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I am going to be running it for a group where most of them don't do much roleplaying. Me and the other player that roleplays hopes that because this is not just a simple dungeon crawl it will have the roleplay more. I have sent out the CoT players guide. I will post more details of the party when I know the make up.
But I was wondering ad a DM what should I look for for possible derailments, unexpected idea that your group came up with that you had to deal with on the fly, ect..
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I too will be running CoT with a mixed group of RPers and non-RPers. I'll let you know what I encounter. One thing I've already read on multiple occasions (by James too) is that the XP is completely borked in the first adventure and you'll need to fudge some to get everybody to level 3 by the end of the adventure. To remedy this one change I've already decided to make is to add in one more combat-heavy encounter between the rescue and the bastards themselves to appease the less RP friendly of the group.
Good luck though, I'll let you know if I encounter anything.
Ill be starting this a week from this friday, due to a new player joining who hasnt played since the AD&D days. This weekend we will roll the last 2 characters.
Ill be looking into this thread from time to time as well, I love to compare notes.
Ill probably give my players more background than whats in the Players guide. Particularly the differences and relationship between the Dottari and the Hellknights.
Im also prepping my usual "NPC list" (mostly shopkeepers, a few contacts, a bribeable dottari a pc may know, etc) with at a glance npc personalities. Speeds up gameplay for us.
Knowing my players, I foresee alot of role playing happening (its an urban campaign after all). Janiven may seem like the only main NPC interaction in the beginning, but bringing out other memorable NPCs and roleplaying moments should be easy with Westcrown's flavor. If one of your players should happen to be a Tiefling, it could get really interesting. :)
Weaving in each players background into the story even further always helps the roleplaying parts. This should keep your roleplaying player happy when elements from his background surface.
Note*** I had a tiefling (infernal bastard trait) npc in my initial group, but decided to go human instead.
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as far as the Combat vs. Non-Combat encounters (most of which are Roleplay intensive in this adventure)...
you have a few very good natural spots for conversations between the NPC's and the party, namely the introduction of Janiven, the first supper meeting, and the arrival at the safehouse.
if you WANT the group to spend more time RP'ing and less slaying monsters, i would recommend you rehearse what the various NPC's are going to say/sound like, then stick as close as you can to your "script."
if they bite, there's plenty to talk about (gods, westcrown, shadowbeasts, ale and hookers, the movement itself, etc...) to keep the conversations going. from the dozen or so "Children" i think i really used 4 or 5 of them (3 of my players gravitated to the barkeep/pimp/meth-addict gnome in the group) and the rest stayed off stage.
i would definitely recommend you make up the sewer maps and possibly the church of erastil maps ahead of time, then you can just swap them out as needed.
if you're not fully up on Light/Darkness rules, now's a good time to bone up on them, especially the levels of light involved with spells.
finally, if you don't have the bestiary yet PF Srd is your friend...read through the various entries for the adventure, and you're set.
also, if the first set of encounters seems to be running very fast, just go with it...keep them down there until you decide its been long enough (or they're just about to die) and then spring the exit on them. that's pretty much what i did (ran them until i was out of pre-generated encounters, had them see something they obviously couldn't handle yet, then showed them the door out), and it worked out well.
good luck, and for further inspiration/pitfalls, check out the Campaign Journals a bit further below.
-t
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I've been running it since the start. Great campaign, but if your players don't like roleplay you should consider selecting another campaign (Second Darkness seems better suited to your group: it's a pure meatgrinder).
But if you decide to play CoT regardless, I highly recommend that your "best roleplayer" max out the skill "Perform (Acting)", as it comes in real handy in Chapter 2.
Adventure says they should get to the safe house once the hit second level.
Thought it said they should be 2nd when they go to hit the Bastards? That would be right after the rescue. I added a sewer encounter or two for my group of four after adding up XP and story awards to make sure they reach 2nd level before the Bastards.
We start it all this friday night, ill let ya know how we did.|
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Adventure says they should get to the safe house once the hit second level.Thought it said they should be 2nd when they go to hit the Bastards? That would be right after the rescue. I added a sewer encounter or two for my group of four after adding up XP and story awards to make sure they reach 2nd level before the Bastards.
We start it all this friday night, ill let ya know how we did.
The adventure states both. James and company have stated that there were some major problems in the XP granted for this adventure and have suggested that DMs wing it for the first module. I think the module was intended to have characters at level 2 after leaving the sewers (before the rescue).
Considering the adventure clearly states that players should be "well into" level 3 at the end, I'd say having characters at level 2 well before meeting the Bastards is probably a good idea just so they can make it to three while adventuring against them. I'm starting it tonight and I've decided to help remedy things I'm going to run level 1 as "fast" XP progression and then switch over to medium (adjusting artificially as needed) after that. I've also grabbed an exciting dockfront chase from an old Dragon Magazine (forget the issue number) as the lead-in to the Bastards storyline to help up the XP a bit.
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I am going to have 6 players. How should I adjust combat for that? Add one more enemy per encounter? Right now I am mainly concerend with the sewers so that they are not wondering in there for too long. Adventure says they should get to the safe house once the hit second level.
I believe you can adjust encounters pretty easily by working with your party's Average Party Level (APL). This can be found on page 397 of the Pathfinder core rulebook.
Step 1—Determine APL: Determine the average level of your player characters—this is their Average Party Level (APL for short). You should round this value to the nearest whole number (this is one of the few exceptions to the round down rule). Note that these encounter creation guidelines assume a group of four or five PCs. If your group contains six or more players, add one to their average level. If your group contains three or fewer players, subtract one from their average level. For example, if your group consists of six players, two of which are 4th level and four of which are 5th level, their APL is 6th (28 total levels, divided by six players, rounding up, and adding one to the final result).
So your first level party of six would be (1/6)*6 = 1 + 1(for being a party of six) for an APL of 2. Since the encounters are designed to be somewhere between CR 1 and 2, I'd say that you could (by what the Player's Handbook states) add in enough creatures to bring up each encounter by +1 CR and have the intended difficulty of the original fight (3 armigers would become 5-6 to transform it from a CL 1 encounter to a CL 2 encounter, 3 goblins could become 5-6 goblins to turn it from a CL 2 enounter to a CL 3 encounter).
I think it's worth saying though that you need to judge the power-level of your group. If you build characters with the "heroic fantasy" build I'd aim to the high end of the rounding, if you build characters with "standard fantasy" I'd stick to the low end of rounding. It just requires a little finesse, but I'd say that working with the Core Rulebook should get you fairly appropriately powered encounters.
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I am going to have 6 players. How should I adjust combat for that?
With the way Pathfinder is now handing out XP: do nothing.
You will end up with a party that is lower level than recommended, but that is fine as the party size is 50% greater.
At level 8+ (i.e. a while from now) you'll have to reassess the situation because PC death may occur more often (i.e. if monsters are meant to hit 8th level PCs "safely", then hitting 5th or 6th level PCs may result in "deaths by one hit" or "not enough healing to cope with incoming damage" scenarios).
Because your party is bigger, one cleric won't be enough to supply damage demand at higher levels, so PC 1 through 4 should for sure contain a cleric, and PC 5 through 6 should contain at least a bard or druid or (safest option) another cleric.
I'm starting it tonight and I've decided to help remedy things I'm going to run level 1 as "fast" XP progression and then switch over to medium (adjusting artificially as needed) after that.
This is a great Idea, I might do the same for the sewer portion, thanks. :)
I've also grabbed an exciting dockfront chase from an old Dragon Magazine (forget the issue number) as the lead-in to the Bastards storyline to help up the XP a bit.
Would that be Jason Buhlman's Mad God's Key from Dungeon #114?
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I've also grabbed an exciting dockfront chase from an old Dragon Magazine (forget the issue number) as the lead-in to the Bastards storyline to help up the XP a bit.Would that be Jason Buhlman's Mad God's Key from Dungeon #114?
Why yes, yes it would. With some adaptations and personal touches of course. They'll be going after a Teifling Barbarian who might not be nearly as speedy as the barbarian in the original (medium armor) adjusted for the fact that the party has a couple small folk in it.
We started a campaign on Mad God's Key, great module. :)
The tiefling barbarian (one of the Bastards?) is a cool add-in. Nice touch.
Well we finished our first session tonight. 2 small issues.
1) Janiven's pitch at the start didnt go over that well with the Sorcerer and Rogue. The Rogue wanted a weekely wage and the Sorcerer seemed like he wanted to get involved. I knew my players wouldnt be the "care for the city" types so its not an issue with the module itself. Thinks worked out in the end.
2) XP is definately an issue. I ran 7 encounters in the sewer gauntlet and my party of 4 wound up with 1305 total xp each. That was with me awarding them 1/2 xp for running from an Otyugh "special" encounter.
I took the advice of running Fast progression XP for the sewer gauntlet so they can hit 2nd level for the Rescue (neat solution btw, ty). They will just be 2nd level a little longer until they reach the needed medium progression XP for 3rd level (sorta like loaning them the 700 xp).
All in all a great game, things went smoothly and I didnt even need to fudge a roll to help the group survive the gauntlet. They had decent ACs and were using solid tactics and positioning.
On a side note and YMMV on this, Theres way too many NPCs in the beginning to introduce all at once. Meeting Janniven, Morosino, and a gaggle of Children of Westcrown all in the first half of the first module of a campaign is a tad much, especially if you want each one to be memorable in their own way. I would have rather had a more staggered NPC approach and introduce them gradually.
On a side note and YMMV on this, Theres way too many NPCs in the beginning to introduce all at once. Meeting Janniven, Morosino, and a gaggle of Children of Westcrown all in the first half of the first module of a campaign is a tad much, especially if you want each one to be memorable in their own way. I would have rather had a more staggered NPC approach and introduce them gradually.
I hear you, but I'd say you don't want all those NPCs to be memorable. It's sufficient to convey to the player that they're not alone in this rebellion thing and that there are one of each class available to help them. Really, Janiven, Morosino and Arael are the only three named NPCs you need to "introduce" formally.
The children have no further role in the adventure path. They represent a pool of talent the party can draw on in future and a reasonable pool to draw from in the event of character deaths.
I understand that too, but my group is the kind that if you put them into a room with interesting looking strangers, they would want to know who most of them are. Especially if they might be committing treason with them in the near future.
Also the Children of Westcrown are interesting enough to be used as a little more than a pool to draw from. I think I might flesh a couple of them out further. Rizzardo already has a crush on the Sorceress in my group. :)
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Well we finished our first session tonight. 2 small issues.
1) Janiven's pitch at the start didnt go over that well with the Sorcerer and Rogue. The Rogue wanted a weekely wage and the Sorcerer seemed like he wanted to get involved. I knew my players wouldnt be the "care for the city" types so its not an issue with the module itself. Thinks worked out in the end.
I had an identical problem. Half the group read the player's guide and made characters that really fit in with the campaign. One was flexible enough to know that getting involved was in his best interest and found a way to work things out. The last had a concept in mind, didn't read the player's guide, and was ready to play a very specific concept that really didn't have any reason to help Janiven. I used her speech as a template and spoke my own ad hoc speech, but even then I had trouble getting him involved.
2) XP is definately an issue. I ran 7 encounters in the sewer gauntlet and my party of 4 wound up with 1305 total xp each. That was with me awarding them 1/2 xp for running from an Otyugh "special" encounter.
I took the advice of running Fast progression XP for the sewer gauntlet so they can hit 2nd level for the Rescue (neat solution btw, ty). They will just be 2nd level a little longer until they reach the needed medium progression XP for 3rd level (sorta like loaning them the 700 xp).
Good to know. I've done three encounters so far (one which was also an Otyugh) and so far I'm pleased with how the "fast" XP chart is working. My problems with the gauntlet so far are that one of the players (the same one who didn't make a character to get involved with the campaign) absolutely refuses to believe that he can get lost and hates the maze concept. He gets quite upset when he starts heading back (after being chased by a hungry Otyugh) and says "but I took two right turns, I know where I am), and I say "but you don't." The other three seem on board though and kind of like how it works I think.
All in all a great game, things went smoothly and I didnt even need to fudge a roll to help the group survive the gauntlet. They had decent ACs and were using solid tactics and positioning.
On a side note and YMMV on this, Theres way too many NPCs in the beginning to introduce all at once. Meeting Janniven, Morosino, and a gaggle of Children of Westcrown all in the first half of the first module of a campaign is a tad much, especially if you want each one to be memorable in their own way. I would have rather had a more staggered NPC approach and introduce them gradually.
I was thinking the same thing. My next session is Wed and I started reading all the backgrounds again so I could have the characters ready. I felt like too many, and it's good to know somebody else thinks the same thing. I'm going to introduce 2-3 in the first meeting, and a couple more the next day when they discuss the rescue.
Good to hear it's working though!
I'm sooo glad I'm not alone here ;)
I've run two sessions so far with my players aka The Testosterone Thugs... They are a bunch of egoistical anarchists that are mostly in it for the money, and to see their faces when they emerged from the sewers and got together with the Children of Westcrown (Which by the way they think is the dumbest name evar! but they don't bother to suggest anything even remotely useful instead of this 'lame arse' name). They looked as if they were expecting to find a full operational resistance group, well trained and well-equipped... There seem to be a sense of 'why bother get involved' over the group...
I'm looking forward to the next few sessions, with a bit trepidation. I sense a real possibbility for a campaign collaps with a group that wont play within the context of the AP. I'm not into rail-roading, but given the time I have to prepare for running a game, well, it's just not possible for me to veer too much from the script...
Sorry for letting it out on you.. I feel soo much better now, though.. ;-)
The group consists of a (they're 2nd lvl now) Human Sorcerer 1/Monk 1 (LE)
Human Fighter (LN)
Human Cleric of Gorum (CN)
and Human Ranger (NG)
BTW average str of this group is 17,75! Hence the nick-name.. ;)
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I had the Children of Westcrown extend the original invitations to meet at Vizio's Tavern instead of Janiven herself, a different member for each PC. That way, each PC has a personal contact in the group, and keeps more of them involved. It also avoids the illusion that Janiven can be in six places at once. I'm hoping to fit in an encounter or two with some Bastards thugs causing trouble at large, to make tha assault more personal than just a mission from Arael. It just seems odd to me that the Villains of the module don't really even come up until the last encounter.
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I had the Children of Westcrown extend the original invitations to meet at Vizio's Tavern instead of Janiven herself, a different member for each PC. That way, each PC has a personal contact in the group, and keeps more of them involved. It also avoids the illusion that Janiven can be in six places at once. I'm hoping to fit in an encounter or two with some Bastards thugs causing trouble at large, to make tha assault more personal than just a mission from Arael. It just seems odd to me that the Villains of the module don't really even come up until the last encounter.
I really, really wish I had thought of this. Frankly the idea's superb.
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I had an identical problem. Half the group read the player's guide and made characters that really fit in with the campaign. One was flexible enough to know that getting involved was in his best interest and found a way to work things out. The last had a concept in mind, didn't read the player's guide, and was ready to play a very specific concept that really didn't have any reason to help Janiven. I used her speech as a template and spoke my own ad hoc speech, but even then I had trouble getting him involved.
Why didn't you tell the players before you started the conceit of the adventure path is the PCs join up with the Children of Westcrown and they need to make characters with that in mind?
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Why didn't you tell the players before you started the conceit of the adventure path is the PCs join up with the Children of Westcrown and they need to make characters with that in mind?
I did. I told them to read the player's guide for good ideas. I told them that I don't allow evil characters in one of our pre-session e-mails. Neither effort mattered in the long run. One player had it in his mind exactly what he wanted to make and he did regardless of the setting. It happens sometimes even with one's best effort to try to make it not happen.
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I am going to start tomorrow night. I went over the XP and encounters needed to bring my 6 player group to second level in the sewers with medium progression. I added two monsters to each of the encounters, but even with that, they have to go through each of those encounters twice to hit second level.
Think that will be too tough?
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I am going to start tomorrow night. I went over the XP and encounters needed to bring my 6 player group to second level in the sewers with medium progression. I added two monsters to each of the encounters, but even with that, they have to go through each of those encounters twice to hit second level.
Think that will be too tough?
I ran my second chunk of sewer exploration last night. So far the group has encountered:
- 1 Goblin Patrol.
- 1 Otyugh (I gave them half XP for evading rather than encountering).
- 3 Hellknight Patrol that surprised them.
- 3 Hellknight Patrol that was met on equal footing.
- 4 Goblins in a side room.
- 4 Hellknight Patrol that was surprised by the PCs.
- 4 Skeletons.
The first three encounters did absolutely nothing to the PCs (except cause them to use four days worth of rations distracting the Otyugh). The fourth encounter cost them a potion of cure light wounds, the goblins cost another, and then it went downhill. The sixth encounter with the 4 Hellknights nearly killed the group outright due to the mix of good rolling on my part and poor rolling on their part and the skeletons did some major housecleaning on the PCs. They're down about half the potions of cure light wounds they've found, and the sorc (the only spellcaster) is down about half spells.
The party could easily do another seven encounters and probably remain alive but completely out of healing pots and spells. The real problem is pacing. There's absolutely no way I could run the encounters through twice, the group would just get too bored. At this point I have two planned encounters left, I'm going to stop it there, and I'm going to make them level 2 regardless of what the tables say the XP should be.
The bigger problem for your PCs will be the gold gain. As listed in the AP itself, the progression through level 1 is so fast the PCs will enter level 2 with pretty much nothing in the way of gold, gear, or magic items. Since the remainder of level 2 doesn't have tons planned (the Bastards being the only real source of gold), you might just want to take that into consideration and throw in a bone or two just to give the PCs a chance to have something to spend (and perhaps buy the bows they need or somesuch).
When my session ended, I left my players taking baths at The Rebel Hideout. They didnt get to talk to all the Children of Westcrown because they were prompted to wash the sewage off first :) .
The fast XP progression (for the sewerportion only) worked well for us as far as leveling goes. As for the gold, Im probably going to have them run into a Shadowgarm and collect a bounty from Bluehood. Im going to raise the bounty abit to make up for some lost gold. Ill explain the increase of bounty as payment for a specific shadow creature (the Shadowgarm in this case) that has repeatedly attacked people in a specific part of town. I just have to figure a way for the group to realize this is the exact shadow creature they are looking for.
Maybe ill give it a distinguishing "light burned" mark or somesuch from a previous victim, maybe a Cleric that got away.
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Well after a late start because of a printer issue with characters,I started it tonight. Only did a couple of sewer encounters but everyone liked Pathfinder and seems to have a great time.
My only issue is there are only a couple of players that really get into there characters and roleplay. I think the only way I'm going to get the pthers to roleplay is give the ones that do extra XP.
:)
Why not introduce NPCs that may be somewhat like the type of character they are playing, and roleplay them into it. They could be more of the "Children" of Westcrown, or one of the pregens already in there.
For example, if one of them is a hack and slash character, Ermolos could come over to him and offer to make a better made (i.e. Masterwork) version of his weapon for a lower price.
This might coerce the non-RPing player into a small bit of dialogue with that particular NPC and try to build from there.
If hes a healer type encourage the other players to RP with him/her asking for healing, maybe asking about his/her religion, you could also use NPCs this way.
Baby steps, etc.
Just a few suggestions. :)
Commentary from my campaign thusfar:
Bastards of Erebus
Chapter 1, early on, hands out four potions of cure light wounds per player character. That's a sizeable chunk of the gp expected for 2nd level right there.
The gp value comes from sellable loot - the armor and weapons on the Armigers alone does pretty well in "picking up the slack" on loot. Combined with the stash (more potions) and anything else you care to throw in during the schlepp through the sewers and getting them gear (or the funds to buy gear) sufficient for 2nd level is easy.
XP wise, I didn't really see a problem for my group until after the ambush and before hitting the Bastards themselves. Whitechin and a easy-KO group of brigands (one or two sleep spells and/or color sprays solves the latter encounter handily, earns a Fame Point and a storyline award if memory serves) was plenty to pop them to the necessary point.
The loot from the special encounters and the BoE themselves should also be more than enough to get them where they need to be for The Sixfold Trial.
The Sixfold Trial
Depending upon how quickly you want to conclude the play - for my group, it was intended to complete the play in one session - I would suggest a pre-game e-mail or equivalent containing the flavor text and establishing the group's preferred method of infiltrating the Lord-Mayor's manor. If they do not wish to go with the play itself, they can certainly infiltrate the manor on the night of the grand ball celebrating the (barely) successful performance of the play. Electing to infiltrate the manor on any other night is a Bad Idea, one that the NPCs will certainly point out to them. For one, the Lord-Mayor tends to send away his guard detail on nights such as the one to celebrate the play ...
Until then, you have at least a week of game time to fill in (and provide the player characters xp and items), so you can play up with any angles that the players' interests provide you to work with. As far as pre-generated material to shoehorn into this role, I cannot help you there, as my group absolutely loved the play.
Once in the manor and in the Knot itself, the greatest threat to the characters is the "deadline". They should have just enough time to 'sweep and clear' the place with one nine hour stretch in the middle to rest and regain spells. A clever group can accomplish this without the rest break.
XP is the greatest potential issue at medium advancement for a group of five or more. The presumption seems to be that the GM is awarding the same experience per-character to groups of four and five. For larger groups, the "APL" approach is necessary, counting the group as 1 level higher per 2 player characters above 4 that are present. This in turn tells you how many critters to toss at them to provide the necessary xp to get them where they need to be.
In the aftermath of The Sixfold Trial, since I do not award xp the same to a group of five as to a group of four, my group just barely hit 5th level on the number after all the story award xp is tallied. Since the indication is that they need to be half-way to 6th level before starting Chapter 3, I had to home-brew the necessary "xp award".
I am going to have 6 players. How should I adjust combat for that? Add one more enemy per encounter? Right now I am mainly concerend with the sewers so that they are not wondering in there for too long. Adventure says they should get to the safe house once the hit second level.
as far as I see it:
1) don't start right off the bat with the camapign material. Start the players in Westcrown. Let them roleplay and do a few things, maybe even possibly meet each other etc.
2) if you do have 6 players, and there is a good mix (ie not 5 bards and a druid) definately double all combat encounters strength, numbers or both.
I am going to have 6 players. How should I adjust combat for that? Add one more enemy per encounter? Right now I am mainly concerend with the sewers so that they are not wondering in there for too long. Adventure says they should get to the safe house once the hit second level.
I went a different direction there. I ran only a couple sewer encounters to let them get a feel for their characters. I didn't think the sewer encounters were going to hold my group's interest long enough to gain a level down there, so I bailed after 3-4 encounters.
Instead I plan to run them through Crypt of the Everflame after they rescue Arael to build up some XP and treasure (and get out of town for awhile). I opted to go with smaller story awards for entering/leaving the sewers as a result.
There are two places where there are level guidelines, and I think the more important one is for them to be 2nd level when they go after the Bastards. The rescue of Arael seems fine at 1st level when you consider they'll be fully rested when they start.
Okay.. So my group crashed, more or less, through the sewers, they wrecked the poor armigers, one of the players, a sorcerer that for some unknown reason has Wizard Mark, earned an eternal enemy by 'branding' his mark on the forehead of Shanwen...
Now they are knee-deep in trouble (though they don't quite realize this yet) in the lair of the Bastards...
I haven't noticed the xp-trouble, and I haven't even run them through whitechin or anything... It was a long rumble through the sewers though, and they are pretty close to 3rd at the moment...
Maybe I'm doing something wrong ;-)
We're having fun though and I'm sooo looking forward to the Sixfold trial... :-)
I had my second session last night as well, we play biweekly too (though we missed last week).
We had one of our old players come back to the fold last night, a pleasant surprise. He also liked the NPC cleric of Iomedae enough that he wants to keep the character for himself, so I wiped his background clean (his story never saw light yet anyway).
All we did was the Arael Rescue, the meeting with Thesing, and a Shadow creature bounty (used the Shadowgarm). Total XPs are now at 2368 per character (includes story awards). My group was semi-heavy with RPing which is always good.
Highlights included...
The exchange with Thessing was hilarious. The female Sorcerer tried pulling one over Thesing about having the horses out to be cleaned for tomorrow's performance, when there was visible evidence of trail dirt and the horses were sweating, nevermind their blood and wounds (they just came back from the Arael rescue).
Thesing took one look at the motley group of armed to the teeth PCs and said "You would have me believe that the four of you are horse handlers?" They did eventually shift his mood one notch for the 900 xp award.
The "Oh sh**!" moment as they left the fence a tad too late and realising that night had come. They tried running full tilt back to the safehouse when they ran into the Shadowgarm. Something along the lines of ... "What a great night for us! 900g!" Then they stared at eachother in horror when they realised that it was night and started running.
Shanwen and one or two Hellknights were killed though. Unavoidable after the Burning Hands and Channel Negative energy, they didnt take any chances.
Observations...
1) I thought the 1500gp value was a hair too much for my group this early into 2nd level. I settled on 900g after they haggled me from 800g. Just a matter of preference here.
2) The rescue was a tad too easy with the 4 mounted hellknights lured away by Gorvio, Larko, and Janiven. The PC Sorcerer used back to back sleep spells disabling quite a few of the knights.
3) The Shadowgarm was way too easy for my 2nd level group to down in a single round despite it having the highest initiative. The SR of 7 wasnt much. I should have used two of them.
Next time will be the whole Bastards thing. Im not sure how im going to do the side houses outside the old temple of Erastil. Being that Arael, Janiven, and a few Children of Westcrown are going as well to prevent any bastards from escaping. I'll either have the PCs go in first and clear one or two of the houses for Arael and crew to snipe from, or have the Rebels do it on their own "off-camera" after the party gets into the temple.
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My second night was just as fruitful. After finishing up the sewers we played through the Arael Rescue and the the Thessing meeting. I tweaked the encounter to playtest the Cavalier rules (which worked wonderfully and brought the encounter up to a more reasonable level of difficulty). The players really enjoyed it too.
The Thessing encounter was another story. One of my players never thinks before acting and pulled a knife out on Thessing's face. After that there was very little the other three could do to change his attitude at all. I'm still trying to decide the ramifications for this during the next part.
Also, you do know that 1,500 GP for a suit of full plate should be divided by two for sale purposes? Just a thought.
The Thessing encounter was another story. One of my players never thinks before acting and pulled a knife out on Thessing's face. After that there was very little the other three could do to change his attitude at all. I'm still trying to decide the ramifications for this during the next part.
Sounds like the PCs definitely made an enemy.
When it gets to the play, he might bring in his own stage hands to try to foil the PCs efforts to survive the trials. I think they will be deadly enough as it is, but for some of the easier ones, perhaps the PCs see Thesing giving signals to change props to have them increase their damage, or have the stage hands cast grease on the floor in a few spots during the combats, etc.
When I introduced Thesing, I had him be conniving and used him as a lead-in to the next adventure. This is from our writeup from that session.
Thesing is furious because he's starring in The Elopement of the Dowager Princess tonight for the Mayor (er Lord Mayor as Mako points out), and he needs the horses the PCs have just completely abused and exhausted (according to him). Wyrm tries to convince him that they simply exercised the horses for him, so they should be energetic and ready for the performance tonight, but Thesing doesn't buy it. Finally Evan steps forward and tries to make a diplomatic case. Thesing seems to get even more upset by that.
After a moment, Thesing collects himself and observes that the group look like they might be adventurers. He's going to be starring in an upcoming play called The Six Trials of Larazod, and they are still trying to cast a few "bit parts". The play calls for a group of adventurers to stand in the back and look the part. He apologizes for his rudeness, and suggests they apply at the Limehouse Theater when the casting call is announced in the upcoming weeks. It is one of the Mayor's (er Lord Mayor's) favorite plays, and performing well may gain his favor. This might even be a special performance since there is talk it will be performed uncut for the first time in memory.
[ Of course, his motivation is that he's furious with the PCs, and he hopes they'll be killed in the play, but he's "acting" like a nice guy for now. I'm also hoping that the PCs will come up with the idea of using the play to get into the Mayor's mansion on their own. I'm going to have Ailyn simply say that they need to get in there somehow, and see if the PCs can connect the dots after I give them a bit more info. ]
Also, you do know that 1,500 GP for a suit of full plate should be divided by two for sale purposes? Just a thought.
When I ran the rescue, my players didn't have time to take the armor from Shanwen. It takes 2-5 minutes to remove full plate, and most of the guys were down only because of color sprays. It was all they could do to free Arael and run. I would think most groups would be in the same boat, unless they went around and killed or tried to tie up all of the Hellknights first.
I don't think my group is going to survive this adventure path for too long. After a TPK in RoRL, you would think they would roll up a fairly balanced party (fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric, perhaps?). No, not at all. We have a rogue (totally fine), ranger (has kind of a glass jaw, seeing as she lacks a Con bonus to her hp) and two sorcerers. The Arael rescue was a mess. Even though they had a good time, both sorcerers wound up unconscious in the negatives and the other two were on their way before their luck changed and they just said,"F*** it, use lethal force." The thing I'm wondering now is if I should send an NPC healer with them just to keep 'em going or make them deal with the party they rolled up.
James, id use an NPC healer type. :) Did your Sorcerer players realise that it may just be time to get a healer on board after the rescue?
Id send an NPC cleric OR a Paladin/Bard with possibly a CLW wand early on, depending on your play style. Oddly, the module pregens contain a Bard and Paladin, no Cleric for a change. Everything up to the Bastards went way too easy for my group, so I dont think a Cleric is all that important early on.
As for your Ranger with a glass jaw (hope she goes Archery :)), try my 100/75/50 rule for HPs in their first three levels. Ive been using it since 2nd edition.
First level (100%) They get Max HP (i think alot of folks do this anyway at 1st lvl).
Second level (75%) For example, if they dont roll 7 or above on a d10, give them a 7. 4 on a d6, 6 on a d8 etc.
Third level (50%) If they dont roll half of whatever the HD they roll, I gove them half. 5 on a d10, 4 on a d8, 3 on a d6 etc.
Hope this helps.
I don't think my group is going to survive this adventure path for too long. After a TPK in RoRL, you would think they would roll up a fairly balanced party (fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric, perhaps?). No, not at all. We have a rogue (totally fine), ranger (has kind of a glass jaw, seeing as she lacks a Con bonus to her hp) and two sorcerers. The Arael rescue was a mess. Even though they had a good time, both sorcerers wound up unconscious in the negatives and the other two were on their way before their luck changed and they just said,"F*** it, use lethal force." The thing I'm wondering now is if I should send an NPC healer with them just to keep 'em going or make them deal with the party they rolled up.
They have two sorcerers - they can suck it up and Use Magic Device with wands of cure light wounds. At 4th level the ranger will be able to use that same wand with perfect reliability.
I don't think my group is going to survive this adventure path for too long. After a TPK in RoRL, you would think they would roll up a fairly balanced party (fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric, perhaps?). No, not at all. We have a rogue (totally fine), ranger (has kind of a glass jaw, seeing as she lacks a Con bonus to her hp) and two sorcerers.
Wow, what a horribly unbalanced party. As a DM, I always say I'll try to accommodate the party the players want to build, although I secretly hope it is balanced to make my life easier.
I'd lean with Sunderstone and go with an NPC paladin to provide melee muscle, act as a flanking partner, and be the healer. A partial wand of CLW also sounds like a must.
Might also think about tweaking some encounters to help play to the party's strengths, although that isn't possible all the time.
They have two sorcerers - they can suck it up and Use Magic Device with wands of cure light wounds. At 4th level the ranger will be able to use that same wand with perfect reliability.
Actually, the ranger can use the wand w/o failure even at 1st level. Check out pg 458 under Spell Trigger.
Just to add to the Paladin choice... Paladin's Mercy ability is very useful.
They have two sorcerers - they can suck it up and Use Magic Device with wands of cure light wounds. At 4th level the ranger will be able to use that same wand with perfect reliability.
Actually, the ranger can use the wand w/o failure even at 1st level. Check out pg 458 under Spell Trigger.
No he won't - he doesn't HAVE a spell list until 4th level. As far as I can tell, you don't get a spell list until you can actually cast a spell from that list, so Paladins and Rangers shouldn't be able to use spell trigger items until then.
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No he won't - he doesn't HAVE a spell list until 4th level. As far as I can tell, you don't get a spell list until you can actually cast a spell from that list, so Paladins and Rangers shouldn't be able to use spell trigger items until then.
This is correct. There's a thread out there in one of the other forums about exactly this and it was confirmed by a developer I believe.
No he won't - he doesn't HAVE a spell list until 4th level. As far as I can tell, you don't get a spell list until you can actually cast a spell from that list, so Paladins and Rangers shouldn't be able to use spell trigger items until then.This is correct. There's a thread out there in one of the other forums about exactly this and it was confirmed by a developer I believe.
Strange. The Core rulebook goes out of its way to say you can do it.
Spell Trigger: Spell trigger activation is similar to spell completion, but it’s even simpler. No gestures or spell finishing is needed, just a special knowledge of spellcasting that an appropriate character would know, and a single word that must be spoken. Spell trigger items can be used by anyone whose class can cast the corresponding spell. This is the case even for a character who can’t actually cast spells, such as a 3rd-level paladin. The user must still determine what spell is stored in the item before she can activate it. Activating a spell trigger item is a standard action and does not provoke attacks of opportunity.
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I've run 2 sessions so far, The party of 5 (drow rogue, half-elf ranger, dwarf druid, human paladin and half elf fighter/wizard) have so far followed the adventure as planned.
Session One: the first session saw them (-1 player) diving into the sewers and enjoying the first 4-5 encounters there. I used the sewer encounter generator presented on these forums and ended up with 96 locations before the exit on medium XP progression. by location 25 and the 6th encounter the players where getting bored and I found myself trying to add fluff and hooks on the fly to make the sewers more interesting.
Session Two: I continued with the sewer encounters for the early stages until the 5th player arrived later than afternoon. by this point the adventure had really stagnated and the party where looking for alternate ways out of the sewer including tunnelling through the sewer walls!. By now the party was still a fair amount of XP short of second so to combat this I simply presented the exit early and awarded 2,000 XP each for story award.
Once outside the sewers they skipped the pleasantries with the Westcrown rebels. I realised to my horror that the passing of the sewers had left the players with more boredom than I had imagined. This resulted in the players agreeing to call themselves the "Children Of Cheliax Knight's Society" !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Laughing it off I pushed the adventure forward to the rescue which went remarkably well, the party chose spells to suit the situation with darkness from the Drow, obscuring mist from the druid and sleep spells flying every which way. To my dismay however, the curse of the rebel naming struck again as they defaced their victims and the caravan with their initials! :(
It could be a couple weeks (with the Christmas holidays preventing the group from getting together) before I get to continue this, hopefully by then the silliness has subsided.
I've run 2 sessions so far, The party of 5 (drow rogue, half-elf ranger, dwarf druid, human paladin and half elf fighter/wizard) have so far followed the adventure as planned.
Session One: the first session saw them (-1 player) diving into the sewers and enjoying the first 4-5 encounters there. I used the sewer encounter generator presented on these forums and ended up with 96 locations before the exit on medium XP progression. by location 25 and the 6th encounter the players where getting bored and I found myself trying to add fluff and hooks on the fly to make the sewers more interesting.
Session Two: I continued with the sewer encounters for the early stages until the 5th player arrived later than afternoon. by this point the adventure had really stagnated and the party where looking for alternate ways out of the sewer including tunnelling through the sewer walls!. By now the party was still a fair amount of XP short of second so to combat this I simply presented the exit early and awarded 2,000 XP each for story award.
Once outside the sewers they skipped the pleasantries with the Westcrown rebels. I realised to my horror that the passing of the sewers had left the players with more boredom than I had imagined. This resulted in the players agreeing to call themselves the "Children Of Cheliax Knight's Society" !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Laughing it off I pushed the adventure forward to the rescue which went remarkably well, the party chose spells to suit the situation with darkness from the Drow, obscuring mist from the druid and sleep spells flying every which way. To my dismay however, the curse of the rebel naming struck again as they defaced their victims and the caravan with their initials! :(
It could be a couple weeks (with the Christmas holidays preventing the group from getting together) before I get to continue this, hopefully by then the silliness has subsided.
The Game Masters' Bane : Bored Players. CCKS ... sicc an advanced Otyugh named Slurp on 'em for that.
The Game Masters' Bane : Bored Players. CCKS ... sicc an advanced Otyugh named...
Not sure if that name is better or worse than my players' first choice: The Rebel Alliance. Unfortunately, that's the sort of name that gets Order of the Rack Hellknights whipped up into a lather. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed (with a bit of brow beating by me), and they opted for The People's Front of Westcrown (NOT The Westcrown People's Front [Splitters!]).
They did, however, opt to take a variant of the eye of Aroden as their symbol. It's an everwatching eye, wreathed in flame, meant to inspire hope(?) in the populace.