Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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If he did not complete three encounters, he gets a chronicle sheet with 0XP. While you might argue that he may, possibly, be able to have qualified for gold and prestige, I wouldn't award any; that would give him an advantage in that he would be able to get above the wealth-by-level (and fame-by-level) curve.
I don't think it's a jerk move to report him as having played (part of) the scenario; the only downside is that he won't be able to play the scenario later with a different character. If it's a scenario the player wouldn't enjoy playing then he's lost nothing.
Many of us end up, occasionally, playing a scenario that we feel would be best suited to a different character. It's particularly a problem at low level, where players tend to use their feats and purchases building an effective character for their primary task rather than a more versatile character. In a situation like that a GM might be able to give some advice. I view that as being explainable, in character, by the VL sent down to the Grand Lodge cafeteria to round up a handful of characters for the next mission knowing just enough to pick the cleric, not the rogue, when he's faced with two volunteers.
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Like many others, I played the background music for Mission: Impossible for this one when I gave the mission briefing. I also opened the briefing with "Good afternoon. Your mission, should you decide to accept it..." and concluding with "As always, should you or any of your force be caught or killed, the Decemvirate will disavow any knowledge of your actions."
"This Venture-Captain will self destruct in 20 seconds."
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I ran this at the higher tier for one of the tables at our monthly PFS: Ireland event and my group had a blast. They really cottoned on to the fact that it was timed and a question of finesse rather than batter down the door so tried not to waste time.
First time I was at the hard cap which was a bit difficult but not too bad.
Firstly, they split the group, two of the stealthiest (Ninja and Urban Ranger with an invisibility potion) were able to simply make their way across the foyer. (In fact the Urban Ranger had a partly charged wand of invisibility but only realised it too late).
With a larger group and the timer in consideration, I got into a rythmn of making sure everyone was aware they should be doing something and not standing there watching what others are doing. There was a lot of 'we're doing X while they're doing that' which, to be honest, is hard to keep track of time wise in game but I muddled through pretty much guessing at time. I used the time tracker supplied in this discussion (huge help by the way, thanks!!) but even with that, keeping time is really problematic with a big group and a split group. Be wary of that if you're going to run it!
So the party split two ways, they get across to the Preparation Room with lots of servants going to and fro. The Wizard has an outside the box idea and summons some rats to scare people away. I liked the idea because it was original and plausible but I then borrowed the mechanic for being conscripted into work from the south corridor. Two ended up having to stay behind and deal with the rats while the others got their bluff checks to fit into the fleeing servants group.
The other guys 'shepherded' the summoned rats into the servants quarters' corridor and both groups eventually met up at the end of that corridor with the Ninja and Urban Ranger.
I just had to cut up what people did and effectively 'pause' their sub-groups. The hardest was with the Ninja and Urban Ranger. I had to get them to do very little (Two perception checks) without feeling that they're not getting to play in a game that should be purpose built for them.
The first fight was rather amusing from a GM perspective. After all the jumping through hoops, finally here was something they can hit!
First, bot devils appeared with 4 people around them. First one goes (1d4 to decide which direction he was facing when summoned). The Ninja! The guy who helps run the place.. our host.. Natural 20. "If you confirm this, you're banned".Confirmed. We all laugh at his expense. His character takes a big hit but is still standing. "Oh wait, higher tier, meaner bad guys, he gets two attacks." I roll the die. Natural 20. "Oh you %&^hole", I roll again and confirm. He's down. Everyone's sides are splitting. Then he says "I think I'm dead.. as in dead, dead". Now it's less funny. I ask to take a look at his sheet. There was bad news.. turns out he's an idiot. He had been playing all the way up to level 4 without putting into account either CON or Favoured Class Bonus when it came to HP. Numpty.
What he didn't know is that the weapon damage rolls were very low. The first crit rolled two 1s on the d10, second all rolled under 5. He would have been 'dead, dead' if those rolled average. I didn't notice the low HP and high CON when I looked over his sheet (by this level I concentrate on passive abilities, class features and maybe the odd magic item). Turns out two other players at my table didn't know about Favoured Class Bonuses either.. jeez guys, making my slaughter easy for me.
Anyway, in this one encounter something funny happened. I racked up 7 natural 20s. I always use this dice and I've made one (maybe two or three) natural 20s with it the entire time, it's definitely not weighted or skewed. They just got 'lucky' However, it was given to me as a gift by my Venture Captain. Talk of 'curses' were happening around the table. (I got to play a game in the evening with a Gunslinger. Same die. Natural 20s: 0. Misfires: 2.)
Everything else went well, especially once they dispatched the chairs rather quickly (I rolled my 8th natural 20 here, no-one even batted an eyelid. I had them broken.) They really then really hunkered down and tried to solve the cypher in this room and got back between 60 and 65 minutes. They even remembered to not be wearing their disguises in the room. With such a big group, I resolved the high Bluff roll simply. I had the Ambassador walk in and asked "Just where the hell have you all been?" First person that talked made the roll. It was their Ninja!
So after teasing him, the group depended on him for this for his lie and his bluff roll. Ninja, high CHA, class skill, ranks invested and high roll.
Ninja sneaked through, thought he was dead, survived and saved the day.
Great scenario, can be a bit long, especially if the party splits. We were over the 4 hour mark by quite a bit. However would definitely recommend it more balanced players and characters that enjoy more than the 'hit it with a stick' adventures.
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I ran this scenario yesterday at our monthly game, and the party of four managed to finish the whole thing in an hour, real time. I blame the fact that 2 out of the four of them were from the Cheliax faction to start, so didn't have to do anything more but finish the mission, and the other 2 where Andoran and I can't remember the last one, but he also had to get information out of the archive room. Basically, none of them had any reason to be in the ball room, or any well populated areas and they all rolled fantastically on stealth checks without being stealth orientated classes. Maybe it was just a fluke, but we got to the end and were wondering what to do with the rest of our time.
The only part they really had any difficulty was when they had to work out the chipher using the letter left behind by Zarta, but I allowed them to make a few intelligence checks so that they knew that it was atleast a code.
I think this scenario is well written, but can be short if some members of the party have no reason to go into the ball room, or other areas where they could be caught by gaurds or just people who may be around.
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... and the other 2 where Andoran and I can't remember the last one...I was Sczarni, and yeah, it was literally just finding the info in the archives.
... they all rolled fantastically on stealth checks without being stealth orientated classes. Maybe it was just a fluke, but we got to the end and were wondering what to do with the rest of our time.I think the problem as a whole was that both myself (the Conversion Inquisitor who was geared up for Bluff, Diplomacy, Intimidate, Sense Motive and Perception) rolled amazingly on everything that moved us along, and our Ninja rolled amazingly in both Combats and in stealth stuff. We didn't run into anyone that needed negotiating interaction after getting into the building, so again it took little time. I think the dice played a large part.
I think this scenario is well written, but can be short if some members of the party have no reason to go into the ball room, or other areas where they could be caught by gaurds or just people who may be around.One suggestion if you're running it again Sibel: limit our information so that we have to spend more real world time on it. I think the best bet would be covering more of the map (printing off two copies and cutting up individual rooms maybe?) so that we had 0 understanding of the layout and therefore had to stumble/stealth our way through. Could you imagine if our pyromaniacal Magus had stumbled into that ballroom accidentally?
Oh hi XD
and yes, chopping up the map may be a good idea XD
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I think the best bet would be covering more of the map (printing off two copies and cutting up individual rooms maybe?)
I did something similar to this when I ran this scenario at OwlCon, and it worked really well. My wife drew out the map on grid paper and I cut out each individual room, then I laid down one room at a time as they entered or peeked into it. I think it did a really good job of keeping up the suspense and making them worried about what's on the other side of every door.
My favorite thing that we did for this scenario, though, was that I photoshopped a picture of Ambrus Valsin with a kiss on it, printed it out, put it in a cheap picture frame, and then hid the player handout inside the back of the frame so that it was just barely sticking out. The players loved it, although I did have to encourage them to actually take it an examine it more closely.
I really loved this scenario, and I'm planning to run it again at GenCon with the same kind of setup.
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I think it's time for me to write a full review of a scenario for the first time.
I enjoyed this one when I played it. When I was looking at the schedule for MegaCon, I intentionally picked this to run multiple times, so I could get away with only doing prep work once and run it multiple times.
Now that I've GMed it twice, this is my absolute favorite PFS scenario. Given that I've probably played more than half of them, that's saying something.
Just a quick recap now, and I'll post more later:
1. The phrase "elephant in the room" took on a whole new meaning when a druid literally had her medium sized elephant companion march through the center of the grand ballroom as a distraction.
2. At both tables, it was worth looking up to watch the reactions on the players' faces when I said "The chair attacks you."
3. And the hilarious response from one of my players: "Good thing my ranger took favored enemy: furniture"
And two recommendations for GMs on this one:
1. Ignore the first paragraph of the intro box text. Just skip the "You think back to your mission briefing" and start with the PCs in the mission briefing with Ambrus Valsin saying that the paracountess doesn't exist. Then, give them time to buy supplies before the evening's infiltration. That first paragraph of him saying that is exactly what you need to grab their attention at the start of the session.
2. Don't draw the map in advance for the main section of the adventure. Or have each room pre-printed separately, and lay them out one at a time as appropriate. My GM drew it as we went when I played it, and as I was prepping, I decided to do the same thing. I usually hate drawing maps, especially in the middle of the game when you're under time pressure, so I draw or print most of them in advance. But given the nature of the exploration here, I think it's the best way to go.
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Few questions:
- Is the vent 5ft squares? Surely it can't be for that puzzle to make any sense.
- There are 5 exits to the vents; 3 of them unlabelled. Where do these go? Can they be used as shortcuts to get back out?
- That door at the top of the records archive - players must have tried to check what's behind it before, presumably in every game. What's been your answer? Anything aside from "out of the scope of the adventure"? I don't want to break verisimilitude here.
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Ignore the first paragraph of the intro box text. Just skip the "You think back to your mission briefing" and start with the PCs in the mission briefing with Ambrus Valsin saying that the paracountess doesn't exist. Then, give them time to buy supplies before the evening's infiltration. That first paragraph of him saying that is exactly what you need to grab their attention at the start of the session.
Take note, Paizo - while this is fantastic advice for this scenario, getting straight to the point in wall text, and simplifying it, will do enormous favours in every scenario and create much more immersion between the VC's speech and the characters.
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Few questions:
- Is the vent 5ft squares? Surely it can't be for that puzzle to make any sense.
- There are 5 exits to the vents; 3 of them unlabelled. Where do these go? Can they be used as shortcuts to get back out?
- That door at the top of the records archive - players must have tried to check what's behind it before, presumably in every game. What's been your answer? Anything aside from "out of the scope of the adventure"? I don't want to break verisimilitude here.
Just going from memory here since I don't have it in front of me, but the adventure does cover this stuff, just not in as much detail as you'd like.
The vent system is long and winding, with several forks along the way. The puzzle is knowing which way to go at each fork in the path. It's implied (don't remember if it's said outright) that there are plenty of vents leading to other rooms long the way. But the whole thing leads to other wings of the building that aren't mapped, so if they leave the vent system in the wrong area, you pretty much have to wing it. That's when you get into the part at the end about what to do if security is called on them, which will definitely happen if they're some place that party guests and informants shouldn't be, and have them fight overwhelming force until they're subdued and captured.
Likewise, the exit to the records room leads to a different wing, nowhere near where they're supposed to be. If they head out that way, they'll set off the alarm noted on the records room map, and again be surrounded by overwhelming force of security guards until they eventually are forced to surrender.
So far, I've GMed this three times, and played it once, and none of my groups have gone that far off the rails. Or failed in the main mission, for that matter, though it's usually close to make it back in time.
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You know you have a generous GM when he allows the Paladin to lie numerous times and make multiple Bluff checks, without saying anything. lol.
We probably needed all the help we could get with 2 fighters and a paladin in the party. I just stood there shaking my head. It was a rough morning.
Great scenario.
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You know you have a generous GM when he allows the Paladin to lie numerous times and make multiple Bluff checks, without saying anything. lol.
We probably needed all the help we could get with 2 fighters and a paladin in the party. I just stood there shaking my head. It was a rough morning.
Great scenario.
I had a paladin at the table one of the times I GMed it. He just kept his mouth shut and let the others do the talking. And when he did talk, it was all completely honest stuff. ie "I'm with them", "Excuse me", etc.
When I played it, we had 3 barbarians. You'd think they'd be worthless at the skill stuff, and they were pretty bad at the talking and sneaking around, but they get perception as a class skill, which helped in the records room. And they laid waste to the two combats in no time flat. Worked out pretty well with my bard, a sorcerer, and a rogue doing the skill stuff, and the barbarians handling the combats.
I feel like I am missing something obvious, but where exactly is Security locker A23? Running a PBP and they have found the reference to it, but I cannot seem to see where it actually is. Got a throbbing headache so I am sure I am just missing it, but if anyone could point it out I would be most appreciative :)
Oh, nevermind, seen it - and it really was obvious! *Blushes*
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As mentioned in the last post, I just re-read this adventure in preparation to run it again for the first time in over a year, and there's something that I'm not seeing.
I could have sworn there was some sort of alarm trap at the entrance to the records room, which summons the guards if the PCs try to leave that room through the doors instead of the vent. But now I don't see any explicit details in the scenario. What am I missing?
Venture-Captain, Netherlands
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I could have sworn there was something explicit, like an alarm spell on the doors or something. In fact, I thought even the discolored squares on the map inside the doors to the records room were trapped. But now I'm not seeing it in the actual adventure. Maybe I was just imagining it.
You are not the only one. THat is exactly how I remember it.
I just skimmed trough the scenario real quickly, and on page 13 it says:
"Security in the records archive mostly involves a series of wards and alarms at the entrance."
The area around the door is indeed colored differently on the map.
And on page 15:
"The PCs can garner the attention of the Chelish embassy’s
guards by failing to get back to the waiting area in
time or by accumulating too many strikes during their
infiltration. Tripping the alarms at the main entrance to
the records archive has the same effect."
Bolding is mine.
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Venture-Captain, Netherlands
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It is indeed very vague. I think is a logical conclusion to assume the squares are trapped as they are drawn differently on the map. But that's about the only evidence.
Its also unclear what kind of alarm is triggered. A silent alarm? An alarm in the guard room? (far away enough the players dont hear) or a nice *meep meep meep* sound so the players get nice and scared?
So yeah. Vague.
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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Woran ran this for me (previous post); we had this sweet party with a bard, Urgathoa Charisma-focused cleric, my Urgathoa-venerating Investigator and a pregen Swashbuckler. We had a super-smooth run, but that's what you get when there's a Hat of Disguise and two people with Disguise Self; I don't remember exactly, but I think we put Sleeves of Many Garments on Jirelle to accelerate changing into servants outfits and stuff. Saves lots of time.
Anyway, I ran this last week, and I really liked how well this scenario is written. I had no trouble looking up stuff at all, everything was where you'd expect it to be, and everything was there. However, the players will of course do things you don't expect (bless their black little hearts), and I'd like to share some things that hiccuped;
- The players wasted a lot of time in the beginning, crossing the ballroom and getting servants' outfits. They spent a lot of time looking for servants' outfits on the one side of the ballroom, while they were actually on the other side. Now, the scenario has Amara Li telling the players when they cross the 40/50min marks, but what is really needed is a way for the players to know when they're losing a lot of time at the beginning. It's always been a bit unclear to me whether pocket watches exist on Golarion, but it might not be a bad idea to tell the players before they go in "you might want to bring a way to measure how much time you have left".
- Something went completely wrong in their thinking on getting the code handouts. They mostly ignored the "Vent" text and tried to decode the imperial seal codes using only that sheet, which of course went nowhere. They also tried to decode the capital letters with the seal text, which was also pointless.
They eventually cracked the cipher in a roundabout way; in the evidence room, at first they had no clue where to look and scattered each to a bookcase, but none towards the Receipts. But when the chairs attacked only when a PC came close to the "sensitive" stacks, they knew they had to look in that neighbourhood. With the receipt in hand, they had a ciphertext that they actually knew what it should represent. One player searched the Linguistics Department stack for clues, and rolled well enough that I gave the "the Chelaxians tend to use substitution ciphers" as a clue. Another player searched the Internal Security Sites stack and I gave them the clue that there are quite a few sites called Citadel [Something]. That gave them the opening they needed to crack the cipher.
It took them way too long, but this was a 4-player party where one player really didn't like decoding. I was already feeling sorry for how long they'd spent on getting to Zarta's room (their fault, but the scenario's timing aid from Amara doesn't help there either), one player really didn't like codebreaking as a puzzle, they'd rolled really unlucky on the Linguistics to get clues (the Aid roll was over 20, the primary check got 11), and they were only a small party to start with. They were trying pretty hard but one mistaken initial assumption (not focusing on Zarta's clue) led them way into the deep end. So I decided to count only half the OOC time spent on the code. In the end they made it back within the 5 minute overtime but with a 26 on an all-hands-on-deck Bluff got away from the ambassador fast enough.
- When they searched the vent, I told them about the loot they found. My mistake here was failing to describe that the vent actually went somewhere. And then of course the players thought they'd "finished" the thing to do with the vent; that it was all about a hidden stash of passports.
Here's how I want to do it next time:
- During the mission briefing, Ambrus tells the PCs that it's their responsibility to keep track of time, that they need to find an unobtrusive way to do so. (One of the possibilities is using staggered ending durations of spells; for example, casting 1-hour Mage Armors from a wand, with 10 minute intervals between castings, means one of them expires every 10 minutes.)
- When they search Zarta's secret study, the imperial seal codes will be in the vent along with her passports. It makes no sense to leave it on the desk, because any Chelaxian search team could recognize seal codes. More importantly, this ensures that the first thing the players will see will be the "Valsin Letter".
- When the players search the vent, I will lavish some attention on how the the vent leads to a network of tunnels propped against the older church decor. This should accomplish two things: make it clear the vent really goes somewhere, and by the amount of description, signal to savvy players that anything that receives this much attention is important. Ideally, players recognize the Vent route code first and then travel through the vent to the evidence room and they'll do their decoding work there. (Comfortably seated, of course.)
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I've GMed this 4 times. Most groups catch on about the vent immediately, but I had one group that just missed the clue. I re-read them the room description, and they caught on. None of them ever thought the bag behind the vent was all there was, though. They all figured out that they should go crawl through it.
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Venture-Agent, Netherlands—Utrecht
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It's always been a bit unclear to me whether pocket watches exist on Golarion, but it might not be a bad idea to tell the players before they go in "you might want to bring a way to measure how much time you have left".
I recently GMed Tears at Bitter Manor, which features watches as well. In the discussion for the RPG Superstar submission one of the judges said actual watches are pretty rare. I'm not sure how rare, exactly, but I'm guessing rare enough that low-level adventurers can't obtain one easily.
Ah, found the post:
9) Watches are pretty rare on Golarion; rare enough that multiple magic watches owned by a group would be quite unusual.
Source
Not entirely what you're asking, as these are specifically magic watches, but same principle applies.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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I've GMed this 4 times. Most groups catch on about the vent immediately, but I had one group that just missed the clue. I re-read them the room description, and they caught on. None of them ever thought the bag behind the vent was all there was, though. They all figured out that they should go crawl through it.
I think I may have accidentally given them the impression they "finished it" when they found Zarta's stash.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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It's always been a bit unclear to me whether pocket watches exist on Golarion, but it might not be a bad idea to tell the players before they go in "you might want to bring a way to measure how much time you have left".I recently GMed Tears at Bitter Manor, which features watches as well. In the discussion for the RPG Superstar submission one of the judges said actual watches are pretty rare. I'm not sure how rare, exactly, but I'm guessing rare enough that low-level adventurers can't obtain one easily.
Ah, found the post:
9) Watches are pretty rare on Golarion; rare enough that multiple magic watches owned by a group would be quite unusual.
Source
Not entirely what you're asking, as these are specifically magic watches, but same principle applies.
Basically, are pocket watches something a PC can buy? I don't think so, but it wouldn't surprise me to see them pop up in the works of a writer who believes otherwise.
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I've created a GM cheat sheet for the non-combat portions of this scenario. It can be found on pfsprep here.
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Venture-Captain, California—Sacramento
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Basically, are pocket watches something a PC can buy? I don't think so, but it wouldn't surprise me to see them pop up in the works of a writer who believes otherwise.It's always been a bit unclear to me whether pocket watches exist on Golarion, but it might not be a bad idea to tell the players before they go in "you might want to bring a way to measure how much time you have left".I recently GMed Tears at Bitter Manor, which features watches as well. In the discussion for the RPG Superstar submission one of the judges said actual watches are pretty rare. I'm not sure how rare, exactly, but I'm guessing rare enough that low-level adventurers can't obtain one easily.
Ah, found the post:
9) Watches are pretty rare on Golarion; rare enough that multiple magic watches owned by a group would be quite unusual.
Source
Not entirely what you're asking, as these are specifically magic watches, but same principle applies.
They are a bit dear at first level... But PFS legal.
Better question, what is the Perform DC to use a song to time the operation (ala Hudson Hawk? (youtube video))
