Ully's page

Greetings,

I am in need of suggestions for alternate story endings for my Shackled City campaign.

I originally decided to run the Shackled City as an experiment to see how well a 3.5e campaign would go with all official WotC sources allowed, all the way to 20th level. (The answer, in my case, is: I am ready to blow my brains out over how broken and frustrating the all-splat-books-allowed 3.5e rules are. YMMV. I blame myself.) That was nearly three-and-a-half years ago, and I just can't dedicate another year or more to this campaign.

The players, who have all min-maxed their characters to some degree, are hugely invested in both the storyline and their PCs. They've just completed Chapter 8, "Lords of Oblivion," without any difficulty, and I'd like to find an acceptable solution to bring the story to a close in 8-10 more four-hour sessions. (That's for their benefit, of course. I'd rather just kill them all next session and be done with it. ;-)) I’ve not made any mods to the campaign, except for running Delvesdeep’s Demonskar Ball way back when.

My entire group enjoys combat, but a couple of players really steal the show during the social encounters, so I’m thinking of breezing through Chapter 9’s meeting of nobles and clergy that will result in my player who has been gunning for the position of Lord Mayor being so appointed. I’ll narrate most of the rescue/evacuation stuff in “Foundation of Flame” to save time. I definitely want to run the Hookface battle, since that seems like a fun one, and I love the concept of demodands plummeting from the sky. I might even combine the two. I’d like to get through Chapter 9 in no more than two sessions.

After that, I’m at a bit of a loss for how to handle things. Chapter 10, “Thirteen Cages,” seems little more than a dungeon crawl with unmemorable encounters, though there’s a Holy Avenger sword to be found that my paladin player has been lusting for, and the Moltenwing encounter, with its role-play and deadly combat opportunities, looks fun. I know the party would love one more encounter with Vhalantru, which comes in Chapter 12, “Asylum,” where there’s also the opportunity to close the loop with Nidrama. There’s also a special hatred in the party for Embril Aloustinai, and there has been too much story involving the spell weavers to pass up including one towards the end.

Not a single one of my players took the Dream Haunted trait, so I’ve not played up Adimarchus’ madness encroaching on the material plane through dreams. Really, Adimarchus is known only as the once previous ruler of Occipitus. I’m not sure how important a direct encounter with him is to the endgame for my group.

Anyway, I’ve gone on for a bit longer than I wanted. Hopefully, this info will help spark some ideas in the community of how I can best wrap things up. Any advice or comments will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

All the best,
Ully

At the end of Demonskar Legacy, Nabthatoron is portrayed as being satisfied with killing Alek Tercival, thereby ensuring (or so he thinks) the conflict between Cauldron and Redgorge. As written, he only bothers with the PCs if they're able to hurt him, and then only long enough to get them out of the way. Otherwise, he has no interest in them.

Um...hello? One of the PCs at this point is likely brandishing Alakast, the very weapon carried into battle against against Nabthatoron and his armies, the very weapon that helped Surabar Spellmason defeat the demon, a defeat that resulted in Nabthatoron being banished to the material plane, where he has been in exile for nearly 700 years! And he's just supposed to ignore the PCs???

I think that Nabthatoron would very much want to know where/how the PCs came by Alakast, and he'd probably want to sunder it as well (though my version of Alakast will be far more difficult to damage than a normal magical quarterstaff).

Anyone else feel this way?

Greetings all,

Maybe it's just the time of year (finals, graduations, etc.), but it seems to me that this board has been less busy of late. One other possibility is that the impending release of 4e has folks either (a) slowing down their current Shackled City campaign to take a look at 4e and maybe play an introductory adventure, or (b) shelving their Shackled City game and moving to 4e entirely.

Personally, I've got the 4e books on order, but my players and I plan to continue with our Shackled City campaign (currently in Bhal-Hamatugn) and see it through. We're invested in the story and the characters. So we are happily carrying on. We may try out some of the Pathfinder RPG rules or even switch over entirely, since we probably have two years still to play, but we won't be trying any sort of crazy 4e conversion.

What about you? What's the plan for your Shackled City campaign?

I received my copy of Wizards' Keep on the Shadowfell adventure, the introductory 4th Edition adventure that includes pregenerated characters and quick-start rules for the new system. In my opinion, its production value, in a word, sucks.

For a list price of $30, you get a full-color pocket folder that contains the adventure booklet and quick-start rules (both are old magazine-style, folded with staples) and three full-color, double-sided battle maps (only 1/3 of which are new maps). The pregenerated characters (sample) in the quick-start rules aren't even in character sheet format, though that's presumably to contain the stats and rules applicable to each within a two-page layout.

The whole thing feels really cheap. For example, the adventure and quick-start booklets don't have back covers; there's text on the back of each. The pregen characters are each represented with a sketch, but they aren't in color.

I bought this adventure to see what 4e is all about (I am currently running the Shackled City for my group). Mechanics-wise, some of the new rules look like an improvement, but at the same time it feels much more "video gamish" to me. My biggest disappointment, however, was receiving a package that I felt was so far below the quality standard Paizo has set with their Pathfinder line that it seemed like a rip-off in terms of money spent. Very disappointing, yet not at all surprising.

I'll be keeping my Pathfinder subscription and am really looking forward to the RPG. It's going to be a far better value (both in terms of fun and money) for my group than D&D 4e.

Now we just need the Paizo team to consider partnering with someone to develop software tools for character creation/bookkeeping... ;-)

-Ully

Greetings,

Has anyone created a larger map for the Gotrrod encounter at Crazy Jared's Hut? I'd like something that provides a larger field of battle, and I thought I'd ask here before trying something myself with one of the digital mapping applications.

I've checked the RPGenius site already. Thanks in advance!

Ully

Hi all,

My group had their first encounter with Drakthar last session, and everyone had a great time. This particular dungeon has been progressing from kinda boring (the first goblin battle was a joke, with the party annihilating way too many of the poor little guys), to better (the goblin adepts and worgs were much more fun) to awesome.

Drakthar was a real challenge, even though I had him attack my party of seven min/maxed PCs all by himself. He came in dire wolf form and was able to sneak up on the party's enlarged aasimar cleric... Well, complete round-by-round details are on the campaign wiki, if you're interested.

Basically, the party left the dungeon after finally taking Drakthar down to zero HP and forcing him to assume gaseous form. They plan to recharge, research vampires, prepare and return to the dungeon. I awarded them zero XP for this session, since they really battled to a draw and will have to face him again.

It seems to me that Drakthar will go looking for the party as soon as he can regain a more corporeal form. Would he leave the dungeon in search of the party once he finds they're no longer present? Or, would he spend his time restocking the goblins and preparing for their return?

I'd love to have him go looking for the party, and he could conceivably use the scent ability of his dire wolf form, but I'm having trouble justifying that course of action. It appeals to me, because I would rather not provide too much in the way of additional XP via restocked goblins and such. The group has already hit an APL of 4, and I'd rather they don't hit level 5 before Flood Season.

I'd love to hear opinions here.

Thanks in advance.

Ully

Hi all,

There are two suggested methods in the HC for managing the inventory at Skie's shop:

• Under 3,000 gp, she has it; between 3,001 and 15,000 gp, there's a 5% chance she has it; otherwise she can get it through Maavu's Imports in 2d6 days
  
• The more realistic yet time-intensive method of building and keeping a list of everything she's got on hand

Jumpet has created an excellent Magic Shop Inventory Generator (available from TheRPGenius.com), designed to take the pain out of the second method above, but I haven't quite figured it out, and it may not be completely compatible with Mac Excel's out-of-date VBA support. It looks awesome, though.

I guess the way that DMs handle magic item acquisition in their games has a lot to do with how their players feel about that sort of thing. I'm sure that some players see it as little more than an irritating bit of bookkeeping, but I think that my players will really enjoy the richness that Skie's adds to the game. Personally, I think that Skie's-as-written goes a long way towards reminding the players that Cauldron is both small and fairly remote.

Since my players are about to (unknowingly) try to sell Skie several items infected with the Vanishing, I'm not about to give up the roleplay opportunity. (She'll buy items from Jzadirune, minus a 150 gp-per-item service charge to get the taint removed.) I can't wait to see the looks on my players' faces, especially those who have used some of the infected items!

So...how are you handling magic item acquisition in your game? Have you changed your methods since the beginning of the campaign, and if so, was it based on player feedback or your own needs?

Hi all,

Perhaps I'm missing something obvious, but are the streets of Cauldron named somewhere? The avenues are labeled prominently on the maps of the city, but the streets that wind their way from city wall to Crater Lake are not.

There's Lantern Street (from the orphanage description), but what of the others?

Thanks.

Ully

I recently started my Shackled City campaign, and to help my players keep track of information, I started a campaign wiki. Now that I have a few sessions under my belt, I'm sharing the link to it here in the hopes that it provides motivation to new DMs.

A couple of disclaimers: The wiki is not complete; I have much to add, and some of my players have not created or updated pages. I hope to motivate them to add session notes and keep updated character sheets.

SPOILERS in the session notes, including maps from the players' perspectives.

Thanks to the folks on the Paizo boards and at therpgenius.com for all the good info!

Here's the wiki address:

www.ericullman.com/cauldron/

Hi all,

At the end of our session last night, all the ECL 1 characters had earned enough XP to level. I plan to let everyone level in-dungeon. Changes to HP/BAB/saves/skills will be effective immediately, as will new feats and class features be available. To get new spells, however, casters will need to rest.

1. Can anyone see any problems with this method? I think it makes sense for the difficulty of the adventure and the time crunch to find the kidnapped children.

2. More specifically, how should I handle new spells for the two wizards? Can I work it so they don't need 1/day per new spell to scribe? That seems like a big limitation of the wizard class.

Thanks in advance for sharing your opinions.

Best,
Ully

Greetings,

I have a player with a busy travel schedule who won't be available to play in our first three or four sessions. I'd like to conduct some sort of a solo adventure for him, either via IM or email, so that when he can make it to our regular sessions, his PC will have roughly the same level of XP as the rest of the party.

He's playing a chaos gnome chain fighter from Cauldron, who was an occasionally hired enforcer for the Last Laugh but has recently found religion (St. Cuthbert, incidentally).

I'd like to hear ideas for a side adventure to either foreshadow future events or that will somehow else tie in with the story. Any thoughts?

Cheers,
Ully

Hi all,

We just had our first session last week, and there are still a few details that I'm trying to nail down. Exactly where we are on the Greyhawk calendar is one of those details.

I was all fired up about having the rainy (flood) season be more of a mid-to-late-summer monsoon, instead a winter rainy season, but I don't really care so much now. In fact, running the AP as written seems to be easier.

For those of you more familiar with how the timeline plays out, does it make sense to begin at the beginning of winter, say early Sunsebb?

Thanks in advance,
Ully

The board was pretty quiet this weekend, what with the holiday and all, so I wasn't surprised at the lack of replies.

The wizard has merchant dealings in Cauldron, so I started the adventure with him just concluding a successful business transaction with Adrick Garthûn. Since the wiz is also a playboy, I had Garthûn mention that a company of players had just arrived in Cauldron from Sasserine, including several lovely ladies, and that they were staying around the corner at the Drunken Morkoth Inn.

I started the cleric at the Church of Pelor, where a very overworked acolyte welcomed him to Cauldron and apologized (over tea, of course) that Jurgen Kristof had been called away on church business, but that he would be back tomorrow. He suggested the Drunken Morkoth as the best place to stay the night.

After meeting at the inn and successfully chatting up a couple of young, pretty dancers from Sasserine, our soon-to-be heroes happened upon a shop keeper's scream. Seems that when she accosted the two boys painting graffiti over her storefront window, she realized they were goblins (as mentioned in the opening to Drakthar's Way). They ran when she screamed. The wizard and cleric gave chase, eventually cornering the goblins in a warehouse nearby. Both PCs were wounded but managed to kill one goblin and capture the other, which they turned over to the town guard.

There was some great NPC interaction and I pulled in a few things from the wizard's background for fun. It was a worthwhile session to be sure. I'm looking forward to getting started with the adventure path proper in a couple of weeks.

Hi all,

This board and therpgenius.com are both fabulous resources for Shackled City DMs, so I thought I'd turn here for advice.

I am about to run my first D&D game in many years, and I'd really like to do it right, with props, handouts and miniatures. It's the minis that pose a problem for me. I only have a handful of figures representing PCs in the few games in which I've played the last couple of years.

What are the best ways to acquire minis for the SCAP? We'll be starting in January. I suppose I could go with some of the counters that are available from therpgenius.com, but they're difficult to move around on a dry-erase grid without disturbing all the lines. I really don't have time to paint a bunch of lead, so the pre-painted plastic minis that I can throw in bags seem to make the most sense.

Thanks for any suggestions!