Bringing back an "old friend" in Shattered Star


Shattered Star


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There are some Rise of the Runelords spoilers ahead, as well as the obvious Shattered Star spoilers, so be warned.

I recently finished GMing Rise of the Runelords for my group, and have since moved on to GMing Shattered Star. I've been trying to spice up Shattered Star by really playing up the Pathfinder Society portion; I've been making plans to add in a bunch of Pathfinder Society scenarios as optional side-missions to be played between (and sometimes during) the main books of Shattered Star.

However, in my attempt to personalize this playthrough of Shattered Star, I had an idea: see, when my players fought Karzoug on the last session of Rise of the Runelords, they lost. I've issued forth the statement that, despite this, their characters in Shattered Star are in the same continuity as the ones in Rise of the Runelords, but what I haven't done is tell them how Karzoug was defeated so that the world could go on as normal. In fact, I believe that the only time it was brought up, I had Sheila Heidmarch state that it was "a long story."

That brings me to my idea: I'm thinking that Karzoug wasn't defeated, by either their old group of adventurers, another group, or any other means. Instead, he decided to bide his time, and to ensure that when the other Runelords decided to rouse from their slumber, he would be the most powerful one, and be able to dispatch them. How did he decide to do this? Why, by assembling the fragments of the Shattered Star, and rebuilding the Sihedron, of course.

Now, this is where the plot gets loopy. Instead of using his sheer arcane power to find the Shards, what if he decided that it wasn't worth his time to do so directly? What if, instead of searching for the Shards himself, he managed to convince a group of lowly adventurers to find them for him?

What I'm sort of planning is thus: Karzoug, undefeated by Varisia's greatest heroes, wants to ensure that his rise - and that of his empire - goes completely unchallenged. To do this, he plans on re-assembling the Sihedron, which has the added benefit of bringing back the Dead King Xin, who Karzoug would certainly love to put down once and for all. To this end, he decides to masquerade as someone who could, within reason, be able to bring on small groups of adventurers to do his bidding without any questioning. And who better than the lovely Sheila Heidmarch?

Thus, Karzoug kills / captures / whathaveyous the real Sheila Heidmarch, disguising himself as her (I know he can't use Illusion spells, but he's rich. He can afford something). He spends a couple of years establishing himself as the "real" Sheila, and searching for the location of the first Shard to kick off his little game, whereupon he brings in the PCs and the campaign starts.

What I'm asking, then, is does this sound like a good idea? If so, how should I go about alluding to it during the campaign (and should I even bother doing so)? How should I have it play out in the end? I was thinking about having "Sheila" congratulate the PCs after they put down Xin, asking for the Sihedron, and then revealing herself as Karzoug (maybe teleporting the group to the Eye of Avarice), whereupon the PCs would have to fight him, but I don't know whether or not that's a good idea.

So, comments, critiques, suggestions? Anything's appreciated!


Sounds good. The final boss sounds suitably awe inspiring and epic. Make sure to drop subtle clues to Sheila's real identity, no idea what form that might take.


I love it. Karzoug is the Sin Lord of Greed right? so you could give hints to the PC's in the way of when Sheila tells them about where the next Shard is, she says it in such a way as to make herself sound to greedily eager to obtain it.

While the PC's are fighting Xin, have Sheila Appear, turn into Karzoug and deal the last blow to Xin, then Teleports the PC's to the Eye of Avarice to dispatch them on his own terms.


I definitely plan on giving some clues as to "Sheila's" real identity; the idea about playing up Karzoug's greed is a really good one, I think. When I ran Rise of the Runelords, I gave Karzoug a very unique voice, so I might even do some minor slips where Karzoug accidentally starts speaking in his "normal" voice, such as when the party gets their hands on a new Shard.

I'm not so sure about having Karzoug deal the final blow to Xin, though. At that point, the party is bound to be low on resources, and if the last Karzoug fight was any indicator, that'll result in another TPK. It would certainly make sense for Karzoug to want to kill Xin himself, I just can't think of a way for it to happen without stealing some of the party's glory or making the final fight unnecessarily difficult for them.

I suppose I'll know more about their capabilities as we get to that part, though. They're only level 2 right now, so there's a long way to go before they could even fight Karzoug's left nostril.

Thanks for the suggestions though guys, and keep them coming!


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Well, i think that your idea is good. This is way im too in my campaign i'm having a Karzoung going around well before the runewells are filled. He's, after all, the main villain, and PCs should feel signs of his presence well before the ultimate confrontation.

However, i find the idea of him pretending to be Sheila quite un-necessary and not worthy of his time. He's the emperor of new Thassilon, and should not invest to much effort pretending to be someone else ... cause he's got minions than can do that for him!

So, here's my suggestions
1) Karzoug is not taking Sheila's identity, but the figure of one of the misterious decemvire of the Pathfinders - which, if you make so he's been around for way longer time, he could have well founded as a measure to "reclaim" the history he's lost in 10.000 years of slumber. It this way he, basically, controls the activities of all the pathfinders in Varisia and uses them to check on the other runelords while recovering the shards of sin. He could also know what will happen when the shard are reunited, and wanting to capitalize on a Magnimar needing help.

2) Karzoug has ordered Sheila killed and send one of his lamia matriarch to take her place, doing basically the first point except he's not directly involved.

Also, a good question: why would your party fight Karzoug, runelord of generosity and wealth?


And why is Karzoug using proxies to assemble the Shard? Why, because Xin heavily warded the pieces against his prime lieutenants or anything of that power level, but the wards won't even notice puny little Pathfinders ("not a threat").


Tonyz, that's a pretty good idea. I don't know how I could hint at it, but I may end up trying to find a way to use that.

My idea right now is, once the PCs have defeated Xin and returned to Magnimar, "Sheila" asks that they give back the Sihedron. Regardless of whether or not they do so, she then tells them that they should report to the Decemvirate, and takes them to a teleport circle in Heidmarch Manor. They go through the circle, and end up in the Eye of Avarice, on the arrival platform.

"Sheila" follows, ends up beside the throne, reveals herself as Karzoug, blah blah blah evil speech. Then, Karzoug summons a new dragon from his Runewell (there wouldn't be any giants this time, since they all died in the last campaign), and revives one (or more!) of the characters from the last campaign to fight for him.

To compensate for the lower action economy, I'm thinking about making the dragon an Adult Red (instead of the Adult Blue that was there in RotRL, maybe to represent his growing power?), and maybe giving Karzoug 4 or so Mythic Tiers. I have absolutely no idea how much that would skew the balance of power, though, since I'm not at all experienced with Mythic.


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Even one Mythic Tier can be pretty absurd if nobody else has any...


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This sounds like an awesome idea. My group also played Rise of the Runelords before Shattered Star and were defeated by Karzoug. I might actually steal this.


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We should be done with our Rise of the Runelords campaign before December is done (okay, maybe first week of January, but close enough). My players have already got their characters ready for Shattered Star to come next. Their defeat by or defeating of Karzoug will determine whether Shattered Star is a nice, leisurely campaign or becomes a race against time to forge an artifact that can defeat Karzoug, who has started his conquest to reforge the Thassilonian Empire in northern Varisia.

Either way will be fun. =)


Sub-Creator wrote:

We should be done with our Rise of the Runelords campaign before December is done (okay, maybe first week of January, but close enough). My players have already got their characters ready for Shattered Star to come next. Their defeat by or defeating of Karzoug will determine whether Shattered Star is a nice, leisurely campaign or becomes a race against time to forge an artifact that can defeat Karzoug, who has started his conquest to reforge the Thassilonian Empire in northern Varisia.

Either way will be fun. =)

Shattered Star:
Well, since the last boss in SS is what remains of Xin himself Karzoug may find himself forced into a confrontation he wasn't really expecting and could even find himself outmatched. What side would the PCs choose?

I'm glad you guys like the idea, and feel free to steal it! The more Runelord fun there is, the better.

Cole Deschain, what you said about Mythic Tiers is pretty much what I've been hearing. I'd still like to try it, though, since the encounter with Karzoug will have two or three fewer bodies for the party to deal with. What I'm sort of thinking of doing, though, it making it so that Karzoug only gets the Mythic Tiers if the party decides to give the Sihedron back to Sheila. If they do, "Sheila" absorbs its power, it falls to the ground dead, and then he transforms back into his Karzoug self. If they don't, then it'd just be regular Karzoug and whatever minions he has.

In regards to dropping clues as to the real identity of Shiela, I'm planning on giving the party Sihedron Medallions some time around the start of Book 2. Have "Sheila" say that they adapted the design from Thassilonian artifacts, and not key them in to the fact that it can be easily scryed upon.

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