So, set-up:
Party loses barbarian against The Scarecrow. Continues on, down to three party members. Make it to Xanesha. The "demon" she summons scares the two spellcasters down the stairs, leaving the poor melee cleric alone up there. He's petrified. Spellcasters come back. They put up a "good" fight (40 something points of damage), but are knocked unconscious. Both stabilize.
I'm thinking now, how am I going to salvage this game. Where would I start from? I'm thinking that maybe it'd be an interesting twist if Xanesha, knowing everyone she had working for her is dead, "convinces" the party to kill the Lord Mayor themselves. She waits for the cleric to un-stone, or whatever, but cleric saves against Charm Monster. Uh-oh. Oh, well, high bluff, she was wearing a mask, she'll just appear as an elf, instead. Bluffs cleric, who never even saw the lamia, that she slew the evil beast and came to the party's rescue. Cleric heals the two spellcasters, who also are bluffed. Now the party invited Xanesha back to their inn to plan what to do from here.
Party's sorcerer already is making some moves on her. Party's rogue wasn't around for tonight, so he was out "hiding" from the mob or something during the events of the session. No one is going to tell him what really happened, to heighten the role-playing.
What do I do? Give me some ideas. I don't want to just jump back into combat with Xanesha. How should I handle this?
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If any of them have been greedy then she can mark them with the Sihedron rune before they recover.
Then she sends them off to slay someone else (also marked with Sihedron rune) and one of the players gets some cool item that she didn't know was there (ring of true-seeing?) so that next time they meet one of the character can see who/what she really is.
Or... she uses them to open a runwell of greed under Magnimar which has some kind of greed-driven sinspawn spilling out. Once they have got through some wards (only a good player can open? bunch of undead? something else that the PCs are better equipped to take down than her) she decides that they are no longer needed and turns on the party.
Or... she successfully uses mind control on them but they buff/get buffed for an encounter using protection from evil (they have x rounds until the spell ends and the mind control resumes to find a solution).
Just some ideas. I would look for a confrontation so that you can drive them on to HMM but if you want to freestyle some more then she could be their 'pal' for a long time.
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What do I do? Give me some ideas. I don't want to just jump back into combat with Xanesha. How should I handle this?
I have an elaborate plan for this eventuality and I actually hope I can whip up a TPK because I think it's so cool.
My plan for a TPK at the Clocktower is to have the PCs be taken by Xanesha up to Turtleback Ferry and forced to work on the Paradise barge, through a combination of wisdom drain and repeated charms/dominates. This would then mean that Xanesha replaces Leucretia as they are the same person. In this scenario, I would have Xanesha pick up the missing Rogue (after interrogating the other PCs) and I would put them all on the barge together.
Once they are on the barge, they would exist in a living death as charm/dominate slaves for some time (months? a year maybe? - probably just enough time to have the timeline make sense for it to be early winter up there), stripped of their identities and their will and made to serve drinks, cook and clean. Eventually, while the PCs are in the hold somewhere, one of the other slaves in the kitchen goes mad and suicidally lights himself on fire, starting a fire in the barge in general and causing it to sink.
Xanesha (in human form) then looks down into the hold, and smiles saying something about them having served their purpose anyway and leaves the PCs to die and goes away to organize the attack on Fort Rannick.
When the cold water of the lake hits the PCs' feet (think the rising water in the lower decks in Titanic), they snap out of their charm and are able to act. They have within their reach the ability to escape from the hold (haven't worked this out yet - I'm imagining an axe or something to cut their way out of the hold as it sinks) and swim to the surface, seeing on the way that many of their possessions were up on the walls in the gambling areas of the barge. They could then return to the barge at the bottom of the lake (water breathing) and retrieve the rest of their gear (probably missing gold and some items) and maybe get some clues about Xanesha's motivations etc. and get any missing treasure or XP they need to get to the next part of the story with a reasonable chance of success.
If you need to add any PCs in the process (i.e. if your Barbarian was dead dead and the player wants a new character), they are on the barge too.
This was the map I have made for the Barge:
http://i751.photobucket.com/albums/xx155/greykloak/Paradise_map.gif
Greycloak:
That's freakin' awesome! I never thought about rolling this into the next quest! Man alive, this is going to be freakin' sweet! This is just the sort of thing right up the party's alley. I'm going to go for it and see how it goes. We play again tomorrow night, so I'll post the results online to let you know how it goes.
I think I'm also going to have her put the sihedron rune on some of the PCs, since at least two of them are incredibly greedy. This will creep out the PCs at least a little bit, and make things incredibly personal for them. I can see them pursuing this revenge thing all the way, baby.
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Greycloak:
That's freakin' awesome! I never thought about rolling this into the next quest! Man alive, this is going to be freakin' sweet! This is just the sort of thing right up the party's alley. I'm going to go for it and see how it goes. We play again tomorrow night, so I'll post the results online to let you know how it goes.I think I'm also going to have her put the sihedron rune on some of the PCs, since at least two of them are incredibly greedy. This will creep out the PCs at least a little bit, and make things incredibly personal for them. I can see them pursuing this revenge thing all the way, baby.
I'd brand them all with the rune. Better to be safe than sorry. :-)
In my mind, I had imagined giving each PC a handout with broken flashback memories of their capture and time in slavery. I even thought about some of the insanities from the GMG (especially for anyone who obsessed about it too much or too little) but that might be too cruel. I'd make sure to have each PC start off their adventures with Wisdom values of 1 to reflect the constant draining. The up-side of this will be that the cleric(s) won't be able to cast water breathing for a day or two or three (to return to the sunken barge) so they'll have some time in Turtleback Ferry to give you time to foreshadow and then attack Fort Rannick.
I am very keen to hear how this idea goes and would greatly appreciate any synopsis of what you chose to do and how your players reacted.
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@Greycloak: that is, indeed, an awesome idea.
I just got to the Shadow Clock with my party, and they are poised at the top in a fight with Xanesha.
Through a series of dueling stealth and perception, the rogue was able to get himself directly under her without being aware of each other. He beat the perception check to generally notice an invisible creature is nearby as he suprised her with dancing lights in her face (essentially, he sank my battleship with placement right off the bat). She still couldn't figure out where the light came from (yay +3 perception vs. stealth heavy rogue!)
He crawled up the rafter and took a swing at the square he thought she was (correct) and rolled a natural 20, backing it up by clearing her FF AC through use of a Hero Point. It was very impressive.
The Ranger was able to get up to the top of the wooden stairs just in time to see her become visible and, in turn, triple hit him with the spear which dropped him to -2. His body hit the floor with a wet thud and we broke for the next session (which is this sunday).
They could pull it out, but I'm really expecting a body count. She's down around 25 pts thanks to the Rogue's beyond lucky hit.
I was expecting a TPK... now I'm kinda hoping for it. :)
(If you are interested in a new battle map for the clock, check this out)
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I was expecting a TPK... now I'm kinda hoping for it. :)
(If you are interested in a new battle map for the clock, check this out)
Nice maps. I'll probably put them together on a single poster sheet as I have access to 42" continuous-feed plotters at work.
Speaking of TPK's, my team (5 players, 3rd level, Pathfinder) just about got wasted tonight fighting the goblin refugees, Grogmurt, the four goblin dogs and his cat in the Thistletop hedge maze. My PCs are masterful at ignoring warning signs, making incredible amounts of noise when they shouldn't and choosing to fight in exactly the wrong places. I for my part roll my attack, save and damage dice out in the open and don't fudge anything (almost), including perception checks to detect shouted conversations.
They stumbled along in the hedge maze and, even after hearing voices from the goblin refugees, they continued to argue at full volume and made enough noise to alert them through the hedge wall. They even knew that they had blown their cover because they heard the gobs go silent and hide at one point. This didn't stop them from spreading out and sending one guy in alone to be pincushioned by ten shortbow arrows while he was standing in the 4' high can't-move-around-tunnel. The goblin refugees then shouted out for help, which Grogmurt heard.
The next round, they heard the goblin dogs howling as Grogmurt herded them towards the PCs. Meanwhile, they continued to work on the goblin refugees, leaving their weakest member to guard the rear.
The next round, the goblin dogs and the cat arrived on the scene and still they chose to leave their weakest guy isolated and alone (and he refused to take a double move to a much better position), while choosing to fight in the tight parts of the tunnel.
The next round, the druid appeared and entangled the lot of them (killing everyone's movement) and began hit-and-run attacks against the softest PCs first. Still refusing to move to better position, the soft PC went down and nearly died right there (requiring a miraculous saving as he had just finished a personal quest and was due something special) and the others stayed fighting in the tunnel and in the refugee room. Rather than help with the big danger coming down the hall, several of my players chose to attack entangled goblin refugees, still held up in the narrow passage in the hall.
When it looked like all was lost, I had to pull the DM-save-game-lever and had Shalelu burst on scene to pull some of the action away from the PCs, allowing the tide to shift back. I had one PC at 1 HP from death and another at 2 HP from death before they drove off the druid (having wasted his animal companion) and having killed most everything else. It was an ugly end to an ugly day of adventuring.
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If you're hoping for a TPK, Xanesha is the fight for it. She's virtually unkillable by a party of L6 characters, even with good tactics because her AC makes her almost unhittable (she buffs to a 34...which will require most of your players need a natural 20 to hit) and even if you do hit...it's just going to hit an image probably. On top of that, all but a High AC target is apt to be hit 3 times a round (out of 4 swings) doing 48 points of damage on average killing pretty much any character at this level except the high AC/high HP tank.
Two words: Dispel Magic.
Two more words: Stinking Cloud.
I think a bomb-heavy alchemist might help lots too.
Well, last week I implemented the plan, and it turned out alright. Went through sorta a montage of the party traveling with Xanesha up to Turtleback Ferry, and Sydney, the halfling rogue who wasn't taken, running around making Diplomacy checks to find out more info and track the party. Party lost some magic items and some gold when the ferry sank, but were consoled with some random loot I rolled up to replace it so they would still have roughly the same level of junk. Everyone was freaking out when they found out they had Sihedron tattoos and now the party has scars where they burned the tattoos off. The party's cavalier had his horse stolen, which really pissed him off, and that's why the party is heading off to Fort Rannick.
After that everything is as written. Party is extremely distrustful of everything now, and the cavalier is convinced the town was in on it and is looking for an excuse to enact revenge. Sydney took Leadership as a feat, so I'm going to have Shalelu be captured along with the rangers, and she'll join the party next session. Campaign had a little hiccup, but recovered nicely.
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6 months later and I did TPK my group on the Clocktower - no cheating, DM rolls in the open, using spell tactics from the book (long duration spells cast when the bell falls, short duration spells once the faceless stalker fight ends).
To make it non-deadly, I added an ability to Xanesha's spear (switched by me to a normal-sized Halberd) whereby it could optionally deal subdual rather than lethal damage. Xanesha did that with the plan of enslaving those who had disrupted her plans.
With Haste and Divine Favour giving her 4 attacks per round netting +23/+23/+18/+13 for a total of 1d10+12/19-20x3 and an AC of 34, she was unstoppable in melee without perfect tactics, which my group did not remotely employ. I have 2 weeks to prep my plan for next time and I am happy it turned out this way because I am excited about what I am calling "Charm Zombies and the Escape from the Paradise Barge".
Sounds great. I'm really looking forward to hearing how this goes!
I did. I shall go comment over there if you like. : )
Did you read the part that I emailed to my players outlining the snippits of memories they got from their time in captivity? I posted it in my campaign thread - no spoilers for KM in the last post.
Thumbs up for a great TPK save idea! My players similarly nearly had a TPK with Gogmurt - I hardly dare imagine what will happen when they meet Xanesha... but at least now there's a great idea to steal to keep the campaign running! :D
Just wanted to post and say that this was a brilliant idea and rocked when I implemented it with my group.
After the lone survivor fled the scene, he spent a few months trying to find out more information about Xanesha's whereabouts with no leads. My player took the ball and ran with it; his Varisian ranger became paranoid and basically turned into a washed out alcoholic over the course of seven months. When he hit rock bottom, Shalelu showed up and lifted him out of a ditch (literally) and gave him the lead he needed.
The others got a nice chunk of connective flavor text. Basically they were imprisoned and slowly turned into vegetative slaves, then taken to the Paradise barge. When Shalelu and the ranger showed up to rescue them, they had no idea what was going on; they just found themselves in the hull of a ship with goofy casino outfits on and no recollection of getting there.
When Xanesha/Lucretia showed up to stop things, an NPC (one of the character's fathers) basically threw himself at her with a molotov cocktail in hand, effectively sacrificing himself and taking down the barge so the players could escape. Of course, when they dived back down to the sunken barge, neither corpse was located ;-)
Kudos again. This was an outstanding idea and made the story that much more epic.
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So, is she waiting in the Ft. Rannick Prison for the PCs now?
My group has encountered her 4 times now:
1) TPK on the clocktower plus taunting sinking barge escape scene
2) Very nearly another TPK when they stumbled on her in the Ft. Rannick prison. Saved by a lucky crit that sent her scuttling to the guard tower
3) Kind of a draw when they met her with the other Ft. Rannick bosses. They killed all the ogres except for the Sorceress and Xanesha and then fled through the catacombs where the large baddies couldn't fit.
4) They got the drop on her when she was supervising the destruction of the Skull's Crossing Dam, nested atop the centre structure. They broke her weapon and drove her off but still couldn't get the kill what with Dimension Door and invisibility and all that. She's just too slippery to catch without dimensional anchor.
I'm thinking she returns for the Sandpoint giant attack riding the red dragon shooting a brand-new Bow purchased using the amazing wealth she took from my PCs.
