RPG Superstar 8 Season Star Voter, 9 Season Star Voter. Pathfinder Society GM. 2,433 posts (4,978 including aliases). 14 reviews. 1 list. 2 wishlists. 25 Organized Play characters. 41 aliases.
And Feiya continues to be the most frustrating single miniature in the entire line.
I ordered this as a replacement for the RoW version that I bought when she first was released.
When the replacement arrived, it was awful, worse than the original. Her sculpt was so bad that she doesn't even stand up. And because her cloak is attached to the base, I cannot even correct it by boiling.
Then I looked at the bottom, and noticed that it said RoW, so I thought Paizo mistakenly sent me an old one. I called customer service and they apologized and promised to send a replacement.
I received the second replacement today. It is also really bad. I immediately checked the bottom, and lo and behold: RoW.
So I called customer service again, and I was informed that they are the same miniature as the original RoW, ostensibly with more quality control than originally, which is why she is still marked RoW.
I can honestly say that it is just as bad as the first one that I got when she was released originally.
I am really disappointed in Paizo. I thought this was intended to be a replacement for the poor job last time. My mistake.
The happy ending is that my money will be refunded to me.
I cannot recommend anyone waste their time and money on this miniature.
I liked everything about this scenario. It is a linear dungeon crawl, but it has opportunities for role-playing. It has combat encounters that can be resolved diplomatically. It is set in a really cool location with a great back-story. The NPCs are well-written, and mesh well with the story. There are possibly plot twists. Skills are rewarded. The Technologist feat is rewarded, but characters without Technologist aren't brutally punished.
If you are interested in reading the game I ran, you can find it here. Beware, of course, that spoilers abound there.
Bottom line: I highly recommend this scenario, particularly for Play-by-Post.
Perspective Player, in a party of 6.
Subtier 4-5.
Time 5 hours.
Even though we finished this one in 5 hours, it seemed like much longer. The scenario actually felt like one-and-a-half scenarios put together. I think the scenario would have been much better without the first act entirely.
Also, I was disappointed with this scenario for another reason.
Spoiler:
I was hoping that this scenario would feature the Aspis Consortium.
But that is a minor issue.
Overall, I think this scenario had a lot of potential. It had cool locations and interesting encounters. But it just didn't work for me.
Perspective: GM
Subtier: 10-11
Party: typical party of 5 PCs, only 1 was out of subtier.
Time: 7 to 8 hours (the lower subtier should go faster).
The setting for this scenario is outstanding! I loved the Storval Stairs. It is an evocative location.
This is an extremely challenging scenario! GMs should read the following spoilers to have an idea of what the players are in for.
Spoiler:
There are four encounters, but the second and third are pushed almost back to back which makes the third encounter a bit tougher.
The first two encounters are appropriately balanced.
The third encounter involves a save-or-suck effect followed by a very dirty trick. From the GM side of things this trick is delightful. But the players will not like it.
The fourth encounter, however, is over the top. My group ran away with one PC dead, another captured and ransomed back to the society, and all with 1 XP, 0 prestige, and only about half the gold. Meanwhile, the BBEG suffered ZERO damage, and his girlfriend was only down by 4 hp (from a single magic missile).
If you play this, bring your "A" game (and a bunch of prestige).
I use my deck literally every session. Not only does it have the rules for these conditions at the ready, but it is a great reminder to make the adjustments. Useful both as a player and as a GM.
I am a player in this AP and I am loving it. As someone who owns every Adventure Path since The Shackled City, I can honestly say that this is my favorite AP, hands down.
The Lords of Rust offers a great setting, colorful characters, and some really interesting turns of events. The sandbox nature of the adventure provides player characters considerable agency over the storyline.
I played this one a while back and didn't care for it. But then I GMed it and my opinion changed.
I have run this scenario twice now and I really love it. Even though the encounters are all pretty well set, an experienced GM can allow for a more sandbox approach to the investigation.
GMs:
The scenario provides three suggested NPCs that your players can use to get information. Use these. And use more NPCs if you need to. If you can get your hands on the map of Riddleport with a key (Pathfinder #13) then you can give that to your players during the investigation. Let them roam the city and have some fun RP encounters.
The mission is straight forward, but involves a bit of investigating to accomplish. The city where it is set is really fun, and provides opportunity for a ton of roleplaying.
There is the complaint that is often repeated: it is difficult to accomplish both the primary and secondary goals for this scenario. I only personally know one group who has done so (and that was the group that I ran it for tonight). They were extremely lucky.
A note on the final encounter for GMs:
The BBEG's tactics work, but they take a while. This gives your players a brief opportunity to accomplish the goal. In the surprise round, she attacks. In the next round, she can draw a weapon as a move action and begin the full-round action from her Tactics entry as a standard action. For her standard action on the second round she can complete this action. So the players should have a chance to accomplish the goal, especially if they do something smart.
But that is perfectly fine, I think. The scenario is not particularly dangerous, but it is difficult to accomplish both goals. I think there should be more PFS scenarios that work this way.
GMs:
The group I ran tonight all got knocked out from non-lethal damage in the second combat encounter. They had to explain themselves to Boss Croat, what they were doing in Riddleport, and why were they disrupting his racket. They were able to successfully bribe him to let them go. It was a great Godfather scene! That was the most dangerous encounter for this group.
I think this is a tough scenario to run well. So I am only giving it three stars. Otherwise it would be a 4-star scenario.
I may be biased because Expedition to the Barrier Peaks was one of my favorite adventures when I was a kid. Or it might just be the fantastic GM and group of players we have. In any case, this AP is a ton of fun. Book 1 was incredible!
The setting is rich and detailed.
The action starts right away.
Although a general plot line is given, there is a sandbox feel to things as well. (However, the dungeon portion is somewhat linear.)
My only warning is that this adventure is both high fantasy and high tech! For our group, that has been seen as a good thing.
To get the most out of this AP, play a character closely tied to the setting. Play an android. Play a cleric of Brigh. Play a Numerian barbarian. Play some genetic experiment created by the Technic League.
The bottom line: this adventure is filled with AWESOME!
This is a great start to Season 5. This scenario provides a perfect mix of combat encounters and non-combat encounters. Plus, player decisions have ramifications both within the scenario and for the season as a whole.
Most of the combats are fairly vanilla, nothing out of the ordinary. However, at least one is pretty tough, at least in the high subtier.
Pacing was about perfect. We played this in four hours. The author makes recommendations for dramatic tension, and it really works.
Lastly, a very serious spoiler to be read by GMs only:
DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT READING THIS IF YOU ARE A PLAYER!:
The secondary conditions are very difficult to meet. I don't know if that is a bad thing. It is what it is.
In our session, the players failed to defeat the BBEG before running away, which resulted in a loss of 1,000 gp and 1 Prestige.
This scenario was a ton of fun! Great opportunities for RP. Players will want to be taking notes while playing in this scenario.
As mentioned by others, the combat encounters seemed very easy. But to be fair, four of the PCs in my group had fighters, which tend to do well at levels 1-2. Still, it would be nice if the combats were a little more challenging.
There was a nice diverse set of skills required by the scenario. It was good to see some skills that don't come up much in PFS.
All in all, I would have given this scenario 5 stars if not for the somewhat lackluster combat encounters. 4 stars.
I ran this for my home group, and we had a blast! The criticism about the maps given by other reviewers is fair, but I drew all of my maps ahead of time. If you have game paper or two chessex battlemats, I recommend pre-drawing the maps. I mapped the henge on a hex grid, which my players really liked.
My only criticism is
Spoiler:
the fire mechanic in the first encounter. It seems inevitable that the fire will get away from the PCs. Maybe that is the intention. If not, a 1-in-6 chance of adjacent squares igniting would have made for a more exciting fire. My players simply gave up on fighting the fire at all.
Perspective: player, 6-player table, APL 5, playing Tier 6-7.
This is one of my favorite scenarios so far. The combats were all tough, but not overwhelming. I think they averaged about 3 rounds per encounter. There is a bit of roleplaying too, which is nice. The puzzle was good.
This scenario is almost entirely combat, with very little opportunity for RP. It also seemed to be extremely tough, at least for a party of 4 characters in the lower tier. We had the prototypical party of fighter, wizard, cleric, rogue, all 1st level except the wizard who was 2nd.
The dungeon was fun, with very interesting encounters and terrain. But the lack of RP elements was disappointing. On the upside, I found the faction missions to be pretty enjoyable, especially mine (GL).
Lastly, it didn't seem to tie in completely with the overall plot of season 4, except for its location (which could be changed to anywhere else) and a bit of flavor text in the intro.
Edit: it turns out that our GM accidentally ran our APL 1.25 party through some of the Tier 4-5 encounters, and for other encounters, did not make the appropriate changes based on our 4-man party. So, I feel I was unfair in saying this scenario was tough. The truth is I don't know how hard this one is. I plan on running it myself at some point. When I do, I will revisit this review.
