A Pathfinder Society Quest designed for 1st- through 4th-level characters, playable in 2-3 hours.
Some disgruntled citizens in Kintargo, who preferred things under Chelaxian rule, have stolen into some very sensitive information concerning the Pathfinder Society's trade dealings and routes. In the hands of enemies, this could put many agents at risk. Cheliax barely tolerates the Society on a good day, and if these thieves-who-would-be-spies can get the encrypted information into the hands of real Chelaxian intelligence operatives, Cheliax would likely relish its ability to do incalcuable harm. It's up to the PCs to infiltrate the theives' base of operations and steal the info back before these rabble rousers can send it off. Keeping things quiet will be key, though, as the heads of Supplies and Procurement definitely don't want to tip them off to what they really have.
Written by Shan Wolf
Scenario tags: Repeatable
[Scenario Maps spoiler - click to reveal]
The following maps used in this scenario are also available for purchase here on paizo.com:
Infiltration is a quest with a bit of everything, including subsystems.
I think this scenario used the infiltration subsystem. It doesn’t feel organic or realistic as we investigate and prepare to break into the warehouse. Also, we earned so many Edge points (9-12?), it was basically impossible to fail the mission before we even started (Edge points can be used to get an auto success, even if you fail a roll. We had plenty of Edge points left over at the end of the scenario).
Infiltrating the base also used subsystems instead of just using the map. For example, we needed to bypass a locked door, one of us picked the lock, but all of us had to do something to "help", so we had multiple people picking the lock at the same time, 2 other PCs smashing the door, another PC shooting the lock, and another PC doing something else. This is just stupid and needs to stop already. It’s because of this and other problems that persist in PFS that my group will be exploring other game systems.
The art for the Silver Devil is really bad.
Played at subtier 3-4 and it ran in 1.5 hours, but could have run faster with more concrete facts. I like the 2 hour quest format for kids.
Overall: It could have been better without subsystems. (3/10)
I ran this quest and we had a blast, fairly simple stakes and it was fast without feeling like it. A great learning adventure for the infiltration system. Plus some of the players had anti Chelaxian story beats so they enjoyed stopping them. I also liked that for a stealth mission, there wasn't an over reliance on stealth and a lot of other skills could be used.
However there was some editing errors with how to scale the encounters. Also it wasn't clear how many "attempts" the players had at doing preparation, I had it as a single attempt from each, which worked good as they still got a decent amount of Edge Points.
Short and easy, you might like that, you might not
As far as I can tell, This is by far the least difficult Series 2 Quest so far. Some people might like that, some people might be put off by it.
I thought the pacing of the obstacles (number of points required for each) was appropriate, it kept things snappy and the infiltration never got bogged down. I wasn't really sure the obstacles were correctly labelled as "group" or "individual," but I essentially ran them all as group obstacles (the last is written as individual but makes no sense as an individual obstacle). My group had a zillion Edge Points from the preparatory stage, and I think they only failed one or two checks anyway.
I learned afterward that it is recommended to increase Awareness Points after every obstacle, so maybe a complicating encounter would have been triggered by my players at some point. But it probably would not have fit with what was happening at the time and it would not have been particularly challenging or interesting, either, so it felt appropriate to inadvertently skip.
The final encounter was over in one round, with some good dice rolls. I do think I had several of them flee because it would make no sense for them to stick around and get slaughtered.
I enjoy the infiltration subsystem and would love to see more of it. I respect what this Quest is getting at. And to be fair, sometimes just steamrolling things is fun...So, in the end, three stars for fun, but this Quest probably won't be in regular rotation for me.
I was a player in this adventure, and I had a lovely time!
Highlights for me
- I liked getting to try out the Infiltration system (even though this one is simplified).
- Going back to Ravounel is always a treat after my Hell's Rebels campaign!
- The infiltration adventure was very accommodating for me and my allies who were decidedly not stealthy.
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, LO Special Edition, Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Brinebeast wrote:
Is this OGL or ORC? I am uncertain when the Quests line will make the transition.
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, LO Special Edition, Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber
FarmerDad wrote:
Does anybody know the significance of the
** spoiler omitted **
It is just how they want the encounter agents arranged. The C is the individual the H represents the mooks (letter is from the higher tier) and the number of the H is the order in which they are added as the CP warrants.
I ran this last night, somewhat to my irritation I had to completely re-write the infiltration part as the author has not understood how the rules work (I'm fine with this if it's a free thing, less fine with having to do Paizo's job for them when I'm paying for it). It's a nice, short, quest otherwise though - it ran about an hour and a half and we weren't hurrying things.
I ran this last night, somewhat to my irritation I had to completely re-write the infiltration part as the author has not understood how the rules work (I'm fine with this if it's a free thing, less fine with having to do Paizo's job for them when I'm paying for it). It's a nice, short, quest otherwise though - it ran about an hour and a half and we weren't hurrying things.
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