Highdelve is in danger, and only true heroes can save the day!
Young human cousins Brialla and Meraina, as well as Kiliuk the tempestuous half-orc and Torgen the stoic dwarf, find themselves engrossed in Highdelve's joyous summer festival, the Brightbloom Jubilee. But all is shattered when the youths being honored return to town battered and bloodied. What's more, bullies robbed them of an amulet that's precious to the townspeople as well as to the regal gold dragon who protects them. As the visitors venture up a mountain to confront the culprits, they find that the situation is stickier than it appeared. Can the heroes stop a tiefling mastermind and his plan to unleash an ettin upon the festival? Or will mayhem win the day?
Heroes for Highdelve is an adventure for the four pregenerated 1st-level heroes in this volume, written for the award-winning Pathfinder RPG. The adventure takes place in Highdelve and surrounding areas of Brevoy in the official Pathfinder campaign setting, and is the perfect introduction to the game and its world!
ISBN-13: 978-1-64078-002-6
Upgrade Your Game! Specially designed to accompany Pathfinder Module: Heroes for Highdelve, Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Cavernous Lair contains two of the main encounter maps from the adventure.
Note: Heroes for Highdelve is published by Games & Gears under license from Gen Con and Paizo in celebration of the 50th anniversary of Gen Con, taking place August 17-20, 2017. It will be available for purchase at both the Games & Gears and Paizo booths, as well as paizo.com on or after the show.
Note: Due to the special nature of this product, it is NOT part of the Pathfinder Modules Subscription.
Heroes for Highdelve has an interesting background. Produced for the 50th anniversary of GenCon, it’s a combination of introductory Pathfinder adventure (plus incentive to buy the related Cavernous Lair flip-mat), advertisement for GenCon’s four iconic characters (presented in Pathfinder rules for the first time), and mini-product catalog for a miniatures & paint accessories company called Games & Gears (Booth # 2402!). The product is 22 pages long, with maps on the inside front- and back-covers, 12 pages of adventure, 4 pages for the GenCon Iconics (integrated into the adventure with individual story hooks), and 4 pages for the Games & Gears products (which include minis of the Iconics and one of the villains). Although obviously produced with commercial partners, the module is very professionally done, with excellent interior maps, artwork, and solid writing. And, an awesome cover—if they made that into a poster, I’d hang it up! I got to play Heroes for Highdelve via play-by-post for Pathfinder Society, and we used custom PCs (I had no idea the product was even intended for pre-gens). For me, the module is most memorable as the first appearance of my Prophet of Kalistrade character, Nistivo Cirek. For everyone else, the adventure itself is fine but forgettable. It does have value as a one-shot with a 2-3 hour running time (perfect for when the usual PFS 4-5 hour scenario running time won’t work).
SPOILERS!:
Heroes for Highdelve is set in the eponymous town, which is located at the foot of the Goluskhin Mountains in Brevoy. The PCs arrive during the annual Brightbloom Jubilee, a spring festival, and can have fun with various low-stakes games like sack races, kick-sack (hacky-sack), a puppet show, and more. The adventure assumes the use of the pre-gens, who each have a reason for coming to Highdelve, and expects the PCs to be asking a lot of questions of the locals during this time. Perhaps oddly though, but fortunately for custom PCs, most of the NPCs just give the questions the runaround or say the equivalent of “I’m busy now, but ask me tomorrow”; the actual adventure itself has nothing to do with the PCs’ individual quests. My GM did an excellent job adapting the adventure for PFS, as it wasn’t until I read the module for this review that I realise how much he had to make up in order to get us hooked into the adventure. Anyway, after some relaxed fun at the jubilee, the adventure kicks into gear when a pair of town youth stumble in, bruised and bloodied. The pair were the town’s celebratory “Bloomgivers” this year, given the honour of walking to the nearby Dendra’s Slope to collect special flowers for the jubilee. It turns out, however, that they were attacked by two other youths in town (Richelle and Tolwin) who were angry about not being chosen as Bloomgivers. And worse, the (rather violent) juvenile delinquents even took the golden amulet of Aurelliax (the town’s gold dragon protector, who hangs out in human form) from the Bloomgivers! “Are there any among you who are willing to be heroes for Highdelve?” asks Aurelliax. Nistivo Cirek will—for the right price!
Part 2 of the module has the PCs travelling to Dendra’s Slope. After finding the site of the attack, they’ll soon find (hiding nearby) Richelle and Tolwin. What the PCs won’t be expecting is that the two aren’t by themselves--their attack on the Bloomgivers was prompted by an evil tiefling rogue named Feran the Pale. (Feran had some sort of unrealistic plan to distract the townsfolk so he could steal from them, but the motivation here is pretty week). I’ll just note as an aside that Richelle and Tolwin fight with longswords and Feran has sneak attack, so it’s perfectly possible that this seeming “playground bullies”-style adventure could become lethal (combats are first level being notoriously swingy in Pathfinder).
Part 3 of the module has the PCs facing off against what could be a pretty big threat: an ettin that is wearing Aurelliax’s amulet (it was part of Feran’s plan). Alas, the ettin doesn’t have much in the way of personality, so this is a pure combat encounter.
And that’s it--there is a *very* short (one sentence) conclusion to the adventure. As an introductory experience to Pathfinder, Heroes for Highdelve is certainly serviceable, though I don’t imagine the plot or writing will be especially impressive to newcomers to the game.
A good introduction using concepts from other games, without the fun twists
Heroes for Highdelve is a module written specifically for Gencon, with slots of uncertain length, that is supposed to be good for introducing new players to Pathfinder. And, if the ads are any indication, for selling Gencon junk.
It borrows the structure that was used with great aplomb in adventures like We Be Goblins! with roleplaying followed by dungeon delving. For new players, for whom the idea is new, this can be a beautiful experience! For old players, though, this is just going to play as "We Be Humanz!" without much of the charm. That said, meeting the [redacted] is sort of cool (again, more cool for new players...) and that's worth something. Plus, you can skip huge chunks of this and make it run in just a few minutes.
Of course, the huge volume of ads for minis of questionable quality eat up space that could have been used elsewhere. As has been mentioned before, the room descriptions are sparse (casualties of low wordcount, perhaps?) and the conclusion got typefit right off the printed page, which is also sort of a travesty.
As you can tell, I have mixed feelings about this. For new audiences, it can be an awesome experience, although you probably need a GM who's been around the block at least a couple times to really make it shine. But that's exactly the situation it's written for! So while it's not as unique as it could have been and it does have shortcomings, it's hard to hold them against it--at least too much. So I guess I'd rate it par. It is perfectly good at what it's designed to do--but it doesn't really succeed beyond that.
Pedestrian adventure whose concept has been successfully executed many times before, this is written with the intent of using the (incorrectly built) pregens that come with the 20 page book.
The book has like 20 pages, 4 of them advertisements for add ons for this adventure, 4 pages for pregens, 1 page for credits, and 11 pages of adventure. Box text for areas consists of sometimes as little as 1 sentence. The entire conclusion is missing. Plot hooks are incredibly dependent on the pregens and do not translate to built characters.
This would be a good way to bring random characters together and start an adventure if We Be Goblins, Neverwinter Nights 2 and Hoard of the Dragon Queen didn't already do it better.
Short and easy to prepare; great for new players and GMs
I’ve ran Heroes for Highdelve twice now. Above anything else I have to say this is a short module that is rather easy to prepare. You can finish the adventure in as little as 90 minutes if you and the players really want to. In that case you’ll skip most of the role-playing and get straight to the fights and subsequent dice rolling. The fights can be scary as there can be quite significant hits, but I personally wouldn’t worry too much about it. The final encounter can be scary for any low-level character though.
While it is certainly doable to tackle the module that way, it is my firm belief that you’re missing out on the greatest strength of this module: role-play potential. Especially at the start there’s a lot of opportunity for both the players and the GM to improvise and really get into character. If the players are willing to showcase what their characters are like based on their descriptions and don’t take things too seriously, they can have a lot of fun exploring the festival. This is especially the case if the GM can improvise well. I myself had a blast of a time responding to and setting up all sorts of shenanigans. Considering some of the players had tears of laughter, I think it’s safe to say we all enjoyed it.
The pregens are solid, but not overly special. They do somewhat foreshadow things, but they’re all useful throughout the module. The only minor complaint that I have concerns Meraina and combat situations.. Both times I’ve GMed the module, Meraina ends up being the ‘I got nothing better to do, so I’ll just walk around and hand out potions’. And that’s a shame. While her spells, scrolls and touch make sense considering her persona, I don’t think there’ll be many moments where players will use them because of a variety of reasons. Especially her touch ability is rather risky to use given her hitpoints. So while the spells available to her make sense, I feel like other options could have had more of an impact and would still have made sense on a thematic level. That said, she’s still a solid and fun pregen though.
The first segment, with all the activities, is therefore the highlight of the module for me. While the rest isn’t bad, it just feels a bit more generic and, dare I say, standard. The words railroad come to mind for the second portion and some of the ‘clues’ early on in the third part were a bit too forced. To conclude I think that this module is an interesting option for timeslots that are roughly between 2 and 3 hours. While veterans can still have fun with the role-play options, I’d say this module is better suited for new players and I would certainly recommend it to them.
I want to know before plan to Dm this module, how many time we need to run the module ? A standard PFS Slot of 4-5 Hours is Ok ? Or we need to plan 2 Slots ?
I want to know before plan to Dm this module, how many time we need to run the module ? A standard PFS Slot of 4-5 Hours is Ok ? Or we need to plan 2 Slots ?
:,( I have waited for a bit longer than 1 month for the PDF for this module and now that it's out in papper I have to wait even longer for the variant I desire (and that's assuming it will even come in this medium). I would truly appreciate a time table for releases like these to assuage my concerns but I understand that Paizo is not the publisher just the distributer.
I want to know before plan to Dm this module, how many time we need to run the module ? A standard PFS Slot of 4-5 Hours is Ok ? Or we need to plan 2 Slots ?
I've ran two tables of it so far. One was 2.5 hours and the other was 3 hours.
I want to know before plan to Dm this module, how many time we need to run the module ? A standard PFS Slot of 4-5 Hours is Ok ? Or we need to plan 2 Slots ?
I've ran two tables of it so far. One was 2.5 hours and the other was 3 hours.
I want to know before plan to Dm this module, how many time we need to run the module ? A standard PFS Slot of 4-5 Hours is Ok ? Or we need to plan 2 Slots ?
I've ran two tables of it so far. One was 2.5 hours and the other was 3 hours.
I want to know before plan to Dm this module, how many time we need to run the module ? A standard PFS Slot of 4-5 Hours is Ok ? Or we need to plan 2 Slots ?
I ran this last month. It took about 4 hours.
Other Question where we can find a Copy of this Module ? Seem No PDF available.
Pathfinder Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Still no word on pfd release? I would probably run this as play by post, and for that the pdf is almost required. Unfortunately, as long as it's paper only, I will not be purchasing.
Made it a point to pick up the module, and the associated miniatures (except the Female Ranger; it was Sold Out) while I was at GenCon this year. Pretty great score. Looking forward to running this.
I don't have it in front of me, but IIRC the number of pages of actual module (excluding NPCs and advertisements) are around 10 or so. It is for 1st level PCs (and the PFS chronicle sheet is for 1-2, so the standard rules for how to apply credit in PFS apply).
The module runs from page 2-12; the entire book with pregens and advertisements is 20 pages. Maps are found on the interior pages of both the front and back cover. From the way it looks I do not believe you will be level 2 by the end of the module.
Pathfinder LO Special Edition, Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, PF Special Edition Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Starfinder Superscriber
I suspect that if they haven't released a PDF already, there isn't going to be one. So I ordered a print copy. I suspect that'll be missing the text Amanda posted upthread, but since she posted it that only bothers me a little. :-)
Still hoping for a PDF, here, but that hope is running low. For GMing online, we've had to fall back on scans of the physical book itself. Perhaps in January we'll see a PDF released... :)
Damn. Was holding out for PDF since I have the map. Now it’s unavailable physically. I’ll still buy the PDF if it becomes available. Please make it so!
Damn. Was holding out for PDF since I have the map. Now it’s unavailable physically. I’ll still buy the PDF if it becomes available. Please make it so!
I second this. I too have the flip mat, but was not at Gen Con to buy this physically. Would really appreciate the PDF being available.
This has been sanctioned for use in Pathfinder Society Roleplaying Guild since August 2017. See the download link near the bottom of the product description on this page. As a Tier 1–2 module, it is replayable for credit at 1st level.
As for a PDF version of the module, I've inquired about this several times with management. There are several considerations that need to be sussed out before I believe Paizo would be prepared to make a statement about when and whether a PDF version of this module would be available. At this point it's above my pay grade.
However, Paizo's entirely aware of the desire for a PDF version.
This has been sanctioned for use in Pathfinder Society Roleplaying Guild since August 2017. See the download link near the bottom of the product description on this page. As a Tier 1–2 module, it is replayable for credit at 1st level.
Looking at that download link: is the permanent boon in there just for familiars and spirit animals or for the whole entire suite of pet friends possible and imaginable? (animal companions, phantoms, etc.)
This has been sanctioned for use in Pathfinder Society Roleplaying Guild since August 2017. See the download link near the bottom of the product description on this page. As a Tier 1–2 module, it is replayable for credit at 1st level.
Looking at that download link: is the permanent boon in there just for familiars and spirit animals or for the whole entire suite of pet friends possible and imaginable? (animal companions, phantoms, etc.)
This only applies to a companion creature that uses the familiar rules. That includes familiars and spirit companions, and the boon's language leaves the naming conventions slightly open-ended in case there's something else out there that uses the familiar rules.
Awesome, thank you! It always amazes me how you guys care and how fast you come on the boards to provide answers! Greatly appreciated!
Admittedly, it's a combination of factors, not least of which is coincidence and when I happen to take a break from what I'm working on. I regularly skim over the most recent posts in a bunch of different sections, and if there's something I spot that I can answer quickly, I try to do so.
I wound up purchasing a physical copy on Amazon. I'm too impatient! However, I do wish that they would at least put the pregens available as PDFs. I had to scan them at work in order to be able to print out copies to give to my players.
Hmm
PS Amanda, I decided to do this as my 150th PF1 table. Kind of fun to do a light little adventure that no one else has run locally.
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