Apologies if I missed this somewhere but will the Print edition of the Kingmaker 2e books include the free accompanying PDF version as per usual Paizo products? I don't see that specified anywhere.
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Hi AlastarOG, I'm just now getting into both PF2E and also Foundry and Iron Gods is the adventure path that I am working on converting into PF2E and then building it into Foundry...can you point to me where these conversion can be found online already? Also I wanted to check out your work but it looks like it uses the Adventure Importer/Exporter module and for some reason I can't locate that module now, I'm assuming this means it's not working and was removed but if you know of another way to open the file you posted I'd love to be able to check it out.
Ha! You definitely live up to your username huh? (: Thanks for the stats breakdown, I vaguely knew enough that I could probably have figured it out but gave up trying when I created the game, so I appreciate seeing the numbers! For context, the game isn't suppose to be remotely fair. For me, it was "how might people use pieces of discarded technology that they don't really understand in interesting ways" scene. That's why I have two games, one that focuses on the barbarian vs technic league side of Numeria and then the other having to do with Tech. It's more of a playing to see the pretty lights machine than a try to win money machine and I assume they'd make more money off of non-Numerian natives who are awed by technology. I also, don't want my players spending in real time 2-3 hours playing gambling games, which would happen if they won more. But with the breakdown of the numbers, I think I'll likely allow 5 attempts but maybe with a catch that you only keep the best result.
I'm starting Iron Gods Wednesday of next week, very excited! I love coming in late and having all the thoughts and resources that everyone else has already created--so a big thank you to everyone who shares on here! I'll post up everything eventually, but for now, I wanted to share the two gambling games I've made for Silverdisk Hall. I have a player who goes to the casino regularly so I know he'll enjoy this so I'm really looking forward to it. These are just luck based games, "6 Light Blitz" and "Ride of the Black Sovereign" 6 Light Blitz! (essentially slots) Read-aloud text
Description: There are 3 panels with roughly 20 LED indicator lights on each panel. Once an electrical charge is applied to the one of the 3 panels, all lights on that panel light up brightly. This is generally done with a zip stick but any electrical source, including spells, activate the device. Once the third panel is activated random lights begin turning off until, for whatever unknown reason now, only 1 and 6 lights remaining on each panel. The lights blink twice once the pattern is completed. If anyone looks at the back side of the device read the following: "On the back of the device a series of strange markings, perhaps letters in a foreign script, stand out starkly against the dull grey sheen of the material." Written in Androffan "WARNING: DO NOT DISCONNECT" Cost to Play: 10 gp for a set of 3 rolls
Notes: Slots are terrible odds, so I could have kept it at 10 gp for one chance, however, I wanted my players to feel like they had a better chance plus everyone likes rolling dice! Ride of the Black Sovereign (Card Game) (Sorry no read aloud for this one) This game is a variation of blackjack.
Players and dealer are dealt 2 cards each. No face up cards.
Player Card Values
Dealer Card Values
Cost 10 gp to play. After looking at cards, player can bet an extra 10 gp. Winnings payout 1 for 1. If Black Sovereign card is not in play, then compare the values. If players win, double their bet. If dealer wins, house takes bet. If tie, player gets their bet back.
Yeah, I thought about that option but didn't think that made a lot of sense...and yes I know it's folly to apply logic to a role-playing game sometimes but the ability states that those that attack it become targets, not for 1 round, just now they are targets. If it were only for 1 round it would actually be really easy to exploit and terribly easy to defeat, not making it much of a guardian at all.
I have a question about an ability of a creature in the first adventure (and just in case)
Spoiler:
Almost had a TPK with the Graven Guardian. Not a lot of room to maneuver, cold dice on the players end and super hot dice on my end. Rolled 3 natural 20's before finally rolling a 19 in order to use the keen ability. Anyway, I had to make an adjustment and decided that the guardian would only stay on that level and not go up the stairs (or they really would have all died, and since it was mostly because of dice I wasn't going to do that). Now the guardian is downstairs and they escaped upstairs. The sorcerer, who is a worshiper of Nethys, wears a holy symbol and was therefor not attacked, is also a sculptor and has clay and other supplies with him. He is considering whipping up some holy symbols of Nethys for everyone to wear. So, my question is what happens in regards to it's Faith Bound weakness? Everyone but the sorcerer already attacked the guardian, so does the guardian remember them and attack anyway because of the "they attacked first clause" or does it reset when they leave it's area immediately? I don't think there's an official rule on this, just curious what other people think. I'm thinking of a once a day type of rule, that it essentially resets when it's haste spell resets. Thanks!
His character made a connection with _____ Haha, I'll post to let you know how it goes down!
Obviously with any campaign some people are going to like it and some won't, it's all about how each group likes to play. My players and myself are enjoying this AP greatly though. I've run 1 AP before and one of my players DMs for a large group and he's done 2 APs as well (he normally runs his own campaign). My players are 4 veteran players and 1 new player. We love the setting and we've found that it does a good job of creating the scenery. It's an AP that isn't Euro-centered which is nice but it also has a very old-school feel to it (at least myself and the other old-timers think so). We are only about 2/3 through the first book so I can't say too much about playing through the AP. But for reading it and being prepared, as others have said I like the I understand what's going on with the bad guys throughout the adventure so far. My only possible complaint/concern would be coming up in book 4: Spoiler:
I love the idea of a contested area where the PCs have to navigate through 2 different sets of bad guys who are also fighting each other. However, as far as I understand it, the main villain group is only at that site because of hubris...that seems weak. I've only skimmed that book once since I've gotten it but if there's no real reason other than "Hey I like this place and now I'm mad that someone else is there so I'm going to just keep trying to take it over until the PCs come here and defeat me..." well, um, I'll have to fix that. But, I really have only skimmed it, I'm hoping I'm missing something to that because so far I think the plot threads have been solid. Specifically about the first book, again, loving it. All of my players are enjoying it.
Spoiler: We've also really enjoying the types of challenges. Most of my players have a lot of gaming experience and encounters with undead and orcs are too routine. I feel that there are some really good combat challenges mostly because of all of the saving throws. My players are all thinking of taking Iron Will and Great Fortitude because I constantly say "...and make a Will save" or "...and make a Fort save". My players have said that this campaign is really making their low level characters feel low level and they really appreciate that and it's not always easy to pull that off with players with a lot of experience. We found it refreshing that it was a straight forward premise to start off with some dungeon crawling. Also, a nice mix of the dungeon crawl mixed with the city but still the threat of danger going between the two. The first tomb my players really enjoyed, they were expecting undead and didn't get any which was pretty funny but the liked all of the encounters and finding some special gear right away was very cool. We all thought it brought everyone into the "Egyptian" theme very well. The second site was even better. No one felt railroaded in that place at all. They came in through the front gate, explored the outside, looked at the tomb, decided to go into the house through the side door. One person went to look at the silver goblets/plates, another went to go look at the pretty statue in the middle of the house, another went right and spotted the skeletons and then pretty much all hell broke loose because the beheaded swarmed and the statue was pissed quickly because no one spoke Terran. The Div hears the noises and is disappointed that people are smashing his toys he's made and starts messing with people mostly while invisible. It was great. And absolutely no one will ever forget the sorcerer becoming paralyzed and me describing how it starts making out with him in very graphic details. As to the NPCs, I think there's enough information for the DM to make this work. What I did is I wrote down all of the other adventuring groups listed anywhere in either books 1 and 2 and then added a couple of more so that I had a dozen groups. Each time my party is in the regular part of the city, I randomly select a group and just tell them who they see, just so that they know other groups are working here. For the specific role-playing encounter listed I got enough miniatures to represent every NPC of each group and set them in groups around the table and asked who's talking with who, everyone got in some good moments with a couple of different groups and only one of my players spoke to the Scorched Hand group, however, it really stood out to that player. His character made a connection with Azaz but I had Velriana constantly interrupting and telling him not to speak with strangers, just being a bully. It really hit home with this particular player and though I plan on having them bump into the Scorched Hand one more time (only because I want my players to at least know about the 2 other members of that group) I already know that when they encounter the Scorched Hand later that there will be some moral decisions about fighting them. My point is that, even if a DM doesn't help out with a little bit more on the NPC part I still think it works just fine as it is. I had purchased the Serpent's Skull AP and I never got to play it but I always thought how they did the opposing NPC group(s) left a lot of work for a DM to do, I think this AP does it very well. I, and I'm pretty sure my players will as well, like the fact that mostly the first book has nothing to do with the AP main plot thread other than some connections at the end of the book. An AP where every part is directly tied to the overarching plot thread would be way too much. And I can't recall any of the APs that I've played in, read, or ran where that was the case either. I like that this AP let's the players get established in the campaign and then bam kicks it up a notch in the second book. SO looking forward to getting to it in a couple of weeks.
We started 2 weeks ago, it's been a lot of fun. I have five players, all Human, all Garundi, all locals to Wati who decided that they'd rather loot the necropolis themselves and make some money rather than let outsiders do so. Cleric of Pharasma
The rogue's almost died twice in just the first day of exploration, I'm expecting that this party may look different in the future. Edit: Oh and the name of their group is "The Hands of Fate" since the cleric of Pharasma is their leader.
Ah, thanks! I was pretty sure I was missing something in there.
Very excited to start this campaign this weekend! I was hoping for some clarification regarding the chariot race. Where it says that a PC can attempt to move 3 cards in one turn by overcoming both obstacles on the card...does that mean that if they do succeed at both checks that they get to skip to a card 3 cards in advance, or does it mean that they have to make both checks on each of the 3 cards? I'm assuming the first but wasn't very sure since you can read "exiting" as something that happened on each of those 3 cards. So if that is correct, at the very start on card 1, if they succeed at both obstacle checks, they would end on card 4 and next round make the checks from there? Thanks in advance!
M'neri Plains of Sargava? I'm just looking at a map now and not reading a description, but I believe that fits.
Some GMs and groups specifically do not like to customize gear to the players because it makes the world more believable to them. It's a different style of play. Not one that is better than another.
I looked through the book once, if I recall most of the bonuses were things like +5 to a particular skill, +2 to ability, or +1 caster level. You could just make up what happens when you use an ioun stone. For the wayfinder itself, it's a compass (+2 survival check on being lost), and can emit the light spell. I don't think it did anything else on it's own.
Great suggestion Asphesteros, I'm changing my house rules now!
I've run a lot of man vs environment type campaigns and the crafting rules have always bothered me. The rules require you to spend gold to create items which I do completely agree with but they do produce problems when you are trying to immerse your crafting in the game world. I read suggestions on these boards a while back and read someone's suggestion that any time a character picks up any sort of magical Crafting feat, the first part of having that feat is learning a special spell/ability that allows you to alchemically transmute treasure into a sort of base magical ingredient that you can then use in your crafting. That the reason copper/silver/gold is valuable is because those elements contain a sort of magical essence (the more essence, the higher the value). That's one way of patching the fourth wall. What I've been doing is this. Anytime a character levels up, they are allowed to convert an amount of treasure (say 100gp x level) into magical components to use to craft with. And then we try to represent this with the time and future spending of this character gathering components from their environment. Not as elegant but sometimes game rules are too hard to try to represent in-world completely.
Good advice and ideas so far, thanks! I'm not sure at all what the two players will choose as characters (we're just putting this together last minute now) but they are both very experienced, very smart, creative players, and very good character/party builders so I suspect that they will pick classes that will be as versatile as possible. I'm going to think about a few thing mentioned above but I think ultimately what I'll do is sit down with both of them and just ask them how they'd like to compensate for the lack of numbers.
It looks like I'll be running RotRl for two of my players. I'm planning on converting the campaign to pathfinder rules as is and so the characters should be stronger than 3.5 characters but I'm wondering how strong they'd need to be in order to actually survive (but still be challenging). I could have both player play 2 characters but I'd prefer to just have them run only 1 character each. I'm looking at the 25 point buy for stats, starting off at level 2, and starting them off with maybe 2,000gp, but I fear that with only 2 characters that those handicaps won't be enough. Thoughts?
Excellent. Thanks for the announcement.
I went with Maptools. After I found the XL spreadsheet that helped resize premade maps (it worked great) maptools seemed to have everything that I was looking for (and greater support with more people using it). However I haven't found a Pathfinder framework (which surprised me). I found a pathfinder toolbar which looks nice but it seems people were using it with either a 3.5 framework or a 4e framework. Is there anyone on here that has found (or made) a pathfinder framework to use? Thanks
The new maps as well as the Inner Sea World guide are not necessarily suppose to be player friendly. Both products are under the Pathfinder Campaign Setting line of products, not Player Companions. Should the new map, specially the huge poster map have been player friendly? Perhaps...but then of course some could argue that a truly player friendly map would have no labels at all.
Very excited about this! I'm glad now that I held off on my Linnorm campaign!
Spoilers ahead This link in the Serpent's Skull forum may interest you
I'm looking at running a VTT for a couple of friends as my face to face gaming will have to wait for a while. My main and almost sole concern is the map function, my 2 players are very tactical players and enjoy that aspect of gaming probably the most. I want to be able to do 2 different things. 1) I have map images extracted from PDFs (Serpent Skull AP) and I'd like to be able to use the maps that have a grid as a battlemap. Optional: I've used Dunjinni in the past and enjoyed it but it was too expensive to print out maps, but might like to use that program to make some nice looking maps (again with a grid already printed on the map) and import those as well to use as a battlemap. 2) For random encounters or for those occasions when my players decide to do something unexpected, I'd like to be able to just "sketch out" a simple map. (In real life we use the standard wet/dry erase battlemap for these scenarios and I'd like the ability to replicate that) So, my question is, which program is best for this. I've tried demos of any of the programs that I could find and frankly I'm overwhelmed with the choices and so far underwhelmed on the ability to match a "pre-gridded" map with the grid of the program's map. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
I've been working on a slightly different coral encounter. I was thinking of having one of the shipwrecks be lightly covered by a white or pink coral, make some sort of check to move past an area and if they get scratched by the coral, it immediately sucks up the blood, turning red and then growing incredibly fast, blocking parts of the ship, turning it into a sort of puzzle on how to get out. Something like that...still figuring.
The curse is unique affect and it doesn't say that it affects summoning spells in any manner so I don't see why it would. If you're trying to delve into the "logic" of the curse, remember that a VERY powerful being created it and could easily create any rules or exceptions that he wanted. If you wanted to look at the curse in that way and try to apply rules to it, I still think summoning should work fine, summoning always seems more like an energy thing to me. But I could see conjuration (calling) spells not working since as you stated when that spell ended it would go against the nature of the curse.
I liked the idea of the Geier coming back and had fun with this since the PCs were off exploring at the time and so I handed my players sheets for the npcs left at the monastery (the mercenaries, the pactmaster guards, and garavel) to fight the Geier. It killed one of the mercs and I continued to tease that player for multiple sessions on getting an npc killed. (:
I like that with the oil, still I think something needs to happen with the weapon, there's multiple references to a weapon to use against Jhavul, so either those references need to be deleted or maybe make the weapon better. I didn't realize this and kept Zayifid's as is, but I changed Zenzirad to Frost Band instead, but still my player's were all "oh gee another icey sword, whoohoo". (: So, it's just something I noticed in my game and I've read others have had a similar experience with that.
The flasks are nice but the "crowning achievement" is Zenzirad, specifically made to fight Jhavul, and it's a +1 fire outsider bane frost falchion...which doesn't have that much of an impact after finding a +1 fire outsider bane frost scimitar.
Oh, one thing I would definitely change: In Book 4 the PCs get a chance to find a special weapon to use to battle the final enemy, however, Zayifid in Book 2 uses the same exact weapon, so if they defeat him and get that weapon in Book 2, it's not quite as exciting to get another one in Book 4. I'd suggest making Zayifid's weapon less and also making the weapon in Book 4 a little better than listed (it's a special named weapon after all)
Read through this forum is my first advice. Make sure and check the threads marked GM Reference for each of the adventures. Most errors are fixed. You'll also find a link somewhere converting 3.5 to Pathfinder for the first half or so of the campaign, I believe there's conversions in the pathfinder wiki as well. Obviously there won't be anything specifically for Witchs or Oracles. There's not many traps in the entire campaign if your rogue is built for that you'll want to add some but there's plenty of other things for a rogue. Good luck, have fun, post if you have any questions!
Great suggestions! I'll be adding these to my SS game this summer.
I'm not starting SS until this summer and so I have some extra time to make some modifications. I like psionics and so I decided to convert the Serpentfolk to psionic creatures. The player's won't have access to psionics, I'm just adding it for flavor and spice. I'm using the default transparency, so no need to change SR or skills. So far this is what I have: 1/day changes
at 4th level
at 9th level
Needs work: For disguise self, I'm thinking of something like this
This will change some parts of the adventure but I like the idea that serpentfolk abilites come from either it's skin or from the myths of snakes hypnotizing creatures. I'm not sure what to replace Ventriloquism, mirror image, major image, or mass suggestion with, however I'm looking at any of the following abilities to still add Aversion
We began back in June or July and finished last weekend, though our weekends all became complicated and it took us I think 2 months just to get the last 2 gaming sessions done. We had 4 players and I DM'd. The players were:
It was our first game with Pathfinder rules. I updated the adventure before each book. We started off with just the core rule book and added the APG after it came out. In general the party (with 3 of the 4 players being very smart, strategic, long time D&D players) didn't have too many problems, Pathfinder characters being noticeably stronger than 3.5 characters. But with the small group I didn't want to make it a difficult campaign and basically ran the campaign as is (small tweaks here and there--besides updating of course) Overall we all had a great time. Comments on:
First scene of play, the party is convinced that Dashki is a red herring and doesn't pay any attention to his mention of pugwampis. Instead they are suspicious of Father Zastoran who I played as being quite sexist (and 3 of the characters were female). Immediately I had to do some DM'ing as the group decided not to go looking for the lost goat and instead head for the monastery the next day. I really didn't want them to go there without having the the foreshadowing of fighting pugwampis and so I had another goat taken the next night which got things back on track. The party is scouting out the monastery from the outside, are convinced that the statues in one small room are gargoyles but discover stirges instead. The Ranger gets a stirge in the neck and almost bleeds out, which was apparently foreshadowing the fairly regular occurring feature of that character almost dieing. For multiple reasons I knew that Tempest would be most useful to the Fighter in the group. However, our fighter specialized in the bladed scarf which I just could not bring myself to claim was also used by one of the templars of the 5 winds, hahaha. So, instead of finding Tempest, I had the lingering power from the Moldspeaker (which happened to the fighter without me even having to cheat) infuse her current bladed scarf with the power of Tempest. Worked out very well. The Moldspeaker idea was very neat and the player did a great job of roleplaying it, at first worrying the rest of the group with symptoms of a split personality. The player even took 1 level of Sorcerer to reflect this more and took Enlarge Person as one of the spells since Jann have that. Very funny moment when after realizing that Dashki was missing, the group goes looking for him, following the trail which vanishes in the middle of a sandy area. The cleric quickly believes that Dashki buried something there and tried to erase the markings and so starts digging in the sand, literally digging towards the mouth of the dust digger which promptly swallows him whole! The rest of the party killed it and he managed to just barely get out alive. He was quite paranoid for a while after that. Epic fight at the Battle Market and we were all sure that the fighter was going to die since she got separated in the fight, she ended up on the second floor while the rest of the party was still on the first with Khardswann in between. Book 2 This adventure went pretty fast and straight forward. The group partnered with the trogs to get to the Carrion King. The Carrion King was a glass cannon. The worst thing that happened was that I had him use that disfiguring attack first on the fighter (the character was a belly dancer using a bladed scarf and who's second highest stat was in charisma), I hit and did 7 Cha damage, thinking it didn't really matter except that I forgot that character had a level of Sorcerer now and so couldn't use those spells until that damage was healed. Other than that, the scariest fight for the PCs was outside against two of the gnoll guards riding on the dire hyenas. The PCs ignored the mounts at first and paid for it with continual trip attacks. After that, those hyenadons were always the first things killed! ha Zayafid, who party quickly despised, escaped. Book 3 Zayafid quickly returns leading the attack in the desert while the PCs travel to Katapesh. The cleric really didn't like that this guy had escaped and had prepared every day since Zayafid fled both Invisibility Purge and Dimensional Anchor. haha He didn't get away again. Dinner party scene as is felt forced, but as I had the NPCs keep approaching the PCs, the PCs wanted to know how the NPCs had found out they had the scroll, and so Rayhan suggested the dinner and that worked out well. We had a little bit of trouble, when the PCs (led by the cleric) decided that the bad guys must need Rayhan alive to open the scroll (you know what they say about assuming) and so replied to the kidnap letter with a taunt...which killed Rayhan and displeased Sarenrae greatly. No other problems in the adventure, they got Rayhans body and raised him (I stressed that he was old and wouldn't normally have wanted to come back but he was too eager to try to open the scroll not to), he eventually opens the scroll and I decided that the energy from the broken scroll shatters and destroyed Rayhan, the group felt pretty bad about that. Oh, one issue with the AP which I had known going in. By book 3 there were some hints that the scroll contained Jhavul. In a normal campaign, the players would not have opened the scroll at all. But, they knew it was a key part of the AP and so they played along and let their character curiosity take them into it. Which of course they see Jhavul leave and just shook their heads. Book 4
I changed the background a lot in this adventure. The author, Jason Nelson, was nice enough to email people copies of his uncut original draft which was significantly different in parts than the published version. I went with a sort of in between version, having the earth genies brought in to stabilize the plane and not part of Jhavul's army. Our Ranger (who is played by a young man without much D&D experience) seemed to almost die a lot in this book. Generally in the same manner. Win initiative, charge bad guy, hit once, then get pummeled by full attack of monster. Rinse, repeat. The worst though was against the Golden Ram. The ram kept escaping them, so the Ranger comes up with a plan to sneak up on it and throw a tanglefoot bag. Good idea. So, they spot the ram again, he sneaks up on it, and then...proceeds to NOT follow his own plan and instead try to grapple it. Not even close, full round attacks then a trample later, only Breath of life saved him. The funniest thing about it was that there was a pattern of everyone coming up with a plan, and then the ranger would win initiative and not follow the plan, making everyone groan as they watched the fight become much harder...but this was his plan and he still didn't follow it! Well, I thought it was funny at least. Book 5 This was really the worst part of the AP. The book itself wasn't bad but NO ONE enjoyed being trapped on another plane after having immediately been trapped on another plane. Then throw in on how HUGE the place was and that it was essentially a dungeon crawl, it really messed with the pacing of the game and the party was VERY glad when this one was over. The group did some scouting, ended up in the Flickering Candle section and cleared that section out. They were making plans on how to attack the Fire Giants by the Bull pyramid when it dawned on them that there were a pile of Fire Giant heads in the Salamander room. So, they went back and brought with them the head of the Salamander and made peace with the fire giants. That saved A LOT of time! The giants escorted them right to the black jinni Imam Shabendeh and from there they went right up to the top of the citadel. They avoided lots of nasty fights because of that too, like the Div who I thought might TPK them with his rain of debris! The elf genie killer assassin guy attacked the cleric, I think, who rolled the DC exactly to avoid the death attack. Book 6
Davashuum got close to taking out the fighter (who was the moldspeaker) but the Bralani had finished off most of the flesh golems before the pcs even got there and so D fell after 2 rounds I think. The fight with the return of the Carrion King was fun but the room was really too small for the morgh's to really take advantage of the trap which heals them. The Carrion King only got one lick off on the cleric who had already cast Freedom of Movement so it did nothing. The cleric then cast wind walk and with the use of a handful of augury spells learned the fasted way to Jhavul and just whisked their way to him. I had the nightmares spot them and they managed to breath smoke on the wizard but she made the save and the party just kept flying past. Next the advanced efreeti hit a couple of them with rays of flame but they still sailed past and got to Jhavul. They used the wind walk to get to the other side of the lake before dismissing it and the battle was on. The Efreeti and fire giants came in chasing after the party but the Moldspeaker with an awakened Tempest set up a tornado (with the party and Jhavul in an eye) to keep everyone else out. The cleric and the wizard then made their rolls against Jhavul and his hit points disappeared quickly. But not before the Ranger charged him and let Jhavul hit him with a series of full attacks haha. Only some temporary hits points, stone skin (from the ram's horn) and the cleric's rebuke death kept him above 0 hps! But Jhavul only got one more good hit off before he was gone. I had decided (since we knew this was the last day of the campaign) that I was not going to have him flee, but I think he took enough damage from a maximized Dragon's breath spell that it wouldn't have mattered! And that was the end of the campaign. The end fight felt a bit anti-climatic but it was only because they had prepared well for the fight. The wind walk and ignoring eveyrone else made a huge difference. I've had to take a break from gaming for now, but this summer I'll be DMing Serpent's Skull for this same group, can't wait! Thanks go to Paizo for their work and for the great support by both Paizo, authors, and fellow gamers on these boards.
We began back in June or July and finished last weekend, though our weekends all became complicated and it took us I think 2 months just to get the last 2 gaming sessions done. We had 4 players and I DM'd. The players were:
It was our first game with Pathfinder rules. I updated the adventure before each book. We started off with just the core rule book and added the APG after it came out. In general the party (with 3 of the 4 players being very smart, strategic, long time D&D players) didn't have too many problems, Pathfinder characters being noticeably stronger than 3.5 characters. But with the small group I didn't want to make it a difficult campaign and basically ran the campaign as is (small tweaks here and there--besides updating of course) Overall we all had a great time. Comments on:
First scene of play, the party is convinced that Dashki is a red herring and doesn't pay any attention to his mention of pugwampis. Instead they are suspicious of Father Zastoran who I played as being quite sexist (and 3 of the characters were female). Immediately I had to do some DM'ing as the group decided not to go looking for the lost goat and instead head for the monastery the next day. I really didn't want them to go there without having the the foreshadowing of fighting pugwampis and so I had another goat taken the next night which got things back on track. The party is scouting out the monastery from the outside, are convinced that the statues in one small room are gargoyles but discover stirges instead. The Ranger gets a stirge in the neck and almost bleeds out, which was apparently foreshadowing the fairly regular occurring feature of that character almost dieing. For multiple reasons I knew that Tempest would be most useful to the Fighter in the group. However, our fighter specialized in the bladed scarf which I just could not bring myself to claim was also used by one of the templars of the 5 winds, hahaha. So, instead of finding Tempest, I had the lingering power from the Moldspeaker (which happened to the fighter without me even having to cheat) infuse her current bladed scarf with the power of Tempest. Worked out very well. The Moldspeaker idea was very neat and the player did a great job of roleplaying it, at first worrying the rest of the group with symptoms of a split personality. The player even took 1 level of Sorcerer to reflect this more and took Enlarge Person as one of the spells since Jann have that. Very funny moment when after realizing that Dashki was missing, the group goes looking for him, following the trail which vanishes in the middle of a sandy area. The cleric quickly believes that Dashki buried something there and tried to erase the markings and so starts digging in the sand, literally digging towards the mouth of the dust digger which promptly swallows him whole! The rest of the party killed it and he managed to just barely get out alive. He was quite paranoid for a while after that. Epic fight at the Battle Market and we were all sure that the fighter was going to die since she got separated in the fight, she ended up on the second floor while the rest of the party was still on the first with Khardswann in between. Book 2 This adventure went pretty fast and straight forward. The group partnered with the trogs to get to the Carrion King. The Carrion King was a glass cannon. The worst thing that happened was that I had him use that disfiguring attack first on the fighter (the character was a belly dancer using a bladed scarf and who's second highest stat was in charisma), I hit and did 7 Cha damage, thinking it didn't really matter except that I forgot that character had a level of Sorcerer now and so couldn't use those spells until that damage was healed. Other than that, the scariest fight for the PCs was outside against two of the gnoll guards riding on the dire hyenas. The PCs ignored the mounts at first and paid for it with continual trip attacks. After that, those hyenadons were always the first things killed! ha Zayafid, who party quickly despised, escaped. Book 3 Zayafid quickly returns leading the attack in the desert while the PCs travel to Katapesh. The cleric really didn't like that this guy had escaped and had prepared every day since Zayafid fled both Invisibility Purge and Dimensional Anchor. haha He didn't get away again. Dinner party scene as is felt forced, but as I had the NPCs keep approaching the PCs, the PCs wanted to know how the NPCs had found out they had the scroll, and so Rayhan suggested the dinner and that worked out well. We had a little bit of trouble, when the PCs (led by the cleric) decided that the bad guys must need Rayhan alive to open the scroll (you know what they say about assuming) and so replied to the kidnap letter with a taunt...which killed Rayhan and displeased Sarenrae greatly. No other problems in the adventure, they got Rayhans body and raised him (I stressed that he was old and wouldn't normally have wanted to come back but he was too eager to try to open the scroll not to), he eventually opens the scroll and I decided that the energy from the broken scroll shatters and destroyed Rayhan, the group felt pretty bad about that. Oh, one issue with the AP which I had known going in. By book 3 there were some hints that the scroll contained Jhavul. In a normal campaign, the players would not have opened the scroll at all. But, they knew it was a key part of the AP and so they played along and let their character curiosity take them into it. Which of course they see Jhavul leave and just shook their heads. Book 4
I changed the background a lot in this adventure. The author, Jason Nelson, was nice enough to email people copies of his uncut original draft which was significantly different in parts than the published version. I went with a sort of in between version, having the earth genies brought in to stabilize the plane and not part of Jhavul's army. Our Ranger (who is played by a young man without much D&D experience) seemed to almost die a lot in this book. Generally in the same manner. Win initiative, charge bad guy, hit once, then get pummeled by full attack of monster. Rinse, repeat. The worst though was against the Golden Ram. The ram kept escaping them, so the Ranger comes up with a plan to sneak up on it and throw a tanglefoot bag. Good idea. So, they spot the ram again, he sneaks up on it, and then...proceeds to NOT follow his own plan and instead try to grapple it. Not even close, full round attacks then a trample later, only Breath of life saved him. The funniest thing about it was that there was a pattern of everyone coming up with a plan, and then the ranger would win initiative and not follow the plan, making everyone groan as they watched the fight become much harder...but this was his plan and he still didn't follow it! Well, I thought it was funny at least. Book 5 This was really the worst part of the AP. The book itself wasn't bad but NO ONE enjoyed being trapped on another plane after having immediately been trapped on another plane. Then throw in on how HUGE the place was and that it was essentially a dungeon crawl, it really messed with the pacing of the game and the party was VERY glad when this one was over. The group did some scouting, ended up in the Flickering Candle section and cleared that section out. They were making plans on how to attack the Fire Giants by the Bull pyramid when it dawned on them that there were a pile of Fire Giant heads in the Salamander room. So, they went back and brought with them the head of the Salamander and made peace with the fire giants. That saved A LOT of time! The giants escorted them right to the black jinni Imam Shabendeh and from there they went right up to the top of the citadel. They avoided lots of nasty fights because of that too, like the Div who I thought might TPK them with his rain of debris! The elf genie killer assassin guy attacked the cleric, I think, who rolled the DC exactly to avoid the death attack. Book 6
Davashuum got close to taking out the fighter (who was the moldspeaker) but the Bralani had finished off most of the flesh golems before the pcs even got there and so D fell after 2 rounds I think. The fight with the return of the Carrion King was fun but the room was really too small for the morgh's to really take advantage of the trap which heals them. The Carrion King only got one lick off on the cleric who had already cast Freedom of Movement so it did nothing. The cleric then cast wind walk and with the use of a handful of augury spells learned the fasted way to Jhavul and just whisked their way to him. I had the nightmares spot them and they managed to breath smoke on the wizard but she made the save and the party just kept flying past. Next the advanced efreeti hit a couple of them with rays of flame but they still sailed past and got to Jhavul. They used the wind walk to get to the other side of the lake before dismissing it and the battle was on. The Efreeti and fire giants came in chasing after the party but the Moldspeaker with an awakened Tempest set up a tornado (with the party and Jhavul in an eye) to keep everyone else out. The cleric and the wizard then made their rolls against Jhavul and his hit points disappeared quickly. But not before the Ranger charged him and let Jhavul hit him with a series of full attacks haha. Only some temporary hits points, stone skin (from the ram's horn) and the cleric's rebuke death kept him above 0 hps! But Jhavul only got one more good hit off before he was gone. I had decided (since we knew this was the last day of the campaign) that I was not going to have him flee, but I think he took enough damage from a maximized Dragon's breath spell that it wouldn't have mattered! And that was the end of the campaign. The end fight felt a bit anti-climatic but it was only because they had prepared well for the fight. The wind walk and ignoring eveyrone else made a huge difference. I've had to take a break from gaming for now, but this summer I'll be DMing Serpent's Skull for this same group, can't wait! Thanks go to Paizo for their work and for the great support by both Paizo, authors, and fellow gamers on these boards.
Thanks Sean for the reply!
Yeah, the wording is confusing to me, it says not alive or dead (such as a construct), so the construct is an example...I feel it could have equally said "such as a rock". But then of course, it doesn't say that and does specify another creature type which makes me wonder if that is the intent.
Would Deathwatch inform the user the ability to detect a construct creature if that creature was just standing still as if it were a statue?
Here's the link to the map Shiv Map The other products that go with this are
And the later adventures have been using lots of creatures from the new Bestiary II, oh and some references to the APG as well. All of these are optional of course. As a DM I do like Heart of the Jungle and it has rules on additional diseases but would mostly be useful for someone running their own Mwangi game since it has a lot more information in it that SS is not going to cover. Sargava I think is very nice even despite the fact that the majority of the campaign happens outside of Sargava. Sargava is a major point in the campaign and plays a continuing role.
Oh good idea. I like Psionics but I'm in the vast minority of my group so I haven't purchased the new Psionics Unleased book since I felt it would go mostly unused but using it on the npcs and monsters is a good way of testing out the rules. Does the Psionics Unleashed book have a chapter on converting non-psionic versions of creatures into psionic ones? I think that Paizo (and Wotc for that matter) just use Sorcerer levels instead and I'd assume you'd just have to change that to one of the Psionic classes and rebuild it, but I was curious if that type of conversion was specifically covered. If it is, I think I'll pick up the book/pdf as soon as I can and begin converting it as well.
Ah yes! Excellent, thanks!
I've seen a Mwangi shaman from Reaper on this site but I was wondering if anyone could point to some more native Mwangi type of miniatures. Specifically I'd love to find a lightly armored or non-armored man with a short spear and a large shield.
I don't give my players free acclimated since I feel it's a part of the campaign. (We're about to start after having played Legacy of Fire, so they're used to the heat rules now ha). There's a trait in LoF and I believe now the Inner Sea Primer guide that gives a character a +4 to resist the environmental heat. I also run with a house rule on heat, I don't like the fact that it goes from 0 penalty to a +4 penalty for wearing armor. So instead, I make the penalty equal to their armor check penalty. Which is why most of the native people wear light or no armor.
That Star Wars level was exactly what I was thinking of, and you could see how I thought an AP would fit the same way. But it was also what I was thinking of when I asked since Lucas made people delete those levels because he didn't give them permission. Boo on him. haha But I think instead of doing LoF directly I think I might start off with doing the backstory.
Oh good, a challenge. ha
I'm a big fan of LittleBigPlanet and have built some small levels if you are familiar with the game. I am looking forward to the release of LBP2 next month and was inspired with a great idea. I am currently wrapping up a Legacy of Fire Campaign. I thought it would be a lot of fun to create a series of 6 LittleBigPlanet levels based on that AP. I'm assuming though that this would not be legal because it is not covered in the community use policy? But I wasn't sure since it's a different medium. Some companies encourage fan based levels while others are against it.
Was going to write something longer, but simply I will like to see future products used in APs with proper references.
When Holy Smite (and other references) say "evil outsider" does that mean an outsider who ALSO has the Evil descriptor... Do you have a reference for that?
Yes, I was talking about Holy Smite and not Smite Evil as others mentioned. Thank you for the reference though. Since Smite Evil specifically says "evil subtyped outsiders" and Holy Smite says "evil outsiders" I'm inclined to rule it as you say but I'm still curious if there's a reference somewhere that clarifies it.
When Holy Smite (and other references) say "evil outsider" does that mean an outsider who ALSO has the Evil descriptor, such as a Bone Devil: LE Large outsider (devil, EVIL, extraplanar, lawful) Or does it mean any outsider who's alignment is evil, such as an Efreeti: LE Large outsider (extraplanar, fire)
You probably want to check the Council of Thieves forum, they might have the answers there. It's probably the best place to ask these questions. demon321x2 has not participated in any online campaigns. |