A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for levels 3–7.
The sprawling maze of caverns and tunnels beneath the hilltop city of Kaer Maga are home to a host of dangers and mysteries. A dedicated group of guards called the Duskwardens is responsible for protecting Kaer Magans and visitors alike from everything that lurks below. Despite the Duskwardens' best efforts, the influence of one of the vaults has been spreading on to the streets of Kaer Maga. It falls to a group Pathfinder Society agents to navigate the factions of Kaer Maga to access and strike at the heart of the lurking threat.
Beyond the Halflight Path is an evergreen, replayable scenario designed to provide a flexible adventure that confronts the PCs with a variety of threats more common to higher-level characters. The scenario has nine different possible villains, as well as myriad other options for the GM to customize the dangers that the PCs face.
I played Beyond the Halflight Path via play-by-post with my disgusting dwarf oracle, Makras Vekker. My thoughts at the time were that it was fine, but sort of loosely-plotted. After having read the scenario, I have a better understanding of why that was: the scenario is a repeatable because it has *nine* different main stories that can be told with it (the scenario weighs in at 92 pages!). Although the stories will have some common elements (including a shared flip-mat), there's enough differences between them that replays should still be fairly fun and fresh. I can't give it a perfect score, but I admire what it's trying to accomplish and can see how it's a real boon to the PFS community.
SPOILERS!:
Beyond the Halflight Path takes place in (and below) the city of Kaer Maga, perhaps the most original (and probably my favorite) setting in Golarion. The scenario has a clever structure to foster replayability. First, there are three major problems going on, and the GM gets to choose which he wants the PCs to address. Each of these problems is linked to a different subterranean vault under the city, and the briefing for the PCs is delivered in a different district of the city by a different NPC. The PCs really get exposed to the flavour of the city, and are encouraged to do things like hiring guides (with some fun random variations on who they end up with), talking to troll augurs, collecting rumors, getting help from the Duskwardens, etc. Although some of this is consistent across the scenario's variations, there's enough differences that even the first quarter of the scenario, where the PCs are trying to figure out the location they need to head to in order to solve the problem, won't be completely repetitive for replays.
Once the PCs know which vault they need to go to, play shifts entirely over to the Bigger Cavern flip-mat (two of the story groups share one side, while the third uses the other side). Each of the three main "problems" contains its own list of room descriptions for the different vaults: the Scintillating Halls (a caulborn storehouse for items from the Dark Tapestry), the Shining Deep (a poorly constructed vault of unclear purpose, with lots of natural dangers), and Sparklegrim Passage (a caulborn vault meant to lure and trap thieves, filled with magical dangers). If anything, I think exploring the same flip-mat is the part of the scenario that could feel a bit "been there, done that" across multiple replays.
The clever part of the scenario's design is that although there are only three different problems (and thus three different briefings, etc.), each of those problems could have three different causes. When the GM preps to run Beyond the Halflight Path, they have to choose the precise cause of the problem in the scenario, and that then provides them with a list of monsters and treasures that they use to populate the chambers. So with nine different possibilities in total, every group will end up running around the same flip-mat but what they encounter should be very different.
This can sound a bit abstract, so I'll give the example of the variation I played. The GM must have selected the second problem group (property damage) which is linked to the Shining Deep. The briefing was delivered by a cleric of Urgathoa in the heavily-undead part of Kaer Maga called Ankar-Te. The GM then had three options for who was responsible, and selected the "Recovering Implements" explanation: two dwarf brothers exploring the vault found a device capable of tunnelling into worked stone, but their use of it has been causing minor earthquakes on the surface. By selecting this option, the GM was given the major NPCs to use for the climactic encounter, a linked danger, and then a free choice of several unconnected dangers. And at the end, the briefer has some custom text for the PCs. Finally, there's even a full set of three different Chronicle sheets so that players don't get spoiled on what the other options are!
I've read through several PFS & SFS repeatable scenarios, and I've never seen one go to so much effort as Beyond the Halflight Path. It's genuinely impressive both in its flavour for Kaer Maga and in the different vaults under the city. I like how the GM is given a lot of advice on how to plan their adventure, and some extra sidebars on making different parts of the scenario really come alive. (It is definitely a scenario that a GM shouldn't try to tackle on the fly--a lot of preparation is required.) If I had a critique, it would be that some of the nine individual stories are under-developed; in the variation I played, my group never really got a sense of what the heck was going on beyond the fact that there were some bad guys in some caves and we won. Still, that was just one experience, and I'd happy replay the scenario to see what happened the next time.
Very fun dungeon crawl making good use of the Bigger Caverns flip-mat. What I like most about this is the ability to customize and flex a little bit of creative control over a Society Scenario. I believe that you get the most out of this if you go through the differing monsters yourself and pick out the ones you want. Although story light, I was able to create a cohesive theme by go through the tables myself as opposed to rolling and I think my players really appreciated it.
That being said, the formatting of the scenario is a bit clunky and difficult to navigate in PDF form while running a game and there are more than a few typos and formatting errors, that make the technical side of the scenario a little messy. Editorial step up your game! (Sorry Publishing Nerd here)
I have run and played this now several times. Overall I think it is a good addition to the evergreen stable. It is similar to Tome but with a variation on the starting investigation portion which can soak up too much time unless you keep the players well on track. It is easy for them to want to go off exploring all the leads when it is just an excuse to get them to the actual adventure portion.
The different paths you can take are varied, with a good mix of different types of opposition. While you can pick randomly I strongly suggest not doing that and choosing something more suitable for your group instead. It is significantly less spikey than Tome (which has some very over tuned encounters) but can still offer plenty of challenge.
This is a very randomized module. It can be great, okay, or awful.
After playing through this, I purchased it. It's 91 pages long. For a 4 hour time slot, 91 pages. Except, here's the trick: you only use about 12 pages. Not only are there multiple maps to choose from, but there are also 3 major story lines with little extra variations, and a slew of monster encounters that are (usually) randomly rolled for and then arranged in a dungeon by a GM. So you winnow it down to just the few things you select, and use only that.
This can be overwhelming, if you try to have all 91 pages ready to go! A GM would really, truly do well to pre-select some random arrangements, and then get very familiar with that pre-selected setup. If you try to learn all 91 pages and monsters and then pick them on the fly, it's going to be a nightmare. If you don't bother to learn any of it beforehand and then try to manage it all spontaneously as the random rolls dictate the encounters, it's going to be a sloppy mess.
For my particular play through, this is what I enjoyed about this module: it was hard. Some of the fights in the high tier were taking down PCs left & right. Nobody died, but we had PCs going unconscious at various points. After the game, I looked up the monster's stat block, and realized it could have been worse. We got off easy because the GM didn't have a perfect grasp of how to play the monster optimally. (And that may again be due to the module being 91 pages and waaaaayyy too much for a GM to sift through in a 4 hour time slot.)
The map is, frankly, beautiful. At least, the "Bigger Cavern" map with the crystals on it is great to look at and to try to maneuver through. (There is a flip side to the Bigger Cavern product, and it's not as pretty, and it's used for 1 of the story lines here.) There are tight spaces, open spaces, water, the crystals, height changes, and so on. People can leap off ledges, swim, get bullrushed off of bridges (or bullrush the enemies!), can get higher ground (+1 to melee attacks!), and finally, as mentioned, there are fun challenges to deal with like the squeezing rules. There are little corners to hide in, too. It's a great map.
Spoiler:
GMs, please note. There is one spot on the map where narrow stairs take the PCs from elevation 0 to elevation 15' in just a single square. The PCs are going 15' up, but doing it by moving through just 1 square on the map (or at least mostly 1 square). This has gotta cost more than 5' of movement!
What else can I tell you? Well, you are going to reconnect with some old friends/enemies in Kaer Maga, that's for sure. If you've played the older products (like The City of Strangers, part 1 & 2), then you'll be familiar with many areas here. If not, you can hope you get a GM who is in love with this giant city on a cliff, and hope he/she introduces you to some of the interesting locales on the city.
Final word: this is a trainwreck or a wonderful time, mostly depending upon how your GM assembles this product. It has great potential, and you could play and re-play this a handful of times before you felt like you had exhausted most of the variations and story details. And the gameplay is great, if done well. So look for a good GM and hope that he/she is well prepared!
Like it's predecessor 3-7 evergreen, needs more GM instruction on encounter balance. While there are two tiers, still possible to have a APL barely over the line forced to play up. These groups may not be able to handle some of the most deadliest aspects of the Higher Tier.
Random generated dungeons are nothing more than a dungeon crawl as plots are too disconnected. Keep that in mind then it delivers as a dungeon crawl.
Spoiler:
It is not fun to be in a APL 5.4, forced to high tier and have a GM spring the worst trap on you (11d6) then say sorry there is no 4 player adjustment for traps. The GM's need to know they are the 4 party adjustment in those situations.
This scenario sounds like a lot of fun. I love Kaer Maga. I would also love to know what the map list includes as I already have it scheduled for a gameday about a week after its release.
Just one map for 'From the Tome of Righteous Repose' and just one map for 'Beyond the Halflight Path'? I am loving that trend!
Same. Makes life very easy when it comes to prep and running the game.
It's definitely nice when it can work out that way, and the Bigger Flip-Mat line has provided us with some fertile ground for this style of adventure. It's a trend we hope to continue, map opportunities willing.
Just one map for 'From the Tome of Righteous Repose' and just one map for 'Beyond the Halflight Path'? I am loving that trend!
Same. Makes life very easy when it comes to prep and running the game.
It's definitely nice when it can work out that way, and the Bigger Flip-Mat line has provided us with some fertile ground for this style of adventure. It's a trend we hope to continue, map opportunities willing.
Awesome. In the meantime, hopefully some of the maps we need for other scenarios, that are currently discontinued, will see the light of day once more as Classics.
I'm not well-versed in Kaer Maga lore at all and was reading the title as "Below the Halfling Path" by mistake for a while. My hype went through the roof and then someone told me this scenario is not about halflings :(
Still hyped though.
What time do these things become clickable?
Thought if something was supposed to be released on 11/29 I would beable to click before it becomes 11/30...
That seems to be about subscribers however we still cannot just purchase the scenario in the usual way.
It's actually both. She said she was going to work on the issue about not being able to obtain the PDF normally when she came into work this morning, but the issues from yesterday had kept her well past her shift. So hopefully today it'll be resolved.
This module was nothing but a ton of fun and I loved it. So far, by far, the best PFS Adventure I have had the pleasure to play.
Enough RP to be engaging, but not so much to bog everyone down with exposition. The visual and story elements were more than enough to get the story going and give us a real feel for things.
My Favorite NPC::
The troll soothsayer? Talk about reading entrails!
I only played it once, and I understand that it can change each time, so I can only speak from the scenario we did, so, going from there...
Oh what a nasty monster!:
We ran into a Golem, and oh my good gracious was that thing a hard fight. We had a mixed group of 1 4, 1 5, and 3 7's. It was incredibly fun and challenging.
10/10 this was my favorite adventure in PFS so far.
Page 28 and 29 it refers to the Shining Deep for Handout #4 and after the NPC Text. Is it supposed to mean Sparklegrim Passage or actually the Shining Deep?
Kyle, take the red pill! Come to the GM thread on this topic! Yes, that is a typo. Ignore it. It is one of many bizarre and sometimes amusing typos in this fabulous build your own dungeon adventure.
We have updated the Pathfinder Society Scenario #9-09: Beyond the Halflight Path PDF with the following changes:
Created a new file of three chronicle sheets, one for each vault, for player use. Each sheet sorts treasure by story arc.
Moved the existing chronicle sheet to the back of the file.
Added DCs for saving throws to the sidebar about check DCs.
Added clarification that GMs may select the ceiling height in each room to best fit the chosen encounters.
Fixed various typos, including cleaning up the charts in the back of
the book to make it clearer which monsters appear at which subtier.
If you wish to download the updated version, you may do so for free at http://paizo.com/paizo/account/assets.
The everything-on-one-sheet chronicle remains in the back of the scenario, and is still given to GMs. However, there are now three neatly-organized chronicles that can be given out to players. It's a very nice update!
I haven't gone through explicitly to compare typos and the like, but what I saw looked fixed. The save DCs were there, for example.
Organized Play Lead Developer
