DarkZergkill's page

True, just keeping some options for myself. Preparing a dungeon is never wasted time. ;D

I am looking into fluffing up the interactions with the aristocrats some, because my group is lacking a bit of EXP. Deepmar seems to be a popular choice for that, but I am also thinking about a short hunting trip with Eldonna Aulamaxa.
Hunting down a rabid (spire?) drake in the hinterlands of Ravounel and letting the PCs discover that someone was experimenting with it. Just some foreshadowing of Barzillais and Tiarises work on Rivozair.

My players are pretty smart about things so far and were able to avoid frontal assaults for the most part. The only open conflict that happened was at the first doghousing they witnessed, because one PC was outraged by it and charged in to end it.
But after it happened they had a long talk about things to prevent something like that in the future.
So I doubt they would walk into a place like Menador Keep just like that.

I will prepare it, but I'll also prepare a small dungeon as a backdoor to the anvil. Just in case they want to go that route.

In general, I am a bit apprehensive of the whole Menador Keep scenario. Flat out attacking a military post, fully armed and stocked seems like a very weird choice for the rebellion, especially since they haven't really done anything like that on official posts. (Also why do the soldiers have weapon proficiency with ballistas, if there is not a single ballista around?)

The background for the keep says that it is an old dwarven installation and one of my player characters is a dwarf. His backstory is that his clan moved above ground long ago and settled in the hinterlands of Ravounel, kinda isolated.
I had the idea that Menador Keep was part of their original holdings and the PCs can find out about a hidden entrance/backdoor to the anvil of unmaking. So instead of a full frontal assault, they can crawl through an abandoned dwarven dungeon and activate the anvil without the soldier ever noticing what is going on.

I am preparing the Menador Keep map and (besides the wrong attack profile) I am a bit confused about how many Soldiers are in the keep.

"Although each of these rooms is slightly different in shape, they all contain the same defenders—a posting of eight Menador soldiers at all hours of the day."

Am I correct that all 4 Guardrooms have 8 Soldiers each, so 32 in total? If that is the case I am just going to turn those into 4 Dottari troops to keep that (inevitable) fight more manageable.

I played up the threat of the Red Jills a bit too much so my players ended up being too afraid to go after them.
In the end they ran into the second in command of the Jills who used them to get rid of Scarplume, because she got too extreme for him. She wanted to shank and rob any humans while he is more interested in the money.
They actually managed to take her hostage and tried to reason with her, but during her imprisonment and interrogation our cleric "showed her mercy" and ended Scarplumes life.

Now the Red Jills are still around, but under new leadership and more focused on extortion and protection rackets. My players loath to speak with the new guy, because he is so sleazy and that brings much joy to my heart. :V

Odexidie would be a good fit for that, but also a bit hard to pull off. I think a easier, close second could be Mialari Docur, since she has a rather large spy network at her hands (and is somewhat underutilized in the AP in my opinion).

So I want to change the whole Lucky Bones scenario up a bit, since I don't really like how it plays out in the book and the map of the dungeon is pretty bad as well. I want a bit more of a investigation and social RP going on before the players go in and murder hobo their way through the mini dungeon.

I am going to upscale the whole operation. The cult of Mahathallah is using the (still intact) gambling house as a public front to hide their secret agenda. The cult is lead by a (storm?) hag and the changeling cultists are her daughters who were drawn to her by the calling, which hopefully should make Luculla a more interesting NPC (can the PCs pull her away from her mother or will she stay loyal?).
I really want to use a Gambling Devil, so one of them will operate the public gambling side of things. A underground VIP area will lead into the illegal parts of the cult, with a high roller table operated by a ghost (but of course ;D) and personal booths for recreational opium enjoyment. The changelings will be the hosts in this area of the Lucky Bones.
So behind all the gambling is a whole drug and human trafficking operation going on. Drugs and sacrifices are both integral parts of worshiping Mahathallah, so I think this should fit nicely.
This should also make the sudden Skum/Aboleth plot and the excursion in book 3 a bit more organic. The cult abducts people for the Skum to deliver to Menotheguro and in exchange they will gain knowledge from the Aboleth.
My players have earlier "allied" themselves with the Red Jills (under new leadership), which could give them another way to get into the whole illegal operation that the cult has going on.

In the grand scale of the campaign, my idea is that Barzillai used the services of the cult to abduct Jilia Bainilus. I think the knowledge that he used the cult to further his own plans while f!~@ing them over with the corruption of the soul anchor fits his personality.
And uncovering that connection is what sealed the fate of Octavio and the whole Order of the Torrent. It will also be the reason why he points the PC in the direction of the cult. This way they have more of a reason to investigate the Lucky Bones, besides just wanting a bigger hideout.