New characters:
Godsmack, Goliath Barbarian 2 + template
Batimor, Human ftr 3 (crusader cheese has been replaced with spiked chain cheese)
The day begins with investigating goblin graffiti; a tip from a group of libidinous farmers leads the party to a suspicious bathhouse. Perhaps fazed by the encounter with the gnome (in which the city guard brought a premature end to the investigation), the party proceeds cautiously. Too cautiously. They know from the divination spell to "ask the dwarf with the red eye, and he'll lie," but they don't even bother asking questions at all once in the bathhouse. "I take a private bath!" "The lizards take the public bath!" "I smell the soap!" "Do we see anything interesting?" And so on. Eventually I inform them that watching them play is like watching the home shopping network sans channel changer. Feeling generous, I decide not to have the wererats come in and attack their soft little armorless bodies. (And if that's how the encounter was supposed to work out, I don't see how the party could survive.)
Eventually the party asks the right question, discerns that the dwarf is under a spell-like influence, and decides to hire a spellcaster to dispel magic rather than shake him down. I have no idea if dispel magic will work against a vampire's domination, but for the sake of moving the game along, I decide to let them try. Once out the door and equipped, they turn 4 wererats into a splatterfest (Godsmack did 85 points of damage with one crit, overcoming the creatures DR rather easily). They return with a cleric who casts dispel magic "successfully" on the dwarf. After a brief conversation, they figure out that they are supposed to take the steps leading from the bathhouse to the underdark.
They rest for the night, descend, and put the spiked chain on "liquify." I screw up by forgetting about its 10' reach, with the result that a pair of goblin adepts ends up wasting a perfectly lovely pair of spells. Anyway, 40-odd goblins and a few darkmantles later, they encounter the massive ambush. Three sneaks hit the mage with their crossbow bolts, dropping him to -2. The kobold bard promptly sends the sneaks to sleep. A goblin adept misses the swindlespitter horribly with his scorching ray, then bolts and lets the other goblins face the music. Face it bravely they do, especially when a couple of bat swarms show up. "Are these swarms behaving intelligently?" says Splatboy, a doubtful frown on his face. I smile to myself; "Just play."
"A bugbear shows up."
Laughter.
"It looks menacingly at you."
"How's this" says Valorpal (put's thumb to nose and waves.)
"Make a will save."
"Oh poo!"
7 + 1 is 8.
Even though Drathkar's Ability Focus and improved Charisma make the DC 15, I decide against giving Batimon another save at +2; instead, Drathkar sends him on a little trip: "Get powerful sword in south cavern!" What fighter wouldn't want to follow that order? Away he runs; I describe the sound of the spiked chain clinking behind him as he singlemindedly pursues his mission.
They waste a couple of spells before realizing Drathkar is a vampire; then it turns into one of those "hit or die" encounters. Godsmack rages, enlarges, and charges. Rolling an 8 gives him a 25 to hit with all his bonuses--alas, just one shy of connecting. (I knew upgrading to studded leather would pay off.) Drathkar responds by hitting him with a morningstar and then his slam, doing enough damage, even after close wounds, to drop him to -14.
The party runs, scornful laughter echoing up the passageway behind them. Now I have a spiked chain of my own to play with, and we aren't even at the Kopru ruins.
We sat around afterward and dissected the encounter. They seemed OK with the way it went. I explained about the 40 pt buy for BBEGs, and they nodded. They also recognized that they just happened to roll lousy when they needed to roll well. Splatboy and Valorpal sat around afterward and discussed possible tactics for the second try. I hope the AC 26 doesn't end up being too much for them, but I think victory is possible. Overall it seems a reasonable "get beat down by the BBEG and take a second crack at him later with more knowledge" type of outing.
If I'm feeling mean, in the next encounter I surround Drathkar with goblin minions whom he strikes to gain temporary HP. Surely no-one out there has ever stooped to that option though, right?
Colin, here's a belated "thanks" to your encouragement; hope you don't think that I was taking your remarks for granted.
Yeah, Cauldron is weird. For instance, the guards in encounter 1 that have been bribed by the thieves guild only have a few silver pieces on them; they'll risk their jobs for a few sp?. My players laughed about that. Also, the AP seems really underpowered when it comes to handing out treasure and magical items. The PCs are halfway through Drathkar's Way, are 4th level, and have yet to find magical weapons or armor. It's gotten to the point where I have to cut the suggested starting gold for replacement characters, just so players don't start trying to kill their characters in order to get more money. (I'm letting characters come in at the same level as the rest of the party for now, mainly so that I give myself some wiggle room if I accidentally make an encounter deadlier than it should be.) On another thread, someone suggested that part of the difficulty of the AP should come from the tightfisted approach to treasure.
Here's a question that came up today about character mechanics: Splatboy noted that Paladins can take a feat that allows them to cast their spells as swift actions; because Paladins normally need to dish out damage in combat, the feat allows them to make use of their spells. Splatboy decided in a campaign that he is running that he would allows other classes to use the same feat--Rangers, Spellthieves, Hexblades, and any other class with casting progression similar to that of a Paladin. He asked if I would allow the same in my campaign, and I said I'd check in with others and see. So if you have an opinion about this rules modification one way or the other, please let me know. I don't have any experience playing the classes that it would apply to.
In this weekend's event, 1 death and 1 successful hostile PC takeover (as in, the DM now has possession of that char sheet). Details at 11. (Yes Turin, the dice laid the smack down this time, but my BBEG needed every bit of his 40 pt buy.)
Thanks, Traken, for the clarification on full defense.
I'm getting ready for another session this evening. I think that I'm shifting from a bloodthirsty style to a "keep them entertained" style. I actually muffed the last deadly encounter that I ran (where the Crusader died) by playing the monsters deadlier than they were supposed to be played. If I'd done it the right way (more grapple attempts from the mindless constructs), the party would have had some more laughs and would probably have come out on top. Valorpal and Kirby do invest a lot in their characters because they enjoy the role-playing part, and they hate to see them go down. So I'm going to try to play more to the spirit of the players that we've got in our crew. I'll let the dice lay the smack down.
Vote 1: Arthelia
Easy choice. Awesome concept and plot hooks. PCs show up to see a performance of their great deeds--and get wasted by a twiggy little kid--who's devoted, big picture, to destroying legends by attack or slander. That's creative motivation.
Vote 2: Voeren
I paired Voeren against Seskadrin in the category of "great leader with plans for world domination and minions with which to do the job"; I think Voeren is slightly better. I think his plans for world dominance are better detailed, and his means of attracting followers (including a possible PC!) are creative. I don't mind that he is working for someone else. And I really like the way religion ends up driving conflict with and among the PCs; it just seems more integral to the plot here than in other settings I have worked with.
Vote 3: Abzirael
I put Abzirael against Onuyaka in the category of "well-designed creature with a finger in every pie." Onuyaka misses out because he seems like just a cool BBEG; Abzirael has more personality. His plans would probably be more subject to his whims, but I don't think that's a strike against a villain.
Vote 4: Kotalya
I paired Kotalya agains Hetty in the category of "interesting idea with some weaknesses in design and writing." This was a tough choice. Hetty has better and more creative motivations, but the writing for her entry, particularly the tactics, is much weaker. I'll go with Kotalya.
Avinash misses out; it's cute to have him keep coming back with a different rider, but why does he keep coming back? I liked Kalyani, but people point out that her stats seem underpowered for a villain; Durgal is very cool, but didn't make the stat block hurdle (thanks to those who vetted stat blocks).
I initially wrote this one off because it seemed just a big baddie. But Chris and Ezekiel convinced me to look deeper for motivation. Now that I'm convinced the motivation can be teased out of the description, I'm more willing to appreciate the work that went into the mechanics. Overall, nice job--but given the requirements, not "wow" work. An orchestra isn't fantastic just because it can play at a loud volume; villains aren't "wow" just because they are big blocks of whirling alabaster that can reinterpret wishes diabolically. Props nonetheless.
I'm with the Doc. From beginning to end, I have a sense of this villain's motivation and plan for dominance. I _love_ the hook of a character who is converted and forgets his party. I understand the complaints about the fact that he's an aboleth, and maybe his race would be a roadblock to publishing this villain in an adventure; however, to me the race is a minor issue compared to all the great work on origin, motivation, strategies, and stat block, all of which were the main hurdles for this stage of the competition.
Fine concept from beginning to end. The initial quote is nice, if on the Bond-villain side. The hooks give a sense for how to draw in characters at several different levels and at several different points in a campaign; lower level characters could encounter her druid minions, and higher level ones might need to deal with a few demons. She's so much more than a mere bad guy. (I picture her flying away from an initial combat while vowing revenge, then returning to plague the adventurers.) The weakness (lack of motivation) can be corrected easily. This villain seems a good villain for a mid-level party.
The writing is usually solid ("vile, thorny trees offer no fruit to the hungry, while sinewy wolves with fiery eyes stalk unwary travelers"). But allow me to point out some serious problems with dangling modifiers:
Original: Clad in cobbled-together scraps of fur, none can doubt how she treats the local wildlife.
The "none" of the main clause are not the ones clad in fur.
Revision: Clad in cobbled-together scraps of fur, Kotalya treats the local wildlife with ...
Original: Once rich with fish, the pollution has turned the river barren.
The "pollution" is not rich with fish.
Revision: Once rich with fish, the barren river is brown with pollution.
Original: Although beyond her ability, Kotalya hopes to bring a select number of her fiendish kin into the paradise she has created in the Material Plane.
This one is unfortunately laughably amusing: Kotalya herself should certainly not be "beyond her ability."
Revision: Although leading demons is beyond her ability, Kotalya hopes ...
I make these observations about grammar because I like what you have done here; I would like to see more polished work in future rounds. Also, I see judges picking on comma splices and passive voice, so I'm confident that some aspiring writers out there will appreciate this lengthy post.
In my last session against Splatboy and his horde of twigged-out death-to-monster doom, the BBEG went down without landing a blow; I was disappointed, but not surprised. Yesterday's short session, however, concluded with not one but two PC deaths. As these were the result of bad luck and utter stupidity, I would normally be only partly satisfied--were it not for the fact that the crusader is now no more . . .
The party began by liberating a grumpy cook (who took a crap in the mouth of his now-dead captor) and leaving the other prisoners behind so it could explore the rest of the fortress. 30' past a set of illusory walls, the crusader failed his listen check and was thus flatfooted when the hammerer automaton served him up a hefty 18 points of damage. Fortunately he started combat at the top of the round . . . unfortunately, he decided to drink a healing potion in an automaton's threat range . . the automaton made its 50% move chance, rolled a nat 19, served up 25 points of damage--and reduced the crusader to a bloody pulp. I will so miss waiting for him to draw his cards each combat.
The party retreated from the constructs, freed one more prisoner, found the treasure chamber, slaughtered the poor mimic in charge of it, and then proceeded to leave. Except for Kirby, who had added two levels of paladin to his level 1 fighter. Kirby wasn't scared of the mimic at all ("I'm not nervous--I'm a paladin") and decided that the only way to figure out what was past the hammerer automatons was to run the gauntlet--on his own.
He ran in, and the constructs pinned him back against the block of stone that they used to seal off the end of the tunnel. I decided I'd play the hammerers by the book's stupid strategy of grabbing with claws and then attacking with hammers. After 10 rounds of lousy rolls and broken grapples (and but one successful AoE), the end came with two consecutive hammer blows to a rather hard head.
Splatboy has yet to lose a character. This should change in the next chapter, when the Swindlespitter animal companion (who now has an AC of 24 and poison with a ridiculous DC of 18) is targeted by an opponent who refuses to take the chance of being blinded . . . and who is not particularly worried about high ACs.
And thanks to those who suggested combat strategies. I like the looks of Hold the Line, and will probably take advantage of it in the future. I am curious, though, about fighting defensively while casting--the SRD says "You can choose to fight defensively when taking a full attack action"--this wording does not seem to allow fighting defensively when casting spells or summoning.
Rationale for some of the improvements: I mistakenly allowed the party to use 40 pt. buy. I've asked them if they would be willing to drop their PCs to the module-recommended 32-point buy; Splatboy's response was (I quote) "No, I don't think I would be willing to give up 8 points at this point. Its agonizing even to consider. Trust me, it shouldn't have much effect long term."
OK. Then there's no reason why the BBEGs shouldn't have 40 pt. buy as well.
Spoiler:
Drathkar, male bugbear underpowered vampire, CR 4
Original vampire stats: Str 21, Dex 16, Con --, Int 12, Wis 12, Cha 13.
Original bugbear stats: Str 15, Dex 12, Con 13, Int 10, Wis 10 Cha 9
New bugbear stats: Str 18, Dex 16, Con 13, Int 10, Wis 15, Cha 9
New Vamp stats: Str 24, Dex 18, Con --, Int 12, Wis 15, Cha 13
Saves: F +1, R +9, W +3
I like some of his feats: Combat Reflexes, Dodge, Improved Initiative, lightning Reflexes, and Weap Foc (Morningstar). I want to swap out Alertness and the feat that bugbears share with Vampires. I was thinking of adding Toughness twice just to make him a bit harder. I don't have access to Libris Mortis, though; does anyone know if there exists a feat to augment his children of the night ability? I plan to use bat swarms to take out the Swindlespitter that I can't seem to hit. I suppose I could also choose Ability Focus: Dominate Person.
Full Att: +10 (d8+7, morning star) and +4 (d6+4, drain; slam). He's still going to have difficulty hitting the heavily armored party members (at least with his slam), and one of the first one's he'll be going after is the cleric).
Last, I gave him studded leather instead of leather; seems reasonable. If he takes toughness once, he has HP 22 and AC 27.
The second session of the SCAP was undertaken this evening. Alas, all the characters made it through the relatively brief gaming session without any fatalities, though they had to exhaust most of the spell casting abilities to revive characters who fell into the negatives.
First, though, to address some questions that came up this week on the thread.
Handofthewraith suggests that dragonwrought comes with some restrictions (alignment, cost); in checking the feat in Races of Dragon, I find no restrictions on alignment or cost, simply all of the advantages I've already recorded. As far as I can see, he gets to keep his kobold abilities as well. (But d*it, I need to check on those aging penalties again.)
Our doughty Cap'n points out that the Tortle will be moving along very slowly and will have difficulty healing PCs. Fortunately for those PCs, the Tortle is a Druid; they have another primary healer in a cleric (plus the crusader's occasional acts of healing, which they used to their advantage tonight.) Still, what Splatboy was clever enough to do was to take a feat that allows the Tortle to sac a spell to grant fast healing X for three rounds to all allies within 30', where X is his druid level, another ability that came in handy in tonight's session. Even I can admire the beauty of this idea; we'll see how far it gets him. (You should see Splatboy's Magic Decks--also works of art.)
As for banning ToB, I'm going to let the crusader stick around until chapter 2 ... I enjoy dashing hopes as much as outrighting waxing characters, and hope must grow a bit if it is to make that lovely smashing noise when thrust to the cold, hard floor ... Plus, I respect Turin's approach to ToB'd PCs: beat them with their own game. I'll see if the modified monster template he posted on his ST journal helps the BBEG at the end of chapter 1. That, to answer some other questions, is why I allowed them to use just about any splatbook they wanted: I'm curious, and I wanted to see how their PCs would work out in practice. And I like a challenge . . .
And now, to the session.
Kirby decided to let his lovelies rot in jail, so he created new characters. The first question he and Splatboy asked was if they could create the same characters, ha ha ha ha. I didn't say anything, but I would like to know how other DMs handle this matter. If a PC dies, can the player just create a carbon copy of the dead one? What restrictions do you put on creating the new ones; do they come in at the same xp as the others (I assume that's how Allen handles it in AoW). (We're using point buy, not dice.)
In any event, my silence was interpreted as a no, and soon the Reptile Crew, fresh from the halls of justice, was introduced to a drunken fighter and mage who were just itchin for adventure.
After an inordinate amount of time pondering what to do about the first room of a Level 1 dungeon (c'mon guys, it's not Tomb of Horrors, those smiling masks aren't going to eat you ...) they proceeded to their first fight. Kirby was unpleasantly surprised to discover that you just don't see skulks until they materialize out of the shadows and flank you with their rapiers. For my part, I was unpleasantly disappointed by my inability to score significant damage before the lizardflesh juggernaut rolled over its opponents. Daze and the animal companion's blindness breath weapon served the party well.
Until they hit the construct in the invisibility sphere. Kirby's fighter waltzed into the room, and was surprised to see a big rusty arm materialize and chunk off a few of his HP. The party slowly moved to surround bronzechops, complaining that I was having him fight too intelligently by having him adjust to hit as many of them as possible with his sonic attack (which did a measly 3 hp of damage, curses), and then slowly wore him down. Kirby's fighter was saved from the negatives by the Tortle's fast healing feat. Then he stood up from prone, took max damage from the construct's AoO, and promptly dropped into the negatives again. (Fighters: even dumber than constructs . . . )
I noticed that my players were a mite peeved at my chuckling. I'll have to save it for the really good moments in future sessions.
In any event, I sc'd the pooch on this one, because I made several damage rolls at d6 rather than d6+4. That's inexcusable, even for someone new to the job. I will serve the lords of mayhem better next time, if so permitted.
The party defeated the constuct, using up most of its spells and abilities in the process. They then wandered through the dungeon (kobold singing his bard song the whole time; fortunately the skulks are cowards) beating down doors, absorbing trap damage, and taking something like 8 rounds to take out a CR1 spider and its two CR1/2 minionlings. I was denied even the satisfaction of seeing someone fail a poison save. They returned to camp to rest, leveling up in the process.
I think of it as a boxing max. They took a good punch from me last week that staggered them; now we're moving around the ring trying to gauge each other. I thought they were going to walz through the upper part of the dungeon, but it proved to be more challenging than I thought. We'll see how the second level works out. I already see a few things in chests that would work so much better in the hands of the hobgoblins . . .
And then there's the effects of The Vanishing ... because the party isn't getting quite enough gp to buy cure disease in packs like poptarts ...
Thanks for all the comments. Looking forward to the AoW report.
Turin and Yasha, thanks for your input and welcome to the thread! I should say that the group is a pretty good bunch of roleplayers, even if they do love their munchkins.
I will be sure to check the Splatbooks in question. While I trust Splatboy to have his facts correct (I would call him a "benign" power gamer), I have a lot to learn here.
Checking Splatboy's stat sheet for his kobold, I see that I mistyped in my previous post: it's the dragonwrought feature that gives him his age bonuses, along with, I am shocked to see, darkvision, +2 to Disguise, and immunity to sleep and paralysis. Hmmm.
The Tortle is a half-turtle, in case you were wondering; I don't know where the race came from, but I'll check up on it. In any event, I believe the hit he takes is to charisma, as that's currently a 6 on his stat sheet. The breath weapon of the dinosaur companion--a Swindlespitter--is a Fort DC 14, blindness 2d4 min/ 1d4 Con (range 15').
I just want to see how these folks pan out. I don't mind too much if they cruise through the encounters in part one; I wasn't planning on dropping a few of them until Chapter 2.
But alas for the party, their prowess in combat could not make up for their lack of R E S P E C T, a trait that means a lot to me (or at least to the higher ups in Cauldron). However, I'd like some feedback on how I handled this encounter; I want to make sure I wasn't too tough on them.
The first evening found them wandering the rainy streets, responding to a cry for help, completely wasting the thugs who were roughing up a local Cleric, and then obediently following the story thread that had them pick up the investigation about the missing children. They went to the orphanage, where the children amused themselves by playing with the Swindlespitter and the druid helped the gardener plant rutabagas ("very nutritious," says the dwarf). Following up the hint about the locks, they proceed to the establishment of the locksmith. On the way there, they spot the two half elf investigators from the Striders of Farlagn (or whatever that deity's name is); the half-fey thingie flew up, charmed them both, and brought them down to the party where they had a nice chat about the Cagewrights and a missing mage friend. Then the party enters Ghelve's locks and promptly forgets its place in the order of things.
The book says that Ghelve will give up the goods after some good roleplaying and a DC 15 diplomacy check. After asking some straightforward questions, the PCs decide to try throwing their weight around, upon which Ghelve reminds them that he is *a trusted member of the community* and that they have been in town about 24 hours. ValorPal mentions the missing children; though he does so belligerently rather than diplomatically, I am almost ready to have Ghelve give up the goods when Splatboy decides to follow up by intimidating the gnome, whose heart naturally hardens once he is accused of being a badguy. Ghelve resists the half-fey's charm spell, upon which the half fey decides to try to hypnotize Ghelve; I decide that the "droning and chanting" that this spell entails will put the gnome completely on his guard and lead him to call for the watch.
Things rapidly spiral downhill. The watch arrives; Splatboy is intellient enough to have his characters leave. ValorPal and Kirby (who runs the half-fey and a barbarian) refuse to leave. The head of the watch points out that nobody knows who they are and that Ghelve is *a trusted member of the community*. Kirby sends his barbarian past the curtain (saving against Ghelve's color spray, damn him) and is attacked in the next room by the skulk. A big brouhaha ensues in which the barbarian rages, cuts down the skulk, and runs upstairs and whacks a chest of drawers to pieces. He is put to sleep by some pursuing guards, and he, the crusader (who ran after him) and the helf-fey thing (who refused to leave) are taken to the watch house. The remaining members of the party question Ghelve and get the info they were supposed to get.
Here's where I wonder if I was too harsh on them: the party has been acting as if it can do anything it wants under the guise of carrying out an investigation for the Church of St. Cuthbert. I want to remind them that they are one step up from being kobold-poo in this town. So I have the three offenders brought to trial for disturbing the peace and destroying property. ValorPal makes a good case for his crusader, and acknowledges that upon being asked to leave, he had alternatives to violence. Kirby has his barbarian simply say "Me fight evil, me do good." Fair enough, and in character. The council debates, and then I decide it's a good time to introduce Lord V: I have Lord V stand up and propose allowing the party to continue its investigation under a suspended sentence, after paying a fine. Everybody wins, right? The party receives a warning about acting like apes, gets what amounts to a slap on the wrist, and is introduced to the shadier side of city politics.
Then Kirby decides that his half-fey creature is just too good for city politics and refuses the deal. He would prefer to sit in jail than get tangled up with what is clearly a corrupt city government. He adds that he's the sort of person who will hunt down family members of people who irritate him (incidentally, he said something similar in another campaign when playing another character). I give the half-fey thing a 2 week jail sentence for mildly resisting arrest, and Kirby decides that his barbarian isn't going anywhere without the half-fey thing. (Beats me why that decision makes sense.) The party is left deciding whether Kirby should roll up new characters or whether to use NPCs for two weeks of game time. Splatboy seems unhappy, though whether with me or with Kirby, I can't tell. Kirby continues to insist that they had no alternative to the actions they chose.
Well, if you've persisted to the end here and have some thoughts, let me know if you would have handled aspects of the encounter differently. Was I drunk with power? Should I have allowed intimidate to function like diplomacy? Was I right to have Ghelve call the watch?
