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This is a short journal from a beta test I ran of an adventure I am writing. The guys playing are not my regular players, but the players of one of my regular players. (My players ran the alpha test.)
I ran two sessions that went the complete adventure and noticed some things the players did that experienced players shouldn't do. So I decided to post this as an example why carrying SOP from one campaign to another without checking to make sure it applies first can be very dangerous.
I will make two posts as journal entries (each covering one of the play sessions) and then follow with some comments on what was happening "behind the scenes". I invite further comments from you, the readers, at that point. Thank you for your time.
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A Cautionary Tale
Dramatis Personae
Chu Li Wung - 2nd level human Wu Jin
Isaac - 2nd level gnome Bard
Nelrin Banefyre- 2nd level human Druid
Drascir - 2nd level human Barbarian
Ertan - 1st level Rogue/1st level Sorcerer halfling (currently hiding his spellcasting abilities)
Mister Z - 2nd level human Samurai
This group represents a random selection of adventurers who happened to be in a village on the frontier when the Sheriff needed some work done. They are from different areas of a multicultural kingdom to the south, hence the mixing of “western” and “oriental” classes.
Pre-Story
The sheriff of New Applegrove has recently had troubles with dire badger attacks north of the village. He sent his deputies and some of the local farmhands to go and track down the dire badgers and fix the problem, and fix it they did.
The posse tracked the dire badgers to their lair, smoked out the lair, and then killed the two adult badgers that came out. After use of the village’s meager supply of healing potions, the deputies went into the lair to finish the job. They found some badger cubs and dispatched them, but also found the remains of a gnoll the young had been feeding on. The deputies searched the gnolls body and brought back everything they found, including a message written in gnoll.
The sheriff had the scroll translated by a local sage and realized he had a problem. The message on the scroll was from a gnoll shaman to his chieftain. The shaman was secretly excavating some ruins near the village, looking for a relic that would “restore gnolls to their rightful dominance”, and was requesting the chieftain send more slaves to expand the digging. More slaves also meant more gnoll warriors in the forest near the village instead of two weeks away on the plains.
The sheriff could not send his posse out after the gnoll shaman and his warriors as that would leave the village defenseless against any other raiding parties in the woods to the north. However, there were some adventurers in town he could send with no problem…
The Story
Day One
The PCs were in town running various, separate errands and minding their own business when each was approached by the three sheriff’s deputies, relaying a request from the sheriff to meet in his office. It is strongly suggested through tone of voice, posture, and ready weapons that this is really more of a summons rather than a request. Reluctantly, each individual PC agrees to meet the sheriff at his office and heads there.
At the sheriff’s office, this group of six strangers is put in a side room to wait for the sheriff. Isaac, a very chatty gnome, starts the introductions and the adventurers had a few minutes to talk amongst themselves before the sheriff arrived.
When the sheriff arrived (following his large belly), he quickly explained the situation to the adventurers. He offered a small reward for the work, plus the adventurers may keep anything they find with the gnolls, except the relic, if the gnolls have found it. The relic is to be delivered to the sheriff so he can send it to the Count for proper disposal. After some clarification on the reward, the adventurers agree as a group to track down the gnoll shaman and his warriors and, in the sheriff’s words, “handle it.”
The sheriff leads the party of adventurers to the location of the dire badger lair and then leaves to let the adventurers “git to it.” The party of adventurers spends an hour searching the dire badger lair, verifying the sheriff’s story (including the very smelly and very decomposed body of the gnoll). Nelrin searches the ground looking for tracks and eventually finds the path of a dire badger dragging the gnoll body back to the lair.
With the sun setting, the adventurers decide to make camp and follow the trail in the morning. Mister Z made a camp fire while Nelrin pulled his possum animal companion out of his back pack, surprising most of the party who had not realized Nelrin had an animal companion. Nelrin sent the possum up a tree to keep a watch out and then turned in for the night. Nelrin was quickly followed to sleep by Chu Li, Isaac, and Ertan. With everyone else going to sleep, Drascir and Mister Z decided that keeping a watch fell to them. After a quick game of rock-paper-scissors, Drascir chose first watch and Mister Z took second watch.
Time passed as Drascir kept watch over his sleeping travel companions. The first sign of trouble he encountered was a giant spider web descending on him, wrapping him up tight. Looking up, Drascir finally saw the huge monstrous spider silently descending out of the trees to land next to him.
Drascir struggled mightily to free himself from the spider’s web, to no avail. The huge creature bit him, injecting its deadening venom into Drascir. Drascir felt the strength leave his body and knew he needed some help. Quietly, so as to not wake any of the other adventurers, Drascir called out hoarsely to Mister Z for assistance. With a loud snore, Mister Z rolled over and fell into a deeper slumber.
Seeing its prey continue to struggle, the spider attempted to inject more venom into Drascir, but was rebuffed by the barbarian’s armor. Realizing the spider would just keep gnawing on his head until it killed him, Drascir finally screamed out like a little girl, waking Isaac, Nelrin, and Mister Z, but not Chu Li or Ertan (for whom sleep was a serious matter).
The waking adventurers rallied to their companion's needs and (after Isaac sleepily threw an alchemist’s fire wildly into the trees) they started a wild and chaotic fight with the spider, eventually awaking the rest of the party. At the end of the fight, the huge monstrous spider was dead, Drascir and Mister Z were under the effect of the venom, and Ertan learned that hiding in shadows from creatures with tremorsense does not work the way he hoped it would. After healing the physical damage from the fight, the group went back to sleep. It was Mister Z’s watch now, so he stayed up, still feeling the spider’s poison in his veins.
Day Two
The next morning, the adventurers broke camp and started following the dire badger trail. Drascir and Mister Z were still very weak from the venom, but managed to keep up. After half a days tracking, the party found the site of the dire badger attack upon the gnoll. Time had passed and the signs were faint, but Nelrin was able to interpret what had happened. The gnoll had been traveling on foot at speed when the dire badger had ambushed him from surprise. The fight had been short, fierce, and one-sided. After a short discussion, the adventurers decided to follow the gnoll’s tracks back the way he had come and hopefully find the shaman at the other end.
At the end of the day, still following the tracks, the party of adventurers made camp once again. And once again, all but Drascir and Mister Z immediately went to sleep. On this night, the dwarf samurai and human barbarian decided to reverse watches, with Mister Z taking the first watch and Drascir taking the second.
Mister Z’s watch was passing calmly and quietly, until he noticed a raven sitting on a branch and watching him. Suspecting something was up but not knowing what, Mister Z kept an eye on the bird without giving any sign that he had noticed it watching. An hour passed with him watching the bird and the bird watching him. Another hour passed, the bird still watching him and he still watching the bird. Another hour passed, he watching the bird and the bird watching him.
Finally, it was the end of Mister Z’s watch and he was on edge. He quietly walked over to Drascir and woke the barbarian up. Without pointing at the raven, he explained the situation to Drascir. Suddenly the bird hopped off the branch it had been sitting on and flew over to another branch where it could better see what they were doing. Without a word, Mister Z quick drew his throwing hammer and, with a fluid movement, threw it straight at the raven. This apparently caught the raven off-guard and, with an explosion of black feathers, the hammer smacked the raven off the branch.
Ertan suddenly bolted right up to a sitting position, awake and feeling a terrible, profound, sense of loss. His first sight was Drascir and Mister Z standing on one side of the camp and looking at the other side. Drascir walked across the camp, past a broken tree branch, and into some tall grass. He picked up Mister Z’s throwing hammer from the tall grass, shook something off of it, turned back, and said, “You got it.”
Ertan let out a wail, realizing the “it” was his raven familiar. He had never told the other adventurers of his ability to cast arcane spells and had kept his raven flying high and out of sight. Ertan’s wail awakened the rest of the adventurers, who saw an enraged Halfling stalking up to a puzzled dwarf, the Halfling screaming about the “murder” of his familiar.
The adventurers intervened and, after a very tense conversation, the truth came out. It was agreed that Mister Z was not at fault as Ertan had not told anyone he was a spellcaster and had a familiar. Mister Z had been concerned that the raven was a spy of some sort and reacted accordingly. Further, it was agreed that Mister Z and Ertan would sleep on different sides of the camp from now on. Once everyone was finally calmed down, they all went back to sleep and Drascir stood his watch, making sure the party was safe from enemies and that Mister Z would wake up in the morning.
Day Three
The next morning, the adventurers broke camp early and continued to follow the trail, Mister Z and Drascir still sickly from the spider venom and somewhat tired from not getting a full night's sleep the last two nights. The day passed quietly until Nelrim lost the trail at dusk. After searching the area for a few minutes in the thickening gloom, Nelrin gave up and sent his possum animal companion up a very tall tree to look for signs.
While waiting for the possum to report, the adventurers heard the sound of immense wings up in the treetops. After some tense minutes, they heard the wings flap away, Nelrin wondering if he had just sent his friend to his death. A few moments later, the possum climbed back down the tree to a very relieved druid.
Nelrin cast speak with animals and questioned the possum about what it saw. It reported that it could only see the tree (due to bad vision), but a big owl had stopped by while he was at the top of the tree. Once he convinced the owl that he was not food, the possum and the owl talked. The owl reported that there were “dog-men” nearby in some ruins and some “small lizard people” much further away.
Relaying this to the rest of the adventurers, the group made plans. Ertan went out to scout and find the “dog-men”, undoubtedly the gnolls they sought. Away from the other adventurers, Ertan was like a shadow, moving quickly and quietly through the darkening forest. He quickly found the ruins the gnolls were making camp in from the sound of their carousing and the smell of the smoke from their camp fire.
Ertan observed the ruins, once a three story manor house made of stone. Half of the building was a pile of collapsed stone, but the other half still had standing walls and the sole entrance in. Ertan spotted two sentries walking the top of the walls, each making a thirty minute circuit of the ruins, about fifteen minute apart from each other. Lastly, Ertan scouted out a route he could take that would allow him to get to the walls of the ruins without being spotted by the sentries. He then returned to the adventuring party and reported all he had learned.
Believing the gnolls to have darkvision (from Isaac’s extensive education and collection of information) and having minimal amounts of that ability amongst themselves, the adventurers decided to attack in the daylight and made a cold camp. At this point, Drascir commented that he wished the spider venom would not make him so weak in the fight the next day. This surprised the rest of the adventurers (except Mister Z) who suddenly realized that the two main combatants of their group had not had a full night's sleep the entire time and had not recovered at all from the spider venom. Correcting their oversight, the adventures developed a watch schedule that allowed both Drascir and Mister Z a full night’s sleep.
Day Four
After a quiet night and with Mister Z and Drascir finally starting to recover from the spider venom, the adventurers moved closer to the gnoll camp as quietly as they could. Once within sight of the ruins, the entire group surveyed the ruins. They spotted two sentries walking the walls (a different two that Ertan saw the previous night), but the boisterous noise from inside was absent, indicating that the gnolls were probably asleep.
Ertan outlined his route to the walls for Drascir, who had some ability at moving quietly and scaling the walls of the ruins. The two of them would move forward, scale the walls, and take out the sentries. Then the rest of the group would move forward to the entrance and prepare to attack. Ertan would provide cover fire with his shortbow while Drascir would make his way down the inside once the attack started and flank the gnolls.
Putting the plan into action, Ertan and Drascir moved forward using cover to their advantage to hide from the sentries. They successfully made their way to the base of the ruins and started scaling the walls. Ertan successfully made his way to the top without making a sound. Drascir was not quite as lucky. Just as Drascir made a ledge along the outside top of the wall, one of the sentries was moving past and saw him. The sentry attacked Drascir, but missed seeing Ertan, who plunged his sword into the gnolls unprotected back, killing the gnoll sentry. Drascir then yanked the body over the top of the wall and threw it to the ground three stories below. Drascir and Ertan then hid, hoping to surprise the second sentry.
Unfortunately, rather than sticking his head over the top of the wall between the two adventurers, the second sentry leaned over the wall behind Drascir and saw both of them before they could react. The sentry howled out an alarm, awakening the gnoll camp and the fight was on!
Throwing subtlety to the wind, Drascir hopped the top of the wall and engaged the remaining sentry in hand-to-hand combat. Ertan hopped the wall, pulled his shortbow out, and started firing at the gnolls in the hollowed out ruins below. Meanwhile, the rest of the adventurers started the long run to the ruins from their place of cover.
After exchanging a few blows, Drascir was able to dispatch the remaining gnoll sentry. Ertan wounded some of the gnolls, but took several arrow shots in return for his trouble and had to drop and use one of his healing potions to stay alive. Drascir started to run his way around the top of the ruins, mis-stepped, and fell to the ground inside the ruins. The gnoll leader sic-ed two hyenas on the fallen barbarian while the he and the rest of the gnolls finally succeeded in making Ertan a Halfling pincushion. Ertan dropped unconscious and (luckily) out of sight of the gnoll archers, slowly bleeding to death.
The hyenas savaged the heavily wounded Drascir, nearly ending his life before the other adventurers arrived. Nelrin dragged Drascir back out of the ruins while Mister Z and a wooden stickman animated by Chu Li held the line in the entryway to the ruins. An epic fight between the adventurers and the gnoll warriors took place, gradually tipping in the adventurers favor due to Isaac’s regular use of a wand of healing to keep Mister Z alive and standing. Eventually the last gnoll warrior went down and the battle was over, the adventurers victorious!
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A Cautionary Tale
Session 2
Day Four, continued
After killing the gnolls and the hyenas, the adventurers searched the ruins. They found two human slaves that they freed, and they finally found Ertan, who had stabilized at the very cusp of death itself. After removing the five arrows stuck in him and applying the wand of healing, Ertan was back up and functioning.
Isaac questioned the two slaves, who insisted on referring to him as their new master. He in turn named them Steve and Harry (Harry is the quiet one). From the ex-slaves, the adventurers learned that the gnolls had found the relic they were looking for and the shaman and his bodyguards left with it the morning before. With the game afoot, the adventurers had Steve and Harry pack up all the food and valuables and follow them.
Once everything was packed, Nelrin searched for and found the shaman’s tracks. The entire group then gave chase, moving as quickly as they could, hoping to catch the shaman before he could reach The Narrows, the only place along 120 miles of river that can be safely forded. Beyond The Narrows lies the plains and gnoll territory.
Several hours into the chase, the party heard the sound of fighting nearby. Proceeding cautiously, the adventurers came upon a small open field with some standing stones at the far end and dead humans and goblins on the field. Fighting defensively with his back to the stones was a lone human warrior of some skill. He was being pressed on several sides by goblins and defending another human slumped to the ground behind him. While the adventurers decided whether or not to help, the human warrior spotted the adventurers and called for help.
This was enough for Drascir and Nelrin, who charged forward, their weapons at the ready. The goblins noticed and their leader ordered for several to attack what he thought were only two additional combatants. Then the rest of the adventures moved in and Chu Li casting a sleep spell from a scroll. The sleep spell knocked out some of the goblins and the rest fell in the quick combat that followed.
At the end of the combat the adventurers were victorious and had two goblin captives. The wounded human was healed using the wand of healing and turned out to be Leonide the Younger, the youngest son of the Baron of Orgoshch. The warrior was Grigori the Lion, his bodyguard. They were in the frontier lands scouting for a site to establish a new community. Their group had been attacked by superior numbers of goblins and they were very glad to be rescued. The adventurers explained they were in pursuit and could not escort the two of them back to New Applegrove, but they could share some supplies and provide directions.
Time was taken to swap gear around and provide directions to the two travelers. In order to keep them safe, Isaac ordered Steve and Harry to go back with Leonide and Grigori. They were not entirely happy, but accepted their lot. The goblin prisoners were handed over to Grigori for transport to the sheriff in New Applegrove. With that the two groups split.
Continuing their pursuit, the adventurers pressed on. As the sun started to touch the horizon, the adventurers once again heard the sound of mass combat. Ertan was sent to go investigate in case the fighting involved their quarry. Ertan found the scene of a mass battle between kobolds and goblins. The kobolds were organized and seemed to be beating the physically larger goblins. When Ertan returned and reported this, the group decided it was none of their business and continued the pursuit.
Rather than make camp when the sun set, the adventurers broke out sunrods and continued pushing ahead as long as they could. They eventually stopped and made camp, re-arranging their watch schedule again so Drascir and Mister Z would both get a full night’s sleep.
Day Five
Starting as soon as they could, the adventurers pressed on in their pursuit. Nelrin was certain they had made time on the gnoll shaman and his bodyguards and might catch up with them later this day.
At midday, the group was resting for a meal when Mister Z spotted something suspicious hanging from a rope in a tree. Moving closer, he discovered a were-rat suspended from the tree by one leg. The rope disappeared up in the tree and seemed to be part of a snare that had caught the were-rat. Mister Z and the were-rat started discussing the situation, the were-rat attempting to negotiate its release, but doing so badly. The were-rat also warned Mister Z that there was a pit directly under it and it would rather not drop into the pit, thank you very much.
Their curiosity piqued, the adventurers investigated the elaborate snare further. They eventually determined that the rope was attached to another tree several tens of yards away and never came down to the ground. Isaac climbed the tree to investigate and was nearly impaled by a spike trap set in the tree using one of its branches. Instead he fell out of the tree while avoiding the spikes. One use of the wand of healing later and he was back up in the tree.
After a long investigation, the adventurers determine that the best way to release the were-rat without dropping it into the pit was to attach a rope to the rope end the were-rat was attached to, pull this end down and away from the pit (effectively resetting the trap), and then cutting the rope at the anchor tree. This plan was put into effect with Isaac tied to the tension branch in the anchor tree, next to the rope tie-off. The rest of the party then threw a rope up to the were-rat, who tied it to the snare rope. The adventurers then pulled the rope (and the were-rat) down until he was much lower and no longer over the pit. At that point Isaac cut the rope.
At the were-rat end of the rope, everyone pulling, including the were-rat, forcefully fell into a pile with Chu Li at the bottom, cracking some of his ribs. At the other end, the tension branch whipped up and down with Isaac tied to it, bludgeoning Isaac into unconsciousness and nearly to death as his head repeatedly smacked into the branch.
A good deal of healing magic later, everyone was healthy again. The were-rat kept his word and left without using the wand of fireballs on the adventurers. The adventurers then returned to their chase of the shaman.
The adventurers achieved the river and The Narrows late in the afternoon. Just as the adventurers were starting to search the area to determine if they had beaten the shaman here, the shaman and his bodyguards burst through the underbrush at the other end of the shallows. The adventurers charged into combat while the shaman cast invisibility upon himself and Drascir raged.
In the ensuing fight, the gnoll bodyguards went down quickly and the adventures moved to cover the shallow part of the river, looking for disturbances in the water that would give away the location of the shaman. With spells and ranged weapons at the ready, the adventurers waited as the tense seconds ticked by.
Due to their choice of deployment, most of the adventurers were at one end of the stretch of shallows, with Isaac the only person covering the far end. The invisible gnoll had observed this and made his way around behind Isaac. The shaman attacked Isaac from behind, hoping to knock the gnome unconscious and then dart across the river. While he failed to kill or knock Isaac unconscious, the rest of the adventurers were too far away to stop the shaman from darting across the river and run for the hills. Drascir could have chased, but his rage ended and he was now too fatigued to keep up with the shaman. He tried to throw Isaac across the river and into the shaman, but was too weak from the spider venom to get Isaac more than halfway across the river. This was when everyone learned that Isaac could not swim, as he started to immediately drown in the four foot deep water.
Nelrin and Chu Li gamely gave chase to the shaman while the rest of the adventurers rescued Isaac from drowning. After nearly twenty minutes of running pell mell into the low hills, first Nelrin and then Chu Li ran out of steam and could not keep up with the gnoll shaman. They walked back to The Narrows, returning in defeat.
After taking a time to rest and catch their breath, the adventurers decided to give chase, hoping to catch the shaman and retrieve the relic before the shaman reached any gnoll encampments. They dropped everything they could afford to leave behind to lighten their load and moved out.
Two hours later, they finally caught up to the shaman in an area of low, undulating hills. Unfortunately, the shaman had met up with a patrol of 15 gnoll warriors. The gnolls were at the top of the next hill over, animatedly discussing something, while the adventurers were staying low just at the crest of their hill, discussing attack strategy.
For reasons known only to himself, Isaac decided to precipitate the conflict (and possibly distract the gnolls) by casting ghost sounds and imitating the sound of Mister Z running. Chu Li, recognizing the sound, immediately cast an images spell from a scroll and put an image on top of the sounds.
Unfortunately, neither had really been paying attention to where everyone was and their illusionary dwarf samurai appeared right next to Mister Z, their real dwarf samurai. This caught the attention of the gnolls, who immediately spotted the party of adventurers, and moved to attack - ten warriors charging forward with battle axes, five hanging back and getting out their short bows.
The adventurers formed their battle line and prepared to receive the gnoll charge. At least some of them did. Ertan charged forward to hide behind a boulder, trying to ambush a gnoll as it ran by him. Isaac stepped back down the backside of the ridge the adventurers were on and ran along it, apparently trying to get into position to flank the gnolls by himself. Nelrin cast summon nature’s ally I and dropped a wolf in front of the gnolls, killing one and delaying two others.
Chu Li, on the battle line, pulled his wand of magic missiles and shot one of the gnoll archers, unfortunately failing to kill him. Having an identified spellcaster to shoot at, all five gnoll archers fired at him. Four hit, one critically. Chu Li fell to the ground unconscious and bleeding to death just as the line of charging gnolls reached the adventurers.
The ensuing fight was brutal, the adventures out numbered two to one. Nelrin saw one of the gnolls give the downed Chu Li a deathblow, four gnolls attacking Drascir, two attacking Mister Z, and had no idea if Isaac or Ertan were still alive. He cast obscuring mist, covering Mister Z and Drascir to protect them from ranged combat and the gnolls attacking them. He then fled the battle, knowing that someone had to report back to the sheriff at New Applegate and warn people.
Shortly after Nelrin fled, Drascir went down under the assault of three of the gnolls (having killed one gnoll first). Issac went next when his flanking maneuver was spotted and the archers concentrated their fire on him. He suckered several into killing their own people first and made his way to Ertan with the wand of healing before falling unconscious from his wounds. One of the gnolls that killed Drascir finally caught up with Isaac and delivered a death blow. Mister Z killed the gnolls he had been facing and pushed forward to the boulder Ertan was hiding behind.
Ertan and Mister Z held out until the only gnolls left were the archers, but Ertan could not reliable get the wand of healing to work to heal their battle wounds. While they were trying, the remaining gnolls moved forward and attacked them from both sides, flanking them. First Mister Z fell to their relentless attack, and then finally Ertan.
Of the six adventurers hired by the sheriff of New Applegrove five days ago, only Nelrin Banefyre survived - in gnoll territory, out of spells, night falling, and being pursued by hunters with darkvision and ranged weapons.
TPK
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OK, let's talk about what went wrong.
First, setting up watches. The group has been playing together for years and worked out a routine - spell casters do not stand watch as they need 8 hours rest in order to relearn/pray/meditate for their spells. This leaves the fighter types to take watch.
This works if you have equal numbers of both or more fighter-types than spellcasters. This group didn't (2 fighters to 4 spellcasters), but they never stopped to think about that, they fell into their old habits.
So I threw the huge monstrous spider at them.
Now the spider was going to show up anyway, just later in the adventure. I just wanted to wake them up to their situation before things got too serious. Why the barbarian did not cry out for help immediately, I'll never know, but that's how it happened.
When they did the same thing the next night, I was rather surprised. I expected that they would let the barbarian and the samurai get enough sleep to start recovering from the venom, especially as the barabarian was down SIX points of strength. But no, business as usual - spellcasters sleep, fighters stand watch.
So I decided to mess around with them a little using the halfling's familiar. The raven came down to watch over his friend and, having darkvision, the dwarf noticed him. I pulled the dwarf player over to the side and worked the scene with him, piling up his paranoia, just to see what he'd do. For all he knew, the raven was a spy of some sort and could not be allowed to report back. So when the bird moved, he attacked it, critically hitting it for near max damage.
Now personally, if I'd been a player, I would have woken either the druid or the Wu Jin and asked them about the bird first. Either way, it was the halfling's fault for actively hiding the fact that he was a spellcaster and had a familiar. Did I have to set the scene up? Maybe not, but then again, this was a freshmen mistake on their part.
When it was finally brought to the group's attention that their main combatants were still weak from the spider venom, they finally put together watches that actually matched their situation and started to act instead of reacting. Their assault on the ruins went pretty well, barring a few touches of bad luck.
That's it for right now, but I'll discuss the next session later. If anyone else wants to comment, I'd be interested in hearing what you have to say.
Thank you all for your time.
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First, I am looking forward to your synopsis of the rest of the adventure.
Second, because of the entertainment value, I hope your players will make up new characters and continue on this adventure. I don't know about others, but I would like to see this story continue.
Third, I haven't played D&D since 2nd edition. I keep up collecting 3.0 & 3.5 edition books as fuel for my own imagination. From that I have a working knowledge of the system, but the best I can offer is a numberical analysis.
From you initial synopsis, it certainly appears that your normally good players made some mistakes that have weakend their effectiveness in succeeding encounters.
Beyond that, I can't comment at the moment other than to ask, how many gnolls were in the ruined manor house and had any of the characters leveled up during the length of the adventure.
Greg
OK, let's talk about what went wrong.
First, setting up watches. The group has been playing together for years and worked out a routine - spell casters do not stand watch as they need 8 hours rest in order to relearn/pray/meditate for their spells. This leaves the fighter types to take watch.
This works if you have equal numbers of both or more fighter-types than spellcasters. This group didn't (2 fighters to 4 spellcasters), but they never stopped to think about that, they fell into their old habits.
So I threw the huge monstrous spider at them.
Now the spider was going to show up anyway, just later in the adventure. I just wanted to wake them up to their situation before things got too serious. Why the barbarian did not cry out for help immediately, I'll never know, but that's how it happened.
When they did the same thing the next night, I was rather surprised. I expected that they would let the barbarian and the samurai get enough sleep to start recovering from the venom, especially as the barabarian was down SIX points of strength. But no, business as usual - spellcasters sleep, fighters stand watch.
So I decided to mess around with them a little using the halfling's familiar. The raven came down to watch over his friend and, having darkvision, the dwarf noticed him. I pulled the dwarf player over to the side and worked the scene with him, piling up his paranoia, just to see what he'd do. For all he knew, the raven was a spy of some sort and could not be allowed to report back. So when the bird moved, he attacked it, critically hitting it for near max damage.
Now personally, if I'd been a player, I would have woken either the druid or the Wu Jin and asked them about the bird first. Either way, it was the halfling's fault for actively hiding the fact that he was a spellcaster and had a familiar. Did I have to set the scene up? Maybe not, but then again, this was a freshmen mistake on their part.
When it was finally brought to the group's attention that their main...
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Sorry for the delay, things have gotten busy. I'll post the second half this weekend (hopefully tomorrow).
To answer the question, there were a total of 5 gnolls and two hyenas in the ruins. The fight was hard fought and it was the gnome bard's wand of cure light wounds that tipped the balance (plus a very helpful initiative order - Dwarf first, gnolls second, bard last).
As I was playtesting an adventure I've submitted to Paizo, all the characters were set at 1001 XP - just enough to put them at 2nd-level, which allows for enough variation in the characters to test the adventure. This would have made the loss of the familiar even more devestating as the halfling would have fallen back to 1st-level and lost all Sorcerer capabilities. This would have skewed my playtest too much, so I just applied a negative level to the character and let him keep his class abilities. Would they have leveled up during the adventure? Possibly. The adventure paid out 1125 XP before the gnoll patrol fight, and in a non-playtest situation, it would be likely that someone would have levelled up before the fight with the shaman at the river.
Having run this adventure twice now, I have a much better appreciation for gnolls and their capabilities. Those guys rock when you have a pack of them. Not so much by themselves.
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Cautionary Tale – Analysis of What Went Wrong
Session 2
After defeating the gnolls in the ruins, the players questioned the freed slaves about the gnolls and learned that the shaman had left the previous morning with his bodyguards. From that point on they were hot to chase the shaman.
They never asked what else the gnolls had dug up in their excavations.
The players had the freed slaves load up “everything useful” and headed out. Being a benevolent DM, I had Steve and Harry pack up the gnolls treasure as well. (Enh, sometimes I’m a softie.)
The chase part of the adventure went fairly well. The goblins were a minimal threat, but it left the PCs with a decision about whether or not to take even more NPCs with them. They decided to send all of the NPCs back to New Applegrove in order to keep them safe. Kudos to the players on this. Steve and Harry also took the gnoll’s treasure with them. This would be a pleasant surprise for the PCs when they returned to New Applegrove. As it turned out, I should have used “if”, not “when”.
Later in the chase, the group investigated the sounds of combat in case it involved their target. Seeing that it didn’t, they wisely skirted the battle. Again, kudos to the players.
The wererat on a rope could have gone better. The players had their characters running back and forth from where the wererat was hanging to where the rope was tied off. Their solution, while it worked, was not very elegant and nearly killed the gnome bard, the only character with healing capabilities (through his wand). If I had rolled a little higher or not applied half of it as nonlethal, it would have.
The fight with the shaman and his two 1st-level Ranger bodyguards was a mixed bag. The PCs cut down the bodyguards fairly quickly, but not before the shaman cast invisibility upon himself. Their deployment to cover the river and watch for signs that the shaman entered it was good in theory, but not in practice. They clumped at the downstream end, allowing the shaman to maneuver around to the upstream end. In the end, the shaman bolted across the river and ran with two PCs gamely giving chase.
My critique at this point may be a bit of hindsight. I think the barbarian was too eager to rage. The PCs outnumbered the gnolls 2-1 and had spellcasters in abundance to handle the shaman. As it turned out, the fight lasted longer than the barbarian’s rage and when they needed him to chase down the shaman, he was fatigued.
Now at this point, the adventure was over. The shaman got away with the relic, but all the PCs were alive and could head back to New Applegate and spread a warning about what happened. This way the sheriff could warn the Count and defenses could be prepared.
But that’s not what happened. They decided to chase the gnoll shaman carrying the gnoll artifact into the gnoll territories. So who am I to argue? Two hours later in game, and they catch up with him and a gnoll patrol. A large gnoll patrol that outnumbers the PCs 2-1. Faced with these odds, the players start discussing tactics. Well most of them do.
One of the players was apparently a little bored or ready to leave for the night and precipitated the fight before everyone else was done talking. Unfortunately, he did not ask for a map or clarification before he started casting. When his brother backed his play using a scroll, I had the battle mat rolled out and drew up the site of the battle. I then asked them to arrange themselves while I pulled out the 15 gnoll figures I needed. After they were done, I set up the gnolls.
Then I looked at how they had lined themselves up. You can read what happened above.
So the final fight took place with no plan on the PCs part, all the spellcasters short on spells, and no one really ready for it yet. Despite that, the PCs still almost won – it would have been with heavy losses, but still a win. If they had had a plan, they would have definitely defeated the gnolls. And therein lies the danger of the impatient player.
Now the gnolls have their artifact and no one back in “civilization” knows what has happened or if there will be trouble. The next adventure I write will follow up on this.
And Steve and Harry? They made out with enough treasure to set themselves up a shop in New Applegrove – Harry the Silent was once a journeyman weaponsmith before being captured by the gnolls. With the talk of war with the gnolls, he should do well.
Chu Li Wung - 2nd level human Wu Jin
Cuz I'm CHU LIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII, CHU LI in looooooove with you girl.
(ahem)
Sorry.
What, no Lionel Ritchie fans up in here?
Hmm...
First thing I'd say is the smoking out the dire badgers thing actually sounded like a lot of fun. I guess if I had my way I think it would have been fun to send the PCs in there in the first place, deputized by the sheriff themselves, rather than having that all be prehistory and the characters bullied into involvement later somewhat against their will and with little promise of reward. Rather it might have been fun if they found a chewed up something in the offal filled cave after having killed a bunch of squalling blind maggoty baby dire badgers--took a closer look and found the note nearby. Then it'd be they who discovered the gnoll danger and hence might have more feeling of wanting to see it through.
My second thought is that perhaps there was a bit too much track and camp. The feel seemed to be that the characters were always ten jumps behind the game. This would get me into a rush too probably if I was one of your characters. I probably would have let the humans fend for themselves against the goblins, would have left the goblins and kobalds to it, and probably would have douced the wererat with alchemist's fire just to avoid having to waste time dealing with him. No doubt the characters were not in deep think mode. They were in furious flight mode, and all the hassles they faced every time they camped probably weren't helping. Dramatic tension is good, but can turn to panic if squeezed too hard. It's a shame when interesting things are afoot, but the players feel like they're wasting precious moments to take time and handle them because they have to rush headlong or fail the mission.
I thought the battle at the ruin had a nice feel to it. I like the fact that the characters were able to concoct a pretty solid attack plan. That healing wand could not be more valuable to the group though if it were made of solid diamond. They got hashed! A bit harsh too, thinking it really all came apart because the gnoll was standing in the wrong spot. I've often felt that when the momentum of a plan is going so nicely and it'd just take a little tip to nudge things into clockwork brilliance or abject awfulness, I oft like to tip toward the brilliance end just as a benny to reward clever planning.
Overall I'd say the story was an interesting one. I'm certainly curious what the artifact was all about, and what plans were in place to see the gnolls ascend to power and I like that it started with something as innocuous as a bid to clear out a den of giant vermin. I'd have liked if the characters hadn't been so bullied into it--if they'd had more of a stake in things. It also felt a titch as though you were DMing against the characters, tailoring events to their weaknesses, having NPCs act in ways that were clever thinking on their part but harmful to the flow of the story at times.
Even in the finale, when the characters planned to distract the gnolls by using illusion to make them expect an attack from a different direction, it would have been more polite to assume they didn't mean to cast their illusion right where they were standing (even if that's what it sounded like they were doing) especially considering that even with a good distraction they were pretty well taxed to pull off a win.
Let me know what you think. I don't mean to be harsh at all. Its by analysing the PC wipeout games that we can tinker out solutions.
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First, thank you for your commentary. I very much appreciate your objective commentary and do not feel you are being harsh at all.
I was designing this particular adventure for publication and trying to keep it close to 4 hours in length (or a single play session). The original version had the PCs hired to track down what was killing the villagers and finding the half-eaten gnoll in the badger lair along with the note. The design issue I had was that this took a couple of hours of game time to get to the actual adventure and so I cut it to speed up the timeline. In retrospect, I think you are correct that it would have been a stronger hook to have them find the gnawed gnoll.
As to the pacing of the tracking part, I was aiming for a sense of increasing pace and urgency - things I enjoy as a player. Therefore, I probably should not have been surprised that the players wanted to give chase at the end. I think what did surprise me that they did not take more time to prepare at the end.
I will freely admit that the giant spider attack was me poking them with a stick. This group was the second group to playtest this adventure and the first group made a pincushion out of the spider before it got more than one attack in. I was trying to point out that they were in the wilderness and it was unsafe. Why the barbarian on guard did not scream out loud to wake everyone else is beyond me. If he had, that fight would have gone very differently and the group would not have been weakened as much.
The battle at the ruin was my favorite part. Both times the setting was the same and both times the PC groups came up with good plans for the assault. The first group sent thier Rogue in to scatter caltrops and oil on the ground in front of the entrance to the ruins. She then climbed to the roof to snipe the guards. The rest of the group set up a shield wall and then started yelling insults in orcish at the gnolls. The Rouge exchanged arrows with the sentries, killing them but taking significant damage. The gnolls charged out to attack the PCs on the ground and ran onto the caltrops. When the gnolls slowed down to avoid the damage, the PCs lit up the oil and barbaqued them.
The second group (the one were're actually discussing) also had a good plan, they just suffered a bit of bad luck in the execution. I think if the guys on the roof had stayed in cover and sniped at the gnolls in the ruins while the rest of the group moved up as a unit, it would have been tipped in the PCs favor.
I agree entirely about the wand of light healing. After running this playtest, it moved up to the top of the list of must-acquire magic items, right next to the Handy Haversack.
I do not feel I was DM-ing to the PCs weaknesses, it just turned out that way. I think part of that was due the the play style of the players. The whole "all the spellcasters sleep and the fights watch" routine was definitely a habit from their regular game.
I will admit I was pushing the toughness scale fairly high to verify that the adventure was playable by the target level of the PCs. I have concerns about the EL-system and wanted to verify that even pushed hard, 2nd and 3rd-level characters could make it through this adventure without getting killed or facing a cake-walk. If I had been running this for my regular group, I would have made allowances for the illusion in the final fight. It would have spread out the gnolls to cover the additional "target", but I'm not convinced that it would have entirely made up for starting the fight without a plan. I may be wrong.
I have a better appreciation for gnolls now and find Adept levels to be completely worthless for bad-guy NPCs. Well, maybe for "main villain" NPCs at least - no attack spells and mostly support spells makes a main villain much too weak. Wu Jin on the other hand, seem a trifle strong, especially compared to a Druid of the same level.
I have started writing the next adventure for this setting (and will be asking for some input on the General D&D forum once I have my notes typed up). Of the two playtest outcomes, I think I'm going to keep the nigh-TPK version (as described above). I think it will provide more interesting dramatic tension to the backstory and set the gnolls up to be respected.
I think I'm losing focus in my responce, so I'll stop now. I am interested in comments on my response. And I promise to respond quicker.
What, no Lionel Ritchie fans up in here?
No.