Hey are those Fire Giants I see on the cover of the next dungeon with 'Kings of the Rift"?????
Or Firbolg or some other 'good' giant kin.
Hey are those Fire Giants I see on the cover of the next dungeon with 'Kings of the Rift"?????
Or Firbolg or some other 'good' giant kin.
You are about to be in for a gigantically happy time my friend...
Yeah for whatever reason my AP ended up being set in the lake of steam, with Ahnkapur as the Free city, Diamond Lake in the hills north of Ahnkapur along the rivers there.
I was going to make the great rift the cauldron of the ArnRock, which if the size of it on the map is any indication is just huge (although Empires of the Shining Seas has it as one mile across). Of course this fits in very well with Fire Giants, but really no one else.
Ahlaster I haven't decided on yet, I misread the change in Placement to be the city of Mintar, and not the Island of Mintarn (Which is right I think) and whooped it up over on Candlekeep and then realized my mistake which I then compounded by mutliple misreadings.
Anywho, Fire Giants means that using the Arn Rock is a reasonalble choice. Don't know what I would have done if they were Frost Giants!
You are about to be in for a gigantically happy time my friend...
I would expect nothing less from Greg "V for Violence" Vaughn given his track record, especially considering the massacre Istivin: City of Shadows turned out to be for our gaming group. :)
Sharpen your blades, folks. We got some giant huntin ahead of us.
Hey are those Fire Giants I see on the cover of the next dungeon with 'Kings of the Rift"?????
Or Firbolg or some other 'good' giant kin.
Got it yesterday in the mail.
Those are Fire Giants. There are tons of giants. Regular Hill Giants, Hill Giants with character classes, 4 big dragons (one is a CR 23), The Mother Worm (a colossal carrion crawler), Fire Giants with character classes, a Gargantuan Gelatinous Cube, a marilith demon, a Frost Giant, and a new monster called RAAM - basically huge undead giant that steels away Strength (the picture for it looks pretty evil) Probably a few things I missed, but I think I got most of it. Gives you idea of what awaits the characters.
Nice, I'm stoked about the Fire Giants. I have to say that so far the AP has been great.
Even after almost half a year, my party is still terrified of fire giants after the Living Greyhawk battle interactive where they acually had to fight that King Gerdi guy. A fire giant withsomehwere around 29 Lvls in fighter is kinda disturbing to everyone...
Lucky! I have to wait for like eight days!
*mutters* What a butt.
P.S. Do you guys live across the street from Paizo or something? How can you already have it?
I live in central Ohio.
Dragons and Giants and Demons OH MY!
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P.S. Do you guys live across the street from Paizo or something? How can you already have it?
And I live in the Grand Rapids, Michigan area. This issue arrived today (Wednesday the 15th), two weeks to the day after my previous issue. I'm spoiled... and haven't even finished the issue of "Dragon" that arrived earlier in the week!
I live in central Ohio.
Me too. I almost fell off my porch when I found it waiting for me after work. Normally it takes about a week to get here.
Me three. Where did Paizo get the gp for a teleportation device?
Those are Fire Giants. There are tons of giants. Regular Hill Giants, Hill Giants with character classes, 4 big dragons (one is a CR 23), The Mother Worm (a colossal carrion crawler), Fire Giants with character classes, a Gargantuan Gelatinous Cube, a marilith demon, a Frost Giant, and a new monster called RAAM - basically huge undead giant that steels away Strength (the picture for it looks pretty evil) Probably a few things I missed, but I think I got most of it. Gives you idea of what awaits the characters.
4 DRAGONS, ONE OF WHICH CR 23? I'm sure my players will try to kill each and every one of them. Dragonhunt is one of the most challenging and aesthetically satisfying of D&D combat experiences.
And they'll make it. Four 18th level characters can take down almost anything.In the PDF of Age of Worms, it is supposed that the party will not be able to defeat them (it is supposed thy won't even try), bu I know they will.
I hope there will be no problems for the XP deluge, then.
Wait 'til you see these dragons. The difference in power between the CR18 and the CR19 one is amazing. The 23 is off the charts. The raam does look pretty cool.
Creative Director
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4 DRAGONS, ONE OF WHICH CR 23? I'm sure my players will try to kill each and every one of them. Dragonhunt is one of the most challenging and aesthetically satisfying of D&D combat experiences.
And they'll make it. Four 18th level characters can take down almost anything.In the PDF of Age of Worms, it is supposed that the party will not be able to defeat them (it is supposed thy won't even try), bu I know they will.
I hope there will be no problems for the XP deluge, then.
That CR 23 dragon can't hold a candle to the boss, just so you know...
"Kings of the Rift" does not assume that the party will kill each and every one of the dragons in the adventure, although it's certainly possible. The adventure DOES assumet hat the PCs kill or defeat the four "main" dragons though.
I got mine today. Five days before normal.
Peace and smiles :)
j.
Haha! Victory! I also got mine early. Fun! So where did you get the teleportation circle? I haven't read it yet, so I can focus on my homework. Er... Its... working...
*ahem*
Back to french then.
HA! I live in Hawaii and my FLGS had #133 two whole days ago!
::Nick rubs it in with relish, as he sips a lava flow on the beach and enjoys perusing "Kings of the Rift" weeks before his mainland friends::
Great adventure Greg! Really dig on the giant NPCs and of course the very very sexy dragons! What a slaughter fest! Makes me guffaw at the poor saps facing these monstrosities! What I thought was really cool is how a smart/charismatic party could easily get a lot of these baddies to turn on each other. Very fun stuff! :-)
I, a humble aspect of a quasi-deity in comparison, praise the demi-gods of the AOW that are Richard, Nick, and Greg V (I'd make you lesser or intermediate gods but then you would be competing with James Jacobs and Co.). The last two adventures have been drool fests, and while I don't even have Greg's yet, I still know it's going to be great! Of course with all the big guns you guys have been putting into these adventures I fear that a major TPK is just around the corner if I ever get a chance to run them.
Spoiler alert
Some random comments after my first look-over of this adventure.
Yes, there is hope yet for the bard to shine in this well-crafted high-level adventure--but it does appear that whatever you do, your erstwhile giant allies have their own agendas, and will turn against you at the end.
And, to quote a certain cartoonish rogue, "Holy freaking crap!" It's the mother of all carrion crawlers.
Which brings on a few technical questions, if Greg and James haven't gotten sick of my nitpicks yet.
1. The colossal "mother worm" has grapple +64 and a maw the size of a boxcar door. Why no "swallow whole" special ability?
2. So, I take out my scroll of Mordenkainen's disjunction . . . Early on in the write-up, it is implied that there are other ways to get into the phylactery vault besides obtaining the keys and performing the ritual. Granted that the door is undoubtedly impossibly strong and the lock an epic quality one, but shouldn't there be some open door stats here: Unless it has hardness 25+ the top bigby's hand spell can batter it down eventually, although one supposes it was constructed to keep large strong creatures out. I'm sure some parties will try force, lock-picking, and magic (maybe even burning a wish) to get into this vault and avoid having to run the gauntlet back to the Carrion Pit to recover the missing key. So if the vault is completely theft proof, give us some stats so we can prove that to our players.
3. Boy, I didn't know handling a lich's phylactery was like handling plutonium! So, is there any safe way to handle Dragotha's phylactery? Will it affect the handler if carried in a bag of holding, for example? What about carrying it in a litter, or on a Tenser's floating disc, so that it doesn't physically contact the bearer?
4. I assume (based on the overload text) that the place where the PCs fight to save the day against Kyuss's army in Library of Lost Resort is just above Kongen-Thulnir on the rim of the Rift. It's not explicitly stated anywhere, though. This vision, or descriptions of the ruins available in Alhaster or Magepoint should be sufficient for a greater teleport to the site, but are there any larger-scale maps of the Rift that I could refer to, in case PCs end up going overland? Also, the description of Kongen-Thulnir places it on the northern rim of the Rift, but the map shows that the cliff-face there is facing west. Is it on a spur of the canyon wall that extends southward into the Rift? For those of us in the GH crowd, what is this site closest too, in terms of the sites around the Rift that show on the four-part poster map published in Dungeon last year?
Thanks much, and awesome adventure! P of B
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Creative Director
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My Answers:
1: The Mother Worm has no swallow whole ability mostly because she doesn't need it to be a menace, but partially because I'm a little tired of that ability and it's somewhat unrealistic treatment in D&D ("muscular action closes the hole?" Come on!). Not every enormous-sized monster in D&D has (or needs) swallow whole; dragons don't have it, for example. I rebuilt the Mother Worm's stat block using the kaiju template (Greg originally used the titanic creature template, I believe, which works but doesn't quite make the carrion crawler tough enough). There's certainly a "swallow whole" option for kaiju, but I instead opted for a ranged attack for the poor thing, since otherwise it's got nothing against flying and faster foes. You can certainly give it the swallow whole ability if you want, though!
2: The Vault Door: This kind of got the short-shift; we ran out of room and time to develop it properly. Feel free to let the PCs get to the contents of the vault using force, but said application of force shouldn't be anything that Brazzemal could have done on his own. If the PCs use something on the power of a wish or Mordenkainen's disjunction to get in, my advice is to let them. They'll miss out on some fun encounters in the Carrion Pit, and you might need to have them do a few other encounters to catch up on the XP they miss out on, but in the end, don't arbitrarilly say there's only one solution to any problem in D&D.
3: Dragotha's phylactery is not any old lich phylactery. It's something unique; it does things other phylacteries don't. But read the description closely: It only causes Wisdom damage when it contacts flesh. A good pair of gloves can protect you from peril when toting the phylactery around. Of course... you don't even need to touch it if you just want to smash it with a big hammer.
4: Kongen-Thulnir is indeed on the north face of the Rift, but it faces west. The scale of the big map of Greyhawk is too huge to show the crazy number of spur canyons and what-not that riddle the place. As far as I know, there's never been a detailed map of the Rift Canyon, althoguh "Into the Wormcrawl Fissure" will have one of the Wormcrawl itself. The site of the battle at the end of "Library of Last Resort" is actually well over a hundred miles west of Kongen-Thulnir; it's much closer to the Wormcrawl Fissure (althoguh it's not so close that it'll appear on the Wormcrawl Fissure map).
My Answers:
4: Kongen-Thulnir is indeed on the north face of the Rift, but it faces west. The scale of the big map of Greyhawk is too huge to show the crazy number of spur canyons and what-not that riddle the...
James, Thanks for the quick response. So the basic idea is that there are good descriptions of Kongen Thulnir in various sources available at Alhaster or Magepoint, and the PCs will probably use Greater Teleport to get themselves there--whether they can cast it themselves or pay someone to do it for them. I'll assume K-T is close to one of the Leering Keeps, toward the middle of the Rift, or perhaps a bit to the east end of it, on a spur canyon running north from the main canyon. Sounds good, and if PCs decide to go overland I'll just come up with some interesting Bandit Kingdoms type encounters for them.
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Creative Director
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James, Thanks for the quick response. So the basic idea is that there are good descriptions of Kongen Thulnir in various sources available at Alhaster or Magepoint, and the PCs will probably use Greater Teleport to get themselves there--whether they can cast it themselves or pay someone to do it for them. I'll assume K-T is close to one of the Leering Keeps, toward the middle of the Rift, or perhaps a bit to the east end of it, on a spur canyon running north from the main canyon. Sounds good, and if PCs decide to go overland I'll just come up with some interesting Bandit Kingdoms type encounters for them.
Yup. Or they could use shadow walk or wind walk to get there in only a few hours. Technically, they could even walk or ride there, since the dragon siege isn't scheduled to start until "just before the PCs arrive."
Ok I got mine yesterday and am wowwed. This set of adventures is going to hold up against the best of all time from D1-3, to Dl-1-12, etc..etc...
James, I'm assuming that you were trumpeting the map for the last adventure which details Zeech's palace. The two page map in 133 is great don't get me wrong, but its not like PCs are going to look at the Citadel and say: I want to curl up in here and sleep forever.
Also, about a month ago I drug the I6 Ravenloft module out of the dust just to look at the castle again. Its still fantastic after all this time, but I think you missed some of the great maps, If I remember properly the maps in the first dragonlance series were also top notch, like the dwarven stronghold in the cavern in DL-2 and the Knights of Solomania castle in Dragons of War, are also two classics. Unfortuneately I am going to have to e-bay them at some point because I traded all of my DL stuff off for Greyhawk stuff about 5 years ago.
Anyways at 18th level if your PCs don't all have free action up all the time they are just crazy.
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I've read a good deal of the adventure now, even in the midst of a crazy-hectic week. Wowza... and I thought the beasties of Last Resort were meanies.
The three-dimentional map is fantastic. What I'm struggling with is the connection points from one level to the next. I wish there had been room/time to include text that explicitly stated where every ladder and staircase leads to. It's been a flip-fest between the two-page map spread and room descriptions so far. Perhaps a key would be a nice community project for us "Age of Worms" forums-dwellers.
*SPOILER*
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One small thing: the descriptive text and artwork of the "Holy" Mother "Freakin'" Crawler hints that she's been slumbering under a blanket of fungal nastiness for a good, long while... years, perhaps. The key the heroes seek was tossed into this area relatively recently... within days. So, how did it end up in her tummy? I realize it's in her so that something as simple as mage hand can't be used to snatch it from an obvious spot in the room, but do like the idea of the PCs peeing themselves as they wake up something very, very nasty as they explore the room. Thoughs? Ideas? Explanations?
What's up? I live in the same city as Golbez57 and haven't gotten my mag. Why the preferred treatment? It's in Hawaii and Germany now, for Thor's sake!
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I rented one of those flashy-light-bulb arrow-signs from Sun Rentals, put it out on the lawn pointing at my mailbox, and put "Dungeon #133 goes here" on the sign's marquee.
I can't believe it worked!
(Actually, I'm in Jenison, which is in Ottawa County, if that makes a different between G.R./Kent County and mail distribution.)
spoiler alert
My Answers:
2: The Vault Door: This kind of got the short-shift; we ran out of room and time to develop it properly. Feel free to let the PCs get to the contents of the vault using force, but said application of force shouldn't be anything that Brazzemal could have done on his own. If the PCs use something on the power of a wish or Mordenkainen's disjunction to get in, my advice is to let them. They'll miss out on some fun encounters in the Carrion Pit, and you might need to have them do a few other encounters to catch up on the XP they miss out on, but in the end, don't arbitrarilly say there's only one solution to any problem in D&D.
Hmmm, what kinds of wards would need to be put in place to prevent someone from simply walking in? *makes knowledge arcana check*
I've decided the stone doors should be magically hardened to the hardness of adamantine. I've made them one foot thick, giving them the following stats: Hardness 20, HP 480 (immune to all piercing weapons and any slashing weapons not made of adamantine, 1 in 20 chance of breakage per attack with weapons, battering rams, etc.). The door fittings are strong enough to resist almost anything except the strongest beings (Break DC 40). The doors have been imbued with resistance 30 to all energy forms. They are also under a greater spell immunity effect (disintegrate, knock, polymorph any object) and have SR 37
The door can be opened by picking the locks, but for each key the party lacks they must make a DC 50 open lock check.
Tampering with the lock without performing the correct ritual or damaging the door in any way triggers a heightened sunburst effect (9th level, reflex DC 27) centered on the lock. The raam have been rendered immune to this trap with a permanent greater spell immunity (sunburst) cast upon them. The raam spring into action as soon as the trap has been triggered, attacking the offending party. (Search/Disable Device DC 34)
All magical effects are CL 25, and can be dispelled only with (greater) dispel magic (caster level check exceeding 35 for each individual effect) or a Mordenkainen's disjunction cast on the door, or a wish.
Both the doors and the chamber walls incorporate a thin layer of lead foil lining as part of their wards against divination, and thus cannot be pierced by passwall or phase door. The chamber can be breached by using transmute rock to mud, if the location of the chamber can be determined from outside the pinnacle in which it is housed, but that spell will not affect the worked stone doors.
My knowledge arcana check failed to turn up any wards to protect the chamber from a thief that can go ethereal. Can anyone help? Presumably the Order of the Storm didn't want the Phylactery to end up in the lair of an ethereal filcher, or to be snagged by a sorcerer who can ethereal jaunt in and out.
Otherwise, these wards don't make the chamber completely proof from penetration, but will require a very strong or magically powerful person to do so, and even then will slow them down considerably. I think, anyway. Can any of you clever, experienced tomb raiders out there see any obvious ways to walk in with a low-level spell or skill check?
I just got mine today here in Minneapolis, MN. It looks great so far.
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Wouldn't a permanent Forbiddance or a Dimension Lock effect keep ethereal and other dimension-hopping trespassers out? Dimension Lock would probably be the best option, as the Forbiddance could possibly put all kinds of requirements on the PC (alignment, race etc.).
Secondly, though I don't have the adventure yet (buhu!) and thus cannot gauge the thickness of the doors' supports, it should not be too hard to Disintegrate your way around them by vaporizing a tunnel through the stone next to them. It might possibly take four castings or so, but hey...
The only problem with the PCs getting through the door without the key or bypassing any of the 'get an object and then, blah blah blah quests' is that they don't get the expts for the monsters in that quest and later end up underpowered. Sometimes PC cleverness can go awry in unexpected ways.
Spoiler alert
Thanks for the suggestion on Dimensional Lock. I'll add that ward. I suppose I may have to proof the whole room from disintegrate, but alternatively, one could rule that disintegrating so much of the wall causes a partial cave-in, blocking the hole they just made.
I certainly won't encourage my PCs to bypass the key quest, and I think as long as I've dropped enough hints about the keys' existence and whereabouts, my particular party will probably take those hints and go find the keys rather than standing outside the door for three days trying to blast their way in with spells. But as James pointed out above, we shouldn't make it so there's only one possible solution to the problem, and if the PCs try something clever I want to have a good reason why it won't work, otherwise, I think they should be rewarded for their ingenuity. One can always have Brazzemal throw the whole dragon army and/or the remaining giants (i.e. the ones hiding in the palace) at them as they try to leave--that ought to make up some of the XP deficit. Also, if it's hard enough to enter the vault that they have to wait a day or two (to ascertain and prepare the right spells), whoever is left in the fortress will come try to root the PCs out and force them to leave, and get them to thinking that maybe it's easier to run the dragon gauntlet and retrieve the key from the Carrion Pit than to park in front of the door.
If necessary, I can play Vercinabex Tor, who is stationed conveniently nearby, a bit differently than written. If the PCs need some prompting, he might approach them with an offer of alliance to take the key from Kagro, then send them with a note to Charlgar telling him to bring back the other key. Since Charlgar did not share Vercinabex's concern of wanting to get the key back in order to find the "treasure" locked away in the Phylactery Vault, when V. told him to hide it where the Tiamikul could never find it, he fed it to the Mother of all Worms, and when V. sends the PCs to find it, he decides it's easier to kill them than to help them retrieve the key . . .
Wouldn't a permanent Forbiddance or a Dimension Lock effect keep ethereal and other dimension-hopping trespassers out? Dimension Lock would probably be the best option, as the Forbiddance could possibly put all kinds of requirements on the PC (alignment, race etc.).
Looking at the spell descriptions, dimensional lock is the more powerful spell of the two, but Forbiddance is more suitable, unless one modifies the Dimensional Lock to allow it to be shaped (instead of a 20' radius sphere) and so it can have Permanency cast on it. A heightened (8th level) forbiddance, keyed to TN alignment, with the effect dispelled when the ritual is performed, works quite nicely, I think.
Wards like you guys are talking about are fairly easy to accomplish with epic level magic, as well arointing certain spells like Disinitgrate, and there is every reason to think that the Order of The Storm would have had access to such powerfull spells. Making such wards for the purposes discussed here are on the low power end of the epic scale and would have been accessible.
Lost Empires of Faerun has specific rules on the cost and DCs to create such spells.