A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for 7th- through 10th-level characters.
A mysterious abandoned laboratory is discovered in the Arcadian Ocean, with clear signs of occult experimentation having occurred at some point. The Waterfall, strangely fascinated by this new find, sends a group of Pathfinders to investigate and gather whatever research they can find inside, while also ensuring the building poses no further threats. Deep inside, a soul and forgotten memories wait, hungry to be found and revealed to the light. The research and artifacts inside seem like they'll lead to answers about the enigmatic Waterfall, though this information may turn out to be unwanted.
Hidden is slow investigation sci-fi thriller featuring mostly combat. It was played at subtier 9-10 and took 3 hours.
The main problem with Hidden is that it starts really slow. A slow briefing. Lots of narration about traveling. Talking to the captain and crew (which is irrelevant). I think it took an hour before anything happened at my table. It just seems like the GM should (quickly) narrate everything until they reach the desert.
The investigation itself was somewhat interesting, but it needs to be sped up. Basically, not enough happens with the amount of time you spend searching through every room. There are a lot of empty rooms.
Each encounter starts off in an interesting way, but it's just cosmetic and the encounters end up being average slugfests.
More Starfinder tech (and maps). If we wanted to play Starfinder, we'd be playing Starfinder.
The boss encounter could be somewhat deadly. For us, we resolved it quickly and easily.
This scenario could (and probably should) be really short, maybe even as short as 2 hours. The horror elements were extremely mild, I'd call them creepy.
Overall: A short investigation scenario that has a sci-fi feel to it. (5/10)
I really liked this scenario, and going into it, I had no idea how much it would reference PFS1. I was absolutely floored in the intro briefing, and only continued to be more and more amazed that Paizo decided to pick up one particularly loose (and fascinating) thread from PFS1. SO MANY RELVELATIONS!
As others have commented already, these revelations might not have much of an impact on new players, but I absolutely loved them as a PF1 vet!
The fights were all interesting and substantially threatening. The final challenge was particularly deadly, but our GM gave us ways to avoid the damage (by leaving the room if need be). I also think that for a final challenge of the game, the deadliness was justified.
Again, as others have also called out, the tone was great. There were also some interesting opportunities for roleplay, and I liked being able to save a few new friends along the way...
Overall, a great metaplot scenario - and I would say it felt like one of the strongest story-wise since Season 2. I was not excited at all about the metaplot this season until I played this scenario, but now I'm really interested to see where the finale goes. Good job Paizo, and great job Michael Bramnik!
Like "wait, how did that person become Waterfall and when?"
Either way yeah, I do like the scenario a lot and it was fun to play and has good roleplaying moments, but admitedly I do feel like its bit of Numeria adventure (starfinder flip mats do contribute to this) since the facility feels like horror laboratory you see in scifi movies set in 1940s, but unlike in ruins of azlant where you run into azlanti ruin that has energy of magical megacorporation complete with completely white sterile rooms and magical announcer voice talking for the corporation, it feels like scenario doesn't really acknowledge how much of the focus on electromagnetism, metal doors working on electricity and clinical surgery tables should feel out of place. Like maybe with rise of inventors and stasian coils and exploration of numeria it could be more normal for pathfinders nowadays, but I do kinda feel like I'd wish scenario more explicitly talked about the eerie disconnect that comes if folks from renaissance showed up in 1940s, that was fun part of numeria adventures in 1e.
Still, tone of scenario is great and horrifying, and scenario does well with handling subject matter of dark crimes performed in the facility.
(that said, the haunt definitely almost caused tpk, but I don't think it being bit too deadly takes away from scenario)
Edit:
It didn't hit me at time, but I realized wait the ending reveal raises lot of questions like "so wait, they never did anything?" when it turned out decemvirate was infiltrated by non pathfinders and "anyone who gets the mask can pretend/become decemvirate" and they promised to fix that. And some of Aram Zey's friends' reaction to Waterfall's identity feels really off. I think problem with bigger metaplot isn't really fault of scenario, but I do feel like ending character roster reaction had some ones that felt so off character I had to edit score a bit even if rest of scenario is great.
I had a lot of fun with this scenario! The island lab we're called on to clear/explore/salvage is appropriately eerie (the elements of the approach were an especially good touch) and the delve throughout the complex felt well-paced as a player, with enough bits here and there for us to begin peicing the history and nature of the place together.
The first two combats felt moderately challenging for our party, but I appreciated the appearance and (apporpriate) use of certain uncommon monsters. The third encounter
3rd encounter:
for us was a haunt, that unfortunately felt quite a bit overtuned. With the extremely high initiative and attack mods on the haunt it went before all but one of us and had critted half the PCs down to >50% health before anyone could blink. We managed to quell it before death only because my Redeemer Champion rolled a '19' on the intiative roll (and thus was the only PC who got a second turn before it) and then nat '20'd her Religion roll to disable it. Which led to an epic and thematically appropriate moment...for the characters. For the players it felt like only incredible dice luck saved us from the majority of the party going dying in a single round (and then they would die-die as the haunt keeps pulsing again and again. Flavorfully and even mechanically a haunt is a great choice here, but the all of the numbers on it - mods, damage, DCs - felt too extreme.
Apart from that I really enjoyed this one. The flavor's good, the mission has a good balance of exploring, investigation, and battling, and it contains some interesting story reveals.
About those reveals:
I'll be honest, I'm a bit mixed on the nature of that reveal, even as a long-time 1e player. I really enjoyed 322 back when they first appeared. But even for me them re-appearing, and in this position, raises a lot more questions than answers and is honestly causing my general impression of the Society to worsen. But we'll see how this plotline continues...
And this is more of a note on the ongoing metaplot of PFS and how the developers seem to want to Society to be portrayed. Within the scneario itself I think the revelation is pulled off well: I appreciate how multiple major leaders are given a chance to showcase their personalities in how they react to it.
All in all, I liked this one. Mike Bramnik captured the personalities of the Pathfinder Leadership as more fully themselves than we have seen in ages. The lab was appropriately creepy, and the story is great.
As a bonus, it runs fast. My party of five got through in four hours. Not bad at all! Plus, I loved all the PF1 callbacks. It was so lovely having a previous plot from First Edition get this sort of callback for dedicated players, and my PF2-only players enjoyed it as well.
Mechanics-wise, a previous reviewer was correct that the pangolin battle drags a bit, but otherwise I had no complaints. This one was a pleasure to run.
This was great! Even as someone newer to the meta-plot, the reveals were very fun.
If you're planning to GM this scenario, I'd suggest adding more detail to the content warning for a pre-session discussion of lines/veils:
>>> Themes of creepy horror such as human experimentation, medical trauma, incarceration, torture, and brainwashing
^ That won't spoil the surprises, but it will give players the opportunity to request lighter descriptions/detail if they have a trauma history of their own.
I made a Gear Handout for all the strange equipment in this scenario and I included a bonus handout of the partial letter which the party is supposed to find (but for which we had no handout.)
All in all, I liked this one. Mike Bramnik captured the personalities of the Pathfinder Leadership as more fully themselves than we have seen in ages. The lab was appropriately creepy, and the story is great. As a bonus, it runs fast. My party of five got through in four hours. Not bad at all!
Plus, I loved all the PF1 callbacks. This one was a pleasure to run.
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