Ambusher

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Thanks for the tip on Chapter 3. Yeah there are cool moments like when all the mages are summoned, but a bunch of repetitive fights against unimaginative enemies? Yeah, that's going to get reworked.

Ooh! I got it!
Chapter one stays as is, with the exception of the ceremony.

Cut out Chapter 2, and put in something similar right before the final boss fight.

Replace some of the Wereants in Chapter 3 with further Unshadowed NPCs the players have met.

After the Larva is trapped by the magical net, Jatembe gives the PCs Bunta, his magical soul boat. They go into the larva's soul, free everyone's shadows, and then fight the 3 bosses after they're ejected.
PCs are named the magic warriors; The End.
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With all that, the players aren't just stopping a Kaiju with 10th-level spells, they're also stopping a hive-mind of powerful spellcasters. Seems like an appropriate 6th book threat.


Flambe wrote:
I have a question about the centipede carcasses trap in chapter 3. The trap is described as being three trapped carcasses. Does the hazard cause a reflex save for each carcass that hasn't been disabled OR does the trap just cause one reflex save if any of the carcasses haven't been disabled?

From the paragraph before the trap's statblock on page 50:

"...Multiple traps don’t do any more damage to people in the room than just one trap—a character can be hit by only so many sharpened centipede legs each turn—but all three traps need to be disarmed or expended before the room is safe."

This implies that, even if range of multiple traps, the PC only needs to roll a single save.


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I get that, but without any narrative reason that explains the tiny world, I'm worried my players will feel less like they're heros of a classic fable, and more like they're on a Wonderland drug trip, complete with a talking cat and a red queen.


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Not really, no. The closest *might* be Onyiji from book 3, but only because she's arrogant and challenges a PC to spar with her. Of course, you can play any NPC however you want, or even make one up to fit the role.

Bullying would go against the Magaambya's purpose of doing the most good it can in the world. Any instance of it would probably lead to intervention/academic suspension, if not straight-up expulsion.


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Am I missing something? How did KoBA accidentally make a Macguffin fit for book 6? He left some ants behind when he was defeated by Jatemebe, and they somehow, without further guidance, created an egg that is powerful enough to twist fate, steal shadows, create a surreal fairyland, and birth a Kaiju? I assume he didn't do all of this on purpose, otherwise we'd see him have more Vesicant Eggs hidden elsewhere.

And the Vesicant Guardian thing at the end comes out of nowhere, no references or hints beforehand.

In all honesty, Book 6 feels like it's a mess/missing something. Was there a plot thread that was dropped during production? Was the Egg originally created by something else? There's no reason the egg should be powerful enough to make a Book 6 boss. In fact, let's look at wheat the PCs accomplish each book.

Book 1: Save the School
Book 2: Save the Town
Book 3: Save a region of the Sodden Land from a marauding cult.
Book 4: Stop Mazli from becoming an evil conquering empire/ help a god ascend/ find a mythical city.
Book 5: Save another PLANET from one of Jatembe's biggest foes, and bring the Old Mage back to Golarion.
Book 6: Save the school/town again?

Book 6 should have been the epic capstone to this adventure, make the players feel like the Warriors of old. Instead they get a whimsical fairyland adventure before fighting KoBA's final form.

So what am I missing? If I'm not missing anything, how can I make the Egg seem a bigger threat than KoBA's soul cannons were? How can I make Book 6 as epic as the books leading up to it?


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Have a death in your game? Manage a TPK?
Where and when?

Book 2 Chapter 1:
Got one PC in the Mpeshi fight.
- The aoe reaction to falling did the Investigator in.
Got two PCs in the Coil Spy fight.
- Bard and Barbarian both went down while suffering poison.


Ngodrup wrote:

How long is the book supposed to take, in-game? I had assumed it was fairly flexible and somewhat "at the speed of plot", but the students get 4gp at the start of every month from Xhokan (page 16), and with the rules requirements for wealth by level / appropriate treasure rewards, this makes me feel like it's supposed to be a specific number of months? Or am I overthinking it?

RAW and RAI and whatever else you want to offer all accepted as responses, please help me with this :)

I'm pacing thevame so it takes place over the course of 1 year.

Two main reasons:

One, it's stated in LOME that it usually takes initiates ”5 seasons" before they become an attendant/receive their masks. The PCs should be able to do this in a shorter amount of time, they're the heroes, after all.

Two, the Nantambu calendar is broken up so that each season has 3 months of 28 days and a extra week of feasting/celebrating to mark the solstices/equinoxes. This also provides a good way to break up the study checks/encounters in chapter 2; 4 study checks paired with 4 "meet the teachers" events brings us around to the players having the masking ceremony right around the time they entered the school a year ago.

Looking at Book 2, I'm going to keep that pacing. 4 semesters will get you through all the conservant tasks. I think I'll aim for 1 year a book, it makes it easy to keep track of the timeline/events for my notes.


Probably any of the Lore skills mentioned in the players guide (Academia Lore Magaambya Lore, Nantambu Lore, Mzali Lore, Insect Lore, Jungle/Forest Lore).

As for other ideas, Folktale Lore could grant them insight into what's going on around them, and you could even quote the stories and lore from the books. Maybe they'll know stories about how Jatambe once fought an evil sorcerer, and banished him from Golarion?

Speaking of Jatambe, Jatambe Lore could be useful. It kind of overlaps with Magaambya Lore, but I think it's distinct enough to fulfill a different role.

Maybe Osibu Lore. The character could have grown up hearing legends of the hidden city, and perhaps they somehow tapped into the powers/mind of the great Dimari-Diji.


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So despite how culturally significant masks are at the Magaambya, we see surprisingly few examples of this in the books so far. Sure there's the masking ceremony, which I admit is a pretty big thing, but outside of that event there's little to no mention of them at all. Book 2 only uses the word mask twice!

Page 43 of Kindled Magic says this, with regards to how important an initiate's choice of mask is:
"They’ll be known according to the appearance of their mask for the rest of their career at the Magaambya."

Takulu's statblock mentions he has an anteater mask, but no other NPC has theirs specified. We get no indication he ever wears it; in fact the only NPC we see wearing a mask is a nameless attendant during the Starday Tournament.

I get that it's up to the GM to fill in the blanks, but it still feels like it's something that got glossed over. I wish there were more 'show, don't tell' examples, but I understand that space is at a premium in the AP books.

Rambling aside, I guess I made this thread so people could share any ideas/plans for NPC masks, as well as suggestions for highlighting the significance of masks to the players.


I'm having my players start right after Nantambu's Autumn Feast, and I'm planning on blocking downtime into 3 month chunks, for each of the seasons.

Chapter 2 has four "Meet the Teachers" encounters, so I'm planning on doing one per season. It normally takes an initiate 5 seasons to complete their perquisite and gain their mask, so the players doing it in four is realistic, but also noteworthy. They *are* heroes, after all.

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What I want to figure out, is how long a Magaambya semester should be. Using the classical definition, it is 6 months, but the more common usage is ~3-4 months. With the way the local calendar is, I can't imagine them breaking the year into 4 month chunks, so I guess the school either has two semesters a year, or four.


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Ron Lundeen wrote:


That's a reference to the fact that each adventure gives express opportunities to use this system, with the "down time" built in to apply it.

I got a clarification elsewhere, but I think it's a good idea to post it here too.


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Ron Lundeen wrote:


That's a reference to the fact that each adventure gives express opportunities to use this system, with the "down time" built in to apply it.

Ah. That's too bad, I was hoping it would give me a good sense for pacing, like how long semesters are and if there are any breaks. I guess that's up to GMs to decide.

Thanks for the clarification, by the way.


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Also, on an unrelated note, I created a quick and dirty graphic to help out my players with regards to teacher and student branch affiliations:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/819586479516811285/88242012536035741 6/Teachers_and_Student_Branches.png
Posting it here in case anyone else would find it useful.


Has there been any word of the Academic Calendar mentioned in the Academy Life section? It says it should be included with each book of the AP, but so far I've seen no sign of it.


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So will this book include the "Academic Calendar" mentioned in book one?