Marcovic's page

After four years playing this campaign (including an add-on between module 4 and 5, On the siberian line), with some breaks, on and off, I'm finally prepping for my last session. We played on fantasy ground the whole time (we started in april 2020, so in-person was a big no-no). For the final game, I'm going full analog, with physical map, paper minis for monsters, actual custom miniatures for the PCs, beer and pizza. Going for a marathon of the fift chapter, to get Elvanna.

It was a fun ride, but i'm happy to wrap this up.

Looking forward to play again, as we move forward to PF2 for our next campaign.

in maiden mother crone, I did put a group of Iriseni camping at the base of the statues, trying to get in but met their fate when the party found them. Nazheena could be leading them, trying to prove her value to Elvanna's eyes.

in frozen star, I did put a simulactrum of Elvanna in the room with the final boss dragon. As a kind of Wyrmtongue, counseiling him. You could do it with Nazheena, escaping through a portal when the party enters the room.

In final module, in the fourth chapter, there is a squadron of iriseni that is found dead in the basement, you could tweak it a bit so they are close to die, but made a kind of little fort for a last stand.

Book 4 is totally fine and fun, it's just the one that feels the most disconnected.

The integration of siberian line is a perfect fit. It grounds the adventure even more in reality than just doing book 5, improves on the military aspect, makes russia feel larger, introduces the most lovable NPC of the AP (well, except Nadya).

DO NOT miss this opportunity ;)

Book 3 was so incredibly long. I had all the three maps fused in one giant map to seamlessly move from one dungeon to the other so it was really long until they realised that they were moving from one to the other. At some point they had done like 2/3 of the adventure but thought that they were like at the end of the first dungeon of three. In retrospect it was a very bad idea, since the players thought it was too long and dragging on.

It's still full of interesting lore. So run the adventure, but be sure that your group understands how far they are in their progression.

Book 4 is really disconnected from the rest of the adventure path. The final dungeon is very cool and a nice boss fight, and the siege is nice too.

Just as warped Savant said, On the siberian line is a freakin masterpiece and fits perfectly between book 4 and 5. (I asked my players if they wanted to do a nice sidequest that would suspend XP progression, everyone agreed and everybody enjoyed the adventure).

However, adding on the siberian line makes this AP a 7 modules adventure, which is getting long. Maybe shorten book 4, so it doesn't feels stretched.

Is it me or the Catoblepas is a kinda lame representation of Baba Yaga's fate? Seems thematicaly weak to me. Maybe I juste didn't get the idea

Does anybody has any idea of another monster/encounter I could use instead of the Catoblepas (kinda same CR)

Thanks guys

We are getting close to the Akuvskaya prison camp and it's no-man's-land after a side stroll in the excellent "On the siberian line" module.

How have you played the no-man's-land? My players might just fly over it, but i'd like to prepare something, just in case. Did you do a theater of the mind encounter with the tanks? A kind of skill gauntlet for the barbed wires and trenches? Drew a huge battle map?

I'm thinking a gauntlet of mini-encounters mostly centered around skills, but i'd like suggestions. (party of fighter(archer), wiz, barb/ranger and oracle)

There is a Geas/quest effect to keep the story progress. I did not put that in play, personally.

There is no +1 for one minute

Finally got to book 5. The players got out of the hut at the end of last night's session. And they are starting On siberian line. You were right, this module is awesome! I'm gonna Keep the book5 first encounter in the village and move the plane fight between the end of siberian line and the prison camp, where the players will have a little wilderness intermission.

Thanks for the advise, the module looks great and helps a lot to ground "earth" in reality, since book5 goes almost immediately "Full fantasy mode" after the village fight.

That is exactly how a see it.

A long and wide vertical chimney carved by melting glacier water. At the botom lies a slab of pale stone and on top of it sits a giant carved block of ice, ivorystone.

Wow, thanks for the input. I'm about to start book 4 (one of our other players runs mummy's mask, and we alternate books) . Really intrigued about "on siberian line".

Can yous expose a bit of the quest and how you inserted it in the RoW timeline?

SO....

I went with Serum's idea of mini-worldwound. When they got to the antechamber, Giants had placed a barricade there and stood guard. Well, after a very hard fight and near TPK, they managed to crack open the door of the eon pit room without being noticed. They saw that a large group of dretches was grouping around two andrazkus fighting in a kind of fight-club arena, and they saw a Vrock emerge from the pit.

Thinking they were outmatched and without ressources. they decided to backup to find a place to rest. and they did. In the birthing stone room. In the morning, they decided to try a route the hadn't explored yet, and so, they got to the Bebilith room.

As soon they realised what was there, and a couple natural 20s on checks, they convinced the Bebilith to join in their hunt for a delicious and tender Nalfeshnee.

Meanwhile, Vsevolod realised his giant guard had been defeated and planned a strike-back.

I ruled that dhe croning riatual was completely deactivated after the party passed it, and so we had the most EPIC Ludicrous Charge of PC lead by a Bebilith through the corridors of Artrosa, against waves of lowCR demons until thy reached the eon pit room. Realizing there was no Nalfeshnee. the end fight was a 3 faction mexican standoff between an injured Bebilith, team centaurs (Vsevolod and svathurim) and the PC. It was the best showdown I ever had in a game and I don't see how i can top that in the future modules.

I'm no russian, and not a scholar on the subject so this answer might be bullshit.

Siberia is a really long way from Moscow. So if your character is a siberian native, he might be closer culturally and ethnically to mongolians or northern chineses. In '18, all the perks of modernity might not be easily available and some ethnies are still nomadic, herding reindeers and fishing.

Maybe the arrival of WW1-era troops is seen as kind of invaders by local, traditional people.

In PC build terms, Shamanism is still a minor but real practice in siberia. So other options might be shaman, ranger, skald (with a different flavor), hunter or slayer.

Indeed, a wizard or a board and shield paladin might need a bit of justification

Serum,
How did it go? did all of your ideas, worked as intended? any advices? I intend to copy some of your ideas, especially the mini world wound. I will probably keep the Svathurim, though

Some brainstorming material.
- Prove yourself by doing an assassination on a cruel jail warden or guard officer.
- Some kind of RP ritual where the character must atone some sins in his past. Can be good for background and character building (ike that time you snitched to the government, or the time you passed your way when someone needed help)
- do a series of low pay tasks like brooming the shrine, or handing out food at the orphanage. "you can play guerilla when we trust you enough".

For the ring, I ruled that removing a cursed item destroys it. Everybody went along. They understood that it's not the kind of money they are supposed to have available at their lvl, and it was a narrative device.

For the skill challenge, it's the correct post:

First, spellcraft DC 15 (aid another possible) to understand how the ritual works

After that:

Player 1: repeat an incantation: Concentration check DC 12 every turn to lower the globe and maintain it at ground level. If he fails, player 2 is ejected and everything must be restated from the start.

Player 2:
round 1: UMD DC 15. project his conciousness in the globe
round 2: "you feel your mind leave your body, your astral self seems to go higher and higher, enough to see all of Golarion. You can easily discern a vast network of telluric lines linking Irrisen to almost every region of Avistan, Garund and Casmaron." Knowledge Geography DC 17 to identify the line linking Heldren and Waldsby.
round 3: UMD DC18: severe the link between the two portals
Every failed check during the "astral projection" results in 1D6 cold damage and must restart from round 1.

Meanwhile, as soon as the globe is lowered, a Waterfiend is summoned and tries to reach player 1. Player 3 and 4 must prevent it from reaching player 1.If ritual is interupted (failed check) the creature is unsummoned et re-summonned when the ritual restarts

I made my DCs to reflect my characters strengths and weaknesses, it's really not build as an objective encounter. Our wizard had good UMD and a single point in geography (+7 modifier).

- After the group told Nadya about Thora, she asked them some time alone with the kids to explain them. So we split the party. 1 went to buy some wood for the kitchen. the guy at the lumbermill tried to extort him. he finally found some at the general store. The wizard wanted to scribe some scrolls, sot he went to the inn. (I made him play the inhospitable host encounter, which i made a little easier). The druid wnet to the communal stable, with the old cow that doesn't produce milk. He met the dvomovoi (or something like that) and they decided to go with a summon nature's ally (bull) to put a veal in that cow, kickstarting milk production in a couple months. really funny moment.

when the 3 events came to an end, it started secreaming outside. 3 wild boars that went through the portal from Heldren were scared and making a mess in the central place. Had a fight and the blacksmith helped them. they became friends, gave them his magic shield and next step was next morning.

after the search and seizure encounter, the rest of the village was called for a public execution. 'Highly illegal' Alchemist's fires were "found" at the blacksmith's place. the party showed up, and right before they imolated the blacksmith with his "own" alchemist fires, battle erupted. after they killed the guards, it was now inevitable for them to go straight for the tower.

- Placed the actual ghost of the wife in the burned house. not a monster, just an apparition. The old woman taking care of Nadya's childrens told them the story. made a little ritual to put her soul to rest.

- For the correspondence, it was Elvanna requesting Nazhenna's presence to take care of the situation in the merchant's quarter. It was of most importance that the hut remained in their possession so that Elvanna and her brother's plan come to term. letter is originally in french so i just google translated it

- the zoom call was already going on when they entered radhosek's room, it was pretty much just an angry BBEG calling her apprentice stupid for letting the heroes reach that point and then leaving with an evil laugh

- the zoom call occured the day after they killed the rimepelt winterwolf. She was simply furious that she was victim of a 'home invasion' that resulted in the death of her apprentice. She wanted revenge and promised them a painful death. As for the party, the wizard was calm and investigative, the fighter and the druid were teasing her.

Also, I removed some encounters in the howlings. It seemed to me that they slowed the pace. The players have wait for months to reach whitethrone, and adding some drunk winter wolves felt like just delaying.

Also, it seemed to me that was the most eventful city block of the universe, with 6 encounters on 3 streets. I kept the running slave and the drunk winter wolves for later, and even then, my players felt it was overcrowded.

We are between book 2 and 3, but so far:

-Weather rules are brutal. It's a great narrative device, but it can turn an interesting challenge in an impossible trial, especially early lvl. I downplayed it a bit. Except for the teb knotten fight. The blizzard really increases the tension.

- I foreshadowed Rasputin, which is a way more interesting nemesis than Elvanna. Elvanna is Still the BBEG, but rasputin is more the grima wormtongue, and I added some refferences in correspondances i planted between elvanna and Nazhenna. The reference to "her brother" took the attention of my players, since all known children of Baba Yaga are supposed to be female.

- my players wanted to stay a couple days in Waldsby before the tower, so I added a few events in the village, to increase se oppression the irriseni suffer from the white witches.

- I changed the scenario quite a bit before Logrovich tower. I started with the Richard Pitt suggestion here:

- Speaking of Logrovich, made him juvenile, and large. It's not the proper way to modify his stats, but no dragon should ever be the size of a dwarf. It is known.

- Gretta is the coolest thing to ever happen, and i think that if you keep her along, you can use her to relativize the notions of good/evil. which I think will be important when we will be getting closer to Baba Yaga.Greta is evil, but she can change, and it's not because that she is evil thatshe is like an incarnation of Zon-Kuthon himself. I play her kinda selfish, unfmerciful, but very loyal and with a lot of humor. My characters like her.

- made may characters interact with Nazhenna a bit before the final confrontation in front of the hut. She was on a zoom call when they entered the top of the tower, and they had a "call" on thora's mirror eye (which they kept). They are now ultra paranoid about mirrors and ravens.

- my players really enjoyed the "skill challenge" to shut down the Heldren Portal. I talked about it in the Snows of summer forum last week.

What OoC reason did you tell your players that the other portals can't be closed using the globe?

As suggested by another GM on the forum, I modified the globe to be an encounter. A kind of skill challenge (DND4e). So, a player had to make incantations (concentration check) each turn to lower the globe and keep it ground level while another one projects his conciousness in the globe to severe the link between the globe and the portal (several UMD check, and a geography check to identify the proper ley line to cut). Meanwhile, the other two characters must fight summoned guardians trying to kill the "spellcraft character".

OoC reason, is that each portal is linked with a specific globe, acting as a control center. Each globe maintains a single portal active, even though you can see all the other links. So, the alternative to continue the AP as intended is to travel Irrisen to each globe, fight it's guardian and deactivate them individually... not really feasible.

My players are cool though, they are concious this is an AP, so if the NPC (In this case the Black Rider) tells them they need to steal the dancing hut, they will play along.

When the group gets to Waldsby why do they hang around there for a few days before heading to the Pale Tower?

first to heal and rest. then, I'm pretty sure any wizard would like some time to scribe some scrolls, which takes some time. Also, you could stall them by making ressource scarce, so they need to wait a couple days so a caravan could bring some rations and/or equipment to town. It's pretty much their first hub of the AP, where they can sell and buy stuff, they might want some time off. Worst case scenario, they are not forced to hang around. they rest, then they go to the tower.

I understand what you mean, and I had the same fear. I tweaked a couple things to make sure my players feel some empathy for the people of irrisen. First I added some friendlier NPC, They had a few encounters with the local blacksmith and they eventualy asked him to join the group to Whitethrone as a DMPC (which I refused... Nadya is enough for me to manage). It made my players grow empathy for the people or irrisen.

And most of all, I made it very clear that even though life have never been great in the past for Irriseni, Elvanna is one bad b$%%#. You can tell that things are different when they mention that control is more strict since the martial law. I try to give them the idea that even if it will not turn to an eden, getting rid of Elvanna is a really good improvement for irrisenis.

I did the pocket of summer yesterday and it went incredibly well. I did foreshadow a huge storm in the comming days. And when they got to the pocket they got suspicious. They still elected to stay in the pocket for a couple of days, until the storm passes.

It was perfect for me.

after 2 days, they started to get comfortable and then I went with the blowing leaves. they went to investigate this mystery, and after a small search/survival encounter, they eventualy found the cavern where the hag was torturing the druid. It was accompanied with a small troop of snow hobgoblins.

Was a near TPK (that's when the barb realized he didn't really have a ring of regen :) ). After they rescued the druid, He recognized the weapon of legacy our druid found in the pale tower. He identified it and narrated a story about it (a triumvirat of a druid, a treant and a dryad who defended a forest, and they failed to prevent a war against mining dwarves). I explained the mecanic of weapons of legacy, and now our druid's player is preparing a RP ritual for the next session, on the theme of a personnal failure that made other people suffer . I asked to include a new part of the character's background to share with the party.

It should be a nice RP moment.

And now all my player want one of those personnal events. Everybody reeeealy enjoyed this session. Me too, and I'm very glad

Good idea, thank you! I think i'll integrate it from the megaloceros encounter or while they search for it.

My players just finished SoS and I'm setting up a little side quest for the druid. In the pale tower's conservatory, they found a legacy weapon (a magic staff with unlockable abilities, from old 3.5 stuff). The party still doesn't know anything about it yet, just that there's something weird but unidentifiable about it.

One of druids of the local circle responsible for the pocket will be left behind to "upkeep" the spell. However, the white witch found out and they sent a hag (don't know what kind yet, probably an Annis hag) to investigate.

When the party gets into the pocket of summer, they will eventually spot some smoke comming out of a small cavern. If they investigate (I bet they will), they will find the Hag torturing the druid to get infos about the circle.

I tought to fill the cavern with smoke (Fortitude save + concealment), but maybe another gimmick could be interesting to spike the encounter a bit. Any ideas?

As a reward for the encounter, the druid will fill the party with some lore and infos about the legacy weapon, so he can make the first ritual.

I'm running a Reign of Winter campaign.

After killing the first "boss", the leader of a band of bandits, they found a caged fey in his stuff. At this point of the campaign, winter-touched feys are pretty much supposed to be the origin af all the trouble in the region.

The fey is swearing and insulting them all the time of the discussion to know if they will free it or kill it.

after a couple of minutes of arguing, the ranger simply kicked the cage in the fireplace. Problem solved.

In the end, it didn't really have much impact in the campaign. It offered a good occasion for the players to define a bit more their character and know the other characters of their group, though.

So, Have you set your mind?

On my side, I settled for custom made painted miniatures of their characters. My group and I have been playing together for 15+ years now, on and off. We now play online (FGU) But we all have our individual bookcase with our RPG history (books, old sets of dices and various baubles. Tought it might be a nice memento

Seems to me that the back-alley boys is a HUUUUUUGE missed opportunity. Why aren't they five? and why does none of them is a bard, with perform (dance)?

Anyway, I changed the encounter in my game. Because...... I want it that way!

Kept the curse as well. Barbarian got cursed. They removed it with the scroll, only to get cursed again immediately after that with the ring. the group haven't realised it yet. and I'm looking forward the next encounter.

the outcome is not a bad thing for me either. Our Barb is a real bag of HP, and it might help me create a greater feeling of risk on their way to whitethrone.

Really great idea! made me think about doing the same. I especially like the dice bag. nice souvenir and useful!

- I don't know where you live, but a piece of winter cloth could be nice (mittens, a scarf or hat)
- stylized drinking glasses. could be a cool artefact for future games, if players around the table tend to change. ("See, I was part of the RoW group")
- If players are also DMing, a custom winter- themed DM screen.