A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for 7th- through 10th-level characters.
The Pathfinders travel to the demon-torn Sarkoris Scar in search of more information about Hesla Embersplitter, who's been rumored to have connections to a cult in the area known as The Cult of the Screaming Grub. The agents in the area will need to explore the desolate wasteland to find Deskari's Gullet, a cave system filled with strange connections to other planes. It's there that the Pathfinders will find Hesla's treasure and maybe catch a hint of her ultimate goal, while frosty eyes watch them from afar, counting on their success.
So, I ran this one shot knowing I was going to eliminate the Hexploration and the first encounter (A, since it didn't have any plot relevance).
Instead, I described them moving around the map and finding the locations in the order that made sense to me plot wise to tell the story.
That being said, the adventure was still fairly long and took my group 4.5h to clear, this is including them skipping the optional encounter, the encounter afterwards, and not examining the following location too much.
They really enjoyed the story and if we didn't have time constraints could have easily spent more time with RP'ing throughout.
I rate it 3 stars because I believe a DM will have to make similar alterations for this scenario to run smoothly which means its much more difficult to run 'raw'.
I know high level scenarios take more time, but this took ~6 hours to run where my players found the hidden entrance after only exploring 3 other hexes. The author put way too much content in this scenario. It should have been broken into two parts: the hexploration and the dungeon. The Scourge of Sheerleaf had it right for a high-level scenario with only 2 combat encounters plus a Hazard.
A hazard was a near TPK and then really boring because one Quickened PC ran in, 2 actions to disable the hazard, then ran out while everyone else did nothing because of how deadly it was. Another fight, few of the players had a way to deal with flying enemies, so I took pity on them and landed (well, more to keep the session from running another hour or more longer). They never found the two social encounters even after I told them certain encounters might not be listed on the map. No one wanted to do the chase after the final combat. I am unsure how the unmarked encounters were supposed to be discovered without GM guidance or exploring every hex.
I would like to see better proof-reading. One part mentions keeping track of time, but the time has no effect on the scenario. Rather, the number of encounters survived does. This, and the large number of encounters could easily have been fixed to make this a great pair of scenarios.
Overall, it definitely needs improvements for me to recommend, but I liked the hexploration to make things feel different.
Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Accessories, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Really excited to run this one for my local lodge, just have a question regarding the hexploration: if the party reconnoiters a hex with no encounter but it happens to be bordering another would it be fair to draw attention to that hex? (I mean all but a certain one of course)
Also the scaling adjustments for final part levels 9-10 seems to be incorrect, would it be the same adjustment as is in levels 7-8?
Hey looking at the creatures in this scenario on Foundry and a few things stand out that seem really strange?
Spoiler:
The Derakni (underlevelled based on it's 1e self) feels like a 1e demon, with no Sin Vulnerability, three resistances to acid, cold and fire like an old demon, and only one weakness to cold iron and none to holy? Not to mention Abyssal Venom, isn't that based on the OGL terminology for demon stuff? Also, the Retriever is here, I was under the impression those are OGL, is it somehow not?
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
smitty22 wrote:
** spoiler omitted **
Exploration Question Answered:
So the reason to explore is that the party can lower the massively high DC to search for the actual final Dungeon.
So I ran this, and as a GM that sometimes finishes early, I would need an extra entire extra session to finish this scenario on time. The Exploration Portion could have been it's own scenario length wise, and the final encounter area is likely on the "Extra Long" Season 2 Quest side of things... So easily three hours if you're Running As Written.
I started the post exploration climax at the end of the allotted session time, and did an ultra-speed run through it to fit the scenario into six hours.
Individually, the encounters are great, and I loved the NPC's introduced. It's just that the added logistics of the Hex Crawl when most parties can afford a spacious pouch and enough rations to last plus the higher level combat makes the added administration too time consuming.
Speed Run to finish in 5 hours - for a convention slot or zero flexibility retail table.:
So I'd ask the party's permission to waive the hexploration rules entirely. I'd skip the animal combat encounter and TPK hazard encounters entirely and combine those Treasure bundles with the remaining combat, I'd basically do all of the NPC encounters & the one combat related to one of the NPC's former village. Hexploration encounters are severe by default because it's the only encounter that day, and at this level they can run super long - particularly if the melee PC's can't deal with Flying in a reasonable manner. After that, I'd start the final dungeon as written or making the first encounter a skill check with no combat option. With the briefing and epilogue, this might just allow a GM to finish on time.
