If you must maybe think about adding a "filler adventure" to bump them to 4th before you send them off to the temple. Or scale the adventure. Nuff said?
Creative Director
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Not really. The advantage of the Adventure Path is the series as a whole. If I advance them ahead of time, that could alter the future adventures in the series.
I'll probably see what power level they're at when Whispering Cairn ends, then reduce 3 Faces. I'm still wondering about an official theory, given the playtesting.
Characters who have played through "Whispering Cairn" are likely closer to 4th level than they are to 3rd level, so it shouldn't take many encounters to level up once they start "Three Faces of Evil." The 2nd adventure is admitidly pretty tough, even for 4th-level characters. But then, so was "Whispering Cairn." If the PCs play smart, don't overextend their resources, and know when to retreat, things should be tough but not undoable. The three factions in "Three Faces" are allied, but they aren't particularly friendly to each other. If things go poorly for one, it might be some time before the other two notice.
As for retreating and resting, the first time the PCs retreat, the cultists likely assume that they've beaten them for good and won't take many measures against a second attack. Only after the PCs retreat a 2nd time will a particular group likely decide to plan against a 3rd invasion.
Of course, all that said, no one knows your group better than you. If you feel that the adventure's going to be too tough, by all means reduce the bad guys a bit. Or send the PCs on a side quest and send them into Dourstone once they hit 4th level. Each of the Age of Worms adventures are for a spread of 2 levels, so there's a bit of wiggle room for side adventures that shouldn't impact later adventures.
I am actually going to start my group through "The Whispering Cairn", but they are using established characters, a mix of 2nd and 3rd level.
Others have criticized me for this, but given the lethal nature of these adventures, I think that it will work best in the long run. They might be 4th level when they finish the Cairn, since the great thing about the EL thing, is that it is self limiting.
Hopefully that will make 'em tough enough for the second meatgrinder ;)
Cheers,
First of all, there is a temple to Heironeous and St. Cuthbert in town. Not to mention Bronzewood Lodge has priests of Obad-Hai and the Cult of the Green Lady has their own clerics. There is nothing stopping the PCs from buying healing consumables. With all the priestliness around, it's fairly reasonable to expect them to be able to find one wand of some kind of healing spell around. Not to mention there should be a practically inexhaustible supply of potions and scrolls. The treasure level practically expects the PCs to use a moderate amount of consumables and they progress. On top of that, as my group discovered in the first AP, you don't have to fight <i>everything</i>. The PCs can blitz to the main encounter and take it out in one attempt if they desire. It's possible to finish Age of Worms and only be 2nd level if you get lucky and find everything you need to at the earliest possible event.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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As for retreating and resting, the first time the PCs retreat, the cultists likely assume that they've beaten them for good and won't take many measures against a second attack. Only after the PCs retreat a 2nd time will a particular group likely decide to plan against a 3rd invasion.
That makes sense for the early part of the adventure, but the encounter with the Ebon Aspect seems like a tpk waiting to happen. Won't the party be relatively low on resources after having taken out the last cult leader, and won't the aspect cut through them like a hot knife through butter? How did this go in the playtest?
I expect that after defeating the last cult leader, my players will try and leave the mines without resting, figuring that it is much safer to do so on the surface. I don't know how they will defeat a CR 6 creature at that point.
Sebastian
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My guys just ran through the Temple of Hextor on Saturday (25 Feb)and although they were initially intimidated with the level of planning the the Hextorites made, they pressed through and eventually succeeded in clearing it out.
They have gone through every portion of each adventure and had just made 4th level at the beginning of the assault into the Dark Cathedral and so the early encounters were seemingly too easy for them, although they were having fun and that is the key, I suppose.
During the assault in the arena area (Area 11) it talks about Kendra using her scroll of Silence on a spellcaster and then a Sound burst. Since she was not in the silence effect, I'm coll with the tactics, but I could just see the players balking at a sonic effect going off inside this Silence (since it too described it being targeted at the spellcaster). Was I reading this wrong, or does Silence not effect a sonic-type of attack?
Also, the map of Area 1 indicates a 5' wide corridor leading to Area 2, but the map of the Temple of Hextor shows a 10' corridor leading from Area 1. This came into play with me because the players alerted the whole place when they arrived and when the cultists (I used 9 of 'em) released Beast, I thought he would go to the closest enemy, which was in that corridor - and to do that he had to squeeze....
Nuff, said... Poor Beast!
Anyway, great, great arc, keep 'em coming and be working on the next arc while you aren't too busy... <chuckle>
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My group just finished the Temple of Hextor portion Saturday and they seemed to enjoy it very much. They have been through the adventure straight through and had just obtained 4th level prior to decending into the Dark Cathedral (Area 1).
I ran into some problems and wanted to see if anyone else had the same problems or knew of a solution.
First was the differences in maps between Area 1 and the Temple of Hextor. In the first map, it depicts a 5' corridor leading to Area 2, but the second indicates a 10' corridor. This would not have been a big deal until the cultists (I used 9 of them for some odd reason) moved past Area 5 and released Beast. From its perspective, I figured Beast would move to the closest enemy (which just happened to be in that previously described 5' corridor). It had to squeeze to get there and that was a big mistake as the enlarged dwarven cleric/fighter made mince meat of it.
Another area of contention was the summarized tactics sidebar. It used totally different room numbers or room numbers that did not make sense to me. Was I looking at this cross-eyed or what?
Finally, in the arena (Area 11) it talks of Kendra's tactics was to cast Silence on a spellcaster and then cast Sound Burst on that same person. My question, does Sound Burst work within the area of effect of a Silence spell? My players would have had a fit if I had tried it..
With all the ranting overwith, I'll say great arc and keep up the good work. I know you all are human and humans err, but to forgive is not usually part of company policy... lol
Hurry up with the next arc so there will be no delay in great epic adventures! Here's a true Southern "Yee Ha!" to the entire Paizo staff.
F
First was the differences in maps between Area 1 and the Temple of Hextor. In the first map, it depicts a 5' corridor leading to Area 2, but the second indicates a 10' corridor. This would not have been a big deal until the cultists (I used 9 of them for some odd reason) moved past Area 5 and released Beast. From its perspective, I figured Beast would move to the closest enemy (which just happened to be in that previously described 5' corridor). It had to squeeze to get there and that was a big mistake as the enlarged dwarven cleric/fighter made mince meat of it.
Yeah I noticed the map discrepency and made the corridor 5' wide. But in your example the dwarf would have been squeezing as well.
Finally, in the arena (Area 11) it talks of Kendra's tactics was to cast Silence on a spellcaster and then cast Sound Burst on that same person. My question, does Sound Burst work within the area of effect of a Silence spell? My players would have had a fit if I had tried it..
You read that part wrong. In her tactics it says "she uses her scroll of sound burst and her scroll of silence". There is no order listed. But, sonic effects don't work in an area of silence and sound burst and silence counter each other. Or since silence is dismissable she could just drop it after a round or two, when the party has accounted for it, and then sound burst them.
My party got frightened off the first time they released the dire boar, they retreated to the top of the lift (seeing as how there is no mechanism to call it up or down) and rested up there, having used warp wood on the barrier into the mine proper.
Then they went back down and walked straight into an ambush by the entire temple (minus the skeletons with bells who got killed last time).
It was hanging in the balance until the druid got a charm animal off and persuaded Beast to switch sides...
My group did the following to solve the ''No Rest'' situation.
They assulted the Hextor temple and went on to assulting the Erythnul temple next, after killing a fair few grims, someone scouted ahead to ensure there would be no futher confrontations in the imediate to near future. They then baracaded themselves in the tunnel leading from the bridge area to the caves. This way they had rest and obviously a watch was set up. This gave them options, if something happened, they could retreat if needed. As for level's, my party are close to level 5 with only the vecna temple and aspect to go :) - They are doing very well.
My party chose the (as they quickly found out...) very defensible Temple of Hextor to rest in after they killed everyone aruond the area. The only thing that bothered them was Beast; they had killed all the cultists trying to get past them (monk+fighter+Qstaff=Cultist Limbo), and reinforced the door holding Beast in his pen, and he banged on the door all night long. The druid wanted to let him out so he could be freed into the wild, but the rest of the party thought that was a bad idea.
Each temple wing makes a great place to rest once they clear it out. The problem is clearing it out, but I think the fact this adventure is a meatgrinder is important; it makes the players think tactically against an intelligent opposing force, something they'll have to get used to. Plus, they're attacking an overwhelming force in a well-defended position with well-practiced tactics; it should be a meatgrinder! ;)
Wand of Cure Light - makes all the difference.
Each temple wing makes a great place to rest once they clear it out. The problem is clearing it out, but I think the fact this adventure is a meatgrinder is important; it makes the players think tactically against an intelligent opposing force, something they'll have to get used to. Plus, they're attacking an overwhelming force in a well-defended position with well-practiced tactics; it should be a meatgrinder! ;)
I completely agree. The party I'm running for attacked the temple of Hextor (well Bane, I'm using FR) first. Despite knowing that the temple was alerted to their presence, they kept pressing forward and were quickly funneled into the arena and promptly captured.
One of the players DM's a game I play in. He asked me about the EL of the encounter and what the author expected a party to do there. I explained that the temple was a well-organized, military installation, and I ran it as one. If the cultist's are alerted, they aren't going to sit around waiting to be smote one by one. If the party is trying to sneak in and strike down an evil cult and they're detected, rushing forward isn't going to help.Eventually he conceded that the uber EL makes sense, and he would have run it the same way. Hopefully they won't underestimate their opponents next time.
They 4 encounters went well for my players ( althought the 4 th lvl cleric with 10 hp, real bad rolls, did die at the hands of the FO). They had difficulties, but made it throught without death before the Vecna temple. The wand of CLW in the temple of Hextor helps alot too.
If your players don't rush in and flank, aid another, etc. they should go throught it.
But DMs be careful with the Web/Lightning Bolt/ players in a straight line combo...really nasty!
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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My group was defeated and lost two party members in their attempt to take the Temple of Hextor. They did a good job of keeping the temple from getting alerted in the first room by defeating the tieflings before they could get help/free Beast. They put an arcane lock on the battle temple door to prevent themselves from being flanked and continued moving forward.
The paladin was in the front of the group and made enough noise to alert the next room containing 3 tiefling guards. The guards weren't sure what to expect, so they all readied actions. Two of them prepared to drink their potion of Shield of Faith, one prepared to run and alert the rest of the temple. The party burst in, the tieflings realized they were facing hostile opponents and took their held actions. Things got nasty at this point because the tieflings used darkness and complete defense actions to create a bottleneck. This gave the clerics 5 rounds to cast their buff spells, gather their zombie minions and drink potions. By the time the PC's cut through the tieflings, all three clerics had 20+ AC's and substantial bonuses to hit and damage. The party couldn't push through the bottleneck. Eventually, they ran out of juice and began a retreat. The monk got hit with a hold person and was coup de gras'd and the paladin got hit with an attack of opportunity while retreating that took him down. The rest of the party had sufficient speed to beat a retreat and used arcane lock to slow down pursuit.
There were a lot of bad rolls in the encounter on the PC side. If they had been able to get past the tiefling bottleneck, they might have done better.
The Hextor temple was a near disaster for my party as well--the Beast took down 2 of 4 party members and took another down to 1 hp, so the rest of the combat at the entrance involved the cleric running from person to person with her wand of CLW just to keep soldiers in the field. I had decided ahead of time that while the Hextorians are militaristic and well-prepared, they aren't necessarily into wearing their plate armor day and night, so I had Theldrick and his two lieutenants start suiting up after the Tieflings spread the alarm. This kept them out of combat until the party had essentially finished off the minions in the entry hall.
As it was, the party had a chance to burn a few more CLWs and get back to full HP, but they proceeded to walk right into Theldrick's ambush. This also was a close call, and might have been a TPK if I'd played it differently. I had the half orc jump down to engage the party once he had buffed, with the aid of a summoned hell hound, while the Tieflings and the other clerics peppered them from above with arrows and spells. The party cleric (of Ehlonna) astutely used her Sun domain power to destroy the zombies instead of turning them, which helped, and the paladin managed to take down the half-orc, which helped, because I figured his wife would jump down and try to heal him, exposing herself to melee. As it was three party members (including the cleric) were unconscious at various points in the combat, and the fact that the party had two back up healers and a wand of CLW (plus an extra one that the enemy cleric was forced to drop) saved the day.
Yes, it's a meatgrinder, and only teamwork, tactics, and a bit of metagaming (i.e. "the last Dungeon adventure arc that we played was a killer--we'd better get a wand of CLW before we go down the hole!") gets you through it.
On a rather unrelated note, I added a kitchen and restrooms to the Hextor complex. They're not overly squeamish about sanitation, I'm sure, but being military they're not oblivious to it either. A small detail that players may or may not notice, but adds a bit of realism. I assume Theldrick doesn't spend all his time standing in plate armor, reading missives from GK and FO, but takes occasional meals, etc.
On a rather unrelated note, I added a kitchen and restrooms to the Hextor complex. They're not overly squeamish about sanitation, I'm sure, but being military they're not oblivious to it either. A small...
Good point. It's also those little details that last. I still remember the kitchen from the Hill Giant Fort from G1. Yum 'humanoid tenders' anyone?