A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for 7th to 11th level characters (Tiers: 7–8
and 10–11).
When a Pathfinder Society Priest of Nethys disappears in northern Geb while studying the Mana Wastes, the Society sends you to uncover her whereabouts and find her journals. Arriving in the town of Bitter End, you find it deserted but for a few mysterious creatures never before seen on Golarion. Those creatures quickly lead to more and soon you're embroiled in a mystery that could effect the very fabric of reality. Will you solve the mystery of Bitter End or find yourself lost forever in the Mana Wastes?
Written by Joshua J. Frost
This scenario is designed for play in Pathfinder Society Organized Play, but can easily be adapted for use with any world. This scenario is compliant with the Open Game License (OGL) and is suitable for use with the 3.5 edition of the world’s most popular fantasy roleplaying game.
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Lost at Bitter End is an interesting scenario with an original story. It doesn’t quite live up to its potential because it doesn’t make good use of its memorable setting. Still, as Season Zero scenarios go, it’s certainly playable. I ran it via play-by-post at high subtier.
SPOILERS!:
The first thing that’ll jump out to players in Lost at Bitter End is its setting: the Mana Wastes! In both the briefing and a special reminder that GMs are supposed to tell players, the Mana Wastes are extraordinarily dangerous because its largely a dead magic area. Dead magic zones hold such potential for interesting encounters (what does the wizard do when he can’t cast spells and how do PCs deal with the fact they can’t heal almost infinitely at-will with cheap wands?). Unfortunately, despite the multiple warnings, there’s only one encounter actually set in a dead magic zone, and even then its intermittent (magic has a 50% chance of working every round). My biggest critique of Pathfinder is that conventional encounter design in adventures helps to reify the “perfect build/one trick pony” problem. If there were more encounters at long range, or against dozens of foes, or where weapons have to be turned over at the door, or in wild magic zones, PCs would really have to stretch to meet different unpredictable eventualities. Ok, mini rant over.
The scenario starts with a briefing by Venture-Captain Adril Hestram. It’s one of those odd Season Zero briefings that’s technically a flashback. Hestram explains that a Pathfinder cleric of Nethys named Rijana has made a career of studying wild and dead magic sites (a clever concept for a Nethys-worshipping character). Most recently, Rijana has been in the Mana Wastes where she reported a potential discovery that could return magic to that blasted land. Hestram is so excited that he doesn’t want to wait for the cleric’s next report to reach him the old-fashioned way. Instead, he arranges for the PCs to teleport to her last known location so they can talk to her and get her journals for inclusion in the Pathfinder Chronicles. So far, so good.
Act One has the PCs arriving at the town formally known as Geb’s Rest (and colloquially as Bitter End), which is near the border of Geb and Nex. Only, once the PCs start looking around, they quickly realise that everyone’s gone! In classic Marie Celeste fashion, it seems everyone vanished in the middle of whatever routine activities they were doing. As the PCs explore, they’re ambushed by several juju zombies (and a bone devil at high subtier). After defeating the foes, they find Rijana’s body--dessicated and showing signs of unnatural death due to performing some sort of ritual. As an aside, I really like the map of Geb’s Rest.
Act Two has the PCs using a journal found on Rijana’s body to realise she had journeyed to an ancient stele (a type of metal monument) two days north of Geb’s Rest that she believed might be the key to returning magic to the area. The PCs naturally head there to investigate the mystery, but they’re attacked by a pair of hellcats (like hellhounds, but feline!) on the way. This is the only encounter that makes even limited use of dead magic zones in the Mana Wastes.
Act Three is where things really start to pick up. When they reach the stele, they find more journals from Rijana and learn of an incantation she translated from it. Because the PCs were specifically charged with finding four journals and have only found three, they can’t turn back. (though that would probably be more logical) Instead, they’re expected to read the incantation which transports them to a pocket dimension! What’s really going on is that, centuries ago, when Geb and Nex were at war, Geb created several pocket dimensions full of undead that could be unleashed by reading the incantation on the stele if the country were invaded. When Rijana intoned the incantation, she entered the pocket dimension (“Geb’s Accord”) and somehow drew all of the people’s of Geb’s Rest with her. A bone devil general wants to come back to the Material Plane, but Rijana failed to properly read the incantation that would do the job, and died instead. I’m a bit fuzzy on exactly the story and sequence of events here, but that’s the gist. Anyway, once the PCs appear in Geb’s Accord, they have to fight off some more juju zombies.
In Act Four, as the PCs are travelling from the site of the stele to the pocket dimension’s version of Geb’s Rest they come across a massive army of undead held in stasis. Some of the warriors and an ancient Gebbite battle cleric are awakening though. I liked that this encounter had eleven foes to fight at high subtier. (they were still a push-over for a modern Pathfinder party, but it made the battle a bit more interesting anyway)
Act Five has the PCs reach the mirror-Geb’s Rest and learning that the bone devil general (“Zepteffis”) has the townsfolk imprisoned and is using them to try to activate the stele. Another big battle lies in store before the Pathfinders can return home. Someone in the group better be trained in Knowledge (arcana) in order to activate the stele, or this whole adventure could get very tricky!
All in all, I liked Lost at Bitter End. I just wish that, for a high tier adventure, it could have taken better advantage of the setting and proven more of a challenge.
I played this scenario alongside Quentin, see his review below. For the majority, I agree with him. As we were playing up, we did struggle with some fights as they were pretty brutal at times. Especially after what happened the first encounter, I'm surprised we even made it. I mean, enemies getting a surprise round and the highest initiative, meant we took quite a substantial amount of damage. The foes were fun, as were the settings, but it sadly got a little repetitive towards the end.
However, a few things bug me about this scenario. The first is the absence of a real story. The only story element we had was to get books back and free people. That alone is not enough in my opinion. It felt like a 'we got these encounter finished and only 5 minutes to go until the scenario is released.. oh dear, we forgot the plot. Lets quickly throw something together'.
This ties in with my second complaint, if you will. At some point you'll come across a big legion of ancient soldiers. That itself has so much potential, including for future scenarios. Yet the only thing you do is fight them and leave them behind. Surely that's something the Decemvirate wants to investigate further as it's a unique trove of knowledge. I'm honestly disappoint nothing has been done with it.
While I certainly had fun, I do not think the scenario aged well enough. I can't see myself recommend it to others if there are other options available. That said, I really hope Paizo revisits this scenario, notices the trove of potential knowledge I mentioned and actually does something with it. There's no doubt in my mind I'd instantly want to play a sequel.
I love Season 0 an 1 so much. They dare to be different. Seasons 2 through 4 are somewhat safe, not really taking any risks, narratively speaking. So while this scenario isn't mind-blowing by any means, the fact that it still manages to do something different makes up for a whole lot.
Combats are pretty tough. We were barely playing up, and we felt it. Coupled with some pretty tough tactics, this could have been a slog. Enemies hit pretty hard, even for a Season 0, and while the high tier adjustment doesn't do a whole lot, it does enough to ramp up the challenge.
The story itself is pretty much absent from a player perspective, but there's still some cool setpieces and little touches that it doesn't become boring.
In the end, this is a fine scenario. Nothing amazing, but also not terrible. A good way to spend an evening.
This entire adventure is a cautionary tale against meddling in things you do not completely understand. It appears that a Pathfinder cleric has been doing just that, exploring an area called the Mana Wastes that's not merely inhospitable but dead to magic as well. However after sending a message that she was going to conduct a ritual carved into a stele that she found there, nothing more was heard. So the party has been sent - by teleport no less, no mundane journey this time - to find out what has happened to her.
The background notes spell it all out for the DM, but of course the party has to figure it out the hard way from what evidence they can find. Fortunately the missing cleric was an obsessive note-taker, so if the party can but find her journals they might find some clues...
Naturally, her meddling has caused a few odd things to happen and liberated assorted monsters, which will have to be fought if the investigation is to make any progress. At times information can only be obtained by (high) knowledge checks - a side effect of characters knowing a lot more about the world in which they live than their players do, lacking the background knowledge of things that don't exist in the real world - and at one point unless the party undertake a particular action, the whole thing comes to a juddering halt. Fortunately that action is quite clearly telegraphed, so much so that suspicious players might resist... but from then on the skill checks to figure things out get easier and things ought to fall into place readily.
Everything is well put together and well-resourced, and it makes sense - cetainly as you read it, and there is much more scope than in many such adventures for the party to understand what is going on as well. The faction missions are actually quite challenging, as often the faction masters issuing them seem to know more about what is going on than the regular Pathfinder leaders who have sent the party out in the first place. Good for combat, good for figuring stuff out - the one thing this adventure lacks is any real role-playing opportunities.
(based on 10 ratings)
