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I'm running "Glacier Season" (from Dungeon Magazine #87) with some older 14° level characters taken straight from the 3.0 rules and updated as per Alpha Release 2. The adventure was designed for 15° level characters, but taking in consideration the slightly higher power level of the revised classes, it was just fine. I used the standard XP progression, and standard HPs.
Where possible I used the updated rules for 3.5 creatures, PrC (spellsword, assassin), and obviously spells and magic items as a base to build on the AR2 test. I used the Core books, the first four Complete books, the Draconomicon, Frostburn, and various monster manuals plus the Advanced Bestiary by Green Ronin.
I didn't do the math to see whether the encounters were average, easy or challenging, as I'm lazy as hell and I was interested in seeing how the AR rules can be effectively dropped into a pre-existing adventure.
PCs Update
Keep in mind that none of my players is a min-maxer, power player or has character optimization as his foremost goal.
- Dwarf Fighter: very easy, no problems at all. Slight changes regarding feats such as Cleave and Improved Cleave. Nice boost both in offensive (attack bonus) defensive abilities (AC value), and the armor training lessened the impact of heavy armor penalty regarding various skills.
- Human Cleric (god of valor from Greyhawk setting): also very easy. Minor issues regarding domains, as the previous War domain granted proficiency in weapons such as longsword, but the larger feat pool and human favored weapon filled in the holes. Adjusted some ability-boosting items. Slightly diminished CoDzilla syndrome, thanks to a better distribution in spell selection.
- Elf fighter/wizard (evoker)/spellsword: again very easy. The PrC wasn't a problem at all. Adjusted some ability-boosting items. Given his long-standing use of the Wings of Flying magic item, and his brand new hippogriff familiar-mount (taken with the Improved Familiar feat from Complete Warrior), the new Fly skill was a perfect fit. The slightly improved HPs value fit very well with the character and gave him a better edge in close combat.
- Halfling rogue/ranger: switched the ranger levels with fighter levels. Went for the TWF feat tree, with disturbing glee. Also choose Minor+Major Magic and Bleeding Attack as rogue talents.
OK, as the following contains a number of spoilers regarding both the aforementioned adventure and others from which I've pilfered encounters and scenes, I'll put everything under a "read at your danger!" warning flag.
NPCs/Creatures Update
- Taigiel, Half-Dragon (white) ranger: switched to multiclass fighter/barbarian. Not really a problem, some minor adjustements.
- Oftir, Human cleric (god of undeath from Greyhawk setting): very easy, and I switched the Evil domain for the Death one, to better test the new turning/channeling rules. While in the original adventure he was a cleric of the god of slaughter and carnage, I was interested in seeing the rules for negative energy channeling and also I held him responsible for the various undead frost giants that prowl the tundra between Latona and the dragon's lair. Frightening result.
- Joltar & Kag, Troll fighters: very easy job to do the math for CMB, feats, skill points. Vast improvement over standard rules in terms of combat efficiency.
- Tomar, Human rogue/assassin: very easy, and once again the PrC was not a problem. Very effective, and interesting to see the new poison rules in action.
- Ice Golems: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all.
- Remorhaz: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all.
- Frost Wolves: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all.
- Frost Worms: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all.
- Yrthaks: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all.
- Mastodons: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all. I felt that the Trample ability under the new CMB needed a bit of house-ruling, but not really a problem.
- Frost Giants: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all.
- Titan: didn't do the math for a conversion/update. It was meant as a roleplaying encounter and I just wished it to stay that way.
- Ice Mephits: adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems at all.
- White Dragons (mature adults): adjusted the CMB/feats with no problems, and used a few feats from the Draconomicon.
Adventure Summary
The characters pulled out of retirement when they heard that an old enemy of theirs was seen in the northern lands (I used Helios as a proxy for Vortigern, from Necromancer Games' "The Wizard Amulet", my first ever 3.0 adventure!), where he allied with a powerful wyrm and killed a wizard in the town of Latona to steal some arcane secrets regarding ice constructs. As they had quite an axe to grind with this elusive mage - he escaped their wrath a number of times - this was the right time to finally catch up with old grudges.
The initial encounter with Taigiel was handled in a purely roleplaying style, with some use of Sense Motive. Just after that, the group had the first encounter with the Ice Golems, and the half-dragon took quite a mauling within the first rounds, as the characters didn't realize at first the constructs' strategy. After a bit of strategical re-assessment, everything went smoothly, even using just basic tactics and powers, trying just a few of the new abilities. The rogue was very happy of being able of sneak-attacking constructs. The group equipped themselves with two sleds pulled by riding dogs afterwards, and left for the northern town of Latona.
The following long trek went pretty smoothly for the rest of the first evening of play, with more roleplaying interaction with Taigiel, and some random encounters added to the fixed ones. The need for elemental resistance absorbed a nice value of the group resources, and the wizard learned quickly that flying during a blizzard is not a good idea. Many encounters were a bit harder than planned, and even simple enemies seemed somewhat more challenging as the group was taxed for magical healing, cold damage resistance, and the higher number of feats available to creatures gave them better performances.
A battle with some Ice Mephits was the first real application of the new Fly skill, and after some tentative aerial maneuvering (both from the player and from me), the wizard took the hang of it; the rogue riding atop the hippogriff and the cleric (using winged boots but with only two ranks in Fly!) joined in the dogfight, while Taigiel and the dwarf fighter provided ranged support. Being quite underpowered and frail, the mephits went down quickly, and the encounter was very pleasant to run.
During following encounters with Frost Wolves and a Remorhaz the characters used more freely their new abilities, and Taigiel had a couple of glorious moments with his barbarian rage powers; the pool points system seemed very interesting to use. A first use of "Ev's black tentacles" spell against the Remorhaz was somehow ineffective, but the new grapple mechanics performed smoothly. The cleric tried some tactics to use his positive energy channeling even if in melee, and was pretty much satisfied with both the results and the tactical limitations.
The group met also some human bandits, but thanks to a couple of Intimidate checks the encounter was almost purely a roleplaying one, as the characters tried to gain as much information as possible from the raiders while the NPCs tried to get away with their lives and a small gain (money for information). A couple of times I called for Diplomacy checks for support, and some Bluff versus Sense Motive, but mostly I managed to keep the scene with only roleplaying interactions.
Things changed for the worse when the two mature adult White Dragons showed up. The pair used a long trail of mastodon bloody leftovers to lure the group in an ambush; their plan didn't work, but neither the characters had the opportunity to properly buff up.
Even if sub-par in performance while flying, these two creatures literally mangled the group. Badly. The feat-enhanced breath attacks laid waste on the rogue and the cleric, and after some very difficult and tense round of combat during which the wizard and his familiar distracted the dragons from the battleground carnage, the group managed to land some serios hits, felling one dragon after a magical barrage followed by an impressive - and lucky! - series of criticals from the fighter and Taigiel, and managing to scare away the other (much to their relief, as they were really strained).
I used the really high CMB modifier to grapple characters, with the dragon pinning an enemy under his claws and savaging him, and it was scary. Also here the fighter complained about his damage dealing potential when performing only one attack, as the new Power Attack seriously limits the balance between hitting performance and damage results.
End of session 1.
After a bit of time spent to recover, the group went on towards the northern city of Latona. At the outskirts of the mountain range, the two troll fighters tried to extort them a sizeable toll, recognizing the group as wealthy individuals instead of common travelers; the encounter quickly degenerated into a battle, with the trolls taking advantage of terrain (I changed a bit the environment, placing their camp along a narrow ledge), and liberally using various combat maneuvers to trip, bull rush and overrun the characters. The fight was quite tense, fun, and showed how the CMB can really speed up things.
Also, during the following trek along the mountain pass I used the cabin scene from Pathfinder #6 (with a number of changes) to spice things up, and give the players a good old fashioned scare. At the end of the encounter they were quite nervous, and the haunting mechanics were formidable. They found a number of evidence hinting of Acessiwal alliance with powerful human magic users, which strenghtened the resolve to finally catch up with Helios/Vortigern.
At the end of the mountain pass, the group encountered the riddle-plagued titan (a funny encounter, good to change the pace after the cabin terror chapter), and then the pilgrim caravan led by Oftir, who was disguised as a low-level priest concerned with the protection of his followers. A bit of roleplaying scenes between the group and the crazed pilgrims, then the ambush sprung during a night stop. Oftir used a negative energy channeling (7d6 damage) to slay a number of followers, then cast "Create Undead" to get a dozen of Dread Ghouls - I used the template from Green Ronin's Advenced Bestiary - that proceed to slay the other pilgrims, while Oftir used his Call Undead Domain power to summon a host of icy skeletons.
The characters quickly dealt with the first wave of ghouls, then found themselves locked in a chaotic battle with other undeads (Oftir cast another Create Undead on the remaining slain pilgrim corpses) with a scary two round sequence of positive and negative energy channeling, in a head on challenge between the clerics that blasted away most of the undead host, then boosted it while seriously damaging the group, then again. Here, the "burst aura" of negative and positive energy channeling showed some problems, and while the scene proceeded without further hindrance, we discussed briefly how these mechanics can be easily abused both by players and mischievious and petty GMs.
The characters decided that a head on battle was not a good idea, retreated at a distance fighting their way out of low level undead critters, and then used magic and ranged attacks to destroy the undeads and blast the evil cleric into oblivion. Unfortunately for them, he was able to use his "Word of Recall" spell to escape defeat.
Once arriving at Latona, the group took the chance to rest a bit (level up!) and search for more information about Helios/Vortigern and Acessiwal the dragon. I had prepared a number of roleplaying encounters with sages and information dealers, and in a few days they learned a bit of past history and that the evil wizard was held responsible for a number of deaths, a trail that ended in a spectacular magical battle with a resident that destroyed most of his residence. While the characters where investigating the ruins in search of clues or useful bits, Taigiel (smuggled within the city walls with some magical disguises) that was waiting for them at the inn was slain by Tomar, who left some false evidence framing the PCs for the murder of a couple of other patrons.
The characters returned at the inn and discovered that the city guard was in alarm and on their trail for killing innocents and smuggling within the city walls a dead monstruous creature, possibly related to the white wyrm of the frozen north.
End of session 2.
Overall
Classes: very well received, and considered a nice improvement over the basic ones (even with the 3.5 upgrade) regarding flexibility, flavor, and power level, which was valued better balanced for these higher levels, mainly because of the improved features.
The players expressed plainly that they would be really interested in taking the whole single class progression without multiclassing or various PrCs.
Some classes though have gotten slightly more difficult to properly handle by the DM in a complex situation, mainly because of the aforementioned improved variety and flexibility of powers (barbarian rage points, wizard school powers, cleric domain powers), and they need to be more carefully considered and planned before running the adventure (as in "I'll stick to this, this and this, won't care about the rest").
PrCs seem so far very easy to adapt to the AR rules.
The unlimited cantrips/orisons are quite good, and we didn't find any situation where these could be abused (again, most of the adventure so far is in the wilderness, so take this in consideration)
Feats and Combat Feats: well received and easy to adapt to.
Power Attack though was considered too toned down; even with Vital Strike as a high level replacement, a fighter-type character needs a better feat or class option for damage-dealing purposes.
Skills: some condensing was well received and played smoothly (stealth, but also acrobatics and diplomacy), and some other caused slight problems (spellcraft).
The main issue though, was with perception, that really does not work well as a catch-it-all single value; please take a step back to listen, spot and search. Too difficult to manage quickly the various facets of multiple senses during battle or a tense, nerve-wracking recon foray.
The new fly skill was a bit tricky to handle at first, but after some time spent battling ice mephits and a lone white dragon, we got the hang of it and was pretty fun.
New rules: the new turning/channeling rules are easy, fun, and very satisfactory for the player. The Selective Channeling and Turning Smite feats are a must have, and can be highly effective.
Unfortunately there's also a good many problems. The battle with Oftir highlighted them, where the evil cleric blasted away enormous chunks of HPs from the PCs and the party cleric had to burn a good number of daily uses to counter that in a drawn-out "who rolls the most" battle. I suggest using rules that discriminate between turning/rebuking undeads and healing/damaging energy blasts; the Turn Undead Domain from "The Book of Experimental Might I" by Monte Cook is a perfect fit for the former, IMHO.
The CMB value performed well during the whole adventure, and one of the players has said that he can't wait to see the monk in action; giants with Improved Sunder are scary as hell. Grapple finally made sense, and a famous "black tentacles" spell wasn't any longer a nightmare to handle in action.
We didn't test any of the new polymorph subschool spells.
Calculating XPs was very easy, and the various "speed" columns for advancement are an interesting tool for the GM, allowing to fine-tune an adventure for a specific campaign or personal style of play.
Uff, longest post I ever wrote on the Paizo boards!