4-22 Halls of Dwarven Lore

[Mark Stratton]

I just downloaded this and noticed that the Chronicle Sheet may have an error. The page is divided in two (as it normally is for a scenario with different subtiers), but the sections are divided into "Subtier 8-9" and "Subtier 8-9." I presume this is an error, and the first should be, "Subtier 5-6," correct? If not, there are no items for the lower subtier.

[John Compton]

You are entirely correct; it should be 5-6 and 8-9.

[ZomB]

The thread title should have a spoiler tag.

I am not clear on several things in this scenario.

1) What shape and size is the

Spoiler:

stele?

It is described as large, granite and weighing 5 tons. 5 tons of granite is about 64 cubic feet (depending on which definition of ton is used). Is it meant to be tall and thin like a totem pole? or a squat 4ft cube? or some other shape? Is it meant to be

Spoiler:

carved on all 4 sides or just one?

2) The block room is not well described.

2a) Are the entry and exit tunnels to the room also meant to be filled with blocks?

2b) I assume the room is

Spoiler:

filled with blocks, and the map shows only the ones that cannot be moved?

2c) You appear to only be able to get on person through the room at one time. Is this correct? How do you get that last person through?

2c) I assume that as you can see the shape and size of the room on the wall then you can just dimension door past it?

2d)

Spoiler:

As Sandricaan has dim door, why hasn't he tried it?

2e) The

Spoiler:

trap

description makes no sense. What should it say? Should it say activating the _same_ control three times in a row?

[wvpolarbear]

2d is explained in the lore during his introduction.

I was expecting alot more out of this scenario. The lore is awesome, the story of the events happening before the dungeon is awesome, the mass traps is awesome; the fight mechanics are underwhelming and what you might say as hardly season 5 material. Even with only core classes this still seems like a free chron sheet.

Just ran this, heres some early thoughts, played at low tier:

Spoiler:

Traps are easy to spot, though the double trap in the second room can be funny.

First fight is a waste of time. The enemies are incapable of damaging even a party of pregens, and a simple grapple or trip combo on any enemy negates the entire fight.
Surprise round silent glitterdust with grease followup allows for some interesting bottlenecking, but overall the boss is just status effects, no real bang.

Second fight has the strange swim mechanic, without fast healing graven guardians are a joke; their DR is too low to negate anything but shurikens and some archery sans deadly aim. Trying to fit all the enemies into a rush into the elevator is a cluster that is difficult to contain, and with no ranged attacks partys can easily hold them at the door and just slaughter everything.

The final fights chaos hammer can be quite powerful, and this fight can challenge PC's. It is pretty interesting. The author did not say where any of the enemys are placed, so far as I can tell. Just general areas, and the main enemy ( trapped cleric ) seems to be in one of three spots.
"trapped by rubble".

Puzzle might have been the best part, seeing how players solve an open ended challenge.

Could have gone better I suppose.

[Czrenobog]

ZomB wrote:

The thread title should have a spoiler tag.

I am not clear on several things in this scenario.

1) What shape and size is the ** spoiler omitted ** It is described as large, granite and weighing 5 tons. 5 tons of granite is about 64 cubic feet (depending on which definition of ton is used). Is it meant to be tall and thin like a totem pole? or a squat 4ft cube? or some other shape? Is it meant to be ** spoiler omitted **

2) The block room is not well described.

2a) Are the entry and exit tunnels to the room also meant to be filled with blocks?

2b) I assume the room is ** spoiler omitted **

2c) You appear to only be able to get on person through the room at one time. Is this correct? How do you get that last person through?

2c) I assume that as you can see the shape and size of the room on the wall then you can just dimension door past it?

2d)** spoiler omitted **

2e) The ** spoiler omitted ** description makes no sense. What should it say? Should it say activating the _same_ control three times in a row?

I also did not like how the last room was written up. From what I gathered

Spoiler:

All pillars start in the down or closed state except the first square. The players can raise one pillar by selecting a direction, causing the current "open" or raised pillar to drop within say... 6 seconds. This causes which ever direction they've triggered to raise with about a 3 second overlap.

Thus, it's kind of like a game of frogger. The "operator" raises a pillar, giving the "mover" one move action to get to the next opening before the pillar descends.

The floor is actually a pressure plate/trap. It detects if a pillar is currently in the down/closed state or the up/open state. If the "operator" fails a check, tries to open a pillar that cannot be opened or tries to raise a square that is a wall, they receive a fail. If there are three consecutive fails, then the trap resets, ejecting the "mover" by dropping them into a pit based on tier.

In concerns to the redacted:

Spoiler:

"The passageway to the northeast leads across a short bridge over a deep trench before terminating in a small recess just large enough to accommodate a fully armored dwarf."

combined with

Spoiler:

"The trench extends 30 feet into a vaulted open space beneath the northern room, and its walls are fairly smooth, requiring a successful DC 25 Climb check to scale."

makes me think that

Spoiler:

the pillar crashes down, doing damage, then opens the trap door to the pit trap below, they then walk west, climb back onto the bridge and start over.

As far as one at a time, last person issue, I'll be adding a on/off switch in F4 so that only one person needs to navigate the puzzle, then the party can join them.

Finally, I'd describe it from my mind at least as a

Spoiler:

map dominating one wall, it's surface appearing to be almost molded from liquid granite, tracing the topography of the inner sea region and runes blazoned in it's surface. As you study it (fake roll) you notice that the runes seem to be moving so slowly as to be almost imperceptible.

[Drogon]

ZomB wrote:

The thread title should have a spoiler tag.

The title of this message board is "Pathfinder Society GM Discussion."

Underneath that title it says the following:

Quote:

This forum is for Pathfinder Society GMs to discuss game play experience and seek clarification on scenarios. Threads in this forum may contain spoilers for players.

In other words: spoilers are assumed.

It is certainly courteous to put "Spoilers" in the title of your thread, but it is not required. Putting spoiler tags in the body of a post within a thread that is within the GM Boards advising GMs how to run said scenario? Unnecessary.

[Mark Stratton]

With respect, I didn't include the world "Spoilers" in my title because my question had nothing to do with spoilers, or even the content or description of the scenario. Rather, my question was about what I thought might be a typographical error, which indeed was the case.

Nothing that I posted included spoilers.

Mark

[Matthew Morris]

I assume once the person is past the first pillar 'line of effect' will come into play. I ask because my local players use message a lot when scouting and the pillar will shut it off.

"Wheelman to scout one. Which dial should I use, over."
"Wheelman to scout one, come back."
"Ah $#$%#$%#$%#$%#$% Who wants to be scout 2?"

[TwilightKnight]

Haven't read the thread nor the scenario, hoping to play it first, but I did peek at the map page. Lots of round rooms...10-foot scale...argh! shakes fist

[TriOmegaZero]

The puzzle room map is pretty useless as far as I can tell. Enjoyed playing, going to have to study up on this before running.

[Drogon]

TriOmegaZero wrote:

The puzzle room map is pretty useless as far as I can tell. Enjoyed playing, going to have to study up on this before running.

Completely useless, I think. It seems something got changed from the point the map was turned over to the point the puzzle was developed. I have no idea what, but the two things (the map and the description of how it works) no longer align.

For what it's worth: it became my "optional" encounter. There really wasn't one written into the scenario, and with all the (awesome) role playing that my group did, we had all of five minutes to handle the puzzle and story wrap-up. I skipped the puzzle and wrapped up the story. That seemed to work out best for all involved.

Plus I had a trap finder in the group with a +23 perception bonus and +18 disable device. That puzzle didn't stand a chance.

[TriOmegaZero]

Drogon wrote:

For what it's worth: it became my "optional" encounter. There really wasn't one written into the scenario, and with all the (awesome) role playing that my group did, we had all of five minutes to handle the puzzle and story wrap-up. I skipped the puzzle and wrapped up the story. That seemed to work out best for all involved.

Yeah, we ran out of time and got the Cliff's Notes version of the final area. Combat just took too long with the time-consuming nature of the opponents.

[Drogon]

TriOmegaZero wrote:

Drogon wrote:

For what it's worth: it became my "optional" encounter. There really wasn't one written into the scenario, and with all the (awesome) role playing that my group did, we had all of five minutes to handle the puzzle and story wrap-up. I skipped the puzzle and wrapped up the story. That seemed to work out best for all involved.

Yeah, we ran out of time and got the Cliff's notes version of the final area. Combat just took too long with the time-consuming nature of the opponents.

I saw that, too. I'm a bit dismayed because I've seen that in a few of the scenarios in the last three months or so. I'm concerned because I feel that, rather than making the opponents "deadly" the development process has begun to focus on making them unhittable, instead.

Although I missed a sweet combo with Shu-Lin Foo: she casts confusion as one of her opening spells during combat. The tactics didn't mention it, but she also has murderous command on her list. Seeing as my confusion target actually missed his save (and was a melee combatant) I'm pretty bummed that I didn't see that until the combat was all but over.

[Samish Lakefinder]

I loved the water room. The insidious part of it is you can not immediately get to air. When the party realized they needed to leave NOW a member of the party was across the room and when he tried to swim back was terrified that his touch of the sea potion had just expired. The party thought they were leaving him behind to drown as they closed and activated the elevator.

When I prepared the scenario I was initially confused that the trench under the Vault Lock only extended 30' under the room. I then realized that if you look at the 1 square=10' map it would be easy to think the lock room was 30' long and made the trench extend 60' back. The party I ran for also wanted to explore in the trench under the room, so I made the trench area under the room slightly larger than room.

This scenario ran long for me as well, over 5 1/2 hours, and that is after I had all of the pathfinder ghouls trapped by stone.

[Majuba]

I ran this Saturday - about 7 hours (5.5 hours before the puzzle, which I was *not* going to skip). A *big* part of that time was a truly epic string of bad luck (the party could simply not roll better than 5 or 6 at most on any offensive action) during the first fight.

My big problem was the water room - how can they possibly escape after the room floods? 5 minutes to drain? Maybe I need to re-read the areas on that level.

Edit: I did very much enjoy the role-play potentials throughout, especially the 2nd to last room. I kept the PCs fooled for quite a long time. The players less so.

[Mo the Monk]

Majuba wrote:

A *big* part of that time was a truly epic string of bad luck (the party could simply not roll better than 5 or 6 at most on any offensive action) during the first fight.

Highest enemy damaging activity in that fight? burning hands. # of casts of burning hands that successfully went through the SR? 3 out of 6.

[Samish Lakefinder]

Majuba wrote:

...

My big problem was the water room - how can they possibly escape after the room floods? 5 minutes to drain? Maybe I need to re-read the areas on that level.
...

I was thinking this would kill people that relied on air crystals until I realized that it is five minutes to drain the room. There is going to be air at the top of the elevator that is breathable much earlier. If the elevator is 15' tall like it says all the rooms are it emptys at 3'/10 rounds. For characters that can swim to the top of the elevator room there is easily enough air at the top after only a couple rounds.

[Drogon]

My group guessed right away that the room on the far side was flooded. They used the adamantine arrow found on the upper level to drill a hole in the door, took the elevator up one level and waited a while, checking back every now and then to see if the hole was still spouting water.

This created a bottleneck fight at the door after they opened it, which became very entertaining when the rogue tumbled past into the room and was suddenly surrounded by the graven guardians, which hadn't activated yet.

[Tork Shaw]

Hey folks - really great reading this feedback/issues/problems thread on my first PFS scenario. I am actually running this at PaizoConUK next month so it has been a help to hear what to watch out for! The scenario took some changes between turnover and publishing, which I totally understand (because I had made it SUPER-BRUTAL), but it has fewer teeth now than as originally designed so I am interested to see how I can keep combat trickier than it seems to have worked out in the end...

Originally Wedderwark was a melee sorcerer sort of a character (and male!), so he could deal out quite a lot of spell damage with touch spells while being quite tricky to blat. I had anticipated the jinkin rogues doing quite a lot of business on their sneak attacks too, running between each of the openings, firing, then sneaking round to another to get their SA again, but perhaps there isnt time/space?

The flooded chambers also contained a rot-grub swarm, living in the lacedons, so melee was pretty risky with them. The swarm would leave the lacedons when they were struck so there would be a pretty serious incentive to leave the elevator and fight with the construct (which was originally a flawed Tophet, and somewhat nasty.) I wonder if perhaps there is some scope for keeping the creatures in that room back and hidden until the PCs are deep in the room - sort of circling round to cut them off?

The Pathfinders were pretty mean too. Marcetta was crit-specced with the elven curve blade and power attack. But actually, she could probably have downed a player in a single round so she probably needed back-scaling ;) I hope still provide a bit of a challenge provided they get the drop? Did people find that they could pile on enough hurt? Or were they a bit too evenly matched with PCs?

I'm glad you (on the whole!) enjoyed the vault lock. It was fun to design!

[Caderyn]

We found that the PC's were far more dangerous to each other than the monsters, but we had a very interesting table, my dragon disciple was proud he had the highest wisdom of the group with an 8 :)

The first fight consisted of the 2 Paladins getting confused and tickling each other, and the second fight was my Dragon Disciple vs the parties Barbarian each of us doing 20-30 damage a hit.

Marcetta also got confusion off but that was just against me so it wasnt a huge deal we managed to avoid that being a problem.

[Fromper]

I played it with 4 PCs at exactly level 5, plus the ranger's wolf companion. We got our butts kicked, but kept just barely surviving on lucky rolls. Having a healing optimized life oracle helped. Actually, having a well balanced team of well built PCs helped. We won in the end, but my rogue and the wolf were both at around -8 to -10 HP when the final fight ended, and the oracle was out of channels, so he was rushing to hit us with a wand of CLW.

Given how many "almost" deaths we had, and we had a surprisingly well balanced team of fairly well optimized PCs, I think this scenario is probably a little too tough for 4 players at the lower tier. We only just barely survived, and a couple of lucky rolls going the other way could have easily caused a TPK. But not scaling down properly for 4 players seems to be a recurring problem throughout season 4, so this doesn't surprise me.

[Drogon]

Fromper wrote:

I played it with 4 PCs at exactly level 5, plus the ranger's wolf companion. We got our butts kicked, but kept just barely surviving on lucky rolls. Having a healing optimized life oracle helped. Actually, having a well balanced team of well built PCs helped. We won in the end, but my rogue and the wolf were both at around -8 to -10 HP when the final fight ended, and the oracle was out of channels, so he was rushing to hit us with a wand of CLW.

Given how many "almost" deaths we had, and we had a surprisingly well balanced team of fairly well optimized PCs, I think this scenario is probably a little too tough for 4 players at the lower tier. We only just barely survived, and a couple of lucky rolls going the other way could have easily caused a TPK. But not scaling down properly for 4 players seems to be a recurring problem throughout season 4, so this doesn't surprise me.

Did your GM make the 4-player adjustments? In each encounter creatures are removed.

In the gremlin fight you should only have faced Wedderwark and 2 jinkins.

In the lacedon fight you should only have faced 2 flawed guardians (and the lacedons).

In the final fight you should only have faced the halfling and the Tian woman (who is pinned in place by the cave in).

[Tork Shaw]

Thanks for this guys. It sounds like there are also some stories of trial as well as ease :)

I must admit to being quite new to PFS having only played in 2 scenarios myself. I've read a lot more (I have a bit of a library going on) but I think group make-up is probably pretty critical. I imagine that a group of 5 optimised players would hardly struggle with anything at all, but that a more hap-hazard or non-optimised group could find a wild card in almost every scenario.

I actually made an error in my first turnover, listing Wedderwark's Charisma 2 points higher. When it was brought down to where it should be I was thinking 'oh no, now her spells will never land', but I was guess its very possible there are a few Wisdom 8's out there - hopefully all in the group I am running this for at PaizoConUK *maniacal hand wringing*.

Fromper : Did you find that even Wedderwark and the Jinkins were an issue? I guess she is my biggest worry.

[Fromper]

Drogon wrote:

Fromper wrote:

I played it with 4 PCs at exactly level 5, plus the ranger's wolf companion. We got our butts kicked, but kept just barely surviving on lucky rolls. Having a healing optimized life oracle helped. Actually, having a well balanced team of well built PCs helped. We won in the end, but my rogue and the wolf were both at around -8 to -10 HP when the final fight ended, and the oracle was out of channels, so he was rushing to hit us with a wand of CLW.

Given how many "almost" deaths we had, and we had a surprisingly well balanced team of fairly well optimized PCs, I think this scenario is probably a little too tough for 4 players at the lower tier. We only just barely survived, and a couple of lucky rolls going the other way could have easily caused a TPK. But not scaling down properly for 4 players seems to be a recurring problem throughout season 4, so this doesn't surprise me.

Did your GM make the 4-player adjustments? In each encounter creatures are removed.

In the gremlin fight you should only have faced Wedderwark and 2 jinkins.

In the lacedon fight you should only have faced 2 flawed guardians (and the lacedons).

In the final fight you should only have faced the halfling and the Tian woman (who is pinned in place by the cave in).

Well, the gremlin fight was made more difficult by messing up diplomacy early, so apparently that allowed an ooze to follow us in from the sewers and attack at the same time we were fighting the gremlins. Were those fights supposed to be combined, or did my GM mess that up?

In the final fight, it sounds like my GM did forget to scale things down for 4 players. We had 3 enemies, not 2.

Those were the two really tough encounters. My rogue actually kicked butt on the trap finding early, which was the first time in 5 levels that he's actually had to serve that role. Which is fine - it's not like that's what I built him for. I just put some ranks in those skills because I could.

[Drogon]

Yeah, the ooze things follow you if you have to sneak in, and that definitely makes the first fight tougher. It's hard to foul up that diplomacy on those dwarves, though. DC 19, and you can use multiple skills to "aid another" (basically, anything that proves you're competent at exploring trap-laden dungeons).

In the one I ran, the tough fight was the flooded room. They had essentially alerted the lacedons they were coming via the method they used to clear the water, and didn't activate the Grave Guardians until the rogue tumbled in. One of the front-line fighter failed his Fort save vs the paralysis, and it was touch and go on the back side until help got through. I liked how that fight played out.

In the gremlin fight, the irritating part was the AC. They were barely able to do damage (unless they successfully sniped, which was difficult to pull of). And I could tell Wedderwark had been hit with the nerf bat during development. It was basically just a long, drawn out combat that ate time due to all the perception checks and the high AC for her. The PCs were never really in danger.

[Mergy]

It's DC 24, actually. You have to raise them from unfriendly to friendly. A DC 19 will get you part of the way I suppose.

[Drogon]

Adam Mogyorodi wrote:

It's DC 24, actually. You have to raise them from unfriendly to friendly. A DC 19 will get you part of the way I suppose.

No, you have to get them to indifferent to make a request of them. They start as unfriendly. So, DC 20 + CHA mod (in this case -1) to improve their attitude one step. Then you can make a request of them: "Can we go into the area you're guarding?" I would call that complicated aid, so another DC 19 check. Though I could see it being dangerous aid, I suppose, so DC 24.

But it's been a long time since I've GM'd a table where everyone didn't immediately pile on with assists. So, most tables are providing between +4 and +10 to the lead PC's check. The table I GM'd had two dwarves, and they brought a keg of ale to liquor them up, then fed them a sob story about their lost brothers (they had done some gather information to discern the names of the delvers who had gone in to find the lost Pathfinders - I had to make them up on the fly). They explained that the other four they had brought were their hired help (who then proceeded to show off their skills), and a roll of the die later those guards were their best friends (meaning they were pushed all the way to helpful). The subsequent DC 4 check to let them in to explore was impossible to fail.

Edit: Hm. I see the scenario actually states they have to be made friendly to allow them in. That goes against what's in the Diplomacy skill description, but, yes, that would be a DC 24. Or two DC 19 checks made back to back.

[Mergy]

I was going to quote it, but you beat me to it.

Two DC 19s would work, although I imagine a 'no' after the first sub 24 roll might cause a player to get upset and ruin things for the rest of the party with an Intimidation attempt. I've had players who might consider attacking the guards as well.

[Fromper]

When I played it, it wasn't just diplomacy to get past them, though we blew the diplomacy roll anyway. I rolled a 1, used my character folio reroll, and got a 6 on the second try. With a +9 bonus, that still wasn't enough, even after adding a couple of assists. The GM also gave us a chance to convince them of our dungeoneering prowess, but only one player had knowledge (dungeoneering) trained, and rolled low. Then someone tried to bribe them, which apparently just pisses them off.

The flooded room was actually the relatively easy fight for us. We figured out how to drain the room from the elevator, then headed in. My rogue was the first to enter and made my knowledge(religion) check to realize the dead bodies on the floor were undead, before they got up to attack us. So I got a sneak attack, then our Life Oracle beat them in initiative and channeled to hurt them. So I forget if any ghouls survived long enough to even get their first attack, but we killed them quickly, which made the rest of the fight much easier. If we hadn't gotten lucky on eliminating the ghouls immediately, I can see how that could have been tough.

[RainyDayNinja]

My character was a cleric of Torag with the Caves domain, max ranks in Knowledge (engineering), trained in Profession (miner), who spoke Dwarven and Undercommon. This scenario was practically custom-built for my PC. So I didn't have trouble getting permission to go in.

The flooded room might have been a TPK, because half of us were knocked prone by the blast of water from the door. Luckily, I can channel to kill undead while prone, underwater, and surrounded. However now that I read it, it looks like our GM either fudged or misread the water hazard; we didn't move the elevator back up (mostly because the GM showed the door swinging into the elevator, blocking it), and he had the water drain after just a few rounds. In either case I learned my lesson, so all my casters now carry scrolls of water breathing.

[Matt Haddix]

I just played this yesterday, party of 4 at exactly APL 7.5, so we played high tier. It was a TPK in the first fight - the entire party failed their saves against the confusion, even after using shirt rerolls.

[WalterGM]

RainyDayNinja wrote:

In either case I learned my lesson, so all my casters now carry scrolls of water breathing.

Just remember to use those scrolls before you get wet! ;)

[Mark Stratton]

Perhaps I am an idiot, or perhaps it isn't entirely obvious to me, but can someone explain to me the purpose of the map of the Vault Lock (on page 6 of the scenario) and the player's handout?

Only 1 pillar can be up at a time, correct? So, what are these maps showing? it looks like they have multiple pillars up, which isn't correct. Are the maps just wrong? A red herring?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Mark

[Samish Lakefinder]

The map shows the pillars that will not raise.

[Mark Stratton]

Samish Lakefinder wrote:

The map shows the pillars that will not raise.

Thanks, Samish.

In fact, I went back and read this thing a third time, and just NOW saw the single line in the text on page 18 that indicates such.

Mark

[Michael Brock]

Think of it as one of those hand puzzles that has 8 sliding tiles and one empty space. The room is exactly like that except with more than 8 tiles. When you shift one column, another space is filled. Except, someone glued the damn columns in place on several spots so the column (aka tile) can't shift there and has to pick a new space.

At least that helped me visualize better since I am GMing it at PaizoCon UK.

[TOZ]

Thanks Mike. That helps a lot.

[Mergy]

In other news, a mechanical version of this puzzle would be the greatest thing of all time.

[TOZ]

I'm thinking a set of 1 inch square blocks to set on the map will help immensely. Then you can move the open space as the character progresses through.

[Drogon]

Pretty sweet explanation, Mike. Thank you.

[Fromper]

Adam Mogyorodi wrote:

In other news, a mechanical version of this puzzle would be the greatest thing of all time.

Life sized, of course.

[TOZ]

But I don't want to smash my players into a pit! Just their characters!

[ZomB]

TOZ wrote:

I'm thinking a set of 1 inch square blocks to set on the map will help immensely. Then you can move the open space as the character progresses through.

A good way of running it is using a bunch of D6s placed on a flip mat, one per square, as suggested in the Block Room Operation file in the GM Shared Prep area

[TOZ]

Well, that saves me a trip to the hobby shop.

[Mark Stratton]

Michael Brock wrote:

Think of it as one of those hand puzzles that has 8 sliding tiles and one empty space. The room is exactly like that except with more than 8 tiles. When you shift one column, another space is filled. Except, someone glued the damn columns in place on several spots so the column (aka tile) can't shift there and has to pick a new space.

At least that helped me visualize better since I am GMing it at PaizoCon UK.

Appreciate the visual, Mike. Since I am running this at Gen Con next month, I thought I should make sure I get it right.

:-D

Mark

[Cybit]

The puzzle was complicated for me to figure out, I wish I had heard Mike's explanation prior to Sunday. :D

Key things to note

1) The maps are designed to 10 foot scale, not 5. Let's say I only realized this AFTER I finished running it. Oops. >_<

Spoiler:

2) They almost have to have someone who can deal with traps. I had to change things on the fly (letting them use knowledge: engineering, survival, and stonecunning) to make it remotely fun at the table I ran. That said, they decided to just send some poor summon monster in, the hound archon.

3) Air Bubble + Dim Door + Gloves that let you see through stone = no underwater encounter

4) Telepathic Bond + a wizard who speaks Dwarven = the puzzle becomes trivial.

I ended up liking it OK. Not as good as Rivalry's End (which is what I ran for four other slots), but was OK. Definitely a heavy prep time scenario.

[Mark Stratton]

Is there a reason the designer chose to use a 1 square = 10 feet scale? It seems unnecessary, really.

Mark

[SetonAlandel]

Mark Stratton wrote:

Is there a reason the designer chose to use a 1 square = 10 feet scale? It seems unnecessary, really.

Mark

I'm guessing it's to make sure that the scenario map fits all on one page saving space. I had to redraw my initial map after reading the 2nd floor's description (specifiying 50ft room), then looking at the 25x25 room i drew out. XD

Thankfully my players were good sports and only teased me for an hour.

[Mark Stratton]

SetonAlandel wrote:

Mark Stratton wrote:

Is there a reason the designer chose to use a 1 square = 10 feet scale? It seems unnecessary, really.

Mark

I'm guessing it's to make sure that the scenario map fits all on one page saving space. I had to redraw my initial map after reading the 2nd floor's description (specifiying 50ft room), then looking at the 25x25 room i drew out. XD

Thankfully my players were good sports and only teased me for an hour.

I am sure you are correct, but to me, that's not a good enough reason. :) I mean, it's a .pdf - it's not like a couple pages more would make a difference. The combat grid is done in 5' squares, so to make maps which have a tactical use require a different scale, and then having to convert them to the appropriate scale is just insane, to me.

I like the maps, and I really like the scenario, but this was just completely unnecessary and, frankly, more than a little absurd (in my opinion.)

[Majuba]

I've found that most people print the scenario before running it, so it does indeed make a big difference how many pages there are, particularly how many pages of high-intensive ink use there are (as maps tend to be).