So I have seen this thread on multiple other Adventure Path boards (Rise of the Runelord being the biggest most successful one). What would you have changed now that you have run through it, or what are you planning on changing when you run through it?
I have tons of plans for changes.
I am making an entire dwarven party and adding lots of dwarf stuff to the Campaign
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I have tons of plans for changes.
I am making an entire dwarven party and adding lots of dwarf stuff to the Campaign
I haven't played Giantslayer, but listen to GCP and have read the AP.
Some thoughts:
#1 - WHY IS THE STORM TYRANT 'MYSTERIOUS'?
The dude is a STORM GIANT WHO RIDES AROUND ON A RED DRAGON AND IS BUILDING AN ARMY OF GIANTS. Everyone should know who he is. Everyone should be aware that doom is coming for Avistan. The first four books are written like this is some kind of mystery.
I get that in book 1. But either Skreed or the Council of Trunau which gathers at the beginning of Book 2 should tell the PCs what's going on, and the enormous danger the entire world is in. There's a giant warlord with a dragon building an army to destroy the lives of men.
I've always thought that a fantastic 'cinematic moment' would be the PCs seeing the Cathedral for the first time... the enormous wall around it filled with giants... and the Storm TYrant himself arriving on top of his terrible Red Dragon. They would see the true scope of the challenge ahead and be filled with dread and doubt, yet steely resolve sees them through!
#2 - THE STORM TYRANT'S ARMIES SHOULD BE RAMPAGING
Trunau was just the start. As the game progresses, the giant armies should be invading, destroying, and enslaving the whole of the area around the Mindspin Mountains. The comparative quiet of the boat journey in book 2 should be a result of the orcs being thrown into chaos as rampaging giants seek to destroy and enslave them as chattel. Like... have the PCs see fighting along the river, refugees seeking to get onto the boat, and in the distance, like... giant shapes marching across the landscape. Burning towns at night. It should be APOCALYPSE NOW in Belkzen.
Later on, in books 3, 4, 5, 6, the party is really deep inside enemy lines, as the Storm Tyrant's armies lay waste to Avistan. There's little chance of resupply and none of reinforcement.
If you have some place in Avistan like... I dunno... Kaer Maga or whatever, that you like or want to use, then the giants just skipped it. But the idea that a horde of giants is just sitting there waiting for PCs to murder it piecemeal is silly.
#3 - THE BOAT
As much as the boat journey is fun in book 2, with some cool PCs and interesting encounters, the boat itself doesn't make sense. Okay, whatever, but there should be more crew on a ship that size. It's a small thing, but add some useless orcs to fill up the oarbanks.
#4 - BOOK FIVE IS A MESS
The whole theme of "giant training" which fills up books 3, 4, 5, is just ridiculous at this point. Like... you have to fight your way through an interminable series of fire giant obstacle courses? Ugh. I can't imagine playing through that, or DMing it.
session 1 - environmental effect + fire giants
session 2 - environmental effect + fire giants
session 3 - environmental effect + fire giants
session 4 - environmental effect + fire giants
session 5 - environmental effect + fire giants
it's ridiculous. i dunno what to do, but like... as written, i wouldn't do that.
the last section is little better. the pcs essentially travel down a hallway, and go into rooms in order, murder the inhabitants, and then get to what should be a grand cinematic showdown with the fire king. like... wha?
doing something with dwarves might make this better... like the PCs are part of a dwarven embassy to the fire king and they have to like... i dunno. there's some fun enemies in the last part of this book, and the dragon encounter is fun, but everything is just a wreck. I really like the image of the PCs battling the fire king in front of his allies, in some sort of ritual duel though.
maybe like... the dwarf PCs have to do like an underdark infiltration into the volcano (which would be a fun change from fighting all giants in books 3 & 4) and then they confront the fire king as a usurper? Make it a sneaky adventure rather than the murder-hobo one its written as?
#5 - ORACLES
If you don't listen to the Glass Cannon Podcast, do so.
One thing that Troy realized is that there are these really interesting oracles in the first four books of the AP (i think in the 5th also?). You can have some really cool RP with them. Emphasize the weird split in giant culture, where their ancient gods of elements are being replaced with ancestor worship... and the storm tyrant is trying to subvert even that and turn the entirety of their people to a far darker path.
that's just some thoughts on my end.
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I'd start with running an actually fun and well-written AP. Which means not Giantslayer.
But if you're dead-set on it, I'd start with setting book 5 on fire and sitting down to find some workable replacement.
to be fair
Giantslayer has 3 really awesome parts, which are some of the top stuff I've read in an AP:
1 - the Battle of Trunau in Book 1 is an intense series of combats with huge stakes for the characters
2 - Skirkatla's Tomb in Book 4 is a great dungeon full of weird and truly evil enemies
3 - the opening of Book 6 where the PCs confront giant artillerists ontop of titanic scorpions while trying to reach a flying castle while possibly being pursued by an enraged fire giant army is pretty great.
not to say that the AP isn't without problems, but...
Yeah Book 5 is a mess and needs alot of help which i will end up doing.
I love running giants and dragons. I will be adding even more Dragons to the AP
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Yeah Book 5 is a mess and needs alot of help which i will end up doing.
I love running giants and dragons. I will be adding even more Dragons to the AP
just a thought: what you could do is plug in book 5 from Ironfang Invasion.
1 - the villain in PRISONERS OF THE BLIGHT is the sort of weird elemental monster which the Storm Tyrant has aligned with already, not a giant but a fey. But not all of Volstus' friends are giants...
2 - there's a fun, weird dragon
3 - it's totally different from the previous volumes of Giantslayer, which would be fun for the PCs (and you) and a welcome break from the monotonous enemies of the Valley and the Camp.
4 - PRISONERS isn't really connected to IRONFANG's larger storyline except for a few things which you can easily fix (there's some hobgoblins that you can either ignore or turn into orcs working for Volstus).
then you just skip almost everything in Giantslayer Book 5.
Add a quick adventure where the PCs find the volcano and have to ascend through the dwarven ruins within it to reach the Book 6. You can have some of the fun giant-style enemies to engage with - like... they are gathering there to get onto the castle, and you fight them while they are assembling. The gigas in particular is something I wouldn't want my players to miss.
but maybe they just fight it and some fire giants in the throne room (which is like... the ancient dwarf ruin throne room) before getting to the caldera.
just a thought.
I’ll have to scan that book and see if I want to run it. The only flaw is that it kills ever running iron fang with this group.
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I’ll have to scan that book and see if I want to run it. The only flaw is that it kills ever running iron fang with this group.Not really. Book 5 is very skippable or replaceable in IF.
like i said, book 5 of ironfang isn't tightly connected to the rest of the volumes in the AP. i think it's a great adventure though.
another possible swapper is book 5 of shattered star, but i don't have that volume. just reading the synopsis seems like its on theme - dragons and giants.
I’ll have to check it out.
Thanks
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another possible swapper is book 5 of shattered star, but i don't have that volume. just reading the synopsis seems like its on theme - dragons and giants.
Was reading through the adventure synopsis and im not really sure how i could tie this adventure in
Having read the AP and listened to the GCP, a huge issue with Giantslayer seems to be that the giants are left to raise their armies while the rest of the world is oblivious aside from five or six amateurs who take it upon themselves to infiltrate.
It would be more realistic given their nature for the giants to be laying waste to the surrounding area, outright destroying settlements and starting wars. I got the impression that the writers handwaved the fact that it makes far more sense to send the entire army of a neighbouring nation to face the Storm Tyrant to give the players a reason to be the centre of the story.
That said, the Tyrant is supposed to be uniting the various giants which is something that has never been done before. Instead of purporting to care about unity what if he were using them as cannon fodder? He could be using the races he doesn't particularly care about to rape and pillage and keep any threats busy while he builds his power. After the raid on Trunau, a group of characters involving the PCs realise this and the armies in the surrounding lands are too busy campaigning against the giants at short notice to listen so they have the PCs go in to enemy territory and possibly recruit allies at places like Redlake Fort along the way.
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Having read the AP and listened to the GCP, a huge issue with Giantslayer seems to be that the giants are left to raise their armies while the rest of the world is oblivious aside from five or six amateurs who take it upon themselves to infiltrate.
It would be more realistic given their nature for the giants to be laying waste to the surrounding area, outright destroying settlements and starting wars. I got the impression that the writers handwaved the fact that it makes far more sense to send the entire army of a neighbouring nation to face the Storm Tyrant to give the players a reason to be the centre of the story.
That said, the Tyrant is supposed to be uniting the various giants which is something that has never been done before. Instead of purporting to care about unity what if he were using them as cannon fodder? He could be using the races he doesn't particularly care about to rape and pillage and keep any threats busy while he builds his power. After the raid on Trunau, a group of characters involving the PCs realise this and the armies in the surrounding lands are too busy campaigning against the giants at short notice to listen so they have the PCs go in to enemy territory and possibly recruit allies at places like Redlake Fort along the way.
well... you are right - the Storm Tyrant's armies should be destroying Avistan.
but... the rest of the world is busy fighting a losing battle against his might. only the PCs - bold, few in number - can infiltrate the Mindspin Mountains and destroy his villainy at the source.
I was going to for sure add the players having to secure allies to protect The forge once they light it. Im thinking Janderhoff might be willing to help protect the forge
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We had our first session last weekend and it was great! The table ate it up and some of them are really opening up as role players. This AP looks to be a lot of fun, but it does need some plot polish and a bit of duct tape heh.
Early in part 1
Below is a list of things I modified to explain away plot holes and be confident I could understand and explain how the events unfold. I owe a lot to this forum for the ideas and inspiration, as well as to the Glass Cannon Podcast. I hope it encourages prospective GM’s thinking about running this AP!
Halgra’s speech
Edited for brevity and added welcoming words to recent merchants and refugees. I played up the influx of outsiders to help explain the presence of the half-orc infiltrators, and to ramp up racial tensions.
The tug of war
My group were lightweights and they rolled like hot garbage, heh. I added the ability for the highest str PC to be able to roll an aid for a +2. I also emphasized that they could take 10 on the check. Not one player took advantage of this, lol. Roderick and the Trunau defenders would have destroyed them, but they went into “good sports for Ruby” mode, and the party wins.
Ramblehouse
I added a little bit where Cham mentions losing her keys as the PCs check in for the night. Skreed stole her keys and she has to find her spare set. That’s how he got into Roderick’s room. I came up with random half-orc names for the guestbook, and had several of them end in variations of “nail” to hint at the twisted nail tribe presence. When Cham describes Skreed, I decided to keep his facial scars between his human and half-orc appearances.
Post murder Kurst
I had him emphasize a sense of paranoia, to help explain why he is turning to these mostly non-militia outsiders, and to encourage them to stick together and set a watch in prep for the assassination attempt.. One of the group is in the militia too, which lends credibility. I had another caravan of traders / refugees come through right at that moment, playing on the heavy suicide / murder vibe and once again, racial tensions. Plus, then Kurst had to take off to take care of the new arrivals.
Ramblehouse Roderick’s room
They found the note, which I printed out and crumbled up, but not the secret compartment in the desk. I added a hidden flask outside the window of the Ramblehouse, engraved with “RG” it was obviously Roderick’s flask. The night before, at the hopeknife ceremony, Roderick, hereafter referred to as Rod, stated that he didn't drink much in public, but he planned on taking a few nips once he got home. The alchemist carried it upstairs, failed his alchemy check, since he is quite the lush decided to take a shot of it, then failed the fortitude save and was knocked out for two hours. All this while the crew is talking to Cham. It was great, I think the player was more amused than anyone else, even while the fighter dragged him around town.
Skreeds room
They didn’t find anything except for a tiny splash of the white alchemical paint, as if someone had spilled some. Too bad the alchemist was unconscious.
Half-orc graffiti
This was a frustrating part of the book, as it didn't describe what the graffiti was, and you just know players are going to ask. So I made it be tiny versions of the graffiti cross (which I modified to look more like a twisted nail, because that makes more sense, but still kind of like a sword), stuff like “Halag wuz here”, “Trunau sucks”, phallic symbols, and a vague map of the town, but no one got the geography check.
Post wolf fight
Of course the ranger wanted to track where the wolves came from and rolled high, and of course the book makes no provision of this. So I had them follow some tracks to a beat up cart, covered with a tarp and shoved in an alley behind Brinya’s boarding house. Then they followed them further towards the commons, where they found a glass potion vial (of invisibility) on the ground and a large crowd of people that Skreed has slipped into.
I will try to post more as we progress. Next session is in about two weeks. Enjoy!
I will definitely add the crosses look like nails or swords. I like the keys part and the flask part I will likely add both.
Things I would change (with hindsight, just finished book 5)
Across the whole AP there are a lot of monsters that are melee attackers with high strength + two handed weapon + power attack.
I wish had put in more time to do this but I advise, for each book, making variants of the vanilla orc / ogre / hill / stone / frost / fire giants.
Just simple stuff like some variant weapons - reach ones, weapon + shield, throwing specialists or archers.
Try swapping out some of the racial feats (and/or adding a level of fighter / warrior, freeing up feats) - perhaps some teamwork feats given all the 'training camp' stuff or combat maneuver focused guys.
There are lots of encounters that feature rank and file folks like this and some variety really helps (I had the orcs in book 2 doing pike blocks with sarissa because they had been prepping to fight the giant)
Book 5 really needs more variety - as per my post in that thread, almost all the encounter there are 'fight giants in melee' or 'fight something fiery' - once the PCs put a communal resist fire up most of the book becomes 'fight giants in melee'
Book 1 - I found the simplest way to handle the long long battle was simply to hand wave a rest point 'buoyed up by victory over so many orcs and all the adrenaline, you level up to level 3 and get the equivalent of a night's rest' and then ask any player that is too upset by that not being how the rules work to just go with it as a one thing for the sake of the story.
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We just finished this AP a couple months ago and our GM made some great changes. I was a player at the time but have since gone back and read through the AP.
Books 1 & 2 he ran as is and those were great. Lots of fun.
Book 3 didn't make a huge amount of sense to our group. The giants wanted to re-light the forge so we should... re-light the forge?
So we played a more shortened book 3 where instead of searching the entire valley for the components to re-light the forge, we just stormed the Cathedral of Minderhal, killed the giant leadership and left the valley in anarchy. That worked well for us.
Book 4 we then played as is and was great. Lots of fun waging the guerrilla war against the giants.
By the end of this book though we were honestly a bit tired of fighting giants. And Book 5 has just got some hideous reviews and enough warnings that our DM didn't want to run in. Instead he changed things up quite a bit here.
When we stopped in Korvosa to rest after Book 4, our group was approached by members of the "Order of the Titan" in disguise (from the "Titanic Alliances" article in Book 4). Giants from the Order had already stormed through the volcano stronghold and were massing at the peak to assault the flying castle. In their attack, they had killed King Tytarian but had been unable to locate Queen Quivixia. The giants hired us to hunt down and kill the Queen before she could rally her remaining fire giant troops to attack the rear lines of the Order. This had us quickly scouting through the volcano through lots of rooms filled with dead bodies, have a few fun encounters with survivors and scavenging monsters coming to pick the dead and a final showdown with the Queen and her guards. Book 5 done quick and simple and a fun time.
Moving on to Book 6, he had us rejoin the Order forces fighting against the ash giants and giant scorpions in the inner crater. Had one quick encounter here and then made plans to assault the castle overhead. Instead of a long "dungeon crawl" through the entire castle, our DM treated it more as a Battle Interactive... take out a few critical locations to affect the entire battle.
The giants tasked us with first securing the engine room. Along the way he was sure we befriended Renfal's ghost. Then once a foothold was established in the base of the castle, our group was sent to head up the tower to take out the Storm Tyrant and his dragon while the Order fought through the rest of the soldiers.
Since we were "below level" for the final encounter, we had to quickly get the Orb of Dragonkind away from Volstus then we got to also control Renfal's ghost as he aided us as well as the dragons Akazerath and Naximarra (from Book 4).
Made for a simple fun finale to the AP without a lot of "minion fights".
Overall, good changes to shorten up and streamline what I could definitely see as an ending that could get kind of boring and repetitive. Just my 2 cp.
The Battle for Bloodmarch Hill Treasures
The Hill Giants Pledge Treasures
So these are some of the scaling magic items that I have been adding to Giantslayer
By the way, love this list Joey. Was looking for a scaling belt soon!
I’m not sure I have a scaling belt made sorry
I'd start with running an actually fun and well-written AP. Which means not Giantslayer.
But if you're dead-set on it, I'd start with setting book 5 on fire and sitting down to find some workable replacement.
Strongly disagree here. Giantslayer absolutely has its flaws (as many have pointed out) but I would neither call it unfun or poorly written. I agree book 5 needs... a lot of help. The idea of a dungeon crawl through a giant sized fortress isn't actually all that bad (not everyone's cup of tea, but it is definitely a throwback), but the timing as much as execution really doesn't work. I don't quite know what I'd do if running it myself. Probably not throw the whole thing out, but I would replace or remove a lot of the super repetitive encounters.
I admit though I have read all six books and listened to the GCP, I have not run it or played it.
Yeah I’m spicing up the encounters trying to add things like elementals and other firey things to the encounters.
Yeah I’m spicing up the encounters trying to add things like elementals and other firey things to the encounters.
Personally, I'd want to add non-giant, non-fire based encounters. A bit like in the Tomb of the Ice Queen. Maybe bound outsiders by the fire giant queen?
I do like the idea that as the AP progresses more giants are out rampaging and the volcano has less inside, so the training grounds aren't even necessarily being fully used. So you can replace some of the tedious giant fights with something else.
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I just had an absolutely ridiculous idea a few days ago about how to spice up book 5... or at least 1 encounter. I do like the idea of adding non-giant stuff to make the volcano so samey but I'm also kind of intrigued by going full crazy with some off the wall Fire Giant encounter.
For instance at the base of the volcano have a huge cavern where Fire Giants have actually built a massive cold iron tank(!?) driven by a couple of fire giants (one a soldier and the other a shaman). Maybe give some hints that it exists with clues like the lower levels being all uniform and the same carefully cut width (the giants use it to cut tunnels as well). Have it run on constantly heated lava or something.
The pilots of the tank are a rank and file soldier and a shaman. The tank fires cannon balls but the shaman can and does use call lightning to charge a battery to fire lightning bolts out of the cannon as well. In addition anyone with the misfortune of being caught in front of it can be run over by the massive drilling tools they use to cut through the volcano's rock.
No matter how many times I fail at this path I'm always thinking about ways I would have done it differently.