Naurgul's page

I wrote the encounters in the back of Book 6. So glad to see someone has utilized them!

Haha they were stewing in my brain for the whole campaign. I wouldn't rest until I found a place for them. And I'm glad I did. I loved playing through them but especially loved how my players slowly realised they were conned both times!

Thanks for the inspiration!

From all the suggestions so far, I think orichalcum is the best. It has some fun properties and is going to eventually be useful against Vancaskerkin (who RAW you have to beat like 5 times before he dies for real) and his minions.

Vancaskerkin the Rumormonger is probably the most compelling member of the Twilight Four and kinda deserves to be the final antagonist more than Olansa. In this thread I'm going to detail some of the homebrew additions I've made to flesh him out more.

Lunch with the Eyes on Absalom

One way to spice up Vancaskerkin's relationship with the PCs is for him to invite them to socialise with him for informal interviews. Here's some ideas on specifics:

• • After beating the Skinner, he invites them over to his office for a dinner-interview. He turns his desk into a dining table with a beautiful blue silk Taldan tablecloth (putting all his documents and curios at a corner on the floor) and gets food catered from the "Mask and Moon" restaurant (see Grand Bazaar). The menu is exquisite and varied. Offers the PCs an Impossible Cake shaped like Norgorber's Mask for dessert. "Beating those skinsaws was a piece of cake for you!" Asks them all sorts of questions about what they found in the catacombs (the answers to most of which he already knows) and what their next moves will be now.
  
• • After beating the Infector, he invites them to dinner at the Golden Serprent, a high-end restaurant in Ivy District. He orders wyrmling green dragon wings. Asks them questions about their adventures guarding Flakfatter (knowing he's responsible for many of the waves of enemies they fought off) and proposes they put on a production of a play about a tyrannical primarch getting overthrown together. Might even mention something about a harrow serial killer on the loose.
  

Clockwork Halls
This is an expansion of the last chapter of book 5 where the party confronts Vancaskerkin for the final time.

You're not better than me!
If the PCs arrive at the Eyes on Absalom HQ to confront Vancaskerkin with evidence from Bottles & Blots or other evidence implicating him with the Twilight Four but while he's not publicly disgraced, they can meet him and debate him before he attempts to go into hiding in the clockwork halls below. He demands to know what evidence they have against him. If the PCs tell him, he starts making accusations against them. He lists any morally dubious and illegal action the PCs have taken during the whole campaign which his journalistic sources and green eyes all over the city have informed him of. The PCs will likely attempt to defend themselves by explaining how their actions served a noble goal. They might be shocked as he nods in agreement. "So you agree that the ends justify the means! What if that hypothetical norgorberite you are accusing also had a noble goal, just like you? Maybe then all these things you said about me would also be justified". He proceeds to rationalise how his deeds served the greater good, for example how overthrowing the primarch could improve the social situation in the city, leaning into everything he knows about the PC's morals and politics. If they seem unconvinved he reassures them there is an even greater purpose. If they seem curious, he invites them to follow him below ground to show them. If not, he attempts to escape below ground to the clockwork halls (preferably through K5 since the PCs will likely hesitate throwing themselves in there, buying him time). He continues debating anytime the PCs are near him, even during combat.

As above so below
As a practicioner of the occult, Vancaskerkin is particularly keen on the idea of belief affecting reality, the symbol substituting for the real thing, the map and the territory being one and the same. The Twilight Four plan to get the primarchy is to him not an end in itself but more so an experiment to validate his theories about how belief affects reality. He does that in many ways throughout the campaign:

• • Using fake news in his newspaper to undermine Starborn's authority, shaping the beliefs of the readers.
  
• • Putting on a play about overthrowing a tyrant while casting The World's A Stage ritual.
  
• • Turning Harrowland into a dark reflection of the Harrowed Realm, where storytelling reigns supreme over realism.
  

The clockwork halls underneath the newspaper HQ also serve the same purpose. The machinery as a whole is a symbolic map of the city so that anything that happens up there is reflected down here. And conversely, anything that happens down here should be reflected up there. "As above, so below".

There are three sources of power for the magic that makes the Machine as a whole function:

• • Absolute truth: The Shoggoth (L11 Pool of Secrets) holds absolute, terrifying truths about the nature of the universe.
  
• • Absolute realisation: The kraken's ink (L5 Levialar's Prison) holds the power to transform ideas into reality. A pipe connects the shoggoth in the pool of secrets with Levialar combining the powers of both in the produced ink.
  
• • Absolute lies: The glabrezu (L16 Den of the Lie-Masters) take that ink and use it to write an inordinate amount of audacious lies. Thus all three powers are intricatelly woven together.

This ink cycle, that also includes the publication of the Eyes on Absalom newspaper printed with the same ink, creates the metaphysical connection between the City Above and the Clockwork Machine Below, making them reflect each other. Thus the tapestry in L13 does not contain simple lies; instead it is like a system log detailing information from the operation of the Clockwork Machine with the end goal being that the information eventually perfectly corresponds to the city above, reality changing constantly to accomodate this feat. Vancaskerkin has not fully achieved this yet but is working on it.

Join me! And together we can rule the city!
If the PCs come peacefully, he shows them the Tapestry of Truth/Lies which displays, among other things, a literal narration of parts of their own story so far. Regardless of what the PCs do, Vancaskerkin continues debating, even during combat, and explains how he is making this Clockwork Machine that reflects the city of Absalom and the city is reflected back down here. He tells them this research is more important than anything else they've been fighting for and even offers to use it for good. He argues that change requires sacrifice but symbolic sacrifice that powers the Machine, even if it entails real lives, will always be smaller than the sacrifices required to enact change in the real world.

If the PCs seem to relent, he can even introduce them to the Transposition Machine (L17). He explains that if the Clockwork Halls are a map of the whole City, then the Transposition Machine room maps to the Gray Queen's throne room. It can literally shift the subjective perspective of the world's narration so that he can swap his own perspective with Olansa's, bypassing most magical and divine protections. Then they can use the position of primarch together for good. If they are sceptical, he offers to physically share the primarchy with them: some of the PCs can step into the machine with him and then they will share control of Olansa's body and perspective. The machine isn't fully operational yet so Vancaskerkin asks for their help to finish it in the following days (anyone with Crafting, Occultism, Arcana or Religion skills can contribute). The price to pay is that, once activated, the machine will break down and it will be almost impossible to reverse the swap. Smart players might realise they don't need Vancaskerkin at all, they can fix and use the machine themselves on Olansa. Doing any of this can end the campaign right here and now (or you can rule that Norgorber's divine power partially or fully blocks it).

Secret of Rebirth
If the PCs fight Vancaskerkin, here's some ideas to jazz up his immortality ability and the Secret Knowledge one needs to defeat it.

The reason Vancaskerkin cannot die is because he convinces his enemies to believe he cannot die. They become so attached to the idea and they believe it so strongly that reality bends to accomodate it; thus is he revived. The trick to defeating him is to reach a form of enlightment detaching the self from this persistent idea. Here's what each point in Secret Knowledge reveals:

• • You cannot kill an idea. He is immortal.
  
• • It is the power of belief that makes him immortal.
  
• • When he dies the thought that he cannot die gets stuck in our minds. It is not an outside power that revives him, it's just us.
  
• • Whosoever would undertake some atrocious enterprise should act as if it were already accomplished, should impose upon himself a future as irrevocable as the past.
  
• • You cannot kill a thought by thinking about it. It's like trying to forget something, a negative reference to a thought is still a reference so it gets reinforced in your brain. The solution is to just listen to the thought without reacting to it, without believing in it or disbelieving it. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the thought has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
  

Encore!

For more Vancaskerkin-related schemes, check out:

• • Pratchett asks to publish his memoirs from prison... Vancaskerkin tattles on him
  
• • Abducting Bolera
  
• • Murdering Bolera
  
• • Blackmailing politicians with spyware
  
• • Duplicating one of the PCs
  
• • Putting on a highly-symbolic play
  
• • Fixing Harrowland and framing a primarch
  

Thanks for reading and feel free to add your own ideas about Vancaskerkin!

How to get the acting primarch arrested
Part 3: A Wonderful Time in Harrowland
This is meant to provide fixes and improvements for the last chapter of Book 4.

The bait
Instead of Vancaskerkin putting a puzzle in the newspaper for Starborn to randomly find and Starborn deciding to fall for an obvious trap on purpose, how about this: Vancaskerkin will attempt to convince the PCs to trick the primarch into going to Harrowland. There are many ways this can work.

First, Vancaskerkin can gauge how okay the PCs are with deposing the primarch. He can ask them their opinion on the conspiracy theory that Starborn is secretly planning a military coup. He can ask them how they feel about his leadership, especially about his lukewarm middle-of-the-road unambitious policies that don't seem to do much ("he peaked when he took radical action and abolished slavery, it's been downhill since"). He can invite them to help with his play (see above) and use that as a pretext to ask political questions.

If Vancaskerkin has roped the PCs into helping him produce a play about deposing a primarch, he can set up a ruse during the premiere to put them on the spot. During the play, Layton Bryne (the editor-in-chief of Eyes on Absalom) barges into the auditorium, goes next to Vancaskerkin's seat, leans in his ear and whispers something to him. Vancaskerkin contorts his face to make it look surprised (visible to any PCs who are on the stage or are seated near him). Bryne leaves and Vancaskerkin makes no further moves until after the final curtain (unless the PCs interrupt the play to confront him). After the play is over and he gives his congratulations to any PCs who acted in it, he takes a deep breath, puts on a grave appearance and tells them he has sudden news. "Remember that Harrow serial killer in Precipice Quarter? We have an eyewitness source that can place him together with Harlo Doleen at Grislyfair." If he thinks the PCs might be willing to help with deposing Starborn, he adds: "But before you rush there, I have a suggestion that came to me while I was sitting here watching the play: What if you contact the primarch and ask him to come along? He's good friends with Doleen and cares deeply about him and he really trusts you guys so he can't say no. He's also a good fighter so your chances of success will increase considerably if he's with you. Of course the scandal of the primarch abandoning his duties to the city and putting his life in danger to save his personal friend will likely lead to him being replaced by the Council, but that's all for the better, he's not fit to serve because..." (add here some justification that aligns with the PCs' political ideology he has elicited from them).

If there's no play, he can call them to his office and tell them the same thing more or less. It just won't have the same impact and feeling of urgency.

If that fails, after they leave, he will forge a letter from the PCs. If "The World's a Stage" ritual was cast successfully, he will use one of his rerolls for this forgery. If the PCs have an animal companion or other mascot that isn't with them at the moment, he will send his clockwork assassins (fitted with nets instead of smoke bombs) to abduct them, take them to Ixusoth, replace their eyes, modify their memory and send them to hand-deliver the letter to the primarch. The letter would be ostinsibly written from the PCs, telling him they found Doleen but need his personal help to free him so he should meet them at Harrowland posthaste.

If that fails too, you'll have to think of increasingly desperate and risky ways for Vancaskerkin to get the primarch there.

Harrowland coming to life
Vancaskerkin and the Rabbit Prince have turned Harrowland into an elaborate magical-symbolic trap. The Rabbit Prince is abducting people and ritualistically "sculpting" them into harrow cards and recreating the harrow tales. This has bestowed Harrowland some of the properties of the Harrowed Realms, making the whole place more like a fairy tale where narrative, storytelling and plot convenience take precedence over realism. And of course the plot that is served by this dark reflection of the Harrowed Realm is to frame the primarch. This has several implications. First, it becomes harder to leave the area, anyone attempting to leave the abandoned part of the Precipice Quarter where the Grislyfair is located must succeed at a DC 41 Will Save or Track check or wander in circuitous paths until they are back where they began. Second, all people, events even the geography itself subtly behave in ways that line up with the predetermined demands of the plot. For example, Lavarsus will arrive with his cohorts to arrest the primarch and the PCs precisely when they get to Doleen's body, not too soon, not too late.

But that is not all. The Graveraker has been activated and its time magic is creating a gigantic time dilation field, encompassing the whole area. Everything inside the big top tent is practically frozen in time. The effect diminishes with distance, you can assume time moves 10 times slower for anything within 100 feet of the Graveraker / big top tent and you can assume time moves 2-3 times slower for anything within Grislyfair. Subjectively time feels like it's passing normally but anyone who makes contact with outside the field might notice something (for example, someone within the field scrying someone outside the field will see them move in fast-forward). The field is set to collapse if anything that is in time stasis is disturbed, for example the empty crates that are piled against the door between F18 and F19. Doleen is still alive in there, with the knife held in place perilously close to his throat. When the time dilation field collapses, the knife plunges into his throat, slicing it and killing him instantly.

Note how the time dilation field gives more time for the Twilight Four to make any arrangements they need, for example to convince Starborn to also go there or tie up other loose ends while the PCs are effectively in slow motion in there.

In order to understand the time dilation field a DC 41 Identify Magic check is required (DC38 Occultism). Nullifying or bypassing it to save Doleen should be complex but doable for smart players. (Only allow that to happen if you are prepared for the adventure path to be completely derailed.)

Rabbit Prince stalking and other details
If you don't want the PCs to randomly wander from attraction to attraction, you can make the scenario more dynamic by having the Rabbit Prince stalk them as they move through Harrowland. If they spot him, he makes a run for it, trying to bait them into as many dangerous locations as possible. His preference is to bait them into following him into F6 the hall of mirrors, which could possibly force them to fight their mirror duplicates and the shatterlings while he escapes from the back door and returns to his sanctum in F18. But his plan might change depending on where they spot him and other circumstances.

If you are using the "Rabbit Prince is a dark duplicate of one of the PCs" idea from above, don't forget that the duplicated PC will not be duplicated again if they face the darkside mirror, they simply will have no reflection. If you have presented the PCs with the "harrow serial killer casefiles" from above and the PCs meet Grulph Nimberdell in Harrowland, he remembers getting blackout drunk at the Tipsy Tengu before waking up in a prison cell in Harrowland. Finally, if the Rabbit prince is defeated he fades out, leaving only his crown and broken sword behind... which will make it likely that the duplicated PC might take the blame for his many crimes.

Lavarsus, brainwashed, making the arrest
Vancaskerkin leaves nothing to chance and even though Lavarsus is a fool full of pride he might be convinced by indignant PCs that this is a frame-up and they are innocent. So instead of just giving him a tip about Harrowland, he sends one of his glabrezu lie-masters to manipulate him, as usual taking the form of editor-in-chief Layton Bryne. The lie-master convinces Lavarsus that the PCs and the primarch are bad people by taking advantage of his pride. This discussion will culminate in the lie-master asking Lavarsus "Besides, isn't this your deepest, truest wish, Lieutenant? This is an one-of-a-kind opportunity to prove your worth, restore your honour as a guard and elevate Edgewatch into a proper district watch." As Lavarsus nods in agreement, the demon invokes its Twisted Desires ability to grant the wish in a perverted way. From that point forward, Lavarsus is compelled to ignore reason and rationalise until all evidence is twisted to "prove" the primarch and the PCs guilty. After accomplishing that, Layton Bryne accompanies Lavarsus and the guards to Harrowland.

If the PCs try to reason with him, he will twist everything he knows about their movements and their characters into "evidence" they were norgorberites all along. Diplomacy DC 40 or even higher to change his mind. (Later, after the adventure is over, if the PCs realise what had happened, they might confront or attempt to console a promoted but depressed Lavarsus who deep down knows he made a mistake. If they encounter the Lie-Masters in the Clockwork Halls under Eyes on Absalom HQ, the demons will taunt them by mockingly repeating any arguments the PCs used to plead with Lavarsus and will relate the story of how they corrupted him.)

Finally, even though the primarch surrenders after being accused and suggests the PCs do the same, I say let the players decide what they want to do instead of letting it play out like a videogame cutscene. Some of them might want to evade arrest (that changes almost nothing) or even fight back (that might change things more but ultimately will make the primarch and the PCs look even more guilty).

How to get the acting primarch arrested
Part 2: The World's a Stage
Before we get to the main act, there's some laying the groundwork that can be done. Getting the acting primarch deposed is a big deal and so it's important for the people to anticipate and accept this at an emotional but also symbolic level.

The ritual The World's a Stage is one way to accomplish that. Vancaskerkin is putting on a production of a play about a tyrannical primarch getting overthrown. If he has a good relationship with the PCs, he can ask them to help even, especially if he thinks they agree that there should be political change. Once the play is performed and the ritual is successfully cast, the universe conspires to bring about the events depicted.

Vancaskerking will, under the pretext of making casual conversation about the play or current events, ask prodding questions to the party about their political beliefs. Their answers determine whether he reveals the ritual to them. If he thinks they won't agree with the purpose, he tries to hide the ritual from them and cast it behind the scenes. If he thinks they would agree, he asks to be the director and primary caster but if a PC has other ideas he will teach them the ritual and let them direct.

If the PCs participate, he asks for their input on some or all of the following questions (depending on player interest):

• • What should be the title? (e.g. The Tyrant)
  
• • What genre? (e.g. opera, comedy, musical, drama)
  
• • What movement? (e.g. traditional, modern, frame story, avant-garde)
  
• • What should be the outline of the plot (e.g. an adaptation of the story of the fall of the tyrannical Lord Daynce)
  
• • How metaphorical or literal should the analogies with the present be? (consider that the Crier’s Table can intervene and censor the play)
  
• • Which venue? (e.g. Grand Dance Hall of Kortos, Ivy Playhouse, the Gutless Griffon, House of Shade and Grace, Irorium, Lantern lodge, Wandering Monster)
  
• • Who should be cast on each role? (maybe some of the PCs could act too)
  
• • To what extent should magic be used? (e.g. none, illusions for scenery and special effects, mental magic to enchant the audience)
  
• • How do we make the sets?
  
• • What kind of music should be used?
  
• • How do we organise the rehearsals?
  

Aftermath 1: Vancaskerkin will decide if he can ask the PCs for help to depose the primarch for real based on their disposition about the play. He can also use the premiere of the play as an opportunity to force the PCs to choose quickly (see below).

Aftermath 2: If the ritual works, Vancaskerkin will use his re-rolls at the most critical times for making the Twilight Four Plan a success. The PCs, if they participate, may re-interpret the play and use their own re-rolls on a wider set of circumstances around deposing tyrants (including Olansa Terimor and Vancaskerkin of course).

How to get the acting primarch arrested

This is an expanded and corrected version of the most critical part of the Twilight Four plan: get Wynsal Starborn, the acting primarch, arrested. It is put in motion at the end of Book 4 but you can start foreshadowing/preparing way earlier.

Part 1: The Harrow Killer
Instead of the Rabbit Prince being an insane stranger how about if he is a dark reflection of one of the PCs?

Vancaskerkin wants to bait Starborn to go to Harrowland where he can be framed for killing Harlo Doleen. So he needs a credible and authentic threat by whom it would seem realistic that Harlo was abducted. If Vancaskerkin had a great relationship with one or more of the PCs he could ask them to play the role of a mad serial killer to help him get the primarch. Obviously this isn't going to happen for most people running this adventure path.

Instead Vancaskerkin will try to trick the PCs into creating the Rabbit Prince and taking the blame for his murders. To do that he will need a darkside mirror. He will perform an occult ritual that will make the mirror only trigger on one specific target person (the chosen PC) and with a substantial delay in creating the mirror duplicate. Then he needs to find a way for the target PC to interact with the mirror for a little while to trigger the magic.

So he sends the PCs on a quest. This is a modified version of the Counterfeit Peak mini-adventure from Book 6. Vancaskerkin asks them to retrieve three golden rings for "my collection of historical curios". From then on run the adventure as normal. When they reach the dragon, the PCs will likely ask to trade. Crystal dragons love mirrors and the dragon will demand a bigger mirror than the small hand mirror the PCs already possess from this adventure. If all goes well, Vancaskerkin will take the PCs to Emporium Impossible (a secret market for high-end goods) and make a big show of all of them together picking a mirror to trade with the dragon. It is all in fact a deception: the seller will be in the know and pretend (Sense Motive DC 35) to sell the darkside mirror saying it's a Mirror of Sleeping Vigil (Identify Magic DC 35 to realise it's actually cursed). Then the PCs will have to arrange a meeting with the dragon to trade it which will necessitate them staying close to the mirror.

If the plan succeeds, Vancaskerkin will wait until the mirror duplicate emerges and together they will slay the dragon and take the mirror to Harrowland. There Vancaskerkin will brainwash the duplicate with his philosophy to turn him into a servant and instill in him the desire to be Rabbit Prince and turn things around him into a reflection of the Harrowed Realm.

(If the PCs instead slay the dragon or become suspicious of Vancaskerkin, he will have to try to find a different way to get the darkside mirror near them or he will have to find a different way to get a crazy Harrow-obsessed serial killer in Harrowland.)

Aftermath 1: Weeks or months later, the PCs might learn (through their old collegues in Edgewatch likely) of at least two Harrow-related cases:

• • Human man named Grulph Nimberdell -shipwright from the Docks district and local drunkard at Precipice Quarter- disappeared. A Harrow card depicting The Vision (but instead of an old man the card features the character of the Rabbit Prince getting struck) was found near the Tipsy Tengu tavern where the victim was last seen. (The PCs might eventually rescue him from Harrowland)
  
• • A murder tableau consisting of a dead body set up to look like "The Lost" harrow card. It was initially thought to be a zombie from the Undercity but it's actually a recently murdered body that has been alchemically treated and carved with a knife to look extremely decomposed. Body remains unidentified.
  If the PCs investigate these in depth and discover the situation in Harrowland, that would require a substantial re-write of the adventure path. Perhaps the Twilight Four will attempt a different way to frame the primarch. Perhaps they would be forced to hasten their plan putting it into motion as soon as the PCs get to Harrowland. Perhaps their whole plan will collapse like a house of cards. For most GMs that don't want to derail the campaign too much, it would be wise to only present these cases to the PCs while they are distracted with other (seemingly) more important business.
  

Aftermath 2: Because of their newfound connection to the Harrowed Realm, any contact the duplicated PC has with harrow cards might trigger the party getting transported to the Harrowed Realm. Use the 1e adventure The Harrowing for inspiration if you want to pursue this. Conversion guide. Alternative conversion guide.

How to secure the votes to become primarch

In book 5, at room J3 of Bottles and Blots there's some very shocking evidence:

These boxes contain a treasure trove of secrets and blackmail materials [...] there are blackmail documents on many of the major noble families of Absalom.

This blackmail is the reason these people on the High Council feel compelled to vote for Olansa as the new primarch. But what did they do exactly and how did Vancaskerkin discover it?

Vancaskerkin had Ixusoth the hyakume brainwasher abduct people that had access to the dealings of these nobles (servants, advisors, colleagues, friends, relatives), swap their eyes for green ones then spy on them until their most corrupt, heinous or simply embarassing secrets were revealed. Then all Olansa needs to do is tell them they have to vote for her or else she goes public with their secrets... and Bob's your uncle.

Vancaskerkin has a file on every person he's been spying on which is way way more than the Highcouncilmembers. However there are only four files in which the names are circled in black ink (because they are the ones whose votes have been secured). Here are their secrets:

• • Ferridan Severus: The file has a detailed log of his activities as Diplomatic Minister (including information about ongoing negotiations with Cheliax on arranging a prisoner exchange). There are a lot of details about his private life, especially his interest in his orphaned nephew (and a note in the margins that he could make a good hostage). His 7 brothers and his father are all high-ups at the Vault of Abadar. A methodical audit of its accounts is attached which shows that the bank is practically bankrupted. The obvious blackmail here is that if more people knew about this, it could result in a bank run and complete economic collapse.

• • Lady Neferpatra: The so-called Great-Aunt Maut is actually an ancient Leng ghoul and the real leader of the House of Ahnkamen. Very few people know of this but Neferpatra definitely does and cannot allow under any circumstances more people to know since this is extremely damaging not only to her standing as the head of a noble house but also as a Priestess of Pharasma.

• • Jaress Molinarro: He's secretly in the pocket of the Kortos Consortium. On its own this would be bad but there's also his close friend and partner Diasco Vade (third law lord) who does not know and thinks Jaress is incorruptible. Jaress would hate to be a disappointment to him... which is why he is vulnerable to blackmail.

• • Chun Hye-Seung: The file goes into great detail about her interest in clockwork machines, her political blunders and her close friendship with Lady Adrielle Neprathep. There is nothing here that screams blackmail. (What is not written down in the file is that Neprathep asked Chun to vote for her party as a personal favour and Vancaskerkin buttered her up too by spending a lot of time talking with her, sharing knowledge about clockwork applications.)
  

(All the secrets were taken directly from Lost Omens: Absalom, if you want all the juicy details, get that book.)

That's 4 votes secured. The High Council has 12 seats normally but if the primarch is indisposed (for example if he's arrested for murder) the remaining 11 can still vote a new primarch with simple majority, which requires at least 6 votes. Lady Nephrathep will of course vote for her party's candidate, she tells herself that she's the bigger person and can put her personal ambitions aside for the sake of the people. Olansa Terimor will obviously also vote for herself if she has a seat in the High Council, which she achieves by taking Larrett's seat). (Alternatively if Olansa is not on the High Council in your campaign, you can invent some devastating secret for Larrett, who is so obviously corrupt that it would be child's play to obtain some blackmail on him, green eyes or not.)

How the PCs can interact with all of this: First and foremost, when the PCs raid Bottles and Blots, they will have a chance to interact with Ixusoth's files, guess which files are the important ones, what the circled names mean and be shocked by discovering the secrets instead of being told vaguely "you found all the evidence about some blackmail". Additionally, even before that, the PCs might grow suspicious if they ask some of the councilmembers that are being blackmailed for help and get stonewalled. That might lead them to investigate, potentially discover the secrets and help resolve them. That would ruin Olansa's plan (since the councilmember would be free to vote someone else) and change the campaign considerably. Alternatively the PCs could help resolve the secrets after Olansa is elected primarch; that would have less of an impact but might still make it easier to depose her.

How to get the party's presumptive nominee to drop out
According to Lost Omens: Absalom Olansa Terimor is part of the Citizens’ League, the party representing labourers and the dispossessed. The party has the tacit support of Norgorber's cult and Olansa is the main link between the two, promoting the cooperation from the shadows. However Olansa is not the leader of the party. That would be Adrielle Neprathep. Olansa is not even in the High Council originally (although that can be fixed, see the Larrett vignette).

To become the primarch Olansa first needs to get Neprathep out of the way, otherwise securing the votes in the High Council for her party would result in Neprathep getting the title. Thankfully Neprathep does have one vulnerability: there has been a rumour for a long time that she was involved in the disappearance of Harbormaster Hugen... after all she was close to him and directly benefitted by seizing his position as Harbormaster. Olansa's plan is to inflame this rumour into something tangible which will force Adrielle to step aside. She will plant fake evidence that Adrielle was involved and then let Hugen's daughter Lady Alidane find it. Alidane is already feeling resentful towards Neprathep for "stealing" the Harbormaster position and Olansa will take advantage of that sentiment.

She hires the services of an alghollthu vidileth called Uruluura and tasks it to create a fake shipwreck, complete with the fake body of Hugen and fake letters implicating Neprathep (or if you want subtler: painting a harsh picture of a very negative relationship between them). Once that is done, she gives a tip to Lady Alidane, handing her a wayfinder that supposedly belonged to her father and is configured to show the way to him.

If Lady Alidane has a good relationship with the PCs, she will ask them to investigate. If you want to run this side quest in detail, you can use the PLUNDER OF THE SLAVER SHIP mini-adventure at the end of Book 6 with the following changes:

• • Instead of the ship being ancient it looks like it sank fairly recently (Identify Magic DC 40 to realise it has been touched up to look like a recent shipwreck).
  
• • Instead of it resting above the waterline on a rocky pillar it is at the bottom of the sea but is partially covered in a magical sphere that keeps the water out of the upper deck (Identify Magic DC 40 to know it shows signs of alghollthu rituals).
  
• • Instead of finding the captain's corpse in B2, it's Hugen's corpse (Medicine DC 40 to notice it's fake). Instead of finding a missive in the chest, you find a lot of letters between Neprathep and Hugen. The contents are hard to summarise but it is evident to anyone reading them in detail that they had a lot of disagreements and frequently blamed each other in an aggressive manner (Vancaskerkin & Terimor used a variation of Norgorber's minor boon to forge the letters, so the forgery is impossible to detect).
  
• • There are no visible manacles or other signs this is a slave ship (DC 40 to notice there used to be originally)
  
• • Instead of having alchemical supplies in C3, Uruluura keeps its schematics for faking the shipwreck here. If the PCs are too slow to reach this location, the vidileth will destroy them and leave. If the PCs get there in time, it will attempt to destroy them during its first or second round of combat. If the PCs manage to retrieve them, a DC38 relevant check together with knowledge of the alghollthu language will allow them to understand what the schematics mean and the deception that is going on.

More likely than not, the PCs will not notice the deception and return to Alidane with "proof" implicating Neprathep. Alidane will be furious and she will decide to confront Neprathep, asking the PCs to be there with her for moral support and "in case she tries anything". During the meeting Neprathep will deny she did anything wrong (and she will doubt the authenticity of the letters if she is allowed to study them) but -unless the PCs intervene in her favour- she will ultimately concede that the material is damaging and will step down for the good of the party, hoping that will be enough to assuage Alidane so that she does not go public with the scandal.

And just like that, Olansa (as the second most senior councilmember from the party) is now the Citizen League party's nominee for the position of primarch.

This is a series of homebrew additions to the campaign to better flesh out the Twilight Four plan to replace the primarch and hopefully make it more interactive for the players.

Feel free to add your own.

Episode 4: Her last bow
This is the final chapter in the series. Bolera is studying at libraries trying to figure out how the Graveraker can be powered by Proteans (as she learned in the previous episode) and how that power can be controlled remotely. She eventually comes up with the theory that it was the Radiant Spark, which is close to the truth, but wrong (could be a good way to foreshadow the artifact because it becomes important in book 6 for a different reason). If PCs show up and show interest in her research they might help in formulating the theory. Or Bolera might test them by asking questions to see if they can figure out what she's trying to research here based on everything that has happened before. In either case she eventually shares her theory with the PCs.

And then there were none
Days or weeks later, she realises her mistake. But now she's too close to the truth and Vancaskerkin, watching her progress through her green eyes, realises this. Bolera in turn figures out that whoever changed her eyes is spying on her and must be connected with the Twilight Four and the Graveraker disappearance. So she understands that this someone might murder her too to silence her. Therefore, she comes up with a plan to discretely share her findings with the PCs after her death. That way they will know but Vancaskerkin will not know they know.

In order to do that, since she's not sure how exactly the green scrying eyes work, she's using as many layers of obfuscation as possible: She's writing an encoded message hoping only the PCs can solve it. And she's doing it while averting her eyes from the piece of paper she's writing that message on. The code is based on a detective book. Ideally you need to make sure that Bolera is established to the PCs as either a well-known mystery novel author or avid reader well before this episode starts.

The handout should look something like this:
[code]
10LD
⮦16→0(3) ⮤12→4(5) ⮦13→3(4) ⮤1→3(5) ⮤3→1(2) ⮤10→1(3)
⮤2→4(4) ⮦8→2(3) ⮤6→5(2) ⮦9→5(3) ⮤7→1(2) ⮤3→3(5) ⮦7→1(5) ⮦1→3(3) ⮤5→2(3) ⮦2→2(3)
[/code]

Here is my attempt at making an authentic-looking handout.

The mystery novel is called Ten Little Dwarves (a reference to Agatha Christie's infamous "And Then There Were None"). Bolera is hinting at this with the "10LD" in her note. A PC who knows her well might immediately recognise it, otherwise a DC30 Society check or slightly lower Lore(Literature) or similar check should do it. After the PCs get their hands on a copy of the book, you should tell them that on the very first page there's a rhyme about 10 little dwarves. A PC who skims through the book realises the rhyme plays an important role in the plot. A PC who reads the book realises the book is about a killer who kills their victims based on the lines of the rhyme. Here's the rhyme:

Ten little Dwarves went out to dine;
One choked on a radish and then there were nine.
Nine little Dwarves powered on though it was late;
One lay down for a spell and then there were eight.
Eight little Dwarves visiting Greengold for resin;
To no avail, one would stay and then there were seven.
Seven little Dwarves chopping up sticks;
One was torn to pieces and then there were six.
Six little Dwarves playing on a hillside;
A giant ant stung one and then there were five.
Five little Dwarves excelling in law;
One got in the Brine and then there were four.
Four little Dwarves on the ark at sea;
A red bunyip swallowed one and then there were three.
Three little Dwarves walking in the zoo;
A bugbear hugged one and then there were two.
Two little Dwarves watching the sun;
One got his eyes frizzled up and then there was one.
One little Dwarf left all alone;
He went out and hanged himself and then there were none.

Bolera's code is confined to this rhyme. The next step is to realise that the rest of the code is instructions telling you how to move through the words and letters like it's a treasure map. Each instruction has 3 parts:

• • how many lines to go down or up
  
• • how many words to skip in that line
  
• • how many letters to keep from the word you landed on

Allow the players to think this through or give them hints for each part of the instructions with relevant skill checks.

The very first instruction says ⮦16 (starting from the first line, skip 16 lines). Then →0 (skip zero words, so you choose the first word of the line). Finally (3) (take the first three letters of that word, which in this case is the whole word "Two").

The pattern of instructions repeats until the message is formed:

two green eyes watch re-lay
radi-ant sp-ark no power giant exc-ava-tor

Locked room mystery
Here's the play-by-play of the fateful day. Most likely the following events will happen when the PCs are preoccupied with something, for example after arresting Flakfatter and are forced to guard him for three whole days at Hunting Lodge Seven.

Bolera is at her Edgewatch office late working on the Graveraker power source theory. Immediately after she has her "aha" moment, she begins planning for her likely assassination. She keeps her eyes on her research notes but takes out a separate piece of paper and begins writing the code on it. She has a few false starts and can't stay on the lines but she manages finish it. Then she gets out of her office and visits Sergant Ollo's desk where she makes some smalltalk (If questioned later, Ollo will describe her as distressed and distracted but at the time he does not realise anything is especially amiss). She expertly puts the crumpled up note in his pocket. She then goes back to her office, locks the door to protect the rest of Edgewatch and waits.

Meanwhile Vancaskerkin realises she knows too much and -if he thinks he can get away with it and the PCs cannot intervene- orders his clockwork assassins to kill her. The clockwork assassins stealthily climb the Edgewatch HQ from the side, locate the window to Bolera's office and pick it open. Bolera makes a futile effort to resist but she's stabbed through the heart in seconds (Medicine DC20 to understand how the wound was inflicted, on a critical success reconstruct her final moments). The clockwork assassins then carefully pick up all her research notes about artifacts and the graveraker power source (DC25 to notice her desk is weirdly clean, on a critical success understand what is missing). Finally they climb out of the window and put it back together so it seems that there was no forced entry at all (Perception/Crafting DC35 to notice the mechanism has been tampered with, disassembled and reassembled).

In Vancaskerkin's mind, this is his way of honouring Bolera's life. She loved mysteries so much it is fitting that in death she became one herself: a locked room mystery.

Aftermath

If the PCs are at Hunting Lodge Seven, Lavarsus goes there himself to tell them the sad news (between enemy waves). He is obviously distrought and his presence is much darker than the "mean boss tough guy" persona he's been putting up for them previously. He might stay and try to help with the defence (though he is woefully underleveled).

On the next day the funeral is held. This is a good opportunity for Ollo to give the note to the PCs. Alternatively Ollo does not notice it and the PCs will have to investigate him and find it themselves.

If the PCs manage to figure out Bolera's final message, they get one step closer to finding Ixusoth/Vancaskerkin and understanding the Twilight Four Plan. Since none of that is actionable, consider also rewarding them with something tangible, like a free investigative feat or similar.

Episode 3: Graveraker in miniature
Bolera is investigating the Graveraker disappearance. Because of her experience being abducted and taken underground, she suspects the real Graveraker was stolen by making it dig through the ground (and hiding the hole with illusion magic since Blune Bandersworth, famed illusionist, is one of her suspects). Investigating unusual underground digging activity, she hears rumours about some digging machine wreaking havoc at the Sewer Dragons' lair, perhaps because she knows Drandle Dreng of the Pathfinder Society. If her relationship with the PCs is good, she will invite them to help. If not, maybe the PCs learn some other way (someone else who Bolera told of her plan and is worried about her safety) and encounter her at the Sewer Dragons' lair or at the Halcyon Hog.

I've written in detail how all this could play out here.

Episode 2: Disappearance

This happens when some little time has passed after the catacombs adventure. The exact circumstances can vary but four thing are certain:

• The Twilight Four needs to "clean house" by making certain witnesses or evidence disappear.
• The PCs are preoccupied with something else and not near the target(s).
• The Rumormonger takes on the mission, sends some of his clockwork assassins to do it.
• Bolera, by foresight or circumstance, gets wind of this and gets herself into trouble.

You can customise this however you like but below I'm providing a more detailed view of how it played out in my campaign.

The interrogation
In my campaign, the PCs didn't make time to properly interrogate Mobana after arresting her in the catacombs so Bolera, as expert interrogator, decided to do it herself. During the interrogation she realised Mobana's life was in danger and hid outside the Stoneshield House where Mobana was kept and waited to see what would happen.

While waiting she sent a letter to herself with her write-up of Mobana's answers. As is her habit, she only recorded the answers and relied on her good memory to remember the questions, which on any other day would be a good bet... but not today.

Here's the handout in case you need it (the implied questions are in brackets, it will be a fun exercise for your players to figure them out):

• [What were you doing before we arrested you?]
  
• Looking for Skinner but she was nowhere to be found. Did you arrest her too? Is she alive?
  
• [Do you have any suspicions on who could have made Skinner's body disappear?]
  
• Yes. The Skinner was part of the Twilight Four. Must be one of them.
  
• [What is the Twilight Four?]
  
• A conspiracy by the greatest norgorberites in the city. Our operations had been funding it.
  
• [How did you make money? Via the Copper Hand?]
  
• We made bank selling the belongings of our victims. We laundered them through many gangs, not only the Copper Hand.
  
• [You said "had been funding". What changed?]
  
• I am not sure what changed, but Skinner stopped sending the money to them and kept it in our vault.
  
• [The Copper Hand used a clockwork drill for their bank heist and we found another one in your base. Where did you get them?]
  
• They're called dig widgets. They were delivered to us to pass them on to the Copper Hand. No idea from whom.
  
• [Any connection to the Graveraker? That huge drill that was stolen?]
  
• I have no clue. We only saw these small drills.
  
• [In that pool of blood you were doing some ritual. What was the goal?]
  
• The ritual was meant to seal a deal with Norgorber. I was not told what exactly the deal entailed.
  
• [Was that ritual the reason for all the murders too?]
  
• Perhaps that was not the only reason for the murders, there could be more: to send a message. To create an atmosphere of fear out there in the city.
  
• [You've been very forthcoming about this. Why? Others would keep their mouth shut in your position.]
  
• Because I don't care for nothing no more. I'm on borrowed time now either way.
  

Captured
She noticed the clockwork assassins too late to save Mobana and tried to give chase but wasn't fast enough. However she did notice a tiny black stain on the pavement: it was due to a small leak from the toxic black ink that is their lifeblood (Vancaskerkin takes it from the kraken Levialar and uses it in all his clockwork creations and his newspaper). Using her detective skills (she literally went to every ink shop she knew of and asked to taste their ink) she traced it back to Bottles and Blots (see book 5).

She tried to outwit Hedul the dwarf but couldn't outwit Ixusoth the hyakume brainwasher controlling him. She was captured and sedated. Eventually Vancaskerkin came along and the interrogator became the interrogated. He asked her to join his cause, talked to her about solving mysteries together, fighting crime, dismantling capitalism, the proletarian revolution... whatever he thought could get her to cooperate. But she could not be cajoled. Because he found her attraction to mysteries endearing and because he felt like he owed her and the PCs some respect, he decided not to kill her but turn her into an asset instead. He asked Ixusoth to replace her eyes with green ones and delete all her memories that could pose a risk.

During this time, she is subject to a Veil of Privacy / Nondetection spell and a Hidden Mind / Mind Blank spell. On a failed scrying attempt, the caster sees a swarm of creepy green eyes gazing back at them. Attempts to use Sending or similar will probably fail since she's unconscious for most of her stay at Inks & Blots (except during the few minutes she talks with Vancaskerkin).

Saving private detective Bolera
Vancaskerkin thought of an extra purpose for her: serve as a distraction. Force the PCs to go save her in order to take advantage of their absence to progress his other goals.

First, choose a suitable goal for him that he thinks might be disrupted by the PCs (In my campaign it was assassinating Violeta who was also arrested and kept at the Stoneshield House but another good option is the witnesses that were found alive in the catacombs). Then he stuffs a pack of demon dust in Bolera's pocket (side-effects include memory loss, which will make the PCs think this drug is the reason for Bolera's amnesia). After that, he makes Hedul move Bolera under the cover of the night to the Ivy District sewers where he sells her to morlocks (who will probably take her to Delirium's Tangle). Finally, allow the PCs to gain some hint about her whereabouts (in my campaign Vancaskerkin knew the PCs had access to the Sending spell so he timed Bolera waking up from the operation to coincide with the time Hedul would hand her off to the morlocks). Only then, with the PCs out of the way, can he send his agents to achieve the goal (probably the clockwork assassins doing another assassination).

In the unlikely event the PCs somehow get there before Hedul is gone, that might derail the campaign as they could trace him back to Inks & Blots. If they come later, they might find Bolera alone and tied up at the agreed-upon exchange point. If they are too late, the Morlocks have taken her and are headed to Delirium's Tangle. Here's a rouch sketch of how the chase could be run, if it comes to that: It takes 10 chase points to reach the Delirium's Tangle. The Morlocks automatically get 1 point every 10 minutes. The PCs need DC 20 to Track: they get 1 point on a success and 2 points on a critical success. Possible obstacles: Brainchild, oozes, gases, cave-in, washed away tracks. The Morlock party consists of 6 morlocks, each riding a giant stag beetle. If they somehow reach the Delirium's Tangle before they are overtaken by the PCs, use the 1e scenario Delirium's Tangle for inspiration. Possible encounters there: Green Slime, Yellow Mold, Shuffling Scythe Blades, Maze of Mirrors, Hound Of Tindalos, Misery Siktempora, Slithering Pit.

The aftermath
Through Bolera's green eyes, Vancaskerkin can attempt to spy on the PCs and Edgewatch. The PCs are likely to notice and investigate the green eyes. Bolera will insist her eyes had always been green and most people will feel inclined to agree. If the PCs suspect or accuse her openly she will get offended and their relationship might quickly sour. If they try to Identify Magic and/or cast (legacy) detect magic, it will take a DC 39 to notice faint traces of scrying/divination magic.

If they start researching at local libraries (Forae Logos in particular) for references to green eyes, a DC 34 Occultism check (or DC 36 Religion/Arcana) will lead them to discover the following passage written hastily with uneven strokes in the margins of a copy of the book "Fungi from Yuggoth":

Monster with green eyes all over. I am the last one alive hidden among the bookshelves. It will soon be my turn too. It has sealed all exits. It is going through the books one by one, reading them in seconds and burning them after. I am using the last of my strength to write these lines and teleport this book to the safest place I know. It is going to be my last and only legacy before oblivion embraces me.

The book's introduction mentions it is intended for the Library of Vista (a district of Magnimar). Problem is there is no such library and no one remembers there ever being one. If a librarian is asked, they will mention the book suddenly showed up on a shelf one day 700 years ago. Since the subject is the worship of Lrogg (a non-existent deity as far as they know) and it's referencing a non-existing library (as far as they know) the book has been categorised as "religious fiction". In reality, the monster reference is Ixusoth herself and she erased the library from existence and memory very thoroughly.

If the PCs start researching for monsters with many eyes and a proclivity for reading and erasing information, a DC 36 Occultism check will be enough to learn about Hyakume and realise green eyes is only one possible option; Hyakume with different eye colours exist.

A DC 40 Medicine check should be enough to reverse the eye operation - but access to Ixusoth's eye tank is needed to get Bolera's original eyes back.

Episode 1: Back to the catacombs
These events happen the very next morning after the PCs finish the catacombs from book 2 and beat/arrest the Skinner. It's especially relevant if Bolera played an active role in that adventure, for example if the PCs invited her to accompany them in the dungeon to help.

No matter the exact circumstances, Bolera realises the PCs left behind something important: this could be some unexplored space in the sanctum, some skinsaw cult member who got away, some piece of evidence they didn't collect. She claims that if they strike while the iron is hot, that important thing will still be there for them to collect. If they wait a few days, it will very likely be gone. Her argument is: whoever is left in the dungeon will believe, rationally, that the Edgewatch is unlikely to return on the very next day, so they will expect to have some time to get back on their feet, re-establish contact with each other etc. But at the same time, they won't stay long because either some norgorberite cleanup crew or the guards are bound to show up eventually.

Her instinct is correct on both counts. It's not only the PCs that may go. The Gray Queen is heading there as well on this day to clean up any evidence. If the PCs killed the Skinner but didn't take her body, that will be the top priority target and she might give up other targets to ensure she gets this one. Any skinsaw cultists who weren't arrested/killed during the main raid are also in the area, especially Mobana and Violetta. They plan to abandon the base after a few days, just like Bolera predicted.

If the PCs follow Bolera's advice, they can arrest any stranglers and maybe indirectly witness the Gray Queen's work. They probably can't directly interact with her since her invisibility (Hidden Paragon ability) is too much for them at this level but there might be a bit of a race against her about who gets to evidence first. If she gets it before them, they might notice some corpses, equipment etc are gone (they were there just a minute ago!). The Gray Queen will not reveal herself or kill anyone while the PCs are there. She will probably kill any cult members she sees as a liability but only while there are no witnesses.

I found that Detective Desdelen Bolera is an interesting character with lots of potential to interact with the PCs and the main plot. I set her up as the star of Edgewatch (but also a semi-famous detective mystery novel author on the side!) who was assigned the missing graveraker investigation. Having her check in with the PCs occassionally about that allows for this piece of the puzzle to stay in their minds, so that when the final revelation in book 4 about framing the primarch for the crime comes, it has more impact.

I've arranged what she might do into separate episodes that can be sprinkled throughout the campaign. I'll be posting mine below but feel free to add more if you like!

Anybody have ideas for Gurbo Mongsley, the guy with the stained wrinkled outfit who Gage tolerates who the mod says might have "some significant dirt on the casino owner." It seems like a fun angle, and he has artwork and everything! But we don't have any guidance on how it might be part of the Infiltration.

How about that idea I had a while ago?

It's heavily implied that Gage got his fortune by aid of a djinni vizier. RAW the djinni is dead when the players get in the vault. There's also some info on Gage that says he really desires to be part of Absalom's upper class but the other rich and nobles aren't accepting him. Now here's where it gets interesting. The Bestiary entry for djinn viziers says

Quote:

Djinni viziers prefer to manifest wishes in physical, often gaudy displays, but cut corners in quality. Wished-for gold, for example, might only be gold plated

So... add two and two together: Gage wished to be part of the upper class and he got his wish: he's outwardly rich yet the upper class won't accept him as one of their own. His wish got monkey pawed, he got the "gold plated" version of being in the upper class.

You can say Gurbo has first hand knowledge of this or simply figured it out so now Gage is paying him off to keep his mouth shut.

Thanks for reminding me of this, I am making a list of all the homebrew additions to AoE and I missed it.

I have a question about the Skinsaw Murderers. Specifically, they have the Twin Takedown action without the Hunt Prey action. As written, doesn't this make Twin Takedown useless since they have no prey to target? Should I have it require two actions the first time it's used on a PC to balance?

Yeah a lot of enemy statblocks, especially in adventure paths, are hastily written and contain mistakes. You can either give them the hunt prey action or allow them to use twin takedown to anyone. Should be more or less fine balance-wise.

I ended up using some of the content from these scenarios.

Background:

Instead of testing the mini-graveraker before building the real one like the scenario says, I had Wakeiwa Atikak build the mini-graveraker after the real one was stolen. I decided that Wakeiwa at that point in the story did not know exactly how the real one was powered. From Blune's requirements, specifications and cryptic clues she has surmised that it might be powered with sentient creatures but now she wants to confirm it, especially due to the extraordinary manner of its disappearance.

So she sets up a secret workshop in the sewer beneath the Halcyon Hog, she builds the mini-graveraker and hires a wizard to summon some voidworms (baby proteans). The experiment is a bit too successful, when the voidworms are placed inside the mini-graveraker it gets overcharged and runs amok underground.

The mini-graveraker digs straight through any walls on its way and eventually reaches the Ivy District. It penetrates the buried theater where the Sewer Dragons' lair is located, wrecking some columns and making the whole building structurally unsound. It keeps going, crashing into a sealed ancient tomb nearby. There it finally runs out of juice or maybe that wall is a bit too reinforced by ancient magicks for it to break through. The kobolds fight against the horrors unleashed from the tomb and through lots of sacrifice manage to place a huge boulder on the hole, sealing the tomb once more and the mini-graveraker within.

Possible hooks:

• • The PCs have some contact with the Sewer Dragons, for example maybe some of the kobolds from the Pagoda. These contacts ask the PCs for help.
  
• • Someone from Edgewatch, perhaps Detective Bolera, is investigating the Graveraker disappearance. She suspects the real Graveraker was stolen by making it dig through the ground (and hiding the hole with illusion magic). Investigating unusual underground digging activity, she hears about the events at the Sewer Dragons' lair, perhaps through contacts at the Pathfinder Society.
  
• • The PCs notice or are told about suspicious activity, especially weird sounds and a loud bang, under the Halcyon Hog inn (for example because they happen to be there to visit Kassi Aziril).
  

Sewer dragons:
When they get close to the Sewer Dragons' lair, the PCs might encounter some of their traps. Use the traps from the Broken Scales scenario, but do it theater-of-the-mind style and handwave the details, especially if the PCs are very high level compared to these traps.

Once they get there, they immediately notice the rampage. The trail of destruction from the mini-graveraker's passage has left theater seats flattened, a straight line of debris dividing the hall in two. On each end of the line on opposite sides of the hall, there's a hole: the one the mini-graveraker got in from and the one it exited. You can find a map of the theater in the 1e scenario Sewer Dragons of Absalom which you can augment with your drawing powers to indicate the mini-graveraker's passage.

Once they manage to get an audience with Yiddlepode and earn her trust, she explains what happened and her concerns: she thinks the theater will collapse and the boulder won't hold off the horrors for long, so tribe will have to move to escape. Yiddlepode's stance is generally trusting and is hoping the PCs offer solutions. Her brother, Trapmaster Tok, is a traditionalist, does not speak common and will resist any attempts to move the tribe or even accept the PC's help.

If the PCs offer to deal with the tomb, the kobolds warn them the whole tribe couldn't fight back the horrors it unleashed.

Alternatively the PCs can backtrack and investigate the graveraker's trail to see where it came from.

The tomb:
PCs will need to be at least level 7 for this. You might want to even tell them outright if they're lower. Use the "meeting site" map from Balancing the Scales. Before getting inside, they'll have to get the boulder out of the way. Force Open DC 25 or just dragging it or some spell that destroys / passes through stone will do the trick.

Inside there's 5 Fire-Eyed Cyclops Zombies and 3 Ash Skeletons. The Ash Skeletons begin the fight in Ash Form and are gathered around the mini-graveraker which has crashed on the south wall.

The undead might not only attack PCs but also the mini-graveraker. Any damage on it from PCs or monsters will puncture a hole which will allow a steady stream of voidworms to be released. These will not fight but are still vulnerable.

The voidworms are semantically synced to the stochastic processes of their enslaved brethren on the real graveraker. If the PCs manage to protect enough of them and have some way of communicating with them, they might become privy to the Cane of Maelstrom's rhyme “Build. Make. Unmake. Shackle/Bend/Break/ and/Take and Unto the Cage, Cerulean Light Lakes.”

Where it came from:
Reaching the workshop from the theater is not very straightforward. Add some random encounter and some digging (will take 6 hours) as some of the dug tunnels have collapsed since the time the mini-graveraker made them.

Once there, they find a small sewer chamber retrofitted into a workshop, complete with a desk filled with schematics, lots of clockwork parts and some engineering tools. Reading the schematics it's obvious it's an attempt to make a miniature version of the graveraker. DC25 to realise only the real inventor of the graveraker would be able to so elegantly replicate and miniaturise the machine.

Climbing the nearby ladder leads to a manhole directly next to the Halcyon Hog. Track or Gather Information DC25 or similar will lead the PCs to Wakeiwa's room at the inn.

She's going to refuse to talk to them but if they are insistent and diplomatic enough she might open up a bit. She will admit who she is and explain she's hiding. She will admit to doing the experiment with the mini-graveraker and apologise profusely for the damage she has caused. She won't divulge she's hiding because she's afraid of being accused of enslaving the proteans unless the PCs first bring up related evidence they have gathered. At your discretion, more pressure might make her confess her business with Blune (but be careful this might derail the whole AP, this is information the PCs normally get in book 5).

If they present her any clockwork technology they have found, she will correctly identify the source. For example, for the dig-widgets in the catacombs/bank heist she will correctly tell them they are made locally, in the style taught at the Clockwork Cathedral. (At your discretion she might even recognise they were made by Vancaskerkin, but again be careful as this might sequence-break the whole AP)

If they pressure her to make an official statement or try to arrest her, she will attempt to escape. She will non-challantly walk towards her desk (DC 30 to realise her suspicious intentions), then throws a smoke bomb, gets a helicopter-like gadget and flies through the window. (the flying gadget can easily lift 2 Medium-sized creatures, but will lose height continuously at 3 and won't lift off at all at 4). Run this with the chase subsystem: First, if anyone has managed to grab onto her, she flies dangerously close to a building so the grabber gets hit. After some evasive manoeuvres she lands. If she has managed to get some distance to any pursuers, she presses a button to transform her gadget into a fake metal chimney she attaches to the nearest building. (DC35 Stealth).

If the PCs manage to detain her after all that, you might need to make huge changes to the AP from the information she will reveal about her association with Blune and Vancaskerkin. Also the whole plot later with her attempted assassination by Vancaskerkin killbots is going to have to change etc.

Possible rewards:

• • Confirmation that the graveraker was powered by proteans.
  
• • Information on the graveraker, Blune and clockwork technology by Wakeiwa.
  
• • Gratitude of the Sewer Dragons tribe.
  

I rewrote this somewhat extensively to fit better into my campaign. Thought you would be interested to see it:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OpaJbvmUoCR1xr07yHA87uhunu04QEdTw5u59TH iEdQ/edit?usp=sharing

You added a space by mistake in your link.

Here's the right link.

One of the players in my group requested to use one of the uncommon feats tied to Kassi Aziril from Lost Omens: Legends and I decided to oblige him by turning it into a mini-quest. This can play out right before or during the events of chapter 1 of this book, but I think it's even better to do it even earlier in the campaign, during book 2 or 3 to foreshadow the Blackfingers Temple and the conference.

Here you go: Kassi Aziril in Absalom

One of the players in my group requested to use one of the uncommon feats tied to Kassi Aziril from Lost Omens: Legends and I decided to oblige him by turning it into a mini-quest. This can play out right before or during the events of chapter 1 from book 4) but I think it's even better to do it even earlier in the campaign, during book 2 or 3 to foreshadow the Blackfingers Temple and the conference.

Background
Kassi Aziril is a prolific scientific healer, sometimes called "The Mother of Medicine". She is from Rahadoum and absolutely hates religion.

The Blackfingers Temple invites her to give some lectures as part of the Noxious Retort conference (from book 4). In the invitation they do not mention they are a religious institution knowing that she would decline if she knew. The hope of the trickery god's followers is that she arrives in Absalom after an arduous trip and at that point she will feel obliged to give the lectures because she has already committed all this time and effort. Alas the plan does not work out. When Kassi arrives at the Black Mask (where the church had offered to host her in one of the spare rooms on the first floor) she realises the ruse and is furious. She immediately leaves without a word which creates a huge gap in the conference agenda, not to mention the embarassment. Now the temple hopes to track her down and make her reconsider.

How the PCs come in
The PCs might, while travelling through the Ascended Court, come across the sign outside the Blackfingers Temple advertising the conference. "Noxious Retort: grand alchemical conference. Book your place now!" followed by the dates and a list of activities, including Kassi's lectures. They might also be pointed to the conference by any NPC knowledgeable about medicine related events throughout the city.

If the PCs inquire inside the temple, a distraught Kalyn Pounch will explain the situation and try to recruit their help. If the PCs show up looking like guards she will present this as a missing person case and feign worry about what might have happened to her guest lost in the big city. Or she might argue that Kassi is contractually obligated to appear in the conference because she formally accepted the invitation. She will not divulge all the details about how they tried to trick her.

Finding Kassi
To track her down the PCs will have to ask around town with Gather Information or Track or similar. If they think to start at the Black Mask, where she was last seen, they will be told by the shopkeeper Marli she left shortly after she arrived and went north. That should lower the DC. Don't forget to spring any plot hooks you have for the Black Mask at this point. One Gather Information check should be enough to narrow it down to a single district and a second one will give them her precise location. Using Track might be slightly harder since it's busy city cobble streets but it doable since Kassi brought lots of luggage (mostly plants) with her so there might be a very faint trail of leaves, smells and cart tracks.

After leaving the Black Mask, Kassi went to a Wise District inn called the Halcyon Hog (see book 5 for more info). She's staying there, mostly brooding and ruminating about what a waste this trip has been. But also not completely neglecting her research. You can use this opportunity to foreshadow the inn and perhaps even the enigmatic inventor Wakeiwa Atikak who is hiding there.

Talking to Kassi
If the PCs talk to Kassi, she will not miss an opportunity to question them about their philosophies. If anyone is openly religious she will 100% start an argument with them (see her entry in LO:Legends for things she might say). If the PCs try to convince her to actually attend the Noxious Retort conference she will be very angry and rant about how she was tricked. It will be very hard to change her mind. Another possibility -that she hasn't considered herself and the PCs might suggest- is that they organise a smaller alternative conference just for her lectures. In that case, any PC that helps organise it will earn her gratitude, access to her feats and item formulas.

Kassi's conference
It would be a one-day conference, during which Kassi delivers a number of lectures with only short breaks inbetween. If the PCs sufficiently advertise, a lot of high-profile people will show up, including: Asilia of Gyr, Wynsal Starborn, Grospek Lavarsus, Chun Hye-Seung, Simo of Wynsal, Runewulf the Unbeliever, Shristi Melipdra, Gaftrin, Urmas Sirola, Venla Sirola, Flevvid Grummlin, Sindoi of the Thousand Poems.

The agenda might look like this:

9.00 Divine poisons
10.00 break
10.30 Addiction
12.00 lunch
13.00 Battle Medicine
14.00 break
14.30 Vaccines
15.30 break
16.00 Kandlerae

The conference won't be completely uneventful. Left to her own devices, during the lecture about addiction Kassi will go off-script and start ranting about how the gods made mortals susceptible to addiction so they can be easily addicted to religion. If that happens Sindoi will intervene and impress/confuse everyone with a cryptic limerick about how Kassi's contempt for the gods might become ironic if she herself ever became a goddess of medicine.

No one from the Blackfingers Temple shows up because they don't want to draw any attention to themselves right before or after the terrorist attack at the Irorium since that could compromise Jonis Flakfatter, the high priest.

Epilogue
A few days/weeks after the conference, Kassi, ever industrious, will leave Absalom to find adventure and diseases to cure. She will write a letter to the PCs who helped her the most:

Dear [PC NAME],

Yours in truth,
Kassi Aziril

I made an undercity pointcrawl based on an adventure hook from the toolbox in book 1.

Snowdew Pond: Most fisherfolk can only dream of a body of water like Snowdew Pond: crystal-clear, with a surface as flat as newly cut glass, and continually stocked with fish ranging from mundane to magical. [...] Despite the water’s clarity and the serenity all around Snowdew Pond, several fairgoers have complained of a foul stench emanating from the spot, and one terrified visitor has even claimed to have seen a ghastly arm reach out from the middle of the pond, curl its clawed fingers into a loose fist, and then sink back into the depths as quickly as it had come.

It is meant to replace or complement parts of book 1 and book 2. Enjoy.

I made an undercity pointcrawl based on an adventure hook from the toolbox in book 1. It is meant to replace or complement parts of book 1 and book 2. Enjoy.

The foul stench of Snowdew Pond
Fairgoers have made complaints about a foul stench emanating from this pond (see book 1, page 72). The PCs might have also noticed during the patrol on their first day at Edgewatch or at some point later while investigating. One visitor has even seen a ghastly arm emerge for a moment before sinking back into the water.

The truth is Snowdew Pond was built over a haunted sank school, which explains the ghostly sightings but not the smell. The smell is due to an ofalth that was attracted to the location because of all the bodies that were dug up and rubish that was produced when the remains of the school were sealed up during the preparations for the Radiant Festival. The ofalth unsucessfully chased some otyughs and then set sight on an even better meal: the constant barrage of body parts produced by the Skinner.

Which means the smell at the pond will go away on its own but the danger it represents will still be lurking under the city and eventually reach the Catacombs under the Ascendent Court (where the PCs will eventually find it if they don't intervene in the meantime).

To represent this, assume the ofalth's initial location when the festival starts is area 2. Precipice necropolis. It will move through the shortest possible path towards the final area 12. Arodenite catacombs at a pace of 1 area every 3-4 days, so it will reach the destination in a little over a month.

The DC to Track the smell, discerning if an exit from an area leads closer to the ofalth, is 5 times the number of areas between the ofalth and the party. So it's DC 5 if it's an adjacent area, DC 10 if two areas over, DC 15 if it's three areas over and so on.

The first hurdle is tracking the smell to the precise location of a tightly screwed storm drain on the northern side of the pond. It takes a DC 25 to Force Open or more likely waiting a week of bureaucracy to get a crew to open it if they ask Edgewatch for official permission to investigate.

If the PCs reach the ofalth before they are at a level they stand a chance, make sure to telegraph its power, perhaps by letting them witness the strength of its Stench Aura ability or stealing a glance of its disgusting form from a safe distance. The ofalth will ignore the PCs thinking they are small fry until they get extremely close or attack.

Here is the map showing the pointcrawl areas.

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

1. Drownyard (Level 1-2)
The once renowned school of Tri-Towers Yard sank in the sewer waters beneath it during the 4698 AR earthquake. Most of the students perished and their ghostly remnants haunt this place.

Cavernous space with derelict ruined buildings that once comprised the school. No light except for the ghostly presences.

PCs who go back to investigate what this school is about might find their way to Lady Dacilane who tells them the story of her daughter who was at the school, went missing and presumed dead but was eventually found and returned unharmed by the Pathfinders.

Check old PFS scenario Black Waters for more info and inspiration.

Exits:

• • Long ladder back to the surface next to Snowdew pond
  
• 2. Precipice necropolis: Dried up pool. Α severed human arm tightly gripping a metal handle connected to a heavy iron plug is blocking a hole in the ground, which leads to a series of slippery handholds.
  

Encounters:

• • A fence of black iron pikes. The padlocked gate that once was the sole entrance to the school grounds lies flat on the ground.
  
• • Backpack with appropriate minor art object. This was a school for rich children after all.
  
• • 1d4 ghost students. Curious and kinda friendly. They may try to possess you to piggyback a way out of here if interacted with. Figure out what they wanted to be when they grew up to help them move on to the afterlife.
  
• • Poltergeist. The area near this classroom gets noticeably colder and foreboding. A restless and naughty spirit of a student inhabits it. Throws rocks, loose bricks and school supplies at intruders. Strictly bound to this classroom where the kid met his demise.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

2. Precipice necropolis (Level 2-3)
A network of once ornate chambers, murals fading, stones crumbling, water seeping through the walls making puddles out of floor cracks. Wet unlit holders for torches, doors of stone -that could once be locked- left ajar. Alcoves filled with skeletal remains. It's quiet down here except for the drip drip drip of water and the occasional undead monstrocity.

Check old PFS scenario Black Waters for more info and inspiration.

Exits:

• 1. Drownyard: Climb handholds leading to dry pool.
  
• 3. Winding tunnels: Staircase leading down to a tunnel
  
• 4. Docks sewer: Wall weathered down from eons of humidity, breaking through causes a torrent of sewer water to be released.
  

Encounters:

• • 1d6 ghouls and a ghast gnawing on old bones excited for living prey
  
• • Draugr (still has a lesser sea touch elixir on his belt, if only he had managed to reach it in time when he was alive!), 2 skeleton guards and a constantly shifting magical tide making water rise and fall. Treat the tide as a hazard; init + 0; routine: 1 action each turn alternating area between high tide (Balance DC 15) and low tide (Balance DC 5).
  
• • Cairn Wight playing dead in sarcophagus filled with gold (150gp) holding a sword with glowing runes (vitalizing, ghost touch); will rise and attack looters until every last coin is returned
  
• • 1d4 ghost children sitting in a circle pantomiming ghost stories to each other, they think they're still taking refuge from the collapsed school.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

3. Winding tunnels (Level 2-3)
Winding maze-like passages, not man-made but a cave system (probably). The water reaches your knees if you're Medium-sized and you gotta bend awkwardly because the ceiling is so low.

Exits:

• 2. Precipice necropolis: Back to the city of the dead after a climb of that slippery staircase.
  
• 4. Docks sewer: One passage progressively widening, walls and floors show more and more signs of regularity, until it opens up to a sewer system.
  
• • Azarketi cave: Another passage leads to a cave that an underwater Azarketi community, the Seafoam Conclave, calls home. You can keep going to reach the surface of the water beneath the creaky boardwalks of the Docks district. If the Azarketi perceive you as honoured guests they might even show you the way from there to 8. Gilltown.
  

Encounters:

• • A shadow forms inside the shadow of whoever is holding any source of light. Needs it to be nice and dark again so it can whisper its sweet maddening limericks to passersby.
  
• • Fortune eater starts following the PCs. Comprised of Pathfinders, it will not shut up about defying sewer dragons, looting graves and finding a little girl alive and unaged 10 years after the earthquake hit.
  
• • The water level reaches the ceiling in this part. Gotta swim or find a way to drain it.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

4. Docks sewer (Level 3-4)
Part of an ancient sewer network that is still in use. There is a narrow sidewalk of sorts at the sides of the cylindrical corridors while the middle is filled with flowing raw sewage.

Exits:

• • Manholes or storm drains leading to Docks District at regular intervals.
  
• 2. Precipice necropolis: That weak -and possibly collapsed- wall behind which is the city of the dead.
  
• 3. Winding tunnels: Passage progressively narrowing, walls looking more and more like a cave.
  
• 5. Coins Sewer: Not an exit per se but this is where you end up if you keep going through the main tunnel.
  
• 6. Docks drainage: Squeezing through a slippery pipe that is intermittently gushing muddy water gets you to the drainage network of the district.
  

Encounters:

• • 1d4 sewer oozes in the way; 1d4 rat swarms gush out of old pipes if the PCs make a loud noise.
  
• • rust ooze + spraying foul water hazard (because the ooze ate through some pipes)
  
• • 1d6 chokers attempt to stalk the PCs, if succesful they will attack when the PCs are occupied and distracted.
  
• • 1d4 slurks huddling together upside-down in a manhole shaft, lazily competing for what feels to them like a prized hunting spot.
  
• • 1 otyugh strangler called King of Dirt, was left behind while his comrades led the Ofalth away. Not interested in a fight (unless provoked) he might attempt to impress friendly PCs by spitting out a Skinsaw Mask he's been unsuccessfully chewing for a few days now. Never has he faced such an inedible gummy delicacy!
  
• • Sewer gas, lasting until the next exit/encounter. Might throw them off the ofalth smell trail (+5 to Track DC). Will also explode (dealing 4d6 environmental fire damage) if exposed to a source of flame.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

5. Coins sewer (Level 4-5)
Inconspicuous change, the scenery is mostly the same (practically a continuation of the same sewer network as 4. Docks sewer) except the decor is slightly different (more chances to find signs of intelligent life).

Exits:

• • Manholes or storm drains leading to Coins District at regular intervals.
  
• • Temple of Lost Coins basement: Secret door hidden inside a comically oversized treasure chest that is made to look like an incompetently disguised mimic. A series of increasingly harder locked doors and non-lethal traps lead to the base of operations of the Forthright, the "honorable thieves" of Absalom. The PCs are welcomed with open arms and invited to join if they pass the aforementioned test chambers.
  
• • Band of the Palm basement: Secret door (permanent illusonary wall) leads to a heavily guarded labyrinthine complex of rooms and traps, traversing them to eventually reach the Bloody Barbers HQ is an adventure in itself, even the Bloody Barbers don't travel here alone, they have a special unit of albino chokers trained to guide them through this gods-forsaken place.
  
• 4. Docks sewer: Visually indistinguishable, you end up there if you follow the main tunnel.
  
• 7. Buried city ruins: Decrepit manhole without handholds and a stuck rusty cover on top. It's been unused for its original purpose for thousands of years. Instead of hearing the bustle of the city or seeing light from the cracks, there's darkness and silence.
  
• 10. Cursed slave holds: Part of the wall used to form a secret door for a slave smuggler tunnel but the hinges have corroded in the past few years so the passage is now comically obvious.
  

Encounters:

• • 2d4 [Bloody Barber ruffians](https://www.pf2easy.com/index.php?id=23391) making sure there are no nosy trespassers in their territory
  
• • 1d4 [Bloody Barber thieves](https://www.pf2easy.com/index.php?id=23392) returning after difficult heist with 1d6 x 10% HP each. They are carrying 100 gp worth of art objects, gems and coins each. Not looking for a fight but also not willing to give up the loot that easily. (If you decide they are members of the Forthright, they instead immediately agree to return the loot to their rightful owners if confronted about it)
  
• • 1d4 Forthright charlatans and burglars returning after a heist. They too are carrying 100 gp worth of art objects, gems and coins each. They will attempt to lie and feign innocence but if confronted forcefully they immediately agree to return the loot, but only to the rightful owners. If arrested they ask to be delivered to the Token Guard where they can easily buy their freedom with a token fee.
  
• • Drug stash behind loose brick (DC 20). Contents: Critical failure = didn't even notice it; Failure = 20 doses of qat; Success = 50 doses of grit; Critical success = 5 doses of either demon dust or succumbus kiss
  
• • Mutated Sewer Ooze and Wizard Sponge. Escaped experiments from the Gallery of Innovation. Not very aggressive but their normal behaviour poses a danger to everyone around them. They kinda stick together instictively but they are not really consciously allied.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

6. Docks drainage (Level 3-4)
Similar environment to 4. Docks sewer except it is narrower, closer to the surface (the noise and bustle of the Docks above can be often heard, and the grates are only 5 feet above the flow). Also no raised paths along the walls, you will have to get your feet wet. The water is also cleaner since this network is meant to drain excess water from the rain or the sea until it later joins the sewage.

Exits:

• 4. Docks sewer: A slippery pipe allows the muddy water outflow to join the sewer network. It's tight enough to be considered greater difficult terrain but not so tight it would require a skill check to Squeeze.
  
• 7. Buried city ruins: Following the drainage system to the east leads to an old rusty storm drain, part of a street that has been unused and buried for centuries. Very silent, dark and dry compared to a normal current-era storm drain.
  
• • Eventually following the drainage system to the west leads all the way to the Groundwater Tunnel (see book 3 for more info). But some of the openings between here and there might be too narrow for most people. It might be possible proceed by breaking through the walls or squeezing through the pipes or magically shrinking down.
  • Azarketi cave: Another passage leads to a cave that an underwater Azarketi community, the Seafoam Conclave, calls home. You can keep going to reach the surface of the water beneath the creaky boardwalks of the Docks district. If the Azarketi perceive you as honoured guests they might even show you the way from there to 8. Gilltown.
  

Encounters:

• • Very narrow passage. Squeeze DC 15.
  
• • Diobel sweeper tough or washboard dog tough. Will warn any transpassers to get out of their gang's territory. Might have to demonstrate the point and toughen someone up (no killing of course!). Might ask 1d6x10gp as a toll.
  
• • 1d12 Dockside Dozen urchins. Their small bodies can fit through some very narrow water pipes; perfect for evading the law and other gangs.
  
• • Jossie Slimfin, azarketi junk merchant
  
• • Cecaelia Trapper washed through the pipes from the sea and lost his way. Extremely xenophobic and wary of land-dwellers.
  
• • Emergency watery wave floods the whole tunnel, pushing PCs in one direction unless they Grab an Edge (Reflex DC 20). Failure could mean the PCs are separated, they have to re-tread some way or even get some bruises or hit their heads somewhere.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

7. Buried city ruins (Level 4-5)
Disused part of the city that has caved into the ground. Actually this general area includes remnants of buildings from different epochs that have been pressured together from eons of newer construction built on top of each other into a sort of labyrinthine amalgamation.

Exits:

• 5. Coins sewer: Decrepit manhole, DC 20 Force Open to get it unstuck.
  
• 6. Docks drainage: Rusty storm drain. Perception DC 20 to notice it's in use.
  
• 8. Gilltown: Underwater tunnel, the entrance hidden behind carefully nurtured seaweed. Must hold breath at least for 10 minutes (Survival DC 25 to not waste extra time lost in the circuitous passages) to fully explore. And then you have to deal with Azarketis who might not appreciate you finding their secret home base.
  
• 9. Mother Venom lair: Ancient outhouse in collapsed building (DC 30 to Squeeze through the cracks) leading to the Eastgate sewer network.
  
• • House of Planes back door: One of the passages leads to an area of olds buildings that are currently inhabited by members of the Hookclaw kobold clan. Further down this way you eventually reach area D6 from book 1. From there you can visit the House of Planes or just exit through the Raptor's Rest graveyard to the surface in Eastgate.
  
• • Dark dark cave leading to the Darklands.
  

Encounters:

• • Kekker & Gref, ratfolk drug smugglers.
  
• • 1d6 Vargouilles. They want to turn you into one of them.
  
• • 1d4 Poltergeists. Restless echoes of citizens of old, confused their home lies in pieces.
  
• • 1 caligni caller and 2 caligni stalkers on an unholy quest to find owbs here in the ruins of long ago.
  
• • Owb. It has come to bargain. With caligni or others. If it won't get a good price, it is not above issuing threats, curses, ultra-violence or strange omens (in that order).
  
• Unlooted ruins of aristocrat's mansion. Perception DC 20: Critical failure: didn't even notice; Failure: 1d4 lesser art objects; Success: 1d6 moderate art objects; Critical Success: 1 greater art object.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

8. Gilltown
A network of mostly submerged caves where azarketis privately live, worship and trade among themselves. Few outsiders are permitted. Exploring here is beyond the scope of this write-up.

For more info, check out the Absalom book, page 141.

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

9. Mother Venom lair (Level 10-15)
If the ooze-dripping ceilings and walls or the oozemorphic passage-blocking clots of this part of the sewer network don't dissuade PCs, describe the sense of foreboding and terror they feel as they catch a glimpse of one of the children of venom going about their business. If they insist you should probably tell them this area is too high-level for them or let them be kidnapped and turned into children of venom themselves.

For more info, see book 5.

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

10. Cursed slave holds (Level 5-6)
This area consists of narrow man-made tunnels, passages and cells spread beneath Misery Row, the former slave pits of Absalom. They were used to hold slaves in awful conditions or to smuggle them to nobles in other areas (the law allowed buying and selling slaves only within three-quarters of a mile of the sea). While slavery is outlawed now, slaver activity even in this obvious place has not completely ceased. And the legacy of past sins still echoes in the dark, metaphorically or literally.

Exits:

• 5. Coins sewer: Through that not-so-inconspicuous secret door.
  
• 11. Ascended Court ancient sewer mainline:Finding your way through all the passages without going in circles is a challenge in itself (Survival DC 23) but eventually you might reach another secret door (Perception DC 23) which leads to the oldest sewer network of the city.
  
• • Grand Bazaar sewer: Another possibility is going west, eventually you get to yet another secret door that leads to the sewers below the Grand Bazaar, and from there to the Foreign Quarter sewers.
  
• • Ascending the pits will get you out through Misery Row, now turned into homes for the poor, empty lots and low-cost staffing agencies that are like slavery with extra steps.
  

Encounters:

• • 1d4 morlock engineers and 1d4 morlock cultists looking to abduct slaves or other stranglers and bring them back to Delirium's Tangle (a mind-bending labyrinth of chambers and tunnels) deep beneath the Ivy district.
  
• • The Stitchlip Man, who creeps at night to stitch shut the mouths of anyone who speaks ill of thieves and steal away their voices. Actually it's an act performed by a masked member of the Family Dogs gang (use elite copper hand rogue statblock) to scare people into paying them protection money. 10% chance it's the gang leader himself (Dras, level 9 fetchling rogue) reprising the role.
  
• • Denizen of Leng. Here to take in the sights and breath in the energy of the place.
  
• • Animate Dream made up of all the nightmares of the people enslaved here over time.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

11. Ascended Court ancient sewer mainline (Level 6-7)
This is the most ancient part of Absalom's sewer network, built in the time of Aroden. It's still in use although not by design; several more modern parts of the sewer network have collapsed or become blocked and through an emergent process the excess sewage from there ends up here.

Exits:

• 10. Cursed slave holds: Secret door that leads back to the pits and passages below Misery Row.
  
• 12. Arodenite catacombs (chasm entrance): There is a small hole that leads to the Starstone Cathedral chasm. From there you can sort of see another window a few hundred feet further. Climb DC 25 to get there. That puts you in area D2 of the catacombs.
  
• 12. Arodenite catacombs: Following the mainline sewer all the way circling the starstone chasm eventually leads you to a large opening in a naturally-formed cavern. That is area D25 of the catacombs. If you don't exit here, you can keep going north to the Wise Quarter sewers.
  
• Ivy District sewers: Branching of the mainline is a smaller newer sewer that eventually leads below Ivy District.
  

Encounters:

• • 1d4 skinstitches, the Skinsaws send them here to ward off guards and other people who could track them down.
  
• • 1d4 skinsaw murderers on their way to look for more victims to skin. Lucky for them they found you, saves them the trouble.
  
• • 1d4 shamblers usually survive with scraps that end up in the sewer. They are hidden among other normal vegetation that has overgrown and taken over this part of the sewer.
  
• • Mohrg, used to be part of the skinsaw cult until there was a scuffle with another member and he ended up left for dead in the sewer.
  

██████████████████████████████████████████████████

12. Arodenite catacombs (Level 8-9)
These halls served as the final resting place of a niche sect of Aroden worshipers called the Fellowship of Prospectus. This is the final destination for the ofalth. It sets camp in area D25 and feeds off a steady diet of corpses provided by the Skinsaw cult.

For more details see book 2, page 30.

You could give a hint to players to have some sort of plan prepared if things go south. The cleric in my group cast status on the bait PC so they would know if he was in trouble and rush in to his rescue. Or you could send him through a less immediately lethal trapped room. Not all trap rooms kill you in 1-2 rounds. Keeping him alive for dissection, torture or some other nefarious purpose like Kemeneles is also an option.

Did anyone else make special arrangements to make resurrection easier for their group? Here's what I did:

We had an unfortunate death in book 4 (the ankou shadow doubles body-blocked the ranger) and the player seemed inconsolable and really wanted the character back. The convenient thing was that the player also wouldn't be able to attend sessions for a while so we organised a few mini sessions for the rest of the players.

The basic structure we used was the Research Subsystem. The way it works is there are various places of knowledge (called "libraries" in the subsystem) and interacting with them (usually requires a skill check) gives you points. The more points you collect, the easier it gets. Each place of knowledge might have its own quirks and restrictions. When you achieve certain point thresholds you get a benefit, like a sudden realisation about what to do or even some unexpected extra.

For Absalom I chose the following "libraries":

• • Arcanamirium (complication: PCs found the dean annoying and had to stealth to avoid her)
  
• • Forae Logos
  
• • College of Mysteries (complication: requires payment)
  
• • Temple of the Shining Star
  
• • House of Healing (complication: need to talk to doctors to get info and they are busy)
  
• • Seventh Church of Iomedae (complication: traditionally only Iomedae worshippers are told the secrets)
  
• • Azari Palace (complication: the books aren't catalogued)
  
• • Ahnkamen estate (complication: only Eaters of Knowledge members may access)
  

Each place grants a maximum of 3 points. Each attempt takes at least 4 hours (half a day). The default DC was 30.

The thresholds I used were roughly as follows:

• 3: Learn the base Resurrect ritual (extras if applicable at location: healer's gel, firestarter pellets)
  
• 5: Learn that speeches made by friends of the dearly departed lower the DC. The more friends call on him the better. (extras if applicable at location: +1 point for a separate research towards the raise dead spell, staff of final rest, dawnlight)
  
• 7: Learn that decorations, sounds and smells that remind the dearly departed of their home, their homeland, their life lower the DC (extras if applicable at location: stumble upon instructions for another uncommon ritual, like commune or planar ally)
  
• 9: +1 point for a separate research towards the raise dead spell or something else important to the story
  

So what happened after that they arranged a speech from all the important people from his background, including the guy who set him free , the people who helped to his feet when he was poor, the colleague he had a fling with. They bought spices imported from the Mwangi Expanse where he came from and so on.

We also role-played him being a ghost for a bit, he encountered a lesser death (the same one the Twilight Four had called to deal with the Infector) who tried to send him to the Boneyard but he resisted. During the culmination of the ritual (which was a critical success) he briefly met Desna. All in all it was worthwhile and I don't think it trivialised the impact of character death.

They later re-used the same tricks to resurrect Harlo Doleen (which I initially thought would completely derail the plot but actually wasn't too difficult to deal with).

I did a write-up on how to run the Pratchett/Ralso trial. It should probably be run at some point during book 2 or in-between books but since it acts as a sort of epilogue event for this book I'm linking it here.

Before the trial:
After getting arrested, Pratchett will make several arrangements to minimise the chances of being convicted. With his charisma and connections, unless the PCs intervene, his cell at the Edgewatch jail will have lots of luxuries not afforded to other prisoners, like no cellmates, a desk, a real bed, good food but most importantly he is allowed to receive as many visitors as he wants for as long as he wants.

One of the people who are visiting him frequently is Mrs. Honeywall who fanatically believes in his innocence. Pratchett is slowly radicalising her and will eventually ask her to burn down the hotel (ostensibly as an act of defiance) to destroy any evidence the PCs haven't gotten around to gathering. If she succeeds and the PCs investigate the ruins, they might find and recognise her glasses (Perception DC 25). If she is arrested she will stand trial with the rest.

He is also very quickly writing his memoirs to "tell his side of the story", of course they will be full of lies to turn the public to his side. He asks Vancaskerkin to publish them but Vancaskerkin, recognising an opportunity, informs the PCs (he's eager to win their trust, hopes they will return the favour later or even prove useful pawns). If the PCs show no interest in stopping this, he goes ahead and does it but if they ask him not to he will respect the PCs' wishes.

Pratchett doesn't want a lawyer, he will represent himself.

Ralso might also be on trial as Pratchett's accomplish. Before the trial she might have cooperated with the PCs and Edgewatch, some of the PCs might have pitied her and want to help her. She makes no preparations on her own, so she won't even have a lawyer unless the PCs take an active interest in helping her and she will only remind them of the lawyer situation the day before the trial. If the PCs try to help her, she will play along with anything they suggest, including an Atone ritual.

Nobbindale (the redcap) might also have been arrested. In that case he will stand trial with the rest. He is completely unhinged and will refuse any cooperation.

The public prosecutor, Zendo Loreya, an old man with a white short well kept beard, comes by at Edgewatch HQ to get the list of all the evidence and all other info on the case the PCs might offer him.

The courthouse:
The trial takes place a few weeks after the PCs resolve the murder hotel adventure, whatever better fits your campaign's pacing and story. It takes place at the badly maintained Puddles courthouse. This happens because Ralso was once arrested while burgling a very well connected haberdasher who is still keeping a grudge and used his connections to make the trial happen at the corrupt and extremely harsh Puddles courthouse.

Lady Seichya of House Tevineg (high warden of the Brine prison, trademaster of the Salt Cartel) is the presiding judge. She has a conflict of interest of course, since her control of the private prison means she'd rather see defendants convincted than go free.

Outside the courthouse, the PCs might encounter Eunice (if they have saved both him and Kemeneles). He is standing next to the door with his arms crossed, clearly annoyed. He is watching a bunch of urchins around his age whose circumstances couldn't be more different than his own: they are selling newspapers and trinkets, shining shoes and possibly even picking pockets. Kemeneles forbid him to go inside on account of the gruesome descriptions that will no doubt be relayed during the trial. He feels this is unfair. Still, seeing the PCs might lift his mood if they were nice to him in the past.

The process:
For simplicity and brevity the trial will be depicted in a series of short episodes, each either from a witness deposition or from the presentation of a piece of evidence. At each episode, one PC will be either making a speech or will have the opportunity to make a retort/comment during someone else's speech. Example episodes:

• • A PC acts as a witness for the prosecution and recounts how the agents of Edgewatch solved the case and made the arrests.
  
• • Kemeneles testifies how he was captured and what he suffered
  
• • Lyrma testifies how she was captured and what she suffered
  
• • Nobbindale is called as a witness. He is extremely candid and incriminates everyone, most of all himself.
  
• • Corpseward pendants are presented as evidence of Pratchett's necromancy.
  
• • Books, scrolls and other magical items are presented as evidence of Pratchett's necromancy.
  
• • The skin with the dragon tattoo is presented as evidence connecting Pratchett with the missing Minkaians.
  
• • Roji Aozo corpse is presented (perhaps not directly) as evidence connecting Pratchett with the missing Minkaians.
  
• • “To Anastatia, my love” locket and rust monster ring are presented as evidence connecting Pratchett with the missing zoo keepers.
  
• • Pratchett is questioned about what possible innocent use he might have had for restoring and actively using the smelter in the basement.
  
• • Pratchett's dueling cane is presented as evidence of suspicious conduct. (note: poisons are illegal in Absalom)
  
• • Mrs. Honeywall's glasses are presented as evidence of her starting the hotel fire.
  

If things are not going favourably for Pratchett, he gets vindictive and tries to take down Ralso with him. In that case, consider adding the following episodes:

• • Pratchett testifies against Ralso, says she built the traps.
  
• • Pratchett testifies against Ralso, says she has confessed to murders in her diary.
  

If Ralso is cornered after Pratchett turns on her, she considers changing her plea to guilty, confessing her crimes. If there is a PC she trusts, she looks at them expectantly hoping for a sign in the form of a nod or other body language. She will follow their advice.

Make sure to modify or skip episodes based on what has transpired in your game (e.g. if a witness was not rescued they can't testify, if a piece of evidence was not recovered it cannot be presented and so on).

The verdict:

Each episode contributes 1 conviction point to all relevant defendants by default. But if some deposition or piece of evidence is doubted or objected to, then the point might be nullified. Pratchett will never miss an opportunity to do this.

If no PC is involved, the GM decides if the point is nullified or not. If a PC is involved in an episode, they roll a relevant skill check (mostly Diplomacy) with DC 20. If the involvement was against a defendent then:

• Critical success: +2 conviction points
  
• Success: +1 conviction point
  
• Failure: 0 conviction points
  
• Critical Failure: -1 conviction point
  

If the involvement was to object or cast doubt to a witness or piece of evidence then:

• Critical success: -1 conviction point
  
• Success: 0 conviction point
  
• Failure: +1 conviction points
  
• Critical Failure: +2 conviction points
  

Example objections that Pratchett might use:

• • Evidence has been tampered with by PCs/Edgewatch (especially if the PCs actually used some of Pratchett's magical items)
  
• • Corpseward pendants are needed because the Precipice Quarter is infested with undead
  
• • It wasn't a smelter in the basement, it was an oven for meatpies
  

Finally subtrack 1 conviction point for each extenuating circumstance, for instance:

• • Pratchett: he successfully published his memoirs.
  
• • Pratchett: the hotel was burned down
  
• • Ralso: cooperated with the authorities
  
• • Ralso: atoned for her deeds in a very public and dramatic manner.
  
• • Ralso: found a lawyer
  
• • Ralso: pleads guilty (don't subtract if it would bring the tally to 0)
  

Depending on conviction points, the verdict is:

• 0: innocent, free to go
  
• 1-2: 5 years in the Brine
  
• 3: 10 years in the Brine
  
• 4+: hanged until dead
  

I made a homebrew sidequest addon. It uses information mostly from book 4 but level-wise and story-wise it fits betters somewhere during book 3.

The sidequest involves uncovering a circle of norgorberite assassins in the Ivy district that might have some tangentially useful information for the Twilight Four. It can be used to replace parts of book 3 or add to it.

Shreeve:
Introduced in the toolbox of the Gallery of Evil, Ventalie Shreeve owns a small potion shop on Vermillion Way in the Ivy District. A hidden cellar under the shop conceals a meeting room, where an elite circle of assassins for hire known as Norgorber’s Knot dedicates its kills to Norgorber.

Shreeve is intimately acquainted with the Blackfinger temple yet she has not been granted access to the inner sanctum under the temple proper. Nevertheless she knows a lot of secrets of the cult. Even though she is not directly involved with the twilight four, she knows a few things about the blackfingers. She has been trying to gain access to the blackfingers lower temple unsuccessfully for a while now. Jonis has word from Norgorber himself that she's not to be trusted. She has heard that Jonis the head priest of the Blackfingers temple is part of the twilight four, a conspiracy of high-level norgorberites. She does not know what the conspiracy involves exactly but she knows it's important. This information was fed to her by Vancaskerkin's agents, hoping it would lead investigators off his trail and destroy Jonis at the same time.

Shreeve was recently hired by Bloody Berleth to kill Maurissa Jonne but he had second thoughts, did not make the payment so the assassination never went through.

Possible hooks to start mini-adventure:

• • she frequently attends the midnight meetings at the Black Mask costume shop, the PCs might be doing a stakeout
  
• • one of the PCs might have dealt with her in his background, especially if the PC is from the Ivy district
  
• • there is a pile of unsolved cases at the Thistleguard, perhaps one of the PCs' contacts there tries to solicit their help to investigate the seemingly unsolvable ones.
  
• • they might be led to her while searching for possible norgorberite activity in the city
  
• • they might notice something suspicious (like a customer speaking in code) going on while purchasing potions from her shop
  
• • they meet her in person at the Noxious Retort conference and decide to investigate her further
  
• • somehow the PCs get Bloody Berleth to admit he almost hired an assassin to kill Morissa Jones
  

Potion shop:
I used this map. It includes the shop and her house and basement. Does not include the secret sub-basement.

Her shop seems like a normal potion shop, with a focus on alchemical consumables. False bottoms/backs in the cabinets she stores her usual wares conceal potent divine poisons (pretty much everything from the adventure toolbox of book 4 is available), those are for special clients or for her own use.

In her private chambers on the 2nd floor connected to the shop via a staircase, on her desk, one can find her formula book, where she keeps all her recipes: focus cathartic, vermin repellent agent, vexing vapor, skeptic's elixir, silvertongue mutagen, quicksilver mutagen, juggernaut mutagen, energy mutagen, dread ampoule, cognitive mutagen, drakeheart mutagen, tanglefoot bag, alchemist's fire, acid flask, snake oil, antidote, bravo's brew, elixir of life, wyvern poison (last one is encrypted, DC 30).

The same notebook also contains a list of her clientèle each associated with a 4-digit code. If studied, Perception or similar DC20 to notice some clients have no associated orders at all. Perception or similar DC25 to notice she has nowhere near 9999 clients so there's no sense in using 4-digit codes. These deductions will come into play later.

The altar:
In the middle of the basement, there is an oblong stone altar. Its surface is sculpted with a network of long winding grooves that connect in an intricate pattern. There is a hole in the middle like a drain. DC20 to observe that it is actually one continuous line with the drain at one end. Religion/crafting DC30 to realise it's a mixture or alchemical and norgorberite symbolism. Another appropriate DC30 check like Identify Magic reveals that it's a magic device that accepts sound and liquid as input.

The actual solution is to sing a skiprope rhyme called "No-No Norgorber" while pouring the right sort of liquid at certain times, as noted below. The players could figure this out on their own if they are familiar with the rhyme (try to foreshadow it), or they could remember it with an appropriate check (DC20 if they realise it's something like a song or poem or hymn, DC30 if they have no idea what they're supposed to be looking for).

The timings and liquid requirements can also be figured out with appropriate Identify Magic or similar checks. The device hums and glows more and more with each correct new liquid poured but if you pour something wrongly then the humming and glowing ends abruptly. This together with knowledge of Norgorber lore (as a lore-skill or just paying attention) will help the PCs figure it out. Someone who is a Master in Thievery can Disable Device DC30 to completely bypass it. Other similar brute-force solutions should be around DC35.

Here is the rhyme and liquids:

Reaper?
Master?
Skinsaw Man?
Where is the poison? (pour in any poison)
What is the plan? (pour in anything that fools senses)
No-No Norgorber!
Folks take care!
How many dark masks does he wear?
One Reaper! (pour in anything that manipulates knowledge or information)
Two Master! (pour in anything that fools senses)
Skinsaw Man! (pour in blood)
Quick leaper!
Jump faster!
Bogeyman!

What lies beneath the altar:
When someone sings the song and pours the right liquids at the right times, the whole altar moves out of the way revealing a small shaft with handholds on all walls. The sub-basement is a small square room, the floor decorated with Norgorber's symbol made out of dried blood. In the corner there is a desk, on the desk there is a small booklet.

Assassination log:
The booklet is the lightly encrypted assassination log. It's written in Elven. Decipher Writing DC30 to decode it in one go. The PCs get repeated tries with possibly a reduced DC every time they make a reasonable deduction from the following clues:

• • There are rows and columns filled with data.
  (rows represent assassinations, columns represent the properties of each assassination)
  
• • The columns are: 8-digit number, another number (range 500-2000), 2-3 comma-separated keywords (from a fixed set of about a dozen different ones), a date, another date, a third date (in some entries both 2nd and 3rd date are missing). The dates are always ordered: 1st is always earlier than 2nd, 2nd is always earlier than 3rd.
  (columns represent 1: combined 4-digit client code and 4-digit target code 2: price in gold coins 3: the aliases of the assassins that got assigned to this task 4: order date 5: payment date 6: completion date)
  
• • The possible keywords in the 3rd column are: "Unseen Hand", "Qat", "Demon Dust", "Arsenic", "Dagger", "Belladonna", "Wyvern", "Black Adder", "Centipede", "Wasp" etc
  (these are the aliases of each assassin in the circle, Shreeve is the "Unseen Hand", the rest are named after assassination methods, mostly poisons)
  

Once the PCs solve this they get a clear picture of all the assassinations Norgorber's Knot has conducted.

There is only one entry that is related to the main case though: The last row is an assassination ordered by Bloody Berleth to get Maurissa Jonne killed. The bounty was set to 1800 gold but was never paid (as indicated by the fact that the last two dates are not filled in). Bloody Berleth, despite his hatred for Maurissa, couldn't go through with it.

Behaviour and schedule:
Shreeve tends to her shop every day of the week during daytime. Sometimes she can be found in the Blackfinger temple. One night per week she attends secret meetings at the Black Mask costume shop. She meets up with her assassin buddies in her basement almost every other night. If she knows the PCs are investigating her she will feign ignorance. If they make a move to arrest her or attack she will attempt to flee at the first good opportunity (perhaps using her gaseous form potion). If the PCs are investigating her shop/house there is a good chance she will show up with her 2-4 assassin buddies (number determined either randomly or based on desired difficulty). She may or may not know the PCs are there but she always returns home eventually. She does not fight to the death, she might trade secrets for her life and freedom.

For Shreeve use the statblock of Japu Thelenger (AoE book 4, page 14). Add a gaseous form potion (and at your discretion, perhaps some more alchemical items for emergencies). For her assassin buddies use the assassin statblock from the Gamemastery Guide. As an example, for 4 level 10 PCs, Shreeve + 4 assassins is a severe encounter, Shreeve + 2 assassins is a moderate encounter.

What the PCs can gain from this scenario:

• • Jonis' omen/instinct about Shreeve being untrustworthy is correct: If she's interrogated or otherwise pressured, she's going to try to trade her freedom for secrets (most likely Jonis' secret identity). Such secret might be hard to be used in an official capacity since Shreeve will be either gone or refuse to repeat it in a court of law.
  
• • Putting Shreeve behind bars and/or dismantling her circle of assassins will make people in the city safer and the Thistleguard will be grateful.
  
• • If they unlock the second basement and decrypt the assassination log, they can hand over the info to the Thistleguard which will be even more thankful.
  
• • If Shreeve abandons her shop and the PCs impound the merchandise, give them unlimited access to alchemical consumables up to level 7.
  

Where do we go from here:

• • You may allow the PCs to skip some parts of the Adventure Path to get to the Blackfinger temple raid sooner.
  
• • Add a new downtime activity to help with cleaning up the cases in the assassination log. This might involve arresting the ones who ordered the assassinations, arresting the assassins themselves based on their aliases. Providing closure to victims' families and so on.
  
• • Or you can invent new scenarios with the PCs doing these things on-screen.
  
• • The PCs might be invited as witnesses for Shreeve's trial.
  
• • Use the info as leverage over Maurissa/Berleth in future encounters.
  
• • Shreeve's confessions and/or trading of secrets might lead to more investigations of norgorberites she has been associated with, the Black Mask costume shop for example.
  

I liked the campaign as well and agree with most of your criticisms. It would be definitely better if it wasn't a 6-part 1-20 level AP.

Why does first book assumes it ends on Arodus 3 and final book on Rova 7? That's less than month for entire thing)

If you're referring to the newspaper frontpages, I don't think they are meant to impose a timeline or deadline on you. They are just used illustratively.

If you're looking for a low-key early foreshadowing of Olansa as the Gray Queen, I have a treat for you. To make a long story short, it's a case they receive about how Olansa stole a High-Council seat but presented in such a way that it will be dismissed until it's too late. You can run this scene as soon as the PCs get promoted to the Starwatch.

You can read the full details here: The Larrett vignette.

One of the subtler foreshadowing I've done is the Larrett vignette.

Larrett, sometimes called Lord Filth, is Absalom’s infamous Commissioner of Sewers. With sunken eyes, a wrinkled nose, and long, greasy locks tumbling down from an unkempt and receding hairline, the twitchy administrator would look as if he had just crawled out of a septic puddle if he wasn’t always bedecked in the latest and most expensive Ivy District fashions. The smirking villain is perhaps the most caricatured politician in Absalom’s broadsheets, his face a veritable symbol of corruption known all across the city. The commission’s efficiency, as well as Larrett’s alliance with fellow Sanitation Commissioners Venlun Frusk (Streetsweepers) and Pondo Funt (Trashpickers), keep Larrett in power despite the fact that everyone seems to hate him.

He's a member of the High Council and thus has one of the precious votes for deciding who's the next (acting) primarch. The year before the start of the AP, Olansa very carefully orchestrated, in conjunction with the newspaper Eyes on Absalom, a damning exposé of his corruption. The scandal was so great that it left the acting primarch Starborn no choice but to replace him during that year's Exaltation of the Starstone. Olansa, with some expert political manoeuvring, was not only credited for catching him in the act, but also got his place in the High Council, thus securing one vote for herself when the Twilight Four plan was eventually enacted. There was a secret tradition that the positions of the High Council were reserved for the bearers of the magical cornucopias (see the 1e Guide to Absalom for more info about this recently expunged bit of lore) but that tradition had been waning for a long time after the artifacts lost their powers with the death of Aroden so Starborn wasn't particularly concerned with being the first to break it.

Since then, as is his right as a council member, Larrett has been regularly visiting the Starwatch and asking them to investigate how Olansa stole his high council seat. He will talk to anyone there who will listen to his ramblings about how he deserved the seat because of the cornucopia and so on. He has become a joke at the office. The Starwatch, as is their right, have decided, repeatedly and despite his protestations, to de-prioritise his case.

Enter the PCs. After they earn their Starwatch badges in the beginning of book 3, you can run this scene for them while they are in their office at Starwatch Keep, preferably when they feel they already have their hands full: One of their colleagues, preferably someone they already have a relationship with, sighs and mumbles "Not him again" as they're watching from a window. If asked, they will tell the PCs about how this low-councilmember has been bothering them with "a case of utmost urgency" (they do the air quotes to indicate the sarcasm). He used to come more often but lately he comes by every time there are new recruits so he's definitely there for the PCs. Larrett of course demands an audience with the new Starwatch agents and if the PCs grant it, he tells them what he tells everyone about how he is entitled to a high council seat and not just a lowly low-council seat and how Olansa stole what was rightfully his etc etc. Obviously he comes off as extremely entitled, corrupt and hysterical. If there's any other Starwatch guards present they roll their eyes incessantly through the whole ordeal. If the PCs recall knowledge about him they remember all the caricatures they've seen of him, not just in Eyes on Absalom but also as a character in puppet shows and word on the street about how corrupt he is.

The PCs will very likely completely dismiss him and write him off as another corrupt entitled nobleman that deserves his demotion... but the narrative seed of Olansa's meteoric rise in political power as well as her being a great thief has been planted.

I wanted to foreshadow Chapter 3: A Wonderful Time in Harrowland, so I ran the module The Harrowing to do so. The idea was that Vancaskerkin used an occult ritual or darkside mirror to create the Rabbit Prince out of the essence of one or more PCs. As a side-effect of this, the PCs stumble into the Harrowed Realm and have to escape. Vancaskerkin's alter-ego inside the Harrowed Realm is the Nightpeddler.

Here's my notes for converting the module to 2e.

I wanted to foreshadow the Harrowland from book 4, so I ran the module The Harrowing to do so. The idea was that Vancaskerkin used an occult ritual or darkside mirror to create the Rabbit Prince out of the essence of one or more PCs. As a side-effect of this, the PCs stumble into the Harrowed Realm and have to escape. Vancaskerkin's alter-ego inside the Harrowed Realm is the Nightpeddler.

Here's my notes for converting the module to 2e.

(I'm linking it from this thread too since this book is the best place to foreshadow Harrowland and the encounters in my conversion are semi-appropriate for a level 10-11 party.)

I ran this module as a side-quest / foreshadowing for my Agents of Edgewatch campaign. My notes are very patchy but I thought I'd share them in case they are useful to someone else.

Should be okay for around level 10-11 PCs.

Playing the corresponding card against a storykin applies the weak adjustment to them for the rest of the fight.

Events:
Andera Paldreen as Algon the Ever-Seeking.

Α. Midnight circus
Combine A2 and A3 into one encounter. 2 reskinned Feathered Bears as the unicycle bears (Feathered Charge represents their exceptional ability with the unicycles). Raja Rakshasa as Bernaditi.

B. Briar
A leveled-down Rabbit Prince as the Rabbit Prince. (In foundry use the workbench module to do this automatically; otherwise just reverse-engineer it using the creature building rules).

C. Demon's Fen
Change the owl into a skill challenge without any combat. Xiuh Couatl as the couatl. Leng Ghoul as the Barrow King.

D. Manmolds
Steam Vents as the steam vents. Formian Queen as the ant queen; either level it down to be an appropriate challenge or turn into an threatening RP encounter with occasional attack/ability usage but not a full fight.

E. Prophet's Garden
Confounding Betrayal as the hunter's horn trap. Replace Sonnorae fight with a Flensing Blades hazard to simulate her haunted ghostly outburst.

F. Sanguine Playhouse
Grig as grig. A leveled-down (just reduce the DCs) Dance of Death as the fiddle hazard. Use Planar Terra-Cotta Soldier as Balio and Balimar with the following changes:

• • Occupies 2 adjacent spaces instead of 1
• • Add a simplified "Act Together" ability: Free action; Trigger Balimar Casts A Spell; Effect Balio can take a 1-action activity.
• • Add some spells: Vibrant Pattern, Mirror Malefactors, Wall of Stone, Chromatic Armor, Haste, Mirror Image.

G. Smith’s Caldera
Great Cyclops as the cyclops. Kolyarut as Ticktock.

H. Trackless Dearth
Denizen of Leng as Nightpeddler

I. Striding Fortress
Marid and Efreeti in I5, 3 Succubi in I9, Adult Blue Dragon as Zassrion. Simplify/skip the rest of the fights.

Yeah that's what I did; inserted a month-long span of downtime there.

You know you can remove fights, right? if you're not enjoying it, start shortening the drawn-out bits. If you're not the GM, discuss with the group and if most people agree, ask your GM to change things up. It's not exactly hard to abridge or completely skip the boring parts.

the "Flying Chairs" obviously seem to be some kind of elevator, but if they're designed for Edrer, why do they have chairs inside? How would Edrer bring his wheelchair with him?

Flying chairs were presumably not designed solely for Edrer. It's just that Edrer having a disability made Gage more keen to design the casino with disability in mind. I assume there are no actual chairs inside or if there are there's also enough space for Edrers wheelchair to fit.

As an aside, I always read this as "flying stairs" until you pointed now that it's actually "chairs".

there is a bouncer at the curtain checking people who are looking to enter, but there's also just an open passageway to the north

I mean it's not that rare, there's theaters that are designed like that too. Not all spaces are designed with absolute security in mind to physically block any trespasser. The bouncer obviously knows you can go through the curtain on the other side or past the corridor that way and will keep an eye on you, not allowing you anywhere else on the floor if you don't have the right credentials. But it's still possible to sneak by the bouncer by distracting him or whatever.

it says the tokens cannot be removed from the briefcase

Think of it like a piggy bank. You can easily put coins inside at any time without doing anything special but removing them requires a key or thievery.

Nice, how did the fight go? Did you use more spells or Reality Rip?

I'm also thinking of changing Olansa, I would REALLY like to give her some sort of supercharged Steal ability that allows stealing spells, abilities. items, all sorts of stuff. Looking into high level rogue feats and Umbral Graft/Extraction spells for inspiration.

I also did the Djinni Vizier from the casino in book 3 a while ago. Had some time to transcribe it today:

Djinni Vizier — Creature 10
Rare CG Large Elemental Air Genie

Perception +20; darkvision; detect magic

Languages Common, Auran

Skills Acrobatics +23, Arcana +18, Athletics +18, Crafting +16, Deception +18, Diplomacy +22, Society +16, Stealth +19

Str +5, Dex +7, Con +3, Int +3, Wis +2, Cha +5

Bound Wishes A djinni vizier can grant a mortal or undead creature up to three wishes within a year’s time. Once they grant a third wish to a single creature, they are freed from service to that creature forever.

Items scimitar

AC 30; Fort +16, Ref +21, Will +18

HP 170; Immunities acid; Resistances mental 10, sonic 10

Whirlwind (air, arcane, aura, evocation) 30 feet. All squares in the djinni's aura are difficult terrain for Striding and Flying creatures. Creatures with the air trait are immune.

Speed 25 feet; fly 40 feet

Melee [1-action] scimitar +23 (forceful, reach 10 feet, sweep), Damage 2d6+15 slashing

Melee [1-action] fist +24 (agile, finesse, magical, nonlethal, reach 10 feet), Damage 4d4+8 bludgeoning

Ranged [1-action] crashing wind +23 (air, arcane, evocation, range increment 20 feet), Damage 2d8+5 bludgeoning

Spells DC 30, attack +22 ; 10th wish (bound); 7th Plane Shift (At Will) (to Astral Plane, Elemental Planes, or Material Plane Only); 5th creation, tongues, summon giant, illusory creature, illusory object; 4th gaseous form, enhance visuals (at will), invisibility (at will) (self only); Constant detect magic

Hurricane Blast [1-action] (air, arcane, evocation); Frequency Once per round. Effect The djinni pushes all creatures in its whirlwind back 30 feet, or repositions all creatures inside the aura without changing their distance to the djinni. Each creature must attempt a DC 30 Fortitude save. Bumping targets to walls or to each other deals damage as if they had fallen. On a success, a target avoids being moved, and on a critical failure it falls Prone in addition to being moved. Creatures with the air trait are immune.

monster.pf2.tools/v/6ZL0m9m0

Hmm.. it's actually more sensible than I initially though. As sensible as you need to make it for an "unknowable extra-terrestrial intelligence whose designs we cannot hope to comprehend". Also more sensible than them camping right next to the Skinsaw sanctum entrance and somehow escaping notice.

You're right, if you want to say that the Graycloaks have been there for a while, it makes no sense that they are right where the Skinsaw cultists come and go.

But to be honest, D13 doesn't make a lot more sense to me as a long-term safe spot either, they would be right next to Tyrroicese. They would be able to hear his slimy appendages and their commander's voice from within its mass. And it's hard for me to imagine that a slightly tight corridor would be an insurmountable obstacle for a slime in a suit of armour.

Perhaps if you changed D13 so the corridors had doors or something else to seal them off? Or maybe move Tyrroicese's initial location away from D13. Or maybe the Graycloaks go back to the lower level and hole up in D23 (after clearing it up as much as possible) or D24.

I think the default assumption is that Flakfatter dies. There's too many things going against him:

• Constant attempts on this life by the fellow Twilight Four, even going so far as summoning a Lesser Death to get him.
  
• Reckless attacks by his comrades who gas the whole building indiscriminately.
  
• A demilich who wants to wear his body.
  
• Angry PCs many of whom will not think twice about ending him or letting him perish.
  

If they manage to have him survive all that, the PCs should be rewarded at least with some extra info on the T4. But in order to move the plot, Flakfatter being alive is not necessary at all. The next part of the plot involves the PCs and Starborn getting tricked by Vancaskerkin to approach the Harrow circus thing. If anything, Flakfatter surviving makes this part more awkward to implement as written.

With all that said, if the demilich succeeds, I would say her next goal would be to get rid of the PCs and failing that run away from them. The demilich is a demented creature. Her plans are insane and her grasp on reality tenuous. Even if she agrees to the trade you describe I doubt she would seriously be of any help to the PCs later on.

Thanks for sharing! That map is awesome.

Anyone find where Edgewatch HQ is on the map?

I talked to narchy and he confirmed the HQ is meant to be this building.

Any other landmarks I should be looking for?

The pagoda and the menagerie are kinda obvious. The Dreaming Palace is also there as we discussed in a different thread. There might be more. For sure there are some old landmarks from before the sector was re-built. You can quickly locate those by comparing the old map from the Absalom book with this one since they align perfectly.

Where is it stated that they could have learned this?

I'm pretty sure it's not stated and it is a mistake. Here's how I handled it in my campaign:

PCs killed Skinner so they couldn't learn anything from her.

From Mobana & Violeta they learned about the existence of the T4 but not its exact aims.

They still had no lead about Skinner's dealings with the Washboard Dogs so I brought in Niervok from the Absalom book to connect his story about witnessing an abduction and the abductions the Washboard Dogs did on behalf of the Skinsaw cult.

We are currently in the middle of book 4 and my players still have no concrete idea about the T4's plan. They have some theories that it has to do with taking advantage of a political power vacuum since the whole "revolt is being puppeteered by the Infector from the shadows" bit at the end of book 3.

It's not on the map. You have to decide for yourself where to put it. However, there's a new map made by narchy that actually shows the location of the Dreaming Palace. It's this one.

If you're asking about the location of the Edgewatch police station, no official location exists. A lot of people assume it is that big building north of the mystic gardens with a humongous backyard filled with white circles.

PS: See also this question I asked on reddit when I was starting.

Hello from the future, this is one GM that will do use of this awesome work when i do start the AoE campaign (probably late 2022/start 2023. First going to start book 6 of EC.

As foretold!! ;)

Nice, well I guess it's not as far-fetched as I thought. You seem to have everything figured out. As for the difficulty, it should be fine I think, just loosely follow the guidelines for the chase subsystem, that's probably the closest equivalent.