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My PCs are at level 9 and inside the Vivified Labyrinth.
This is my first try at GMing past 8th level (and that was a one-shot), and I'm WAY outside of my comfort zone. So when a PC stumbled on a Symbol of Insanity and tanked his save, I was surprised to read that he would "Permanently go Insane" and it'll be a while before there's magic of appropriate power to restore his mind.
Suddenly I was at a loss. Strictly speaking every six seconds he'd have to roll to see what he'd likely do. The wizard asked if Dominate Person over-rides insanity. Looking at the descriptions of the spells, I said it did, but only if he was under instruction.
So I have one player enslaved to another, on pain of being left to his own insane devices (he tried to choke himself to death with a rope).
Later they discovered Vimanda's true identity, (when one PC 'ported into the room with the REAL Vencarlo). The fight that ensued was insane (she was tearing the party Monk to shreds!) The monk came up with the clever idea of bullrushing her into a portal. So she's somewhere else in the Vivified labyrinth.
Finally, a Question:
How are the PCs supposed to find the second level of the Vivified Labyrinth?
My PCs are at level 9 and inside the Vivified Labyrinth.
This is my first try at GMing past 8th level (and that was a one-shot), and I'm WAY outside of my comfort zone. So when a PC stumbled on a Symbol of Insanity and tanked his save, I was surprised to read that he would "Permanently go Insane" and it'll be a while before there's magic of appropriate power to restore his mind.
Suddenly I was at a loss. Strictly speaking every six seconds he'd have to roll to see what he'd likely do. The wizard asked if Dominate Person over-rides insanity. Looking at the descriptions of the spells, I said it did, but only if he was under instruction.
So I have one player enslaved to another, on pain of being left to his own insane devices (he tried to choke himself to death with a rope).
Later they discovered Vimanda's true identity, (when one PC 'ported into the room with the REAL Vencarlo). The fight that ensued was insane (she was tearing the party Monk to shreds!) The monk came up with the clever idea of bullrushing her into a portal. So she's somewhere else in the Vivified labyrinth.
Finally, a Question:
How are the PCs supposed to find the second level of the Vivified Labyrinth?
Vencarlo knows where the second level of the Vivified Labyrinth is since he's been there. "If the PCs haven’t already rescued xyz from area qwp, Vencarlo suggests this should be their first
priority. Having spent some time himself in the abc, Vencarlo can show the PCs where jkl etc the entrance to the
lower level." Pg. 56, just above his stat block.
And there are permanent effects in the game starting at 3rd level. Blindness/deafness is permanent. Death is permanent. If the party doesn't run across the fountain, (like they leave Vencarlo unconcious or like beat him until he's dead I have no clue players are stupid) heal would only costs 660gp to cast from, say, the Temple of Abadar, and the party has a good reputation with them after 7DttG. You have a wizard-- the Temple of Abadar's a dimension door up and onto the streets of Korvosa, a dimension door across the Narrows and a run to the temple and then a single teleport back.
Don't be discouraged by high level play. 9th level isn't even near high level, and for most groups it just begins to open up more and more opportunities. For DMs, you can honestly go full bore on your PCs now without having to worry about them falling over dead after a lucky critical-- since if you have a cleric in the party, the cleric can just resurrect them for 5000gp! It gets crazy from here.
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No Cleric in the party, but a pretty crazy druid is.
After we wrap up Escape from Old Korvosa I'm going to take a hiatus, and read over more of the high level spells. Before now I've pretty much been able to run things without stopping to refer to the books (I'm VERY well versed with low-mid level play). Tonight was the first time I'd have to stop to pull up the rules practically every room (damn symbols).
Also did anyone else have problems with mapping the Vivified Labyrinth. I run my game in a Lecture Theater so I had to mentally rotate things in my head (managed to screw up only once, so I had the PCs skip the wasp trap. They've been lucking out in not finding the Dark Sphinx yet.
I'll have to remember E5.
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No Cleric in the party, but a pretty crazy druid is.
After we wrap up Escape from Old Korvosa I'm going to take a hiatus, and read over more of the high level spells. Before now I've pretty much been able to run things without stopping to refer to the books (I'm VERY well versed with low-mid level play). Tonight was the first time I'd have to stop to pull up the rules practically every room (damn symbols).
Also did anyone else have problems with mapping the Vivified Labyrinth. I run my game in a Lecture Theater so I had to mentally rotate things in my head (managed to screw up only once, so I had the PCs skip the wasp trap. They've been lucking out in not finding the Dark Sphinx yet.
I'll have to remember E5.
I built mine using Gaming Paper, poster board and foam-core poster board. I could probably put a picture up later if people want.
Graywulfe
I built mine using Gaming Paper, poster board and foam-core poster board. I could probably put a picture up later if people want.
Graywulfe
That'd be really nice. I already am terrified of how I will handle the rotating stuff.
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Easiest way to do the spinning rooms:
Draw the map all the way out (I use 1" gridded easel pads).
The 4 spinners, draw on different paper and cut out the circle.
Glue to a paper plate (or poster board) and pin through the center with folding paper hole fasteners.
Put an arrow showing direction of travel, and spin as needed.
I did 2 things for the rotating rooms.
1) Each room of the maze was cut out individually and taped down as the PCs explored it. This made it easy to rotate the spinning rooms.
2) I made a series of 4 cheat-sheets for myself to track the positions of all the spinning rooms, as well as the NPCs that move around.
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No Cleric in the party, but a pretty crazy druid is.
After we wrap up Escape from Old Korvosa I'm going to take a hiatus, and read over more of the high level spells. Before now I've pretty much been able to run things without stopping to refer to the books (I'm VERY well versed with low-mid level play). Tonight was the first time I'd have to stop to pull up the rules practically every room (damn symbols).
Also did anyone else have problems with mapping the Vivified Labyrinth. I run my game in a Lecture Theater so I had to mentally rotate things in my head (managed to screw up only once, so I had the PCs skip the wasp trap. They've been lucking out in not finding the Dark Sphinx yet.
I'll have to remember E5.
I built mine using Gaming Paper, poster board and foam-core poster board. I could probably put a picture up later if people want.
Graywulfe
My map has suffered a minor technical malfunction and need and needs to be fixed before I put up pictures of it. The spinners curled because of the humidity of the basement where I had it stored.
My party triggered the Symbol of Insanity as well. It wasn't pretty.
The PC Rogue/Duelist is an excellant trapfinder. Half-elf with skill focus in perception, racial bonus, and the trap sense ability from the rogue class which gives her a free perception check whenever shes within 10ft of a trap. And her player is very diligent about searching for everything, so she finds them all.
Anyhow, she had searched the first 'handle' in the labyrinth and found no trap. They pulled it and discovered the rotating aspect (and had also been informed of such by Glorio). This naturally led to the next room that contained the lever with the Symbol of Insanity.
Now when prepping the labyrinth, I had noticed this particular symbol, and realized that it would be very difficult to deal with if triggered, since they'd need a Heal spell (or limited wish, wish, or miracle) to remove any insanity effect, and they aren't high enough level for that. I also pre-rolled the Rogues search checks for all the traps, and she didn't see this one with her free check.
So she gets to the second level, and just naturally grabs it, thinking that since the other one was harmless then this one would be too. Wrong. The runes lit up and half the party went insane. The half that carries big swords and swings them really hard. I wasn't sure what to do at this point, as it was getting to close to the PCs killing each other due to the confusion effect.
Well the PCs basically headed straight towards Vimanda/Vencarlo, and bumped into her about 5 rounds after going insane. She realized what was going on. So I had her help them out a bit, and she led them to the control room that had the teleportation globes, and teleported them to Room 5 that has the healing fountain. You drink from the fountain, you get a heal spell! So that cured the insanity.
So remember that fountain, its the only thing that gives quick access to curing the insanity.
Plus its very nice when they find the very similar looking fountain and rush to take a drink :)
******
On dealing with the rotating labyrinth. I photoshopped the map in the book and made 4 separate images, each showing a different configuration of the labyrinth. The labyrinth only has 4 possible set ups, and they go in order, so I just labelled the printouts and rotated them depending on the current configuration. I'll post the images on my webpage tomorrow if any one wants to use them.
With large maps I like to copy the map from the pdf file, blow it up to 1' squares, and then print it out, often room by room. Then I glue the individual room printouts onto poster board, and I have little individual maps the right size for miniatures. This way, when they are exploring a dungeon or what not, I can have their miniatures on the current room they are in, and I can take off the rooms they have already been to. I think this gives a better feel for many dungeons as opposed to seeing all the areas they've already explored. I did this for the labyrinth, and it kept them a bit confused at first, but then they got the feel for the place and figured it all out.
Ok I posted the four images of the labyrinth positions on my webpage under the Escape from Old Korvosa section.
If you are projecting those images onto a screen, you might want to edit the images a little bit to hide the secret doors and rooms.
If you want the individual room cut outs I can put those up too. The image files for those often contain more than one room though, but it wouldn't be hard to copy and paste them into your own set up. I do recall that these came out a little smaller than usual, but they were of sufficient size to be usable with miniatures.
Ok I posted the four images of the labyrinth positions on my webpage under the Escape from Old Korvosa section.
If you are projecting those images onto a screen, you might want to edit the images a little bit to hide the secret doors and rooms.
If you want the individual room cut outs I can put those up too. The image files for those often contain more than one room though, but it wouldn't be hard to copy and paste them into your own set up. I do recall that these came out a little smaller than usual, but they were of sufficient size to be usable with miniatures.
Oh my God, those will be incredibly useful. Thank you, Father Dale! <cheers>
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Re: One PC Dominating the other.
To steal a classic trick, might I suggest the Dominator tell the fighter "Act as you would if you were not under the influence of any outside magical compuslion." This would allow the dominated PC to be run, interefernce free, by the player, with the Dominate overriding the Insanity intact.
I'll be honest and say that I don't think Dominate will override Insanity. If the insane creature 'acts normal' for that round, then the Dominate would kick in, but I think he'd still have to roll each round to see what he does.
I'd think of a domination effect as the target making decisions according to the desires of his master. Insanity takes away the targets ability to make any decisions.
Plus, domination can be blocked by even a first level spell (Protection from X). Insanity requires some powerful magic to overcome (heal, greater restoration, wish, limited wish, miracle). I just don't see how the stronger can be overcome by the weaker.
Finally, Confused is an actual condition. Dominating a confused creature doesn't remove that condition, so even while dominated the creature is still confused. It will attempt to comply with the dominator's commands to the best of its ability, but its ability will be severely hampered by the confused condition.
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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I understand where you're coming from, but I've three thoughts on it...
a) It's a 5th level spell, putting it up there with remove blindness/deafness and break enchantment. For a 9th level party that's a pretty large resource to burn.
b) It keeps the game fun, by allowing the player to (mostly) continue to play his character.
c) It's a clever use of that 5th level spell. I'm willing to err on the side of player creativity. Bonus points if they did the Gargoyles trick.
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I understand where you're coming from, but I've three thoughts on it...
a) It's a 5th level spell, putting it up there with remove blindness/deafness and break enchantment. For a 9th level party that's a pretty large resource to burn.
b) It keeps the game fun, by allowing the player to (mostly) continue to play his character.
c) It's a clever use of that 5th level spell. I'm willing to err on the side of player creativity. Bonus points if they did the Gargoyles trick.
This was basically my thinking. It's hard to have fun when you're likely to try and kill yourself every six seconds or do nothing but babble incoherently. Or attack your fellow PCs.
The resource is burned, the party know it's not a permanent solution, and the player gets to keep playing (even if it's "Aye Aye Cap'n". (Hilariously every time the Wizard tries to gain information through the Insane character's senses I get him to roll. On any insane result I describe bizarre things. "The entire world is made of ham sammiches.")
Well I do agree that sometimes things have to be bent a little to keep the game moving.