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Just prepping this for GenCon and noticed the potential for ability drain in A3, or bestow curse in A2.
In the beginning of act B, the PCs may be healed with lesser restoration, "lf anyone has suffered ability damage ...redacted... looks them over and uses a wand of lesser restoration to heal them". This will not do a thing to help the PCs as written. Of course, this is my first read through, may have missed a source of ability damage. Thoughts? Did I miss something? Or should A3 dish damage instead of drain? (Will not help w/ the curse either way)
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Regarding the shadow creatures,"The shadow monsters only deal 20% normal damage against anyone who has recognized them as illusions, all special abilities that do not do lethal damage are only 20% likely to work, their AC falls to 14 (AC 17 in Subtier 4–5), and their saving throw bonuses are reduced to +4 maximum (+6 in Subtier 4–5). Any spell-like or special abilities that require a saving throw have a DC of 14 rather than the creature’s standard saving throw."My question is whether the reductions to special abilities, AC, and saving throws apply to all attacks, or only those involving someone who made the save?
I'm also unclear on how (or if) the shadow status affects DR. One monster has DR5/- normally and DR10/magic in smoke form. For subtier 1-2, there may be no magic weapons in the party.
That same monster has FIVE attacks that will probably hit four times and average about 20 hp at this subtier. If the attacked PCs don't save, they are going down quick.
For this scenario, I would ignore the damage reduction for anyone who sees through the illusion. Regarding the five attacks, I would be sure to give the PC a new Will save after each attack, which should quickly cut down on the damage sustained.
The first check (and the similar Linguistics check) should be active (i.e., characters trying to pick up on any nuances during the sign language conversation between Murqual and his servant). The second one, when he's handing out the assignments, should be called out as a roll by the GM, since it's less likely players would realize they can negotiate the length of the scenario downwards otherwise.
Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East
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Just ran this 5 times at gencon, all low tier. I had everybody preroll a sense motive and if they had it a linguistics check before the game and used that for the hand gestures, then handed a note to those who succeeded when it came up. Oddly, while one person let on after the tasks where done that he spotted it, none of the groups brought it up in negotiations, or asked why the translator was even there.
I asked for an active sense motive check on the number of tasks though.
For the later run-throughs, I also had them pre-roll me a will save. I used this in the 'green hag' fight for their first illusion save. After that, it was in-game rolls.
The Belkers would typically spent their turns alternating between gas and solid, and I tried to spend the solid hits into as many targets per turn as I could.
One thing that was very helpful was having extra cards that I could put in front of each player as they made their disbelieve checks. Made it very easy to track the alternate stat sets. I kept the damage reduction even with a disbelieve, as it wasn't in the sidebar, but I'll run this again Wednesday and see about taking it out.
For the 3rd task, I saw a lot of solutions. One group (that only needed 2 tasks) was opposed to the mirror (after seeing the others in the shop), so they rejected the task before price even came up. One tried to gamble and ended up with 40 years off. One gambled and broke about even. And one rounded up 10 street urchins, told them what would happen, paid them 10 gold per year, and used them to buy the mirror.
Nobody ever got into combat with the gnolls.
One thing that I tried to make very important was using the floors & walls to communicate with the group. Especially with new characters, it's very good to poke at the players and get them to have the character introduce himself to a curious entity, and helps them develop the character a bit. It also relays a bit of what's going on.
4 games ran short and 1 ran long. The long group did all 3 tasks and took their time about them. Though it's not listed as such, I used the terra-cotta soldier as an optional encounter, which got them back on track and let them finish at just past 4 hours. Talking to some other GM's, they were also feeling that the soldier was a little repetitive.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East
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I had an elf in the party that was totally cool with giving up 20 years of his life. Oops! :)
The party that got to just past breaking even thought about that too. With some guided discussion, it wound up at 14 years for him, and one each for the others.
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Played it at GenCon and loved the scenario. Just bought it to run in 2 weeks at a local store, but I haven't had a chance to read it yet.
My group gambled and won, getting down to 1 year. The rest of the group wanted to continue to get rid of it, but my gnome volunteered to take the 1 year off his life, just to see what it would be like. That probably postponed bleaching by at least a few years, so he probably came out ahead.
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None of my four groups ran long, all finished fairly quickly, regardless of route taken.
2 ended up taking the deal, with both groups that discussed having a lively discussion about the motives and nature of the Archive itself. I wonder in retrospect if I played the Archive as a little too foreign of a creature. I tried to play it as a Neutral creature that had spent so much time in the archive that it just didn't understand a lot of the concepts of the outside world. The two groups that took the deal seemed hesitant to attack something that wasn't actively hostile, especially after it showed previously that it thought of them like mice in the walls, which they interpreted as it merely misunderstanding what they were. I felt bad taking away prestige points from players that were trying to reach a peaceful solution, but at the same time they did take the deal, actively knowing what it meant.
Of the two groups that didn't take the deal, one didn't talk to it at all. The players walked in and one punched the image immediately before I had a chance to have it start a "conversation" with them.
All of my tables were a bit exhausted of the illusionary opponents by the time the Terra-Cotta statue fight happened.
Only one groups succeeded in discovering who the real merchant was, and even then they didn't mention it. No group actively tried to negotiate how many tasks they needed to perform, though many tried to negotiate the gold cost by saying they'd been promised 8,000 gold and then trying to negotiate up to the actual 10,000 they had. No group offered their own money, which is good.
As for the gambling, one table loved it, two actively complained about it / the mechanics involved in it, and one didn't even try / know. Of those that did gamble, each eventually came out ahead, one paying nothing, one paying only a single year (might have been Fromper's group because it was the Gnome that did it), and one paid slightly less than 20.
None of my four groups ran long, all finished fairly quickly, regardless of route taken.
2 ended up taking the deal, with both groups that discussed having a lively discussion about the motives and nature of the Archive itself. I wonder in retrospect if I played the Archive as a little too foreign of a creature. I tried to play it as a Neutral creature that had spent so much time in the archive that it just didn't understand a lot of the concepts of the outside world.
Oh, I like questions about intent, those are easy to answer!
I don't think it's possible to play the Archivist as 'too foreign'; like any Aeon, it's all about performing its function and not so much concerned with the preferences, desires, and comfort of those pesky little mortal things that merely live in the universe. It's not so much its time inside the archive that has warped its view; that view was always warped, at least from a non-aeon point of view. The only thing being in the archive gives it is a focus in a slightly different direction than the average thelatos.
It's nice (and surprisingly non-hackslashy) that your players were so considerate of this perspective that they understood it wasn't actively hostile, but still: letting the non-hostile alien being essentially enslave/devour the mind of a friend (or, at least, a superior Pathfinder) because it can't comprehend the concept that it's harming her (and wouldn't regard that as something to be concerned about if it did) should be a pretty clear non-optimal resolution. (In retrospect, while I don't regret including the 'sell Wulessa' deal as an option, maybe I should have given Wulessa a chance to offer her own plea not to do so just so PCs would have no illusions that they're taking the cheap way out. But then, maybe not. Wulessa Yuul really isn't the beg for her life type. She'd just be pissed.)
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I don't think it's possible to play the Archivist as 'too foreign'; like any Aeon, it's all about performing its function and not so much concerned with the preferences, desires, and comfort of those pesky little mortal things that merely live in the universe. It's not so much its time inside the archive that has warped its view; that view was always warped, at least from a non-aeon point of view. The only thing being in the archive gives it is a focus in a slightly different direction than the average thelatos.It's nice (and surprisingly non-hackslashy) that your players were so considerate of this perspective that they understood it wasn't actively hostile, but still: letting the non-hostile alien being essentially enslave/devour the mind of a friend (or, at least, a superior Pathfinder) because it can't comprehend the concept that it's harming her (and wouldn't regard that as something to be concerned about if it did) should be a pretty clear non-optimal resolution. (In retrospect, while I don't regret including the 'sell Wulessa' deal as an option, maybe I should have given Wulessa a chance to offer her own plea not to do so just so PCs would have no illusions that they're taking the cheap way out. But then, maybe not. Wulessa Yuul really isn't the beg for her life type. She'd just be pissed.)
Part of the problem, I think, is that all tables made no effort to talk to Wulessa once inside the Mindscape, even when prompted to. I tried to get her to explain that things were clearly going wrong for her, but most seemed unsympathetic at best. More than one table concluded that being added to the archive almost seemed to be what she wanted, as she'd be fusing with the great minds of the past.
I'm glad to hear that I wasn't approaching the Archivist incorrectly. Of all the GMs running the scenario at GenCon I talked to, I was the only one that had any tables take the deal, let alone two tables.
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Part of the problem, I think, is that all tables made no effort to talk to Wulessa once inside the Mindscape, even when prompted to. I tried to get her to explain that things were clearly going wrong for her, but most seemed unsympathetic at best. More than one table concluded that being added to the archive almost seemed to be what she wanted, as she'd be fusing with the great minds of the past.I'm glad to hear that I wasn't approaching the Archivist incorrectly. Of all the GMs running the scenario at GenCon I talked to, I was the only one that had any tables take the deal, let alone two tables.
I didn't have any real issues with players engaging Wulessa, especially in the first room. A fair number had that "WTF" moment rather quickly. Also, I didn't have any problems with tables realizing that "thing sucking out VCs mind = bad thing". Only had one table really consider the deal once someone reasoned out what the "Matrix Murqual" was up to (sorry, I've been explaining what was going on with the Mindscape using Matrix references all weekend :P).
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As a player at one of LilyHaze's tables that took the deal, I think part of the problem is that we didn't really know what it meant. We tried asking the archivist if it was just copying her memories, or if this was really her and she'd be trapped there, and it didn't seem to understand the question (which makes sense).
I was playing a mostly non-combat character, so being the one to start a fight with the archivist would have been very out of character. I was kinda surprised that none of the others at my table chose the violent route.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East
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None of my parties took the deal, but one of the tables next to me did. I asked them about it afterwards - they were rather dissatisfied with their GM and mostly wanted the game to be over is why they took the deal.
I talked with them some more to see what had made them unhappy so that I wouldn't make the same mistakes. Mostly it was failing to sell what was going on in the different rooms and failure to have the aeon 'socialize' with them. I was able to fill them in a bit on what they missed.
And apparently the GM rambled about off-topic things. I never got the GM's name, but I did recommend they talk with HQ about it - don't think they did though.
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None of my five tables took the deal either... As a GM, you need to work hard to convey what is going on with the archivist.
I do appreciate whoever brought up the idea of showing the rats running around, then putting the players faces on the rat bodies. I did the rats, but without the faces for my first table, and the idea didn't carry off as well as it could have (I made up with it with other symbols). Following that up with flipping the rats over dead, with x's on their eyes in the Terra-Cotta Statue room was just brilliant. I showed the rats being stepped on, then flipped over with the x's on the eyes, asked for a perception check to notice the moving statue, and then made the first slam attack a "boot" kick to reinforce the idea.
I thought I'd never want to run this one again after doing it over and over at GenCon, but I'm very excited to run it for local players now. Off to give it a 5 star review. Here's hoping the rest of season 7 is so well put together.
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I ran two tables of it at Gen Con and neither took the deal. The way the aeon interacts and how the players could possibly understand is all up to the GM running it.
Personally, I don't know how the aeon would ever convey in picture form that he was hesitant about killing the PCs. That was just a weird instruction and I did not think it was truly thought out, it seemed more pawned off.
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My GM had it show us an image of a little house, with an image of my character (since I was the one most directly trying to interact with it) running around in it, until being pushed out of the house.
My character was able to respond by mirroring that with Silent Image, showing my image of my character running around the little house image, banging on the walls, but not leaving because there was no exit available. Our GM was impressed with this one - apparently, we were his only group that managed to successfully convey the idea that we didn't know how to leave.
Having played this one, I'm looking forward to reading it, to learn what details we missed as players. I already bought it, but I haven't had a chance to start reading yet. I'm still catching up on laundry and unpacking from GenCon, in and around working my full time job and other life stuff. Luckily, I've still got a week and a half until I'll be GMing it, so I'll probably read it next week.
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I am preparing the scenario and have a doubt about flindbars.
The flind creature statsblock in pag. 21 indicates:
Melee flindbar +6 (1d8+6/×2 plus disarm, trip)
I know when an effect is placed next to the 'plus' in an attack it means you need to roll against those effects if the attack is successful. That said I cannot find anything in the Flind creature or the flindbar that supports this idea.
As far as I know the flindbar has the disarm and trip characteristics which means you have certain bonuses when attempting those maneuveurs.
Am I wrong about the plus meaning and the entry just points out the weapon has those properties? Or I am missing something that allows the Flind to take a free disarm and trip attempt after a flindbar successful attack?
Thanks in advance! :)
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My GM had it show us an image of a little house, with an image of my character (since I was the one most directly trying to interact with it) running around in it, until being pushed out of the house.
My character was able to respond by mirroring that with Silent Image, showing my image of my character running around the little house image, banging on the walls, but not leaving because there was no exit available. Our GM was impressed with this one - apparently, we were his only group that managed to successfully convey the idea that we didn't know how to leave.
I was more than impressed with that. Across 4 tables, yours was the only to try communicating in pictures. Additionally, most, at the point, just watched the Arbiter try to convey its message to them, then just ignored it. Your table, and you especially, went beyond simply talking and instead tried to talk to it in its own "language." I wish I could have done more to reward that.
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Had a blast running this one.
The party talked through the gnolls and talked the guy down to two favors, so part 1 went fairly quickly.
Liked images to the party , playing with 4th dimensional physics of a dream world (one player through a ball through a wall, so it came back around the other side, and so did the wolf chasing it) and in general weirding the players out, filling in blanks for interactions and items not brought up in the scenario.
The party accepted the gold key without seeming to quite realize what that was going to mean. I let them get back in with a DC 28 use magic device check on the archives (i'll look to see if something like that is even possible tomorrow)
Just purchased this about 30 mins ago and after skimming it have 2 questions/bugs.
1) On the chronicle it lists equipment purchases for All Subtiers and Subtier 6-7. I take it it should be 4-5?
2) On p. 19 under SCALING ENCOUNTER B8
I don't understand why the Subtier 1-2 reduces the eidolon's hp by 8 but Subtier 4-5 reduces the hp by 20 and the AC by 2. Shouldn't it be the other way around?
EDIT: Never mind, brainfart here, I forgot that there were 2 different stats depending on Subtier.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East
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What are thoughts on animal companions and mounts during act 2? Basically I let players decide if they brought it up into the tower and just went with it. But it seems questionable to bring them into the mindscape. I'm thinking an int3 minimum maybe? But at the same time, removing class abilities based on plot is iffy.
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I didn't quibble over companions. One druid had a crab companion that I ruled was in her lap and joined the mindscape, another had a bear. It didn't seem to bother anyone at the table.
I also embellished the 'rat/broom' metaphor by making it into a busy kitchen, with the PCs being represented by a stray cat being chased out of there by one of the cooks. And I had the image of the cook morph into the statue in the room just before it attacked.
RPG Superstar 2015 Top 16, RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16
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Question: since the mindscape isn't real, do charges/consumables used in the mindscape stay gone when the PCs go back to reality?
I've checked Occult Adventures to see if the mindscape rules there have anything to say about that, but if they do, I can't find it.
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Question: since the mindscape isn't real, do charges/consumables used in the mindscape stay gone when the PCs go back to reality?
I've checked Occult Adventures to see if the mindscape rules there have anything to say about that, but if they do, I can't find it.
That is an excellent question. I don't have Occult Adventures or anything, so I wouldn't even know where to begin to research that. Hopefully, someone can provide a definitive answer before I GM it this weekend.
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I ran this on Sunday and, while I enjoyed it, two things narked me about it.
Firstly using shadow conjurations is generally a bad idea. The shadow spells are some of the worst written spells in the game. Just how various abilities like DR work is very far from clear. It is also very easy to miss the reductions in AC and saves that these creatures take. When I made my first prep pass I totally overlooked it and my group was nearly fighting full AC enemies which would be normal for shadow conjuration. Really that sidebar needs to be written in letters of fire three feet high as they are far from standard for shadow conjuration. I would have much rather seen a proper stat block with perhaps one fewer fight. I don't think having the base hag, statue and air elemental stat blocks in the back helps in this case.
Secondly, the adjustments you make for the final eidolon are interesting but are lacking a rather crucial element. This scenario is highlighting, in part, the introduction of Occult Adventures with its use of a mind scape. However, it doesn't have any instructions on how the Eidolon changes in the presence of occult based characters. I had an Occultist in my group and was left a bit stumped as there was no Occult caster option so I picked full BaB as it was a Battle Host.
So I finally got around to reading this last night. This was just a "first pass" read, so I still need to draw maps and go through stat blocks in detail before I'm ready to run it on Sunday. But at least now I know enough to really jump into this thread with more than just a player's perspective.
Not really knowing the details of shadow conjurations, I read the sidebar and know that I'll need to adjust the stat blocks. This is annoying (the stat blocks in the back really should have these adjustments built in), but I can live with it. But I'm also assuming that everything I need to know is in that sidebar, and that knowing how shadow conjuration "normally" works isn't a requirement.
Your second question is more interesting, and highlights my biggest problem with PFS since returning. Due to other stuff going on in my life (including GMing a home campaign, but also lots of other life stuff not related to RPGs), I haven't been playing/GMing PFS nearly as much in the last year and a half, and I've gotten way behind on keeping up with all the new material that Paizo has published. This Sunday will be my first time GMing a PFS session since last November, I think. My home group is a lot more basic in what Pathfinder material we use (mostly just the Core Rulebook and Advanced Players Guide, with the very rare spell or item taken from elsewhere).
I haven't even looked at the Advanced Class Guide or Occult Adventures yet. Usually, that's not an issue, because I assume the players using one of those classes will know what they're doing, so I don't need to know the details, especially since I haven't been GMing. But that's harder for something like this, where the adventure assumes the GM will know quickly and easily whether the PCs are full BAB, divine casters, arcane casters, etc. Not only don't I know where occult PCs fall on that scale, but I don't even know about the ACG PCs. As an obvious example, I've played at tables with warpriests a few times, but I've never read up on the class, so I have no idea if they're full BAB with minimal casting like a paladin, or full casters with 3/4 BAB like clerics and oracles.
I'm also still hoping for someone from Paizo to jump in with an answer to Charlie Bell's question: How are consumables treated in the mindscape?
Question: since the mindscape isn't real, do charges/consumables used in the mindscape stay gone when the PCs go back to reality?
I've checked Occult Adventures to see if the mindscape rules there have anything to say about that, but if they do, I can't find it.
With the caveat that I'm not an official Paizo answer and if one is provided it supersedes anything I might suggest here:
In writing the mindscape portions of the adventure, one of my key questions was 'should they be able to walk away with (or, rather, purchase, since it's PFS and slightly more of an abstract method of treasure gathering) treasures found inside the mindscape'? The answer pretty much had to be yes, since fully half of the adventure takes place there. It felt weird and unintuitive that someone can say at a later date 'Oh, yes, this rope of climbing just materialized on my lap after I freed my mind from an intangible surreal prison', but I just accepted there's hand-waviness to that kind of thing. Maybe the items form out of ectoplasm when the PCs 'claim' them.
By that same token, I feel like (and wrote this under the assumption) that charges and consumables would be drained or consumed. Again, it might feel weird that their potion bottle is empty or their alchemist's fire flask is gone when the PCs wake up, but since the PCs are using said consumables and gaining tangible benefits from doing so (receiving the chronicle sheet gp value for defeating encounters and possibly spending those gp on items found in the mindscape), it seems only fair that they deduct resources used in doing so. Again, it's kind of hand wavy and non-intuitive, but if an explanation is needed, you can just claim that the psychic energies present in the room burned off a charge or evaporated the liquid in a vial when the characters minds activated them in the mindscape.
I don't know if that's how mindscapes in general are intended to work, but that's how this particular mindscape was intended to work.
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RPG Superstar 2015 Top 16, RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16
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I don't know if that's how mindscapes in general are intended to work, but that's how this particular mindscape was intended to work.
I appreciate your answer! I had planned to let them skate out of charge/consumable expenditure, on the theory that mindscapes work like astral projection, which creates astral copies of your gear which disappear when you go back to your body. But... I totally forgot to do that when filling out chronicles. So it's a wash.
I felt that this was a really fun scenario with some big curveballs, and I rather like the use of the shadow conjuration mechanic to allow the PCs to face monsters way outside their usual EL. Today or tomorrow I'll get around to posting a review for you.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East
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Got to play it as well now. It was our GM's first time as a PFS GM and he did a good job. We ran late though, and again turned the glass golem encounter into an optional.
I played the Mesmerist pregen, and yeah... none of the occult classes affect the Eidolon stats in any way. None are full BAB, arcane, divine, or precision.
Generally when I ran it, I just asked those details before game as the party was getting sorted out, and asked people who where mixed which they felt was a bigger part of the character. No one really seemed to catch on to it.
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RPG Superstar 2015 Top 16, RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16
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I found the official charges/consumables in a mindscape answer. It's on p. 237 of OA, under the Normal Magic trait:
In an immersive mindscape where magic behaves normally, characters and creatures can use spells, spell-like abilities, and magic items as they normally would. Spells are consumed and charges or consumables are spent.
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I found the official charges/consumables in a mindscape answer. It's on p. 237 of OA, under the Normal Magic trait:
In an immersive mindscape where magic behaves normally, characters and creatures can use spells, spell-like abilities, and magic items as they normally would. Spells are consumed and charges or consumables are spent.
In a twisted way, this actually sorta makes sense.
Think about how the VC in this adventure converts prepared spells to potions for the PCs in the mindscape. Well, it works both ways.
In the mindscape, PCs have access to use their magic items that they have on their physical bodies, and only the ones that are on their bodies. If they left a magic item at home, they wouldn't have it with them for either the physical or mindscape portions of the adventure. But within the mindscape, they can use those items that are on their bodies, and that magic can be expended.
So if they drink a potion in the mindscape, that liquid is still sitting their in a bottle on their physical body, but the magic has been drained out of it.
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RPG Superstar 2015 Top 16, RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16
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I found the official charges/consumables in a mindscape answer. It's on p. 237 of OA, under the Normal Magic trait:
In an immersive mindscape where magic behaves normally, characters and creatures can use spells, spell-like abilities, and magic items as they normally would. Spells are consumed and charges or consumables are spent.In a twisted way, this actually sorta makes sense.
Think about how the VC in this adventure converts prepared spells to potions for the PCs in the mindscape. Well, it works both ways.
In the mindscape, PCs have access to use their magic items that they have on their physical bodies, and only the ones that are on their bodies. If they left a magic item at home, they wouldn't have it with them for either the physical or mindscape portions of the adventure. But within the mindscape, they can use those items that are on their bodies, and that magic can be expended.
So if they drink a potion in the mindscape, that liquid is still sitting their in a bottle on their physical body, but the magic has been drained out of it.
I follow your reasoning, because magic.
So here's what blows my mind: if you burn a smokestick, or eat a trail ration, or expend a use out of a healer's kit, in the mindscape--that smokestick, ration, or kit use is gone in the real world. No magic involved.
INCEPTION
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I found the official charges/consumables in a mindscape answer. It's on p. 237 of OA, under the Normal Magic trait:
In an immersive mindscape where magic behaves normally, characters and creatures can use spells, spell-like abilities, and magic items as they normally would. Spells are consumed and charges or consumables are spent.In a twisted way, this actually sorta makes sense.
Think about how the VC in this adventure converts prepared spells to potions for the PCs in the mindscape. Well, it works both ways.
In the mindscape, PCs have access to use their magic items that they have on their physical bodies, and only the ones that are on their bodies. If they left a magic item at home, they wouldn't have it with them for either the physical or mindscape portions of the adventure. But within the mindscape, they can use those items that are on their bodies, and that magic can be expended.
So if they drink a potion in the mindscape, that liquid is still sitting their in a bottle on their physical body, but the magic has been drained out of it.
I follow your reasoning, because magic.
So here's what blows my mind: if you burn a smokestick, or eat a trail ration, or expend a use out of a healer's kit, in the mindscape--that smokestick, ration, or kit use is gone in the real world. No magic involved.
INCEPTION
There's still magic involved. The magic that transports them into the mindscape.
Because... magic.
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I like and enjoy putting work into preparing scenarios that I run. But I'm a bit put off that it seems like this adventure requires way more prep than most others. Yes, Pathfinder scenarios vary between "dungeon crawls" which are easy to prep and full on "role-playing" scenarios but this one seems especially onerous. The encounters are all different with a lot of background to study, the monsters are unique. I'm having a hard time getting into this one.
I'm glad that it sounds like players are having a good time, but I'm not, preparing for it.
If I hadn't played it before starting to prep to GM it, I'd probably agree with you. But I enjoyed playing it enough to feel the effort's worth it.