A little mythic in RoW

[Nikolaus de'Shade]

Hey Everyone,

I'm reading around the forum since I've started running RoW with a gaming group and I just came across THIS THREAD where the idea of giving out a mythic tier, rather than the Geas was given.

This seems like a really cool idea and I was wondering how many poeple have done it, what else you changed, how many tiers you give/gave out by the end etc?

Any help would be great! :)

[Zhangar]

I gave out a mythic tier when they received the mantle. (I gave Tob Knotten the mythic invincible creature template.) From there I started adding mythic to the bosses and to certain lesser enemies - Radovich, Logrovich, Nazhena, Vsevolod, Yrax, Rasputin, etc.

I awarded the 2nd tier when they broke the Hut's shackles, the 3rd tier they recovered the keys from the Eon Pit, the 4th upon defeating Yrax, the 5th upon defeating Rasputin and destroying the world engine, and a 6th upon recovering Baba Yaga's life.

NPC recruits could be bonded with the Black Rider's Mantle at the hut, where they'd initially get the +2 inherent bonus and a boon (Greta got Shape Change (human), Hatch got the ability to become an improved familiar (Domovoi normally can't)). NPcs and Cohorts were awarded their 1st tier after completing an event that awarded a tier to the rest of the party (so Hatch and Greta initially got the Arcane and Invincible mythic templates at the Eon Pit, progressing to proper monster ranks after Yrax; two cohorts who were picked up at the end of Book 4 got their 1st tier upon the defeat of Rasputin)

I think I made thee tier 7 upon defeating Elvanna, who I had made tier 10, and gave her endless winter fey reinforcements and a Spawn of Rovagug as a familiar (because it's amazing what sort of help you can get if you promise an apocalypse).

I significantly scaled up encounters - the party finished the AP at 20th level on slow progression. I also have house rules for making enemies stronger.

Mythic Logrovich is here.

My re-write of Vsevolod as a mythic warpriest is here.

My re-write of Yrax, Lord of the Howling Storm is here; I think I gave every golem in the castle the savage or invincible templates, reflecting Yrax's superior expertise.

Some of my later stuff got pretty crazy - like I made Rasputin the actual Anti-Christ, and had Lucifer (who'd I'd made Earth's malebranche) show up as an ally because Rasputin had aligned with the Four Horsemen of Abaddon rather than with Hell - or as Lucifer put it, even when prophecies come true, they come true wrong. (I also worked in some ties to Cthulhu, who I'd wanted to figure prominently in the After-Campaign stuff.)

I also had an alliance between Elvanna and Kostchtchie, and on the final approach to Baba Yaga's life replaced the giant encounters with a mixed force of demons and humans - Kostchtchie and Winter Guard special forces, with the force ultimately led by a mythic demon and two of Elvanna's daughters (one of the witches and the witch/cleric mystic theurge, both 19th level and mythic IIRC).

I had wanted to do the "continue the campaign" thing, and run a couple of winter collectors (one on Triaxus guarded by an army of white dragons; another on Hoth, located inside a crashed Star Destroyer and defended by an immortal Sith wookie; after dealing with both of those problems, the party talked a bunch of Triaxus's white dragons into moving to Hoth) but had to put it on hiatus on account on my players going off to pharmacy school. And another player left the group afterwards, so it's unlikely we'll ever come back to it.

[Nikolaus de'Shade]

Damn Zhangar! That sounds like an absolutely fantastic game! This reinforces my opinion that the AP has loads of potential, if you can just get past book 1...

Thanks for all the ideas - I will probably use them myself! :)

[Dhrakken]

Book 1 was a blast! And so is book 2!

[Rycaut]

I've been debating - on the one hand I think this is an AP that really does justify using Mythic (and there are a bunch of very natural spots to level up - and the mantle of the black rider is somewhat forgotten about in the later books) but on the other hand I don't want to as a GM have to rebuild every encounter in 5 books - and without some checks on it mythic can quickly get out of hand.

My current thinking is that I probably won't give out mythic levels in the early books but will probably introduce scaling magic items (one or two per party member) which will interact with the mantle - and if I have the time to prep (and the players seem ready for the power boost) I will consider introducing a few mythic levels later on in the AP - but most likely I won't use Mythic all that much.

(however I may consider making a handful of the enemies mythic even if my party isn't - Rasputin being a prime candidate for this)

For cohorts/NPCs/potential future PCs what I am doing is a couple of things - one, I'm making it clear that the mantle(s) aren't just being given to the PCs - that the other riders (as well as the black rider) granted their mantle or some fraction of it to other people who have some tie to Baba Yaga and the Fey (whether they know it in all cases or not). I'm also rebuilding some NPCs with PC level stats (20pt buy) and a character level close to the party - with the intention of them being at the level of the party when/if they join the PCs. I won't be allowing Leadership or similar feats as a PC option - but I may grant it to the party as a bonus feat in effect if they have NPC's joining them (or I may just continue to level up the NPCs on pace with the PCs) I have a four person table with a likely 5th player who may join occasionally.

But I love the idea of the mantle / mythic levels granting some unique boons to some of the NPCs who may be joining the party.

[Dhrakken]

Everybody knows you never go full Mythic... unless you're ready to re-write each and every encounter.

I went full Mythic...

[sadie]

I'm going slightly Mythic (one with the mantle, one with the hut, etc, for a total of only 5 or 6), which I'm hoping means I only need to rewrite the important boss fights. More important is adjusting the encounters for party size, adding minions or environmental complications, since Mythic or not the action economy is what often makes the biggest difference.

I am totally stealing some of Zhangar's stat blocks.

[Manuelexar]

Great work Zhangar! I'm thinking about running this again, but with mythic, but I'll give them just 3 or 4 mythic levels, one as the mantle of the black rider, one after the aeon pit and one after Rasputin (or with the destruction of the world engine).
Since we had problems with our magic stuff the last time we played I think I'm going to add some scaling magic items.

[Dhrakken]

Manuelexar wrote:

Great work Zhangar! I'm thinking about running this again, but with mythic, but I'll give them just 3 or 4 mythic levels, one as the mantle of the black rider, one after the aeon pit and one after Rasputin (or with the destruction of the world engine).

Since we had problems with our magic stuff the last time we played I think I'm going to add some scaling magic items.

Be prepared to re-write every single encounter... Mythic is that broken.

[Manuelexar]

Dhrakken wrote:

Manuelexar wrote:

Great work Zhangar! I'm thinking about running this again, but with mythic, but I'll give them just 3 or 4 mythic levels, one as the mantle of the black rider, one after the aeon pit and one after Rasputin (or with the destruction of the world engine).

Since we had problems with our magic stuff the last time we played I think I'm going to add some scaling magic items.

Be prepared to re-write every single encounter... Mythic is that broken.

Really? I hoped that slapping an advanced simple template and doubling the HPs on everything would do...

[Zhangar]

At tier 1 and tier 2 I only had to occasionally adjust monsters, and usually reserved it for key ones.

Though I think I deliberately made Artrosia really rough - like everything that was supposed to be there had at least the advanced template and max HP. My party was tier 2 for most of it, reaching tier 3 mid-battle with Vsevolod.

Tier 3 was where I started having to make significant adjustments (some of the stuff that comes online then is crazy good), and after tier 5 I was in complete rewrite/rework territory.

Keep in mind that simply optimized "normal" monsters, or adding the class templates from Monster Codex to strong monsters, is perfectly valid. Most standard monsters aren't optimized in the slightest.

Though I think I buffed what the class templates to give more abilities, since most of them really don't give enough to justify +2 or +3 CR.

But, for example, ramped-up "normal" monsters my PCs had to deal with book 6 was a pair of starspawn - one sporting the wizard template (and buffing up with Fiery Body to be immune to the only thing that could kill it) and one sporting an anti-paladin template (with Abyssium armor, because why the hell not).

The party was genuinely torn on what was worse - the giant pillar of fire that was tossing out prismatic sprays, or the armored beast that had just activated Smite Good.

After a point, your PCs will be complete bad-asses; don't hesitate to be nasty.

[Dhrakken]

Manuelexar wrote:

Dhrakken wrote:

Manuelexar wrote:

Great work Zhangar! I'm thinking about running this again, but with mythic, but I'll give them just 3 or 4 mythic levels, one as the mantle of the black rider, one after the aeon pit and one after Rasputin (or with the destruction of the world engine).

Since we had problems with our magic stuff the last time we played I think I'm going to add some scaling magic items.

Be prepared to re-write every single encounter... Mythic is that broken.

Really? I hoped that slapping an advanced simple template and doubling the HPs on everything would do...

I have the added issue of having 6 players. I'm sure that contributes to it a lot.

[Zhangar]

Heh. In that case, you were already in "everything needs to be adjusted" territory before you added mythic.

[Stone Dog]

I have six players. They are all varying tiers of Mythic depending on when they came into the game.

Everybody is having fun and there is still a decent amount of danger involved. They get precariously close to the edge of doom again and again.

And now, almost at the end... they are out of diamonds.

[Poldaran]

Zhangar wrote:

Hoth, located inside a crashed Star Destroyer and defended by an immortal Sith wookie

I know I'm a couple months late, but I saw this and had just say how much I love it and would totally steal it if I didn't have any earthlings in the party who might get the reference.

Quote:

Some of my later stuff got pretty crazy - like I made Rasputin the actual Anti-Christ, and had Lucifer (who'd I'd made Earth's malebranche) show up as an ally because Rasputin had aligned with the Four Horsemen of Abaddon rather than with Hell - or as Lucifer put it, even when prophecies come true, they come true wrong.

You know, THIS? This I might steal.

Current plan is to have the party gain tiers after the completion of each character's backstory arc. The first when they fight one character's inner demon, one when they take on the man who killed one character's master, and one when they defeat the man who killed one character's family and bound his soul in the body of his own daughter. And then one when they defeat Elvanna and everything goes topsy turvy.

Since we've been having trouble with scheduling for a couple weeks, I've also been plotting out and statting up post game stuff. One such encounter will involve facing

Spoiler:

Bill, King of the Undead(Slayer 10/Fighter 10 Champion 6 Graveknight) and Steve, the Mythic Wyrm Red Dragon Ravener(out of the book Mythic Red Wyrm with Ravener applied) on Triaxus.

Another will involve fighting Cthulhu and then needing to

Spoiler:

steal an alien spacecraft in the middle of an invasion and drive it into the winter collector to destroy it.