If you're looking for most powerful melee build, I agree with Taja above: you can't go wrong with wildshaping druid. Get up to wildshape and then throw some barbarian levels on top for flavor. I played a Druid (bear shaman) 6/ Barbarian 10 for Kingmaker and it was a blast.
But it sounds like you want the flexibility of lots of shapechanges for whatever the situation calls for. As a druid, you'll only get a few wildshapes at best, so you'll be limited to the number of changes/forms you can take. Your sorcerer/eldritch knight sounds like it would be a fun build. Can't say I've tried it personally, but I'd be very curious how it turns out.
Campaign Death #4
Name: Ugratz... again
Race/Class: Half-orc / Magus 9
Adventure: Dreams of the Yellow King
Location: Kallas Lake
Catalyst: Failed Ritual... again
spoiler:
Sigh. Not much to add here. Another failed ritual. Another animate dream. Another couple bad dice rolls against phantasmal killer results in dead character. This just reminds me of why I hate "save or die" spells so much. Anyway, this book is great except for all the animate dreams from failed ritual attempts.
Hey all!
Maybe a dumb question, but when applying the "advanced" and "nightmare" templates to the images of the players coming out of the water, do I apply the attribute bonuses from BOTH templates? Specifically, do they get a +4 DEX from the nightmare templates and also the +4 DEX from the advanced template? Or do they only get the higher of the two?
Thanks!!!
Quick question for anyone that's read both these APs!
From what I've heard, Hellbreaker and Hell's Destiny seem pretty cool and I'm strongly considering running them. Only problem is, in our campaign world we haven't run Tyrant's Grasp yet. Is there anything in the Hellfire Crisis APs that require the Whispering Tyrant to have returned to Golarion? Just curious if that's something I'd have to adjust or quickly have happen off screen in between APs or if it won't matter down in Cheliax.
Thanks for any info! Cheers!
Campaign Death #3
Name: Ugratz
Race/Class: Half-orc / Magus 8
Adventure: Dreams of the Yellow King
Location: Sellen River
Catalyst: Failed Ritual
Gory Details:
The group had recovered the Green Idol and the Viscount's Ring. They were casting the Dreamlands Excursion ritual to continue collecting gifts for the Mad Poet when a string of bad rolls cursed the ritual casters. An animate dream appeared and turned to the last one to flub the ritual roll, Ugratz. The animate dream opened with a phantasmal killer and the bad rolls just kept on coming. Ugratz failed the WIL save and then failed the FORT save. The dream was destroyed and fortunately the Sellen Starling was only a day out from their supply stop in Xer. They were able to get a Razmiran priest to raise Ugratz for a heft donation to the church and continue their missions.
Campaign Death #2
Name: Nayeli
Race/Class: Half-elf Druid 6 / Cleric (Desna) 1
Adventure: Dreams of the Yellow King
Location: Caravanserai
Catalyst: Formless Spawn
Gory Details:
After healing in Thronestep, the group returned to the Dreamlands. They navigated the caravanserai and were surprised by the formless spawn that lunged from the dried bathes. The group's main damage dealers were an archer and a spiked chain wielder... against a creature immune to piercing damage. The group yelled something about "discretion and valor" before fleeing back through the doors. Nayeli was a bit too slow and she was snatched up by the formless spawn's tentacles and devoured. Fortunately, she gave the others a chance to get away, and Nayeli woke with a start back on the Sellen Starling. She was a bit more paranoid of the shadows now but was ready to rejoin her companions.
Campaign Death #1
Name: Marko
Race/Class: Human Ranger 7
Adventure: Dreams of the Yellow King
Location: Caravanserai
Catalyst: Animate Dream Shopkeeper
Gory Details:
Pretty self-explanatory. The group learned the Dreamlands ritual and performed it. I dug out my Chaosium "Dreamlands" books and added some extra details about the Cavern of Flame and the guardian priests, but the group eventually arrived at the desert and caravanserai. They met the shopkeeper and I was genuinely shocked at the bluff skill of an animate dream. So were my PCs as they were in a bad position crammed into the shop as the shopkeeper started attacking them. He used his negative energy touch to spread his nightmare curse through the group and Marko stepped up striking several blows with his magic shortsword. He received a negative energy touch with nearly max damage... and then it happened again on the next turn. The poor ranger was blasted out of the Dreamlands to wake up back on the Sellen Starling. The others finished off the shopkeeper and fled back to the waking world. Several of them were cursed and they made an unscheduled stop in Thronestep to get some scrolls so they could return to the caravanserai.
So far a fantastic adventure. The river journey overlapped with the Dreamlands has been a lot of fun.
Got to finish up Book 2 of Strange Aeons this weekend. Melisenn proved to be pretty tough and almost scored my first campaign kill. Quick healing turned it into just the loss of an animal companion instead.
Strange Aeons continues to be a lot of fun. Can't wait for Book 3 next week and journey down the Sellen and off to the Dreamlands!
That also sounds like that one human guy who was some sort of maintenance worker who was exposed to some weird machine energies and was granted instant deityhood of some sort. His weapon is a big wrench of some kind. I can't think of his name at the moment, but you get the idea.
That would be Benekander, one of the immortals from the spaceship the Beagle that landed in Blackmoor in the Mystara setting. I loved me some Mystara.
I own it but honestly have never sat down to read through and implement the Mass Combat side of their rules. What I've flipped through looks good! Units get an index card as a "character sheet" and can be moved around to simulate unit v unit engagement on the battlefield.
I will say, I've used the "Casualty Roll" in Kingmaker to determine the fate of NPCs that are in units destroyed. We also used the Casualty Rules to determine how many crew were killed/injured in engagements during Skull & Shackles. Helps to determine minimum manning and how many recruitment rolls will be required in the next port.
Sorry it's not more of a solid review. It's sitting on my shelf taunting me with the rest of my RPG books I just haven't gotten around to fully reading.
Cheers!
it's difficult to avoid deathly taxes... even in a Fantasy World...
I'm still trying to imagine a Runelord Spelling Bee, "ᛖᛞᛁᛒᛚᛖ"
It sure is!
We finally got to play this weekend though and -as suspected- finished up book 1 of Strange Aeons. Almost got a death for the Strange Aeons obituaries thread but close doesn't count. But suffice it to say, the "strangler" feat is more dangerous than I thought...
Anyway! Off to Thrushmoor in book 2 to finally get a chance to go shopping and find out what Count Lowls has been up to.
A fantastic adventure path so far. Book 1 was a very solid location-based survival horror game. Would work great as a standalone Halloween adventure a well!
Normally I agree on sticking with Medium size for the speed, but for a flanking melee rogue I'll add ratfolk as a possible race suggestion. Their swarming ability is devastating and if you can't find another player to play a ratfolk, see if your DM will allow "scurrying swarmer" from the Dirty Tactics Toolbox.
Just another option to consider. We played a team of ratfolk for "Iron Gods" and it was bunches of fun for the two-weapon slayer.
Cheers!
Maybe someone with an opinion may see this before our spring 26 Pathfinder cabin trip comes up where we play in-person and this will likely come up. In M11. the Nazhena fight, she will almost definitely be the target of a fireball and the Dancing hit will also be the blast area. So if the hut caught on fire how much damage would it take compared to how much it heals. Or what would be a fun way to scare my wizard into thinking he made a huge mistake hitting the hut with fireball?
Well, the Dancing Hut has an SR 28, REF of +21 and evasion. In reality, a fireball at the level your wizard probably is won't do anything to the hut at all... even before its fast healing kicks in.
BUT! if you wanted to have some fun just the same, you could have the hut be pacing around and just take the fireball saying it chooses to fail its reflex save just because it's in a ticked off mood and shackled in the clearing. Maybe the hut wants to prove to Nazhena how much better it can take a fireball that she can? The hut technically has an INT of -, but I always loved roleplaying it like it was an angry chicken.
Anyway, burn damage is usually d6 ("catching on fire" from the CRB pg 444) so you could have some fun with flames licking across the wooden roof or railing on the porch until the Hut's turn when its Fast Heal 20 kicks in and restores it to perfect condition.
That shouldn't work, since a banshee's wail is a death effect and Breath of Life doesn't fix those.
Wail of the Banshee does 10 pts of damage per caster level that "... possibly kills creatures that hear it." Breath of Life restores HP damage even beyond death (aka. neg CON).
I believe Breath works. It's not spelled out in the Wail spell description that "this is a death effect".
You might be thinking of the 3.5 version of Wail that was a straight "save or die."
Both our last game(weather) and our next game(DM and some players will be out of town) are cancelled.
I feel the pain. Our regular Sunday game has taken over a month off. We have four players, so if two are out we generally cancel.
25 Jan: Ice storm cancelled game. Wasn't safe for any of us to travel.
01 Feb: One player had to work (tax consultant so busy season) and one stuck in NY with weather (coming back from vacation).
08 Feb: One player had to work, one had to pick up wife who was getting in late to airport due to weather. Plus it was going to be a short session for the Superbowl anyway.
15 Feb: Two players working (tax consultant and military shift)
22 Feb: Next game? Maybe...?
The weather and tax season have hit us hard.
The really irritating thing is we started Strange Aeons, everyone has been having a blast, we get to (most likely) the very last session of book 1 and... put the game on hold for a month. Seriously, talk about killing momentum!
This suddenly got me super excited. Made me immediately think of the old school World of Warcraft dungeons where you'd have the bosses to kill (and eventually farm) but you also would often have quests to accomplish in the dungeons.
I gotta agree with Pizza Lord. The hex says it's gotta be "hair" (or eyebrows, moustache, beard etc). Just because an elemental looks like it has something comparable to hair... it's still only water or fire. Water and fire obviously aren't hair.
If the witch got hit with a "polymorph any object" and turned into the Mona Lisa, they couldn't use the hex even though the painting has hair... the "hair" is still just paint.
But! That did get me thinking!
What about fur? That's basically just hair, right?
Could a witch beast shape into a lion and use prehensile hair hex on the lion's mane? What about if they beast shape into a wolf? Could they use the wolf's fur?
Just a fun thought!
Cheers!
Hey I forgot to add one from my wife's campaign. She doesn't prowl the message boards, but I figured I'd add to the collection just the same.
Name: Korlath
Race/Class: Half-Giant/Warpriest 6
Adventure: Turn of the Torrent
Location: Lucky Bones Dungeon
Catalyst: Globster and poor decisions.
Gory Details:
Spoiler:
The Silver Ravens had been cutting through the skum in the lowest level of the Lucky Bones dungeons without too much difficulty. Then they ran into the globster like a buzzsaw. Most of the group used blunt weapons or had switched to piercing weapons due to the underwater fighting so were having serious difficulty hurting the ooze. Also, that advanced globster hit like a truck. It knocked several people down including Korlath and all the other melee fighters. Korlath was healed up right next to the globster and -instead of turtling until the melee went passed him- he tried to stand up. Despite repeated warnings from the DM (and his fellow players), Korlath was determined to resume his place as tank. Of course he was grabbed and constricted taking him from barely conscious to quite dead. Fortunately they had the scroll of Raise Dead and Korlath was soon back to the land of the living, hopefully wiser than before.
One slightly less stressful idea you might try is giving each player their own settlement. That's how our group did it. There was one kingdom ruler, who obviously ruled the capital, and then as the kingdom expanded to encompass more settlements, each PC was given a settlement to run as they saw fit. When conflict came up between the settlements (over where to spend gold for new buildings and what not), the ruler would arbitrate fairly.
This worked well for our group especially since we had a couple players that weren't interested in ruling a whole kingdom, but they did like having their own small village or town. And everyone was working towards the success of the kingdom as a whole, so that kept inter party conflict down to a minimum.
Hadn't seen this thread get updated for a bit, so I thought I'd bring it back.
We just finished Book 2 of Hell's Rebels. Man, this is a really great AP! I think Paizo hit a sweet spot of having the Rebellion rules matter enough in the background, but also have them NOT matter so much that you could ignore them if you wanted. FYI, we're really enjoying the Rebellion rules.
Also if I can take a quick moment to brag, wife did a great job as her first stab as a DM. Book 2 was her first solo outing (she co-DM'd Book 1) and she's enjoying it so far.
Taking a week off from the game for Christmas prep (gotta get the baking done and those cards out!) then I'll be back to run Strange Aeons.
Cheers!
Also, co-DMing is a possibility to consider if one of your DMs is getting overloaded.
Weeeelll... I have to walk back my previous comment a bit. Or add a caveat "... unless one of the DMs is a control freak... like my wife." LOL.
Things went well for a couple weeks but one DM was still really overworked and not putting in as much effort towards the game and the other DM (my wife) was working overtime to make sure everything was perfect. So, she started to get frustrated when she'd set up an encounter to run in a certain manner and the other DM would run the tactical encounter completely differently.
So before last week she sat down with her co-DM and said she'd be taking over DMing duties 100% and told him to make a replacement character. He was perfectly happy doing that and the group agreed we'd just walk through the combats a little slower. Everyone is happy except my wife who still complains that her first attempt at DMing really shouldn't be with a full adventure path and one of the more complicated adventure paths at that. I only half kid. She's doing a great job so far and she loves rising to the challenge.
Finished up Mission 1 in Book 2 of Hells Rebels and this AP continues to be amazing!
Cheers!
Well, we began Hell's Rebels and immediately started having an issue. We started playing in Sept and our DM is a schoolteacher. And even from the player side of the screen, I could tell Hells Rebels was going to be a complex campaign with the rebellion turns, mixed in with predetermined events and NPC encounters on top of the standard location-based encounters. Nothing too horrible, but it was a bit much for our schoolteacher at the beginning of a brand new school year.
So, my wife volunteered to step in to try her hand at DMing for the very first time. She agreed to take all the event/RP encounters and the original DM would continue to handle the combat encounters, since she's not quite as familiar with that side part of the game. So far, it's worked pretty well. They've co-DM'd for three sessions now and it's gone quite smoothly. We reached the end of book 1 this weekend and she even flexed a bit to take over the combats on the first floor of the Fantasmagorium.
Verdict: Book 1 of Hell's Rebels has been excellent!
Also, co-DMing is a possibility to consider if one of your DMs is getting overloaded.
I'll agree with all of Ironbar's great suggestions. I like a whip myself with the nice long 15-ft reach and aiding from there. You can also go the trip or disarm route if you want ... though you don't have the STR or BAB to make it anything more than a "hope I roll well..." Sometimes you get lucky or you might get a wizard target that you can disarm his staff.
Just what I like to do!
Hell's Rebels = hands-down my favourite AP that I've run.
Fantastic! Glad to hear that! It seems to be quite high on most folks' lists so I'm anxious to get to play in it!
Warped Savant wrote:
Strange Aeons = I wish I could've run this one, and the first book is one of the best I've read.
I've prep'ed all six books and it has its highs and lows. I'm working on tightening some of the connections and coming up with extra motivations.
Really what it comes down to is my wife (one of our players) finished "The Complete Works of Lovecraft" and wanted to play this AP next. So I was on the hook no matter what! :)
But I'm convinced any campaign can be a fun one with good players! I look forward to running it.
Warped Savant wrote:
Best of luck for both of those campaigns! I hope you enjoy them.
Thank you sir! I love this thread and will continue to try to report back semi regularly. Cheers!! <salute!>
APs Played:
DNF (2006): Path of Ashardalon (D&D 3.5) – Player to end of book 3 (of 8). Ended due to DM military deployment
DNF (2007): Age of Worms (D&D 3.5) – DM to end of book 9 (of 12). Ended due to players’ military deployment.
DNF (2008): Rise of the Runelords (D&D 3.5) - Player to mid book 2. Ended due to DM military deployment
#1 (2009). Curse of the Crimson Throne (using PF Beta) (Player)
DNF (2009): Second Darkness (using PF Beta) - Player to book 5. Horrible "Memory of Darkness" ended campaign
DNF (2010): Council of Thieves - Player to end of book 5. Campaign ended due to TPK
#2 (2013): Serpent's Skull (DM)
#3 (2014): Kingmaker (Player)
#4 (2014): Skull & Shackles (Player)
#5 (2015): Shattered Star* (Player)
#6 (2016): Reign of Winter** (DM)
#7 (2017): Giantslayer*** (Player)
#8 (2018): Iron Gods (Player)
#9 (2019): Carrion Crown (DM)
#10 (2022): Ruins of Azlant (Player)
#11 (2023): Wrath of the Righteous (non-mythic conversion) (DM)
#12 (2023): Ironfang Invasion (Player)
#13 (2025): Return of the Runelords (Player)
#14 (2025): Age of Worms (PF conversion) (DM)
DNF: did not finish
Year is the year the campaign ended
* With a greatly shortened Book 6 due to DM moving and leaving the group but still wanting to finish the AP
** With a shortened Book 6. Only did one of the demiplanes then jumped to the final demiplane and finale
*** With a shortened Book 5. DM changed this up to only hit the main encounters to move to the final book.
And as for what's next, this weekend we start Hell's Rebels where I get a break back to the player side and then I have Strange Aeons ready to go after.
As evident from the years completed above, we usually try to have two APs running at once. That way we can do 2 books from one and then give the DM a break by switching to another AP where we'll do 2 books. If your group can, I highly recommend taking turns like that. It really helps to keep any one person from getting burnt out. But we're blessed to have 3 DMs that can round-robin like that.
After 44 sessions, finished up my Age of Worms, Pathfinder conversion campaign this weekend. It ended with a whimper not a bang with Kyuss going down like a chump. Oh well.
I'll take a second to congratulate our group on our 14th adventure path completed. Been playing every Sunday for 20 years now. Some of the faces have changed, but it's been a good group of guys and gals. Cheers!
Death #15
Name: Vilipende
Race/Class: Teifling/Paladin 20
Adventure: Dawn of a New Age
Location: The Alhaster Spire
Catalyst: Broodfiends
Spoiler:
The group had previously fought into the first level of the Spire's ziggurat. As per the adventure, Lashonna opens another 6 broodfiend eggs after the initial assault. So, there were three flying around outside the Spire and I replaced the guards on the first floor with three more broodfiends. Made sense since only two floors up is the broodfiend aerie with another three broodfiends anyway. So, the group lured off the three guards flying around outside and headed back in to clear out the new guardians on the first floor.
Oh boy. These monsters just blow. I'm sorry, but two attacks with +32 to hit and causing d8 INT drain is a bit much. One of these guys had been challenging on a couple encounters, but three? That was nearly a bloodbath. The party managed to bottleneck the fiends in one of the entrance tunnels, but the INT drain still was too much. A couple of bad rolls on d8 left the paladin with negative INT. And, as per special rules for the broodfiend, negative INT results in death from their drain.
Needless to say, after winning this battle, when the party wanted to use the scroll of wish to just seal up the third level aerie to take those three broodfiends out of the fight, I was only too happy.
Other DMs may want to seriously consider toning these guys down a bit in the future. Seriously this was my last death. Kyuss and Lashonna were both pushovers compared to three broodfiends at once.
The Hero Points awarded from "Spire of Long Shadow" are running low, so we actually got another real death yesterday.
Death #13
Name: Ruso
Race/Class: Human/Monk (Zen Archer) 19
Adventure: Dawn of a New Age
Location: The Alhaster Spire
Catalyst: Maralee, Advanced Kyuss Knight
Gory Details:
Spoiler:
My group had conquered despair through the city of Alhaster and shut down the Unlife Vortex under the Boneyard. They were now ready to move against the Spire of Alhaster and defeat Kyuss. I didn’t like the idea of Lashonna being on the ground floor of the ziggurat and Maralee being up at the base of the Spire, so I switched the defenders of B2 and B8.
The group fought their way into the base of the ziggurat. They met with Maralee and her Kyuss Knights in the central chamber and recognized the power coming off Dragotha’s favored creation. The paladin kept moving and channeling, keeping Maralee from getting off a deadly hasted full attack. Meanwhile, Ruso near the entrance kept hitting her with arrow fire from his undead bane bow. Maralee finally got sick of it, sent her knights to tie up the paladin and charged down the hall at Ruso. Ruso stood up to the attack, but foolishly stepped back to continue full attacking, greatly underestimating how injured the Kyuss Knight Commander was. She stepped forward and hit Ruso with every swing, two-handed power attacking and the zen archer was smashed across the walls in a horrific mess. This caused Maralee to get a bit too confident as she then charged back up the hall, getting toe to toe with the paladin. She wasn’t prepared for the smiting full-attack she took in return that cleaved through her helmet and finally put Balakarde’s sister to rest.
For his part, Ruso was quickly “battle rez’d” by Dax’s “life giver” hex unfortunately causing…
And Death #14 (this one was Hero Point saved)
Name: Dax
Race/Class: Human/Witch (Hedge Witch Healer) 19
Adventure: Dawn of a New Age
Location: The Alhaster Spire
Catalyst: Kyuss Knights… lots of Kyuss Knights
Gory Details:
Spoiler:
Dax had hurried down the hall to get Ruso back in the fight but by now the defenders of the other three entrances into the Spire had joined the fight with Maralee’s surviving knight guards. More vampire shadowdancers and Kyuss knights spilled into the central chamber causing a wild melee. Kyuss Knights went down the entrance corridor, cutting Dax off from escape. The bard teleported him and Dax into the central chamber, but there was no safe place to take the healer and allow him to continue providing mass cures against the horde of attacking undead. The Knights were able to close in, getting off several vital strikes that took Dax to just passed his CON. The bard had a single hero point left so acted out of turn to get off a cure just as Dax took the last hit. The witch was saved, merely unconscious instead of dead.
The group was able to rally, defeating the waves of undead and securing the first floor of the ziggurat. Unfortunately, the massive running fight had tapped nearly all their resources. They fell back to rest and tackle the upper levels and the Spire next.
Name: Ruso
Race/Class: Human / Monk (Zen Archer) 18
Adventure: Into the Wormcrawl Fissure
Location: Dragotha's Lair
Catalyst: ... Dragotha... duh... :)
Gory Details...
Spoiler:
The group had done well cutting through the Tabernacle of Worms after several bad rolls against Wail of the Banshee in the Wormcrawl Fissure above. They had made good preps against the undead dracolich and launched into the attack. They managed to cut through the minions summoned and the melee rogue and paladin engaged the dracolich on the ziggurat. Their displacement spells were the saving grace, protecting them from about half the dragon's attacks. The witch healer, bard and summoned planatar were able to keep up with the healing. The melee still weren't able to consistently land blows against the undead. The same couldn't be said about Ruso across the cavern. The archer was inflicting devastating damage with his undead bane bow and the whopping +20 to hit from Balakarde's slayer spirit. Dragotha healed himself up with a wish and decided the archer needed to go. He launched himself off the zigguarat, ignoring the AoOs from the rogue and paladin, and landed next to Ruso. A massive greater vital strike power attack from the dragon one-shotted the monk from about 3/4 straight to dead. Fortunately, Ruso was able to use a hero point and heroically dive aside to only be knocked unconscious. A heal from the witch and a blade barrier cover from the planetar allowed Ruso to get up and get back in the fight. This was where the fight took a bad turn for the dracolich. The melee and Ruso were now all close enough to share the slayer spirit as an immediate action. Dragotha realized his mistake too late as Balakarde's spirit jumped from the archer to the smiting paladin and to the two-weapon, flanking rogue. With a shriek at being defeated by the spirit of Balakarde, Dragotha crashed to the ground.
A great fight overall, but Ruso turned out to be the only death (despite some close calls!)
Isn't there something in there about him spending six rounds to buff, yeah right, like all those minions would last that long.
Absolutely! Though he has "quickened spell", so I think it only took him 3 rounds to buff up. All for two "greater dispel magics" to make all that prep time worthless. Sigh. The action economy struggle for solo bosses is real. LOL.
But! I was at least able to make the minions last for a bit. The earthcancer centipedes were spring attacking from the walls and ground using their tremorsense. It took the PCs a turn or two for everyone to get up in the air and force the centipedes to the surface. So there was that at least.
Tin Foil Yamakah wrote:
WotB is nasty(I used the 3.5 version) but sadly never got it to stick. I celebrate vicariously through you
Thank you! I've still got a book and a half to rack up some more kills (hero point saves or not...)
Yeah, if I do ever end up doing WotR, I would definitely look at tweaking the mythic rules. Whether I would go with exactly Legendary's tweaks or not I would decide nearer the time.
I'll agree both that it's a great AP story wise and that the mythic rules don't work. I used a rechargeable pool of Hero Points and that worked great 99% of the time.
I documented the changes I made over on the Wrath thread.
Link if you're curious.
Names/Classes: Daxum (Hedge Witch Healer 18), Ruso (Zen Archer 18), Archie (Bard 18)
Adventure: Into the Wormcrawl Fissure
Location: Apostle Caves
Catalyst: Wail of the Banshee (again)
Gory Details:
Spoiler:
Well "wail of the banshee" strikes again. The group had followed the statue with Balakarde's soul into the Apostle Caves looking for the next portion of his soul. They cut through the spring-attacking earthcancer centipedes and mindkiller scorpions all while the Apostle was buffing up. Then N'vesh-N'kar flew out invisible and let loose with a wail. Over half the party was caught by the terrible shriek and would have died if not for heroically throwing off the effects. The Apostle's victory was short lived as he was immediately pelted by arrows from Ruso and took a full attack from a smiting paladin that finished him off before he even got off his necromantic breath weapon.
We finished our "Return of the Runelords" campaign after 44 sessions played over 21 months (Aug 23 to May 25) and alternating between our other current campaign, "Age of Worms".
Overall verdict: A fantastic campaign to play in. Good lore and locations as well as lots of callbacks to other campaigns. Some fun twists and reveals along the way.
My only complaint is from my own expectation management. I was told that our Shattered Stars characters would play a part, so I got excited and dusted off my old character for a return. It wasn't nearly as much of a return as I'd thought/hoped. Oh well. If I were to take a shot at running it later...
Spoiler:
I might be tempted to try and set up the last book more like the final dungeon of Final Fantasy VI. Where the players have to send groups of characters after paradoxes two at a time where you get to switch back and forth between characters.
But that's a minor complaint. Overall it's a "recommend."
The Parchlands are in the Meraz Desert east/southeast in Casmaron.
From Okeno, you could sail east to Ayesh (pop 40k) or Sadiyeh (pop 14.5k), to stock up, but you'd be adding 500 miles to your trek to get to the edge of the Meraz and the smaller Sadiyeh might not have what you need or might charge a premium.
You could go around the southern end of that penninsula and go as far as Heger (pop 12.5k) or Husanah (pop 14k, not a port city) in Al-Zabrit, but crossing 200 extra miles of desert belonging to the native horse tribes might complicate your journey in addition to the issues smaller population towns have when it comes to supplies.
Which leaves the 'best' way: Katheer (pop 132k). Landing in Katheer, you're going to be able to get the best deal on supplies. You can travel 250ish miles upriver on the Pashman to a natural pass between the Northern and Southern Zho mountains, and then another 230ish miles in the highlands (importantly not desert) to reach the western edge of the Meraz, starting the real journey much closer to the Parchlands than coming in from the south.
Perfect! Thank you so much for the detailed description. That was 100% exactly what I needed!
Death #8 (another Hero Point save but still a death)...
Name: Archie
Class: Bard 17
Adventure: Into the Wormcrawl Fissure
Location: Thessalar's Fortress
Catalyst: Wail of the Banshee
Gory Details:
Spoiler:
The group made contact with Thessalar and decided they didn't want to work with a crazed evil lich. They went back and found Zulshyn and found working with the lillend more to their liking. They agreed to assassinate the lich and the next morning headed back. They went up to his fortress and quickly cleared out the thesselhydras before Thessalar arrived. The lich opened up with his wail of the banshee and everyone saved... except poor Archie. The bard was in danger of being killed by the spell but heroically shook it off. That was nearly all Thessalar was able to do as he was soon pinned between a smiting paladin and two-weapon rogue. End of the lich before he could run and heal. Oh well. Dragotha still awaits below!
Hey all!
So I'm getting prep'ed to run this AP next, and I -like some others- am having some trouble figuring out where the Parchlands are supposed to be. Nearest I'm figuring, they're south/southeast of Qadira beyond the Meraz Desert.
In that regard, is the reference to returning to Katheer on pg 6 just a misprint? It makes zero sense to go from Okeno, north back to Katheer to launch the expedition only to go back to the south to go beyond the Meraz Desert. Unless Katheer is the only place to get supplies for the journey to the Parchlands, but it looks like there are numerous better options for cities south, along the coast of Qadira.
Thanks for any help that can be provided!
This weekend we continued racing towards the completion of "Return of the Runelords". Continued working through Book 6 and started fixing paradoxes (I'll keep it vague to avoid spoilers).
I will say I'm a bit surprised by the lethality of this campaign. We've had 8 character deaths so far... and that's not counting "save from death" boons. That's second only to our non-mythic "Wrath of the Righteous" campaign which had a whopping 14 deaths... though those deaths were all avoided by Hero Points.
Just something to consider for others considering this AP. Otherwise, it's a fantastic adventure and story! Absolutely loving it!
Brazen question, might your Age of Worms PF conversion be something you're willing to share or do you want to keep it to your own (understandable considering the work it must have taken)?
Absolutely! I have no problem sharing it at all! Mostly, I just used the excellent stat document that Sc8rpi8n_mjd put together and made available on the following thread:
I'll be honest, D&D 3.5 and PF 1 are so close, I made a lot of the changes on the fly that I needed to beyond that document. If you have any specific questions about location changes I made to move things to Golarion, I can certainly start a thread over on AoW subforum. Just lemme know!
This weekend finished up the 3rd (of 4) arcs to my Pathfinder Age of Worms game. Despite several more VERY close calls in "Book 10: King of the Rifts" (Brazz is one tough red dragon! And that was AFTER the Mother of Worms almost got them!) there were no further deaths.
As previously requested (back in... July?? Where does the time go...) I started a lessons learned thread for my Age of Worms in Golarion campaign. Feel free to take a look and ask any questions there if you'd like!
Now I get to enjoy a return to the player's seat for a while and finish up Book 5 & 6 of our "Return of the Runelords" game. I gotta say, ReotRL has been really good! I never heard much about it when it came out. Kinda just slipped by I think. But it's really good! I highly recommend it.
Then it'll be back to finish up Age of Worms in a couple months.
Cheers!
Book 10: King of the Rifts
- So it was a return to the Acadamae in Korvosa and a quick bit of research through books that Toff swore didn’t have details in them before. I needed a nice mountain location for the giant city, not too far from the location of the Worm War on the Whistling Plains. I didn’t know of TOO much going on in the World’s Edge Mountains, so that was the lucky location. - I had a canyon cut in from the eastern side of the mountain range, running west before turning south into a large box canyon. About 300 feet deep between several large peaks, this let me have the giant city about 200 feet up above the canyon and keep the orientation of the map the same. This was also a fairly tucked away area that wouldn’t be discovered except by the giant tribes of the mountain range.
- This was a pretty straightforward one to run. All the conversion stats are present.
- I added that the giants had set up big barrels of oil burning along the edge of the upper city. These produced big clouds of black smoke. Added with setting fire to several wagons and the fires set by dragon breath it semi-concealed much of the city in smoke. I did this so the PCs couldn’t immediately just teleport to the Citadel at the end and so the first flight of dragons the PCs fought didn’t trigger a chain pull of every dragon fighting near the city. That would have been way too much for my group. Instead, I told them it was very difficult to make out details beyond 60-80 feet due to the smoke. That also just so happened to be about the distance between encounter areas that I played fast and loose with.
- I’d say try to give a sense of urgency by repeatedly destroying locations. By the end of the first night, have the gate tower at A be destroyed. Then have the tower at K destroyed the next day. Then the big one, when the dragons finally crack through J. Make it really seem like all of Dragotha’s dragons that flew in from the Rift Canyon are making real progress.
- As for the phylactery, I said that it was so powerful that it had its own soul. Thus they made a plan to run in, grab it and teleport away that I told them wouldn’t work because it was more like a creature that would resist them than an object. Bad news: I also ruled that the paladin could smite it as an undead so that ended the phylactery fairly quickly. LOL.
- I will say, I skipped the whole return of Alastor Land’s ghost and the vaati bloodline angle. That just seemed a bit too much “Chosen One” (drink!) to me. Instead, I had them find the information needed from pg 82 in the many books that Vercinabex Tor had collected. These were first hand books left by the stone giant druids, so I figured they’d have almost any adventure details remaining in there.
On to book 11
This is going to be at the northern end of the Windswept Wastes of course, where I put the Rift Canyon. At the far western end is the Wormcrawl Fissure.
And then from there, on to book 12 which of course will take place back in Alhaster where the spire will have been suddenly completed.
Book 9: Library of Last Resort
- So Lashonna gets to tell them about the Order of the Storm and that they had their headquarters on a small island off the coast of what was once Lirgen. 25 miles off the coast to be exact, which of course in the Eye of Abendego. I figured an unassuming rocky island here wouldn’t attract too much attention… especially just inside the hurricane.
- While scrying on Darl they of course see the Hand of Vecna. Since there is no god Vecna in PF, I kept this related to Norgorber. Darl is a priest of Norgorber and Vecna was a powerful lich that served Norgorber. When the lich died, his hand was turned into a powerful artifact of the god of secrets. My Greyhawk players chuckled but were cool with the change.
- The good news is, since my group already sailed down here to get to Kuluth-Mar, they could do a teleport run to Drenchport. Then it was a tense sailing voyage along the edge of the hurricane. I had them able to get within eyesight of the island with some good piloting rolls so a teleport jump to the beach was then an option.
- I really liked how Sc8rpi8n_mjd stat blocks focused far more on a First World approach. Once they arrived at the demiplane of Last Resort, I had the PCs make a decent Knowledge (planes) check to note that this demiplane was very close to the First World along with the no access to the Astral Plane. This gave a great excuse for the vibrant explosions of life, the large animals and fey Tanes that make up the tests.
- The stats files include other creatures you can include on the island if you want. I didn’t.
- I had to tone down the fight with the Wild Watcher a bit. The cloak’s disarm attempt and catch projectiles once per character per round was a bit much. I changed it to once per round… period.
- Entering the fountain of dreams of course takes the PCs to the past where they experience the final fight of the Worm War. It’s on a hill on the southern edge of the Whistling Plains overlooking the Windswept Wastes beyond. I let them know from the start that they had a sense of déjà vu… that these events had all already happened. That way they wouldn’t spend their precious hero points nor be too upset when that horrifying boneyard shows up to kill them all.
- That pretty much wraps book 9 after finding out that the phylactery was hidden in Kongen-Thulnir.
Book 8: Prince of Redhand
- So back to Toff at the Acadamae who’s research with Celeste and Eligos has revealed the involvement of Balakarde and Lashonna. So it’s off to the Kingdom of Redhand. I placed Redhand on the north shores of Kallas Lake, between the Sellen River and the East Sellen River. Alhaster itself, the one and only large settlement of Redhand, overlooks Kallas Lake.
- All of the stats in this book have been rebuilt. So nothing to worry about there.
- In the city, the chapel of St. Cuthbert again becomes a chapel of Abadar. The Ruby Spire to Wee Jaz becomes the Gray Spire to Pharasma. Hextor becomes Asmodeous.
- I also changed the “Free Lords Embassy” (area 19) to the “Outlaw Embassy”. Zeech kept it for visiting members of the Outlaw Council but it was usually empty… a source of much embarrassment for Zeech who didn’t like to be ignored by the other River Kingdoms.
- I also had to remove any “slave” references because Redhand was in the River Kingdoms and the River Freedoms. So they just became indentured servants that were essentially slaves. This worked out just fine for the workers stuck out in the glories and the quarries supplying the stones for the Great Project.
- What I did for the banquet was print out every guests’ picture and break things up into “turns”. The PCs could influence one guest as they move between events or at each event (if they weren’t involved in the actual event). That way I could move their mini onto the guest’s picture as a reminder of who they were interacting with. When they’d maxed the guest out as helpful, I’d put an H on the picture. Just so the PCs could keep track.
As for each guest, I made a lotta changes there.
- Prince Zeech- I changed him to a prior paladin of Iomedae who fought in the Worldwound from Mendev. He grew tired of mismanaged and badly planned battle plans and wanted to be in charge. He abandoned the war effort 20 years ago and conquered Alhaster using his military genius and using Quemps’s barbarians.
- I had Kilraven be the Redhand Captain of the Guard. Kept things a little simpler.
- Miszen I had be a spy from Daggermark. Alhaster was a small kingdom, but at a critical junction on Kallas Lake. The Outlaw Council, that have frequently ignored Zeech, didn’t like what they were hearing about this Great Project that he’d become obsessed with.
- Shag got changed because there’s no quaggoth in PF. So he became a very shaggy mongrelman from the Emporium. Otherwise no change.
- Toris was a nobleman merchant from Daggermark that was the lowest ranking member of a family who was told they had to send SOMEONE to Zeech’s celebration. I had him saying “I’m not even supposed to BE HERE today!” a whole lot.
- Bkruss, Vjuss and the Redhand Knights I had be mercs that worked for Zeech. They clashed frequently with the elf forces north in the Cordelon forests.
- Vulras I had be the Redhand Warden. He was in charge of all the wardens and security in the countryside around Alhaster and the Glories villages.
- I added in Okral as well as Tirra as guests at the banquet. Okral because they never got a proper show down with him and Tirra my PCs were friendly with her. She was sent because the Night Blades were angry that Okral performed an assassination in “their” city. Tirra was sent to get revenge.
- Most of the rest of the book I ran as is. I changed the Lively Baiting event a bit. I have players who work with a rescue for feral cats, so these obviously became dire rats instead. I also didn’t want the other players to get bored, so there were 6 cockatrice rings that would be used, not just Zeech and one other.
- At the party, if need be, among the servants have a number of low level priests casting undetectable alignment on guests and such. That way if you need Lashonna to have a mind blank running, it won’t tip anyone off as being out of the ordinary. You might have her with a permanent Appearance of Life spell running as well if you want to keep up the game or if you happen to have a soul seer tiefling with death watch running constantly.
Book 7: Spire of Long Shadows
- So, here’s where I really had to decide on the overarching timeline and Kyuss’ background. Specifically, why had no one heard of him or any of these events before in Golarion history?
Golarion History of Kyuss
- I decided that about -6500 AR, when Xin and all his followers left Azlanti to go north and founded Thassilon, another Azlanti was exiled, though this event was VASTLY overshadowed in the history books by the other. A very charismatic priest was kicked out of Azlant for unnatural experimentation with undead. He was a devout follower of Urgathoa and was sent into the wilds of the Mwangi.
- The young priest Kyuss made contact with the locals and the very charismatic man was able to trick them into worshipping him and enslaved them to his will. He had them build Kuluth-Mar in the Jungle of Hungry Trees just south of the Korir River. Why the Jungle of Hungry Trees? Well it’s a jungle and nothing else was going on way down there that I knew about. Easy to slip into Golarion.
- Alternately, you could have Kyuss be a cannibal follower of Zura I suppose. Either way works. He just has to be a very charismatic priest.
- From there he met with the undead spellweaver, who I changed to a dimensional traveler in PF. Kyuss learned how to ascend to become a powerful demon lord using the lifeforce off all his enthralled followers and got trapped in the monolith. From there, the ordeal of the ascension caused him to slumber for nearly 2000 years (through Earthfall, the Age of Darkness and into the Age of Anguish.)
- In approx. -4000 AR, Kyuss started to stir. Slowly his undead followers began to wake and wander into the surrounding jungles.
- At the end of the Age of Anguish, Old Mage Jatembe and his Ten Warriors bring magic back. One of the groups that were trained by them was a group of druids who worshipped Gozreh on the shores of what at the time would become Lirgen. This of course was to become the Order of the Storm.
- At about -3400 AR (ish), the Order of the Storm working with the native Eku’Jae elves are threatened by the undead spreading out from Kuluth-Mar. Working together, they push the undead back and create the obsidian ring around the city.
- The next step was figuring out where the Rift Canyon was going to be. I liked the idea of the Wormcrawl Fissure still being off of this so I decided to place it far in the east at the northern edge of the Windswept Wastes.
- So! During the Age of Destiny, I went with -2900 AR ish, the red dragon Dragotha has fled from Tiamat’s service, heard Kyuss’s whispering and took the monolith over the walls of Kuluth-Mar. He flew far to the east and made his lair in the western fringes of the (newly added) Rift Canyon. I’m glad there’s no detailed maps of the Windswept Wastes yet because there’s now a 200-mile-long canyon there I added at the northern end along the mountains there. I know somewhere further south/southeast there’s the dreaded Pit of Gormuz, but to the north there’s the Rift Canyon now.
- Anyway, Dragotha manages to free a small portion of the demon lord Kyuss, enough to make an avatar. Kyuss begins to teach Dragotha the strange techniques he’s learned in the dimension beyond the monolith where he’s been trapped. He teaches Dragotha how to become a true dragon lich – a dracolich if you will- instead of just a ravager (the PF equivalent). Tiamat’s followers catch up to Dragotha and kill him. With the prep work they’d begun, Kyuss raises Dragotha as the one and only true dracolich on Golarion and makes him his Herald. This covers the rarity of the dracolich and also keeps me from having to make him a ravager instead.
- So then Dragotha and Kyuss build up an army of undead and about -2800 AR they come storming out of the Rift Canyon in the Windswept Wastes in what I dubbed the Worm War because I love alliteration. They drive the nomadic tribesmen before them and begin destroying the small villages to the north in the Whispering Plains. The plains tribesmen and their stone giant allies in the nearby World’s Edge Mountains call their druid allies far to the west. The Order of the Storm arrives, steals the phylactery and works with the tribesmen and stone giants to hold off the attack (with a band of heroes that arrives next book). They then drive Kyuss’ avatar back into the monolith since it’s not the Age of Worms yet.
- So by moving the last fight against Kyuss to the Windswept Wastes and Whistling Plains, it explains why no one in the Inner Sea region is very aware of it. Also the ritual that hid the phylactery could also have affected the Worm War as well.
Anyway, back to Book 7!
- The PCs go the Acadame where they meet up with Celeste again and are pleasantly surprised to find Eligos alive and well. Obviously after Book 5, Toff has his old student Resurrected to assist him in the coming research. I left Agath out. He’s a Greyhawk character and I didn’t see any reason to include him with Celeste and Eligos already.
- Did I mention I like epic journeys? I didn’t like the idea of the picture of Kuluth-Mar, teleport and POOF you’re at the next dungeon. I had Balakarde’s notes mention a large stone arch justeast of the Korir River delta region where the waterways merge into the main river. This marked the road that once led south to the city, back in Kuluth-Mar’s height. So the PCs sailed from Korvosa down along the coast, through the Shackles to Port Freedom. From there, they hire River Guild guides who wouldn’t wait at a camp for the PCs without Ivory Cross mercs. Then they barge up through the Korir River delta region to the main Korir River. They find the overgrown arch and follow the ruined road 10 miles due south into the (now) trackless wilderness to the valley with Kuluth-Mar in it.
Or just teleport through the painting. It’s up to you.
- All of the creatures here have rebuild stats so that’s great.
- In Kuluth-Mar I didn’t change much except some of the visions as I’ve spelled out above.
- Human priest Kyuss had a holy symbol of Urgathoa in the vision.
- I spread out the dungeon levels to make the whole thing less crammed together. Added some longer passages between the chambers and added more than one door into each room. I also didn’t like the three other Kyuss knights sitting on their asses in their room while the place was getting attacked. They moved out and rallied the defenders to a counterattack, using the (now connecting) corridors to hit the party from multiple directions… like genius tacticians should.
- As others have said, also maybe move the Harbringer out into the main overworm chamber to have room to fly around. At least give him a MUCH bigger chamber.
- Consider at the end of the book giving a full hero point for each vision experienced instead of just a reroll. The “avoid death” of a couple hero points is huge in this AP with some pretty deadly encounters.
Book 6: A Gathering of Winds
- I already covered how I started this book off with the Battle for Diamond Lake. Here it is if you want to look at it again. Link!
- Then they headed up to the Whispering Cairn where they fought Ilthane, who I had bumped up to an old black dragon. Sorry, I like my dragon’s huge at this level. Horse sized dragons just seem a bit small for boss encounters.
- Continuing with the theme from Whispering Cairn, I changed Icosiel’s tomb to being of Azlanti architecture. The Azlanti up here in Varisia watching the serpentfolk at Viperwall built the cairns in gratitude to the Vaati that helped them.
- Most of the rest of the adventure was pretty straight forward with the PF conversions available.
- I changed the “true ghoul” Moretto to being from Nemret Noktoria, the civilized ghoul city in the Darklands under Osirion. Yeah he was a LONG way from home up in Varisia, but my PCs didn’t question it.
- After the Battle of Diamond Lake, Mayor Neff is left dead and Smenk is either dead or arrested (and likely to be sent back to Korvosa to be hung as a traitor). The garrison takes over temporarily but soon places “the smartest man in diamond lake” in charge, Allustan as the new mayor. This is a good way to keep Allustan busy and out of the rest of the adventure. Plus the PCs have out leveled him anyway.
- Allustan recommends they go speak with his old mentor, the headmaster of the Acadamae, Magemaster Toff Ornelos. I used Toff as the stand in for Manzorian/Tenser. I wasn’t 100% happy with that stand it, but there’s a shortage of high-level wizards in Golarion, and even less that are good aligned and would be adequate patrons of the PCs. So Toff works.
Book 5: Champion’s Games
- So here we have the Champion’s Games, the main setting for this book. For me the obvious choice was the Serpent’s Run Arena at Magnimar. So how to fit it in? Well there are monthly gladiator fights put on as shows by the city guard (from the Magnimar City of Monuments sourcebook). But once a year (for the past ten years) anyone can enter an event called the “Champion’s Games”, a chance for anyone to win big prizes. It’s put on by an ex-gladiator/city guard Loris Raknian. Magnimar’s arena has a pretty strict no-bloodsports policy, so Raknian got around that by having priests standing around the playing field with “stabilize” spells ready to go. Anyone that goes down automatically gets a stabilize tossed on them. Plus, Raknian argued that folks could surrender and give up at any time. His games were NOT supposed to be a fight to the death, but accidents could (and did) happen. This was still considered acceptable for the amount of money the games brought in.
- With the Apostolic Scrolls in the possession of Raknian, the group was set to infiltrate the Champions Games.
- At the dinner they were excited to meet up with Tirra again. They’d grown to like her and I made sure to extend the invitation to the Night Blades (the biggest Magnimar thieves guild) if things worked out.
- For the early fight, I just used the 3.5 stats. I added an extra archer to the elves and an extra gnoll to the druid’s team. This wasn’t supposed to be a super tough fight after all. I had some fun fleshing out the other teams in the cenoby but had pre-determined who was going to win anyway of course. Just the same, the PCs enjoyed interacting with them down in the cenoby below Serpent’s Run Arena. I’m not sure if that’s actually in Magnimar lore, but it seemed an easy insertion.
- For the temple of Kyuss below the Coenoby, I used the 3.5 stats for the tiefling cleric and the alkilith demon as well. Careful of the demon too. At CR 14 he was tough at this level. Stinking cloud at will and cloudkill form meant a lot of saves each round. Consider making the chambers a little bit bigger to account for this.
- Also, I wasn’t going to let the PCs handle the trapped ulgurstasta prior to the big finale. They recognized the artifact nature of the Apostolic Scrolls and that it had something sealed in very dangerous but there was little they could do at the moment.
- For the Pitch Blade fight, I grabbed a level 10 dwarf barbarian from the PFSRD. I also added a third brother to Pitch Blade. This made for a fairly challenging fight.
- For the finale, I had Dourstone up on the main balcony overseeing the action where he’d been sitting with Raknian during the competition. He seemed nervous with no Raknian present.
- I did a mini-rebuild to Auric’s Warband, adding the extra feats to Auric and adding HP to Khallek. Added an extra flesh golem to them too.
- I let my PCs fight them for a few rounds (taking out a few golems) before the ulgurstasta burst up. Then it was a crazy free for all. Raknian ran up yelling about sacrificing the champions while holding his rod of cancellation. Dourstone and Raknian joined in, their personal guards joined in. Tirra joined in from the sidelines. Good times had by all.
- The only one who didn’t join in the fun was Okral. He was busy killing Eligos and then fleeing up to his true boss, Zeech in Redhand who had sent him to spy on Ilthane and the Ebon Triad and then he followed Dourstone to Magnmar. Make sure that Okral carves out and takes Eligos’ heart to stop Raise Dead and Speak with Dead. Resurrection is probably more than the PCs are willing to pay at this moment.
- They ended up killing Dourstone and Raknian. Raknian’s holdings were seized by Magnimar and sold to pay off ALL bets since there was no clear winner then it was declared that Magnimar’s annual Champion’s Games were shut down.
Book 4: Halls of Harsh Reflections
- I had the Free City stand in be Magnimar. This was mostly because I knew I wanted the arena in Book 5 to be the Serpent’s Run Arena. Plus, I own the Magnimar City of Monuments sourcebook and there’s PLENTY of side adventures if folks were interested.
- The PCs had their own lead here with the peace negotiations. Allustan also asked them to speak with an old classmate of his in Magnimar, Eligos. It finally came out that Allustan had been a top student at the Acadamae in Korvosa before deciding to come to Diamond Lake to try and help the miners living in squalor. One of his good friends and classmates was Eligos who traveled to Magnimar.
- I had Eligos’ manor up in the Alabaster district, not too far from Sheila Heidmarch’s place. He had contacts at the Crooked House which I put down in the Dockway District, not far from the Bazaar of Sails.
- The group also had another side quest. Moonmeadow really wanted his ship back that Dourstone had taken off in. The group found out about a squibbing location in the Underbridge District, coincidently not far from Sodden Hold, the hideout where some dopplegangers were dwelling.
- So! Let’s address the aberration in the room. Obviously mindflayers aren’t a PF thing. So, when Zyrzog makes his appearance upon exiting Sodden Hold you have a couple options.
a. Replace him with something else (probably an aboleth) or
b. Use him as is.
I went with B. I had a high Knowledge (dungeoneering) remember that aboleths experimented with a number of bioengineered creatures. This creature was obviously a unique result of such an experiment (I think my players ended up calling it a “brain ripper” for fun, since we couldn’t say mind flayer). Then I grabbed a couple drow fighters from the PFSRD to cover Zyrzog’s dramatic withdrawal.
- For the second part of the adventure, I had the Cold Forge weapon shop in the Lowcleft District, not far from the Seacleft cliffs. I had the old sewers run underneath the Seacleft towards the far side of the city. Then they dropped down into the series of caves that made up Zyrzog’s hideout.
- from the PFSRD I grabbed stats for Drow House Guard to include as well as Drow Noble Cleric. I also added in a couple giant black widows for melee blockers in the caves.
- Having the octopins in the lab be created by Zyrzog just backed up the bioengineered origin of the “brain ripper” as well. This detail was appreciated by my players. They all traced their origins back to the aboleth.
- In Zyrzog’s notes I included how he’d been searching underwater through the old Azlanti ruins off the coast looking for the Apostolic Scrolls to sell to a buyer (of course leading into Book 5). In return, he would get several teams of miners for some excavation job.
- Why the excavation? Well my PCs had fallen behind again even with a few goblin encounters in the Magnimar sewers. I added a level below Zyrzog’s chambers at M14. It went into the aboleth tower in the PF module “From Shore to Sea” and down to the dungeon where an aboleth was trapped in an observation post from long ago when the aboleth had been hiding below Magnimar and keeping an eye on the Runelords of Thassilon. This one got trapped during Earthfall and was hibernating. Zyrzog found the aboleth and was trying to dig him an escape route to sea.
All of that part you can ignore if you want. Unless you want to strengthen the mindflayer/aboleth connection some more.
Book 3: Blackwall Keep
- I placed Blackwall Keep west of Lake Syrantula down the Yondabakari River. It was on the south bank of the river (a bit further down than the town of Whistledown) to keep trade open up and down the river to Magnimar and make sure any tribes of lizardfolk from the Mushfens didn’t attack shipping coming into the Lake.
- I kicked this book off with an animal messenger sent from Marzeena. In my game, I had Marzeena as the previous apprentice to Allustan. Allustan took in the new arcane caster (one of the PCs) and Marzeena graduated. She left for Korvosa to join the Korvosan Guard as a battle wizard. From there she was assigned to Blackwall Keep.
- Couple of options here. You can have the PCs hop on a ship and sail down the Lake, down the River to Blackwall if you want. Mention that the Blackwall Keep’s boats have been sunk pier side during the lizardfolk attack if you want.
- OR, I like journeys. I added a small pass through the Fenwall Mountains just southwest of Diamond Lake. This pass is actually what the Bronzewood Lodge guards. So, I had Dourstone take Moonmeadow’s ship and disappear to Magnimar and the Green Lady cult’s ship (the Harkness) was off getting supplies. This left nothing but an overland trip for the party. So through the mountains, along the edge of the foothills above the Mushfens and finally through the swamps along the river to arrive at the Keep. Lots of fun outdoors encounters and time for any outdoors characters to shine.
- The rest of this book is fairly straightforward. Book 3 is where Sc8rpi8n_mjd starts his fantastic stat document.
- If they’re willing to negotiate with Hishka, have her tell them how the farmers from Magnimar are starting to expand into traditional lizardfolk hunting grounds along the Yondabakari River and Mushfens. They can help her by taking out the tribe chief and negotiating a peace for the lizardfolk tribes.
- Make sure to describe the alchemically modified lizard king and kobolds as having black scales. You want to foreshadow Ilthane’s involvement for sure.
- Finish up with a rest at the Keep while the garrison fixes one of their boats and they can sail back to Diamond Lake along the southern shore of Lake Syrantula. If you have a group that likes to negotiate, you’ll probably already have your next lead in Magnimar. My PCs liked Marzeena so I had her take some leave from the Korvosa Guard and come back to aid in Allustan’s research.
