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For now, this is just a list of alterations I have made to the existing module and my initial thoughts. As we move through these encounters I will post feedback from myself and my players.
I will do my best to avoid spoilers, but if you are playing through this adventure and do not want any information on it I suggest you look into other playtest threads.
I switched Roy Flaxbeater from a rogue to a slayer. The initial loss of half of his sneak attack dice looks like it will hurt his design a lot. While there is still some advantage to flank-and-spank tactics, the loss of 2d6 sneak attack and 4 bleed hurts this method, and I now intend to use his spring attack and vital strike feats more, focusing in on his two favored targets for the added hit and damage. I also swapped out two of his feats: Combat Expertise for Power Attack and Combat Reflexes for Improved Vital Strike. With these changes i expect that he can do the one thing that most damage focused rogues wish they could do: stay mobile and not noticeably hurt their DPR. He has gone from a damage tower to a fighter jet.
I switched Larla Clankypump from a bard to a skald. My hope was that ragesong would better augment her minions, as most of her bardic music ability falls by the wayside in her tactics. Statted out at her level, ragesong just isn't as good as inspire courage. +2 Str, Con, and Will saves and -1 AC just can't overcome +2 to hit, damage, and saves vs fear unless they are augmented by Heroism, Good Hope, or similar spells (which don't stack with inspire courage in the first place). I'm a mean DM, so I advanced her two levels. Now her song is better than standard rage (+3 Will saves, -1 AC) and she has Good Hope, but I think I'd be better off just giving her minions a level of barbarian and calling it a day (more HD, bab, saves). That said, I expect my PC's to have a rough fight of it.
I switched Zolerim's levels of Wizard to Arcanist, as I felt that was a great fit for his character. As a side effect, I had to advance him one level so that he didn't lose one cleric caster level. He's a solo encounter, and as previously stated I'm a mean DM. The flexibility of Arcanist casting is something that I greatly look forward to playing around with. Because he can spontaneously cast and add metamagic feats, his spell selection did not suffer from the conversion. Spells that he had memorized multiple times at low levels had their copies replaced by spells he had memorized with metamagic feats at higher levels, so even though his higher levels spells are extremely limited he only lost one or two in the conversion. The real gem, however, is the counterspell arcane exploit. I have thought since the birth of 3.0 that counterspell was a very powerful ability that was often overlooked. Its just not sexy enough to expend a whole action doing it. Many attempts have been made in the past to clean it up and make it attractive, but they were all rather clumsy or feat-intensive. The arcane exploit is almost too good. My plan for it is to use his immediate/swift action to counter any attempt to Dispel his buffs. You cast a Dispel at me, I counter, your action is wasted while mine is basically unaffected. I even had enough space for him to prepare Dispel so that he could get the +5 bonus. Yes, it will burn through his arcane reservoir quickly and use up spell slots, but no faster than augmenting his DC's and quickening spells. Very excited for this fight!
I considered switching Ardathanatus to a warpriest, but it would severely handicap his tactics and the role that he is supposed to play in the climax. Gathuspia almost became a shaman, but the loss of the witch spell list and the addition of the druid list was too heavy a hit. I also didn't change the sinspawn guards from ranger to slayer (it did not fit with their tactics, I preferred to keep favored enemy) or Kob Kog, Luthask, or Sufestra. As I write this, I am considering switching the Pallid Path Cultists' cleric levels to warpriest. Bonus feats are always good.
I also had one of my players switch classes. Anya was a level 11 human rogue, but with an archeologist bard in the party she had focused entirely on two-weapon slice and dice. Slayer was a perfect fit.
As I mentioned above, and we playtest through encounters I'll post player and DM feedback here.
-Rynthief
