I'm runing AoW in Eberron; I modified the temple to be Blood of the Vol (Hextor), The Shadow (Vecna), and The Keeper (the other one). For the Keeper, I used irvhir kobolds in replacement of the grimlocks---their dark living creatures who love traps.
So far, its been great! My players, veteran D&D players, when the finally realize they are facing kobolds, got all smug. Then, the best part---the battle against the kennel master:
Player: "I hit the kobold. Yup, its dead."
Me: "How much damage?"
Player (looking funny): "13 points"
Me (making notes): "It looks wounded, spits at you, and keeps fighting."
Players: "WHAT?!?"
The players dropped it to -1, not realizing it was only at -1, then cast cure minor wounds to stablize it. It staggered awake, drank its cure light potion (suriving the AoO), and keep fighting! :)
The look on their faces when they faught the kobold female barbarian (weilding kurki's) was great as well. Can't wait 'til they see the rest of my changes (evil grin).
Morale of the story---Kobolds are just cannon fodder anymore! :)
Any similar intersting/unexpected changes?
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Grimlocks don't do much for me either.
Since my campaign has eight players, I am considering using tannaruks. However, kobolds are not a bad idea either. (I certainly have plenty of D&D minis.)
My players have run into groups of fiendishly clever, devious, and quite lethal kobolds in the past, so they would probably approach them with a little more respect than other parties might.
Does anyone else remember "Tucker's kobolds?"
Since there's a lizardfolk druid in my group, I'm beefing up the Blackwall Keep module. I'm adding draconic lizardfolk to the Twisted Branch tribe. They're the supperior "upper class" of that tribe, treating the original members like slaves. The PC lizardfolk fled as a child when Ilthane and her draconic lizardmen took over. His return to his tribe could be interesting.
I definitely add levels to my monsters all the time. If those grimlocks seem weak, beef'em up! Don't hestitate. I've never used grimlocks before, so I'm excited to run that branch of the module as is. I've also never used kenku before, so that will be a new experience as well.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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That's an awsome story. I love when players get beat down by kobolds.
In my thieves guild campaign, I had a tribe of kobolds in town that worked with a rival faction of the guild. Unlike the typical kobolds, the dragon blood in their veins manifested as monk abilities. Thus, the leveled kobolds were monks rather than sorcerers.
The players encountered a halfling and three kobolds in an alley. Figuring the halfing was the threat and the kobolds were negligble, one player provoked three attacks of opportunity moving through the kobolds' threat zones.
Technically, he never made it into the third attack. After the first two, he was at negative hp.
Does anyone else remember "Tucker's kobolds?"
Yup... Can't remember which Dragon magazine though... It think it was Roger E. Moore's tenure.
To my Dragon archive CD's!
YOINK!
Consider this idea stolen. I too am running an Eberron based game and one of my players is a Kobold (The ones born of Eberron's blood - sorry, I cannot remember their name). Considering the hatred between the two groups, it will make for an interesting set of encounters.
YOINK!
Consider this idea stolen. I too am running an Eberron based game and one of my players is a Kobold (The ones born of Eberron's blood - sorry, I cannot remember their name). Considering the hatred between the two groups, it will make for an interesting set of encounters.
Glad to hear. Yup, an encounter between iredar and irvhir kobolds could be fun.
Currently in the process of redesigning the Vecna/The Shadow temple. Going to use outcast/maddened 'forged who seek the secret to undeath (told you they were mad!) Fortunately for them, they are immune to most of the old temple's defenses (living spells with the right combination of effects). Gonna be fun!
IMC I kept the grimlocks.
The Eberron twist is their relationship with the Keeper. They don't worship the Keeper; Grallak Kur worships the demon overlords from the Age of Demons. He is a minion of the Lords of Dust and given his current position for his crusade against the minions of the daelkyr (which included the slaying of a beholder). He has no formal ties with any of the rakshasas. He was given a dream and told to seek out the Faceless One.
Grallak presented himself to the Faceless One and said he was a worshipper of Katashka. The Faceless One has no knowledge of Katashka, but like most followers of the Sovereign Host and the Dark Six, he believed this grimlock's "god" was simply an aspect of one of the Six. He presented all of the weapon of the Six to Grallak, and Grallak chose the one from his vision: a scythe. The Faceless One saw this as a sign that Grallak was a worshipper of the Keeper, thus securing his trust in the grimlock.
IMC the grimlocks kicked butt. Grallak took on the party cleric with obscuring mist. This has no effect on blindsight, giving his now scythe-wielding minions the upper hand. All it takes is one lucky crit from the x4 scyth to take down any PC at that level. The cleric stabilized and to this day is trying to get heavy fortification on his armor.
That is the one thing you loose with the kobold version---no blindsense. Darkvision works pretty well as a replacement for module.
That is the one thing you loose with the kobold version---no blindsense. Darkvision works pretty well as a replacement for module.
Since this module is an intentional meatgrinder, I would change the entire grimlock-turned-kobold area. Check out the archetypcal locations section of the DMG 2 on restrictive tunnels. Make every area low for medium creatures and every path low and narrow. In a few places make the paths crawl navigable only for medium creatures but only low for small creatures.
I have a huge fetish for kobolds, which I sometimes forget to make obvious when playing with a new group of gamers. One of the first sessions I was in with our current GM we came accross a pack of about half a dozen kobolds fighting a bugbear shaman. The DM opened the sceen with a vivid description of one of the kobolds being pounded to mush by the bugbear (who I eventualy found out to be a druid), which sent me into an immediate rage. Blasting the bugbear with the most powerful spell I had at the time, I then started casting buffs and moving up to engage in melee and seek some revenge for my little scaled budy. This utterly baffled the DM, who decided the bugbear druid would cast entangle on me and the rest of the party, which I was the only one to fail my saves and strength checks. After some quick explaining the rest of the party sided with the bugbear and wiped out the remaining kobolds, then restrained me further so we could get some plot lines furthered by talking to the bugbear. I spent the rest of the campaign trying to kill the party members in their sleep.
I realy like the kobold rather than grimlock idea, though I've never used grimlocks and was looking forward to trying them out. Not sure what I'll do. Blackwall keep will however be assaulted by not only lizardfolk, but black skull lizard folk (not sure if that's what their realy called, but it's the size large lizardfolk from MM3). And there will probably be a kobold ranger handling the dire weasles in Vecna's maze.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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IMC the grimlocks kicked butt. Grallak took on the party cleric with obscuring mist. This has no effect on blindsight, giving his now scythe-wielding minions the upper hand. All it takes is one lucky crit from the x4 scyth to take down any PC at that level. The cleric stabilized and to this day is trying to get heavy fortification on his armor.
Oh yeah. I was shocked that obscuring mist was not in Grallak Kur's spell list. I slotted it in and ruined my players' day. GK cast the spell from atop his bluff. He hit the rogue scout w/hold person and then the front line fighter on the next round. Both failed their saves, were promptly grappled, and dragged into the mist. One of them came to in time, but the other suffered a coup de gras.
The characters finally got rid of the mist by using a wand of summon monster I to repeatedly call up an air elemental and have it use its whirlwind ability.
