I don't know if this has been mentioned yet, I didn't see it in any of the threads, and I wanted to point it out for those DM's who haven't gotten this far in the AP yet.
The Cathedral of Wee Jas has an unhallow effect with an invisiblity purge tied into it that affects the entire cathedral. It says so in the last bulleted list of effects just before the details of the doors and walls- "Invisibility purge throughout the entire Cathedral." It also mentions the unhallow effect in the aura section of the room with Ike.
Yet Ike Iverson's tactics have him using a scroll of invisibility on himself. Why?? I just eliminated that part of his tactics which had him finish his buffing session a round early.
Another thing I wonder about is the hero's feast spell. Can it affect the undead? The spell effect in the PHB says 1 creature/level...it doesn't specify living creature. The text of the spell uses the words consume and partake to indicate who is affected. I suppose the zombies could eat it if commanded to, but does digestion need to take place or is just putting the food in one's body enough? How should consume and partake be defined here? According to Libris Mortis, most undead have no metabolism and zombies have no diet of any kind. I would think that having no metabolism means the zombie's bodies would not be able to digest to food. But do they need to digest it or is just eating it enough? And since the wraith is incorporeal, can it benefit from the spell? How can it eat the food if it can't touch it?
Something else is that the giants, half-orcs, and the cleric down below are never mentioned as benefitting from the hero's feast. Since Ike Iverson is a 13th level caster, he can create the feast for 13 creatures, enough for himself and the bone devil, the 2 giants, 3 half-orcs, and cleric in the lower temple, and the 5 zombies. He doesn't have enough for the wraith too but...well it's incorporeal. I don't see any reason why the giants and the others shouldn't benefit from the spell if there's enough for them too. I gave them the benefits from the spell. And I will probably give the benefits to the zombies too, but not the wraith since it's incorporeal. We ended our session tonight after the party fought the giants but before they went up into the upper tower.
Creative Director
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I don't see a problem with Ike inviting as many of his minions as he can to dig into the heroes' feast. As for undead, I'd probably say that the coporeal undead could gain the benefits of the spell, but the incoporeal ones would not. Of course, since undead are immune to morale effects and are already immune to fear and poison... all they'd really get from the feast are the temporary hit points.
As for Ike's invisibility tactic... D'OH! Good catch. I don't have that issue handy right now, but it might be better to replace his invisibility scroll with some other spell that helps him hide. Obscuring mist perhaps? Or meld into stone?
Also in the tactics Ike (after casting Invisibility) prepares a Flame Strike to cast in the surprise round as the PCs enter the room. Casting the spell makes him visible negating the purpose to useing the scroll anyways.
I just ran the fight with Ike Iverson and noticed a few more things I didn't catch the first time around...
Ike's daily tactic while expecting an attack from the PC's is to cast both Magic Vestment and Greater Magic Weapon on himself twice a day. He has 4 Magic Vesment spells prepared. He should only need to have 2 prepared, freeing up 2 3rd level slots for other spells. His duration of 13 hours means that he will only need 2 Magic Vestments instead of 4.
He also has prepared a Divine Favor and Shield of Faith, plus quickened versions of both spells. There really isn't much of a point to having them prepared twice, the durations of the spells are 1 minute and 1 minute/level respectively, and it's unlikely that the fight will last longer than his spell durations. I'd say keep the quickened versions and go for 2 other 1st level spells to prepare.
Another thing is that Ike Iverson has the Tomb-Tainted Soul feat from Libris Mortis so he is healed from negative energy spells and harmed by positive energy spells. His tactics include the casting of Death Ward on himself, which makes him immune to negative energy effects. The description of Death Ward (PHB p.217) says "The subject is immune to...any negative energy effects such as from inflict spells..." Since the spell is in the PHB and rules in the PHB take precedence over rules in any other book, doesn't that mean he can't use his Inflict spells to heal himself? The spell doesn't prevent being damaged from negative energy effects, it makes the subject immune to them. I didn't notice this until after he was dead, so he got to heal himself with an inflict spell, but if I had noticed it beforehand I probably would have swapped his Death Ward for another spell.
One other possibility that could cause a problem for a headstrong party is this...What if they capture and interrogate one of the assassins, which happened in my game, find out they were sent by Ike Iverson, and then go straight to the Temple for a fight? A party with access to a lot of healing magic, or one that got lucky in the fight with the assassins, could be capable of dealing with both threats in the same day. If this were the case, wouldn't Ike's spellcasting be reduced since he had cast a dozen or so spells on the assassins? His prepared spells don't take into account all the spells that he cast on the assassins, nor is there a note in his tactics describing that possibility. My group almost ran into this problem, but decided to rest for a day before going on to the Temple. They talked it over though, and were on the verge of doing just that. Lucky them. Or lucky me, it depends on how you look at it.
One other possibility that could cause a problem for a headstrong party is this...What if they capture and interrogate one of the assassins, which happened in my game, find out they were sent by Ike Iverson, and then go straight to the Temple for a fight? A party with access to a lot of healing magic, or one that got lucky in the fight with the assassins, could be capable of dealing with both threats in the same day. If this were the case, wouldn't Ike's spellcasting be reduced since he had cast a dozen or so spells on the assassins? His prepared spells don't take into account all the spells that he cast on the assassins, nor is there a note in his tactics describing that possibility. My group almost ran into this problem, but decided to rest for a day before going on to the Temple. They talked it over though, and were on the verge of doing just that. Lucky them. Or lucky me, it depends on how you look at it.
Wow, that's great feedback. I certainly wouldn't have anticipated that from reading the adventure (even twice). I'm a long way from Soul Pillars, but I'll prepare for that possibility (particularly if my party stays as headstrong as they are now).
One of my players has graciously pointed out to me that I was wrong about the invisibility purge. According to the text of the unhallow spell, any of the other spell effects tied to it (invisibility puurge in this case) can be designated to affect only specific targets. In this case, the purge could have been deisgnated to affect only nonfollowers of Wee Jas, thus allowing Ike his invisibility and still preventing any of the PC's from turning invisible and sneaking around. I missed that when I was going over the adventure because I didn't think to read the unhallow spell description. Maybe in the all-in-one AP, a line could be added to the text of the Temple description stating that the invisibility purge only affects non-followers of Wee Jas?
Allowing Ike to turn invisible isn't much of a change since he readies a flame strike to cast on the first character to enter the room, which ends his invisibility. Maybe a little change of tactics would help too?
A bad posibility is that Ike (being a weejas priest) can use wizard scrolls. He could be invisible and he could've cast a Fire trap or other sort of magical trap on the door.
I know that you cannot compare Flame strike with Fire Trap, but he would remain invisible...
Nanmaniac
A year later, and I have feedback on these comments...
Ike's daily tactic while expecting an attack from the PC's is to cast both Magic Vestment and Greater Magic Weapon on himself twice a day. He has 4 Magic Vesment spells prepared. He should only need to have 2 prepared, freeing up 2 3rd level slots for other spells. His duration of 13 hours means that he will only need 2 Magic Vestments instead of 4.
Ike casts Magic Vestment on both his armor and his shield twice a day, so he needs to prepare it four times.
He also has prepared a Divine Favor and Shield of Faith, plus quickened versions of both spells. There really isn't much of a point to having them prepared twice, the durations of the spells are 1 minute and 1 minute/level respectively, and it's unlikely that the fight will last longer than his spell durations. I'd say keep the quickened versions and go for 2 other 1st level spells to prepare.
I've seen a number of high level fights last more than ten rounds, and the quickened versions are also useful if someone hits Ike with a targeted dispel magics (although his ring of counterspells will counter the first one).
Another thing is that Ike Iverson has the Tomb-Tainted Soul feat from Libris Mortis so he is healed from negative energy spells and harmed by positive energy spells. His tactics include the casting of Death Ward on himself, which makes him immune to negative energy effects. The description of Death Ward (PHB p.217) says "The subject is immune to...any negative energy effects such as from inflict spells..." Since the spell is in the PHB and rules in the PHB take precedence over rules in any other book, doesn't that mean he can't use his Inflict spells to heal himself? The spell doesn't prevent being damaged from negative energy effects, it makes the subject immune to them. I didn't notice this until after he was dead, so he got to heal himself with an inflict spell, but if I had noticed it beforehand I probably would have swapped his Death Ward for another spell.
Death Ward is his domain spell from the Death Domain, so the only thing you could swap it for is Imbue with Spell Ability from the Magic Domain. On the other hand, it may not make sense tactically.
I'm running this fight tonight or next week. Wish me luck.
If you have two duds for domains spells for a certain spell level, fill it with a lower level domain spell. For example, my cleric with the Good domain fills his higher level domain slots with holy smite because I really love casting "happy fun ball". :)
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I don't know if this has been mentioned yet, I didn't see it in any of the threads, and I wanted to point it out for those DM's who haven't gotten this far in the AP yet.
The Cathedral of Wee Jas has an unhallow effect with an invisiblity purge tied into it that affects the entire cathedral. It says so in the last bulleted list of effects just before the details of the doors and walls- "Invisibility purge throughout the entire Cathedral." It also mentions the unhallow effect in the aura section of the room with Ike.
Yet Ike Iverson's tactics have him using a scroll of invisibility on himself. Why?? I just eliminated that part of his tactics which had him finish his buffing session a round early.
It is Mentioned in the description in the HC of SCAP that the purge Invisibility effect does not effect Followers of We Jas (Which was nice for one PC in my group who is a cleric (We Jas)/Wizard/Necro).