as gaunt and mindless creations. For the ghouls, don't say that they're undead. Just remorselessly corrupted. Then you can use the rules for channeling against them without actually using the term undead.

I like Ms. Pleiades idea for the Skinsaw Man though. Jekyll & Hyde him and his ancestors and you're good.

Just remember that undead is a descriptive term. Just don't use it and your kids will have fun.

Though you might really want to soften up the Hook Mountain portion. I haven't played through it yet but I can already hear banjo music.


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I've got a few suggestions...

Spoiler:

Undead are not at all critical to Burnt Offerings - Skinsaw on the other hand is another story but we'll tackle that next.

I'm doing this from memory but I only recall three undead appearances in Burnt.
1. The skeletons in Father Tobyn's tomb. Suggestion: replace with goblins. Or a sinspawn. You could make the tomb have a secret entrance to the Catacombs. Beyond undead, I assume you're going to have to do something with the Glassworks. What Tsuto and the goblins have done there as written is pretty R-rated. You could simply have Lonjitsu and the workers captive instead of dead. Maybe the players save them but Ameiko has been taken to Thistletop.
2. The zombies in Catacombs. As placed they're unimportant, you could simply omit them.
3. The shadows in Thistletop. Simply omit them. Replace them with goblins. Or a low level construct of some kind.

At this point I'm going to suggest a theme - portray the "villains" as bestial and rabid instead of malevolent and depraved. The players enemies have let their emotions run amok - anger or greed/hunger. You can emphasize this for Lamashtu worshippers and replace the ghouls in Skinsaw with lycanthropes. This would let your players save many of the victims even Aldern and Iesha. The "monsters" aren't all evil - they're cursed.

You can change the haunts at the Foxglove Manor to be less violent and more story-telling by omitting the failed save consequences. Perhaps Iesha is a spirit that helps the pc's save Aldern by giving hints about what's happened to him. You'll need to change his backstory of course. Have you or your kids seen the movie Monster House? It might be too intense for a 5 and 7 year old but it might give you some ideas.

You'll need to think a little about Skinsaw since Aldern shows up early in Burnt Offerings, at least as written.


tabrizia wrote:


So short question, what would you replace the undead with in Burnt Offerings, that isn't overly scary? Thanks for any help.

A goblin who stayed behind, got drunk on pilfered brandy and is sleeping it off in the crypts.

The two skeletons aren't meant to be much of a fight anyway. I'd personally skip the 'goblin in the closet' encounter or at least alter it so that a dead man's face isn't getting eaten.


Something else to keep in mind, when they are young enough they will not understand certain mature things enough to affect them.


Thanks for all the ideas everyone, it is helping a lot in the planning for the adventure.


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captain yesterday wrote:
never ever ask yourself "how would South Park do this?":p

OMG!!! That's going to be my AP motto from now on! Woo hoo!

More seriously, I ran Curse of the Crimson Throne for a 7-year-old and a 10-year-old (both boys), and it was exactly as everyone has already suggested: Leave the monster stats the same, just change their descriptions. Instead of a dad having his "face eaten" (the goblin in the closet), have his favorite slippers stolen.

People live. Crimes are minor but annoying. Kids get to beat up on critters they're comfortable beating up on.

It all works.

Heck, you should have SEEN the difference between Laori Vaus' behavior when the kids were at the table, and when they weren't. Shameful!

EDIT: Of course, this would mandate the corollary that the PCs would *always* succeed just by asking, "What would Brian Boitano do?", but I can live with that. I'm old enough to remember him as a skater, rather than a punchline...


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So you're saying CotCT is the AP to go all south park on then:p


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Thats the difference between growing up on the west coast vs midwest:) here he was always a punchline.
Dick Trickle, however is an american hero:p

i suspect alcohol has something to do with it:-)


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Again thanks all, great ideas here, I am totally going to try to leave the stats about the same and just change the descriptions for what I can.

I'm actually surprised at the 7 year old, when we played a quick module last night he kept trying to talk to the NPCs rather then just killing them. He almost sent my husband's rogue into fits last night when he paid off the goblin bandits that had ambushed them, rather then just killing them. Then we had to tell him, "No, skeletons and zombies are not going to negotiate." later on. It was kind of shocking and neat to see him, not just go for the easy kill everything option.


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I nearly forgot, good luck with bringing the next generation into the fold.

The Exchange

tabrizia wrote:

Again thanks all, great ideas here, I am totally going to try to leave the stats about the same and just change the descriptions for what I can.

I'm actually surprised at the 7 year old, when we played a quick module last night he kept trying to talk to the NPCs rather then just killing them. He almost sent my husband's rogue into fits last night when he paid off the goblin bandits that had ambushed them, rather then just killing them. Then we had to tell him, "No, skeletons and zombies are not going to negotiate." later on. It was kind of shocking and neat to see him, not just go for the easy kill everything option.

This is awesome. I love that kids often find ways to do things that we adults don't bother to think of with our social programming.


I'm running a homebrew for my daughter (age 11) and several of her friends. They are ALWAYS trying to talk to things instead of taking them out. It's refreshing, actually, and they have challenged me, as a GM, to come up with scenarios where talking to the NPCs really pays off.

It's a lot easier to just throw drooling monsters at them and let them hack them up. I think the next time they try to talk to a zombie, I'll give him a brain and have him start reciting Shakespeare!

Related to the thread, though, I love all of the ideas everyone has thrown out here. I'm prepping to run this AP for our regular group, which is a mix of adults and our teenagers. We don't have any undead issues in the group, having gone most of the way through Carrion Crown at this point (our youngest in this group is 13, and while I'm not GM'ing it, I know our GM has modified how he describes things in deference to our younger members), but if we decide to invite any of the 11 year olds in our families to join Runelords, I'll be looking to lighten it up some, too. The suggestion to allow the party to "save" many of the victims is a great one.


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We played again last night, they were at the last fight of the first section of burnt offerings. After quickly decimating the goblin commander, the 7 year old again attempted and succeeded at paying off the other goblins to just leave. The goblins were happy with their 10 gold and the party was happy with not having to fight, and they took the couple of goblins that has been color sprayed unconscious as captives to gain at least a bit of information about what was happening.

I do have to modify and up the difficulty though, we're playing a mix of regular and starter box rules (no AO for the kids only for my husband), and they rolled for their characters so they are strong at this level. Plus the 3 year old decided to play too, so I have 2, 2nd level fighters with +8 or +9 to attack at this point, which means things die fast and hit points on all mobs are at least tripled.

I am always kind of amazed when they do something unexpected, because it falls under the, I really won't have thought of that, and I really won't have thought the 3, 5 and 7 year old would have thought of that!

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