I guess PCs look tasty to the local wildlife of Saventh-Yhi but their taste is rather unappealing!
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RIP Voren. Those are a lot of painful status effects for a party to get hit with.
Updated the death sheet.You did mark him as the stone golem, right? He took two full-round attacks from the stone golem, and that 80 hit points was more than his total even if you don't count the Lightning Bolt.
I counted it as Sozolthola, but I'll change it. Sozolthola is technically from CoSS while the golems are from VoM, right?
Also, that is an awesome way to bail the party out :D
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9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (50%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (30%), Itombu (27%), a 2-way tie between the astradaemon and the Coils of Ydersius (20%), and the Green God (17%).
RIP Voren. Those are a lot of painful status effects for a party to get hit with.
Updated the death sheet.You did mark him as the stone golem, right? He took two full-round attacks from the stone golem, and that 80 hit points was more than his total even if you don't count the Lightning Bolt.
I counted it as Sozolthola, but I'll change it. Sozolthola is technically from CoSS while the golems are from VoM, right?
Also, that is an awesome way to bail the party out :D
Correct. They're getting both the end encounter from Book 3 and a nasty encounter from Book 4 at once, both because of how the game played out and because I wanted to see whether they could tactically deal with the challenge. It looks like they will, but Ms. Bail-Out is showing up in 6 rounds, just in case.
And a maxed-out angry waifu is just a scary, scary thing. I'm betting on the golem dropping in one full-round attack and a follow-up hit. And it's not like the golem's going to hurt her with only 100-200 hit points of damage. Waifu is big-boned.
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In 6 rounds, it looks like the entire party will be a red stain on the pavers. Might want to fudge that ETA.
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Name: Templari Bourne
Race: Female nagaji
Classes/Levels: Paladin of Iomedae 10
Adventure: Vaults of Madness
Location: The First Vault
Catalyst: Poor mobility combined with poor visibility
In the continuing battle with Sozothala and the stone golem, Templari and the grippli barbarian decided to switch places, since the barbarian's poor armor class was sure to get him killed by the golem, while Templari's lack of Darkvision ensured Sozothala could comfortably hit her with his wand of Enervate all day long.
Unfortunately, with all the corpses littering the doorway between the two rooms they were fighting in, Templari couldn't quite reach the golem. The golem reached her, however, but only managed to slam her once. Unfortunately, already wounded by her battle with Sozothala and the flame oracle's party-hitting Fireball, this put Templari dangerously low on hit points. Even worse, I was having Sozothala plan his moves one turn in advance, so he stepped around the smoke cloud the party had conveniently provided him, prepared his Scorching Ray, I looked for targets... and there was no one except Templari to hit.
The 33 points put her to exactly negative her CON. In such situations, I rule that she has until her next action for someone to heal her. Unfortunately, no one could make it in time (the flame oracle was busy summoning a devil, of all things, which was pretty hilarious all in all -- "Sorry, I was busy summoning a devil so I couldn't save the paladin of Iomedae"), so Templari expired on the floor in the middle of the battle.
I do want to be crystal-clear: The flame oracle didn't have an action between the hit and the death. It was just funny that she didn't have an action because after a lot of delays, she finally decided to take an action just before Templari went down, and that action was to summon a devil... in front of a paladin of Iomedae. Nice!
To add insult to injury, the barbarian lost a bunch of levels to Enervate as well and had to flee the room, so Sozothala, left alone to his own devices, used Animate Dead on the paladin's corpse to send a Templari zombie after the aforementioned flame oracle.
Put this death squarely on Sozothala's shoulders; his Enervates dropped a lot of Templari's hit points, and his Scorching Rays finished her off. The flame oracle did help quite a bit with that fireball, though. Adding another notch to Xethos' belt of dead PCs.
EDIT: And the player has chosen to retire Templari in favor of a new character, so this is a "permadeath".
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In 6 rounds, it looks like the entire party will be a red stain on the pavers. Might want to fudge that ETA.
Other than Templari, they managed to (barely) survive. And Bara did next to nothing. She showed up, Hooken finally got up the courage to shoot because he could do so from behind her bulk, and he crit the golem something awful (139 points in 4 hits), then finished it off the next round.
She DID eat poor Sozothala something awful, but once the golem was down he was on the losing end of that fight anyway. He might have killed Malek, who was one Enervate away from death, but at the time she met up with him Malek was hiding and Athelya was introducing him to the wonders of a flame oracle's nigh-limitless Fireballs.
So the *only* reason she changed the game was that she gave Hooken the gumption to shoot.
Once Hooken started shooting, it was all over.
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Good to hear that Malek didn't...croak.
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Second death, same player. I'm building a streak . . .
Name: Gleep
Race: Gelatinous cube
Class: Gelatinous cube 3
Adventure: Souls for Smuggler's Shiv
Location: Temple of Blood
Catalyst: Yarzoth's dominated personThe Gory Details:
One note: You might be wondering how a gelatinous cube is a playable character. Gleep had an empathic link with Chester, the party cleric, though which she could issue commands and also share emotions with the cube. Were it not for their bond, Gleep would have probably eaten someone in the party.
Fresh from their final gibbering mouther fight, my party burst into the blood temple and saw Yarzoth. She started talking about her plans, lulling the two spellcasters into a strange trance. Gleep slapped the skald for 9 points of damage (~half his hp) to get him out of the trance, and actually ended the spell for both casters.
While Gleep was doing that, Yarzoth hypnotized the party muscle (a dwarf slayer) and ordered him to kill his friends. The slayer dropped the skald with one blow, thanks to Gleep's prior attack. Gleep realized Gleep had probably doomed the skald to die, and remorsefully slid out in front to try to draw the slayer's attacks. All this time, Gleep was sending empathic messages to Chester to explain Gleep's actions (pasted below). Gleep successfully drew the slayer's attacks, and was AOOed for enough damage that Gleep fell unconscious. Yarzoth called the slayer to her side, leaving only Chester standing.
Chester healed the skald, and they GTFOed as the skeletons fell on Gleep. Gleep's sentient protoplasm was scattered across the floor, and Gleep's life force ebbed. Even as the skeleton's claws melted away in Gleep's slime, the cube died.
There was this whole thing with the skeletons being cathartically smashed to pieces by the Cleansing Chamber and a pit trap, but that's a story for...
Damn you for making me feel sorrow for the death of a gelatinous cube.
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One death, one honorable mention:
Name: Athelya
Race: Female Dhampir
Classes/Levels: Flame Oracle 11
Adventure: Vaults of Madness
Location: The Vault of Silence
Catalyst: "Interesting" tactics... and TIGERS!
Name: Kwai Chang
Race: Male Human
Classes/Levels: Monk 11
Adventure: Vaults of Madness
Location: The Vault of Silence
Catalyst: Sheer ludicrous bravery in the face of certain death
After losing 30 (yes. Three-zero. THIRTY) levels to the spectres in the entrance to the vault and having to spend thousands of gold getting themselves Restored, the party came up with a new plan for exploring the vault: Athelya, being immune to drains, and Kwai Chang, being ludicrously fast, would go far, far, FAR ahead of the rest of the party, seek out those nasty life-suckers, and then run back to the party.
Yeah, it was all kinds of interesting. Considering they'd found a blood-drained, skinned serpentfolk just outside the cave, you'd think they'd have been thinking, "What happens if both of us get Dominated?", but not even a Magic Circle Against Evil on them. Buffs are not a strong suit for my group.
Their next "interesting" choice was to move forward in total darkness, so Kwai Chang couldn't see a blessed thing. Athelya's Perception roll isn't exactly amazing (I think it's +7), and they were relying on her entirely to lead the blind monk through the maze. For even more reasons unknown, the elven ranger rode his wolf animal companion along with them, bumping the walls with the rest of the group.
The three-quarters blind group (the human, the elf, and the wolf) arrived at the massive chamber with the tigers. In addition to her low Perception, Athelya's low Stealth ensured that the tigers knew they were there well before they knew about the tigers. So the tigers waited for someone to come within charge range. In difficult terrain, that wasn't all that far, so I figured the party would spot them, retreat, and do a standard bottleneck battle. Didn't think it would be much of a fight, honestly.
Instead, they decided to light a torch so now they were clearly visible to the tigers, but the tigers were out of the human's normal-light vision, the elf was hanging back just far enough they were beyond his 12-square vision, and Athelya failed her Perception roll to spot the crouching tigers. (No hidden dragons, fortunately.)
In her final moments, Athelya walked a full move forward into the room. Alone.
Two of the tigers charged up and hit her. I first rolled full attacks, figuring they'd have Pounce, but I double-checked with I didn't see Pounce on their sheets, and, sure enough, zombies can't Pounce. Even fast zombies. So she was dead, then she was alive. Those tigers hit for a LOT of damage, and +20 attacks when no one in the room has an AC of over 22 is just Bad.
We went into initiatives, the tigers rolled low... and Athelya rolled lower.
So the ranger ordered his wolf to carry him away, then took a full round attack on one of the tigers before his wolf took him on a full-round retreat. Kwai Chang and Athelya were alone with the tigers. Kwai Chang, being a gentleman, decided not to leave Athelya alone to her fate, but instead used two Xi points to jump 20' into the air, then activated his Boots of Levitation and proceeded all the way up to the 40' ceiling. I guess so he could watch the carnage?
Two tigers took full-round attacks on Athelya. Not a single miss. 155 points later, she was a bloody pool on the floor. The third tiger jumped at Kwai Chang, but even a natural 20 on its Acrobatics roll wasn't enough to get Kwai Chang, hovering at 35'.
Curiously, once the tigers had moved down the corridor to find the rest of the party in a thoroughly-defensible position, Kwai Chang decided to descend to take on the lone remaining tiger mano-a-tigero. It was a noble act -- by distracting it, he ensured I wouldn't mangle Athelya's body beyond the capabilities of a Raise Dead spell. Unfortunately, a second tiger was now equidistant between the grippli barbarian and Kwai Chang. I told everyone that, as non-intelligent creatures, it would be unfair for me to choose for them so I would roll a die. 1-3 would be Kwai Chang, 4-6 would be the barbarian. The barbarian's player said, "I don't think I've ever rooted for the GM to roll high before."
And the die landed in the middle of the table... a 1.
Two tigers attacked Kwai Chang, and 99 damage was enough to drop him to -13 hit points. His CON of 14 made things look dire.
Sure enough, the next round he failed his stabilization roll and dropped to -14. Technically a death.
But I house rule that if you're at exactly negative CON, you have until your next action to be saved. The party had been mopping the walls with the tigers, as expected, so the bard managed to get in (right next to the lone remaining tiger) and get in a Cure Light Wounds to save Kwai Chang according to my own house rules. I was looking forward to seeing whether I could one-round a noble bard, but Hasted barbarian and ranger? Yeah, tiger didn't last long enough to get to do anything.
And so the death count continues to rise...
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Name: Kwai Chang
Race: Male Human
Classes/Levels: Monk 11
Adventure: Vaults of Madness
Location: The Pathfinder Camp
Catalyst: Just plain bad luck, dire tigers, and TWO GM errors...
Sometimes, it's your time to go.
The party returned to the Pathfinder camp after a day of exploration to find it destroyed, with a pair of dire tigers gnawing on the corpses of their fallen comrades. Needless to say, they chose to engage.
11th-level party? CR 8 monsters? What could possibly go wrong?
Well, this particular tiger got ONE action in its entire existence. And that action was to charge Kwai Chang. Its Pounce gave it all 3 attacks. The bite was a crit, and both claws hit. Unfortunately for Kwai Chang, I misread the rake rules so I applied the rake damage on the turn of the charge instead of the subsequent turn.
So I rolled up 4d6+16+8d4+32. In Bizarro land of the "Roll20 hates Kwai Chang even more", I got a total of 102. Which doesn't make much sense, but it's at the edge of mathematical possibility. Aha. Yep. Checking the logs, it used 4d6+16+16d4+32. Big difference.
So Kwai Chang died, Athelya brought him back with Breath of Life, and looks like I need to give them back a scroll and 1000 gold pieces on that one.
Sometimes, you just make mistakes...
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I have a feeling your group is going to radically change the Vaults of Madness death distribution. Though The Thousand Fangs Below certainly seems like it could go wrong a number of ways . . .
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (41%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (30%), Itombu (27%), a 2-way tie between the astradaemon and the Coils of Ydersius (20%), and the Green God (17%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons now constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi, Itombu, the Green God, Gbala, a six-way tie between TTFB encounters, and the Avatar of the Serpent God.
I have a feeling your group is going to radically change the Vaults of Madness death distribution. Though The Thousand Fangs Below certainly seems like it could go wrong a number of ways . . .
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (41%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (30%), Itombu (27%), a 2-way tie between the astradaemon and the Coils of Ydersius (20%), and the Green God (17%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons now constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi, Itombu, the Green God, Gbala, a six-way tie between TTFB encounters, and the Avatar of the Serpent God.
What surprises me about that is that Gbala really wasn't that dangerous at all to my party; I think it might have had to do with them making tons of noise just as they entered the trap room and then moving through it anyway -- the "pincer" maneuver was a fail for them. Nylithati and the lacedons did indeed get their share of kills. And Itombu, ah, Itombu! Either the party does the right thing and it's a no-fight, or they don't and it's a TPK. I don't know what the heck he's doing in that part of the AP...
...and we all know what *I* did with the Green God...| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Rakes in themselves can be used in "certain conditions" with grappling being the basic condition built directly into rake. Pounce adds another trigger condition in the form of charge.
Rake (Ex) A creature with this special attack gains extra natural attacks under certain conditions, typically when it grapples its foe. In addition to the options available to all grapplers, a monster with the rake ability gains two free claw attacks that it can use only against a grappled foe. The bonus and damage caused by these attacks is included in the creature's description. A monster with the rake ability must begin its turn already grappling to use its rake—it can't begin a grapple and rake in the same turn.
Pounce (Ex) When a creature with this special attack makes a charge, it can make a full attack (including rake attacks if the creature also has the rake ability).
You can't charge against creature that you had in grapple at the beginning of your turn (aside of weird action shenanigans), so the last sentence of pounce must be an alternate condition for use of rake.
They are extra attacks and require attack rolls, though, so pouncing dire kitteh has five attacks. They can miss, but they can also crit...
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Thanks. So it's actually only ONE GM error, and that was plain old typing. Ah, well, the party's so inured to dead party members they didn't even pause to mourn him...
Rakes in themselves can be used in "certain conditions" with grappling being the basic condition built directly into rake. Pounce adds another trigger condition in the form of charge.
** spoiler omitted **
They are extra attacks and require attack rolls, though, so pouncing dire kitteh has five attacks. They can miss, but they can also crit...
Thanks, I didn't realize my Allosaur druid was missing out on rakes.
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What surprises me about that is that Gbala really wasn't that dangerous at all to my party; I think it might have had to do with them making tons of noise just as they entered the trap room and then moving through it anyway -- the "pincer" maneuver was a fail for them. Nylithati and the lacedons did indeed get their share of kills. And Itombu, ah, Itombu! Either the party does the right thing and it's a no-fight, or they don't and it's a TPK. I don't know what the heck he's doing in that part of the AP...
...and we all know what *I* did with the Green God...
So, I have a party of a 6th-level cleric, a cleric 3/barbarian 3, an Iron Caster fighter 4/brawler 1 (basically just a flexible fighter who can cast some mid-level spell-like abilities a few times per day), a 6th-level conjurer, and a 5th-level blaster sorcerer. Plus an NPC archer ranger 5, Athyra, and Jaji. Most encounters are easy for them, even without the ranger helping, and they haven't had to face a single Will save since the chemosits.
. . . How stupid am I for thinking about giving Itombu a mesmerist level?
While the party was negotiating with Izon, the hunter PC flew off to take care of some personal business (in-game and out). He was forced to ground by a patrol of Udefharn and captured by the driders.
In an effort to force the PC's to do her bidding Vedavrex contacted the PC's and informed them she return their companion unharmed if they rescued her brother from Izon.
The PC's of course attempted to kill her O.K. Corral style. They failed leaving their companion to his fate!!!
Korgan (Dwarven Ranger/Barbarian) - Charged up and climbed the cliff to reach the escarpment on the approach to the the Hunter's Maze, Pointe du Hoc style, all the while taking mass volleys of arrows and ray attacks from the Daemons from at both ramps. Succeeded in cresting the top and took down one of the Urdefharen Skirmishers before a final volley fell him. His heroic charge allowed the balance of the party to finish off the skirmishers in the ruins, reach the barricade and clear the escarpment.
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Name: Kells
Race: Half-Elven
Classes/levels: Hunter
Adventure: Sanctum of the Serpent God
Location: The Inner Sanctum
The Gory Details: (not-optional)
Using his fast strike ability Ydersius charged and crit on both bite attacks for upwards of 100pts. The hunter attempted to acrobatics out of the threatened area but failed and is awesome blowed with a tail into a nearby brazier taking some fire damage and knocked prone. On Ydersius next turn the hunter fails a save vs the ongoing poison and gets hit with fast strike again, one a crit and dies. Ydersius swallows him whole! An epic death at the epic conclusion of this awesome AP
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More souls for the serpent god!
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (39%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (33%), Itombu (27%), a 3-way tie between the astradaemon, the Coils of Ydersius, and the zombie dire tigers in VoM (17%), and the Green God (16%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons now constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi, Itombu, the Green God, Gbala, a seven-way tie between TTFB encounters, and the Avatar of the Serpent God.
215 deaths have been recorded so far.
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Hey folks, it's me again.
And yes, I've killed KC's character, again.
Name: n/a; Title: The Grisgol
Race: Duergar
Class: Wizard (conjurer) 6
Adventure: Racing to Ruin
Location: Area S - The Enclosure Wall
Catalyst: Homebrewing a challenging encounter, plus a "sticky situation"
The Gory Details (obligatory):
The party arrived on the eastern edge of Tazion at the beginning of this session, and saw a lake that was swallowing up much of the wall ahead of them. When they got closer, they saw that there was something shining on a small stone island in the middle of the lake, near a place where the wall had eroded below the lake's surface. The party cleric asked the Grisgol to take her hand and trust her, even though the Grisgol had been having trust issues lately as a result of being body-snatched by Itombu, so the Grisgol took the cleric's hand and was instantly teleported to that tiny stone island in the middle of the lake. The light was coming from some sort of enchanted gem - jet, the cleric thought.
And then suddenly the surface of the lake pooled away and three enormous skeletons (two feline, one elephantine), covered in tar, bulged out and attacked the two people currently on the island. The Grisgol and the cleric immediately fell unconscious, and a drawn-out fight ensued.
Highlights:
- The amusing notion of making the sorcerer's familiar alone fly a wand of cure light wounds over to the island surrounded by Large and Huge skeletons with +17 and +20 attacks
- The Grisgol waking up from a channel, going invisible, and trying to summon water elementals, only to be knocked out again before completing the spell by one of the cat skeletons
- The cleric waking up and immediately being knocked back out
- Jaji the deinonychus trying to jump into combat and landing in the tar
- The cleric-barbarian rolling two natural ones on her 2d6 channel
- The fighter literally never being attacked and only once getting to fight in melee
- Everyone using up their dimension doors to get to the fight and then being unable to leave
- A pile of 4 people on the island, all stuck together by tar, with the jet lying underneath them
Now she's facing the afterlife - as a duergar who deserted her duties to Droskar for many months.
Name: Chester A. Arthur
Race: Dwarve
Class: Cleric of Keltheald 3/elemental kin barbarian 3
Adventure: Racing to Ruin
Location: Area S - The Enclosure Wall
Catalyst: Being the only one left
Details: Chester took a while to get to the fight, and was teleported to the wall rather than the island by the (iron caster) fighter. Then she jumped the gap to the island and started trying to kill the last skeleton remaining. It devoted all its energies on her, in turn, since she was the only conscious creature in reach. She actually withstood one round of full attack before going unconscious in the second round. Then, she wound up very near to death.
But in my games, we have a rule that you get one deific intervention per player character - also known as a "lifeline." Chester worships the empyreal lord of travel, vistas, and sunsets, Keltheald. So she was at one negative hit point off from her Con when the sorcerer's familiar suddenly started glowing with a light very similar in color to the setting sun, and moved at double its speed. For those counting at home, that's 10 feet rather than 5! Which was enough to get to Chester in time to use fast healing before she died outright. If not for that intervention, Chester would've died.
Name: Runeshell
Race: Tortoise
Class: Newly minted familiar of the sorcerer
Adventure: Racing to Ruin
Location: Area S - The Enclosure Wall
Catalyst: Sacrifice, hubris
Details: Runeshell was for a long time just the animal friend of the sorcerer, because she didn't take a bloodline that allowed a familiar. Before this session she used her free retrain 1/adventure to swap out her heavenly fire celestial bloodline ability and make Runeshell her familiar. Now imbued with intelligence, the ability to speak like five different languages, and a minor ability to provide fast healing, Runeshell was perhaps a little more audacious than warranted by his very very bad statistics. He got stuck on the island in the pile of unconscious people, where he would have been killed if I hadn't done some GM fudging.
Then he was healed and evacuated by the Grisgol's invisible servant. Unfortunately, when the Grisgol died, the invisible servant disappeared, and Runeshell fell onto one of the still-protruding bones of the destroyed elephantine skeleton. At first he just tried to retreat into his shell, but then he realized there was a lot of blood on the island at that moment, and went over to try to save Chester. With a touch of Keltheald's grace, he was able to get to the cleric-barbarian and start giving her fast healing (which only keeps going as long as the familiar touches the target, for a maximum of 3 rounds in this case). Chester was stabilized, but Runeshell was now the only conscious creature on the island. And since the skeleton had something like life sense, it wouldn't bother coup de gracing an unconscious person when it could attack a hale, living creature. So it did, and one attack took Runeshell to negative Con and beyond.
Fortunately, he was now glued to Chester by the tar, so he provided two more rounds of fast healing. She kind of uh, sucked the life force out of him.
- Maybe consider how terrain will work when devising encounters??? I did not realize the fighter might not be able to get to the combat (and that archery would be mostly useless) when scaling the CRs.
- Never trust your fellow party members.
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The spreadsheet is now up to date, and I also noticed some errors from early on (now fixed) where I confused different Red Mantis attacks. I'm gonna start linking the source of each death from now on to make auditing easier.
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (39%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (33%), Itombu (28%), a 3-way tie between the astradaemon, the Coils of Ydersius, and the zombie dire tigers in VoM (17%), and the Green God (16%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons now constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi, Itombu, the Green God, Gbala, a seven-way tie between TTFB encounters, and the Avatar of the Serpent God.
214 deaths have been recorded so far.
MORALS:
- Maybe consider how terrain will work when devising encounters??? I did not realize the fighter might not be able to get to the combat (and that archery would be mostly useless) when scaling the CRs.
LOL. I teach the opposite moral: If every PC doesn't have a decent ranged attack that'll readily pierce DR 5, you're all doing to die.
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That's a decent moral, but in this case the question of a good ranged attack only mattered for one PC, the fighter. The ranger who plinked away with arrows and the Athyra who ??? ran around trying to find a way onto the wall are both NPCs. Everyone besides them and the fighter was able to get right up into melee. To their regret.
I think I will put some composite longbows or magic slings in coming loot, though. I honestly did not realize a good ranged weapon wasn't in the fighter's toolbox.
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Name: Kamashi Godtouched
Race: Half-Orc
Classes: Inquisitor 11
Adventure: Vaults of Madness
Location: E7, Moldy Catacombs
Catalyst: Dem bones dem bones dem rawbones
The gory details: Since their encounter with the shadow demon en route to Saventh-Yhi, everything had gone smoothly for the party. Exploring the city had gone fairly smoothly, with none of the tribes inhabiting Saventh-Yhi being able to stand up to the group. Even the fearsome Green God went down with minimal trouble.
Success breeds overconfidence.
After clearing several of the Vaults, the group came to the conclusion that they were not a major threat. Having cleared the first five vaults in five days, the group decided that they were still in good enough shape to clear the sixth without resting.
The spectres in the entryway messed the group up pretty badly, but after a brief return to camp for Restoration (thanks Nkechi!) they came back again without resting for more punishment. Rushing right through the trapped chamber, the group came upon a hideous skinless vampire who took one look at them and retreated down the hall.
The party pursued, with the heavy melee-focused characters hanging back to self-buff while the Magus and Arcanist rushed forward. In short order the Magus was tripping balls and the Arcanist was nauseated, energy drained, and grappled, with both having taken a fair amount of damage from the Rawbones' vomit gore ability.
Kamashi rushed forward to the rescue while the party's Ranger provided fire support, and in short order the Terkow was cut down. This gave the Magus and the Arcanist time to retreat while the Druid moved forward to support Kamashi against the remaining Rawbones.
Unfortunately, the Rawbones continued vomiting gore, and soon the repeated shotgun blasts of blood and bone began to take their toll. Kamashi went down, out cold, and the last Rawbones had just enough time to toss off one last Vomit before going down itself. This was enough to kill Kamashi, and left the druid in pretty rough shape as well.
Fortunately, with the help of the flying Magus, the party's Oracle was able to get into position to use Breath of Life to bring back Kamashi before a round had passed, but the death still totally counts!
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Name: Kwai Chang
Race: Male Monk
Classes/Levels: Monk 13
Adventure: The Thousand Fangs Below
Location: The Cave of Spiders
Catalyst: Pretending to be a tank
There really isn't much to tell here. Kwai Chang was scouting a bit ahead of the rest of the party, and the vagabond spiders' Tremorsense allowed them to detect him. A natural 20 on one of their web attacks and Kwai Chang was glued to the floor with webbing.
The next 2 rounds were... curious... to say the least. As the first spider walked up and hit Kwai Chang for 42 points of damage, he chose to forego Abundant Step in favor of an Escape Artist attempt. His natural 2 did nothing to help. The flame oracle cast Burning Hands on the webbing, figuring Kwai Chang's Evasion would save him. It did, but the Burning Hands didn't do enough damage to burn the webs away.
So... knowing full well that Kwai Chang was trapped, that the spiders did 40+ points per hit, that two of them were approaching Kwai Chang, and that he didn't have enough hit points to survive those two hits, the rest of the party... stood back and buffed.
So Kwai Chang spent his next round trying to use Escape Artist again. I suggested, "Try rolling higher than a 2 this time."
He obliged by rolling a 3.
And the spiders walked up, hit him twice, and sent him to -24 hit points.
The flame oracle's Breath of Life prevented this from being a perma-death, but it really was funny watching the party stand back and watch Kwai Chang get eaten. I suppose they must have found him irritating or something...
And this is why scouts two scouts (one a move action ahead mayhaps) is better than one very dead (for a little bit) monk scout :)
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And this is why scouts two scouts (one a move action ahead mayhaps) is better than one very dead (for a little bit) monk scout :)
LOL. Or maybe, just maybe, it shows that if you have something with a 100% chance of working (Abundant Step) and something with a 50% chance of working (Escape Artist), you might want to give up trying to show off and just get out of there.
Two full-round actions and two failed Escape Artist checks *after* verifying with me that Abundant Step would work just fine struck me as... overconfident...
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I was trying to avoid that giant spider in the room...LOL...
::fails Will save::
I guess our monk is note quite as wise as he needed to be just then...
OK, got that outa my system, many pardons if I offended Kwai Chang's player...just being silly, not trying to be an ass-hat.
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I was trying to avoid that giant spider in the room...LOL...
::fails Will save::
I guess our monk is note quite as wise as he needed to be just then...
OK, got that outa my system, many pardons if I offended Kwai Chang's player...just being silly, not trying to be an ass-hat.
"Up 'till now, the soup has been fine" (A seven year old boy had grown up and never said a word. Everything else about him was normal, but he just didn't speak. One night at dinner, his mother asked him how he liked the food, and to his astonishment he looked up and replied, 'The soup was too salty.' Amazed, the parents asked him, if he could speak, why he had never said anything before. He replied, "Up 'till now, the soup has been fine')
And with that, I humbly submit my first post.
Along this lines, up until now, Kwai Chang had done really well at lots of various types of saves, has improved evasion, an outlandish Acrobatics bonus, and a handy number of built-in monkish buffs. But the Ki points? Ooooh, those are like gold. I only have 7 (I used my level-up bonuses for extra skills and feats). I really need them. I plan out the battles, especially the big ones like the spiders, with how many Ki Extra Flurry attacks, Wholeness of Body heals, Extra Speed movements, etc that I will need. And I can't (usually) use up the last Ki point - in case it is needed for damage reduction. And Abundant Step takes two of those puppies, So I tend to conserve them. And this was to be weighed against .... what? ... an Escape Artist roll? Easy schmeasy. Or so I thought. Sometimes the dice just don't like one.
The other thing that had me drooling, so I reallllly wanted to stay in the battle and not just vanish, was an extra +12 on trip attempts for a spider (for a +30 total, and that's not including the buffs from the party). Granted these guys were gargantuan, so had a large CMD, but it would have a fun challenge indeed. Throw in immunity to poison, and I was ready to go. Then I go and roll a 2. Followed by a 3. (The usual "meh!" emoji just doesn't cut it here). They teach us special stress-reducing techniques at the monastery for just such occasions.
No offense taken. I like the commentary banter. You'd have to try really hard for me to consider you an ass-hat :-) Cheers.
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I was trying to avoid that giant spider in the room...LOL...
::fails Will save::
I guess our monk is note quite as wise as he needed to be just then...
OK, got that outa my system, many pardons if I offended Kwai Chang's player...just being silly, not trying to be an ass-hat.
"Up 'till now, the soup has been fine" (A seven year old boy had grown up and never said a word. Everything else about him was normal, but he just didn't speak. One night at dinner, his mother asked him how he liked the food, and to his astonishment he looked up and replied, 'The soup was too salty.' Amazed, the parents asked him, if he could speak, why he had never said anything before. He replied, "Up 'till now, the soup has been fine')
And with that, I humbly submit my first post.
Along this lines, up until now, Kwai Chang had done really well at lots of various types of saves, has improved evasion, an outlandish Acrobatics bonus, and a handy number of built-in monkish buffs. But the Ki points? Ooooh, those are like gold. I only have 7 (I used my level-up bonuses for extra skills and feats). I really need them. I plan out the battles, especially the big ones like the spiders, with how many Ki Extra Flurry attacks, Wholeness of Body heals, Extra Speed movements, etc that I will need. And I can't (usually) use up the last Ki point - in case it is needed for damage reduction. And Abundant Step takes two of those puppies, So I tend to conserve them. And this was to be weighed against .... what? ... an Escape Artist roll? Easy schmeasy. Or so I thought. Sometimes the dice just don't like one.
The other thing that had me drooling, so I reallllly wanted to stay in the battle and not just vanish, was an extra +12 on trip attempts for a spider (for a +30 total, and that's not including the buffs from the party). Granted these guys were gargantuan, so had a large CMD, but it would have a fun challenge indeed. Throw in immunity to poison, and I was ready to go. Then I go and roll a 2. Followed...
Can you tell there's an adult in my kids' group? ;-)
Welcome to the boards, monkman =)
I had noticed :) LOL
Hey, we all have our moments, I managed to get my awesome Vishkanya divine hunter paladin killed because I went to aid an ally, without any of my gear.
What I thought was a "go find someone quick" turned into "our worst foes just found us and I am wearing a dress, yeah, no other stuff just my clothes and boots"
Though to be fair, while I was executed, my last act was to destroy the evil bugger who did me in, seems paladin noble sacrifice blood is holy, and melted the guy who cut my throat while I was tied to a post.
If ya gotta go, may as well go out being friggin awesome!
Didn't even mind dying, as it was a noble death, and then I wrote up a drug addled elf storm druid, and had a BLAST playing him the rest of the game. I saved the entire party several times, the best being when I used fog cloud to blind a serious demon (all my lightning was useless, could not get through SR, of course, fog cloud, not subject to SR :) ) and while the demon was not taking damage, the tower roof he was standing on could and did...hehehe score one for the good guys!
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"Up 'till now, the soup has been fine" (A seven year old boy had grown up and never said a word. Everything else about him was normal, but he just didn't speak. One night at dinner, his mother asked him how he liked the food, and to his astonishment he looked up and replied, 'The soup was too salty.' Amazed, the parents asked him, if he could speak, why he had never said anything before. He replied, "Up 'till now, the soup has been fine')I was trying to avoid that giant spider in the room...LOL...
::fails Will save::
I guess our monk is note quite as wise as he needed to be just then...
OK, got that outa my system, many pardons if I offended Kwai Chang's player...just being silly, not trying to be an ass-hat.
Polish version of the joke has "because there was juice to every dinner" as a punch line but otherwise works the same.
Welcome to the madhouse, madhouse even comparing to your party antics.
Along this lines, up until now, Kwai Chang had done really well at lots of various types of saves, has improved evasion, an outlandish Acrobatics bonus, and a handy number of built-in monkish buffs. But the Ki points? Ooooh, those are like gold. I only have 7 (I used my level-up bonuses for extra skills and feats). I really need them. I plan out the battles, especially the big ones like the spiders, with how many Ki Extra Flurry attacks, Wholeness of Body heals, Extra Speed movements, etc that I will need. And I can't (usually) use up the last Ki point - in case it is needed for damage reduction. And Abundant Step takes two of those puppies, So I tend to conserve them. And this was to be weighed against .... what? ... an Escape Artist roll? Easy schmeasy. Or so I thought. Sometimes the dice just don't like one.
Once a monk in our party was hit with disintegrate from an enemy mage. "That's easy!" He exclaimed after hearing the DC of the saving throw and promptly turned into a pile of dust (that was 3rd edition with the very unforgiving destroyed on a failed Fortitude save) as he rolled a natural 1.
On another occasion, in different game with mostly different party I was hit for a bit over 50 points of damage, a meager fraction of total hit points of my paladin/fighter/owner of every possible feat increasing saving throws. Ah, I said, I only fail the saving throw against massive damage on natural 1. Guess what I immediately rolled. That was a shame, as we were fighting a bunch of evil guys nth time, up to that moment I was the one who survived every fight and carried bodies (or shuffled the dust) of my comrades to safety. We got a portable resurrection altar (that was Warcraft game, long before World Of Warcraft was released) in that game from priests in a hidden temple.
The other thing that had me drooling, so I reallllly wanted to stay in the battle and not just vanish, was an extra +12 on trip attempts for a spider (for a +30 total, and that's not including the buffs from the party). Granted these guys were gargantuan, so had a large CMD...
And a +12 bonus to CMD against trip attempts for extra legs.
Though once I decided that I WILL grapple that Large earth elemental that I can't harm with my short swords anyway. I succeeded but then those pesky companions of mine simply blasted it away before I could do anything useful... :(
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Polish version of the joke has "because there was juice to every dinner" as a punch line but otherwise works the same.Incredible.
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (42%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (33%), Itombu (28%), the vagabond spiders (25%), a 2-way tie between the astradaemon and the the Coils of Ydersius (17%), and the Green God (16%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons now constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi (31), Itombu (14), the Green God (7), Gbala (8), the vagabond spiders (2), and the Avatar of the Serpent God (4).
215 deaths have been recorded so far.
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Name: Narlock
Race: Female Human (Azlanti)
Classes/Levels: Bard 14
Adventure: The Thousand Fangs Below
Location: The Fortress of a Thousand Fangs
Catalyst: An amazingly disorganized retreat... and serpentfolk officers
(a) Heard quite a bit of movement down the hall and decided to go in anyway
(b) Had their "pet" froghemoth rip the bars away without any kind of Silence field to keep such activities quiet
(c) Did not have any crowd control or flight spells prepared for the ensuing mayhem.
So in the as-written book, that's a grand total of 12 "standard" guards (though attacks at +21/+16/17-20/1d10+15 are MEAN), plus 4 "officers". Since it's a party of 6 instead of 4, plus a froghemoth, I "upgrade" by 50% more monsters and max hit points. Thus, we had 18 guards and 5 officers (I missed one) who heard the froghemoth's ministrations and came a-running. The party was smart enough to have Fickle Winds up, but that just meant a swarm of serpentfolk who could hardly miss (most of the party has ACs of 28 or less) just came running at them and beating on them. After the barbarian lost 2/3 of his hit points in the initial onslaught, the flame oracle put up a Blade Barrier to try to slow them down and funnel them into a choke point, but they just relied on their natural toughness to run right through the barrier and start hitting anything else in the way. (The froghemoth took 288 points of damage in a single round. If she didn't have levels of bard, she'd have been one-shot.)
With no crowd control and no flight, the party knew they had to run. Unfortunately, while some of the PCs took the retreat to heart and moved away, others had "things to do" and stuck around. Narlock had to save the froghemoth with a well-timed Bard's Escape, then slowed down the onslaught with an expertly-placed Grease (you'd be surprised how hard that DC 10 Acrobatics check is for armored fighters with no ranks in Acrobatics). Unforunately, after all she'd done, 3 of the officers managed to move up to her. Seeing her lightly-armored form, they all chose to Vital Strike and Power Attack, because if you can't miss, why not?
The dice hated Narlock.
3 attacks. 2 crits and a hit. 150 points of damage. Her total hit points are 123. So she dropped to -27 in her very first engagement with the enemy.
The flame oracle managed to Breath of Life her, and the froghemoth returned the favor and lifted her to safety so she could assist in the retreat, but a death is still a death.
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Name: Athelya Mire
Race: Female Dhampir
Classes/Levels: Flame Oracle 14
Adventure: The Thousand Fangs Below
Location: The Fortress of a Thousand Fangs
Catalyst: Fireballs! Fireballs! So many fireballs!
Name: Kwai Chang
Race: Male Human
Classes/Levels: Monk 14
Adventure: The Thousand Fangs Below
Location: The Fortress of a Thousand Fangs
Catalyst: The dice. They be a-hatin'
While it didn't kill Athelya, it did take off over half her hit points. Unfortunately, even worse, it sent the party scrambling in disarray. The bard and Athelya ran up the passage to hide and heal. The ranger stepped out to shoot at the naga. The barbarian and Kwai Chang moved out into the open to engage the serpentfolk guards on open ground. And the alchemist Hasted everybody. (Long story short: I had to grandfather in allowing the alchemist to affect other people at range to prevent forcing someone to throw away their PCs and start over.)
Notice that this did nothing to stop the naga from Fireballing the group again.
I didn't. I had them spam Blindness on the ranger and the barbarian. Amazingly, one of the Blindnesses affected the ranger.
So another full round for the party. Kwai Chang tripped all the serpentfolk around him (though it should be noted he rolled four 4s or less (he needed a 5) on eight trip attempts. So we already knew the dice hated him). The alchemist bombed a naga, Athelya came down to Heal the ranger and he proceeded to kill a naga and a couple of serpentfolk, and the barbarian killed one of the serpentfolk on him, and the bard started up a Shadow Bard to use Soothing Performance.
And another full round of doing absolutely nothing about the naga and their fireballs (except, of course, the ranger killing one).
So I hit the party with another 5 fireballs. This did in Athelya, putting her to -45 hit points. Everyone else was relatively OK (the ranger has the distinction of not taking a single point of damage in the entire combat thanks to evasion). Then I rolled my 8 attacks from my prone serpentfolk on Kwai Chang. I needed an 18 or higher.
I rolled two 18s and two 20s, all critical threats.
For two of the confirmations, I rolled natural 20s again.
We allow double crits. For the double confirmation I rolled another natural 20. We don't go beyond double, which is good, because my next roll was a 19.
So, 4 hits including a crit and a double crit = 7x damage. 7d10+105 = 150 points of damage to Kwai Chang. While he'd avoided virtually all of the fireball damage (evasion again), he had been in the front lines for a while, so I sent him to -94 hit points.
At that point the party called for a general retreat, so they picked up the corpses of their fallen comrades and Dimension Doored away.
The saddest part of the whole affair? It's not the first time they've been spammed with low-level fireballs from a group of casters, so I said, "You guys really have to figure out some way to get Communal Resist Energy," and the alchemist replied, "Oh, I have that."
D'oh!
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RIP. But honestly, I would've done the same thing as the alchemist . . .
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (42%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (33%), Itombu (28%), the vagabond spiders (18%), a 2-way tie between the astradaemon and the the Coils of Ydersius (17%), and the Green God (16%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread. Souls for Smuggler's Shiv constitutes over a third of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi (31), Itombu (14), the Green God (7), Gbala (8), the vagabond spiders (2), and the Avatar of the Serpent God (4).
218 deaths have been recorded so far.
RIP. But honestly, I would've done the same thing as the alchemist . . .9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (42%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (33%), Itombu (28%), the vagabond spiders (18%), a 2-way tie between the astradaemon and the the Coils of Ydersius (17%), and the Green God (16%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread. Souls for Smuggler's Shiv constitutes over a third of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi (31), Itombu (14), the Green God (7), Gbala (8), the vagabond spiders (2), and the Avatar of the Serpent God (4).
218 deaths have been recorded so far.
Once summer is over I'm sure the kids'll pick up the pace again.
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Race: Human
Classes/Levels: Paladin 9
Adventure: City of Seven Spears
Location: Sozothala's Fortress, which also served as The First Vault. I used Vault's map and locations, but its monsters were swopped to undeads that Sozothala would have had in his Fortress.
Catalyst: Sozothala. Player didn't pay attention to his negative levels and when he finally did, he thought he wasn't in danger of getting any more.
The Gory Details:
The party had fun picking apart the undead minion army assaulting the Artisan District without suffering anything major. The paladin got a few energy drains from wights, so he had 3 negative levels. Maybe his holiness didn't feel the undead being a threat for his holy might.
So they charged into Sozothala's undead Fortress. They encountered some undeads and as Paladin did the major tanking he got 3 more negative levels from minions before well pre-buffed Sozothala engaged and started raining AoE spells. Fight was not going well for party, until the fatigued paladin finishes the minions, casts for the first time a spell to get a halo and wings made of light. Now he can find his way through the darkness to Sozothala to corner him and planning to Smite Evil him all the way to and past the afterlife come next turn - Everyone knows this is going to be the end of the enemy, as this character has been built to crit often and hard, and paladins do love evil and undeads.
But behold, DM sees a Wand of Enervation listed in Sozothala's Combat Gear. As it is known, paladin's touch AC is balls, and he gets hit without problems. 3 negative levels is suffered and the epic holy light surrounding him is tragically extinguished as he falls down with the honours of being the campaign's 1st dead PC.
The players thought that was the worst, but DM was not done, and next round Sozothala awoke him as a undead to attack the party. Emotions were high when they had to put the Paladin down themselves after Sozothala was murdered. Now undead paladin left the world again by faceful of positive energy spells, and wasn't that poetic.
(I accidentally cheated, because I didn't read the casting time for the rise spell, which was 1 min. I asked the player afterwards if he was cool, as party had no real access to 7th lvl Resurrection, which was lowest lvl spell you need to bring an undead back. He was fine with the Paladins semiepic ending, so I had no need to backtrack that undead effect to something like an animation of a corpse.)
Race: Halfling
Classes/Levels: Monk 10
Adventure: Vaults of Madness
Location: Isle of Shadows
Catalyst: Greater Shadow, and DM rolling dmg like the devil. Player didn't get scared after losing 11 strenght after two taken hits, runs head first into monster with 8 str left and gets OHKO'd.
The Gory Details:
Two players were swimming in the treasure vault when the shadows attacked (3 shadows and 1 greater shadow). Monk was hit once for 5 str dmg (1d6) before they both got out of water. Shadows followed them up to upper floors and attacked the 4-man party + Juliver. Then on the next round the monk was hit again once for 6 str dmg (1d6). Then the greater shadow made his appearance and while the party was taking the smallers down nicely. Monk did not switch away from the front even when he and Juliver were the only ones that were hit by drain, just downed a potion of lesser restoration and ran to the greater shadow to pummel it down. Greater shadow had ~6 hp left when its turn came again and was able to touch the monk, rolls max str dmg with 1d8 and that's exactly what the monk had left.
The goriest detail might be that if they had remembered to add all their bonuses to att & dmg, death would have been easily avoided. They noticed this afterwards, and boy if in the future they still don't remember to add the bonuses their bard supplies them with.
In the situation they used hero points to stop the monk rising as a shadow spawn, so he didn't turn into undead and thus was easier to resurrect (thay had this undead resurrection problem before with their dead paladin). I nudged them to ask Osond for help as he had mentioned having done something like that once for his tribe before. Monk got reincarnated as a dwarf, and wasn't it weird to roleplay how he suddenly has this deep connection with rock and basically has an ability to smell the traps in the Vaults...
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*erases the sign that says "1 year since last workplace fatality"*
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (42%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (33%), Itombu (28%), the vagabond spiders (18%), a 2-way tie between the astradaemon and the the Coils of Ydersius (17%), and zombie dire tigers (16%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread. Souls for Smuggler's Shiv constitutes over a third of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi (31), Itombu (14), the Green God (7), Gbala (8), the vagabond spiders (2), and the Avatar of the Serpent God (4).
220 deaths have been recorded so far.
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*erases the sign that says "2 years since last death"*
9 TPKs have been reported here, with Nyilathi, Itombu, and the spirit dancers each contributing 2 and Klorak, the Treasure Pit, and the Creeper Clearing each contributing 1.
The first six deadliest encounters, by % of their adventure, are Gbala and rawbones (40%), Nyilathi and lacedons (37%), Avatar of the Serpent God (33%), Itombu (28%), the vagabond spiders (18%), and the Green God (17%).
Nyilathi and the lacedons constitute a seventh of all deaths in this thread. Souls for Smuggler's Shiv accounts for over a third of all deaths in this thread.
The top encounters for each adventure are: Nyilathi (31), Itombu (14), the Green God (8), Gbala (8), the vagabond spiders (2), and the Avatar of the Serpent God (4).
223 deaths have been recorded so far.
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At this point I should probably record the greatest death of our campaign.
Name: Fish's Serpent's Skull's Campaign
Classes/levels: Precariat-bourgeoisie/6
Adventure: City of Seven Spears
Location: online
Catalyst: Serpent's Skull
The Gory Details: We played from spring 2015 to spring 2021, starting with four players and ending with four players. Book 1 (session 1-24, 19 Arodus-8 Rova, 4710 AR) lasted from March 2015 to August 2016, while book 2 (session 25-66, 8 Rova-21 Neth) was completed around December 2018. We never got through book 3 (session 67-121, 26 Neth-28 Kuthona), but we played our last session somewhere around May 2021.
A moment of appreciation for all the characters who've passed through this campaign, and those who stayed until the end:
- Thornton Poer, cabin boy, halfling ghoulblooded sorcerer, joined a pirate crew after being raised from the dead
- Athelstan Twice-Dropped, token rich kid, dwarve skald from the Five Kings Mountains, left the party to manage the family mine in Sargava
- Dovret Wyvernmane, bodyguard for Athelstan, dwarve slayer who left the party to keep watch over Athelstan
- Chester A. Arthur, cartographer, dwarve cleric of Keltheald who left the party on various occasions but usually returned to save the day. Had a horse named Applestan, who was killed by Itombu, and a horse named Carty.
- Gleep, empathically bonded to Chester, gelatinous cube, killed by Dovret while he was dominated by Yarzoth
- The Grisgol, exile who seeks to reach the stars, duergar wizard, left the party without explaining why in Absalom. Had an unseen servant named Fellstroke.
- Ilisa Khazdar, adventurer from the newly started Eleder Explorer's Guild, dwarve cleric of Cayden Cailean
- Bhekithemba Phila, hellknight converted to LG worship of Irori, Kalabuta human fighter/brawler. Had an ox named Tulip who was stolen (to safety?) by Chester when the rest of the party got captured.
- Thunderchild Thrice-Locks-the-Heart, self-taught polymath, Osiriani human celestial sorcerer. Had a tortoise familiar named Runeshell, replaced with an ibis named Khenti after his death.
- Healer Siren, wendifa, painterlily bard, joined the party to help defeat Itombu and left when the demon was dead
- Sasha Nevah, ex-Red Mantis, Chelish human ranger/rogue, left the party to help the Pathfinders with less dangerous tasks. Had a pet dimorphodon named Beaky.
- Rebeca, Arcadian conquistador seeking to claim "Cheliax" for civilization, wyrwood summoner, fled the party when they all got captured by the Aspis Consortium in Tazion. Had a pet boat that they used to fly away with.
- Sandboxes are fun if you have a clear goal
- Lots of gaps for homebrewed material
- A setting that is not medieval Europe can be very engaging and perspective-widening
- All of the entries we played were fun; much of this comes down to having good players, but the skeleton for building fun and interesting stories is there (sandbox in book 1, travelogue in book 2, sandbox again in book 3)
- Initial castaways are good fun
- Yarzoth, Itombu and Issilar are very fun villains. Honorable mention to succubus in book 2.
- Shortage of fun/interesting treasure
- Random encounters are only fun if they are woven into the scenery
- ... which means LOTS of prep work for GMs
- CoSS was not a complete adventure path entry
- Historical and racial politics are not handled appropriately in the AP or in supporting PF1 materials
- Swingy, mostly very weak combats with a few high power level monsters that can wipe parties in 3 rounds (aka normal PF1 fare)
- RtR dropped the ball on the journey feeling like either a travelogue or a race
- Faction interactions generally clunky
- Eleder is a poorly fleshed out town, Kalabuto is worse
- Scale of Saventh-Yhi too small
I think in the end we just got tired of this AP. In the beginning of 2021, the group teleported to Absalom to do some side adventures there, and no one truly wanted to go back to Saventh-Yhi and keep up the discovery points grind. After a summer break, we decided to start Strength of Thousands instead.