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She then started fleeing off the boat, and got off with the Monk chasing her and most of the rest of the party bleeding out on the deck. The Tiefling Magus had activated his Darkness spell-like ability early on (twenty round duration) which pretty much prevented her from casting any spells. Finally she got out of the Darkness as she was fleeing, Blinded the Monk, and fled off.
Now according to the scenario, she flees if reduced to 5 hp or lower.
However, there's nothing indicating how the players would find the underground headquarters if she fled. If she lives, she can be interrogated. If she's killed, then they find a note and map on her body.
So, does this mean my party is stuck and can't continue the scenario?
Or should I make something up and say she forgot a satchel (including the map) in the ship's cabin?
Of course, as written she's going to be in the Cult's HQ when / if the party shows up, so maybe it'd be best if they just cut their loses?
It's kind of relevant that I misread the stats and included two zombies instead of one in that fight (oops), so if that hadn't have happened she may have been killed earlier. I'm fairly new to GMing so I'm not sure how best to proceed.
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Always make sure there is a way for the PC's to proceed through the adventure (if they wish to continue that is), in this case the easiest method is Gather information checks (Diplomacy or Local) to see if they find someone who spotted her running down the street, have them make a few separate checks at a DC they can pass fairly easily to get led around town to the location they should arrive at
Ah, good idea. I can combine it with some Perception and Survival checks to follow the blood trail (She was at 2hp when she fled) as well for variety.
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Always make sure there is a way for the PC's to proceed through the adventure (if they wish to continue that is), in this case the easiest method is Gather information checks (Diplomacy or Local) to see if they find someone who spotted her running down the street, have them make a few separate checks at a DC they can pass fairly easily to get led around town to the location they should arrive at
Isn't this modifying the scenario, and as such forbidden in Organized Play? For example, GMs are not allowed to add more monsters, change written tactics, or add more items. Surely this is a similar situation.
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Always make sure there is a way for the PC's to proceed through the adventure (if they wish to continue that is), in this case the easiest method is Gather information checks (Diplomacy or Local) to see if they find someone who spotted her running down the street, have them make a few separate checks at a DC they can pass fairly easily to get led around town to the location they should arrive atIsn't this modifying the scenario, and as such forbidden in Organized Play? For example, GMs are not allowed to add more monsters, change written tactics, or add more items. Surely this is a similar situation.
I'd put it in the "reward creative solutions" category. If the players come up with the idea of chasing after her, trying to track her dripping blood from the fight with Survival, or asking if there was anyone on the street who saw which way she went with Diplomacy or Knowledge (Local), then I'd give it to them.
But to keep the adventure going, I'd probably just go with BNW's solution, above.
Isn't this modifying the scenario, and as such forbidden in Organized Play? For example, GMs are not allowed to add more monsters, change written tactics, or add more items. Surely this is a similar situation.
I don't own the scenario -- is there something in it that says gathering information is useless?
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I don't own the scenario -- is there something in it that says gathering information is useless?Isn't this modifying the scenario, and as such forbidden in Organized Play? For example, GMs are not allowed to add more monsters, change written tactics, or add more items. Surely this is a similar situation.
The scenario says that the two ways to find the bad guys' HQ are to interrogate this prisoner or find the note on her body. If she gets away, then neither of those are possible. Thus, the adventure is off the rails and improvising becomes necessary.
Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East
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When I ran it, Luscilia wiped out half the party and left the others fleeing and near dead. She was still fine. We scrubbed out the mission and called it a night.
Just a lot of really awesome rolls on her channels and really poor rolls from the players.
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Actually, her tactics say she heals her zombie or harms the players, whichever is more effective.
Luscilia lets her zombies do the brunt of the fighting
and uses her Channel Energy ability frequently, choosing to either
harm the PCs or heal her zombie depending on where it will do
the most good.
So, when the party refused to come up on deck (they were just below the main deck and were pretending to be the Fighters' she'd send down to find her orcs, and failed their bluff miserably), she kicked off the battle by channeling negative energy down through the hatch and grates, nailing the PCs.
The PCs then came up on deck and got ambushed by her zombies
he healed the zombie once, but after the zombie was gone, she burned through the rest of her channels by the end of the fight. At the beginning of the fight, the Tiefling Magus used his Darkeness once-per-day spell like ability to really mess up her tactics, I'd said the sun had set and it was dim light up on deck, so his magic Darkness made it pitch black and she thus couldn't cast useful spells without a line of sight. She made for the stern cabin, which had the lantern in it in the hopes of escaping the darkness, which of course didn't work. However she also couldn't tell where people were so she held back on channeling a couple times, and swung her flail at the Aasimar Monk that attacked her in the dark.
Eventually, after knocking people down a few times, the Monk hit her with a flurried Temple sword for 26 damage, leaving her with 2hp. She tried to flee, provoking from several people, none of whom hit. She burned through her last channel to drop almost everyone into the negatives, including the Tiefling, and finally got out of the Darkness spell. As she got to the wharf, the Monk chased after her, so she Blinded him and then escaped into the night.
At tier 1-2, she can clobber a party. But remember, her tactics specifically say that she uses channeling to heal her zombie, not to hurt the enemies. If you have her just channel to harm the PCs every round, she can pretty much TPK any party at tier 1-2.
And to add insult to injury, she's wearing heavy armor without having any nonproficiency penalties built into her stats (unless it's been changed since I played it).
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I ran this scenario 7 or 8 times at Gencon 2009. I *just barely* TPK'ed one party using the channel feature. Another party promptly bull-rushed her into the drink...fight over. So much depends on tactics.
And yeah, hogarth is absolutely right -- she doesn't have the feat to be wearing her armor without penalty.
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At tier 1-2, she can clobber a party. But remember, her tactics specifically say that she uses channeling to heal her zombie, not to hurt the enemies. If you have her just channel to harm the PCs every round, she can pretty much TPK any party at tier 1-2.And to add insult to injury, she's wearing heavy armor without having any nonproficiency penalties built into her stats (unless it's been changed since I played it).
The PDF was never updated; she also doesn't have the Blind Fight bonus feat from having a Darkness domain.
Venture-Captain, California—Sacramento
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Hmm.... So how have people dealt with the half plate issue? Reduce to a medium armor? or Let her wear it and suck on the no-pro penalties? (Suggesting that she got it because it was the best she could get, and she seriously underestimated how hard it would be to fight in, and now she is regretting it.)
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Venture-Agent, Florida—Longwood
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I RAW so the heaviest hitter went after the cleric, only issue that came up in mine was the level 4 fighter standing toe to toe with the (they played up) specter then running below deck to "hide" from the specter. The specter sank into the floor and ate him. The fighter then raised as a specter but was destroyed easily as the cleric and other specter was down.
I was later authorized by my VC to put a permanent kill star on my GM screen. (evil laugh)
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Hmm.... So how have people dealt with the half plate issue? Reduce to a medium armor? or Let her wear it and suck on the no-pro penalties? (Suggesting that she got it because it was the best she could get, and she seriously underestimated how hard it would be to fight in, and now she is regretting it.)
By running the scenario as written, even though it's incorrect. If it hasn't been fixed by now it likely won't be, and we are supposed to provide as similar an experience as possible.