A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for 1st to 7th level characters (Tiers: 1–2, 3–4, and 6–7).
Reports from Andoran's Darkmoon Vale indicate that a new plague is causing the deaths of untold fey. The Pathfinder Society sends you there to aid the nymph queen in stopping the plague and finding and destroying its source. When the plague spreads to the human population of Falcon's Hollow, the need to find a cure grows more frantic. Can you save the many denizens of Darkmoon Vale from certain death?
Written by Mark Moreland
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 Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.
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My Half-Orc fighter managed to be in a more supportive role when it came to the roleplaying aspect of it (Instead of being the party leader; nice change).
The one downside I feel is that how easy it is for anyone melee-oriented in the party to catch the plague in combat.
Its all you can ask for - great lore, great roleplay opportunities, skill and combat encounters, and frankly a hard to solve puzzle, that can have great, neutral, or even BAD consequences for players! It will make your killbot munchkin players cry.... drink their tears of sadness and rejoice they have never bought a skill or listened to boxed text.
This was a very fun scenario, and both times I've ran it, the group enjoyed it. There are some interesting RP moments, as well as several enemies that are a *lot* of fun to play. Unfortunately, it is very swingy with the tier change. Spoilers ahead...
Spoiler:
So, the titular plague can turn out to be quite deadly at mid or high tier. The second time I ran this, a player very, very nearly died to it. In my mind, this is not a particularly satisfying death - I would encourage potential GMs to read up on the disease mechanics ahead of time and to be prepared to allow some creative solutions if things start to drag along.
Yea I have a query. I've ran two different groups through the previous modules that take place in Darkmoon Vale, and both groups loved it. I did however miss the "Carnival of Tears" module, and am now considering it for my newer group, since they are still low level enough to run it without drastically changing CR's and such. But in that readout it talks about the evil and uncomprimising fae that threaten the entire community. So my question is how, if I run my players through "Carnival of Tears", does it tie into "The Pallid Plague", where it says it starts off HELPING the fae folk of the area? Sure, eventually the people of Falcon's Hollow contract the illness as well, but I get the feeling that the players should already be well into the module before that happens. Orf is there something at the end of "Carnival of Tears" that leads into possible diplomatic relations with the fae in the future, and this simply plays on that? OR will I have to introduce that into the end of "Carnival of Tears" myself if I plan on running my players through both modules? Ok, so it was several questions, not one. I really enjoy the campaign setting, and would love to run as many modules as are out there for it, so I just want to be as well informed as possible before I spend my small amount of money purchasing them. I's appreciate any input on my questions, thanks.
This is a Pathfinder Society Organized Play scenario and is independent of the modules line. I'll let Mark talk about how this might fit in with the published modules at this location.
I wanted to let people who might see this thread but not the Gamer Connection one that Mark will be running The Pallid Plague at the Second Annual Dave Arneson Memorial Gameday on 3/27 in NYC. I'm kind of hoping no one shows for the game I'll be doing so I can jump into his - even though I'll need to make a new PFS character because Mark killed my last one, and his little dog too.
There are two factions of fey in Darkmoon Wood, one evil and one benign. In Carnival of Tears, the good nymph queen, Syntira, wants to help the PCs defeat her sister and her evil ice fey. She wants nothing more than to end the ongoing hostilities between humanity and her people, but old grudges die hard. Neither adventure assumes the use of another, but I think it would be fairly simple to add this to the end of CoT. Your PCs will have already met Syntira and you could easily have her contact them again after a little bit of time to ask for their help again. I wrote a little bit more about making the fey the primary motivation in the scenario (instead of being ordered to the region by the Pathfinder Society) in this thread, but am happy to address any specific questions you might have. I hope you enjoy the scenario!
Running through this adventure it went pretty well. There were a few issues though. Of course, any of these could have just been a misreading of a rule or missing some element as well.
Spoiler:
For the at least the 3rd-4th tier, the DCs for beating the plague felt too high. It felt like a PC dying from the disease was just as likely (if not more so) as them being able to survive the disease.
It them comes to the encounter with Laurel where she treats the afflicted. But there is a line saying. "once Laurel succeeds in curing the PCs (and Inor) of the disease, she now has the recipe for an antiplague concoction ..." which seems to indicate that she doesn't come up with the cure until she cures the afflicted characters. That feels like a sort of a catch-22, you only get the cure if you don't need the cure. Even with her help treating the disease, it didn't seem as though progress would come at a decent pace. Instead, it seemed like the likely result would be all the afflicted characters dieing without even the option the retreat from the threat claiming their life.
It was still a nice adventure aside from those percieved issues. I probably would look toward running it if I need a Tier 1-2 scenario, but only look forward to running the higher level tiers if the party has characters with magic that can stall or remove the disease.
Pathfinder Adventure, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Recently joined the PFS, and had my first sanctioned game last night. The GM chose this as the intro scenario as some members were new not only to PFS, but also Pathfinder RPG.
Spoiler:
I won't give away anything, but as a group of six, with three of us armed with missile weapons, and a fourth having one as back-up, I have to say it was surprisingly easy. As an Elven Wizard with a bonded composite longbow, I didn't even need to cast a spell until the end, and even then it was more "well I have it readied" than actually needing to use it. The HP f the opponents seemed rather low, as did their AC; though maybe we were all just rolling well.
Anyone else feel this way? My regular game saw much tougher battles and challenges at first level than what we encountered last night. It just seemed, somehow off based upon my experience with running the Legacy of Fire, and playing in two home-brewed PF games since PF came out.
So far I'm digging the story line. In trying to wrap my head around the skill challenge with Laurel I'd like to know if I should just TAKE 10 on her heal checks. At tier 1 she makes them every time! Is that by design or do I not understand how "take 10" works? Thanks.