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So my group finally started "Hall of Harsh Reflections" yesterday. Along the way, I used the troll brothers random encounter.

When the first one went down, the second begged for his life as written. The party relented, not only sparing him but not torching his brother either. Once they got the description of the adventurers who routed the trolls, the party agreed to let them both live in return for a "future service". There was some debate over whether or not the party was actually supposed to fight Auric and friends, but they hate them (him, in particular, enough that they really don't care).

Once they got into town and started hearing about the Champion's Games, though, they've started to talk about bringing them into the fold as teammates. Obviously,it would be easy to rule no on that, but it might be fun. Thoughts?

For the DMs who went ahead and replaced a character: how did you handle the party's exploration of Sodden Hold. As it turns out, the best candidate in my party (who's in love with the idea) happens to be the rogue. He therefore knows about the ladder (which I removed anyway since it didn't make sense, as has been beaten to death on this board) and the fake door. What about the dopplegangers in the cells? What about the invisible stalkers? I've considered allowing a Reflex save on the door trap (complete with an unmentioned bonus since he knows it's there) and maybe a hand signal that he can slip to the stalkers, but I'm open to some input.

Has anyone actually taken the time to look at how overpowered all of the magic items in this book are? The Belt of Magnificence gives +2, +4 or +6 to all abilities and the weapons all seem to apply special critical effects to opponents that aren't affected by crits.

OK, so I've never really looked at the math behind advancing monsters before, so I'm sure this is simple and I'm just incompetent.

MM has an Otyugh's abilities as
Str 11 Dex 10 Con 13 Int 5 Wis 12 Cha 6

By my math, the racial modifiers for an Otyugh are
+2 CON and WIS(?)
-4 CHA
-6 INT

The abilities of the Advanced Otyugh is the Lizard Man lair are
Str 14 Dex 14 Con 17 Int 5 Wis 14 Cha 4

The Int 5 means that the base was an 11, but there's no 11 in the elite array. All of the other abilities work out, but the only way I can come up with a 5 Int using the elite array for this thing is if the base was 10 and it added to it's Intelligence when it got the "freebie" ability point at 8HD (which seems odd).

Again, it's certainly workable and the abilities aren't a big deal but I've never really messed with advancing/advanced monsters before and I wantto make sure I'm understanding it before I get into some of the crazies in the higher level adventures.

Thanks!

If any DMs out there have a monk in the group kill the character at a low level...it gets outta hand fast.

Here are the latest debates that came up while my party's uber-monk grappled every opponent that they came across...

#1.) can a pinned opponent use a breath weapon?
#2.) can Flurry of Blows be used to make four grapple/pin attempts?
#3.) if a pinned/grappled opponent has multiple natural attacks, do they get an attempt to break the grapple/pin for each? If so, do they retain any remaining attacks after successfully breaking the grapple? For example, if somebody grapples a dragon (6 natural attacks) does the dragon get six attempts to break it? If the dragon does so on the second attack, can it make its remaining attacks?

Yes, the monk grappled a dragon...as well as a pyrohydra and a cloud giant to name a few. Someone really should look at the sort of chaos that can be wrought with these newfangled v3.5 rules.

I probably care too much about a minor point (or three)

I know that the Spawn stats in the MMII are 3.0, but are all of the differences between those and the stats in EBK from the conversion process, or are the ones in EBK wrong?

Specifically...
1.) the addition of Weapon Focus (slam) and the corresponding +1 to hit
2.) different Hide, Jump and Move Silently numbers

Also, why do they have a Base Attack of +1 and a +6 grapple? Shouldn't the base attack be +2 (4HD)? If the BA is +1 then shouldn't the slam attack be +5 (as opposed to +6)?

Again, I just want to make sure I'm not missing anything. Sadly, I've got a number-crunching, metagaming, rules lawyer in my party and on more than once occasion he's dissected creature's ACs and whatnot to determine where all of the modifiers are coming from and verify them.

Thanks

I don't know why I'm letting this bug me as much as it is...but it is.

Has anybody taken a good look at Allustan's skills (Encounter at Blackwall Keep, reiterated in Gathering of Winds)? By my math he has 73 skill points. Knock off 11 of those points for bieng an 8th level human (4 at 1st + 1 for the next 7) leaving 62 points. None of the schemes I've tried add up to those 62 points. If he had an 18 INT all along, that would give him 66; if he had a 17 originally and added the 18th point at 4th level, that would give him 60.

Obviously, it's not a big issue. It's both easy to fix and unlikely to matter. I'm more worried that I'm doing something wrong or missing something.

I've got two questions about the higher levels of cleaving.

With Greater Cleave, a character can make unlimited cleaves; would this also apply to the various attacks? If a character has three attacks in a round, drops a foe on his first attack, cleaves, makes his second attack and drops that foe, can he then cleave again assuming he can reack any enemy?

Secondly, can a character make a five foot step using Supreme Cleave if they've already made a five foot step in that round? On a related note, are they limited to only one five foot step between cleaving attacks?

These crazy fighter feats give me headaches once the players start getting uber-powerful.

Anyone wonder how they came up with the handful of prestige classes that a paladin can take and still be able to progress as a Paladin? They all seem to fit the classic paladin (like the Hospitaler), but I'm wondering how some others didn't make the cut - like the Divine Crusader, Pious Templar and Shining Blade. Just a random observation because I was bored.

Having worked for years in retail and then in a support role, I know the cardinal rule: only the people who are unhappy will say anything.

I just wanted to post this note to give you guys a break from all of the complaints and problems. Although you certainly need to be made aware of such things so that they can be corrected, this post is to let everybody looking through these posts know that I got everything I ordered a few days earlier than I was expecting.

Thanks - job well done!

So my group's resident munchkin ran out to gobble up this book as soon as it hit the stores (I think he offered to drive in the shipment for them from the distributor). Has anyone taken a look at the dragonborn? This seems really out of whack. Admittedly, he made it up yesterday for a one-shot side trek adventure while I make time to prep the next adventure for the "real" characters, so I didn't look at it too in-depth.

Am I the only one who thinks that a character with a breath weapon, increased abilities and various resistances should have some sort of level adjustment?! Personally, I don't like the race in the first place, but there are plenty of races and classes that I dislike but allow because they're at least somewhat balanced. This one just seems to be over the top...why the hell WOULDN'T you take it?

I'm sure this is an easy one. I never really played much with 3.0 and have only been at it with 3.5 for a few months (I went on a long hiatus during 2.0). I just received a bunch of back issues of Dungeon that I want to work into my campaign but I can't always spot the differences between 3.0 and 3.5. Can anyone tell me at what point (which issue) do the adventures become 3.5?

Thanks

In earlier editions of the game I seem to recall that a cleric's choice of greater/lesser gods as patron diety affected the level of spells that the cleric could learn. Does this still hold true?

Also, are there any "hard and fast" rules for a cleric changing dieties due to some crisis of faith and/or alignment change? I have a high level cleric who "lost the faith" through some good roleplaying and wants to change dieties - I like the sincerity of the character, but I wonder how badly should I penalize them?

Unlike Toughness (which the book says stacks), Improved Toughness gives the character bonus hit points at each level. Would the effects of multiple Improved Toughness feats stack? The book doesn't say one way or the other, but allowing a potentially limitless number of extra hit points at each level seems high.

My group was up in arms (no pun intended) about the lack of magic weapons in the AP. After a near TPK (saved only by some generous interpretation of the rules by yours truly) at the hands of the Ebon Aspect, they pointed out that the AP pits them against a creature with DR 5/magic (as well as some respectable armor classes along the way) and the group has a +1 short sword between them. Has anybody else had problems with this?

OK, the Erythnul caves are considered difficult terrain (1/2 movement). The setup for the caves states that the grimlocks move with ease as they are accustomed to the caves. Did anyone take this to mean they moved normally?

OK, I think I must be doing something wrong. I see tons of threads talking about how deadly the AP is proving to overpowered (or, at least, overmanned) groups. My group consists of four characters (admittedly, some power gamer/munchkins are afoot). We're a little over halfway through 3FoE and have had one fatality...and he wanted to die so he could make a new character. We had a close call with the wolves in the Whispering Cairn (strangely enough) and they got a good fight from the Hextorites in 3FoE, but that's been it. Even the kenku in Dourstone never had them in any sort of danger (although I did manage to get them a bit paranoid). Here's hoping the Faceless One can teach them some respect...he at least has advanced warning.

One of my characters wants to start forging his own arms and armor. I can't find any numbers on how much a small forge would cost, though. Any thoughts? Is it out there someplace?

Thx

...or perhaps the same ones again.

I think one of these has been answered already, but I can't find it so let start by apologizing for the repost.

I'm prepping 3FoE (we finally finished WC) and haven't been able to decide how to address these two issues.

#1. the commoners - I believe we decided that there are 9 (technically 7-9, but my group is a bit overpowered, I fear, so it's 9); did we ever decide why they are proficient with two weaps? Also, they are listed as lvl 1, but their BA and skills seem to indicate lvl 2; should I lose the BA, or make them lvl 2 (if they're level 2, what does thay do to their CR?)

#2. the clerics - so it's been established that they should not have heavy flails and shields, since the dmg listed is for light flails, did everyone make that change or did you adjust the damage and lose the shields?

Thx

In the grand scheme of things this is minor, I'm just looking for proof that I can still read.

In the boxed description of the egg chamber, there's a reference to three chests on the other side of the chamber (toward the tunnel). I can't find any other reference to them or their contents.

The text states that the lower sections are completely submerged, yet the characters only encounter water halfway down the steps to Area 19. The steps appear to go down about 10', which leads me to believe that the water is about 5' deep. Am I missing something?

Also, if those rooms are completely submerged, there's no way in hell a character could hold their breath the whole time or come up for air (without retreating back to the steps). How have your groups gotten through it? Am I completely off?