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The Ecology of a Death Knight article.

Features this gem....

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Vanthus Vanderboren: Vanthus featured as a villain in Dungeon magazine's "Savage Tide" adventure path. Appearing as a human foe throughout the first two adventures, he returns as a half-fiend after visiting the Abyss and being transformed by the Flesh Forge. Following his death at the hands of the PCs, Demogorgon turns him into a death knight, and he bedevils the PCs again only to meet a second death. Upon this second failure, he is transformed into a larva, and the PCs meet him in this lowly form during the last adventure.

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Talk about inconsiderate, could the folks at Paizo do what they can to get it removed before all my players read it. Assuming you are still on speaking terms with WotC.

If the players miss the final battle, does Vanthus still trigger the Shadow Pearl?

Because looking at the VP maths the PC's can still snatch a victory without even being at the final battle, so long as the pearl isn't triggered. From the description of his tactics it seems to be a something he does out of spite when losing the fight, if the PC's aren't there to threaten him does he still activate the pearl before leaving?

What are the rules for vocal and somatic components to spells cast underwater? Does Water Breathing (vocal) and/or Free Action (somatic) allow you to cast fine underwater?

Without then is it even possible, do you need a concentration check? What?

Are there any official rules anywhere?

What's to stop a the group sailing direct to Farshore rather than hugging the coast, or resupplying water at rivers?

Two castings of Create Food or Water a day could feed the entire ship.

Oh and they also came up with the idea of towing the boat horses that have horseshoes of waterwalking, to get above the 1.5 miles an hour.

So I'm reading through "Here There Be Monsters" because my players are about to start "The Sea Wyvern's Wake" and I like to keep at least one adventure ahead so I can foreshadow stuff, and because I'm checking out the survivors and how important they are.... anyway I come Tavey Nesk background.

"Tavery spent most of his young life aboard the Sea Wyvern after he was rescued from the sea six years ago."

What so he's from the The Sea Wyvern, he survived the Savage Tide in Karken's Cove, and the crew of the ship going savage and killing each other.

Forgive me but shouldn't he have been mentioned in "The Bullywug Gambit."? Shouldn't he have more of a story to tell? shouldn't he have been discovered at some point either during "TBG" or at the begining of Sea Wyvern's Wake, not only really be introduced in Here There Be Monsters?

It's a bit late to reveal he's been a cabin boy on the Sea Wyvern for the last six years.

Assuming that you are encouraging settlers to Farshore, by offering land, just how big is the island and Farshore is on and are there any native settlements on it?

The Homestead Act gave land rights in lots of 160 acres, but in medieval times it was estimated 10-12 acres was what was needed to support a family. So I was figuring 30 to 50 acres would be an attractive offer to most settlers, some would obviously sell their land rights to set up a business in Farshore itself.

I'm just wondering how big the island Farshore is on and how many 30 acre plots could be marked out.

How many crew and passengers is the Blue Nixie taking to Farshore (it being nearly twice the size of the Sea Wyvern)?

Also the adventure says there is bunk space for 22 people on the Sea Wyvern...

There are 9 beds shown, I imagine some are triple bunks? Are some doubles and the captains a single? How is it broken down?

I'm just wondered who is going to complain about being bunked with whom.

Assuming a Greyhawk calender what time of year is the adventure taking place in, probably most importantly when do they set sail from Sasserine?

Also what part of the world is the adventure original planed to be in Tropical, Temperate?

I was wondering what are the names, stats and stories behind the characters we see regularly appearing in the Savage Tide art work, they look an interesting bunch.

And what's the weapon the female wizard is using?

The Sea Urchin Venom seems a little harsh to me, there is a reasonable chance that a fair number of the party can quickly end up sitting out the encounter. It's not far off a save or die effect, since once you are nauseated you can't do anything other than defend and running away isn't even an option.

I know the DC is reasonably low (DC11), but if they fail it the character might as well not be there, it's not like they can do anything useful, and at such a low level they have nothing to remove the effect. If enough of the party fail their save then you could easily be looking at a TPK as the remaining villains gang up on the ones that passed it.

In the Journey to Blood Bay it states the following...

a) Rowing to Kraken's Cove takes 2 days if they row in shifts

b) Rowing will take 5 days if they only row 8 hours a day.

c) Sailing takes only 16 hours and that the fishman could be paid to wait.

d) Walking overland (walking only 8 hours a day) takes 5 days.

It also says that Vanthus struck only a few hours before they arrived, therefore Drevoraz Kabran, didn't leave until sometime after that heading overland to Sasserine. No in a best case scenario the Bullywugs he recruits were on a direct path to Sasserine and they didn't need to pack and were all ready and willing to head off from the village as soon as he contacted them. So he didn't waste a moment negotiating or waiting for Bullywug warriors to return from a hunt.

Assuming the PC's don't take too long exploring Karken's Cove; if the PC's use option a) 2 days or c) 16 hours to get back to Sasserine, how come they arrive later than Drevoraz who is going to take 5 days to get back?

From the Bullywug Gambit I've noticed a couple of issues with the Shadow Pearl and the "Savage" template.

First is a minor issue.

In the Bullywug gambit several areas have descriptions of deformed corpses supposedly deformed by the Savage Tide, yet when creatures take on the Savage Template they get the Death Throes (Su) ability, which means when they die they disolve into puddles of acidic goo leaving nothing but a skeleton and their gear. Hence no deformed corpse.

Second is a more major issue. The Savage Tide will probably effect about 2/3rds of the creatures in a 1 mile radius, including all animals (proved by the encounter with the Savage monkeys). In a one mile radius of the Karken Cove just how many animals, including birds, fish, lizards, snakes, are there? Thankfully it doesn't effect vermin or there would be countless savage rats.

Now each one of these creatures can transfer the savage plague with a bite. They can bite even as they die so the sparrow gets eaten by the sparrow hawk but not before it turns it stands a very good change of it turning it savage. It seems to me that it is quickly going to lead to a savage plague that will spread across the globe.

Isn't just the activation of one pearl miles from civilization a problem enough considering the easy of which the template is transferred and the number of possible carriers?