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Thanks for the feedback. We ran a session, probably the last outside Harrowstone, and they straight mashed a CR 3 encounter. Gonna have to keep that difficulty turned up to 11.

I had thought I’d figured out how to run Father Charlatan interestingly (remote so as written isn’t an option), but I really like the idea of making him an Allip. There are enough haunts I do think it’d be fun to really get to fight another 1 of the 5, and I can run him optimally without risking character death in a semi-contrived situation.

I'm running a new CC campaign and am about to head into our fourth session (about 3 hours apiece, playing remotely over Roll20, pace moves fairly slowly). Thus far it's been very little combat and a lot of roleplay between the players/Kendra/handful of the townsfolk I'm featuring.

My group consists of:

Human Paladin (Undead Scourge)
Human Magus (modified staff magus archetype)
Dhampir Inquisitor (Kinslayer)
Aasimar Cleric (Gozreh)
Human Bard/Brawler (playing a Jekyll and Hyde character with two sheets - randomly switches between the LG Bard and CE Brawler based on a die roll once per session or when I say so for plot funsies)

As we get into Harrowstone proper and going forward I'm concerned about how to make combats fun and challenging (I want the very real threat of character death). My group rolled ability scores and one player (the Bard/Brawler) rolled absolute rocks, which is part of why I was OK with the Jekyll/Hyde setup which will nerf the character some. Paladin and Magus rolled around 20-25 point buys so I didn't feel the need to do anything special. The Dhampir and Aasimar rolled 10-15 point buys so I allowed them access to advanced races.

Group has 2 experienced players, one with some reasonable experience, and 2 newbies. All but one player built fairly optimized characters, and the one who didn't is the cleric so they ought to still be pretty effective in this Book.

TLDR - I have a party of 5 pretty optimized characters averaging around a 25-30 point ability score buy. My current plan is to use max hit points for all enemies, and add additional enemies to most multiple baddy encounters. Haunts I think are tricky enough not to need tweaking. Does this sound about right? Asking up front because my brain likes the idea of applying this consistently across the Book rather than, say, yes for the Lopper but no for the Splatter Man.

Thanks by the way to all the other great tips I've gotten from this forum.

I'm afraid I've been running this AP in 2e, so I don't know what the difficulty curve will look like for a 1e party of any number. That said, any solo boss you're worried about getting out-economied too badly can always have a few low level minions added to their room to sponge up damage and actions. The final boss of the AP is actually such a fight where I've seen this recommended. I can't remember if Vrood's minions were written in his fight but I know I ran him with something.

Much appreciated on the responses. One other issue I'm running into having read and re-read Harrowstone a few times - I don't see how the PCs are reasonably going to get into the Property Room (and then the hidden vault) as written before they acquire the Warden's keys. The group doesn't have a Rogue, so even if the Inquisitor or someone else takes Disable Device they won't be able to hit the 30 DC. I guess they might spend the time to break down the door if I really emphasize the importance of the items through Vesorianna?

Otherwise I think it's most likely they would only be able to get the items right before they face Splatter, which will not only make the encounters much harder but removes the potential fun of the cursed items and trying to figure out what each does.

My current plan is to start by just emphasizing the importance of the items and see if they figure out how to break down the door (or go buy a Knock spell in town). Just wanted to make sure I'm not missing some other obvious way they can get in there?

By default I believe the name Auren Vrood is first revealed to the party in Ascanor, since some of the staff there heard and saw him enter the lodge and meet with Estovion. It shouldn't hurt (and might improve) the party's reaction to this by inserting his name in the end of TotB, perhaps learned from Caromarc after freeing him. I like the idea that the party has their suspicions of AA diverted to broody Vroody only for it to be revealed that he was working for a bigger boss.

As for Lorrimor, if he knows Adivion, he may know or suspect too much, but I like the idea of him lingering as a spirit in book 1. The cure for him knowing too much of course is death amnesia--perhaps he only remembers general things that would be lot relevant

Thanks for the tip on when Auren Vrood first gets named - I've read through TotB but no further yet. Definitely going to have Caromarc know his name so they get it earlier and are linking him to the letters they'll be getting.

Question on difficulty in general: I'm pretty confident in how to tweak encounters to party strength. My group has 5: Bard/Brawler multiclass (long story); Undead Scourge Paladin; Dhampir Inquisitor; Aasimar Cleric; Magus (we rolled ability scores and the Dhampir/Aasimar rolled shit so I gave them leave to use advanced races). Generally speaking the party is well set up to handle the haunts/ghosts - I have read a few places that Undead Scourge is almost too optimized for this AP, but I think between him focusing on Greatsword vs. skelly's slashing DR and the Lopper/Splatter/other incorporeals there are enough encounters where others will outshine the Paladin. I'm thinking I'll use max HP for most monsters but not planning on further modifications yet, but this is my first group with more than 3-4 players so a little worried the action economy is going to ruin single enemy boss fights?

First of all want to thank this board for a whole bunch of great ideas. I'm running HoH (just had our first session) after a long time away from GM-ing and this has been an awesome resource. I did want to see if anyone had ideas/recommendations for a few thoughts I had that aren't exactly covered here:

As background, things I've adopted (stolen) or plan to:
- Adivion present at the funeral (my PCs were immediately wildly suspicious of him)
- Local ordinance prohibiting anyone from going to Harrowstone to encourage exploring the town (if they break it they'll get tossed in jail for a night, create some tension with the Sheriff)
- Letters from "A" (ideally I want them to suspect Adivion for the first two books, but slowly learn about Vrood; then end of TotB Adivion fakes his own death and they spend book 3 chasing Auren Vrood before a big Adivion reveal once Vrood is killed)

Two things I'm working on related to the above:
1. I want them to slowly learn about Vrood and ideally learn his first name starts with "A" at or near the end of TotB. I was trying to think of a way to have Vrood be involved in the story (similar to how I plan to have Adivion be hosting them/around in Lepistadt) but he doesn't seem an easy/plausible character to have playing say, some guy trying to date Kendra. Just drop clues about his name probably?
2. I like the idea that Professor Lorrimor's ghost has become a rapping spirit in his old study in the house. Can't leave until Kendra is safe. I might have him continue to follow the party in various forms to other books (makes sense for Lepistadt at least), and ideally the PCs could use the Planchette to learn about Vrood and eventually get his name. My one concern is if the Professor would naturally have too much information to give the PCs access to?