At first I planned on converting Rise of the Runelords to 4E, but I think I want to start off with a shorter campaign. Now I want to run a Falcon's Hollow campaign using the various modules that take place in and around the community.
I'm starting off with "Into the Haunted Forest". I've decided not to award experience for this adventure, but the players will obtain magic items that will be upgraded throughout the campaign. They'll also encounter the Company of the Black Banner, a group that I'm hoping to incorporate into other adventures.
I didn't really run into this problem when I started converting Burnt Offerings because of the wide selection of goblins in the Monster Manual, but many of the adventure modules set in Darkmoon Vale feature encounters against a small number of monsters, such as a lone bombardier beetle or assassin vine. Does anyone have any suggestions on how I should expand encounters like these?
Keeping in mind that I haven't read the adventure you're referring to, it's relatively simple: add more monsters. You should shoot for around four or five monsters for most encounters, with a handful featuring two or three and a solo monster added in every once in a while.
You'll have the same problem in Burnt Offerings when you reach Thistletop. If you'd like assistance with converting the adventure, Burnt Offerings can be found completely converted to 4th Edition at my blog, Tales from the Rusty Dragon.
Consider your site bookmarked!
Here's a rundown of the adventure's battles:
- A single wolf.
- An assassin vine.
- A black bear.
- A charmed wizard and a nixie.
- A giant bombardier beetle.
- A rival adventuring party and the "wooden protector".
As you can see, only one of the adventure's encounters includes more than two opponents (in fact, most of them are solo encounters!).
I also just realized that the adventure-as-written intends the PCs to hand over the five magic items they acquire in exchange for their freedom and one magical dagger. Now I need to figure out a reason for them to keep the items.
Consider your site bookmarked!Here's a rundown of the adventure's battles:
- A single wolf.
- An assassin vine.
- A black bear.
- A charmed wizard and a nixie.
- A giant bombardier beetle.
- A rival adventuring party and the "wooden protector".As you can see, only one of the adventure's encounters includes more than two opponents (in fact, most of them are solo encounters!).
I also just realized that the adventure-as-written intends the PCs to hand over the five magic items they acquire in exchange for their freedom and one magical dagger. Now I need to figure out a reason for them to keep the items.
Ah, I've looked at this adventure very briefly (I remember reading about the last encounter). Just throw a few extra creatures into each fight and find a way to justify their presence if necessary.
- 5 wolves/hounds
- not sure what you'd do with the vines, I'd have to go hunting for plant creatures
- 2 bears (bears are elite creatures in the Monster Manual)
- perhaps a solo monster wizard and normal demon of some sort
- 4-6 beetles
- rival adventuring party
Hexmage, I did up the magic items from "Into the Haunted Forest" and posted them in another thread. The only thing I'd change would make would be to up the dagger's resistance from two to five per plus, just to bring it in line with the standard 4E items.
*bump*
I've been running a Darkmoon Vale campaign, which we converted into a 4E campaign a few months back. So far, it's been a phenomenal success. The prepublished adventures are of such quality--as is the setting--making conversions with recognizable monsters easy, and facilitating the invention of others.
So far, the party has been through "Hollow's Last Hope" (the last leg of it was converted to 4E), done a sidequest set-piece encounter from Christopher Wissel's excellent "Wingclipper's Revenge" adventure from Dungeon 132, and only last night pretty much finished "Into the Haunted Forest".
Conversions have rarely been difficult, though it's been enlightening learning how to create monsters using the 4E DMG. (Chapter 10--The DM's Toolbox is pure gold!) Also, certain encounters lend themselves more to Skill Challenges...
I had a lot of fun converting the "magic items" in "Into the Haunted Forest" to 4E equivalents, and others from "Hollow's Last Hope". One of my favorites to convert was...
Ring of Torag—
Property: +2 on saves to end ongoing fire damage
Power (Daily): Immediate Interrupt—Gain resist 5 to fire damage from a single attack. If you have reached at least one milestone today, the damage resisted is doubled.
I'll try to post some more info on monsters I've made for the campaign so far, if others are interested. For what it's worth, the conversion has been well worth the effort.
I'd be interested in seeing how you did the bar room brawl skill challenge.
Consider changing the assasin vine to a trap / skill challege style encounter.
I actually did turn the assassin vine into a variation on a Daggerthorn Briar trap (DMG p.90). As it was, the visible tree bough and previously discovered ritual scroll of Comprehend Languages made it pretty obvious that attacking the plant was unnecessary; though I can't think of too many real penalties for doing so, I wouldn't have considered actually slaying the vine worth experience, rather discovering the riddles to be worth the reward.