Aurelian Greyfire's page

So, we had to stop in the middle of their evening with Kendra and Adivion, so I've got a week to hammer out more details! Below is the summary from that part of the session yesterday. I was kind of delighted that our Mesmerist (Mortimer), one of the only party members still alive from the beginning of the game who actually MET Adivion before, got a nat 20 on his perception check to notice something weird about the simulacrum! I had a lot of fun playing "Adivion" here, and had a lot of chances to rub in how arrogant he is, which maybe they'll be able to use against him in the next book. Next time, they'll have their confrontation with Vrood...

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SUMMARY-

They reconvened and took the carriage to Adivion's manor, where they were brought in to meet Kendra. She was delighted to see them all, and when she hugged Seraphina, the tiefling mindlinked with her and told her everything they'd learned about Adivion and how she was meant to be used as a vessel. Kendra stiffened at this, but Adivion entered almost immediately after. Mortimer noticed something off about the man's appearance from the last time he'd seen him and shared that telepathically with Morgrim (our cleric), who used true seeing to try to get to the heart of what was going on. It only raised more questions, however, when he saw that something about the man was an illusion.

They took to dinner, where mainly Morgrim and Mortimer made 'polite' conversation with Adivion, that was riddled with double meanings on both sides. While the nobleman was a gracious host, he also seemed quite arrogant, openly discussing his belief in vampires being behind things in Caliphas, and his own knowledge of the Whispering Way, which he said was gathered from hunting down cabals of them with Petros when they were in the Palatine Eye together. He did not sound as if he had much love for the Way, describing them contemptuously as 'sloppy'. He seemed to greatly mourn the Professor's death, calling it a deep shame what had happened to him and speaking of him with much admiration. Morgrim got Mortimer to ask Adivion about a Professor he'd had in college, whose name Mortimer made up on the spot, and Adivion stepped into the trap, speaking of the man as if he did indeed know him. Adivion openly questioned Morgrim about the Raven's Head mace that he carries, and about their journey so far. He claimed to have remained here in Caliphas with Kendra since the funeral, preparing for the wedding, helping teach her further divination magic. He also hailed the party as possibly being 'his equals', the reason he'd wished to meet them, and offered a dismissive, smug rejoinder when Mortimer pointed out that he seemed to be equating their combined worth to his own singular, and therefore calling them 'lesser' still than himself. Adivion even offered to finance their remaining quest, hailing them as "Petros' champions" and offering to secure any gear they might need.

At one point, Kendra asked Morgrim if he would speak with her privately after dinner about wedding arrangements. Adivion offered to speak to Mortimer about his magical research in more detail in his office. Adivion asked Kendra to entertain Morgrim in the upstairs study, which she did, not wishing to draw suspicion by insisting they stay downstairs.

In private, Kendra spoke to Morgrim openly about how she had been nursing her own suspicions about Adivion, and that he had changed since their engagement, growing colder, distant, and seeming 'empty' in some way. She said that he had seemed to grow almost bored with her. At first, she entreated them to kill Adivion that night, but then began to grow concerned for the party about the legal implications if they murdered him, given they did not have any solid evidence to prove that he had done anything. She was also concerned that the servants here might be loyal to him and implicate the party if he was killed, and she pointed out that if she didn't go to the gala the next day where she was expected to announce their engagement, it would draw attention as well. Kendra was also clearly shocked to learn she had a brother, and inquired about where he was, seeming quite interested in his fate. Morgrim speculated with her about what change Adivion might have undergone, but they ruled out that he was some kind of vampire now or undead, based on what Kendra had seen of him, although she did remark that he seemed cold even to the touch.

Meanwhile, in Adivion's office, they saw his collection of Ustalavic historical artifacts. When prompted, he openly spoke of his studies in necromancy and in the veil between life and death, purporting that in his eyes, necromancy was more of a study of the essence of life than death. Mortimer disputed that theory, but Adivion held firm on his interpretation. He also claimed, when questioned, that he was here to take care of Kendra, and that after the wedding, he hoped to travel with her to historic sites of Ustalav. He spoke of his great interest in figures from history who transcended lines of being mortal or immortal through their genius and ambition but weren't gods, those who had reshaped Golarion into 'an existence worth experiencing'. He seemed to be intellectually bored with the world as a whole, and signs of his arrogance slipped out on several occasions.

I love that we're both doing a dinner party at the same point in the book! And yes, my players ended up cooperating with the vampires so the amount of loot that they got was really sad this chapter ... I'm hoping to make up for that here, because I can't imagine they won't want to snoop around the place. Necromantic things are a good call. I'll see what I can dredge up.

I felt that the lesser simulacrum would overly complicate things too, because I'm not sure where to go with it in the end. But I just really liked the idea of Adivion conspiring against himself because he was so annoyed at being used as a tool. I think it might slow things down too much, however. And he's probably smart enough to guess that would happen anyway :P

My players are in Book 5, and just finished dealing with the vampires and the witches. I've taken a lot of suggestions from other GMs in this forum over the years we've been playing, so in our game, Kendra is Auren's twin sister, and there are three potential characters with the Whispering Tyrant bloodline that Adivion can use as the vessel: Kendra, Auren, and Count Galdana.

I've been playing Adivion as an omnipresent background figure who has been there since session one (as a mourner at Lorrimor's funeral), who has been slowly revealed to be a mastermind pulling the strings. In Book 2, after the events in Lepidstadt, Kendra took up his invitation to come to Caliphas, where he'd offered to look after her, with overtures of a potential marriage down the line. The players were a bit suspicious, but it wasn't until Book 3 & 4 that they confirmed that Adivion was evil and behind all of this. By the time they arrived in Caliphas, they learned that Kendra had become engaged to Adivion, and that the engagement is to be announced at one of the Countess' galas coming up soon. They sent her a message, asking if they could see her (obviously concerned about her well-being) and received a message back from her inviting them to come to dinner at Adivion's manor so that she could see them again. They learned from the Palatine Eye, however, that Kendra is a potential vessel, and they've figured out Adivion's game.

We're playing that session tomorrow, and I'm working on prepping it right now, but would welcome some suggestions. Currently, what I'm planning is that Adivion himself paid to have a simulacrum of himself created, and he has already departed from Caliphas to put his Book 6 plans in motion, having arranged the abduction of Count Galdana. He and Professor Lorrimor were very close (they were once both members of the Palatine Eye and close friends until their views took them in opposite directions), and he would actually prefer to use Kendra as his LAST resort, so he has trained up this simulacrum to pass off as himself and keep an eye on her. He has no actual romantic interest in Kendra, and the 'marriage' is ostensibly just a way to keep her there and locked down at his beck and call. Kendra, however, isn't stupid, and she noticed a 'change' take place in Adivion when he swapped with the simulacrum (he's grown colder/more distant/seems "empty"). She is hoping to speak with the party's cleric for advice, as he's a cleric of Bolka (dwarven goddess of marriage) who had previously offered to officiate the wedding for her, and that is her real intention behind calling them there.

In Book 3, my players suffered a near TPK from Auren Vrood, and he managed to escape. In their vision from Desna when they reconsecrated the Temple, they saw that they would face off against him again, so I've leveled him up and been waiting for a good chance to have him recur. I thought that this might be a good place for it: "Adivion" has agreed to let the party come to dinner as a trap that will work in his favor in one of two ways. Either the simulacrum will be able to put on a convincing front, and this will put Kendra's growing fears at ease, in which case, after they leave, he will send Auren after them to finish them off, or they will try to openly "rescue" Kendra. If they do, "Adivion" will try to abduct Kendra out of there while Auren appears to try and destroy them for good.

My questions are 1) It's likely they'll try to explore his manor if it boils down to some kind of fight and the simulacrum is destroyed. What might be some good loot to drop in there, or information they could find? Or other generally weird things that might exist in Adivion's house...

2) Given that simulacra replicate their original (arguably, I know), I think it might be interesting to have this version of Adivion be a LESSER simulacrum instead of a full version, with his own 'free will' and resent being used in this manner and have plans or a goal of his own in mind. Adivion is an arrogant mastermind and even a lower level version of himself would be much the same. I'm wondering if there's something interesting I could do with that to complicate matters slightly, or if that's just an unnecessary addition.

3) Does anyone have any feedback or interesting ideas that could complement all of this? Or fun things to come up during this really awkward dinner?

Big thanks to the many people over the years who have come up with great suggestions about Kendra/Auren/Adivion's role and expanding those things in the storyline. My players have loved all of it and it's made for great reveals.

Not even on that note, but my players are planning on attending the Countess' gala (and managed to get invitations procured for them through a vampire ally), and I've still got to figure out what I want to do with any of that. Has anyone explored the Elizabeth Bathory angle with the Countess a little more? Or done anything interesting with adding in a gala?

I'm also running this AP right now with a group who was 'defeated' by the Bastards at the conclusion of Book One. They got to the room with Dravano and then got nearly killed. They ended up leaving one of the PCs behind alone with Palaveen because it was the only way they could escape with their lives. Since the PC was a noble tiefling who had no understanding of his heritage, Palaveen actually told him that they were 'the same' and revealed to him what his heritage was, insisting that he should join the Bastards and promising to teach him powerful magic if he would agree to work for them. Since it was either that or die, basically, the PC agreed, and Palaveen made him drink a 'potion' that would kill him if he didn't comply with their demands on him. Of course, this was just a lie... but the PC is convinced that his life is in the hands of the Bastards. They released him and he returned to the others and told them the truth about what had happened.

Instead of forcing another confrontation with the Bastards right away, I simply pushed them forward into The Sixfold Trial, and left the Bastards as a looming threat in the city that they don't feel strong enough to deal with for now. Palaveen continues to contact the PC in question and give him orders, while they've struggled to find a way to break this 'magic' binding him. They've finally reached a point in Book 3 where they are hitting a lot of side quests and have been granted the ability to manage what side quests the NPCs of the Children of Westcrown are dealing with in the background of their main quest adventure. One of these side quests is following the activities of the Bastards, who are continuing to menace the city, and they are gathering intel that they can use to go back after them. By this point, they will be more than strong enough to crush them, and it will be a great morale boost for them to finally take them down at this point. I would just not recommend having them sit idle. They should be causing problems in the city - I even had them murder the boss of one of the PCs who worked at a blacksmith (and his wife). There's a sort of rising sense of urgency - the longer they wait, the worse things might get, but they are honestly terrified of the Bastards and want to feel fully prepared before taking them on.

I'm thinking that they might move hideouts and have been actively recruiting to replace their numbers, so the threat will be a little higher CR than it would have been at the end of Book 1 for them, but still not impossible this time.

As for Vahnwynne, my players were out hunting Shadow Beasts and got in over their head when I had her show up and handily take out some, bored with it and looking for vampires. I allowed them to make Knowledge checks to recognize her as a famous vampire hunter who worked alone, and she was very dismissive about the idea of working with them as low level heroes. I think just a brief cameo of some kind that shows that she is capable (to make them afraid when they have to face her as an actual vampire) but also to keep them from allying with her is sufficient but I'd be interested to hear if you find a way to more fully incorporate her!

In 16 years of GMing, this has been the deadliest campaign I have ever run. o__o

Name: Mako
Classes/levels: Ranger 1
Adventure: Haunting of Harrowstone
Location: Lakeside by Harrowstone Prison
Catalyst: Flaming skeletons
The Gory Details: Annoyed that the party was wasting so much time gathering info in the town, our ranger (who was brand new to gaming), decided to go up to check things out on his own. He was torn apart by skeletons that climbed out of the lake.

Name: Verno Q'ugokam
Race: Orc
Classes/levels: Barbarian 3
Adventure: Haunting of Harrowstone
Location: Inside Harrowstone prison near the oubliette
Catalyst: Gurtis Vortch
The Gory Details: While Verno barely survived the fight with the skeletal champion, its death throes killed him and his brother was forced to bury him (although he has kept some of his bones and sworn to bring him back - one way or another).

Name: Khali
Race: Elf
Classes/levels: Rogue 4
Adventure: The Midnight Mirror (added in between books 1&2)
Location: Inside the Midnight Mirror
Catalyst:

Name: Elstrum Covenscar
Race: Half-elf
Classes/levels: Wizard 4
Adventure: The Midnight Mirror
Location: Inside the Midnight Mirror
Catalyst:

Name: Stryfe
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Rogue 3
Adventure: The Midnight Mirror (added in between books 1&2)
Location: Inside the Midnight Mirror
Catalyst:

Name: Kyontha
Race: Half-orc
Classes/levels: Slayer 11
Adventure: Valley of the Brain Collectors
Location: Dominion Hive, the Incubator
Catalyst: Felled by Ugothokras and eaten

35th session of this game after 3.5 years, and this is our first death of a PC who has been with the party since the beginning (we had a temporary PC join during Choking Tower, who died quickly - much less dramatic). The team had brought Sanvil with them since book 1, basically turning him into a reluctant ally and eventually getting him to turn his back on his Technic League past. He was, however, killed by another PC who went crazy, and his body was hidden by the party until they could leave the Valley and get him rezzed (again).

That is, until a brain collector stole his brain. Having returned from a weary fight against the Shipmind, they set out immediately, without resting, to track where his brain had been taken, and headed straight into the Dominion Hive. There, they had a disastrous encounter with the Damaged Annihilator, and Isuma sacrificed herself to heavily damage it and allow them to escape. They spent a rough night in the wild, getting attacked anytime they attempted to rest, before retreating to their cave to regroup and heal.

On a second foray into the Hive, they ran into the Incubator fight and things went nasty fast. Kyontha was downed by a pair of Ugothokras, and one proceeded to eat most of her torso while the rest of the party finished the fight. With no cleric, no rez spells on deck, and no easy way to travel out of the Valley and get her fixed up, she is currently considered down and out for the count, and her player is rolling up a new character (and a cleric, to boot).

Oakrin "Wrinkles", aasimar warpriest of Besmara was my first player casualty in so long. Session two of the campaign, day five of the game: an intense game of heave proved his undoing. Luckily, the game also took out Jape, one of their most hated rivals. Our players couldn't stop laughing, and I even gave it a fifty percent chance of his living through it because he was blessed by Besmara... but in the end, he went to be with his goddess, in a way that most certainly made her proud: drinking himself to death.

Thanks for the offer! But I think that's a little outside the range we were looking for. ;; We have a lot of active non-Society campaigns that keep us satisfied most of the time, but we did like the idea of developing our Society characters more than once a year at GenCon.

During the school year, I work six days a week (five at school and one at retail), including Saturdays, and that makes it hard to plan trips to anywhere too far out. Now that it's almost summer time and I can arrange for more free Saturdays, we were hoping to find something we could hit at least a couple of times. I'll keep an eye on the MIPFS website though.

Fantastic! Thanks so much... Somehow I failed at turning all this up when I was checking it out last summer, so I appreciate it.

I just got into Society play at last year's GenCon, and started investigating whether there was any PFS action around the Grand Rapids area. It seems like there used to be, years ago, at White Cap Comics in the Walker area, but it died out at some point. I've spoken to some of the employees there, who said that if there was a willing Venture Captain who wanted to organize Society play in the area, that the space would still be interested in hosting.

They've asked me if I'd be interested in filling in the VC role, but I'm not sure I'd have the time for it/am uncertain of how demanding it would be for my already full schedule. I do know at least one other player, potentially several others, in the area who have also expressed interest in attending, if there was anyone who might be willing to take the helm, so to speak.

After running Aldronard's Grave, my players insist that I share what they all agreed was somehow their favorite encounter of the entire campaign so far: talking to the Smilers in the watchtower upon first approaching the fort. When I first read the description, I got a straight up Monty Python vibe from the scenario, and couldn't help running it with a little hint of that flavor. It was definitely fun trying to decide how characters with no lips would sound. The situation was rendered even more entertaining when the Smilers rolled a one on their bluff check. Delightfully, one of the players actually transcribed the entire thing as we were doing it apparently, so here you are.

Needless to say, their plan to ambush the PCs inside failed miserably. Having the paladins explain the story of the fort, and the ghost that haunts it was enough of a catalyst for them to make a plan to put the spirit to rest, and they immediately jumped to disguising one of the PCs as Justinia. I think they were legitimately surprised that their plan worked so well.

My players have officially graduated into Lords of Rust! No casualties, although we did lose our oracle player, who was replaced by a new player with a half-orc slayer. Because we were so close to the end of Fires of Creation when she came in, and given what she had in mind for the character, I decided to have her character be a loner who actually hailed from Scrapwall, hired for the express purpose of undermining Meyanda's operation by a gang member who was bitter about the Lords of Rust taking over. The players first ran into her when investigating Ulreth's warehouse, which she had also gotten a lead on: she actually managed to follow them through the building without their awareness, and burst in to cut some people in half in the middle of the fight that broke out within. Given that her personality is very brusque and she doesn't talk much, it's proven to be a nice way of dropping in hints for LoR ahead of time.

Other noteworthy happenings from FoC:

The party chose to ally with Sef, and most interestingly, chose to take Hetuath prisoner back with them to town, where Joram could cast comprehend languages, and allow them to learn more about what he was. This actually allowed his entire awesome backstory to be revealed, and the party grew very sympathetic towards him, returning him to the restored habitat module in order to release his spirit, and that of his people.

The cerebric fungus REALLY freaked them out. We play on Roll20, and I used private whispers to players to send them its freaky telepathic messages, which made them all feel like they were going crazy. It unsettled them probably more than anything else in the whole adventure.

Sanvil managed to convince them to take him with on one of their forays into the Science Deck, where he proved a very useful ally, particularly in helping them solve the power coupling mystery on the elevator. Unaware that he was Technic League, they kept selling him lots of their technological items as they found them, much to his delight. However, one of the PCs noticed his Technic League pin with a nat 20 perception check, and so when he went off to fix the coupling for them, they argued over whether to kill him and take their stuff back, but instead decided to play it cool and try to keep their distance from him. Their attempts to tell him he couldn't come along with them anymore roused his suspicions however, and he broke into the tavern at night while they slept to see if they were keeping any other items from him he could swipe. Caught redhanded, they confronted him, made him almost wet his pants with fear, and got him to admit his unfortunate position with the Technic League. They strong armed him into going to fix the elevator for them, but decided to check out the warehouse before exploring the engineering deck.

After meeting their new friend from Scrapwall, they managed to shake down Ulreth for more info on Meyanda, and, having brought Sanvil along for the ride to keep a watchful eye on him, got him to figure out what the generator was for them, and where it was broadcasting to. Having proven his usefulness over and over again, the party really surprised me by repeatedly insisting on bringing him with them - although they were divided on whether that was out of mistrust, or hope for redeeming him. Overcome by curiosity and afraid of the repercussions of refusing them, Sanvil had no reason to turn them down, and helped them through the end of their mission through Divinity as well.

The thing that nearly kicked their asses was the Gearsman, actually, more than anything else. They wound up defeating it by bullrushing it into the furnace and sealing it in there, after a fight that nearly killed many of them. Shutting down the robots, however, drew Meyanda out to investigate, and they were forced to face her in their half-dead condition for the final showdown. It was something of a disappointing fight, however. They easily took her down with a few very lucky rolls, but when she recognized a certain member of their party as an android, it at least sparked some great drama - he'd previously managed to keep it secret both ICly and OOCly from the party, despite his glowing facial tattoos, which they'd written off as part of his 'magus thing'. His hateboner for Sanvil suddenly made a lot more sense to them, and in a hilarious turn of events, on their way back up, a random encounter with some cockroaches resulted in a crit fail on the android's behalf - that KILLED SANVIL. Considering what had just come out moments earlier, it looked pretty bad for him, and so the party surprised me even more by USING THE SCROLL OF RESURRECTION THE CITY HAD GIVEN THEM, TO RESURRECT SANVIL.

Yep.

When he returned, they did ask him to use his considerable wealth to buy them a new one when he could, but it was such an unexpected gesture, that he couldn't help but be moved to reconsider his position in the Technic League, since it was already so tenuous. He luckily did not remember the cause of his exact death, but does house his suspicions, and while he's agreed to travel with the party to Scrapwall, he's keeping a close eye on the android, and still looking out for number one.

They returned Meyanda to town to question her along with Khonnir, Joram, and Dolga, and managed to draw her from a little intel about Hellion. Meyanda showed a particular interest in the android party member, basically trying to pitch to him why he should forsake these fleshly compatriots of his to serve Hellion and realize his full potential.

(They also tried to convince him to attempt to hit on her, which was hilarious, if not completely ineffective, particularly with his diplomacy check of 2: "I do believe I have some components that may have been designed to interlock with some components which you may have.")

They wound up leaving her in Torch's prison. So somehow both she and Sanvil came out of this alive, and one of them turned into a potential series regular.

It's been an interesting ride so far.

Seeing a lot of people talk about taking combat feats that will be useless on another day. When I was designing a 15th level Medium, I actually sat there unsure of where to start when it was time to pick Feats, because of exactly this sort of situation. Curious what other people think about solid feat choices for a class that rotates its role so often.

What I wound up doing was taking the Barroom Brawler feat that lets you have access to a single combat feat for a minute (at least a full combat), that you qualify for pre-reqs for. It seems like a strong, natural match for the changing nature of the class, even if it doesn't help the pre-req issue.

Improved Init also seemed more necessary than ever, so that your character can trance early in the combat.

Toughness helped counterbalance the hit die and Harrowed really fit with the flavor of the class, as well as my character concept. Felt the need to give her Combat Casting as well since many spirits provide spells that could be useful in combat, but there's also a strong melee focus from the physical spirits.

My other choices were more flavor based for my particular build, but I'm interested in what other people are pairing with the class.

Got a GM throwing together a special Halloween one-shot for messing around with the new classes, and he decided to go full hog and have us be level 15, so that we really get a chance to feel out the character's spectrum of abilities and potential. Designing my 15th level medium, found some things to clarify in regards to channeling secondary and tertiary spirits. Beginning with...

If you wish to bind the Twin as a secondary or tertiary spirit for the day, does that mean you always must select a Neutral or Charisma based spirit as your primary? When I first glanced at it, I thought it was based solely on "your most recent temporary trance spirit for the purposes of its alignment, ability score, and lesser spirit power" as stated, even at the beginning of a new day, but it also specifies "if you have not yet used trance to beseech a temporary spirit since contacting the Twin, copycat has no effect until you do" effectively maintaining it as a Neutral Charisma spirit until that point. I assume this means since contacting the Twin on that given day? So does it 'reset' to Neutral Charisma at the end of 24 hours? Or if I tranced an Evil Int spirit at the end of the day before, does it start the new day as effectively Evil Int?

Ooo, I like the idea of having the brown mold spread. Excellent.

Given that they're likely to be adding a party member or two next week, it's definitely a good place to shoe in some town encounters that I can tie their introductions into before they have a chance to head back down. I don't think they're likely to prioritize investigating any other rumors at the moment, but I can probably tailor some of those sidequests into events that run into them while they're about town. I'm also planning on placing their invitations to Silverdisk Hall and their first encounter with Sanvil here, so hopefully between all those things, they'll wind up with plenty.

Ran our first session tonight with a party that consisted of:

A female Kellid skald, from Torch
A female half-elf silver-dragon bloodline bloodrager, from Torch
A female pistolero from Absalom
A male android card caster magus
and a deaf female Kellid stargazer oracle

2 have the local ties trait, 3 have the stargazer trait.

We're a Roll20 group so it'll be 'whoever can make it' that night, as we'll play every other Thursday night. Our two other players who couldn't come are intending to play some kind of shaman (still has to make her sheet) and a human inquisitor (sacred huntsman).

Finished Part 1 & 2, party is about 3/4th of the way to level 2.

Since my Bestiaries were still packed post-moving, I just used these Blindheim stats (from Tome of Horrors, it seems), which includes the line "A successful save renders the creature immune to the same blindheim’s eye beams for 24 hours." That's the rule we used in facing the creature (which STILL almost killed our party of 5), and I found it worked pretty well. Two characters wound up blinded, and many of the others opted to fight the creature without looking at it directly, taking a miss chance instead.

We had our first session tonight, and made it through Parts 1&2 successfully. We play on Roll20, and the players who could make it tonight were:

A female Kellid skald, from Torch
A female half-elf silver-dragon bloodline bloodrager, from Torch
A female pistolero from Absalom
A male android card caster magus
and a deaf female Kellid oracle

I set the opening scene in the Foundry Tavern, where the skald and bloodrager were discussing Khonnir's disappearance since they both took the background trait that involved having known him, and would have access to hang out in the Tavern even while it was closed. The others wandered in seeing lights on, and Val's screams and the ensuing simple robot encounter were great for sudden party cohesion and creating talking points for them, given that some had knowledge of Numerian tech and others didn't.

They bypassed a few encounters in the cave unwittingly by immediately climbing up and taking the stalagmite forest through to the blindheim cave. I was surprised that they wanted to continue with two of their party members blinded (and another functionally deaf already) after that fight, but they moved on, and headed right into the skulk lair. They diplomatically struck the deal with Sef, and cleared out the gremlins without even triggering any of the traps. The advanced jinkin leader actually proved really challenging for them in the confining space, and it was only through knocking him prone and flanking him that they finally managed to consistently hit his AC. (But keep in mind... two were still blind).

Considering the PCs who have background stories tied to Khonnir were loath to leave him to his mysterious fate and had to be talked into going back to town by their party mates despite their depleted health and spell pool, I have a feeling we'll probably press through Parts 3&4 next time, or at least close to. Unfortunately, with the number of encounters they managed to avoid, they're still not level 2 yet despite me dumping an additional couple hundred on them for good RPing in general. I know the path recommends players be level 2 while exploring the habitat module, but I'm wondering if other people ran into this, and how their 1st level players might have fared going in against the Kasatha skeletons. We might just stop mid-session to level, if necessary.