briand97's page

a really easy solution... either make the room empty or change the encounter to something easier i.e. zombies. Let them retreat and come back in force. Of course Michto will have gotten a few more guards by then.

So my PC's just survived the assassination attempt and found out the church of wee jas was behind it all - so like any good party they decided to sit around and construct magic items, join the last laugh, hob nob with nobles... for the next 45 days. So what would the temple of WJ do? I would think hire more assassins but they know that the PC's are probably too strong to handle anybody they can hire. Suggestions?

Here's what I wish I did...

Start it off with a bang! Have the players be in town for the flood festival - it will give them a feel of the city, give them some text so when next year's festival comes and the wands go missing it actually means something. You can also use it to introduce some interesting NPC- maybe keygan runs a booth that challenges people to pick on of his locks, lord V should make his friendly gregarious presence know - I had a large parade where he and lord mayor gave gifts to the poor, alek tercival could have just returned from successful campaign vs. a troll. Hell, even introduce the stormblades - have them being rewarded for some small deed (make it seem weird that they are getting so much praise for such a little deed).

There are many adventures between start of game and the flood season adventure and you can feel free to have dead areas of time between them - drakthar's way could be months after the opening adventure.

I think the festival is a perfect intro to rufus... maybe he is walking home late after partying a bit too much - then he gets jumped.

you could even introduce one of the orphans who gets kidnapped.

My gaming group is composed of six death machines. After retreating to her room & healing herself, Triel gave them a pretty good fight before they dropped her. The real problem is that they didn't kill her. After knocking her into negatives (-7), they quickly stabilized Triel. Soon they will ask her questions. The dwarven wizard has spell focus: enchantment and has a very good chance of charming Triel, if not the very next game session, it's only a matter of time before she fails her save. A charmed Triel could really sing far more about the Cagewrights that is called for in the AP at this point. If worse comes to worst, then I can have Thifirane (via Scry) disintegrate Triel via Limited Wish, but that's the very definition of Deux Ex Machina. If I cheat on her next Charm Person save hoping that that little bastard (one of my players) didn't rack a 2nd *just for that contingency*, then they *might* deposit her in jail for a night at which point Vhalantru could be ported in to disintegrate Triel himself. This is better because at least she's not literally being killed from a bolt from the blue right in front of them! She'll just have disappeared, which they'll find suspsicious & far more mysterious and consider treachery, and all kinds of other theories. Regardless, my guys are *smart* and I'd like to come up with something better in either case. Anyone have any ideas?

I'd let them interrogate her. I don't think the adventure does enough foreshadowing at the beginning and it can leave PC's either lost or thinking that everything is unrelated (or bashing their heads metagaming trying to figure out how everything is related because they know it comes from the same book).

My party did the same as your and captured her. They really forgot to question her though and then I got nervous that they would remember to question her at sometime so I eliminated her by a hanging for treason - I wish I would of done the following. Let them interrogate, had her say something about the cagerights even if she doesn't say their name. I'd also use the oppty to mention something (again very vague) about the cages.

my 2 coppers

There is a thread on the AoW messageboards with tips for DM's running the AoW AP. I thought a thread for the Shackled City AP would be good to have as well. So, what are the best tips or suggestions that you would have for someone running the SCAP?

My first suggestion would be to read all of the adventures before you start so that you can get an idea of the whole campaign. It also lets you see any parts that you might want to add, remove or change so that it better suits your group.

Anyone else have any tips?

Olaf the Stout

1. Write out the stat blocks. It is really frustrating to go back and forth to the back of the book / MM's.

SO here is what happened. Hopefully one of you can give me a idea of how to get the campaign back on track.

PC's - got thumped by the dragon but managed to kill it. It was just about to turn tail and retreat and then got critted for 40 HP's. They talk to Jared (which was great) rest and head down.

The Hydra wasn't a push over but they did a good job attacking it and beat it... unfortunately they were beaten up and low on resources... they decide to keep going.

They had a random encounter with 4 shadows and the fighter gets 4 strength sapped from him taking him to 12. more resources depleted and they don't stop to rest.

The meet the ferry man and I roleplay him as just concerned about ferrying the group not to attack at all. They don't fight him but still don't rest.

Here is were it gets interesting but falls apart.

So the bard uses alter self to turn into a Kuo-toa but the guards spot him doing the magic (one goes and warns the priest). The party battles the guards to get in (taking heavy damage due to the sticky shields). They have almost no resources and no spells and are hurt so they decide "lets explore more". The bard, still in Kou-Toa form walks through the trapped door to the ritual room where the whips are doing a ritual (knowing the party is there). He smooth talks his way through the room and ends up meeting the high priest. unfortunately the high priest catches his ruse (the bard said he'd say hi to the high priest if he saw him; unfortunately he was talking to the high priest himself... bluff failed).

Battle ensues and they get wiped out.

Bard - Dead
Monk - Could have made it out but died trying to create distraction so rest of party could retreat.
Cleric - captured
Fighter - 6 strength now due to curse and shadow. - captured
Rogue and fighter/rogue - escaped.

OK so how do I save this game. I've decided that the Kou-Toa will hold them prisoners and I'm thinking the survivors will mount a rescue? Who should I have help with the rescue? The striders? The stormblades (who the PC's have bad relations with... could be fun). Some of the PC's (cleric, monk and bard) want to roll new characters but I'm thinking if they can be saved they might want to keep their initial characters.

Also what level should PC's be for this adventure? I think my party was a little under powered being mostly 5 and 6th level.

thanks

SO I've been playing for the better par of 20 years and this was one of the best sessions I've ever had.

There are (change that to were) 6 PC's and they are currently just finishing the Kopru ruins... litterally just finishing. They had cleared out the whole complex except for the zombie ogres and the spawn of Kyuss.

When the last session ended They had caught Treil and killed skaven and just destroyed the Gnoll creature (but the quaist was still undetected).

They were really beat up after the T-rex and the Gnoll so they decided to retreat to one of the bunk rooms. The Quasit decided to slip in with the party while invisible and cause some mischief by stealing a sleeping PC's backpack. Not a big deal but kind of funny to listen to the blind fighter (he got blinded by the glyph trap) and the monk explain how the backpack just disappeared (they were thinking ghost or the like).

Anyway, One them cast locate object on the final wand and they started following the Quasit (who was invisible nearby and heard them talking about casting locate object to find the wand). Of course being mischievious it led them right to the orges. A battle ensued and the PC's were getting hammered. The druid is killed in combat and the quasit decides to have some more fun and starts invisibly stealing random stuff off the body while the orges are still busy thumping the party. The rouge spots the quasit's lifting the items and decided to use the cloak of aracnid to cast web to catch the quasit and caught up the whole melee in the strands (comedy), They finally kill the orges but are really really beat up. After about 20 minutes of roleplay - cutting through webs and shooting at the invisible quasit they finally kill it too.

They are beat up and have one prisoner (triel) and a dead druid who due to some really poor decisions with alchemist fire and the web spell is dead and burnt worse that an Irish Grandma's cooking... so like all great party's they decide to pack it up and go - except the monk who went just far enough down the hall to see the Sarcofagus in the Spawn of Kyuss room. He sees the coffin and says "hey guys here's the loot" They walk in (not seeing the hiding spawn) and between the suprise and the fear aura total whackiness ensues (benny hill theme playing in the background). So half the party runs due to the fear and the other half stays to fight. The spawn hits the bard and infects him. After a short melee where the fighter did some serious whooping the spaw are no more. They slap each other on the backs congratulating each other (note Bard is infected).

The bard goes to open the chest and wouldn't you know it - posion. since it has a 0 initial damage I said well you really don't feel anything so he assumes he made his save. He opens the chest and gets all wide eyed seeing all the coin - then promptly dies a minute later due to the 14 points of secondary con damage (think of the posion scene in Princess Bride).

So the party is now carrying out triel and the bard; the druid but was so burnt to a crisp they didn't feel he could be raised). They make it to the basket bridge and are halfway across when the gift of Kyuss activates in the dead bard (I did make the transformation minutes instead of rounds because I thought rounds were too short of a transform time).

So now they are stuck in the basket with the bard / spawn when he re-animates a la army of darkness (eyes flick open and kind of giggles to himself before attacking). The rogue again fails his will save and has to make a DC 5 save or be so terified he jumps out of the basket (thankfully he made the save so he just cowers and cries). So here they are all swinging around in this basket fighting, the rogue is crying in terror, the cleric is running the pulley system wondering why the hell everyone is screaming - totally one of the best moments I've experienced.

Question - they are 6th level now and the bard really likes his character so they want to raise him. Is there anybody in Cauldron that can do it? If not I'll make them travel to Sarssrine.

I had the party burst in just in time to see tongue eater baboon friends finishing off the rest of Sarcem's corpse... just leaving the head (sans tongue).

cool - right now I am making it really really clear just how powerful their families are but the PC's are really having a tough time not doing anything.

To give you a sense of the fun I've been having with tormenting them with the stormblades.

The PC's have been calling themselves "the champion's of cauldron" almost since day one and the bard in the party has been doing his best to promote the party's deeds. So I start having some random people start referring to them (PCs) as the champions of cauldron, basically making them feeling special...

I had the flood festival end with the demonscar ball where the last event is the Emmy's Oscars and VMA's rolled into one grand party. At the end of the party Zachery Axlton the elder was presenting a special award to a party of adventurer's who had help cauldron over the last year... basically listing out all of the sucess of the PC's line by line; then he called up who he referred to as the "champions of cauldron" - the stormblades, who had no problem accepting the praise for all the hard work the PC's had done.

The other fun part is that the PC's think Tiel (who stole the wands) is Cora - red haired woman... so they are hellbent on proving she is involved with the Triad. I'm tempted to have the stormblades confront the PC's when they emerge from the Korpu ruins and demand the wands - so that they can once again claim the glory.

Fun times.

So I am currently in the Flood season adventure and the stormblades have been a huge bee in my PC's bonnet. I think that combat might happen between the two groups as the stormblades are constantly taking credit for deeds done by the PC's and the PC's using spells like alter-self to pose as the stormblades am doing embarassing acts... It is coming to a head. My question is whether or not the stormblades are a important part of the story-line? I've only read a few adventures ahead and would hate to have the PC's kill off an important plot point.

Can anybody let me know if they have a major role in the future adventures or are they just there for roleplaying ideas?

Do the Pulverisor's in Jzardirune have hardness? I didn't see if in the stat block so I said no - but the encounter with the broken pulv seemed rather easy then partially because I kept rolling that it stood and did nothing.

So what are you all doing when they inevidiably get thumped on and leave to heal and rest? Do you re-populate the dungeon? Put it on alert? Just run it as is?