Eltanin's page

Hopefully this isn't already covered elsewhere.

I am currently a Pathfinder subscriber but next year is going to be extremely tight financially. I would very much love to be able to continue receiving Pathfinders though, and I thought that perhaps I could suggest it as a Christmas present that friends or family could give to me. Currently there doesn't seem to be a mechanic to do this though. I know that "wish lists" are on the list of things to implement on the site and perhaps that would cover this. But I'd love to have a way for a family member to buy a gift certificate or something that I could apply to my Pathfinder subscription.

If this has already been done, please help me out and point me to the right place. If it hasn't been done, please consider it so that I can somehow get more money into Paizo's hands over the holiday season.

Thanks much.

Ok, I've been wracking my brains all week trying to think of a graceful way to work this and my brains hurt without getting me appreciably nearer to a solution.

Here's the skinny:

A while back we had to introduce a new wizard character while the group was in the Free City. It fit the player nicely to have had him be apprenticed to Tensor before Rary's betrayal. I was imagining the young wizard mostly running errands, maybe learning a first level spell or two, but thinking that he's really cool for hangin' with Tensor. Think Baker Street Irregulars from Sherlock Holmes stories. The player was as tickled by it as his character. Cool.

But now this is coming back to bite me a little bit. We have just successfully averted disaster at the end of the Games and now it comes time for me to figure out how to get the party back to Diamond Lake. Bear with me here. We're having to introduce another new character here who will be a Diamond Lake native (rogue 5/druid 5). This is all well and good and gives me a vehicle to convey things if I need to.

Now the published hooks are Eligos' note and the fact that there's a dragon in town. Eligos' note is a little tricky for me, because why would they need to or care about going back to talk to Allustan if the party wizard already knows Tensor (or did 10 years ago or however long it's been)? They don't necessarily need Allustan's introduction anymore. So I'll need to reword Eligos note...somehow.

As far as the dragon, I'm having a hard time figuring out why the party would rush back to the town. Wouldn't they expect the higher ups to deal with natural disasters like an irate dragon? There is one remaining party member who is from Diamond Lake who would certainly wish to go back to check up on his family, but currently he's an NPC. So I don't want all of the motivation to come from the DM. What a fun night of roleplaying that will be. The DM talking to himself and the players riding the railroad. As for the new player, he just left Allustan's side 2 and a half days ago. It just doesn't seem as graceful as it could be to have him be the vehicle to call them back. "So your character trekked all the way to the big city, but now you need to scream for help and get back to your small town as quick as your little legs can carry you."

I'd love to hear suggestions about how to bridge this slightly awkward moment between modules. Even if your plans, or what you did at this point, don't seem directly applicable, please share. Other stories always help spark ideas in my overtaxed noggin.

Thanks for the help once again O Wondrous Paizonians.

My players have been casting around for a way to keep them safe from worms. They're split between levels 9 and 10 right now, and it's amazing how challenging a few simple spawn can still be.

I recently started a thread about the use of grease as a worm preventative, but now my players have returned to more conventional tactics. Last night we saw the first use of Repel Vermin and though I should have seen it coming, I found myself at a bit of a loss. If a verminous critter makes it's will save and crosses the barrier, it suffers 2d6 points of damage. That's enough to kill any worm of course. So if some PC has a worm inside them and the cleric approaches with her Repel Vermin sphere up, then presumably the worm is instantly destroyed.

But what about the spawn? Should this act like the "Curative Transformation" weakness that they have? Should every spawn suddenly become a regular zombie? Doesn't that make this simple spell more powerful than it should be? For the rest of the AP, (almost) including Kyuss himself, all the players would need to do is have their repel vermin up and they reduce challenging fights to zombie smashing. Broodfiends? Just undead bugs now.

My thought is that the spawn (or whatever Kyuss creations) should suffer the 2d6 points of damage, but all of the worms within them should not automatically be blasted out. But once in the sphere, could the spawn place a worm on the cleric successfully?

And does this spell give a free ticket past any of the wormswarms in the Spire?

I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions to moderate what could otherwise be sweeping ramifications for this spell. Admittedly, it's a 5th level spell and so should be powerful, but it shouldn't be the magic bullet to solving the Age of Worms problem.

Thanks in advance.

Given the dearth of responses to my query, I've decided to throw more words at the attempt in the hopes that more words will garner more attention. You're probably bored with my stilted sentence structure by now though and are on to the next thread. Ah well...

Some Paizo friends that I have been consulting outside the messageboards have come up with the following suggestions.

For a thrown worm, give it a 50% or 25% chance to hit a non greased spot on the target. If it does hit a greased spot, give the worm a reflex save to see if it sticks anyway.

For the touch method of depositing the worm, perhaps give the opponent a +4 to touch AC as the Spawn attempts to force the worm in through the eye slits of your helm or some such.

Not sure what to do about the slam attack and deposit worm method. Perhaps a similar treatment to the thrown worm, though maybe the worm would get a bonus to it's reflex save to stick because it is just being placed.

Now comes another question: what kind of reflex save would a worm have?

Also still wondering about the negative effects of being covered in grease.

I hope that my further words prove exciting to you and cause you to feel the itch to respond. ;-)

Okay, I have a simple question. Here's the setup:

Jump Skill

All Jump DCs given here assume that you get a running start, which requires that you move at least 20 feet in a straight line before attempting the jump. If you do not get a running start, the DC for the jump is doubled.

The DM in a game that I play in ruled that "running start" means that you need to be RUNNING. I.e., if you want to make a jump check without doubling the DC, you need to take a full round action to Run. Therefore every jump check with a running start is a full round action.

This seems a bit stiff to me. The rules say, right there, that you need to "move" at least 20 feet. Not "run" at least 20 feet. I therefore assume that this means that the words "running start" are merely descriptive and not calling out a specific action (i.e. the full round Run). However, this is merely a matter of interpretation so far. Can anyone point me to somewhere in the rules that makes it clear that you can jump (with a running start) as part of a move action?

I can have a different opinion than the DM, but I can't change his mind unless I can point to the rulebook.

Lena, I bailed on you in the Paizo chat room. I didn't mean to, I just accidentally closed the tab when I was trying to get back to it. But I was too slow to log in and I 'entered the room' a second after you left. :-(

Come back anytime! We're friendly over there.

And the rest of you! Come hang out at the Paizonian Chat Room. It's where all the cool kids go. Well, they used to.

So come say hi to your fellow Paizonians in REAL-TIME!

Technology is fun.

*sings*

Spoiler, spoiler, spoilers are ahead.
If you're a player player player, read this and you'll be dead.

*/singing*

I was careening toward a threadjack in another thread, and just managed to pull up in time to avoid it. Whew!

I'm looking for suggestions on what to do with a dominated PC. The cleric in our group fled Zyrxog's layer after losing half of her companions. On the way out, she suffered an attack from the stone brain. Despite a phenomenal will save (for her level) and an active Magic Circle vs. Evil in effect, she failed her save. The Magic Circleprotects her from being immediately dominated, which is good. What's bad is that her buff disappears long before the dominate person does. As it stands, she's returned to the Crooked House with the barbarian, and has gone to sleep.

Next session we will be introducing two new characters to the group. I'm in a quandary about what to do with the cleric now. If she had lost her mind down in the dungeon, it would have been easy. She would have attacked her friends. Now that she's successfully fled, what should I do? Zyrxog should be receiving input from her, so she could just be a spy. I would imagine that he would prohibit her from praying for any protection spells (especially Spell Immunity which she and the barb. used to good effect in their first encounter with Z). I could think of all sorts of evil things to do to the cleric, but right now, she doesn't really have much of a party to support her. It's a delicate time as completely new characters come to meet the group, but haven't yet. The barbarian is going to be little help to the dominated cleric.

So what should I do? How do we have fun with the fact that she failed her save, and yet not derail the campaign and have the cleric die (because she ran right back to Z to have her brains sucked out). Should I give her a get-out-of-jail-free card on this one?

Any and all help/evil suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks!

There I was, no s@#!, hanging out in the Paizo Chat room. All of sudden, who should come in? Cos! It was like he had telepathic superpowers. He sensed that I needed to improve my podcast repetoire, and that I needed help from Customer Service. It was amazing.

I'm here to tell you, that today I'm a much more informed and hip citizen. My Cosmo-Endorsed-Podcasts(Registered Trademark) have really helped out. Women look at me differently, and men treat me with more respect. Try it today!

All silliness aside.

Cosmo: After our discussion last night, I got home to find my nicely forwarded, un-ripped, tarnished, bent, or mutilated Dungeon #147 in my mailbox. It must have been our little talk that scared the Post Office into delivering it. So you can call off your CS dogs, thank you very very much.

Greetings friends, countryman. Richard Pett.

I'm looking to consult the sages (that's ya'll) about a rules question from last night's game.

I have a mindflayer who has been happily eating brains in my campaign. As is common among those creeps, he has levitate up and running, though he wasn't using it actively. A clever little wizard (who later provided dessert) cast a web spell. Now the illithid made his save, easily, but nonetheless found himself entangled. It occurred to me that he could use levitate to get him out of the sticky mess, since he happened to be a particularly weak cuss.

Levitate allows you to move yourself, another creature, or an object up and down as you wish.

Ok, that's not that interesting. What's more interesting is this:

Target: You or one willing creature or one object (total weight up to 100 lb./level)

In order to leave a web, you need to make a strength check. For every 5 points over DC 10, you can move 5 feet. As a 7th level sorceror, the mind flayer can levitate up to 700 lbs, if I'm reading the spell correctly. I'm not sure how to work this one out (so I didn't even bother with it last night).

Can this spell even be used for this application? How would you "roll" to see how far up the levitate allowed you to move? Does this take away from the utility of Telekinesis?

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

Hi Gary. I just wanted to let you know that I frequently have trouble reaching the Sign In page. Often, when I am reading a thread and decide to post something, I click on the "sign in" link at the bottom of the thread. Once I do, I would say that I have a 50/50 chance of reaching the page where I can type in my user name. Just as frequently I reach the front page of the Paizo site. I think that it's the front page. It's currently displaying Erik's note about Pathfinder.

The bug isn't really a problem, I can just click back and try again, but I thought you'd want to know about it.

Sorry to add to your list!

Newbie question here. Do all drow use poison? My PC's are about to go drow-killing in HoHR and I can't find any reference to poison use in the various stat blocks. Are these non-poison using drow or should I assume standard practices (and saves) from the Monster Manual?

Thanks for the help.

I'm not sure what it is about the new polls that I find so entertaining. I mean there are a lot of threads started asking for people to vote about this or that. It happens all the time, and I rarely follow along. Maybe part of the draw is that it tabulates the data so that you can see the results without necessarily reading every response. Maybe it's just that there are "chunky and exciting" graphics (to quote Douglas Adams). Whatever it is, I find myself watching the polls closely. Thanks Paizo!

Now, a couple of suggestions.

First, I think that many of these polls would do well to have a finite duration. As it stands (as far as I can tell and I may be missing something) the poll continues until people lose interest and the thread gets archived. This works for some poll subjects, but others might benefit from a concrete ending. The "Who's your favorite author" poll being an example. Let's have an end to it, so that Nick Logue can crow or cry about it finally.

Also, I was wondering if we could adapt the polls to another use. The use that I'm thinking of would require multiple votes, or some other creative way to poll. It would be really cool to take the Obituary threads, and throw in a little data collection scheme like the polling code. Some way to tabulate the number of deaths in a given module, right up top for everyone to see. I can think of all sorts of interesting ways to collect and display that data. One problem is that it would be coolest to splice it into the existing obit. threads instead of starting totally new ones.

Anyway, just some thoughts. Thanks for the fun!

Rules arbitration question here.

My players were in the middle of a bar fight with a difficult opponent and the dwarven rogue grappled the bad guy. The cleric then pulled out her rope of climbing and 'willed' it to tie itself around the bad guy's leg.

This was difficult for me. What's the rope's attack bonus? So I turned to the animate rope spell for guidance:

The rope can enwrap only a creature or an object within 1 foot of it—it does not snake outward—so it must be thrown near the intended target. Doing so requires a successful ranged touch attack roll (range increment 10 feet). A typical 1-inch-diameter hempen rope has 2 hit points, AC 10, and requires a DC 23 Strength check to burst it. The rope does not deal damage, but it can be used as a trip line or to cause a single opponent that fails a Reflex saving throw to become entangled. A creature capable of spellcasting that is bound by this spell must make a DC 15 Concentration check to cast a spell. An entangled creature can slip free with a DC 20 Escape Artist check.

In game we just decided that she should make a ranged touch attack, which of course has a 50% miss chance because the target is grappled. It missed and tied itself around the rogue, but really had no effect on the battle (they had pretty much won by this time). The cleric's player was understandably disgruntled by this resolution. She argued that the rope should only need to make a melee touch attack not a ranged attack. For reference:

A 60-foot-long rope of climbing is no thicker than a wand, but it is strong enough to support 3,000 pounds. Upon command, the rope snakes forward, upward, downward, or in any other direction at 10 feet per round, attaching itself securely wherever its owner desires. It can unfasten itself and return in the same manner.

A creature must hold one end of the rope when its magic is invoked.

So the rope of climbing can do what the animate rope cannot, i.e. snake forward more than a foot. But what attack bonus does this thing have? Can it even tie itself around moving targets? I'd like to come up with a better resolution than "Well, I'm not sure what else to do and since it's not effecting the outcome anyway, lets just stick with the ranged attack". Thoughts?

I have a barbarian in my campaign who has been putting points into Handle Animal. He also took the Animal Affinity feat at first level. Part of his starting equipment included a guard dog that he had trained from a puppy. We're playing in the Age of Worms campaign, so as you can imagine, his puppy didn't last that long. Longer than I expected though (mostly because he kept it in his backpack 90% of the time).

Anyway, much time has passed and the group is now visiting a major city. The barbarian is currently 7th level, and he's looking to replace his lost puppy. Preferably with something already trained because he no longer has the time to train it. I will probably offer a couple of normal animals for him to pick through if he wants, but I was looking to reward him and the party for good play etc. So I searched for something with a little more wallop.

Enter the Gray Render. The description indicates that they sometimes imprint on humanoids. Perfect, I thought. Plus, it should be able to hold it's own more than a 5hp dog which doesn't really gain levels. My tentative plan was to reduce it to 4th level and a medium-sized (juvenile) creature. Then, I thought that the barbarian would be given a chance to imprint it by entering into a wrestling match. The Render would be dealing lethal damage of course. If the barbarian could pin it (for 3 rounds?) then it might imprint on a new Daddy. After that, my plan was to advance it as a cohort. It would grow as it aged and become a large creature at level 8 or 9. Eventually it could reach huge, if it lives that long.

Does anyone have any critiques or suggestions? I realize that the Render isn't actually an "animal". It's a beast. But, why not stretch the rules a little in the name of fun? It has an intelligence of 3, making it smarter than an animal, but still pretty dang stupid. What kind of tricks might it know already? Guard for sure. It seems to me that the trick might be getting it not to attack everything that it perceives as a threat...

How much would an amazing creature like this be worth? It'd probably be some sort of black market transaction, and I imagine that it's current owners are pretty interested in getting rid of it since it hasn't imprinted on anything and is probably wreaking a little havoc.

Anyway, thanks for helping me to fine tune this idea.

I've seen some similar pleas out there before, but nevertheless I wanted to ask one more time.

Based on some holiday gift cards etc., I am in a position to purchase a new D&D book or three. Currently I own the core rulebooks and DMG II. There are so many supplements out there, it's hard to wade through sometimes. So I'm looking for suggestions.

If you had to buy just one (or two) books, which would they be? I play as both DM and PC. Would you recommend different books for each facet? Are there books that you consider a must-have regardless of use by DM or player? Are supplement books a waste of money and I should buy something for my wife instead? Thanks for the thoughts. Happy 2007!

I recently purchased a pdf for download that turned out to be 44 mb. No big deal I thought. Except that I can't seem to download it faster than 3.5 kb/s, which if you're counting, is very slooow. Is this normal? I finally got the thing downloaded and have noticed several places where the image is displaced to the left or right in bands 20-30 pixels wide. Is that a problem with the download or the original.

I'm trying the download again at home, but now I'm averaging 2.4 kb/s - oy.

Thanks for the help!

We're almost done with Blackwall Keep and I've been preparing my notes for the Free City and the adventures therein.

I decided to give myself a few weeks breathing room with the whole doppelganger thing, and I approached one of my players out of game and asked him if he'd be willing to play along with the abduction plot (he plays the rogue of the group). He decided that he wasn't the right one to "collude" with me. Dagnabbit. I was really looking forward to that, but I'm glad I gave myself some time to work with.

I've thought about approaching a second player (the barbarian) but I'm not that excited since one player already knows about the idea. Well he knows that he was supposed to be replaced be a (singular) doppelganger at some point in the near future. He doesn't know about the gang, or about the fact that it's supposed to happen in the city. The adventure suggests just skipping the whole thing and replacing the tied-up players with a few araneas. I'm not sure that the araneas set me on fire creatively.

Have any of the rest of you come across this kind of reaction? What did you do instead? Any clever suggestions out there?

I came across an entry from one of the adventures in Dungeon in which there was a wand of burning hands "CL 3rd". Is that possible? I mean you have to be caster level 5th to be able to make a wand in the first place. Can you purposefully dumb down the spell that you use in your wand? Why would you?

I gave the wand to a player and he immediately cried foul and has been grumbling and complaining ever since. I told him that it's just a wand of inferior quality. He's not satisfied. Bah.

I couldn't believe it when the mail had lucky #142 waiting for me on Saturday. I hadn't even gotten around to pining for it yet. What luck!

I'm sure that there will be more to praise or bemoan, but I really wanted to give a first reaction to the piece by Mr. Conklin "G" III. It's a beauty. I haven't quite finished it yet (I call it "savoring" my wife calls it "an unusual display of restraint"), but I love the two thirds I've read so far. What an awesome adventure for first levels. So much excellent roleplaying and fun times. I'm gonna have to run this one at some point, even if it's just a one-off. I wish that I were half as creative. Five stars (so far).

I know that I would be on pins and needles if I were in your shoes, waiting for a reaction. Which is partly why I've started the thread before I've even finished the adventure. The other reason is that I have enjoyed the premise so much I couldn't wait longer to spread the word. Superlative work! Thanks so much.

I need a little help with a rules discussion revolving around entanglement from a web spell.

I have a cleric PC in my game caught inside a web spell and she failed her saving throw. Adjacent to her is an unconscious and dying party member who is not in the web (but is, of course, prone). She is holding a wand of CLW. She would like to know if she can touch the dying PC.

From the SRD:

from Web

...Anyone in the effect’s area when the spell is cast must make a Reflex save. If this save succeeds, the creature is entangled, but not prevented from moving, though moving is more difficult than normal for being entangled (see below). If the save fails, the creature is entangled and can’t move from its space, but can break loose by spending 1 round and making a DC 20 Strength check or a DC 25 Escape Artist check. Once loose (either by making the initial Reflex save or a later Strength check or Escape Artist check), a creature remains entangled, but may move through the web very slowly. Each round devoted to moving allows the creature to make a new Strength check or Escape Artist check. The creature moves 5 feet for each full 5 points by which the check result exceeds 10. ...

Entangled

The character is ensnared. Being entangled impedes movement, but does not entirely prevent it unless the bonds are anchored to an immobile object or tethered by an opposing force. An entangled creature moves at half speed, cannot run or charge, and takes a -2 penalty on all attack rolls and a -4 penalty to Dexterity. An entangled character who attempts to cast a spell must make a Concentration check (DC 15 + the spell’s level) or lose the spell.

-------------------------------------------------

It seems to me that this means that you're just entangled but you can still swing a sword and use a wand and touch someone at your feet. You just can't walk.

This seems silly. I hate to mix movies in too much, but I imagine failing your saving through playing out like Frodo in the Shelob's lair. He definitely couldn't have touched his toes. He spent a full round action trying to get free and then suffered a movement penalty from difficut terrain thereafter. Perfect!

Any thoughts or clarifications on how it does (and should) work in D&D?

Alright, as promised, I have a quote for ya'll. This comes from an autobiographical book called Wanderer by Sterling Hayden. Sterling Hayden was an impressive man: tall, blond, and barrel chested. He was a great sailor and an ok movie actor. At one point he prepped a schooner to sail from San Francisco to Tahiti and gathered most of his crew from an ad placed in the newspaper. Once they had sunk the Golden Gate below the horizon, Hayden pulled out this red velvet chair, nay, throne, and sat down on the quarterdeck and called everyone aft. He then gave the following speech to let them know what was expected of them aboard ship during their voyage.

"Now the key to this operation lies in vigilance. Always regard the elements out here as an opponent—cunning, implacable, and able to knock you down and stomp you before you know it. Keep a sharp eye out at all times—you can tell an experienced seaman in many ways, one of them his habit of sweeping the horizon constantly. For all we know, there may be some poor devil adrift in a boat or a raft, so forget what they practice on shore and remember the golden rule.
When you steer, g@*%#*n it you steer. Stand up to the wheel, don’t smoke and don’t discuss the Big Ten and rock ‘n roll. The brighter the man, the poorer the helmsman—that’s an old adage in sailing—just in case you were feeling discouraged.
When you work, try to protect your hands. Cuts don’t heal in the tropics and if you sprain something it’s that much harder for everyone else.
If you don’t understand an order, say so—don’t just sashay around pulling on any old line till you come to the right one—because you can maim somebody that way.
When you’re awakened to go on watch, roll out and think it over afterwards. If you need an hour to get dressed, we can call you an hour early—otherwise you have twenty minutes…And if you hear the call ‘All hands on deck!’ that means to come as you are as fast as you can—don’t reach for a cigarette or mess around with your clothes, just come on up and dive into the work…What’s more, if you’re off watch and you hear hell break loose on deck, there’s no law against your coming up uninvited to lend a hand—this has obvious advantages: first, you have time to get the feel of things, and second, you might learn something—but I won’t hold my breath until you do it, either.
One final word—and this is the most critical of all. This ship lives off the wind—wind is to us what money is to life on shore. Always scan the windward horizon. Always keep in tune with the feel and heft of the wind… and don’t forget that a sudden squall could lay this wagon down so she’d never get up, no matter how hard you prayed."

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With a little adaptation, I thought this would be a fine way to get people started on their voyage to the Isle of Dread.

Reading the party composition thread got me to wondering. How long does it take folks to get through the AP? Granted, we play with differeing frequencies etc.. I'm trying to estimate how long we'll be until we save the world from Kyuss before we can begin being pirates in the new adventure path. So much to look forward too!

At any rate, my group started in mid-June (2006). We are just about done with Three Faces of Evil and we have been playing pretty faithfully once a week.

When did your game start and how far along are you?

I'm looking for information about anyone's use of the Seekers in their game. I searched the archived threads and there is only a little bit about it. Have any of you included more info/side treks etc. with the Seekers?

One of my players found Ulavant's ring and I gave him a little handout picture of it. Well now he's holding on to it for dear life. He knows it might get him in trouble so he wears it with the symbol facing his palm. He has also collected every other piece of jewelry they've come across. He's wearing multiple necklaces, several rings, that awful smelling red-painted wolf skull from the grimlock kennel master. He's even determined to make some of the grimlock earrings fit. I think he's trying to be some sort of half-orc pimp.

At any rate, he's expecting trouble, so I'd like to give it to him when they get to the Free City adventures. :) Has anyone else followed through with this?

I was reading another thread in which several posters happened to indicate their age. This got me thinking about my own D&D (and RPG) experiences. When I was 9 I played several RPG's with my cousin (he was 12). Just two players neither of whom is mature enough to even see a PG-13 move. Yeah it was hard. We stopped playing after several months and I never really thought about it again until a little more than a year ago. Now I'm back into the swing of things and it's so much more fun playing a mature version of the D&D I liked all those years ago.

So I'm curious about what experiences you all are having out there. What's the average age of your gaming group? How many people? How gender mixed are your groups? Whatever other information you'd like to relate will be fascinating I'm sure. To start it off:

I'm 31. I play in two games, one as DM.

In the first game there are currently 5 players and 1 DM (though we've been up to 7 players). Two players are women. Average age: ~33. Max age: 42; min age: 22. We play once every other week.

Second game which I DM has four players and me. One woman (she plays in the other game as well). Average age: ~30. Max age: 42; min age: 17. We play once a week.

Forgive my density, but I struggle with the three dimensional nature of some of the maps. Specifically in the caves of Erythnul, we have the horseshoe cavern. This is a small detail map showing a serpentine route no more than 5' wide. I understand that this is a plan view, but is it showing the area where the grimlock barbarian hides, the level with the chokers or both? I'm just not sure how to make the place clear to my players since it's not clear to me.

Also, how do the grimlocks get from the archers' ledge to the entrance to the caves? They presumably don't want to mess with the chokers or the chokers wouldn't still be there.

And finally, I have a similar question about the climb down to Moreto in A Gathering of Winds. The map scale indicates that each square is 25'. How do you DMs logistically work the players through this? At some point they're presumably clinging to the cliff fighting Wind Warriors (unless they're all flying down of course). Do you just make up a cliff face (draw a bunch of squiggles on the battle mat)?

I suspect that my questions are all related to the fact that I just don't have much experience under my belt with this kind of stuff. Any tips would be appreciated.

Hello fellow AOW DMs. I was happier than a pig in slops when finally wandered into these messageboards. You all have been a source for inspiration and understanding. Thanks!

We just started the AP recently and everyone's having a great time so far (especially me). My PCs have recently blundered a bit when they met Tirra in the Feral Dog. One of the characters was wearing some flashy Seeker armor that she'd found in the Cairn and Khellek was mighty interested and then a bit pissed off when Tirra introduced the party to him. A couple of unfortunate slips about how the party was trying to make money to get out of Diamond Lake and a poor response to Khellek's admittedly aggressive questioning and hey presto! The party has a rival group on their tail. Luckily they sent the rivals off in the wrong direction and I had planned on giving them several days before the rivals discovered the mistake and found out the true location of the Whispering Cairn. Then two members of the party died and now the two remaining are talking about getting drunk for a week in remembrance (and hoping to find some more beef to accompany them back into the hole).

It's time to use the rivals as the goad they're supposed to be. I have some ideas about how further encounters with Auric and co. could go, but I'd really like to hear how other people have dealt with this. What happened when your PC's met Auric and others wandering around the Cairn? Where do you go from there?

Thanks for the help and suggestions!