#07-01 - Between the lines


GM Discussion

51 to 98 of 98 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | next > last >>
Shadow Lodge 4/5 5/55/55/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East

As written in the conclusion - yes.

Silver Crusade 4/5

Stiletto wrote:
If the party leaves at Section B6 do they lose the 2nd Prestige Point?

I don't have the scenario in front of me, so I don't remember the numbers of the rooms/encounters. But if you're talking about accepting the deal and using the key to leave, then yes.

Sczarni 5/5 5/55/5 ***

Played this at GenCon and had a blast. Running it tomorrow and enjoyed reading it even more.

Gotta say after doing #7-00 through #7-03 that I'm super impressed with Season 7.

5/5 5/55/5

Hi Nefreet,

I have the opposite impression so far.

All Season 7's are really complex. I have experienced multiple inexperienced GM's butcher these scenario's. Also, all of them are considerably long making them practically un-playable in a 4 hours slot creating some of the content to get cut and end the of the scenarios to be rushed. (This Also appliers to 6-20, 6-22, and 6-23).

So all 3 new season 7's require 5 hour time slots and experienced and well prepped GM's to run. Since I rarely get that in Society play, I'm on the verge of changing game systems if the next few run this way also.

5/5 *****

One thing did strike me as I was running this about the alchemist task.

Spoiler:
There really should be a 4 player adjustment for this task. As things stand if you just go with the deal a 4 player party who divides the cost equally each takes a point of drain. A 5 player party who does so loses nothing as it reads like you only take a point per 5 full years given up.

Restoring drain costs 380gp or 2pp, pretty much the entire award from completing the scenario for a low tier group. That is pretty harsh.

When I ran it my group choose to gamble. I rolled a 20 then a 19, they gave up when each of them was paying out 7 years of their lives.

Shadow Lodge 4/5 5/55/55/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East

roysier wrote:

Hi Nefreet,

I have the opposite impression so far.

All Season 7's are really complex. I have experienced multiple inexperienced GM's butcher these scenario's. Also, all of them are considerably long making them practically un-playable in a 4 hours slot creating some of the content to get cut and end the of the scenarios to be rushed. (This Also appliers to 6-20, 6-22, and 6-23).

So all 3 new season 7's require 5 hour time slots and experienced and well prepped GM's to run. Since I rarely get that in Society play, I'm on the verge of changing game systems if the next few run this way also.

Complex yes, long... eh. Of the six games I ran, 4 finished with time to spare, and 2 went a bit long. One of those was because they did all three tasks with a lot of role-playing, another of those was a bunch of super-paranoid players. When I played we went a tad long, but it was the GM's first PFS game and again, we had some rather paranoid players.

Grand Lodge 4/5 **** Venture-Captain, California—Sacramento

Granted, we seemed to have an absurdly well tuned* party for this adventure. But we finished in 2 hours, 30 minutes. And that was with two pregens. We were fairly paranoid, but honestly, once we got past the green hag, and figured out the "look for the thing out of place, interact with everything" the mindscape went like clockwork. There was a degree of consistent iconography that made everything highly predictable and obvious.

(We played at the table next to Nefreet's. They were still going when we left, so I don't know how they did.)

*by absurdly well tuned, I mean my summoner who is designed to be a backup face (diplmacy 7, no other social skills) and level one Kyra were the only two with decent social skills other than intimidate, and we wouldn't let the other people use intimidate (even on the gnolls) because were were supposed to be being good guys. This was not even remotely an optomized table. I believe the arcanist occultist spent the entire second half of the mindscape trying to figure out how the rope we had been given was supposed to be useful (for some reason we didn't stop to identify it, mostly because we figured normal rules might not apply in a mindscape.)

Grand Lodge 5/5

Ran this 5 times at GenCon, never took more than 3 hours. Average was right around 2:40. Basically comes down to how fast people catch on to the method to move around (and how fast the GM starts throwing clue bricks :P). Making will saves against things help to :P. Now, granted speed is kind of my thing and I prepped the heck out of the module but still :).

4/5

This one was interesting... I like the attempts to do something different in a dungeon crawl, but it's probably not one I'd want to GM or play again (at least not without making sure the GM and I had the same assumptions.)

When I ran this, I missed John's note about giving a will save for each individual attack... which was almost lead to some dead players from high CR enemies and one near TPK. I did give a will save after each set of attacks, but the Will saves on a few of the frontliners were tragically low.

The players also didn't really get what the key entailed, but I gave them a skill check to realize the ramifications.

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/5 **

Just reading this now. Man, even by Paizos standards, the proofreading in this is absolutely atrocious. There are errors all over the place.

Silver Crusade 4/5

pauljathome wrote:
Just reading this now. Man, even by Paizos standards, the proofreading in this is absolutely atrocious. There are errors all over the place.

That's a common problem with scenarios released for GenCon every year. Because they're trying to cram in too many at once, their staff is overworked and either don't have time to edit as thoroughly, or maybe they're just tired enough from working overtime that they're more likely to miss stuff. Happens every year with the specials and first three scenarios of the new season.

Liberty's Edge 1/5

Played this on our german pathfinder con, our group was really horribly designed for this xD
We had 3 arcane casters, my cleric and a far from optimal built fighter,we got lucky because I asked the merchant if he knew anything about the divs that we had to fight and so wen ended up with cold Iron weapons, we had a single scroll of magic weapon and without it we would have been lost, but after we took oils of magic weapon from the VL (She was VL, wasn't she?)we had a chance to make it, and we actually made it, we were so lucky I did only prepare a single offensive spell, otherwise...
They gambling stuff is strange, if I am not completely mistaken, no servant of Sarenrae is allowed to waste his life, an my cleric worships Sarenrae, good thing my group gambled through it, the gnome spended a year afterwards because he was curious xD
I really like the S7 adventures so far, they were all great.
We were playing more then 4 hours too, but tbh that was just because the arcane casters had all not taken the feat to overcome spell resistance xD
Our paranoia saved us ultimately, but it took also some of our time.

I will run this next month as my first PFS adventure, I was GM for a couple of other games so far, even for PFS on roll20, but this will be a whole new experiance, and on top of it, it will be a complicated one ^^
I am actually looking forward to it, my roommates are all playing PFS too, and they will probably all play on my table, it will be interesting how the Llv 3 Magus of my roommate will pwerform in there, so far he nearly 2 shootet everything he encountered, but from my experience he will be forced to think of other ways to play his character, tbh I think that is a good thing for him^^
Anyway, are there any new insights on this? Is the abbility drain/abbility damage thing solved, is it really only intended for the wisdom dmg from the divs?
I had more questions, but I can't remember them right now, I don't even have the adventure yet, my VL just asked me the day before yesterday if I want to GM on that date and we needed some time to figure out what adventure I should play.

Dark Archive 1/5

James Anderson wrote:

I was about to ask the same thing. I see ability drain from the wager, but not ability damage.

The Doru Divs can cause wisdom damage with a poison bite - so it would help with that.

Haven't GMed this, but my lodge ran through it on my first PFS game as a player. The first encounter in the second half of the scenario gets kind of nasty if people keep failing their will saves. Actually, the entire second half is nasty if people keep failing their will saves.


Can someone explain how the gambling works? For example, if you buy dice in the 1st round, do you roll with them once and then need to re-buy dice the 2nd round? Or do you keep the dice and keep rolling for free?

Grand Lodge 4/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

The PCs buy the dice and roll them. Results are determined and the PCs receive what they win and Jelaris takes what they lose. Then the PCs buy more dice and continue until they choose to stop, or either side is out of tokens to bid.

4/5

Firillion wrote:


I really like the S7 adventures so far, they were all great.
We were playing more then 4 hours too, but tbh that was just because the arcane casters had all not taken the feat to overcome spell resistance xD
Our paranoia saved us ultimately, but it took also some of our time.

Hi :)

Actually the Gnome had Lvl 4-ECL 8 to break SR, but the Spell resistance 20+ / Fire Immunity killed me. :)

For me the Scenario was great, story wise, but the choice of opponents resulted in me ideling in nearly every fight, which was aweful.

Sovereign Court 4/5 *

Hi all,

It's been mentionned before, but I see no conclusive answer:

I'm facing a party including an Alchemist and a Psychic, this weekend.
Am I correctly assuming these classes do not affect the aeon in any way?

Grand Lodge 4/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

I would count the alchemist as granting the skill ability and the psychic as an arcane spellcaster. Naturally the DR against precision attacks won't come into play, and if psychic powers are not subject to SR that won't help it either.

Dark Archive 4/5 5/5 *

I laugh that they didn't account for the psychic classes in the first scenario dealing with psychic concepts directly. It might be a simple oversight. I was GMing for a party with a Kineticist last weekend. Didn't end up mattering, they bailed as soon as they could.

Grand Lodge 5/5

Monkhound wrote:

Hi all,

It's been mentionned before, but I see no conclusive answer:

I'm facing a party including an Alchemist and a Psychic, this weekend.
Am I correctly assuming these classes do not affect the aeon in any way?

At GenCon I was treating the Occultists I ran across as arcane casters (had 2 at 1 table :P), so I'd do the same for psychics. Alchemists are trickier but don't forget their extracts...

Sovereign Court 4/5 *

So you'd advise to treat both as Arcane casters?


So, this module has forced me to deal with a question that I've never resolved. I need your help with this text:

Shadow Conjuration rules about shadow creature attacks wrote:
the shadow creature's damage is one-fifth (20%) normal, and all special abilities that do not deal lethal damage are only 20% likely to work.

Does this mean the Shadow Conjuration green hag's special attack ends up being "2d4 strength damage, but only works 1 out of 5 times" or "20% of 2d4 strength damage rounded down, AND only works 1 out of 5 times."

Basically, do the Shadow Conjuration rules have a cumulative effect that stacks, or is it an either/or situation where only 1 limitation applies?

Silver Crusade 4/5

I don't know the answer to your question, but pay attention to the wording in the adventure. I don't remember exactly where it says it, but all the creatures in the mindscape do full damage to enemies who think they're real. Only if someone makes a Will save to realize the enemy is fake does the damage go down to 20%.


Thanks Fromper, I know. I'm just very concerned about whether those rules double-limit the ability damage (which makes it pointless) or if I really DO have chances of doing a full 2d4 damage.

My concern is this situation: they make the save, I hit and make the 20% odds of doing real damage, so I then do the full 2d4 strength damage -- at which point the player complains to upper management that I didn't apply the 20% reduction correctly, things get overturned, etc.

I want the damage to be full and scary if it supposed to be, but doing that kind of damage can freak out some of the more "this is serious business" kind of players. So it seems like it's on me to be super certain I'm running it correctly.

Silver Crusade 4/5

It's just ability damage. It's not permanent. If it were drain, and required a Restoration spell or something, that would be different, but nobody's going to get that freaked out over a little temporary damage.

Besides, that fight usually gets skipped anyway. I played this once and GMed it twice, and this fight only actually happened once. You're supposed to give them a couple of rounds to look around and realize the room changed, so then they get a Will save to move on before the fight even starts.

Grand Lodge 4/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

I knocked an Unchained rogue to 1 Str with the hag fight. It was pretty amazing.


OK. I'll do the full 2d4 and not worry about it, since it's just temporary damage and Steven seems to have done full damage in his games.

Silver Crusade 1/5 Contributor

I had a player fail the disbelief and then fail a save against the night hag's disease. Bad news for that guy. ^_^

Sovereign Court 1/5

Fromper wrote:


Besides, that fight usually gets skipped anyway. I played this once and GMed it twice, and this fight only actually happened once. You're supposed to give them a couple of rounds to look around and realize the room changed, so then they get a Will save to move on before the fight even starts.

Never seen it go that way.

"the arrival point is nearly identical to the meeting room in Farseer Tower."

"When the PCs acknowledge or touch her..."

It's not open your eyes, blink, roll a will save to disbelieve.

Breaking the circle and standing up looking around to investigate a room that looks the same without anyone even acknowledging that your venture captain that you've been sitting and holding hands with is now motionless and silent hunched over the unfurled scroll sounds bizarre to me.


Hmm. I feel dumb. It turns out that both of the topics currently under discussion are flatly answered just by reading the module. Regarding whether the shadow hag can use the option of full 2d4 strength damage when someone has saved against the shadow illusion, the answer is no:

module page 12 wrote:
Note that her weakness attack also does only 20% normal damage against anyone who disbelieves the hag.

So I guess the module author anticipated this question arising from the murky rule text, and decided to make it clear. It may not answer how the rule should be run in other cases, but at least for this module, the author wants us to cut the 2d4 by a fifth. So both limitations apply: 1 point of strength damage at most, AND it only activates 1 of 5 tries, which makes that special option utterly useless. It should never be used. But at least now I know to just use her normal claw attacks.

Regarding the PCs moving on before the hag fight even happens, the module directly contradicts this approach. It says:

module page 12 wrote:
Once the PCs have defeated Wulessa’s replacement, they can examine the room.

The order of events seems pretty cut & dry. That fight happens, then they examine the room, then they get to save and move on. Maybe there is an edge case where the PCs never interact with their leader and leave her on the floor, but as Quadstriker suggests that seems really odd. Also, if that does happen, this is an edge case where we simply have no instruction -- it's not that leaving the room is assumed. We have to guess/decide what to do. A GM could decide to ignore the text about her waiting for interaction and just attack before they leave. Or the GM could ignore the text mandating that the fight happen before they leave, and allow them to zap out. Either way, some text is being discarded, which sure makes it appear that either approach is equally valid.

The good news is that I cannot imagine this problem being common.


I just noticed that in some cases (room B4) there is only 1 discrepancy to allow the PCs a will save. So... what if they all fail that save? The DC is high enough that it could happen, especially with a group of 3 players using a pre-gen to fill out the table. A fighter, ranger, and alchemist? That's bad will saves all around, so everyone could fail, easy peazy.

Are they just forever stuck, then? Do you say, "Well, we end the game here, with you trapped in the void, unable to will yourself out of the room. Your bodies starve in the real world, and you eventually die."

There is no text in the module for this (nor in the mindscape rules) so how will you as a GM ad-lib this?

Grand Lodge 4/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
aboyd wrote:
OK. I'll do the full 2d4 and not worry about it, since it's just temporary damage and Steven seems to have done full damage in his games.

1st level rogues don't pass many Will saves. And he was unfortunately right next to her when combat started.

The hilarious thing was he had been talking at the start of the adventure about how his character uses Dex for everything so why wouldn't he dump Str?

Silver Crusade 4/5

The Will save to move on happens as soon as anyone points out that the room has changed.

You've spent the entire adventure reading boxed text that repeatedly mentions that it's a windless night, and before they start the ritual, the description of the closed windows is emphasized. Suddenly, they enter the mindscape, and the breeze through the open windows is making candles flicker. In two out of three tables I've done of this adventure, someone has immediately said "Weren't those windows closed?" or "Where'd the sudden breeze come from?", and made the Will save to get out of there before the hag revealed itself.

Even if they don't immediately say that, the hag is supposed to sit, hiding its face, for a few seconds before attacking. If the players get up and start walking around, she attacks, but they could look around for a round or two from where they are before the hag attacks. So they could still notice the breeze and/or open windows before the fight.

Grand Lodge 4/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

None of the players in my three runs so far have noticed the change in winds.

Silver Crusade 4/5

It's a pretty big thing that you should be emphasizing when you read the boxed text. Especially since I believe there's several sentences about the closed windows in the room before you start the ritual, and also more than one sentence about the wind blowing from the open windows in the boxed text after they get into the mindscape room with the hag.

As I said, players have noticed at two of my three tables of this. I was the player who noticed it when I played this at GenCon, and I've GMed it twice since then, and one of my players noticed it immediately in one of my runs.

Grand Lodge 4/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Fromper wrote:
It's a pretty big thing that you should be emphasizing when you read the boxed text.

I see no reason to force them to make the Will save. It allows them to explore the the room and possibly trigger the combat before such a thing happens, as the scenario was written. I read them the description of the room and wait for them to notice the discrepancy on their own rather than forcing it on them.

Shadow Lodge 4/5 *

4 people marked this as a favorite.

Having run this 6 times (gencon and after), my VC asked for notes and advice on running it for a local con. Here is what I came up with in case it is helpful to others. Also, some of these suggestions are from Caedmon Tracey, my son and 4 star gm who has also run this 5 times.

Wall of Text:

1. If you feel the table is comfortable enough with each other, have everyone hold hands (including you) during the seance. Put the scenario in your lap, ask everyone to bow their heads and read the box text looking down. Release your hands at the pause. Most of the time someone will actually touch/poke you (they -will- now be in the moment and you can give them a jump when you go into "hag mode"). Note: Play this one this way only if it would not be uncomfortable for the players to hold hands. Some people have different levels of personal space. You can alter it just holding hands up and out without players actually touching. If you hold your hands up, indicating the seance, the players will generally follow your lead and do the same.

2. The first transition in the mindscape is the hardest. They don't yet know they need to look for differences. I pushed the no wind in katapesh as much as I could prior to the scene. I even let the characters introduce and describe themselves to each other on a boat heading into katheer, with a pre-introduction something like this, "The strong inner sea winds push you on your vessel to katapesh, but stall as you approach the city itself. Your yet unknown mission awaits you at the pathfinder lodge in Farseer tower within the city. The crew resorts to rowing, much slower, but gives you ample time to get to know the other agents. Please introduce yourselves to each other". Any chance to reenforce the lack of wind will pay off. The div fight on the roof can be described as sticky hot with no wind, and the gnolls can even add a complaint about having to wait for the 'late as usual' shipment in the ruins with the heat of the day still lingering with no wind to ruffle their fur.

3. Plan what you are going to say when someone tries the door in the first mindscape scene. Does their hand go through the door knob? Does it turn but fall off in their hand revealing no door when they look up? It is "merged with the wall" according to the text, but it is the first moment out of combat that you get to shock the characters they aren't in Kansas anymore, so deserves a good dreamy description.

4. Bring poker chips in two colors for the game with the alchemist. It will make the game more tactile. Also, you can then use the chips later as simple "I disbelieve' tokens to put in front of players every combat in the mindscape after they make their will saves. Helps when you are computing damage. You'll have two colors of chips and there is not a combat with more than two creatures, so that works out nicely.

5. Talking visually with the archivist is hard, and can go wonky quickly. There is no box text for this, so actually say this scene out loud a couple times to yourself or a friend first. Thinking over your visual metaphors before the game is crucial. Paizo gm forum has lots of examples on this (rats in a house, with a broom shooing them out, and then later when it gets dangerous, maybe with dead rats with x's on their eyes is just one example).

6. Be very clear in the key/scroll trade scene that they are actually about to trade. Make obvious gestures even if you feel you are overacting. It is sometimes hard for the players to realize what is going on here. Also for fun, I always describe the sleeping form of the heavy as drooling, but that's just me.

7. When I describe the archivist coming out of the mist in the final scene, at the end, if the pc's consider negotiation or do not immediately pick up dice for initiative, I describe one of the arms holding forth a box, like a gift to the pc's and gently releasing it in the air. You can give them a sense motive here, if you want them to realize it's activating a defensive magic item, but honestly, the players are usually a little awestruck with the description and 4 out of the six times I've run this, the archivist gets the box out before combat. As an added bit of flair if that works, I describe the spear arm bracing into a combat position, while one hand whipes it's (crystal) lips and the final hand beacons the forward (ala Bruce lee in enter the dragon)

8. These are personal flavor, but you may find some value: A) I describe reflections of ancient combat manuals, scrolls and patterns appearing in the archivist crystals as it uses it's reflection evolution to gain new abilities. If they insist on looking into the chest to see the scrolls (no on trusts Murqual), B) I describe it almost like the briefcase in pulp fiction, with a golden glow that illuminates the face of the viewer. If that character persists beyond an initial look (wants to read the scrolls) I describe double copies of that pc's face getting sucked/pulled into the scrolls. That keeps them from getting too curious before the next scene.

9. If you run the gnolls, the donkey never lives.

3/5

Quick question on the will saves to disbelieve the shadow creatures - once a player has disbelieved one shadow creature are they set for the rest of the adventure or do they have to try again to disbelieve during the next shadow creature encounter?

5/5 *****

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Each encounter is how I ran it.

Silver Crusade 4/5

I think I treated it as each creature.

Grand Lodge 4/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Will save for each creature, just like illusions.

3/5

Many thanks all :)

Silver Crusade 4/5 Venture-Captain, Pennsylvania—Pittsburgh

Got talked into running this one--mindscapes are interesting things. The quote on page 1 only captures part of it:

Mindscapes wrote:

Normal Magic: In an immersive mindscape where magic behaves normally, characters and creatures can use spells, spell-like abilities, and magic items as they normally would. Spells are consumed and charges or consumables are spent. Damage dealt by magic is real, and the real-world body suffers accordingly if the mindscape is harmful. However, any magic that requires physical manipulation (such as drinking a potion) might not behave in the expected manner (the character could —drink— the potion and discover that nothing happens).

Some divination magic might provide strange or nonsensical information if it is providing details on what is going on in the real world while the caster's mind believes it is elsewhere. When a creature emerges from a mindscape, any magic it used while within has been consumed.

I'm inclined to say that wands and scrolls function and are consumed as the magic is used up, potions do not function and cannot be consumed because the action cannot happen (except for the potions Wulessa summons), and nonmagical things (arrows, alchemist's fires) function but are not consumed.

3/5

Prepping for a session this coming Saturday. Trying to wrap my head around the shadow conjuration. The sidebar says:

"their AC falls to 14 (AC 17 in Subtier 4–5)"

I've been comparing this to the actual shadow conjuration text in the CRB as well. From the looks of it, the sidebar has some 'special' rules because these creatures wouldn't normally be eligible as summoned monsters.

So some questions on the AC:

1) Is the drop in AC constant? IE, if the PC has not made the will save successfully yet, is the monster's AC the original or 14? For example, the green hag's AC is 19 normally. So is it 19 against PCs who believe it is real, or is 14 regardless?

2) I'm assuming the AC only goes down (falls) and not up. By that, I mean, the green hag has: AC 19, touch 11, flat-footed 18. I'm assuming that the AC doesn't become: AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 14. My guess is that it is: AC 14, touch 11, flat-footed 14.

3) Related to 2), is the AC scaled: should the green hag's AC be: AC 14, touch 6, flat-footed 13?

4) Is it a flat 14 (17 on high tier) for all shadow conjured monsters or should 14 be the maximum? The CRB entry says the monster gets 1/5th the original AC bonuses. The green hag's AC bonuses is +1 Dex, +8 natural. So per the CRB, the green hag's AC would be: AC 11, touch 10, flat-footed 11 (+1 natural), and not the flat AC 14. Of course, again it seems that the sidebar is overriding some of the shadow conjuration rules from the CRB.

Silver Crusade 4/5 Venture-Captain, Pennsylvania—Pittsburgh

Based on my experience running the scenario, the AC (and the DCs and saves and any other characteristics mentioned) needs to be the number listed for the subtier regardless of whether the illusion has been disbelieved or not, because otherwise those suckers would be simply too lethal. Any logic you apply to the AC would seem to also apply to saves and ability DCs as well.

The difference between 18 HP or 92 HP won't matter much if you're throwing an otherwise-CR-9 night hag at the party!

While this is referred to as a shadow conjuration, it does absolutely follow some unique rules to keep you from killing off your players. So follow the text wherever possible and if you've got questions about how things interact, then try to use the shadow conjuration rules to resolve those.

Regarding the specifics of applying the AC change, I interpret the text as referring to a cap on any particular AC category. So your latter example on item #2 is what I went with. I did not scale other AC values proportionally lower.

3/5

Terminalmancer wrote:

Based on my experience running the scenario, the AC (and the DCs and saves and any other characteristics mentioned) needs to be the number listed for the subtier regardless of whether the illusion has been disbelieved or not, because otherwise those suckers would be simply too lethal. Any logic you apply to the AC would seem to also apply to saves and ability DCs as well.

The difference between 18 HP or 92 HP won't matter much if you're throwing an otherwise-CR-9 night hag at the party!

While this is referred to as a shadow conjuration, it does absolutely follow some unique rules to keep you from killing off your players. So follow the text wherever possible and if you've got questions about how things interact, then try to use the shadow conjuration rules to resolve those.

Regarding the specifics of applying the AC change, I interpret the text as referring to a cap on any particular AC category. So your latter example on item #2 is what I went with. I did not scale other AC values proportionally lower.

Yeah this scenario is feeling like a reversal of the save or suck - where instead of a PC wrecking an encounter with their save or suck build, its the scenario wrecking the PCs with a save or suck encounter.

Liberty's Edge 3/5 5/5 **** Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha

I will be running this scenario on Saturday. Any additional comments from those who have already ran it?

Thank you to all the posters for your comments and suggestions. Will be using many of them.

3/5

After Action Report:
Ran this low tier with 3 1.0s and a lvl 3.

Phase one went well, they diplomized the gnolls and killed the mask div after negotiating down to two tasks. A few lessons learnt here:

Something about the mask task initial description implies that you need an arcane skill set, the group immediately discounted it as something they didn't have a skillmonkey for before asking more questions about it and when I played it my group did the same thing. I had Marqual eavesdrop and volunteer that removing the protections would be more physical than academic (I have a soft spot and wanted to avoid the ability drain task).

The gnoll task was simple enough, but after they completed it they looked at the 100g surplus they had left over and thought about spending it / keeping it. They decided to return it on the meta-reason that it is PFS and you don't get to keep it anyway. It would have been great if they spent that extra gold on gear and potions (level 1.0 characters) but I couldn't think of any way to encourage them to spend that gold without being ham-handed.

They really wanted the VC to delay the ritual till the morning. I ended up giving the ham-handed direction that it looked like she was too excited to wait for morning; they could join her, or they could let her go alone. In hindsight, I should have been more flexible and gave them a diplomacy check to talk reason into her.

The hag was a great opener. Just the previous session they all learnt that detect evil only detects 'mundane' evil if it has 5+ HD, so when the hag cast invisible the paladin detected evil. Him detecting that evil aura put the group on their toes.

Once everyone started to clue in that everything was an illusion, they starting wanting to choose to disbelieve the monsters. This would have been a good educational moment to stop, explain illusions and shadow illusions, and what is required to get a save (some sort of interaction, including at least a move or standard action worth of effort, by my interpretation). I didn't stop and educate the players, I had the Belker full attack, I made a mistake. So, decide how you understand the Illusion rules, stay consistent, and plan to stop and teach somewhere along the way.

Other than that is was really fun to interact with the party as the Archivist, ditto to other people's advice to make sure you take some time and have it quiz/interact with each player. That was some very fun RP, one character offered himself and then a pathfinder chronicle in exchange for the VC.

51 to 98 of 98 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | next > last >>
Community / Forums / Organized Play / GM Discussion / #07-01 - Between the lines All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.