Papasteve08's page

I played this at Gen Con 2016, and I have one thing to say to prospective GMs out there.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE read your stuff and be prepared!!! Our GM (A VC to boot) was not prepared and it was by far the worst table experience of the 8 slots our group played in.

I give this 4 stars because I believe I can see past our GM's poor performance and see the creativity behind the scenario. There were several things that really had the potential to be fun, but you as a GM better know your stuff, or your players will be lost. This is despite the rigid formula of encounters that nearly every PFS scenario seems to suffer from.

It is hard enough as an experienced player to wrap our heads around unique characters and classes we may or may not be familiar with, so the GM needs to be ready to help the players along. There are many synergistic things between the PCs, but by the time the players figured out what those things were, it was too late in the scenario to actually use them.

I enjoyed this scenario. I wish our group had been high enough to play the higher tier, which I understand was a bit more challenging. I was happy to be able to finish off the story arc that I got to be a part of at Gen Con 2015.

My one complaint was that it seemed rather anti-climactic.

Note what I mentioned above, I did enjoy this scenario. My constructive criticism is that this scenario suffers from much of the same things the vast majority of scenarios suffer from, which is a strict adherence to a scenario formula. A handful of quick combat stops on a railroad from beginning to end. You do have the ability to choose what order you arrive at a couple of those stops, but in the end you are really just along for the ride until you get to the final reveal.

I GM'd this scenario at Gen Con 2016 and it was a blast. The story was fun to tell, and the setting was very colorful. I especially enjoyed the temple set in the mountains. It gave me a great place to be able to paint the scene for the players.

Each one of the challenges that the PCs face, whether they know they are facing a challenge or not, was very fun to adjudicate. I really enjoyed presenting them with situations and having the ability as a GM to give them more control over how they handle it, and also the framework to understand how it would affect the ongoing story that we were creating.

I really want to note that it is very important to be prepared to run this for your players. There are some background things going on throughout the entire adventure that the GM needs to be on top of. It isn't difficult or complicated by any stretch, but it plays such an important role in the scenario that it is important for the GM to be aware of it in order to give the players the full experience by the time it is all over. In fact, I think you will find that understanding those underlying threads will give you as the GM more ways and opportunities to create a scene for your players and also get them to interact with it.

Pay attention to the combat encounters as well. The foes of the PCs can be formidable (but not impossible) if the GM doesn't hose it up. Failure to be prepared can lead to an encounter that the PCs roll over and as a result, don't have as much fun. I'm all about fun on both sides of the table.

I would happily run this again, and I would absolutely love to play it, even though the behind-the-scenes stuff and reveal at the end is spoiled for me. As I mentioned about the fun, all 7 of us at the table had a great time. Definitely get this scenario!

My biggest complaint about this scenario is that as a player I felt like I had zero control at any point in the scenario. At no point did I ever get the impression that any of the character's role play or decision making contributed in any meaningful way to the storyline, and certainly had no effect on the lackluster and disappointing 'resolution' to the scenario.

All in all this scenario felt like a train ride for the character and player. I was just along for the ride, staring out the window while the dice were rolled and things happened around me, but at no point could I get off the train and do anything meaningful in the story. There is a popular and amusing theory that had Indiana Jones had zero effect on the outcome of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Regardless of how true that is, that is exactly the feeling I was left with as a player in this scenario. Why was I even there? Nothing I did or didn't do mattered.

If you want to experience this scenario for its part in the aftermath of seige of serpents and serpents rise, you are better off just getting a copy of the scenario, reading it so you know the story, and spending your valuable playing time with a different game/scenario.

I ran this over Play by Post and really enjoyed it.

The challenge with evergreens is replayability, and I thought that this one did an excellent job of giving the GM plenty of options to keep things fresh and just unpredictable enough for players to not get bored with multiple runs.

The scene and encounters were explained exceedingly well, I had very few questions, and no questions that I couldn't figure out myself with a quick re-read of the relevant material. The complexity of having multiple possibilities for different encounters was taken care of quite well I thought, with step by step methods to make sure you cover all of the bases.

Most importantly, the players enjoyed it, and I enjoyed telling the story for them. I would highly recommend this for any low tier characters who plan on enjoying lots of season 7 scenarios.

I may be slightly biased because my character really had an opportunity to shine in this adventure, but I loved every one of the encounters. The final two encounters were extremely fun to play. The final encounter might be in my top 5 favorites just for the amount of environment interaction that is required.

This one was extremely light on the RP, it was essentially moving from encounter to encounter, but I will forgive that on account that the encounters, in my opinion (as a player) were great fun.

I liked the flavor of this, I loved how it transitioned from "by way of bloodcove". The scene, the NPCs were all great. I am enjoying a taste of the Aspis Consortium as well from bloodcove into this scenario.

I was highly disappointed in the combat. I played this on the higher tier, and I don't think we made it into the third round (or out of the first for the most part) in a single one of the combats, except the last one. I am guessing the only reason we made it into a third round at the end was that there must have been planned events that were supposed to happen periodically through the fight.

At best, the combats were speed bumps.

As mentioned above, though, the RP and the flavor keeps me from giving it a bad rating. Its a good start to the 3 part series.

I won't go crazy on details here, but I had a blast playing this scenario. Easily one of my favorites so far. I loved the NPCs, the encounters all flowed well and allowed a variety of RP possibilities to overcome, more than just hack and slash. It never felt like we were just moving from one encounter to the next, checking them off the list either. There were reasons to be engaged from beginning to end, and the NPCs were great to interact with.

The BBEG was by far one of my favorite encounters, particularly with the added bonus of succeeding on one of the encounters earlier in the scenario. That alone is worth at least 4 of the 5 stars I gave it. I loved that things we did and choices we made had an effect (in this case positive) on the most important part of the scenario.

This scenario should absolutely be on the "gotta have it" list.