I ran a crew of PCs through, or rather "into" this module, and I noticed an error on one of the enemies the PCs face. I ran this at subtier 3-4.
Monster error:
Captain Calgredine is a level 5 fighter, but does not have Weapon Training. Assuming this feature is supposed to apply to lances, his attack and damage is one lower than it should be.
Somebody's already mentioned the 6-7 subtier damage being wrong on the magic longbows as well, so maybe it's just a problem localized to this scenario.
Followup question:
Is Captain Calgredine too much to throw at an APL 3 table? Even with only three accompanying mercenaries, he still killed two PCs at my table, and I even set up the terrain such that he could not ride by and charge across lines. A level 5 fighter may be CR 4, and a horse may be CR 1, but I feel like there's some synergy there that drives up the encounter level a bit.
Before I dive into this, I'll confess that one of the players made a mistake, but it was a small one. Probably not one worth dying over. Party composition: Summoner, Alchemist, Ninja, Ninja, Wizard. APL 3.
Pre-combat: Everyone succeeds on their perception check. No surprise round (thank goodness). Calgredine gets 2nd initiative, behind one of the party's ninja.
Round 1) The ninja moves to step between the party and Calgredine, shooting a shortbow from beyond 30 feet for 2 points of damage. (the only potential mistake here, I think, was not going invisible with Ninja Vanish as to break up Calgredine's charge lane on the party.)
Calgredine charges on horseback. Charge, higher ground, and generally being a fighter see him rolling in at +14, with 3d8+21 damage even without weapon training. Calgredine rolls 20 to hit the Ninja, dealing 40 points of damage. Dead ninja. After one round, the archers drop the wizard, and Calgredine (over 2-3 rounds), without charging, kills the other ninja before going down (dropped from 1 HP to dead, so that was unfortunate.) He blows away his ride check to manage his mount in battle every time, and I had him 'forget' to drop for cover behind his horse when given the opportunity. The Summoner's Eidolon ended up being what saved the rest of the party in the end.
I love the fighter class, I like that PFS pits characters against NPCs with PC levels, and I like that they use the Elite Array so as to give the characters a numerical edge. I think, though, that building an NPC with such burst capability as Calgredine on horseback, AND giving him the chance for a surprise round, might be a bit much for 3rd-level parties who don't quite have the resources to deal with 40 points from a single attack. If he isn't incapacitated or otherwise prevented from charging on round one, there's a very significant chance you'll have a dead PC on your hands.
Now, there WERE a few outliers:
1) Nobody in anything heavier than chain shirt
2) Nobody with bigger than a d8 hit die
At the 1-2 tier, he's much less likely to kill, given that his damage is only 2d8+6 on a charge.
And while I'm on the topic of this mod, I'd like to discuss...
The Fatty Fight:
The Iron Golem vs. Donkey Kong without his tie. This is theorycrafting a bit here, because the party decided to abandon the mission after losing 2 PCs to the Mwangi Expanse in the first combat.
It's thematic and cinematic, but in the end what it really does, I think, is take one PC out of the action for a few rounds. I play Pathfinder because it's a party (group) game and I get to play the characters that I've built alongside those of my friends. This encounter kind of defeats that purpose, taking one PC out of a fight for several rounds to put him in a different fight that, in addition to giving the character 3 extra lives, it is near impossible for him to lose. Given the lack of consequences that this fight has for the party and the overall outcome of the module (it's GOING to end in the monkey dying), it might as well not happen, letting the party play as a whole unit through the end.
Maybe it works much better in practice, but I know that I would rather be fighting alongside my teammates than playing patticake for a few rounds with a monkey that can't hurt me.
To keep this pertinent to GM discussion, then I guess I'll sum up:
Is Calgredine a bit much for an APL3 party? I know he's CR'd correctly, but the horse/rider synergy there is VERY strong, especially if he rolls well on initiative. I might advise other GMs to make sure the party's kitted out to either disable him or survive one charge before you run them through this neck of the jungle. Calgredine SHOULD have weapon training at level 5, right?
And what does everyone else think of The Fatty Fight? Maybe input from people who've seen it in action? Was the cinematic/cool factor enough to justify taking one player out of the party for several rounds? Was that player still having fun?
I don't see this as a problem with the scenario, I see this as a problem with the party composition.
You said your group was APL 3, does that mean they were mostly level 2 characters, and with a 5th character they were APL 3? Or they were all level 3?
If they were playing up, playing up is a risky venture at best, everyone has to play at their best, optimized characters, and good tactics. The ninja standing, unstealthed, in the charging lane doing only 2 damage is not a good tactic.
1st fight:
But yes, at subtier 3-4 the captain is very dangerous, maybe too dangerous. And I'm not really sure what to do about it, except maybe the PCs should use better tactics. Ideally the fighter would be maybe 1 level lower?
When my group played it, at subtier 3-4, I was level 2 and had 19 hp, so I got behind a tree in the jungle, so he couldn't charge.
He was especially vulnerable to willpower spells and he spent the entire time prone from Command spells while our two fighters took him down.
BoosterThePaladin wrote:
Party composition: Summoner, Alchemist, Ninja, Ninja, Wizard. APL 3.
Honestly, with this group composition, I would expect to TPK them in almost any scenario, even at the proper subtier. Too many squishies (especially rogues) and no martial characters = TPK in my experience.
And no healer either. Yikes. This group doesn't have the endurance (healing or DPS) to deal with this scenario, maybe even at subtier 1-2. As GM, you should have known this before they started (and advised them appropriately or made adjustments). I can actually see them wiping at almost every single encounter in this scenario. This is a tough scenario.
So the party composition just sucks and they probably should have played down (especially if they have level 2 characters in the mix). Or someone should have played a healer and/or martial character.
Showdown:
I actually liked the cinematic nature of Kong vs PC-bot and as a player I would have found it really fun to control my bot (and give him a robot voice also!). It's just something *different*.
Some people like it, others don't. There's lots of opportunity to fights WAVES of monkeys after the big guys collide, so I don't see what the big deal is.
When I played it, we actually feared the monkey and it was a (somewhat) close fight. (GM used updated stats on the monkey). If the monkey had won, even if we could have gotten another bot, it would have meant one of us dying or going unconscious each round. So it was exciting and the best part of the scenario for me.
After posting my remarks and having some time to think about it, I came to the same conclusion you did: It came down to party composition and the fact that they had two level 2's (alchemist, the ninja who died second).
I do think that having someone capable of healing more powerfully than a wand of cure light wounds would have saved the second ninja from being killed, and had the first ninja put 14 points into con, he would have survived at -13 with one round to be stabilized. So, yeah, in retrospect, a good party composition (or even a decent one) will see them through that encounter.
The thoughts on the final showdown are welcome. I didn't know that updated stats existed. I admit that I was slightly disappointed in that I didn't get to say "Reactor on-line. Sensors on-line. Weapons on-line. All systems nominal." as I handed the stat sheet over to the player.
I see the difference in opinion on this scenario now (that I've bought it).
Subtier 1-2 is ridiculously easy (perhaps as it should be), which is why some GMs/players say the scenario is a pushover. At subtier 3-4, this scenario (as seen above) can be deadly and is difficult. Subtier 6-7 could be deadly if the GM plays the first two encounters with too much intelligence/tactics, but is a cake walk after that.
One note about the first encounter.
First encounter:
The swamp where the PCs and the captain start, it's very hard for the captain to charge the PCs initially. You can't charge through difficult terrain, and the log (and jungle) is directly in the path to the PCs. So either the captain or the PCs have to get over the log to charge.
In my groups case, the captain couldn't charge, went over the log first and we just hammered him.
This is a large tactical disadvantage the captain has... and if played intelligently, he just waits at range (while his archers pepper the PCs), until a PC crosses the log. Using tactics makes the encounter exceptionally more deadly.
Out of curiosity, what is the responsibility of a PFS GM when it comes to enemy stat blocks that have either likely (in CC's case in 3-4) or certain (in the ranged enemies' case at 6-7) errors? Run as-is, or correct the math?
Obviously in this case the enemy in question did not require additional help. But as a general rule... what's the protocol?
I could be wrong, but I think it's ok to make minor stat corrections. Personally I usually just leave the error.
Major corrections (for example, converting from 3.5 to PF), tactics changes (playing an encounter too intelligently with monsters with a 0 Int), or spell selection changes should probably be avoided, since the scenarios weren't tested with this in mind. Changes like these can often lead to TPKs. It's doesn't take much sometimes.
Monkey fix:
The stat fix to the monkey didn't matter very much, the fix was mostly to give the monkey the proper stats, make the fight closer (he still loses), and give him a chance. So nothing really changes, it's all cosmetic, so it's ok. :)
Having said that, if the PCs went head-to-head with the monkey, without using the golems (which has happenned), the stat changes would matter... a lot. And I'd ditch them in this case.
I think I'll be GMing this at tier 1-2 for my home game, because I'm afraid I'll wipe them at tier 3-4. I have 7 players but 2 rogues in the group, and it's a disaster when I have only 4 players and 2 of them are rogues.
