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So, I ended up going with Abadar as my replacement for St. Cuthbert, not the least reason being that I like the symbology: Abadar's symbol is a golden key, which contrasts nicely with the Cagewrights. My PCs include:
Going to be an interesting mix. The NE PC's player doesn't really roleplay much, so the alignment "problem" probably won't be. I run a consequences-heavy game, and he knows that. Since I ended up with a Pharasman cleric, Pharasma became a lock for the Cathedral. I'll have to adjust one encounter slightly to compensate, but I'm not too worried about it. I started them off with a minor encounter at the Lucky Monkey, where they were the last people sitting up at night, drinking and eating in front of the only fire. A swarm of tiny monkeys started attacking them (flinging poo and the like) and the battle was on. That led them to a caravan which had been carrying the monkeys as live cargo; they found one dead body of a drover who had crawled into the jungle before perishing. The drover carried identification: Rob Urikas. At Cauldron, they saved Ruphus on their way to the Church of Abadar, then met Jenya Urikas who gave them a job. And so it begins.
Having read the encounter in question, I have some thoughts...: I think that I might still replace Wee Jas with Pharasma (who is a more important deity to the common people than Nethys), and just replace the few undead used in the module. Alternatively, instead of undead they can be "spirit guardians" called from Pharasma's Graveyard to help a powerful cleric in his time of need.
Alternatively, Ike Iverson can secretly have become a follower of Urgathoa masquerading as a Pharasman, perhaps due to Vhalantru's manipulations of his suggestible nature, and as a result this is his explosively public fall from grace.
Regarding the god replacements: Shackled City spoilers: As far as Pharasma goes, I hadn't read that far ahead - this is good information. I had considered Nethys, but thought to try to keep the psychopomp aspect.
I was thinking Desna as a replacement for Fharlanghn. It seems more likely that there would be a shrine to Desna in a roadside inn.
So far, I think Cauldron looks like this: CAULDRON
DEMOGRAPHICS
MARKETPLACE
I gave it a Disadvantage of "infiltrated" which I thought described the situation pretty well. I would say it adds +2 to Corruption and Crime, and +5 to Danger.
On classes, assuming you are going to convert npcs to paizo classes, aside from possibly the summoner (if optimized for combat only) all of the supplementary classes are in the same range as those that came in the core rulebooks. Paizo has been rather good about not increasing the power level in terms of base classes. I would say some of the APG classes are somewhat more powerful (or maybe easier to minmax) than the Core Book classes. The Magus is really too powerful. The Oracle and Alchemist are probably okay. But I figure keeping them all to the Core Book cuts down on some of the craziness; I have some players who are REALLY GOOD at optimizing classes.
Yeah, I did a read-through of a bunch of threads before deciding on my substitutions. I figured on two places to possibly put Cauldron, and eventually decided the farther-away one made it less possible to go to Eleder or Fort Bandu to get help. Thanks for the comments!
So, in a couple of weeks, I'm going to be starting the Shackled City Adventure Path using Pathfinder. I told my players to use the PFS guidelines for making their characters, but that they could only select classes from the Core Book; my thinking is that the NPCs in SCAP were constructed with (for the most part) base classes in 3.5, and I want to keep the playing field relatively level. I'm going to set the campaign in Sargava, the Lost Colony. I think flavor-wise it fits very well, with Chelish colonials and Mwangi natives in a sweltering jungle setting. I'm going to place it at the extreme top right of the Sargava map, which puts it a little further from the capital (Eleder) than Cauldron is from Sasserine, but I think it'll work better that way -- the outlying towns will be more reliant on Cauldron for protection. I'm trying to work up Cauldron as a city in PFRPG terms, and I'm not sure which of the Qualities to give it. At 4,500 people, it gets 3 qualities. Academic (for Bluewater Academy) and Insular seem appropriate, leaving one I'm not certain of. Also, while I would like to give it a Disadvantage to reflect what is going on in the SCAP - none of the available ones seem to make sense: Cursed? Maybe Hunted? Other conversions look like they'll be easier. I'm replacing Wee Jas with Pharasma and Pelor with Sarenrae. I'll replace St. Cuthbert with either Abadar or Iomedae, and Kord with either Gorum or Cayden Cailean - I'm going to go over all of the scenarios to see if one or the other fits better.
Sort of late notice, but there is a Pathfinder Society Introductory Gameday being held at Maplewood Hobby (1970 Springfield Avenue, Maplewood, NJ 07040-3436) this Saturday starting at 9:00 AM. There is a cost of $5 per slot, or $10 for the day. The modules to be run are the "First Steps" Introductory trilogy. The schedule is as follows: 9:00 AM - 2:00 PM : Intro 3-01 In Service to Lore
There will be two tables for each slot. Currently several spaces open. More details here: http://maplewoodhobby.com/Pathfinder.html
I just realized Yavka is based on Words of Power from Ultimate Magic. Since I'll be using the module to introduce some people to the Pathfinder Society, which forbids Words of Power, I'd rather not give them a pregen that will open a can of worms for me. So... HAGATHA TONGUEBLISTER CR 1/2
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I'm thinking that Sir Glubrup might do better with a dogslicer and a cast iron pot lid (small light steel shield). That brings his AC up to 18 when he's using it, for slightly less damage. If someone decides to play Sir Glubrup, I'm going to have to pay attention - if Bufo leaps into combat while they're among trees, Glubrup's hooked lance is definitely getting caught on something.
I'll probably be running this module for a relatively sizable group, so I thought I'd check online for more pregen dudes. I love the concepts and fluff of these guys! I think I can agree they're slightly more potent than I'd make them, but the fluff is almost perfect, and the rhymes are awesome! A couple of changes I'd make: 1) These guys all have two regular Traits. To make them consistent with the guys in the module, I'd reduce them to just one Trait, and make it a goblin-specific one from Goblins of Golarion. 2) Almost none of these guys have a pet toad!!! This is the Licktoad tribe, they've all got to have their favorite toad pet, that they love and cherish more than any living thing (including their relatives, mom and dad, and so forth). Although I guess goblins on wolves is iconic, I kind of think I'd have gone a different way with the cavalier.
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First off, kudos! I was about to make this exact thing, and said "Maybe someone else on the Web has had this same need and already done such a sheet?" This is really well done, probably better than what I would have come up with. Secondly, Pathfinder Society characters who get an Artisan Shop can Craft items at a 5% discount (and with a +1 circumstance bonus), allowing Alchemists with shops to make items at 55% off. Maybe this could be another Yes/No field under "Swift Alchemy?"
I'm currently running "The Aundairan Job" for my Eberron group, and I realized that the web supplement isn't on the site. Then it occurred to me how low a priority they must be, what with the current state of things. Are there plans to produce web supplements for the remaining issues of Dungeon, or are we SOL?
There was also a Dungeon issue which included an intelligent magic mirror that created clones of people. Ah, Glimmerpane! He'll be a recurring master villain in my Eberron campaign, once the PCs get around to going to Xen'drik. Truly an awesomely unique master villain! My intelligent Hand of the Mage (which retained some of it's former "owner"'s powers) pales in comparison.
My reality has been shattered! I always pictured drow in all sorts of fancy, fru-fru duds that were shiny, scaly, iridescent (basically, whatever was impossible for human smiths/tailors to really produce). I always figured adamantine was black; kind of like how every fantasy critter tastes like chicken.
114: Torrents of Dread, by Greg A. Vaughan (6th level) This nice little adventure is almost a perfect fit as written. In EBERRON, place it on Xen'drik instead of the Isle of Dread. The PCs are on board a ship going to an archeological dig for Morgrave University (thus, the reason the PCs are being sent to see the natives is because that's their job on this voyage). The villagers speak a debased form of Giant instead of Olman. The koprus are trying to summon a creature from Kythri to the material plane here, because the area is currently a Manifest Zone to that plane and the summoning is much easier. The process of summoning is causing the storm, which has effects as described in the adventure. For flavor, consider studding the bronze plate in area C22 with a khyber dragonshard. You might also consider making the Zombie Master a magewright and arming him with a wand as described in the "Scaling the Adventure" sidebar under "4th- to 5th-level PCs".
I must be in the minority, then. I found the article unhelpful. It didn't contain enough unusual ideas and easy-to-use fluff for me to find much use for it in-game. I would have preferred maybe a three-article series, with these blurbs combined with short writeups for variants on the classic undead listed; for instance, after the bit about ghosts, you have a variant kind of ghost. There was an old series of Halloween articles in Dragon years ago that had just the right mix of info on the undead and stats on variants of those same undead. That would have been more useful to me.
SPOILER ALERT: The rest of the thread will necessarily have spoilers to specific adventures, since otherwise it'll be really difficult to give DMs conversion notes. You have been warned.
121: The Styes, by Richard Pett (9th level)
In Eberron, the aboleths are contemporaries of the Lords of Dust (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ebee/20050704a). Rather than a plot involving a Greyhawkian deity, the aboleth has discovered something like a unique aberrant dragonmark on the kraken. Believing this ties it to the Draconic Prophecy, Sgothgah is planning on using the creature once it fully matures to take its revenge on dragonkind. The other aboleths are its allies and assistants, guarding the kraken until it is fully mature. Mr. Dory became part of a Cult of the Dragon Below, created by Sgothgah to forward his designs. No other statistics need to change.
I'm a huge EBERRON fan, and was excited to find out that it was being supported in Dungeon magazine. After picking up a bunch of issues, I sorted them to find all the EBERRON-related articles. I note that Keith Baker is putting conversion notes for the Age of Worms Adventure Path in every issue, which also gave me the idea to do that for other adventures. So, I figured it would be a good idea to list the published adventures, and also to post conversion notes in one place. ARTICLES:
Of these, I think the Ring of Storms article is invaluable to the EBERRON DM. The Lord of Blades writeup is not as important since his stats were reprinted in the Five Nations book. ADVENTURES:
Steel Shadows is a great EBERRON adventure, fully enmeshed in the EBERRON setting; I highly recommend it. Crypt of Crimson Stars, Temple of the Scorpion God, and Pit of the Fire Lord are loosely related, as the Shards of EBERRON campaign arc. The rest are good, solid adventures.
I'm pointing out how it can be done. However, the adventure as written lacks some defining elements of Eberron, like warforged/shifters/changelings/kalashtar, the lightning rail (not a problem with Regalport since it's not on the line), and so on. Does it suffer for their absence? Not at all, I like the adventure quite a bit. However, if I ran a campaign arc with fifteen-twenty adventures, and not a single one of them had any of the aforementioned "Eberron elements," it would be a jarring note to my players. These elements have their place in adventures; without Eberron specific adventures, I'm forced to write them in. "You can always do that anyway," you say. Ah, yes, but that's why I buy Dungeon magazine - so I don't have to.
1. I think a map drawn for an adventure is constrained to some extent; it has to map the adventure locations in a logical and consistent manner, that also satisfies the requirements of plot and character interaction. Maps of Mystery are under no such requirements, and can be as fanciful or unusual as the cartographer likes; then the DM has the enjoyable task of fitting his villain's machinations around the available terrain, rather more like the real world. 2. Maps in Dungeon adventures typically map a certain number of specific locations: inns/taverns, churchs/temples, underground tunnel complexes. There are thousands of other kinds of places you can have an adventure, but the selection of maps for those is much more limited. With the Maps of Mystery feature, you can have maps for such unusual things as boathouses or glacial rifts, or whatever. It's an additional resource. 3. For gamers, maps = good, more maps = better. It just is. Really. :)
To answer an earlier question, I think this is a great port to Eberron. (I can't speak for the Forgotten Realms, not being a player or fan of it.) The Styes could be placed as a district of the following cities: Stormhome (in Aundair), Regalport (in the Lhazaar Principalities), Newthrone (in Q'barra), Trolanport (in Zilargo), or Stormreach (in Xen'drik). My suggestion would be Regalport - the strong maritime tradition of the Lhazaar Principalities, combined with the more chaotic governance could easily lead to an urban blight like the Styes springing up. In this interpretation, Hopene'er Asylum becomes a House Jorasco establishment. Master Refrum becomes a priest of Onatar (male human expert 5). SPOILER SPACE
In Eberron, the aboleths are contemporaries of the Lords of Dust (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ebee/20050704a). Rather than a plot involving a Greyhawkian deity, the aboleth has discovered something like a unique aberrant dragonmark on the kraken. Believing this ties it to the Draconic Prophecy, Sgothgah is planning on using the creature once it fully matures to take its revenge on dragonkind. The other aboleths are its allies and assistants, guarding the kraken until it is fully mature. Mr. Dory became part of a Cult of the Dragon Below, created by Sgothgah to forward his designs. No other statistics need to change.
Can I add here that putting two kinds of each map in the Online Supplements is an incredibly huge plus in my book? The maps in Dungeon are always far nicer than my old-school pencil-and-graphpaper maps, and I like that I can print them out, blow them up, cut them into sections and otherwise improve play speed.
I think derro could easily be a Khyber tainted subrace of Dwarves. I know the tendency in Eberron is not to emphasize the subraces, but I think the derro are an easy exception to that rule. Perhaps they are remnants of the original dwarves, who did not leave the dwarven citadel in the deep, to be corrupted by centuries of slavery to the daelkyr. (See the Dragonshard on the history of Eberronese dwarves: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ebds/20041101a). As for the planar issue, the realm of Daanvi the Perfect Order is a perfect substitute for mechanus. Both planes are strongly law-aligned, and both planes are inhabited by inevitables and formians. The only problem I see with using Daanvi is that it is only coterminous with the prime material plane once every four hundred years and does not exert any influence over Eberron. That is easily explained by an Eldritch Machine designed to make Daanvi coterminous with that part of the Mournland, sort of like an orrerry of the planes, only on a much larger scale. Perhaps this is supposed to weaken a dimensional seal imprisoning a daelkyr deep beneath the Mournland? |
