Grimtk1's page

The only other thing that I could suggest for you to do is to refocus the point of the game. In the end D&D (or any role playing game for that matter) is not about being the "winner", it is about telling a controlled story with an ambivalent ending. Past that it is about having fun.

After reminding your group about this fact, you need to present this question to them.

"What seems like more fun to you? Do you want a game that is intrigue and backstabbing and doesn't move past the PvP? Do you want a game that is about an epic quest where a party works together for a common goal? Or do you want something a bit in between?"

After they give their answer, decide as a group what kind of game to play and then have everyone work together to make that happen. Because the simple fact is, if you make the game "not fun" by forcing something on them the whole adventure will fall apart and then no one will be playing D&D.

(Oh one more suggestion. You might try partnering up more with the player actively trying to betray the party. Offer him this deal, "I will work with you to make this character's betrayal awesome, but when he dies, you have to agree to make a character that will work with the party." Then use the player as a deputized secret GM of sorts)

Hope this helps

My party went evil and the adventure works. You need to impart three things to make the adventure successful.

1. You need to find a replacement for the Lavinnia motivation and understand that this may be different throughout the adventure. I used greed to motivate them to the Isle of Dread. It may take some rewriting, but not much. If the party hates Vanthus (see #3), the kidnapped individual is almost secondary.

2. Play up the events of Scuttlecove with the savage pirates. Even evil characters don't want to see hell on earth (well, at least someone else's version of hell). When the time comes to give a broader motivation, they will have a good foundation.

3. Make them hate Vanthus as much as possible. If Parrot Island and Scuttlecove aren't enough, have him kill an animal companion, a familiar, or just have him send assassins periodically after the party for messing up his plans with the Lotus Dragons. (Even if the party joins them, he can't be happy that he was thrown out because of their actions). Evil parties don't like to be messed with and their motivation to kill those that cross them can't be underplayed.

Hope this helps.

Jeff

If even that doesn't work for you, who's to say that the abduction of Lavinia happens while they're at Taboo Island? Give the players some well-deserved downtime, then send them to any number of sidequests that takes them out of Farshore again -- a negotiation with one of the Olman tribes, a pearl-hunt in masher water, or even just a voyage around the perimeter of the Isle to map the coast for the Emerald Crest.

This would be my suggestion. Just change the timeline. No railroading, no tweaking encounters and rules, no unhappy players. They don't know when things are supposed to happen, so you have the advantage. Just let them do what they are going to do. Give them downtime. Make it easy for them to travel to somewhere else or give them a juicy side quest and when they return, V has snatched Lavinnia.

I wouldn't have a problem with this character in my campaign. Just a few tweaks for you to ponder. Tony's evolution into a true infernal force to be reckoned with should start slower. Have him hunting down and executing criminals who have escaped punishment. The way I see it, if Asmodeus really wants you to become a truly depraved and lost individual, he will start you out with stuff that looks good on the surface.

Killing families for stealing bread (not sure if you gave a reason for killing the family but it seemed like a good guess) seems a bit extreme and is maybe something he might do later when he's traveled down the path a bit more.

Also, having him hunt down the corrupt politician who is untouchable or the gang leader who has bought off everyone would have the added effect of making him appear respected by those officials who are frustrated by always seeing evil individuals get away with everything.

My only caveat, the way you describe him, he seems more neutral, leaning to chaotic. I always see Lawful as following the law to a T, and Lawful evil as using the laws to promote themselves.
"Oh, I'm sorry, you were told to pay this debt by the end of today or you would face the full force of the law."
"But I had not money."
"Now, that is not my problem. The law is clear. I sentence you to 40 years hard labor, or you may have your left hand removed. Because I'm lenient, I'll let you decide."

If he is following his own moral code or just violating the laws around him that seems more neutral or chaotic and don't get me started on how chaotic it is having multiple personas.

Hope this helps, it sounds like the kind of campaign I would like to play in.

My party hated Lavinnia too and ended up joining Rowyn. For them, it was greed and, I guess, that Lavinnia was too much of "the man". I didn't play her out of character, maybe slightly haughty when the party demanded more than the healthy sum I was giving them early on.

Without knowing the makeup of your party, I can't really give you any specific advice as to how to work around this problem. My party was filled with all CN, CE leaning characters. It wasn't much a stretch for me to have Rowyn fill the roll of Lavinnia in the adventure when they finally had had enough of her.

My suggestion is to really look at what motivates your party, and then use that to drive them through the adventure. You may need to do this out of character. I actually asked my players what would motivate their players and they told me "loyalty to the crew and money".

Since my party is motivated by party loyalty and then greed, I worked very hard to make Rowyn seem like a part of the group and give them bling for their deeds. As long as I dangle money and power they will do what they need to. Oh, and they hate Vanthus so he becomes a motivator as well.

If they really don't like Lavinnia and Rowyn is not an option, then I would create a character that fits the party's goals and weave them into the story.

Hope this helps

In this case the problem is that STAP came out over the course of a year.

The only thing I will say to this is there was a preview that outlined the basic plot of each adventure. It says clearly for the WoD "and when the PCs finally do reach her [Shami-Amourae] they may be forced to make some difficult decisions."

Also the brief on the final adventure clearly states that the party may "secure the aid of demon lords"

If I had had a player wanting to play a paladin or other uber-good player in this adventure, I would have told them there might be some difficulties at the end of the adventure.

That being said though, I will offer the same advice I've offered elsewhere when this type of issue comes up...change the adventure to fit your party and have fun (since that's the whole point of all of this).

So - play them smart and sneaky, have them actually doing hit and run instead of hit-and-fight-to-the-death, and then when it's been long enough, have them run away leaving Rowyn and her lizard chum. Gotcha. Thanks very much!

If they survive long enough. My PCs would shrug off the initial ambush and before the LDs could escape, they would be cut down. It was a bad day to be a rogue.

uzagi wrote:

. . . the kobold cook (who ended up in his own fireplace ) . . .

Nooooooo! Churtle!

I'm starting to wonder if we're the only group that spared her.

The group I'm DMing for fell in love with her and immediately offered her protection and a stipend if she would come work for them. She is a much beloved member of the crew now. (although, they are careful what they eat from her).

To me, it seems like the Prince of demons is distinctly lacking in the Pirate aspect of the the whole issue.

Perhaps Demogorgon's two heads are fighting over which one gets to be the pirate captain and which one has to be his trusty parrot companion.

Its set up as yet another battlefest, but isnt this a more interesting opportunity for the 20th level Bard/Diplomat to reveal to one head, the others plans to destroy it? Sure one half of Demogorgon wants the Savage Tide, but the other half has a very serious investment in not letting it go ahead. Having the two heads and arms battle over the master pearl should be as much an option as the PC's battling a united Demogorgon.

Thoughts.

SJE

I would argue that Demogorgon already knows that it's other head hates it and wants to see it destroyed. Were the PCs to attempt something like that in my game, I would just have Demogorgon laugh, and say something along the lines of, "Thank you for telling us about our betrayal. Once we have destroyed you all, we will have to do something about that."

I do have to say, the Isle of Dread is the only place in D&D where I have felt dinosaurs were normal.

Any other adventure and I would agree with you. But it's the Isle of Dread.

(Honestly though, it is your adventure and you know what you want best). Your monster list seems fine, though I would expect all of those creatures were on the island already.

So no specific promises beyond when the time comes she will be there to help defend farshore.

Well, then I think you should use her to make the battle go easier for the party, if not secure victory.

One thing that I did think of was that you could have the dragon start using the party to run errands for her. Obviously they are resourceful or they wouldn't have bothered to even come to her in the first place (in the conceited logic of dragons). You could then use her as a source for side quests and the like.

She would probably even take into account their "goodly" natures and make sure she kept them at least as reluctant opponents. After all, they will eventually get stronger (unless she wants to rub them out). However she could easily have the party wipe out all of the groups (such as the Crimson Fleet) which challenge her for resources, etc.

It might make a good way to motivate the party.

Just a thought.

I agree with everyone who says you should have the dragon give aid to the party. However, how did the deal exactly go down?

Why I am asking is because LE in my opinion is like making a deal with the devil. He will follow exactly what it says, but if you forgot to close a loophole, well, your screwed.

If the dragon said he would give aid, was there any sort of specific nature to the aid.

With all of the spells and powers available to the dragon, he could do everything from destroying the ships to killing one pirate and flying off. He might even make himself invisible (I can't see a dragon necessarily wanting to start a vendetta against him) and help out quietly.

You could use him to provide buffing and healing to the party.

Finally, I think after the fight, he should now consider Farshore under his protection, and be afforded that right in gold and food. It's like getting help from the maffia, it never goes the way you want it to.

My list of the scariest movies....in no particular order except for the first.

Shining (Kubrick) I saw this in a theatre of college students and everyone screamed when those damn girls appeared in the hallway. It creeps me out every time.

Event Horizon

Halloween

Alien

Mothman Prophecies

Jaws (any movie that makes you creep out when swimming in open water deserves a vote).

Whatever Happened to Baby Jane

Dressed To Kill

In the Mouth of Madness (carpenter)

To clarify my rambling statement above: the effects of a spell are constant as defined by the spell description, not the physics. I generally rule that a spell resolves as described unless it is acted upon by other magic, modified when cast by a meta-magic feat, or other situation such as those. I figure spells follow the laws of magic over the laws of physics. Magic trumps physics. Just my take.

I just want to add that I agree. Magic is not science, it is unnatural.

I would also like to say that the example above of a rogue in a 20x20 pit being firestormed doesn't seem right to me either. According to the rules, the only time a rogue can't use evasion is if they are helpless (ie: a dex of 0). So unless they can't move in the 20x20 pit, they should be able to do the extraordinary (which I guess is no less amazing than a someone being able to rain fire down on them from nothing).

uhh-bad day at the office?(LOL)

maybe they just closed their eyes and threw darts at a board with animal parts.

kikai13 wrote:

Great! I never knew that! Now I can get that second suit of full plate!

Hello new item: Mithril Long Johns of Greater Fortification!

~ Bryon ~

You know, when I first read this I thought it said.

Mithril Long Johns of Greater Fornication.

the MUST have item for those multiclass Bard Fighters.

Yeah actually I was already guessing she was like a Godly Queen Ant, Inseminated once then giving birth whenever? But I just wanted to make that joke about congigal visits lol. This leaves room for my Imagination to go crazy with Ideas on new creatures and being from the Greek Pantheon makes It more sweet. When "Clash of the Titans" first came out I was always integrating the myths Gods and Goddesses Into my campaigns. I know It's off subject but did anyone hear news about a remake of "Clash of the Titans"?

Dave

umm...severe threadjack, sorry.

Yes. comingsoon.net reported (ala Variety) that a new screenwriter was hired in May. Otherwise, nothing new.

I would not read it. Especially if you want to play in the adventure. As someone who has been on both sides of adventures, it would ruin it for you as a PC.

sorry, but it is for the best.

While I enjoy the idea of Orcus yanking Tenebrous out of the Binder, I am pretty sure he has no way to do that other than through GM hand-waving. Vestiges cannot be targeted or expelled except by the binder himself, and can only be suppressed by an Anti-Magic field or the like. Maybe Orcus could pick up the actual Binder himself, and the Binder feels a compulsion to speak to Orcus as Tenebrous, but otherwise, Tenebrous is beyond even Orcus's reach. However, its your game and you can do as you want, but the player may protest if he doesn't like what you are doing to his character.

But its Orcus. I'm of the belief that there really shouldn't be rules governing major powers of the multiverse.

Certainly I wouldn't do anything that would impact the players negatively (unless they really deserved it). But who is to say what Orcus couldn't do in the seat of his power with a former vestige of himself. Reality isn't stable when it comes to Demon Lords and gods coming back from the dead.

I kind of liked the whole whisper in the ear thing. Also, your player obviously wanted there to be some sort of connection to Orcus anyway, or they wouldn't have chosen Tenebrous in the first place. Let there be the strange connection.

I would say hand wave and as a good gesture, give the characters a boon and make it easier for them to convince Orcus to join them or just give it out of hand.

I just had something you might want to consider. Are you giving action points to important baddies? (Like a Hecueva with Cleric levels?) It has been said by other DMs on this board that whatever you give the players, you should at least give to significant NPC villains.

I don't know if it would have made a difference in this encounter, but you might consider giving some of the NPCs action points to use against the players. It will keep them on their toes and help to balance things a bit.

I don't use action points, but the d20 SRD put the standard at 1/2 the NPC level.

Just something to think about.

yes...don't make Grazz't have his hands full with Lolth. It's your world do what you want. It sounds like you already had established a hook that could be used for the future so use it.

Just because the fine writers at Dungeon put it in the adventure does not mean it is written in stone. Change the adventure to fit your needs and make Grazz't part of it. In the end, I think that it will make the play all that more memorable than ignoring such a wonderful plot device.

Just my two coppers.

My vote would to not punish the party for being proactive. Unfortunately, this means that you won't have that wonderful moment written into the adventure.

However, I can attest that your party can still hate Vanthus without Parrot Island. The group I'm DMing for was just goofing around and decided to explore Parrot Island before the Vanthus set up. They had cleared the dungeon before I could even introduce Vanthus looking for them.

What I ended up doing was tweaking the parade ambush and made them hired by him to kill off the PCs for ruining his plans. I just had one of them yell "Vanthus sends his regards" as they attacked. That coupled with the devastation they experienced with the Savage Pirates and all was enough to turn up the hate for Vanthus

Hope this helps.

Personally I would just ignore him. Books and TV do this all the time. Let him stay the night shivering in the cold and wondering about the chances of surviving one hit point--cut to commercial--next chapter. It's a great cliffhanger.

I agree. Turn the next session over to the rest of the party and leave him to sit bored while they all play. What would be really fun, is to not tell him what has happened. Have the party search for him and only find his weapon and an empty row boat. That should get him nervous. If he asks what happened to his character, tell him he was unconscious the last he knew.

I am unfortunately thinking we will need to leave Demogoron alive provided there is any other way to stop the Savage Tide.

Perhaps the Abyss can survive his loss but with two-face out of the way Orcus and Grizzet can fight it out for control without the third party getting in the way. If one of them wins without another Demon Lord rising to match their status that could spell doom for the Devils in the Blood War followed by the rest of the multiverse.

Whatever the solution to the Demogorgon problem, it will involve allowing the lesser of two evils.

Good times for all!

Aameul and Hethradiah get separated....but each only half of Demogorgon's former power

Unless, of course, the Savage Tide is supposed to fuel the separation spell which instead makes two Demogorgons equal to his original power. What if he really is like a demonic Siamese twin and not a mutant with two heads.

Two of em might be able to kick everyone's arse.

Think of it more in the mafia sense

This is exactly how I played it with my party. By the time the harbor was back under control, they had threatened innocent people to apply pressure on officials and engaged in some murder of "reluctant" followers. To cap it off, they killed Lavinnia during the Bullywug Gambit, planted evidence that she was behind the Lotus Dragons and they spread the rumor that the Bullywugs were an army of thugs she had recruited in to further her ends.

All that being said, you have to be very careful as a DM with a party of...questionably moral individuals. I am on the look out for the party to betray anyone. The only things they care about are each other and money (in that order). As long as I can find a financial or personal reason for them to move through the adventure, everything should work out fine.

I just thought I would weigh in here with some observations.

1) Let your players have teleporation. It is a cool part of the game and makes the PCs be the heroes they are. I think what gets missed sometimes is that the rules don't really matter (per se) as long as everyone is having fun. If at the end of the night, everyone says "I haven't laughed so hard" or "that was a blast" then it was a successful night of D&D.

2) This was in a way earlier and now buried thread, but I believe James pointed out that they (the writers & Dungeon staff) specifically timed the ocean voyage adventure to be before Teleporting was an option and specifically made the distance long enough that a wizard would have to use 2 teleports to get back to Sasserine.

3) By the time a wizard would be high enough level to cast 7th level spells (for greater teleportion), they will be starting City of Broken Idols. By that point, they should have already wandered all over the island. But unless your Wizard is telling you that they are memorizing every location they walk past (what an agonizing trip that would be), most of the teleporting will be "viewed once" or "seen casually" which might still get you there with a 12%-25% chance to teleport into the middle of herd? pride? death-mual? of TRexs or worse. You do not want to be off target on the Isle of Dread.

anyway, just my 2 coppers

My party joined Rowyn and are now completely evil whacky. As long as they get paid, they rough up or kill whomever Rowyn asks them to. It is actually pretty fun and makes the stories a bit more entertaining, if a bit twisted.

But otherwise, I have the same advice. Give them increasingly more horrid tasks and see if they break. If they do, don't forget to look at alignments. The thief in may game has moved to CE from CN because she just started wantonly killing people (she wanted to be an assassin). The other two characters are still CN...for now.

The important thing is to have someone in the wings, whether it is Lavinnia, Rowyn, or someone else that can fill the "Lavinnia--DAMSEL IN DISTRESS" (said in all caps and with a meek "save me" at the end) role for the STAP. A lot of the story hinges on the party actually caring about her or at least having the idea that helping her will be good for their own personal gain (for those evil type people).

Hope that helps.

I think it would depend on the relationship the PC's have developed with Lavinia. If they have strong ties to her I wouldnt do it. How ever if you wanted to screw them over and they dont really care for her all that much...then by all means you should royally mess with them.

This is what I am planning, to royally mess with them. My PCs have already killed off poor old Lavinia and joined with Rowyn. They think they have their bases covered, but they don't. Lavinia will be making a comeback sometime in this adventure, and I think the Abyss is a wonderful place to make this happen.

hehehehehe

Have them investigate further, but redirect them. Don't make it take too hard for them to find the "source" of the problem. Throw in some baddies for them to fight in whatever you have planned.

However, once they are through, leave evidence that the leader had just recently left. (Maybe because of the party). Anyway, either through a journal, letter, or partial navigational reports, show the villain responsible was heading south on a ship maybe with a day or two head start. Have a savvy sailor point out that the Blue Nixie and Sea Wyvern could possibly catchup with the villain's vessel and you have a chase on your hands.

If all goes right, they will race back to the ship and continue the voyage trying to chase the villain. From there, you can run the adventure as planned and there should be no problem letting the trail running cold.

Hope that helps.

We just got underneath Parrot Isle this evening! I had to utter quite a few "Yarrr... braaiiinnnsss..." to get the point across.

I did exactly the same thing. They all thought it was funny until the dwarf was down and getting munched on.

I know I read this a few months back. It may be on the heroics thread (or whatever the opposite for the obituaries is being called).

Anyway, I remember the story. There is a party out there that did exactly what your party did. No silver, can't damage it, so they grappled the hecueva.

The only thing they did that was different from your situation, was after it was held down and diseasing everyone, the party managed to pour several vials of holy water down it's throat, killing it.

It's stories like these that make me keep playing D&D. Anyone can slay a monster with a spell or sword, but the stories you remember are when the party takes a wild left turn and does something oddball.

spellbooks would be out of place as treasure... but ancient Olman stone tablets could contain very old spells... So could Olman hieroglyphs located in some long lost jungle stronghold... my 2 cents.

How do you figure? The Isle of Dread has been visited by adventurers before. It would not be out of place to have some unfortunate Wizard's spell book "lying around" near some dino's who munched on him or picked up and carried home by a curious Olrangu. The Aboleths certainly have wizards so there is another location.

Finally, it is your world. Nothing says you have to follow the adventure word for word. Put in Moon-Eye The Crazy, an elf with a wizard shop on the beach of the Isle of Dread. Business has gone down since the last adventuring party came to the Isle, but he still teleports around to pick up supplies. He could be a former high level adventurer who just decided to stay and isn't opposed to selling some spells to a fellow wizard. This is just an example, but there are opportunities to not hamstring the wizards if you create them.

This was a widespread problem. You just need to contact Paizo customer support and they will send you a copy of the map. There was a post about it when the issue came out further down if you want some more information.

We haven't gotten there yet but it sounds like your game was awesome. It is always nice when everything comes together to create the right level of suspense. I definitely will be stealing some of your ideas when my party gets to there.

Dude, you are ahead of your time.

"No, bro, I swear it's in the freakin magazine. I'm not just reusing the same campaign because I'm only playing with you."

Sick more savage pirates on Harliss and have the PCs aid her, making sure to keep track of the ones she kills in comparison to the player characters.

That's what I did. The only thing I did differently was essentially treat Harliss as a party member and divided the XP by 5 (I have a 4 player group). It cut a little off of the top, but with the extra Savage Pirates (I put 15 in the room) and the fact that they got experience for the ones Harliss killed, my party had no difficulty leveling up and it made the fight challenging but not overwhelming. (They were all 4th level by that time).

My logic was that the group benefited in the fight by Harliss as much as Harliss benefited by the party's aid.

Anyway, I could see this sort of constant reinforcement leading to them negotiating with every monster from now on, which will get them killed against, say, the T-rex at the tar pits.

If a party thinks that a T-Rex with an animal intelligence charging at them with meat hanging off it's teeth is wanting to talk they probably are in the wrong line of work.

However, trying to negotiate your way out of encounters with intelligent creatures isn't a bad option and personally its nice to see encounters written where the party isn't forced to perform hack'n'slash with every monster they meet.

Personally, I can't wait until the big boys come into the game (Orcus, Igwilv, etc). In fact, it could be argued that having encounters where the party isn't forced to kill everything might be setting them up to survive against entities that could kill the party outright if they were simply to attack.

I agree cthulhu, you know what would be really cool If Lavinia was just as evil as her brother and the PCs were helping her out for some hidden agenda that hasn't been mentioned yet? Then Lavinia can also be transformed Into a sexy little Lemorian! lol

It would have been easier for me if she was evil, because my party of morally questionable antiheroes offed her (they had already joined Rowyn). Right now, I'm trying to see if I can bring her back in some way to torment my players. (Maybe a ghost?)

I would do it if you want to add some more interaction with the Olman tribes in the area or maybe preview the Korprus before the party moves into the island. The entire adventure is self contained and doesn't (as far as I know) complicate the Adventure Path. (The Dungeon staff seem to be pretty good at making sure adventures in the same locale don't contradict each other.)

However, you would have to do some work to level it up for the reasons already stated. I would do it if you want to put the work into it. I was already thinking about running it myself.

I've liked all of her books up until the last two (I didn't even read the last one, I just made my wife tell me what happened).

I agree with what others have said about the series. When she began, the plot revolved around some mystery Anita Blake (the main character) was involved with. Behind that was the continuing "soap opera" storyline between her and the other characters and the sex very much tertiary. Anymore, it is sex is the primary, followed by soap opera, and then she is scrambling to rush the "mystery" out in the last 50 pages of the book. The last book I actually read, Anita Blake didn't leave her house or bed for 3/4 of the book.

Read them until the ratio between sex and story passes your threshold is my suggestion.

Or a scanner...

Or, you can do what I'm going to do and hand them the magazine and make them read it. (Just a thought).

If, on the other hand, they have a sudden (or even gradual) awakening of morality on their own, you can introduce such an NPC to help re-center their motivation in a more "module-as-written" fashion. Rez

At this point, if they awake to morality on their own, Rowyn will change with them. I am already playing Rowyn with a twinge of good in her. I used her Bardicness to foreshadow the Savage Tide when the PCs told her what happened at Krakens Cove by having her remember some obscure tidbit of a story about a black pearl destroying a kingdom. The way I played the scene, the idea troubled her, it only because she couldn't control it. However, I don't think it would be too much of a stretch to have her experience a change of heart when the fate of the entire world is at hand.

Beyond that, there's nothing really keeping Rowyn and the LDs from taking over Sasserine's harbor, at which point the campaign can follow the Switching Sides sidebars more normally.

Thanks James and everyone else at Dungeon for even providing an alternative to the notion of a "good" party. Those sidebars were the only thing keeping me sane for awhile when my party just refused to work with Lavinnia.

Knowing that I could switch off the adventure to someone who fit their moral compass a little better made staging the change so much easier.

But pretty much I plan on making Rowyn the main motivator and when it comes time for the PCs to chase off to Scuttlecove, it will Rowyn they will be racing off to rescue instead of Lavinnia.

Boost up Rowyn's statistics and give her skilled bodyguards, because she too is in danger of evil PCs getting too cocky.

Yeah, I'll beef her up a little. But honestly, the party really likes Rowyn. They are completely mercenary and I am playing Rowyn smart enough to know this. Besides, the PCs are making her life very easy at the moment. First, they are making her money and they are single handedly accomplishing tasks she was having difficulty dealing with. Pretty much, as long as they do what she asks, she will reward them accordingly. The only thing "noble" about my PCs is that they have a strong code of honor and won't betray those they feel are "part of their group".

Yes, Lavinnia is now dead and my PCs murdered her.

To begin with, my group had already sided with Rowyn. They were sent to go rob the place and plant evidence against Lavinnia, blaming her for the assassination of the Harbormaster.

So, after a tough fight that saw both the party's fighters brought down by Drevoraz, the group's rogue demands to Lavinnia that she provide a cleric to resurrect her fallen comrade. When she refused, the rogue killed her. It was all rather shocking for everyone in the group.

Now they are planning on sneaking her body back to Rowyn so she can raise it into a zombie and to avoid anyone being able to discover their crime.

Looks like I don't have any other choice but to have Rowyn take the lead.

whatever it is I think I see

becomes a zombie brachiosaurus to me.......

**distantly related candy reference...sorry**

what? doesn't everyone put the undead and candy together?

Have then in some sort of suspended animation until the zombiesaur reaches the wall (which triggers their awakening).

Well, you could cram as many peasants as you could grab and stuff them into the zombie ultrasaur. Maybe some animals just to make it interesting. Then, you just give one insane cultist (they'd have to be insane to ride inside a rotting zombie), with the pearl, a hammer, and a knife. As soon as they breach the wall, crack the pearl, bleed and let the fun begin.

Those who resist the effects would wish they hadn't.

(gee I wanted them to seem brash but not to the point of all the PC's taking offense)

My PCs were more annoyed than anything else. However, they did ask if they could take out any of the other adventurers during the raid on Lavinnia's. Only one of my PCs admitted to me of having some moral misgivings about framing Lavinnia, but she agreed in the end.

The only real change I made to the adventure as written was to not mess with the whole "race back to save Lavinnia". I was worried that if I mentioned that, they would have deliberately gone slower. I also didn't like the idea of Harliss sending her first mate after Rowyn, when it was Vanthus she was pissed at.

So, now in my campaign, the Wormfall assassins were hired by Vanthus before he went to Krakens cove because he had failed to kill off the party to date, and the Bullywugs were hired by him to help him pick up some obscure passage about the black pearl that his parents had collected during their travels.

It worked for my PCs so I'm running with it.