I'm having a little trouble with the dimensions of this particular map and was hoping someone could give me some advice. In Serpents of Scuttlecove, it says how to set up the encounter, with one of the Seventh Coil assassins hiding under the central walkway and two more in the rafters. My question is about the rafters and the "sloping roof" of the building. Because the map is a cutaway, I'm not really sure where there's a roof and where there isn't. Initially, I thought it was just over the small cluster of rooms on the north part of the map, but the text seems to imply that the roof covers the docking bays as well.
I'm trying to understand the rafters a bit better because the assassins are hiding up there when they start studying the PCs for their death attacks, which would assume that they're concealed well enough that a casual glance up by the PCs wouldn't automatically reveal a bunch of yuan-ti staring intently at them with raised weapons. By the same token, I want to be able to make the layout of the place clear enough in my description that the players don't think I'm trying to put one over on them ("They were hiding where? Look, if you'd said there was a roof over our heads, don't you think we would have LOOKED up in it?")
Also, and this is purely for the sake of realism, I need to make sure I handle balance and climb checks for the assassins if they are indeed squatting on beams in the rafters looking down over the docks.
Any help would be appreciated.
|
if i recall correctly (away from books ATM)
the front rooms (with the entrance way, where the boss guy has his nest, and the connected rooms are roofed)
the 2nd floor room (the one with the outside stairway leading to it) has a partial roof, and the rest is just beams and rafters.
keep in mind also, that the boss can easily hide in the water or be invisible to the left of the entrance to the whaling area, and the others can easily be up in the rafters, hiding with cover relative to the ground floor by interconnected beams, rigging, metal hooks and the like. those assassins are VERY good at hiding.
the one on the roof of the 2nd floor room turns into a tiny viper, IIRC, allowing him to be VERY well hidden and also go all kinds of little places.
be sure to time up the rounds the party spends with pseudo-harliss, as they can count towards the death attacks, and if they use their beads of force for the initial attacks they can kill while incapacitaing and blocking off exits.
very very nasty, if you play it up to the hilt.
just don't do what i did, and forget the boss is Large, has extra reach if he wants, and all kinds of Thrall to Demogorgon abilities.
-t
if i recall correctly (away from books ATM)
the front rooms (with the entrance way, where the boss guy has his nest, and the connected rooms are roofed)
the 2nd floor room (the one with the outside stairway leading to it) has a partial roof, and the rest is just beams and rafters.
keep in mind also, that the boss can easily hide in the water or be invisible to the left of the entrance to the whaling area, and the others can easily be up in the rafters, hiding with cover relative to the ground floor by interconnected beams, rigging, metal hooks and the like. those assassins are VERY good at hiding.
the one on the roof of the 2nd floor room turns into a tiny viper, IIRC, allowing him to be VERY well hidden and also go all kinds of little places.
be sure to time up the rounds the party spends with pseudo-harliss, as they can count towards the death attacks, and if they use their beads of force for the initial attacks they can kill while incapacitaing and blocking off exits.
very very nasty, if you play it up to the hilt.
just don't do what i did, and forget the boss is Large, has extra reach if he wants, and all kinds of Thrall to Demogorgon abilities.
-t
Thanks for this. I thought the roof over the docks seemed like a misread, and it took a few read-throughs before I finally realized the Leech would probably hide in the water. I won't forget his abilities... learned that lesson with the Aspect of Demogorgon, who had dual actions(not as written though, oddly enough) and greater dispel at will... and I kept forgetting I could dispel the dozen or so buffs that kept the party's tank nigh-unhittable. When I looked at the stat block the next morning, I kicked myself hard enough for Demogorgon to feel it.
hmm...
well, that's a stupid rule, melee death attacks only.
oh well.
-t
Got that covered. Sniper's Eye spell. I just replaced the less useful spells in their statblock. 60 ft sneak attack and ranged death attack.