"The Lost Star": My experience GMing after I played it.


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Player characters:

- Dwarf Fighter (2-handed weapon) Pathfinder Hopeful
- Goblin Rogue (crossbow & teeth) Goblin Renegade
- Elf Wizard (Universalist) Budding Osirionlogist
- Human Cleric of Shelyn (Reach weapon) Esoteric Scion

Half of the players took the chance to integrate themselves into the narrative, and the other two just rolled with the opening narration. The group took the opportunity to get a rough mapping of the Ossuary, which combined with the Rogue's familiarity allowed them to know basically everything there.

In Exploration Mode going to the Dungeon, the party wasn't optimized. The Cleric was detecting magic since the Wizard didn't have that spell, the Fighter was Sneaking because she had nothing better to do, the Rogue was covering their tracks to avoid sewer monsters and rival gangs, and the Wizard was investigating the surroundings, looking for evidence of vampires. Nothing the characters did actually helped them (the Wizard critically failed his Lore check, and thought he did find evidence of a vampire), but the party took to it in a natural manner, which was a good first response.

When the party entered the first room, the Wizard and Fighter saw the Ooze, and both got critical hits on it! Their excitement and high-fiving died off when I told them the ooze was immune to critical hits. :p Still, they killed the ooze with only the Cleric taking any damage.

I ruled that the party could talk and cast spells in the first room, but once they went down the stairs, excessive noise would alert anyone. So the Rogue went down to sneak up on his allies, and that was when I pulled out the rules for sneaking. Apparently, PCs have to make rolls every time they use the Sneak action, so the Rogue was moving 10 ft. per check. He decided to slip behind a corner for his 3rd try, but fumbled it on that attempt, and alerted his comrades. He made a Lie action to tell them he was captured and escaped, but he failed that check as well. Since the Goblin Rogue and the goblin NPCs were playing a game of cat-and-mouse, I decided to make everyone roll a Deception roll for Initiative, since everyone was pretending to be still talking.

Since only the Rogue had been revealed, the other goblins moved up to him, with only one getting a shot off. Wanting to be able to see, the party let the Cleric go first, to cast Light. That sparked a 10 minute rules referral on what counted as "Unattended" for the Light spell. Eventually, I referred to the skills section under "Thievery", because the Steal An Object action was more helpful in explaining what being "unattended" meant. I ruled that the Cleric could Light an object attached to her, and we moved on.

The party moved in and quickly routed the goblins there. The rogue went up to stab another goblin, but I used the Scuttle ability to get out of range. The Rogue's player argued he should have known his former allies could do that, so I let him rewind and shoot the guy with his crossbow.

Once it was the goblins' turn again, they were in a fighting retreat toward the Fountain. The Cleric spent all of her actions to move up next to them as they entered the Fountain room, but then realized that she didn't have Attack of Opportunity, so she couldn't stop them from running, and had taken up the space for the Fighter! The Fighter asked for a way to get next to the goblins, even though the threshold to the Fountain room was blocked by Cleric and goblin. Cue another 10 minute searching for jumping. Eventually we found the "Leap" action, and I ruled the Fighter could move through the Cleric's space (roleplayed as the Cleric crouching while the Fighter uses her back as a springboard to making a running leap) and leap over the goblin. Landing next to the two goblins and having an Attack of Opportunity ready (which she had displayed as being capable of last round), the two living goblins surrendered.

(Looking back on how I ruled the Leap action in this adventure, I may not have run it correctly. She started the Leap action in the Cleric's space, which she was allowed to end in according to Page 311, but there are also rules where you can't enter a foe's space without rolling for it. However, Leap doesn't specific how vertical you get while you Leap horizontally, and the goblins are fairly short. The PCs used the 'jump off another PC' trick later in the adventure, and I think I'm fine with allowing another PC to give the leaper a free adjustment in height. But I will be clear that they don't get vertical and horizontal for free.)

Telling the goblins to stay put, the PCs decided to examine the room. The Rogue pointed out the idol, and the Cleric detected it as magical. The Wizard identified it as being evil, and was going to extract it, but the Fighter quickly interjected "Follow Pathfinder Protocol!" She rolled a Pathfinder Society Lore role to Recall Lore on how to deal with idols of evil deities. Her result was so good, I told her that good Pathfinders check for traps before interacting with magical items.

While the Wizard was identifying the idol (without touching it), the Cleric and Rogue began to convince the surviving goblins to move on. The Cleric failed her Request check, so the Rogue used his Quick Intimidation feat to Coerce them to not interfere with the battle. The party hadn't been badly hurt yet, so they waited until the Wizard identified the idol properly. The Rogue told the goblins to put the idol in the fungus room, and then beat it. When the waters started to clear, the Fighter took a sip from the fountain, and found herself healed.

Knowing where the other goblins, the skeletons, and Drakus was, the Rogue led them to the statue trap. I informed the Rogue's player that it could be disabled, but that it would be difficult, and failing might mean he gets hit by it. The Wizard, using his background's lore, recalled that drinking from the fountain, or wearing a holy symbol of Pharisma, would allow entry. The group was fairly healthy, and didn't want to 'waste' the water. That's when the Cleric got a good idea. She spent all her spell points for her domain power Fabricate, and planned to make Holy Symbols of Pharisma for all the characters! I told the player that such an action would work, but after checking the time it took to cast Fabricate (two actions for an item that lasts 10 minutes), I suggested that they plan out their entrance to Drakus' lair.

[u]Party Plan[/u]
- Cleric makes Holy Symbol for Fighter, then Wizard, then Rogue, then Cleric. While doing this, Wizard summons a Fire Beetle.
- Cleric opens door, walks into room, attacks Drakus.
- Wizard sends in Fire Beetle, using Light Flash like a S.W.A.T. team's flash grenade.
- Rogue jumps in and sprays Drakus with arrows.
- Fighter moves into melee with Drakus and pounds him.

[u]What actually happens[/u]

- With everyone prepared, Cleric tries to open the door... and realizes it's jammed. She fails the first time, succeeds the next time, and then walks into the room with no Drakus in sight.
- Drakus, who hid when he heard all that noise outside, leaps from cover and attacks the Cleric twice, misses both times.
- The Wizard, just now realizing the Cleric would be in the Light Flash, instead maneuvers the summoned creature in for a flank.
- The Rogue jumps in and gets a Critical Hit on Drakus!
- The Fighter moves into a flank with the Beetle and deals a lot of damage, leaving Drakus with just 9 HP left.
- Drakus walks away from 4 enemies (missed by the Fighter), knocks out the Wizard with one attack, and leaves the room looking for his reinforcements.

The Fighter manages to catch up with Drakus and end him, but by then, not even a Coerce action from the Fighter could discourage the goblins from attacking the party now that it was in disarray.

Cue two hours of the Wizard being unconscious, the Fighter facing goblins four ranks deep, the Rogue not being able to flank thanks to the narrow halls, and the Cleric duelling the Goblin Commando one-on-one to keeping him from killing the Wizard. A lot of it was also due to bad rolls by the PCs, but as soon as the party fell out of standard operating procedure, things went south. Eventually, the Rogue used a Leap action to get into flank with a goblin, killing it, and giving the Fighter a chance to move forward. The Martial PCs went into the Shaman's Lair and killed him (with the Fighter's Attack of Opportunity as he cast Burning Hands) just as the Cleric's epic duel was almost over. She had spent all of her healing (and a head-dunk into the fountain) when the Fighter and Rogue rushed up to close with the Goblin. The Fighter offered him surrender, but I had been roleplaying the Commando to be really sadistic (spending 3 actions just firing at the Cleric) so he took his turn to get one last shot at the Cleric. The Rogue was going to kill him, but the Cleric begged for her to make it non-lethal. Her anathema was Hate and Ugliness, and she was afraid wanting him dead when he could be spared could be considered 'hate'.

The party cleans up the rest of the dungeon, with only a prick on the Rogue's finger as trouble.

****************************
Here are the experiences of the players, who I'll arrange in the order I think did the best.

Fighter: An absolute beast. Her damage, especially on Critical Hits, was incredible. Powerful Charge is a very useful feat, especially for a Dwarf. Her small number of trained skills (most of which were still negative because of Armour Check Penalties) didn't hold her back. She did very well using her Lore checks, meeting the DC I had set for the Wizard and Cleric. At only one point was she in danger of dropping, and after a Heal by the Cleric, she kept on going. She had zero Resonance thanks to the Ancient's Blood feat, but that didn't affect her at all.

Cleric: Very useful warrior and healer. She wasn't as happy with her experience, even though she did very well. She was supposed to be attacking behind the Fighter or helping the Rogue get flanking, but combats weren't as straight-forward as they expected. Taking the Healing Hands feat made her Heal spells very effective, but the rules around Recovery rolls meant she couldn't do much to get the Wizard conscious after getting to positive HP. She held herself very well against the Commando, mixing her self-Heals and attacks prudently. She was upset that her de-buffing spells didn't make much of a difference, but the Commando saved against both of them. I think her PC was so great that things going sideways for her didn't kill her, just frustrated her. She was happy that she got to use Fabricate, since she just choose that Domain for the glaive.

Rogue: Did fairly well. It felt like all of his skill training really didn't make him great at anything, just good enough. If he failed at something, he could try something else if he had the chance, since a high roll mattered more than his skill bonus. The DC of the trap seemed too high for the Rogue to reasonably succeed at. The Rogue felt like the old Bard: master of nothing, second-best at everything. He was indecisive between taking Razor Teeth and Very Sneaky as his Ancestral Feat, and after playing, he was happy with Razor Teeth and looked forward to getting Very Sneaky.

Wizard: Spending most of the game unconscious wasn't great for his morale. The players are still getting used to Attacks of Opportunity being limited to certain PCs, so the party misread how well protected the Wizard was. The Wizard got healed quickly, he just rolled very poorly for his Recovery checks. He liked the tactical choices with his cantrips and Summon Monster.

(A weird rules interaction we noticed was cover interacting with spells. The goblins got cover against ranged attacks and reflex saves for area effects, but not Electric Arc. It felt like that cantrip should be treated like a ranged attack.)

My experience was I liked the system and the adventure in particular. It felt like a typical dungeon and a good venue for teaching the players how the new system worked.

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