
Alleyne |
G'day,
We have just started the SCHC and upon reading about Jzadirune I found a problem with the doors. Bear in mind I may have missed some information somewere.
The gear doors work with a key to open and close.
I was trying to work out if you need a key on the inside of a room to work the door (so if the PC's crawl into J15 is that as far as they can go)?
Iam not sure were the Skulks and Dark Creepers originally entered the enclave from (I have not read all the locations yet), but it looks to me like they cannot open the doors from inside rooms.
I assume that somewere inside the PC's can start finding keys?
Do any GM's have any other advise on running this location, as Iam new to D&D.
Thanks in Advance Allan

Christopher Parkins |

What I did was improvize... I had some lack wits figure if its to hard then why bother... I think it was designed that a first level rogue would not be able bypass the doors as how the open locks DC is to high even if you were to take twenty, your party should be able to find a key then that one will let them find the next... hope this helped
Chryz

Lord Foul |

When we played through this we took detailed maps of the area. We marked the doors with what ever letter was on them so that we would know what key to try latter on. This made the adventure move slow due to all of the back tracking to open doors as we found keys but I am one of those players (and DM's) that hates to leave a door unopened. Also I do not believe that we found any doors that we could not open that way.
Foul out.

ultrazen |
You don't have to open any of the gear doors to complete the mission; you can use secret doors and pulverizer tunnels to get to all the major areas, though not every single room. It's possible for a first level rogue to open the doors, but skill focus and/or masterwork tools will be required. The traps are the tricky part, and the divination riddle the PCs can get from Jenya warns of this, though it may not be obvious until two or three doors are encountered.
I don't recall any mention of a lock inside the rooms; just decide yes or no depending on how hard you want to be on your players, then be consistent. I do recall that there was a key for each room. Make notes of key locations before the game as you prepare, or just place them yourself wherever you think appropriate.
The only other real consideration is the size of the place. It's so large. I ended up ignoring a few areas and instead placed stone walls (from Stone Shape) that sealed a couple of smaller exits from the complex. You may also want to come up with a reason why the main entrance to this huge magical enclave came to be under the stairs of a locksmith.

Sean Mahoney |

There are keys you can find for each and every door in Jzadirune, so you don't need to feel too bad for players who can't get in. My players are actively avoiding them after setting off the second trap (even the ones they now have the key for). I think it is just to long a dungeon crawl for them and they would rather get back to a good story. So, I dropped some hints from NPCs as to which quadrant the elevator down to the Malachite hold is in. (To this end I will probably run a substitute adventure from Dungeon for them to get levels on instead of Drakthar's Way as it is another Dungeon Crawl... Maybe Mad God's Key or Thirds of Vellum).
As for their being a key hole on both sides, I assumed so. If you think of it they would have either had to open with no key from the inside or have a key hole there. Otherwise they would just be cells. I want them to remain a blockage for the PCs so they are that much more rewarding when they open it.
As another poster mentioned, they don't need to go through any doors to reach their goal, so I don't feel bad for them not getting through them. The two guys on the team who don't want to leave a single stone unturned are going nuts though.
Sean Mahoney