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OH. How about when entering the kitchen with Gobbler, Granny Nan is pushing a child inside the oven. She wheels around (alerted by the attic whisperer thing) and targets our big heroic PC with something to keep him occupied, then our doomed PC charges in to save the child from the Gobbler, only to be munched on a few seconds later. The other two PCs will have their hands full with Granny Nan and the attic thing.

Thoughts?

That's a good idea! Unfortunately the doomed PC is a pretty wary caster who tends to stay at the back, it's going to be hard to sell him doing the heroic thing. I will ponder on it. I only have about 4 hours remaining til our session starts, hopefully I come up with a good idea! :)

I spoke with my aunt, who plays a lot of Pathfinder, and she says it always feels best when a PC dies by sacrificing themselves in someway. Can anyway think of a good way for that to fit in with the Logrivich fight?

Addendum: It should also be noted, none of the other players know that this PC is doomed to die.

I need some quick advice on how to kill off a player, tonight. Long story, but he has no attachment to the character he's playing and we have already attached a new NPC that he rolled to the party, and he's going to start controlling him instead (found in the prison cells downstairs in the Clock Tower!)

My plan is for the Gobbler to kill off the doomed player character. Seems like a pretty epic way to finish someone off, and let's the new PC take part in the Logrivich battle later on.

It feels like the Gobbler's Swallow Whole would be a fun way to get rid of him, can anyone think of a way I can make it seem a bit more organic? I was thinking of keeping the Gobbler quiet for a bit while they explored the Kitchen and the Pantry, and then having Granny Nan come through the door, surprise them, and push the character standing nearest the Gobbler into his gaping maw.

The doomed PC is a pretty feeble caster, and while we agreed he shouldn't know his fate, I can signal him to let him know this is it and he shouldn't fight back too hard.

Thoughts?

They have done G1 (they sweet talked their way through), G2 (killed everyone), G3 (snuck away from the Mirror Man), and ended at G4. I think I am going to introduce them to G5 (two drunk Winter Wolves), skip G6 (slave guy), do G7 (troll guards) and G8 (papers), and HOPEFULLY G9 (Mirror Men, and then into the city).

I'm the DM for a group which has taken a hiatus from RoW for about a year (following a series of unfortunate events including our venue burning down...)

We last saw our valiant heroes trekking through the Howlings, specifically somewhere after encounter G4 or G5. I'm very new to being a DM (this is my first time), so can anyone give me tips on how to reintroduce everyone to the game with vigour? I feel like I should allow them to progress pretty quickly through the Howlings (perhaps one or two small encounters) and then enter Whitethrone itself to spend a short while investigating the town and avoiding too much combat. Hopefully setting them up for the exciting looking Clock Tower encounters on the next session.

Thoughts?

Cheers!

So for a casual DM like myself, what's the best way to try and get all these characters for the campaign I am running? Will I be able to purchase individual units (including the rares like Rasputin) or am I just going to have to chance it? Because I really don't want to put my faith in blind luck, that seems like a foolish use of money.

Or should I contact my local game store and see if they are getting the cases, from which I could reserve the individual units?

I would discourage that honestly. The encounter has a story and that approach is really letting a lack of mechanical explanation do the GMing for you. Please understand I'm not saying this harshly nor am I judging you. Just remember, this game has a GM for a reason and part of the GM's role is to tell a good story. If the players just cut this helpless guy down, that's a pretty pathetic and pointless story.

Thanks for the reply Jim, sorry it's taken a few days to get back to you! I completely agree with what you said, and my original post wasn't clear. I love the story with the mindslaver mold and definitely want my players to experience it, I'm just a very new DM and I am sometimes not clear on the mechanics. I feel a bit cheap just saying "BTW there are two targets!" and I wondered if there are standardised methods for them realising. I am getting better though!

ANNOYINGLY, I somehow managed to miss the mindslaver mold encounter when I ran my players through the area last week. I don't know what came over me, but I totally blanked. I even had the pawns and map ready for it. Now I need to see if I can slot it in somewhere... they have got to the Fishcamps so I'm not sure where I can make room for it! I am an idiot.

I will have another set up in todays session for the troll bridge but can't post it yet until the players finish it. :)

I'd love to see it! I'm actually thinking of skipping the haunted village, but the troll bridge is a must.

In the encounter with mindslaver mold, should Finngarth and the mold be treated as separate entities, and how should the players be made aware that there are two targets to attack? Otherwise I envisage them just attacking the man who is wailing on them with a battleaxe and quickly dispatching him.

So for non-subscribers, you anticipate that a pre-order will ship towards the end of Feb?

Damn that's amazing. Where'd you get the half destroyed house from, or did you make it?

Oh I meant to say that I LOVED how you have made them not overflow onto other level maps, that is totally awesome. I think it's great as they are, I'm looking forward to my players seeing this map.

I actually used removable glue dots from Michaels to stick "fog of war" paper cutouts over the hidden areas, which worked really well. They tore off without damaging the map underneath.

I don't have a printer at home and no real desire to get one, I get them printed at the nearest FedEx Office which costs a little under $1/page, and then I glued them to big cardboard sheets for structure. They are one shot usage for me I'm never realistically going to re-run the same area, so I was quite happy marking the maps with permanent marker.

Thanks again for your hard work. :)

My party played the first three events of The Shackled Hut last night, and it's great so far. They specifically commented that the encounters were varied and awesome, which was great.

Looks absolutely great mate, I love the details. Only negative is the placement of the 2nd and 4th floors on the PDF version. 2nd floor has a teeny sliver on second pages, and the 4th floor also has a very small section. Printing costs less than a dollar a page, but it'd still be a nice saving of $4. :)

Either way, I'll definitely be using this in the coming weeks when my party gets there, I am excited. We did less than I expected last night, so The Howlings are still a couple of weeks away I think.

Actually disregard that, the PDF versions use blue dots in all parts, which is what I'll be printing! :)

Awesome, I'll get these printed this weekend probably! By the way, I noticed that Part 1 of The Howlings map has a grid of black lines, while the other parts all have a grid made from blue dots. I like both, but it might be wise to make them both the same! (I'm looking at the high-res .PNG)

Should be able to get the last part of the howlings done tomorrow or Tuesday. I am also already working on Logrivich's Clock Tower. The ground floor is mostly done. Should have the tower complete by the end of the week (Crossing Fingers). It will be a while before the Market Square is ready. The Market Square probably will not get completed until March due to the shear size of the project.

It seems like you are running perfectly in sync with my party! I anticipate they will get to The Howlings next week, and the Market Square by the start of March. :)

I am just starting The Shackled Hut with my party, and have a quick high level question. It seems like two of the maps are HUGE; The Howlings and the Market Square both being about 30x40 squares, where 1 square is 10 feet. We are doing this all with pen and paper, not the ever popular roll20, and the rate of 1" = 5 feet, these are both considerably larger than our play area. I'm actually intending to use bwatford's printable maps, which I used for the Pale Tower with great success.

Any tips on how to make this workable? It seems like the Market Square might be made modular, but The Howlings is a huge and contiguous space.

Thanks!

Thank you for the donation. If more people donated the maps would get done a little faster.... lol.

I use Dundjinni to do the map work. I use a combination of artpacks from a wide variety of sources including custom done art as well.

I am uploading the newest section of the map now. Will post it shortly. The Howlings should be finished within the next few days. End of this coming week at the latest.

Thanks man, I'll definitely donate whenever I use a map, which probably means I'll be making a donation for The Howlings map in a couple of weeks! The Paizo maps are great, but the fact that these are of a printable size is just fantastic. Here's my party fighting Radosek: http://i.imgur.com/hBI4FSa.jpg

Obviously don't rush to make these maps on my account - I may try my hand with Dundjinni myself - but it definitely makes my life a lot easier! :)

I used your Pale Tower map for my players last week, it was absolutely fantastic, really drew them into the experience. I printed out the PDF verion on 110lb card stock at Kinkos for about $16, then stuck them to large boards I found at Michael's using glue dots, complete with "fog of war" cutouts stuck on top.

Really hoping you manage to finish this Howlings one soon so I can use it in a couple of weeks time when my players get there! If not, I may have to resort to making my own... What tools do you use to make them?

Sent you a donation too, keep up the good work! :)

The troll, ice dragon, and Radosek definitely sounds like a TPK for the party.

My plan is to have Jairess and her Raven Swarm descend from on high to help the players out.

They befriended her in the aerie, helped significantly by a charismatic druid who worships the same god (Gozreh). The party had also not killed the raven swarm earlier, they had successfully hidden from it, and have been generally pretty awesome to animals along the way, so I decided to give them a break and let them befriend her. And, happily, they actually called it out as a highlight of the session, mixing up just going from battle to battle.

I think I'm going to start the battle downstairs with the troll, ice dragon, Radosek and three guards all ready and looking ominous. My party looks like they are going to be feather falling from the tower down to the courtyard, with Nadya alongside. I'm going to give it a couple of rounds, probably with the monk taking a beating, and then have Jairess drop in with her ravens to take on the troll and the guards. I'll probably fake some rolls and take out the guards extremely quickly, meaning she and Nadya can deal with the troll while my players take on the ice dragon and Radosek.

My party got almost all the way through the Pale Tower yesterday, in a 7 hour epic campaign. They managed to do it without rest, although after the final battle with Radosek the druid only has one spell left, but he did find a sweet wand in the chest next door.

Radosek has flown downstairs to the courtyard, holding on for dear life and preparing to animate the ice dragon. Unfortunately for our players, the troll Bordegga is still alive down there, and the three guards on the wall, all of whom they successfully bluffed past into the tower.

It seems like the troll, ice dragon, three guards and Radosek is going to be way too difficult a fight for my party (three players, level 4), but I have a couple of fun ideas to even the playing field. :)

Does anyone have interesting physical puzzle based ideas on how to make the closing of the portal more fun?

My group is about to do the Pale Tower tomorrow, and I just realised that the lack of rest is going to be punishing. I'm sure they'll be able to clear up the ground floor easily enough, but there's sufficient resistance upstairs for them to have difficulty if they don't take a rest between. Especially as my party is only three people (monk, rogue, druid).

Did any of your parties manage to barricade themselves downstairs somehow? How did you justify Radosek not just feather footing down and awakening the dragon? Perhaps I should give them somewhere on the ground floor that they can hide out for a few hours?

I use the digital copy of the Reign of Winter maps product, click on the "remove DM notes" button, copy the images into photoshop, scale them up so one square is roughly an inch, and then print them off on the printer at work.

I picked up the PDF of the maps too; does anyone know if we are given the copyright to print them off? I would like to take it to Fedex Office to get printed at a good size, and would rather they didn't try and argue with me about ownership. :)

Thanks for the prompt reply!

If disguised, how do you think they would break disguise? They get through the front door and then get jumped by the troll down there, who is backed up by the guards on the wall (who could slide down to join in).

We play together and most of us have iPads during the game, but we are trying to keep it a bit more low tech. I might print out the map in chunks, it's probably worth it for this space.

Now I just wish the damn miniatures would ship so I could use them instead of the cardboard pawns. :)

Hi!

I'm a really new DM, and I have a few questions about the Pale Tower, some of which are probably REALLY basic which will have you shaking your head in despair. If possible though, I would appreciate the support!

I am DMing for a party of three; a Monk, a Rogue and a Druid (all currently lvl 3, nearly 4). They all have no experience of D&D either, except the Rogue who hasn't played in a decade or so. We are all game developers though, and we are familiar with the general mechanics of things. We have had a LOT of fun so far, and I'm excited to have them see the Pale Tower. I am still helping them with mechanics a lot.

1. The Pale Tower seems almost completely impregnable. The Climb DC is huge, you get major damage busting through the door and there are guards on overwatch. I doubt my guys will manage to take a disguise, although perhaps they will. Both Nadya and Hatch are friendly and will be coming with the party. Any ideas on how they could break in?

2. Should the entire duration spent inside the Pale Tower be done as if in combat? Moving turn by turn, very specific distances? It seems that it should...

3. How would they go about going into Stealth during the Pale Tower, between combat, to sneak away from ambushes?

4. How should I physically present the map to them? I have dry erase grid maps, but drawing the whole thing on there seems like it would take a huge amount of time, and I'd love to keep the high amount of detail present.

5. Speaking of the map, it seems super tight in places, specifically the barracks, where there may well be a dozen characters fighting in about two dozen squares, many of which have beds on them. How does movement and combat on a bed work..?

Thanks in advance, and I apologise again for the elementary nature of my questions! :)