Running a campaign in a few hours. Emergency questions!!

[paladinguy]

(1) I'm running a pathfinder scenario. It gives 3 different tiers for every encounter. 1-2, 3-4, or 6-7 (Why the f~#$ 5 is missing, I have no idea). How do I determine what tier my players are in? It's three level 3s and one level 4.

(2) There are several "large monstrous spiders" as enemies, but I don't see that enemy in the bestiary. It's asking me to go to the "MM 289" for the stats, which I assume means monster manual. The f&@! are they asking me to go to a monster manual for when I bought a bestiary.

(3) There's a bunch of traps involved that I'm not really sure how they work. One pit trap and one "swing block trap". I see the search DC and the disable device DC. But no info is really given on the traps other than that and how much damage they do.
Questions: how many players does the swing block trap effect? How exactly does it work? Having trouble picturing exactly how it works, so I have no idea how a rogue would disable it.
ALSO for either trap, assuming they don't spot it, is there some kind of "reflex" or 'acrobatics' save once the trigger it to the jump out of the way and take 0 damage? It never says so anywhere in this scenario manual.
Finally, how many of the players does the swinging block trap hit?

(4) There are "explosives" in the hull of the ship that cause damage to players if they use fire spells. What is this in pathfinder? after the battle, if my players search the explosives and want to take them with them, exactly how do I handle this? I don't even know what "explosives" are in the pathfinder world...

Thanks!!!!!!!!

[Mathius]

1. Use the average party level to find the tier. In your case it is 3.25 so use the 3-4.

2. They are asking you use the monster manual because this mod was written before pathfinder separated from 3.5 They were just writing adventures 3.5.

3. What scenario is it? Maybe we can help.

4. I would guess that a combination of perception and disable device could defuse the bombs.

[paladinguy]

It's Perils of the Pirate Pact. I'm using the general layout and combat scenarios, but having to mod the entire storyline/fluff around it to fit the campaign they are in.

Regarding your answer to the explosives, that's not really the issue. The issue is WHY are their explosives at all in the pathfinder world and what are they? What do I do when my characters want to take the explosives and use them themselves? How are they used? I'm inclined to just completely skip the explosives part...

[SCPRedMage]

For the traps, look at the map; there will be markings (in this case, a red dotted-line box with a "T" to indicate it as a trap) to show where the trap is. if a player enters the trapped area without disabling the trap, it is triggered.

For subtier 1-2, the trap is defective, and kills one of the ettercaps the party WOULD have fought; that means the trap doesn't really do anything, and you have them fight the ettercap that's listed in the encounter (the one that the trap killed isn't included, as it doesn't ACTUALLY participate in the encounter).

For the higher subtiers, you roll the attack against anyone in the marked area, just like a weapon attack.

The only thing I see as far as explosives are the "explosive supplies" in Act 2. If any of the squares with the red X's on the map are exposed to fire (magical or mundane), they explode, and, quote "behave like alchemist’s fire delivering both direct and splash damage". Since you don't actually THROW the supplies at people, that would suggest that there's no direct damage, and thus they'd only do 1 fire damage to everything in or adjacent to those squares.

[paladinguy]

Can anyone answer the "large monstrous spiders" question? Is there a stat block I can use for these guys?

If it's true that it's really a "3.5" monster and not a Pathfinder monster, they need to edit the pathfinder book and stop selling it as a pathfinder scenario. I only have pathfinder books, bestiaries, etc., and if they are going to include 3.5 monsters in their pathfinder scenarios, then the scenarios are completely useless to me since the whole point of buying them is to reduce my prep time.

[Odraude]

Use the Giant Spider stats in the Bestiary 1.

Also, these scenarios were published before Pathfinder was an official thing. The current season of Pathfinder Scenarios do not use 3.5 anymore and there is no reason to waste time going through to edit them when the game can simply replace them with the Bestiary counterpart.

[Matthew Downie]

I suggest applying the Giant Template to the standard giant spiders since the default ones are CR 1 and the ones in the adventure are CR 2 and described as 'large'.

[Shane LeRose]

Click here for spiders!

This link is TRAPPED!

Avast! Bewary around the gunpowder.

[paladinguy]

Matthew Downie wrote:

I suggest applying the Giant Template to the standard giant spiders since the default ones are CR 1 and the ones in the adventure are CR 2 and described as 'large'.

How do I do this? Can anyone provide the stats? Game starts in 30 minutes... thanks for any advice to this newbie DM.

[Matthew Downie]

Sorry if this is a bit late.
Giant template is listed in bestiary page 295.
It should look something like this

Giant Giant Spider CR 2 600XP
AC 15 Touch 11 Flat-footed 13
HP 22
Fort +6 Ref +4 Will +1

Speed 30, Climb 30, Space 10, Reach 5

Bite: +3 (1d8+3+poison (Fort DC 16, 1/round for 4 rounds, 1d2 Str damage, cure: 1 save))
Web attack: +3 ranged, DC 14, HP 2)
CMB +5 CMD +17

[paladinguy]

thanks!