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After reading a few other threads it would seem my question was rather vague. So here is a bit more detail.
There will be 4 level 14 PC's. They will start in a tavern inside a castle/village. They will be told of the adventure from a "strange person" that will either already be at the tavern or just entered the tavern. If they stay the night in the tavern they get attacked by “thugs” if not. They get attacked on arrival of next tavern. On the way to the tavern wolves follow them but don’t attack unless they attack first.
That is all I have for that.
The final battle they will enter a cave that has a tribe of bugbears inside. Upon further inspection of the cave they will find the entrance to the castle/lair. There are two layers the first layer they will find; a Beholder in stasis (non-combat) just to scare the party a bit, a Deathknight, a Dread Guardian, a Fire elemental, a TombStone golem that will awaken and needs the “password” to be put back to sleep or it will attack, Vsolt the Yuan-ti Death Master and two orges in the laboratory room, a Chimera, and a Grell. Granted they wont HAVE to face everything but is they have bad luck or make bad decisions they will.
On the second layer they will find giant spiders and the simi-boss, a mind flayer. He is trying to raise a dracolich. As far as the heroes know all they have to do is defeat the mind flayer. What they dont know is if they DO defeat him they then have to fight a black dragon. (He is rather pissed of being enslaved). If they DONT defeat him they have to fight the dracolich.
So how do I get the players from the tavern to the cave? Do I send them straight there or put more obstacles for them to over come?
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The start and end are often the hardest points of an adventure to write, I find, so good work on getting those out of the way first.
Anyways, a good rule of thumb on getting PCs where you want them to go is to always give them three different ways to do something, or reasons to want to do it. Basically don't JUST rely on the word of a mysterious stranger to convince them to go on the quest, give them additional reasons to work with, because it's possible not all of them will bite the hook on your first motivation. What I'm talking about is something along the lines of:
#1: Quest given by mysterious stranger might spark PC interest.
#2: Gold/Magic Item reward appeals to greed.
#3: Rescue subplot (which happens to take place at the same dungeon) appeals to heroics.
Multiple reasons to go ensures that you avoid the need to send them along at all, and instead makes them want to go.
Filling out the dungeon with a nice and interesting variety sounds like something you've got covered. 14th level is decently-high, so things are probably going to be pretty crazy, but my one big suggestion is to avoid just combat after combat after combat. Sounds like you have some creative things in mind, though, so that's good.
When in doubt, falling back to the rule of three is a good way to be safe. If there's something you want to guarantee that your players will find, or do, don't hide it behind one obscure skill check, or even the assumption that your players will think to look for it or do it in the first place. Basically be ready to (subtly) shove the important stuff in their faces in a variety of ways, and you can ensure that they find whatever you want them to, regardless of what they give you to work with.
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The map I am working with has two paths, which I am calling easy and hard. "Easy" path bypasses most of this but you have to be very lucky and/or very patience. (Which some of the players are not.) "Hard" path is filled with traps that IF triggered starts battles. If the party isnt curious or is lucky it is possible to take "hard" path and only get into two fights.
Anyways thanks for the advice. :)
Gluttony's advice is pretty solid. The word of a complete stranger might not be enough to compel the players to undergo the quest. That said, you have to consider the pacing of the adventure. If you want to get right to business, then send 'em straight there (make sure to hook them with a good hook, though). Otherwise, you could build the tension by having bugbear raids on the town, leading them to the dungeon. The bugbears could be controlling a tribe of goblins, as well, to serve as a diversion during the attack. Thus, you could introduce multiple attack routes and trails leading from the town (forcing the players to choose a path, which ultimately brings them where ever you choose, but fooling them into thinking that they had a choice about it; this approach feels less linear and appeals to a sand-box mentality).
My biggest question/criticism, at a glance, is regarding the theme (or lack thereof). What exactly is going on and why are all these creatures living in such close proximity? From a player's perspective, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of consistency. Is there some kind of ecology going on here?
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My biggest question, at a glance, is regarding the theme (or lack thereof). What exactly is going on and why are all these creatures living in such close proximity? From a player's perspective, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of consistency. Is there some kind of ecology going on here?
If you are wondering why there are so many monsters in one place, the idea is the mindflayer is a type of necromancer and has been for awhile. Normally, no one would pay much attention to what he does. But when rumors start that he might be creating a dracolich then people start to get worried.
Which brings me to another sticky point. How far can this place be? It cant be on the other side of the world, otherwise by the time the heroes find out and arrive the necromancer would have finished his work, right?
A simple solution is that he (the mindflayer necromancer) hasn't collected enough materials to cast the spell he intends to. He's manipulating the bugbears into doing his grunt work for him, so they're the ones off gathering supplies (perhaps in the form of living sacrifices; hence, the raid on town that I suggested above).
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A simple solution is that he (the mindflayer necromancer) hasn't collected enough materials to cast the spell he intends to. He's manipulating the bugbears into doing his grunt work for him, so they're the ones off gathering supplies (perhaps in the form of living sacrifices; hence, the raid on town that I suggested above).
Sorry I didnt see the top part. (still morning, drinking coffee) But that is a great idea. I never thought about using the bugbears. I just figured the necro would see them as a nuisance. But using them as a resource is much better and actually give the story some flow. Thanks alot! :)
With folks going missing during the attack, you'd be appealing to more players and character types, as Gluttony was saying. The greedy players/characters would still be motivated by the desire to accumulate wealth, but the more heroically-minded/altruistic of the bunch would be motivated to save the prisoners (and intended sacrifices).
No problem, xangpow, and the reason you didn't see the top bit was that I editted my post (adding that stuff later). Sorry about the discrepancy.
If you decide to use the rescue subplot, leading the players to the dungeon, then you don't necessarily have to reveal the mindflayer's existence to them right away. Keeping it a secret until later might provide for a dramatic reveal later on when they're half way through the dungeon (perhaps reaching that second layer you mentioned). Make sure to drop the hints and eventually provide the proof (before the actual encounter, mind you). At this point, they aren't certain what's going on and believe the attacks to be orchestrated by a rag-tag tribe of bugbears, not a super-genius necromancer. When revealed, the existence of the mindflayer might cause the players to take a step back and consider their actions. Those moments are pretty rare at the table, so cultivate them whenever you can!
Exactly! Just let it keep unfolding. Bugbears < Mindflayer < Dracolich. The rule of three, wasn't it? XD
In all earnest though, good luck running your module! You seem to have a pretty good basis for an adventure here. I hope you and your players have a blast.
@ xangpow: consider the characters when setting the distance to the mindflayer's castle. If they're 14th level, a spellcaster with arcane spells may have a Teleport spell, or Overland Flight or some other spell that makes distance and travel trivial. If that is the case, distance is irrelevant.
If on the other hand the characters' resources are strictly managed by the GM at the time of their creation, their travel options may be limited and thus distance is a factor. If you want the journey there to be a memorable point in the module, consider ways to make the castle unreachable by magic or else limit the player's powers to get there.
Said journey should not overpower the main "meat" of the adventure, which seems to be the cave and castle. My advice then would be not to make that journey more than perhaps 3 days worth of travel. This will provide ample space for the Hard path to take something out of them if that is the intent, but still short enough where the main destination remains reachable.
3 days at a standard overland travel of 30 puts the castle roughly about 90 miles from the first tavern. That's my 2 cents on it anyway.
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These are great ideas. Thanks alot everyone. This is the first time doing the GM thing so I was stuck at certain parts for months.
What I am hoping for is the thought of "man this is easy. We will get this done in no time at all." at the beginning. "wow things are starting to get tough." in the middle. Then "If I survive I will be happy." at the end. Those have been the best adventures I have been on.
My impression is that this doesn't look like a 14th level adventure. Are they established PCs or are you starting them at 14th?
If you're new to GMing Pathfinder, I'd like to take a moment to caution against starting at mid-high levels. The adventure you've written sounds good and will work perfectly fine for lower/low-mid levels, but higher levels in Pathfinder change the plot options available to GMs.
In fact, I've been GMing for almost 20 years, and I would never start a party at 14th level.
So if there's anything wrong with your (otherwise decent looking) setup here, it's that.
Another potential hiccup for you is that you're going to be juggling a ton of statblocks. It seems like you are full of energy and ideas, but you need to turn an eye toward what it will actually look like in play, keeping all of those stats sorted out.
These are just my thoughts of how I would fill out what you have...
The bugbears have harassed the area for a while. They started kidnapping people, and a tacit understanding grew. If the people of the village keep quiet and submissive, they only abduct travelers - and those who get in their way.
What no one but the head of the bugbears knows is, that they are abducting and collecting these people for a mindflayer - who requires multiple sacrifices which must occur in one ritual.
There are a few villagers who cannot stomach this (Quest givers).
After they defeat the big bad and booned bugbear, the party will discover the connection.
One thing you could do at the battle of the mind flayer... is have the ritual started, and have the mooks the party kills slowly revive the dracolich. (and break up the area of the ritual to provide slowness... several areas of encounters within one battle)
Keeping it simple until you find the spine of your adventure is a good idea. That is why, in my post, I tried to use what I thought was most important in what you had. From there you add what is essential and makes sense.
I agree starting at 14 is difficult (and inherently not keeping it simple) It depends on the characters how much difficulty this will bring to your storytelling. My own players seem to level up more with "pluses" rather than interesting and game-changing potential GM headaches.
... though there was one alchemist...
The final battle they will enter a cave that has a tribe of bugbears inside. Upon further inspection of the cave they will find the entrance to the castle/lair. There are two layers the first layer they will find; a Beholder in stasis (non-combat) just to scare the party a bit, a Deathknight, a Dread Guardian, a Fire elemental, a TombStone golem that will awaken and needs the “password” to be put back to sleep or it will attack, Vsolt the Yuan-ti Death Master and two orges in the laboratory room, a Chimera, and a Grell. Granted they wont HAVE to face everything but is they have bad luck or make bad decisions they will.
On the second layer they will find giant spiders and the simi-boss, a mind flayer. He is trying to raise a dracolich. As far as the heroes know all they have to do is defeat the mind flayer. What they dont know is if they DO defeat him they then have to fight a black dragon. (He is rather pissed of being enslaved). If they DONT defeat him they have to fight the dracolich.
Man, those dungeon denizens sound old school!
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These are just my thoughts of how I would fill out what you have...
The bugbears have harassed the area for a while. They started kidnapping people, and a tacit understanding grew. If the people of the village keep quiet and submissive, they only abduct travelers - and those who get in their way.
What no one but the head of the bugbears knows is, that they are abducting and collecting these people for a mindflayer - who requires multiple sacrifices which must occur in one ritual.
There are a few villagers who cannot stomach this (Quest givers).
After they defeat the big bad and booned bugbear, the party will discover the connection.
One thing you could do at the battle of the mind flayer... is have the ritual started, and have the mooks the party kills slowly revive the dracolich. (and break up the area of the ritual to provide slowness... several areas of encounters within one battle)
Keeping it simple until you find the spine of your adventure is a good idea. That is why, in my post, I tried to use what I thought was most important in what you had. From there you add what is essential and makes sense.
I agree starting at 14 is difficult (and inherently not keeping it simple) It depends on the characters how much difficulty this will bring to your storytelling. My own players seem to level up more with "pluses" rather than interesting and game-changing potential GM headaches.
... though there was one alchemist...
Well our group doesnt do campaign type adventures with any game system. The way we do things is one person comes up with the adventure and the characters and on game day the GM would pass out character sheets and we decide who plays who and how we will play them. All of us have full time jobs and are married with kids so we dont really have time to be making our own characters. Plus, we play alot of different games so we dont really want to spend to much time with character creation.
The reason I used lvl 14 characters was so we could have lots of actions and spells that we can use. Plus, I did want them to go up against a dragon. You know the stereotypical adventure, heroes fighting dragons.
It's all good, play the game the way you want.
I avoid starting up games at levels beyond 9th, because if the players don't know their sheets organically it really slows things down. Your group may well be different, and more power to you!
Dragons, ever since D&D 3.0, are 'any-level' monsters, so don't let that limit you on what level you make the adventure for. You can have the heroes be fighting dragons at 1st level, if you want. Mind you, they are 'boss monsters', and their CR a bit on the low side for their abilities.
14th level characters have access to 14th level gear and spells. Mass fly will get a 60' movement for 140 minutes (just over two hours). Assuming that flying means you can avoid the terrain, yet cannot "hustle" or "run" despite being moved through the air by pure magic, you are looking at covering 6 miles with one casting. Greater Teleport is also a 7th level spell, so your adventurous trek there may just be skipped.
"A stranger in the local tavern gives you a quest" seems weak, but it may be exactly what your crew is looking for.
Me, personally, I would have a rich, well-to-do noble contact the heroes, and tell them he would like the heroes to capture a particular black dragon for him. He has this castle/old fortress that is almost finished be refitted to house the dragon- its an evil creature, after all, and razing the country side. He shows the heroes his refitted fort, explains the various defenses for the to-be jailed dragon.
After the heroes capture the dragon- on boy won't that be fun- and delivery of the beast at the fort, the heroes get their pay. They should note the collection of workmen and architects that are laying the finishing touches on he castle. They should also note there is a large gathering of bugbears in the forest (likely through rumor and hints, but nothing so direct as the bugbears roasting marshmallows outside the fort walls). Shold they mention it to the noble, he will be reluctant to agree to hiring the heroes for a follow-on quest to ride the area of the bugbears, but will agree after a moment. "However," the nobles states with an easy smile, "why don't you go and spend the payment, and come back in a few days? My own security can hold out for three days against any army, and you said the bugbears aren't really organized, right?"
Upon return to town, they find the noble man they were just talking to has been found dead...and had died three days before the heroes talked to him. A quick teleport back to the "re-fitted" fort fails because of various wards that were put into place (which, after attempting it, the heroes should go "uh, yeah, that's right. He told us that..."). By foot or wing, the heroes arrive at the castle where they see all of the workmen are now potent undead creatures waiting for the foolish to try and "rescue" the dragon.
Upon entering the fort, the bugbears that were hiding the in forests are now living in the fort, ready to defend it. These bugbears are more than just your average thugs, and they got some fun pets. Their leader rides a chimera, they have a pair of ogre enforcers (add a few levels of barbarian, and lots of spikes on their armor), a golem with a fire elemental trapped inside it (which, once the golem is destroyed, will burst out and attack as well), and so on.
Once besting the bugbears, they confront the noble, who turns out to be a mind flayer in disguise. His partner, the yaun-ti deathmaster, and his two bodyguards (the death knight and the dread guardian), keep the heroes busy while the mind flayer finishes his ritual on the pool-of-obvious-evil (this takes, say, two rounds). After completing the ritual, the mind flayer jumps in the brawl, spells and brain power flailing.
After the mind flayer falls, the party has a moment of rest before the newly formed draco-lich rises from the pool-of-obvious-evil. Spotting those irritating heroes that captured it in the first place, and being quiet angry about being forcefully turned into an undead, the much-more-powerful-dead-than-alive dragon attacks.
Should the dragon escape, then the country side is in for it. And the heroes were the ones that made it possible. Not only did they capture the dragon in the first place, but they killed the only creature capable of controlling the monster (the mind flayer had a much more subtler plan for the undead dragon that didn't involve putting the nation to the torch).
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Dragons, ever since D&D 3.0, are 'any-level' monsters, so don't let that limit you on what level you make the adventure for. You can have the heroes be fighting dragons at 1st level, if you want. Mind you, they are 'boss monsters', and their CR a bit on the low side for their abilities.
14th level characters have access to 14th level gear and spells. Mass fly will get a 60' movement for 140 minutes (just over two hours). Assuming that flying means you can avoid the terrain, yet cannot "hustle" or "run" despite being moved through the air by pure magic, you are looking at covering 6 miles with one casting. Greater Teleport is also a 7th level spell, so your adventurous trek there may just be skipped.
"A stranger in the local tavern gives you a quest" seems weak, but it may be exactly what your crew is looking for.
Me, personally, I would have a rich, well-to-do noble contact the heroes, and tell them he would like the heroes to capture a particular black dragon for him. He has this castle/old fortress that is almost finished be refitted to house the dragon- its an evil creature, after all, and razing the country side. He shows the heroes his refitted fort, explains the various defenses for the to-be jailed dragon.
After the heroes capture the dragon- on boy won't that be fun- and delivery of the beast at the fort, the heroes get their pay. They should note the collection of workmen and architects that are laying the finishing touches on he castle. They should also note there is a large gathering of bugbears in the forest (likely through rumor and hints, but nothing so direct as the bugbears roasting marshmallows outside the fort walls). Shold they mention it to the noble, he will be reluctant to agree to hiring the heroes for a follow-on quest to ride the area of the bugbears, but will agree after a moment. "However," the nobles states with an easy smile, "why don't you go and spend the payment, and come back in a few days? My own security can hold out for three days...
wow that is quite a story. And I like how you used alot of what I put out there. Unfortunately, that is not the direction I wanted to go. But if you get it working let me know I would like to play that adventure. :) (I promise not to spoil it for the rest of the party. lol)
Thanks. I tend to runaway with other people's stuff, as far as the baseline plot goes. Creating my own...that's not so easy.
Other options:
Prisoner Transport: The heroes are handed an already captured dragon to transport to the keep/fort. They are attacked by token groups of bugbears and perhaps stumble upon a grell or other creature on the way. Then proceed as per the above
Prisoner Escape: When the mind flayer is about to finish the ritual, the dragon breaks free. Hilarity (or holocaust) ensues.
To the Rescue: Two other dragons shatter through the ceiling to rescue their brother/sister/mom. Its a toss up if they reach the captured dragon in time to save it from the ritual. In any case, they might just side with it anyhow.
To the Rescue?: In this case, the heroes are hired by an already captured dragon's sibling/parent/significant other to rescue said captured dragon. The heroes might end up being the rescue celebration snack afterwards, because what dragon would give up some of its hoard to meal-on-heels?