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Someone in my campaign may soon succumb to Ghoul Fever. If he does, I’m letting him remake his character with the Ghoul Dedication feats and continue with this character.

So, my question: the description and lore for ghouls describes a craving for the flesh from the corpse of a “sapient” creature. I don’t see a game definition for sapient, but I would interpret that as something with an intelligence of at least 3 (Int mod no worse than -3).

However for the Consume Flesh action, the requirement just says “the corpse of a Small or larger creature that died in the last hour.” Nothing about it being sapient or anything.

Should I just keep it RAW and allow Consume Flesh to work with any freshly killed creature?

We’re about to get to Pagked, and this will be my first time running the Infiltration rules. I’m a little confused on the preparation activities. I know Create Disguises will give each character 1 Edge point to use for maintaining their cover identity, but for the Edge points on the other activities, do those just go to the a group pool that anyone can use? Or do they go to a specific character?

Does anyone have any suggestions on subtle ways to push the party to be more likely to head to Sallowshore before Pagked? The book seems to be depending on Sallowshore being closer to do this based on the text at the start of chapter 2, but unfortunately that's just not true based on the provided map, which my players already have.

I think it’s okay if they do them in either order, which gives the players more agency, which is usually a better experience for them. Just Pagked will be a little tougher and Sallowshore a little easier.

But otherwise, if you prefer them to do it in order, you can have one of the characters recall knowledge or somehow hear that Decrosia, or Pagked, is more dangerous. Just be prepared for players to completely ignore the hints, as they often will.

MalazanEnjoyer wrote:

CorvusMask wrote:

Its very obvious yeah that none of other writers were consulted that book 2 sneaked in plot ritual that gives negative healing for year :'D

So removing it from ap is probably just straight up better for the experience

That works for living PC's, but my whole party is undead already from character creation. I guess replacing the damage to cold or something is the best solution for this situation

Nah, I think in undead party case you should just let them enjoy their undead benefits

My only concern is that in a nation where the vast majority of the population are undead, wraiths seem pretty ineffective. I think I may give some of them ghost touch daggers, as a backup option, without having to change the rules. It seems like it would make sense for a Blood Lord to arm them like that.

[snip]

I agree. I think what I’ll do is skip that ritual in Graveclaw, to restrict the benefit of negative healing to just the undead PC’s. Although who knows, by that point the whole party may have taken undead archetypes, which would still be fun.

Traum13 wrote:

Really interested in any ideas to handle the continuing problem of how to run combat with monsters like wraiths that only deal negative damage. There is an encounter marked as Severe 13, against 6 elite dread wraiths, who have no way to hurt the group. They can’t even hurt any undead NPC witnesses like they are supposed to be doing, for that matter.

I feel like I should just say that they can switch up their damage to force or something when fighting undead, as a simple solution. Does that make sense? Or any other more creative ideas on handling this?

My take: if the PCs are undead, then let them enjoy an encounter that would normally be super scary and easier for them to handle. That's one of the things that really intrigued me about writing this adventure—setting up some encounters to be easy for living and tough for undead PCs, and vice-versa. That said, the strong expectation we had when writing all of these volumes is that most groups are going to play living characters, simply because that's the standard expectation. So the encounters still skew toward challenging living PCs overall.

Thanks, I do like the novelty of undead PC’s being able to laugh at the ineffective attacks of wraiths, shadows, etc. But doesn’t the ritual Berline performs at the beginning of Graveclaw mean that living PC’s will be equally unaffected by the attacks?

I’m also trying to understand for how things work in Geb, do wraiths then pose no threat to the mostly undead population? In Graveclaw, Nathnelma has wraith watchers who attack anyone trying to break in, but in a city that’s 81% undead, they seem like a poor choice for her.

Just want to add, we are loving this path. We’re still only halfway through Zombie Feast, but I am eagerly buying each new chapter to help plant seeds that will eventually tie the group’s backstory into the plot.

Really interested in any ideas to handle the continuing problem of how to run combat with monsters like wraiths that only deal negative damage. There is an encounter marked as Severe 13, against 6 elite dread wraiths, who have no way to hurt the group. They can’t even hurt any undead NPC witnesses like they are supposed to be doing, for that matter.

I feel like I should just say that they can switch up their damage to force or something when fighting undead, as a simple solution. Does that make sense? Or any other more creative ideas on handling this?

Anyone cobble together any side quests in Greydirge yet?

Just ran session 1 and I can tell the city really interested them so I can bet after they get their new digs cleared out they will go explore and seek in town stuff to do, and I'm drawing a blank at the moment for anything fun, interesting and storyline related side quests :(

Thanks

Tom

I think the two most intriguing hooks, from what is given but not expanded on, are Haldoli’s Grace, and the Ovens.

For the Grace maybe the Builders League are causing trouble, maybe backing a group of ghouls to cause trouble for the residents, and the group could deal with the ghouls and then have to influence the faction somehow to leave them alone.

The Ovens presents a mystery with no answer given in any of the published adventures. Maybe Berline or someone wants to hire the group to find out what the Governor is up to, or investigate a disappearance of someone important, last seen in the Ovens, that is somehow related to the Governor’s plan. As for what that plan is, maybe the area is haunted by the inhabitants that were burned alive there, and one of them is a particularly powerful ghost who is exerting control over the governor, and has some plan of revenge.

How the heck does Nathnelma get a pint of blood from one of the characters for the Portrait of Spite ritual?
The one idea I have so far is if someone gets injured in her office or another earlier encounter, can assume she managed to scrape up enough blood from the floor or something.

Nathnelma’s Office:
The map is huge, 45’x90’. It seems odd that a professor’s office would be so big, backed up by the description that calls it small, in a small building.
I am considering using a different map, but wondering if it was intentionally changed after play-testing because of the haunts? Are they too much to deal with in a smaller room?

About Glorinsa: Although it’s not explained in the text, I think the subtext that Berline had her killed and brought back as skeleton because she wasn’t cutting it as a corpse tender is a nice subtle clue for why Berline’s people are so terrified of her, which is pointed out in the 1st book.

I´m having a hell of a time figuring out what foods to put on the table, as I´ve got a vampire, skeleton and a ghost in my party lol!

Vampire is not too bad; besides the obvious bottle of fine blood, I would think they have enough semblance of life to enjoy a meal. I’m thinking of the Lost Boys and their Chinese takeout in the cave.

For the skeleton PC in my game, I had Berline serve him various oils to mix with bone powders.

For a ghost? Hmm, maybe some kind of ectoplasmic dish created from negative energy.

inhabit vessel on the granite vultures is missing the following strike (probably supposed to be the Jaws attack), and the jaws attack is missing an attack bonus!

What should the attack bonus be, +7?

I’m also confused by these things in general. They inhabit the granite vultures, which come to life and can attack, but when they aren’t inhabiting, they have no way of attacking, right? I’m confused why they would ever want to leave the bonded vessel, can’t see that happening in game.

Should each phalanx of phalanges occupy a 4x1 space? Or 2x2?
4x1 makes more sense to me, but not sure what problems that might cause in gameplay and combat.

My group will be going to Qhallaqh Manor next session. I’ve decided I’m going to change Arghun from a hand to a talking head (BotD page 40), to avoid redundancy with the necromancer PC’s crawling hand familiar, and I think it will be more fun for me to RP, as I wasn’t feeling the idea of the hand talking through its wrist. I think he will be fun, playing him as this blustery old general who enjoys telling old war stories.

Page 45 of Book of the Dead specifically does say Soothe can heal undead, which seems to contradict the spell description. As a GM I am allowing Soothe to heal undead, because we have two undead PC’s, and healing options are limited.

It’s definitely an important discussion point to have between GM and player to establish for any cleric or champion of Urgathoa. Some may enjoy the challenge and RP aspect of it, others, including the rest of the party dealing with that character, may find it frustrating.

Just let Soothe work on Undead. The Undead ancestry and archetypes were seemingly written with the assumption it does (based on the boxout in that section), even if its own text says otherwise.

Ah, excellent, thanks. I thought I remembered reading that somewhere, but was thrown off when I read the spell description during the game. I’ll go with that, then. But I think I’ll still do away with critical fail on Treat Wounds causing damage.

2nd session tonight, and healing remains a challenge… Bard has Soothe, but that spell states it only works on a living creature. She does have Stitch Flesh, but then rolled a critical fail, causing 7 damage to the mummy instead of healing…. We said she’s used to zombies, not mummies. But then at the end of the session when she tried Treat Wounds on the mummy again, rolled another critical failure, although fortunately had a hero point to re-roll.

I think starting next time, I’m going to say critical fail just means can’t treat wounds again until the next day, I don’t like that she could end up hurting party members who have no option for magic healing. Anyone have suggestions about that?

Any suggestions for how to play Arghun? I think it will be fun to run it like Thing from Addams Family, but the description seems to imply it talks? That seems strange to me, and I think takes away from some of the mime-like charm of that character.

My idea so far is that it will introduce itself by using a finger to write its name in the dust on the table, and then maybe keep the description of it making whistling noises from its stump to communicate a little, but stop short of letting it produce actual words.

Thanks Traum13, I missed that!!

Ya, I've been looking around, first for our first Blood lords estate as that REALYY needs to in there to set the whole mood and not just theatre of the mind it in my opinion!! Ha Ha

Best I could find is I bought a farmland pack on Roll20 and will try to kit bash it in myself as best I can.

Next is the PC's home base as that needs a LOT of cool looking stuff and found more than a few cool maps in RPGNOW land.

Thats as far as I got so far as my game took a hit and the GM dumped us just before session 1 next week. Then a couple of players flake freaked out and did not want to wait so left as well. So looking like I'll have to GM another game, SIGH, instead of playing it, yet again :(

But I'll get my fun out of it either way I am sure, was hoping someone would have started up a homebrew map thread, but no such luck as of yet.

When is your game going to start?

Tom

Just finished our first session tonight, and really having fun with it so far. This is my first attempt at running a weekly campaign in literally decades, with friends mostly new to Pathfinder, so we’re taking it slow to start.

Tonight was primarily a session zero, then met with Berline and ended with their arrival at the farm where they quickly dispatched the two zombies at the gate, but not before a skeleton PC took a nasty hit. Healing is going to be tricky in this campaign; I realized I need to read up on how medicine works on the undead. No one has harm, but I’m letting them adjust their characters in between sessions, and recommended the bard to take Soothe.

The group is a human necromancer, dhampir bard, skeleton champion of Urgathoa, and mummy (elf) investigator. They had the idea that they know each other because they all worked for a necromancer in Yled who was killed (and killers removed his head so he can’t be reanimated). I worked with that to say he was a Blood Lord allied to Berline. When she heard what happened, she sent for them to come work for her, telling them she can set them up with a new place to live, as the military in Yled assumed control of the manor there.

I’ve been watching Deadwood, and taking that as inspiration for Greydirge. Basing Berline on Al Swearingen, and plan to give Geb a bit of a western vibe.

Sorry for the long post, I am very excited for this.

Did anyone see the actual distance from Graydirge to the PC's new digs at Quallaqh Manor?

On page 20 Berline says it is about a mile south of Greydirge.

I’d love to find a high res map of the farm too.
Has anyone else found that the button to remove grid on the interactive maps is not working properly?