DeviantDesign's page

So, I started running this campaign myself last year after our previous one ended and I got a lot of inspiration from Inspectre! (Love your stuff good sir! Really helped me get the creative juices going to alter a lot of stuff into a much more memorable game for my group!)

One of the biggest changes I made was I made Illeosa a sympathetic character, more CN to start with, just a girl who got wrapped up in something that was bigger than herself being a pawn to the Arkona's and Andaisin's plot to get their hooks into the king at the beginning of the game.

I also have had the crown of fangs start to slowly influence her and start to push her towards corruption, using her insecurities and fear as fuel to fully let Kazavon's influence take over somewhere down the line. Early on, after they became a known quantity in the city to her and they had done a few things helpful to her, she actually invited them all to lunch just to try and get to know them better and hopefully make friends. (She's a young woman thrust into power who's been betrayed by the only person she's known for a long time and nearly everyone else is playing the political game, she's scared and lonely and was reaching out for support!)

So I actually think there is a good likelihood of something like this being possible in my game, once she devolves into madness they're going to have to decide do they try and save her? Or do they make absolutely sure that this monster can't come back and kill their friend instead!

AoO when you fail or fail by 5 or more are decent takes. I'm not sure if the extra layer of risk/complication is worth it, but it could be a nice balance or way to ease into it.

What I like is the idea that the feats give you an AoO when someone tries to use a combat maneuver on you.

Another option would be to do away with the penalty to the CMB from the AoO, either on it's own or in conjunction with some of these other options.

I've been using this rule with my latest group since we started pretty much. So for the last 4 years nearly? Never used it with my previous groups, but then no one at that time ever really tried Maneuvers or even mentioned them so just never came up.

We've liked it quite a bit, and while we still don't have a ton of Maneuvers done, it definitely has instigated them happening more often than before.

I didn't read through the entire thread, so sorry if anyone has gone over something similar, but I'll mention how I do Combat Maneuvers for my group as they seem to like it.

When attempting a combat maneuver against an enemy, two things will provoke an AOO; failing to hit the CMD of the target by 5 or more, or if the enemy has the Improved Feat of the maneuver you are trying against them. (If both the attacker and the defender have the feat, it acts as normal.)

My reasoning is I don't want my players to feel like they are locked into just attacking if they don't have the feats. I want them to do what is cool and what drives the story... but I also want those who specialize in those feats to feel like they get more out of it than just a +4.

That's my two cents at least!

Heya guys! My group recently decided they wanted to give CotCT a go after feeling a little too combat heavy with Wrath of the Righteous. So as I usually do, I came here and started browsing; seeing how other people ran it, changed it, and what they added and took away.

I found Inspectre's rewrite and felt rather inspired! Amazing stuff there and I'm loving the vibe of Book 1 in comparison after reading both the original and his changes.

So I find myself doing what I did with RotRL for this group... adding tons of details, pushing for roleplay heavy interactions and drawing out the campaign by quite a bit!

One thing I did add, and figured I would share here, was a mocked up a Newspaper page for my players, the Korvosan Carrier.

Link to Google Drive Download: Korvosan Carrier

A few changes I made that might matter if someone decides to use it...

-I changed the starting year and date due to my RotRL campaign being stretched out previously for my players and I didn't want the game to feel like the next world ending catastrophe was just waiting on the one before it to end.

Anyhow! That's about it! If people want to see more of them as I go along I can post links or any suggestions/ideas!

Fake it 'till you make it con artist street magician actually learns how to spellcast.

My current run of RotRL includes this menagerie of miscreants:

Raiez Fellfallen (Tiefling Alchemist): Former slave soldier to the House Arrione of Cheliax, she was released from enslavement by Queen Abrogail herself, along with all the other slaves owned by the Lord Cizhal Arrione as an added disrespect to the Arrione family for an attempt by Cizhal to unlawfully destroy the trade routes of other Houses. Since her freedom, she has been attempting to find her place in the world as well as a way to regrow her severed tail.

Lyle Tighfield (Halfling Rogue/Bard): Former house slave of the youngest son of Cizhal Arrione. Lyle truly and emphatically believes that Coren Arrione was one of the best people in the whole world and practically worshiped the ground he walked on. After being forcefully separated from the Arrione family, he found the next source of his hero worship... Raiez. Ever since then he has followed her and helped her dutifully and will do ANYTHING for the tiefling.

Lasair (Aasimar Witch): Lasair grew up in Nirmathas, raised by the herbalist of one of the many small towns that are scattered through the forests. He has always had a burning passion to learn new things and as such, a chance encounter with a seemingly normal cat who spoke to him and offered him access to powers and gifts beyond his understanding was too tempting an offer to refuse. Since then, he has been traveling with his childhood friend, Jameson, searching out new interests and studies.

Jameson, Son of James (Human Ranger/Paladin of Sarenrae): Jameson grew up in Nirmathas as a stocky farmboy, surrounded by his siblings and helping out wherever possible. He trained with some of the militia before joining his friend Lasair when he was broached about seeing the rest of the world. Since then, he has found his faith in Erastil ebbing as signs and portents from the Dawnflower guide him to her side.

Orthello Corvantus (Half Elf Paladin of Torag): Orthello grew up in the Hinterlands of Sandpoint, helping his family with the farm when he wasn't in Sandpoint taking his studies at the Turandurok Academy. His father never cared for him and shunned him in every way possible (neither of his parents had any elven heritage that they knew of and while his mother vehemently denied cheating, the cant of his ears suggested differently). RIP: Slain by Bruthazmus as he rushed the bugbear, putting himself between the vicious ranger and the injured tiefling alchemist.

The Greymulkin (Catfolk Rogue/Sorceror): Grey was trained in his small, hidden village before being sent out by the Elders to seek out the looming evils that assaulted their vision dreams of the future. Since then, he has traveled across Varisia. He was encountered by the party in Thistletop, a mercenary friend of Orik's who tagged along with Orik. They both turned against Nualia and helped the party against her. Since then he has stuck to the party, observing them and guaging their mettle.

Qaflifum Glombogglae (Gnome Spheres of Power Armorist): Q (As everyone calls her because damn gnome names are annoying to say...) recently joined the party after seeing Lyle order a few drinks and meals for the party at the Rusty Dragon while he waited for them to filter in. She promptly helped herself to the drinks while talking to the frustrated and beleaguered halfling and quickly forced her way into the group. She seems quite capable with a scimitar and seems to have a few tricks up her sleeves, including some extradimensional pocket to store goods, the ability to shapeshift, and a head of hair so ridiculously party colored it would make a Calistrian whore blush. The party still doesn't know what to make of her, though they have gathered that she is quite old, even by gnomish standards, has a hard time remembering anything, and has been doing everything in her power to stave off the Bleaching as long as she can.

Ameiko in my game has had a few changes to fit with the elongated timeline that I have for my RP heavy group.

1. Her time away from adventuring was a little bit longer than is originally written, giving her another year or so.

2. Her friendship with Shalelu is a bit deeper than as written. Shalelu helped her out with a few very delicate issues after returning to Sandpoint and ever since they have been fairly close.

3. One of my players used to be a soldier and as such, took Profession: Brewing, so I gave Ameiko a fairly impressive collection of wines, beers, and draughts from all over. As such, Ameiko took a shining to my player's moonshine, 'Soldier's Salvation' and has an agreement to buy from the PC when they decide to make fresh batches.

4. After the death of Tsuto and Lonjiku, Ameiko is now the owner of quite a bit of estate. In my game, she doesn't really care for dealing with quite so much of a headache. She is currently on the way to Magnimar with my PCs to see if she can find a buyer for the family manor (her reasoning being that there are too many bitter memories tied to her father's house).

-Added bonus here is that the buyer for the house will be a noble I plan on being a fairly strong red herring to make Chapter 2 less obvious!

Hi. My PC will be done with the catacombs today and they should move to Thisletop. But as far as I know, the only reference to THISTLETOP was in the journal. Apparently, I missed some of the backstory or they don't have the maps, but I am pretty sure they will not go there directly.

Should I make them figure out their next move or let them find a note in the last room in catacombs (Levitation room)?

Or am I missing something.

Thanks.

I personally got rid of Tsuto's journal under the Glassworks. I found it way too obvious and wanted my players to feel like going there was more their idea than forced on them by saying, "GO HERE!!!" (It will be placed in Tsuto's room in Thistletop instead.)

So it took a little setting up, and it worked off of the PCs thinking that Sandpoint needed more help then just them. While Sheriff Belor was away in Magnimaar and they were scouting around the wilderness around Sandpoint, they ran into a few undead (hinting at undead issues in the area that will at some point lead to the red herring that is Habe's). These undead had black chips of obsidian jammed into the base of their skulls with arcane runes.

The PCs took these chips to Father Zantus, who consulted the priest of Sarenrae, Brother Walter. Brother Walter, who has a bit more interest and study in the undead found it to be troubling and offered to go to Windsong Abbey (north of Sandpoint) and see if he could garner aid for Sandpoint.

So after dealing with the Catacombs of Wrath and waiting on the Sheriff, my players ran into another group of goblins outside of Sandpoint with Thistletop badges a few days later. They easily took them out and found among the loot a pair of cracked spectacles. I made certain to describe them as nicely made and how spectacles are expensive and fairly rare.

They took them to Kesk's Shinies (My name for Maver Kesk's shop) and he identified them as belonging to Sabyll Sorn... who they knew went with Brother Walter to Windsong Abbey... *cue the dramatic music!*

Excuse the long drawn out response, but yeah, my players are now running against the clock after freaking out and realizing that Sabyll and Brother Walter are either dead or captured by goblins!

That’s not a bad way of doing things.

Thanks! I just always felt that the whole situation with Aldern and Iesha could have more of a punch if the players got to actually have more interaction with them then just saving Aldern and a single boar hunt.

The last time I ran RotRL, the 2nd book ended up having my players skip over Habe's and even the farmsteads due to them connecting the odd taunts to Aldern from their brief interactions at the beginning of the adventure path.

Now that I am running the game a second time, with a new group, I have been toying with the idea of changing the dates for his romance and marriage to Iesha to help throw off what I feel is a little too obvious.

Instead of the marriage and ensuing death occurring before the AP starts, I plan on having my players receive invitations to Aldern's whirlwind of a marriage ceremony shortly after the end of Book 1. The players will get to meet Iesha, breathe a huge sigh of relief that the awkward nobleman has someone else to be interested in and everything will seem peachy keen when book 2 starts.

I use tbug's list personally for my group. (Thanks alot for the awesome work tbug!)

For my game, I extended a bit of the info on each of the guards for quick use for when the party runs into or interacts with them.

My group had an interesting time of the Erylium fight, of course, I am also heavily editing the RotRL campaign in many ways as we decided to play a more RP focused game to allow for exploration of character backstories.

My little group of intrepid adventurers made fairly quick work of the Sinspawn patrolling the entrance and had no issue passing their Will saves versus the effect of the Sinful Bite. This left them not knowing exactly what was going on with these creatures as none of them could roll high enough to figure out what they were.

I ended up moving Koruvus and an extra Sinspawn into the alcove outside of the temple, my reasoning being that while Erylium may be annoyed by Koruvus, she would also see his usefulness at the very least as an early warning of intruders.

After dealing with Koruvus, they entered the Temple and began the fight.

Erylium summoned a Sinspawn and flew up above the group, beginning to throw Hexes as the Spawn charged into the fray. She was able to knock out the Tiefling Alchemist with her Slumber hex before the Aasimar Witch passed a pretty high Perception check to notice the small little bird hanging about in the dark recesses of the room. One well-placed crossbow bolt later found Erylium lacking her Witch repertoire which pissed her off to no end.

The one change I made to her abilities was I gave her an ability I called the Choir of Chaos. Once per day, she can shriek, calling on Lamashtu to bewilder her foes in an area around her for a DC 12 Will save. Failure placed the Confusion effect on the affected target with a new Will save at the end of every round to shrug off the effect.

I did not expect this to have too great of an effect, as the DC was fairly low, but the rogue's player proceeded to fail his save every round for the entire fight. (Humorously enough the Paladin was the only other PC to not pass the save the first round, although he did pass after the first round.)

The fight quickly turned against Erylium though and she used her Invisibility to bolt, as the party had forgotten to close the Temple doors behind them and now they find themselves, especially the Aasimar witch who killed her familiar, paranoid and worrying when the little demon will show up again to exact revenge.

So after having run three-quarters of the RotRL before with a home group before and finding myself itching to run the game again for my new online group with whom I've been gaming with for a year, I have decided to do something a little different.

My current group is very interested in exploring more of the game than just the 'rails' of a campaign as well as stretching their roleplaying chops so taking that into account when we talked about running through RotRL, I suggested a much slower version of the AP
than what the original campaign allows for.

-The experience track has been adjusted from Fast to Slow.

-Using various aids from here and other places, as well as many of my own ideas, I am fleshing out all of the various NPCs that could be encountered or interacted with. This includes giving more on stage time for interesting characters down the road. (I.E. Lyrie and Orik both have already made an appearance at the Swallowtail Festival. My reasoning being that my Nualia already had them in her employ and sent them both to Sandpoint to see how things went down as well as to provide support to Tsuto if the need arose... otherwise they were to see if there were any possible threats to her plans.)

-The Hinterlands and its surrounds are being fleshed out further. Bounties will be posted at the Sandpoint Barracks for various issues that the town guard can not deal with themselves. (I.E. A rash of undead running around on occasion *cough cough Experiments from Habe's cough cough*

And more things along those lines of thought. I just thought I would see what other people thought of doing the campaign like this? And if interested I can always share my notes and perhaps even one of my player's journals as the game goes on, in case anyone would like to do something similar at some point!

Cheers!

First and foremost! If you are playing this adventure path and named Kethne, Bloodtusk, Aden, Alden, Hinata, or Locke turn back now for the sake of your crunchy crunchy soul!

For those interested, I have been running the Savage Tide, converted to the Pathfinder rule set from 3.5 for a group of fellow Critical Role Critters. Most haven't ever played Pathfinder before and are working off of knowledge from 5e so it has been fun teaching the much crunchier system to those interested in trying it out!

On to the good stuff!

After fighting their way to freedom from the depths of the tunnels beneath Parrot Isle, they rest and recuperate as much as possible while setting to finding out what they can about this Lady of the Lotus, mentioned in Penkus' note. -Important Note: I changed the mention of the Taxidermist's Guildhall written in Penkus' last words to what he knew it by, the Stuffer's Hall. (I felt that the previous was kinda ham handed and obvious while calling it the Stuffer's Hall still is a good hint while allowing the players to explore the city and feel like I'm not just pushing them down the path.)

Soon afterwards, the cleric of Sarenrae finds in her pack the warning message from the Lotus, having not noticed it being placed in her pack as she was searching the various docks for ships named "Lady of the Lotus". She quickly found it disturbing and set out to gather her other allies, running across the city gathering everyone to inform them they may be in danger.

At this point it was late evening, and a few of the more 'enterprising' members of the guild decided to attempt to attack them on their way back to the Vanderboren estate, seeing the night to be their best chance. (Cue the attack by the rogues on the roof in the alley).

They found themselves facing 3 rogues and a 3rd level rogue/cleric of Norgerber, adding a bit more deity flavor and depth to the Lotus Dragon guild members.

After surviving the fight, many going unconscious or to very low digits, they tied up the last survivor, and started to interrogate him.

As they interrogated him, and based on what they said and their rolls, I found out that this particular brute was more afraid of the Lady of the Lotus than of what a few adventurers could do, so after answering a few vague questions he shut up.

The best part though, was when one of the PCs asked the best question I could have ever heard a player ask as they went through this portion of the adventure path....

"Is the Lady of the Lotus Lavinia Vanderboren?"

Absolute silence before everyone freaked the hell out, the level of minds being blown was out the roof, including my own! It was an amazing question that they realized that regardless of if she is or isn't will have really big complications depending on how they handle this level of doubt they just placed on themselves!

And as any good DM does, as they planned to confront Lavinia in as careful and sneaky manner as possible, I ended the session for the week there!

I just had to share this, it was the most awesome single question that turned everyone's viewpoint on a campaign I have ever run!

Background

I have been hosting DnD 3.5 and then more recently Pathfinder for the last few years fairly consistently on a weekly basis for a group of in person friends. We have run through some personal homebrews (many of which did not continue after a period of time for one reason or another) to Adventure Paths such as the Savage Tide and now currently a little over halfway through The Rise of the Runelords.
As the Always GM I try to keep my ideas fresh and put spins on things the players would enjoy thus was born the idea for my next campaign.

Caveat

I tried posting on Reddit for help with the idea but most everyone instantly took it the wrong way and began ranting about taking away player angency. All the ideas when it comes to the player's characters have been talked about and explained to them and they have agreed that they like the idea of this.

The Concept

We start with the epitome of a fantasy trope.... all the PCs wake up in a room together with amnesia.... yeah yeah I know it is over done, most often in video games or with players that just don't want to spend the time to create a back story!

What I am doing differently though is that I will be compiling a list of 'Memory Snippets/ Flashes of Insight' that when a PC has done something that I as a GM feel could trigger a hidden memory that player will randomly receive a Snippet which is actually a very brief flash of memory of their unremembered life. All of them will be drawing from the same list of memories, I won't be tailoring memories to each character as if I have written their histories for them, the memories will be totally random.

What I'm looking for is constructive critiques as well as help compiling a list of compelling, interesting, bizarre, and even goofy memories that the players could draw from.

Obviously this is sort of an exercise as well as a game for me as a GM as well as for my players, memories cropping up that go against their current view of their character's morals could definitely make things difficult but I feel that having to riff off of and work with these ideas could help me as a GM and my players get better and developing deep and thoughtful characters!

Thanks for the suggestions people!

DeviantDesign wrote:

I have an idea in mind but I wanted to ask a few questions of the DM and the players first to get an idea to see if it would be viable.

I have always loved Kobolds and I've always wanted to actually play one in a game. In the rundown it mentions that your group has made an alliance/truce with the Sootscales.

Is this a tentative truce or is it fairly amiable? You mentioned changing things up so I was curious how doable a Kobold Wizard would be? I was thinking something along the lines of having been shunned to an extent but not to the point that he was exiled by the clan and perhaps this group of possible allies would be a good opportunity to have the young Kobold show his loyalty to the clan and keep tabs on them!

(Of course it wouldn't be meant to backstab or anything like that, just a reason for a Kobold who doesn't want to follow the norms of the clan to make sense in a setting without having been shoehorned!)

So what does the party think of Kobolds? Would a quirky little wizard be a welcome addition or would it be too much trouble?

The party is pretty ok with Kobolds.

The problem you'd have is Chief Sootscale doesn't like spellcasters after being betrayed by one. If you were found in another tribe by the Sootscales, the best you could hope for would be exile.

The Sootscales are also a very particular brand of psychopaths.

If you do want to give your hand at it, decide what kind of angle you want to approach it from and I'll try to give you some advice.

Sounds good, I'll think of what my angle would be and do a write up sometime tomorrow if I can think of something good to work with!

I have an idea in mind but I wanted to ask a few questions of the DM and the players first to get an idea to see if it would be viable.

I have always loved Kobolds and I've always wanted to actually play one in a game. In the rundown it mentions that your group has made an alliance/truce with the Sootscales.

Is this a tentative truce or is it fairly amiable? You mentioned changing things up so I was curious how doable a Kobold Wizard would be? I was thinking something along the lines of having been shunned to an extent but not to the point that he was exiled by the clan and perhaps this group of possible allies would be a good opportunity to have the young Kobold show his loyalty to the clan and keep tabs on them!

(Of course it wouldn't be meant to backstab or anything like that, just a reason for a Kobold who doesn't want to follow the norms of the clan to make sense in a setting without having been shoehorned!)

So what does the party think of Kobolds? Would a quirky little wizard be a welcome addition or would it be too much trouble?

Well, you could always do something like animated objects. That way you can taylor them to your age group.

For example, you could make the skeleton in the tomb at the beginning of the AP an animated grve digger's shovel, or perhaps the lid to the old priest's tomb even.

So tomorrow I'm running the next session of ROTRL. My group has already alerted Gogmurt to their presence by spending an hour attempting to set fire to the briars even though they were told it looks too green to do so and then attempted a sloppy recon attempt before dragging all the hungry little refugees out after the tasty looking kitsune.
I have a party of 6-7 level 3s and after rereading Gogmurt again it clicked in my head just how nasty he is. Correct me if I am wrong, but after he casts Entangle, any PC that is caught in it is considered flat footed and thus would be subject to his Sneak Attack bonus with his Produce Flame wand (within 30 feet of course and only if actually having failed the save) since the spell acts as a ranged touch attack.
Has anyone else used this approach with Gogmurt before? I'm not trying to wipe my party but I have told them since the beginning that I'm not going to play with kid gloves on this time and they needed to play smart.

tl;dr. How nasty is Gogmurt and Tangletooth when played to full effectiveness?

Edit: Words are hard! :P