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This is a spoiler-filled resource thread for GMs running the Dawn of Flame Adventure Path, specifically for the first adventure, "Fire Starters."
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All GM Threads in this series:
1 - Fire Starters
2 - Soldiers of Brass
3 - Sun Divers
4 - The Blind City
5 - Solar Strike
6 - Assault on the Crucible
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Some early thoughts as I prep the adventure:
The opening is the weakest part, by far. The PCs just happen to be there, they happen to get drafted into combat by someone they don't know, and then they're hired by someone else they don't know to take them somewhere else. This is beyond railroading.
Modifying this so that the PCs "acquire" a piece of technology that a researcher on Far Portal Station is paying for. May start it in the middle of a 3 way shootout as they're recovering it, maybe in a small Diaspora facility that's on the verge of destruction because the other parties (Brass Dragons, etc. to foreshadow) have some serious firepower. The PCs will be trying to race back to their ship and get away.
This takes them to Far Portal to get paid. Can meet the station master. I'll probably seed a doomsday prophet character here, to foreshadow some events and especially the psychic characters being strongly affected by the sun. I'm thinking Starfinder, Lashunta, sent to Far Portal by a Liavaran Dreamer, something about the proximity to the portal particularly afflicting them.
The buyer is Laeress. The McGuffin starts getting readings during the transaction and then the ship and whale burst through. Continue similarly from there.
I'm reworking the Laeress/Nib relationship to be student/mentor. Laeress was disavowed by the DCI for her theories too crackpot even for the DCI. Adds some reason for the PCs to mistrust Laeress when they find out. I'm not really into role-playing both sides of a domestic dispute while the PCs look at their phones, waiting for it to be over.
Nikkost and Lux will be a less violent encounter, more comedic. I'd like to bring back Nikkost as more of a Harry Mudd character in later chapters as they progress. We'll see.
I really like the unrest episodes. May expand a bit here.
The happy Nazi skittermander should be a lot of fun.
The Sunrise Collective dungeon crawl looks pretty solid on its own. Not sure a party of four L2s is going to make it through without some balancing, though.
Seems weird that we hear so much about General Kam but never meet him in this adventure. If he's not in the early part of book 2, may have to work him into the book somehow. The post-climax part, certainly.
Definitely plan to give lots of atmosphere on both locations in the book. The sun is one of the coolest places in the Pact Worlds.
Thoughts?
Some of my thoughts.
I actually really like the opening. It leaves it open for the gm and playing to work out how they meet and took this job. I REALLY love that the first thing you do in this adventure is fight a freaking fire whale with a space ship. It is so sci fi/fantasy.
I really like Nikkost and i would love for him to survive so i can keep bringing him back. Maybe in the second book he is in the brass bazaar and they pcs encounter him again maybe they save him from one of the gangs.
I have been trying to think of an real world example of what the burning archipelago would be so i can give example to my players. Thinking Dubai? open to suggestions.
Imps seem really strong especially if the pcs have the wrong weapons. ive been thinking of changing the encounter but not sure.
A lot of the enemies in this book surrender to the pcs if moral is low. Any idea what to do with them once they do?
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Not a lot of discussion on this AP, so I'm hoping I might be able to get some firing!
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After dragging my feet for a while (ostensibly to allow more books of the AP to be released), I've finally sit down to look at GMing Dawn of Flame. My players liked the idea of an adventure that happens inside the sun, and it definitely looked like it had the potential to be pretty awesome.
But after reading Fire Starters, I'm left with a lot of questions (and honestly a lot of disappointment too, as the adventure itself feels like one that could have been set anywhere). Some of these might be discussed in some of the future books that I don't have yet, so if anyone has any insight, I'd appreciate it:
And one last overall question: Why would the PCs entangle themselves in the crisis in Asanatown if the adventure didn't railroad them into it? As it stands, Taeress strongarms the PCs into taking her to Asanatown exactly on time for the PCs to be trapped there until the uprising is stopped. It turns out that the DCI HQ isn't even in Asanatown, but instead in Stellacuna. Its pure circumstance and railroading that Taeress' contact was in Asanatown in the first place. The PCs are forced to resolve a civil "war" (by killing a bunch of mentally impaired victims of psychological trauma/manipulation, I might add). Not everyone is going to have the stomach for this.
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Will take me a while to work my way through this, but here goes.
Question #1 - Why would conquering Mataras bring Malikah closer to becoming a god? Why would this be beneficial? The adventure background and AP summary is silent.
Pure speculation, but my guess is that either (a) he was given this task by a god to complete in order to be worthy of ascension or (b) he was going to use it as a staging point for an assault on Absalom Station. Two of the more common paths to godhood in Starfinder are being raised by another god and working your way up, or passing the Test of the Starstone (which is now in the Station).
Question #2 - What does conquering the sun entail? It doesn't seem like the sun is controllable in any real sense. Even the efreeti are mentioned as only conquering individual bubble cities. Is this a threat to the Pact Worlds? It sure doesn't seem like it.
See above. Having it play into a future assault on Absalom Station strikes me as a good hook
Question #3 - So the Pact Worlds folks have sent ships through the Far Portal, and some have returned. They know it connects to the Plane of Fire. The Plane of Fire is not some mysterious place. The Plane Shift spell still exists after all! So why are ships going to-and-fro through the Far Portal unusual?
Because it's darn expensive to have an entire ship that can survive that as opposed to plane shifting and magicking up a handful or adventurers? And those few early expeditions likely found little of profit on the other side to justify the higher expense.
Question #4 - Why is a starship native to the Plane of Fire vulnerable to the Fire Whale's fire attacks?
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I got nothing on this one.
Question #5 - (see pg 10) Since when does a Starship need a Drift Drive to protect it during interplanar travel?
Have we ever seen a starship undertaking interplanar travel before this?
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I think the idea that Malikah plans to use the Sun as a staging point for attacking Absalom Station seems good, but I mostly want to make sure I'm not contradicting intentions stated in later books. One of the things I often like to do when running APs is seed the early books with rumors, hints, or allusions to the BBEG's future plans.
For Q5, I don't think we have. But other objects seem perfectly capable of being sent to different planes without a Drift Drive. So I'm not clear on why it was needed here. I was hoping it was discussed in one of the other books and I just missed it.
I think the idea that Malikah plans to use the Sun as a staging point for attacking Absalom Station seems good, but I mostly want to make sure I'm not contradicting intentions stated in later books. One of the things I often like to do when running APs is seed the early books with rumors, hints, or allusions to the BBEG's future plans.
For Q5, I don't think we have. But other objects seem perfectly capable of being sent to different planes without a Drift Drive. So I'm not clear on why it was needed here. I was hoping it was discussed in one of the other books and I just missed it.
I've read all the books except the sixth one. I too wanted to read them all before I started the game. I wanted to place seeds throughout each book. Unfortunately, reading up to book 5 has little to no information on General Kam or the Malikah. I am hoping I get more in book 6 but I'm not too hopeful. I feel like the AP is just meant to showcase the sun.
I've read all the books except the sixth one. I too wanted to read them all before I started the game. I wanted to place seeds throughout each book. Unfortunately, reading up to book 5 has little to no information on General Kam or the Malikah. I am hoping I get more in book 6 but I'm not too hopeful. I feel like the AP is just meant to showcase the sun.I think the idea that Malikah plans to use the Sun as a staging point for attacking Absalom Station seems good, but I mostly want to make sure I'm not contradicting intentions stated in later books. One of the things I often like to do when running APs is seed the early books with rumors, hints, or allusions to the BBEG's future plans.
For Q5, I don't think we have. But other objects seem perfectly capable of being sent to different planes without a Drift Drive. So I'm not clear on why it was needed here. I was hoping it was discussed in one of the other books and I just missed it.
Gosh, that's really disappointing. The sun is pretty cool, but if the main villain (and their right hand man) have next to no information or characterization by book 5, I'm not sure if its the AP for me.
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So after some careful consideration, I've decided to take Dawn of Flame for a whirl with some changes to fix perceived issues with the overall story and the specific bits of Book 1.
I'll drop my thoughts off here, in hopes they may be useful to someone. Fair warning that I only have the first two books right now, so anything I suggest below could be contradicted later.
So after some careful consideration, I've decided to take Dawn of Flame for a whirl with some changes to fix perceived issues with the overall story and the specific bits of Book 1.
I'll drop my thoughts off here, in hopes they may be useful to someone. Fair warning that I only have the first two books right now, so anything I suggest below could be contradicted later.
Malikah's plan is to seize the Starstone and use it to become a god. The original adventure overview provides no good reason for why Malikah wants to conquer the sun, or what it has to do with becoming a god. As a fan of dramatic, potentially-setting-shattering events, I see her plan as threefold - use the Anassanois' psychic/telepathic influence to throw the Pact Worlds into disarray, drag Absalom Station into the sun to burn everything except the Starstone away, and finally use the temporal vortex at the heart of the sun (Mentioned as a rumor in the CRB) to create backup copies of herself and attempt the Test of the Starstone as many times as needed.
Malikah isn't trying to completely conquer the sun (which is pointless anyway) She's just trying to sow chaos to distract from her General Khaim's seizure of the Crucible.
The Far Portal isn't that mysterious. But I'm having the escaping mystery ship emerging DIRECTLY from the sun itself, not from the Far Portal! Instead, Khaim's fire whale is the one that comes out of the Far Portal in pursuit. That way the mystery ship is of 100% interest to the DCI.
The fire whale bites the fire immune ship, rather than using its breath weapon The mystery ship is being piloted by an escaping Anassanoi, but the fire whale manages to chomp the ship and take out its bridge in the process.
The PCs find a psychic suppressor made with magic and technology unknown to the Pact Worlds - one made by the anassanois - on the mystery ship This adds a mystery (what is this strange device), a motive (the PCs are tasked with secretly delivering the device to the...
These are really great! I hope you don't mind if I take some.
One caught my attention. You say that the vessel will come out of the sun instead of the far portal. Book 3 has the PCs going after a ship that can go into the sun. I don't think this is really a problem for you because you plan on having the ship being mostly destroyed by the fire whale.
One caught my attention. You say that the vessel will come out of the sun instead of the far portal. Book 3 has the PCs going after a ship that can go into the sun. I don't think this is really a problem for you because you plan on having the ship being mostly destroyed by the fire whale.
You've got it exactly right - I figured that the ship is derelict and likely too damaged to fly properly. But its also an opportunity for the DCI, who have been studying the ship, to reverse engineer some special heat shielding to augment whatever the PCs manage to scrounge up during Book 3.
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Hmm went back to read this thread, but yeah, Malikah planning to steal starstone is kinda unneeded considering she is already daughter of Feronia and divine being already.
Malikah is the daughter of a demigoddess and therefore only partially divine. Her stated goal per Book 1 is to become a full god. The Starstone is the most setting-famous way to do so. Why do you think its unneeded?
In any case, I think the additional work is worth it. The individual adventures in Dawn of Flame are pretty great looking from a read through (barring a few plot holes and railroading), but the overall plot and the climax are both... so so. Repelling a warlord's attack on a desert sun when his boss is still waiting in the wings undefeated makes this feel like an AP that ends mid-way through.
From what I've seen of books 3-6, my plot changes aren't going to invalidate any of the individual book plots (which stand pretty nicely on their own), nor are they going to require much in the way of encounter changes, except in Book 6. But they will change some of the context behind why the PCs need to do what they're doing.
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The way I understand Starstone working is that it pretty much turns a creature into fledgling demigod with potential to become full god relatively fast. Malikah already has potential to become full god(implication seems to be that she just needs to establish her worship on material plane?) and presumably starstone isn't only artifact in setting capable of doing so, just in this galaxy or part of universe.
That said, it IS called STARstone so I don't think its bad idea for change since it is still sort of sun and flame connected :D
And yeah, I definitely agree that it kinda feels like AP ends half way before it got to high level adventuring. It doesn't help that Khaim never got his big villain moment in AP or even encounter banter.
Hmm yeah, you are right about the context being really only thing that gets changed. I'm just generally wary of removing npcs and replacing them with another. But I do have to admit that replacing Tash with anassanois is great idea because it both makes sense and allows foreshadowing later book whereas Tash himself isn't that important after players have seen his message.
On sidenote, final encounter of book 1 can actually be done with relatively low combat wise without changing encounter much: PCs could sneak aside the wall of the building(the imp isn't mentioned to patrol the building's walls, just sit in ceiling at vantage point), listen or peak through windows and then crash through window & attack boss of collective and take him hostage to talk down other collective members. But its definitely not directly pointed out in the text.(though they do give diplo/intimidate dc for talking them down after their boss is taken care of)
The way I understand Starstone working is that it pretty much turns a creature into fledgling demigod with potential to become full god relatively fast. Malikah already has potential to become full god(implication seems to be that she just needs to establish her worship on material plane?) and presumably starstone isn't only artifact in setting capable of doing so, just in this galaxy or part of universe.
Hmmm, I'd forgotten that the Starstone got you to demigod status first (mostly because every person who succeeded the Test of the Starstone is now a god). That does make it seem redundant! I guess I'm kind of assuming that Malikah is less than a demigod - she's the offspring of Feronia (a demigoddess) and some unnamed efreeti noble (non-divine). As opposed to her bro Ragathiel, who has Feronia on one side but Dispater on the other (an archdevil), which puts him solidly in demigod status. I don't know, the whole thing is kinda vaguely defined. Probably on purpose.
Paizo have come down before to say that gods don't rely on the worship of mortals, so I doubt that Malikah needs to establish her worship on the mortal plane to become a full god. Plus there are plenty of demigods being worshipped that haven't bumped up to full god status. Either way I'm not sold on the driving goal for the AP being "take over one solar system's sun in an attempt to reach godhood". That's a pretty mundane way to get closer to being a god, even if its just a first step. In my case, I'd like Malikah's ascension to be something more dramatic and exciting for players to experience.
On sidenote, final encounter of book 1 can actually be done with relatively low combat wise without changing encounter much: PCs could sneak aside the wall of the building(the imp isn't mentioned to patrol the building's walls, just sit in ceiling at vantage point), listen or peak through windows and then crash through window & attack boss of collective and take him hostage to talk down other collective members. But its definitely not directly pointed out in the text.(though they do give diplo/intimidate dc for talking them down after their boss is taken care of)
That's a good point. I really like the idea that the final section can be resolved with minimal to no loss of life - though priming my usually bloodthirsty players to consider it may be tricky :>
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Hmm, yeah, that is true, and they don't really detail in adventure why Malikah believes conquering the sun will help her become a deity. I guess its possible that it wouldn't actually do that, but she still wants to people worship her as god even if she isn't actual one? They would still need to specify why the pact world's sun in particular though.
Hmm, yeah, that is true, and they don't really detail in adventure why Malikah believes conquering the sun will help her become a deity. I guess its possible that it wouldn't actually do that, but she still wants to people worship her as god even if she isn't actual one? They would still need to specify why the pact world's sun in particular though.
Perhaps the Pact Worlds are the beginning of an empire on the material plane. If she expands her reach and control over other species then maybe that could jump her up to godhood.
I do think that seizing the Starstone could vault a demi-god to complete godhood.
Cellion, your thoughts here are absolutely brilliant. I love all the ideas you've put forth.
Hmm
Thanks Hmm! Happy you like them.
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What is supposed to happen to the Allegiance collar on Koshnar's neck if the PCs kill her before she can activate it? The collar stat block doesn't say anything about what happens if the creature dies before it is activated.
Well presumably nothing happens then. That or it activates anyway if you don't want to players get access to super expensive item :p
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I didn't much care for the set up, and I am playing with 3 people who have not played it. I did the initial set up based on their backstories and classes they get recruited by the Starfinders (since they were on Absolom Station to start) for a search and rescue mission to get scientists to the Far Portal. In the process they rescued the scientist's derelict ship which was given to them to start the actual AP off. Had a simple combat with a few Space Gobs and a little crawl in the ship itself. Figured that would work as a session zero.
Sunday we actually start the book.
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I'd suggest having Koshnar being a little more talkative. When I ran it, I had him bragging about being personally trained by "the General". The hesper can also provide some tantalizing hints about the origin of the Breath of Embers, which in turn foreshadows Khaim and the whole war machine spinning into gear.
There's some very vague foreshadowing for the Malikah in book 1, which is exactly the right amount in my mind. I think even just mentioning the name off-handedly is enough until a later book.
There could be other plane of fire portals on the sun other than the far portal, they just link to more civilized and less threatening parts of the plane of fire.
Or ships with drift drives that came from planar portals on other stars visit the Pact Worlds via the drift and conduct trade that way.
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We're about to go into Laubu Station and I forgot to add the psychic suppressor from this thread to the Breath of Embers. My PCs are definitely in a "shoot first, ask questions never" mood when it comes to Space Nazis. One of them is a brakim (and the players just finished Against the Aeon Throne) so he's not at all interested in a peaceful solution.
They haven't rested though. They did the entire Breath of Embers and fought a bunch of Collective troops in the streets before heading to the station, so they're effectively out of spells, biohacks, resolve, etc. I'm interested to see how those two elements combine. Will they just kick in the front door or will they try to be more circumspect because of their diminished resources?
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Can't help but notice that Zeylan Trinipol, the boss of the adventure and dude on the cover, can't actually do his listed tactics.
He's got a sniper rifle, and is supposed to do trick attacks with it, but definitely doesn't have Debilitating Sniper. Even if he did, the pistol is better with the range penalty because of trick attack.
Did I miss an errata somewhere that says operatives can successfully use sniper weapons?
Nope, its just a mistake. One that Starfinder adventure writers constantly make. That said, it doesn't unbalance the encounter if he's able to trick attack with the sniper, so if your PCs aren't sticklers you can probably just let him do so.
In my game I rebuilt him as an Envoy instead of an Operative, giving him get 'em and clever feint. This makes him take a more thematically obvious leader role in combat, and thanks to this being a pretty wimpy tactic, it also gave me room to add in a couple more low CR allies for him.
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Thanks to splitting the party, bluffing to get into the compound past some guards, and thinking "oh hey transparent walls, that sounds neat, let's look into the boss's room" my party managed to pull encounters C8, C9, C11, and C12 all at once.
Trust me - if Zeylan has buddies he can hide behind and snipe, he can be a real challenge. The party barely survived, mostly thanks to some quick-thinking Engineering checks to jam doors shut once they realized they were out-numbered.
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My group recently finished this book (we're going slow because we're playing in Play by Post). I did end up making some of the changes I suggested up-thread. Here's my post-mortem thoughts. Hope they're useful to someone looking to run the book in the future:
Overall, the actual encounters for this book and the scenario as a whole in the second half played really well - even better than I expected from a read through. My only advice would be to consider allowing some encounters to cascade into each other in Laubu Station and Horizon House. The individual encounters are pretty easy, but they're very hard if totally combined, so an approach where they run into one another on a delay works pretty well.
I did end up adjusting the final encounter with Trinipol. I changed Trinipol to an envoy (using the stats for an 'expert' creature of the appropriate CR) with the get'em and clever feint improvisations, leaving his equipment the same. His tactics were to never attack and instead serve as a force multiplier for his allies. This actually makes him a little weaker than just attacking normally, so I gave Rej two additional CR 1/2 Brass Dragon ifrits. My PCs "enjoyed" eating overheats to the face, but managed to pull through a victory despite coming into the fight already depleted on resources. Rej is a very beefy and dangerous combatant for level 2 PCs to face, and works well with a debuff-focused Trinipol.
The Brass Dragon involvement in this book is the big tease for the next book, and I was happy to see my PCs getting suspicious about their presence here.
The telepathy suppressing bracelet I seeded in the Breath of Embers didn't quite catch on as an in-combat tool, as my PCs were more than happy to just beat up all the Collective members, but it still served a narrative role at the end - the DCI will be studying to bracelet to work out a way to duplicate its psychic-attack blocking capabilities and restore Asanatown to normalcy.
I expected the Nib/Taeress banter to be a bit of a dud, but my players were on board. It really adds some more life to the characters, though I expect its harder to pull off in-person since the GM has to voice both characters.
I completely changed the initial starship encounter. The fire whale as written is a speed bump that the PCs defeat in their wimpy Tier 1 starship. My revision changed it to a David and Goliath type encounter where the whale is a powerful but slow and hard to turn foe (poor piloting modifier, can't turn in place) that the PCs are trying to distract in order to stop it from finishing off the Breath of Embers. The PCs need to hold out for a certain number of rounds for more powerful backup to arrive to finish the whale off. And depending on how well they distracted the whale, the Breath of Embers is easier or harder to explore afterward.
This hit pretty well with my group, and I think does a better job of hinting that the bad guys have serious firepower on their side.
Thanks for the comments and suggestions. I'm just now starting to prep Book 1, and I'm sure I'll take some of these on board.
I've been reading through the first two books of this AP, and I think one of the things that surprises me is that there's really not that much action and adventure specifically related to the sun or its inhabitants. Apart from very first encounter (against the fire whale), almost everything in the first two books involve battles against terrorists or street gangs in locales that could be on pretty much any planet. James Sutter is one of my very favourite RPG writers, and Crystal Frasier also has a strong writing reputation, but I've found these first two books just a bit . . . pedestrian. I'm sure I'll still have fun running it, though. Maybe it's just a bit of a slow-starter for an AP.
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I feel the same way Jhaeman. My group just finished the AP's second chapter, and since the starting third of Chapter 3 appears to be more of the same (fighting organised crime in a casino....on the sun) I'm sorely tempted to just hand-wave that first bit and turn it into a 1-ish hour skill challenge, so that the party can actually start doing cool stuff inside the freaking sun :D Looking at Chapter 3 and beyond, though, the AP definitely picks up and goes hard at that "shenanigans inside the freaking the sun" fantasy.
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Does anyone know how many there are in total? I imagine over the coming days he'll be able to recruit more people to join the Sunrise Collective but can he get any more Brass Dragons?
Anyone have any ideas what Zeylan & his minions would do with this time? I'm not really sure what his plan is with the captured politicians and how he can actually enact his coup more fully or if he would move from the Horizon House now he knows there are pesky adventurers trying to stop him.
Book 2 has more information on the Brass Dragons if you're looking for more official guidance on the size of their organization, but it doesn't drop any specific numbers. There's at least 20 more Brass Dragons in that adventure. Personally, I would run with the assumption that there are far more than that and use as many Brass Dragons in Book 1 as you'd like.
If your party is resting multiple days, during that time I'd guess that Zeylan can finish seizing control of Asanatown. Its up to your imagination how this plays out, but I'd go with:
- Each day the party rests, Zeylan sends out news broadcasts about all the good progress they're making and how things are going to be so peaceful and wonderful after the last few undesirables are gone. The captured politicians appear in these broadcasts and appear to be agreeing with Zeylan, legitimizing his rule.
- Emphasize that non-lashunta have been ejected and/or attacked while the party has been idle. This feel bad moment shows that the party failed far better than TPKing them would. Use this only if you know your players will be motivated positively by such emphasis.
- Before the party is fully rested, the Collective finds them. Now the Collective isn't distracted with the rest of the bubble, they can focus their efforts on tracking down the PCs.
- Repopulate encounters at Horizon House, and have them fortify (but not so much that your rested PCs can't succeed, of course). Make use of that cool map! Consider providing sneaky ways to infiltrate the heavily guarded building. With an infiltration scenario (perhaps suggested by Nib) you can change the feel of the climax from "smash through a disorganized Collective" to "the Collective IS the law now, but we can still cut the head off the snake".
I'm confused a bit about the constant psychic feelings in Asanatown. How long have they been going on? As long as anyone can remember it seems? Since the source seems to be the Anassanois trying to send a warning, have they been trying to send this warning for decades? Has Khaim's plan been ongoing for that long?
The adventure background says it’s been decades. Presumably he’s been laying the groundwork, slowly but surely and only just kicks things into gear as the adventure begins and the rebellious pilot kind of forces his hand.
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The way I figure it, and building a bit upon the stuff at the end of Chapter 4, Ezorod acts as a sort of blocking lens for the Anassanoi's psychic warning. To make it fit into the canon, I posit that it works like the moon during a solar eclipse, except it blocks & bends across space and time. The psychic warning is blocked and refracted enough by Ezorod that the context and meaning of the warning aren't decipherable by the time it hits the Burning Archipelago, leaving just the "nameless dread" bit that Asanatown is familiar with. What both the Archipelago and Kahlannal don't know, though, is that Ezorod is refracting the signal across time, too - it first starts affecting Asanatown decades before the signal is ever actually sent. The strength of the signal and its dread is stronger the closer you get to its actual send time, temporally, so it started off weak decades ago, and has been gradually ramping up in strength as we get closer to present-day (which is why things came to a head during Book 1, just weeks/months before the signal is sent.)
If my PCs check into it in Kahlannal or Ezorod (...the latter being pretty unlikely, with all the fiery undeath the'll be busy with :D) they can deduce that the psychic grumbling will continue to propagate forwards in time, too - so Asanatown still has a few decades' to go before it stops completely. Luckily, the intensity should diminish over time, before finally stopping in the future.
Who knows, after Khaim's army is dealt with, perhaps Kahlannal can help devise a psychic blocker that specifically negates the time-travelling signal for Asanatown.
So which hull did you have you players choose at the start of the AP? IN Dead Suns they had a Explorer class (Medium) and in Aeon Throne and Signal of Screams they have a Light Transport Hull (Medium).
Anyone have them choose something other than Medium sized? This AP is silent on this selection.
Does it affect the story in any way? I'm pretty sure that large ships can dock just about wherever the PCs want to go.
The only problem with large ships is the minimum crew of 6 to go anywhere. Small ships are bad because they can't mount heavy weapons, making starship combat take forever even if you're good at building offensive ships. The explorer and transport are really the only practical base hulls for most PC groups.
@Darius: Note that the initial ship the PCs use for the first encounter is never used again in the AP. There's no starship content in book 2 and in book 3 they get an entirely new ship with special properties. You can freely have your players choose/construct whichever ship they'd like. A large ship tends to be impractical for BP reasons.
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@Darius: Note that the initial ship the PCs use for the first encounter is never used again in the AP. There's no starship content in book 2 and in book 3 they get an entirely new ship with special properties. You can freely have your players choose/construct whichever ship they'd like. A large ship tends to be impractical for BP reasons.
That is great to know. I am setting it up on roll20 now and haven't got passed book one. I am just used to the prior AP's the PC's keep the ship and moving on.