Hi everyone,
After having a blast with the shackled city AP, I'm getting ready to run my party through Savage Tide. I would like to kick the game off with a bang.
In TinH every character should have done something that makes him or her stand out. Rather than just accept a story from the players, I would like to run each PC through the encounter. In one of the threads on these boards someone suggested tying in Malcanthet to the PCs back story. After all, they came to her attention early on, and she created this elaborate plot. She's only going to do that if she's aware of the PCs and is reasonably confident they will make it to the gaping maw. Another possible hook is to link the PCs to the lotus dragons in some way (like in Edge of Anarchy). They were wronged by the lotus dragons (or perhaps Vanthus himself) and now have an opportunity to get even.
Has anyone else done something similar? I would love to hear about it.
My other worry is the jade ravens. They seem to be a carbon copy of the rival party in SCAP (the stormblades). I would rather they stand out more. How have others handled this?
I am also curious to what other alterations or add-ons everyone has made to the AP.
Thanks in advance
Hey, Chef's Slaad, happy to hear you're taking this one on. You'll have a lot of fun with it.
From what I've seen over the past year on these boards, here's what people are doing.
1-There's plenty of GMs that are doing short intro adventures prior to There is No Honor to get them up to 2nd level since there are a LOT of deaths in that adventure.
2-There have also been short side treks between TINH and The Bullywug Gambit for the same reason, just to get them on the higher side of their level so they can level up earlier for the challenges late in the adventure.
3-In TBG be careful of Drevoraz. His rapier has cut down a lot of PCs. You may want to replace it with a weapon that won't have the potential to dish out as much damage, perhaps two-weapon fighting with a pair of nasty looking daggers.
4-Be very wary of how you run the encounter with Harliss. She is meant to be very intimidating, too tough for the fighters, and basically stick out in the players' memories so her reappearance later in the campaign is notable. If she can leave on semi-good terms, all the better so the PCs have greater motivation to answer her message in The Serpents of Scuttlecove.
5-Be very, very careful how you run the encounters that happen along the way in The Sea Wyvern's Wake. The hydra and the Tomoachan ruins have been trouble, as has the flotsum ooze, and the sargotto.
6-As suggested by someone on these boards, replacing the ending of TSWW with an encounter with Emraag the dragon turtle in The Lightless Depths makes their mission a much tenser and anticipated encounter during that adventure and it's great foreshadowing. Avoid a full on battle with the dragon turtle. Perhaps ground the ship on him and have him take a few chunks out of it and breathe on some of the crew, then wreck 'em on the beach as written.
7-There has been a lot of talk about moving encounters around in Here There Be Monsters and Tides of Dread. These two adventures can work very well to swap out parts you think would work better and make more sense to the overall story that's developed at that point. For instance, someone mentioned combining the Fog Mire in HTBM with the Fangs of Zotzilaha in ToD. There has also been talk of simply skipping a lot of HTBM and then combining it with ToD after the initial pirate attack on Farshore at the beginning of ToD.
8-If you take out some of the encounters prior to ToD you'll need to replace them. Some people have taken the Infamous Seven in the write up of the environs of the Isle of Dread in ToD and make short side treks out of them to help the PCs get to the level they should be at.
9-Be careful of how you run City of Broken Idols. There are some tough encounters in there. You may need to toughen your PCs up with extra levels before hand.
10-Wrapping up the campaign has been mentioned after the Serpents of Scuttlecove. If you feel the campaign is dragging on too much and you and your players are getting burned out, that's a good place to end it. You can also end it well after ToD or either TLD or CoBI.
I haven't been keeping up on chatter on these boards beyond that, but I hope those tidbits help.
6-As suggested by someone on these boards, replacing the ending of TSWW with an encounter with Emraag the dragon turtle in The Lightless Depths makes their mission a much tenser and anticipated encounter during that adventure and it's great foreshadowing. Avoid a full on battle with the dragon turtle. Perhaps ground the ship on him and have him take a few chunks out of it and breathe on some of the crew, then wreck 'em on the beach as written.
I wish I had seen that before hand.