|
Page 6 notes it will take the players 8 hours to reach the city, with hourly Survival checks to reduce the travel time by 1 hour, to a minimum of 4 hours. This time also tracks how many lightning bolts hit, how much ash there is on an armor's faceplate, and how many hourly investigation checks to make. Once they reach the city, encounter B triggers.
If the players fail at the Survival checks, they each have eight opportunities to reach the investigation goals. A talented survivalist can cut these opportunities to half. Am I missing something, or should there be an upside at reaching the target area faster than anticipated? The only benefit for succeeding at the Survival checks seems to be avoiding lightning bolts and ash on your faceplate, and the Mysticism goals can provide cover from the lightning bolts.
I'm probably going to have the players preroll their eight faceplate Survival checks before the game starts. That way I can consult the results quickly when needed and avoid a situation where six people are yelling numbers at me.
Page 6 notes it will take the players 8 hours to reach the city, with hourly Survival checks to reduce the travel time by 1 hour, to a minimum of 4 hours. This time also tracks how many lightning bolts hit, how much ash there is on an armor's faceplate, and how many hourly investigation checks to make. Once they reach the city, encounter B triggers.
If the players fail at the Survival checks, they each have eight opportunities to reach the investigation goals. A talented survivalist can cut these opportunities to half. Am I missing something, or should there be an upside at reaching the target area faster than anticipated? The only benefit for succeeding at the Survival checks seems to be avoiding lightning bolts and ash on your faceplate, and the Mysticism goals can provide cover from the lightning bolts.
Correct, the benefit of moving quickly is to minimize damage from the lightning/cold and penalties from the accumulating snow. The cover from the Mysticism checks will take a minimum of 2 hours to kick in if the PCs succeed on two Mysticism checks in a row, and even with the +4 to EAC the lightning is quite dangerous. Since the skill checks to gather clues become more difficult with each attempt, the party will likely reach a point of diminishing returns on later rolls that make expedited arrival to the city more valuable than additional investigation checks.
That being said, PCs shouldn't feel penalized for rolling well. If I were GMing and my players did well on Survival but poorly on investigative checks, I would give them the option to keep exploring the outskirts of the city to try to get a couple more successes before moving on to encounter B, essentially foregoing a number of successful Survival checks to retry Culture/Engineering/etc.
I'm probably going to have the players preroll their eight faceplate Survival checks before the game starts. That way I can consult the results quickly when needed and avoid a situation where six people are yelling numbers at me.
Excellent idea. The preliminary reconnaissance has the potential to drag if the PCs fail key checks, so having certain outcomes pre-rolled will help keep up the pace.
|
|
Thank you for the answers. The increasing difficulty really is likely to be more relevant than reduced time in this case.
Player reactions in the chase part are going to be interesting. Any gear of the captured players is probably best placed somewhere near the sacrificial area (as trophies or whatever) so it can be recovered and used. (Unless Ekkerah can deliver it straight to them.)
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Thank you for the answers. The increasing difficulty really is likely to be more relevant than reduced time in this case.
Player reactions in the chase part are going to be interesting. Any gear of the captured players is probably best placed somewhere near the sacrificial area (as trophies or whatever) so it can be recovered and used. (Unless Ekkerah can deliver it straight to them.)
Indeed, the best place for confiscated gear would be near the kohkleim, so PCs trying to reclaim their weapons will draw attacks of opportunity and players will need to be pickier about what weapons they want to try to grab (once the PC escapes their bonds, of course). I don't think I called that out specifically in the text, so thank you for bringing it up here.
Ekkerah can untie all captured PCs and return their confiscated gear (or additional gear from his stockpile if the other PCs also convinced him to provide minor aid in the form of equipment) as a form of major aid. Confiscated gear returned in this way is not "replenished" in any way, so any used battery charges or ammunition remain expended. The captured PCs will still start combat among the captured Starfinder team, near the demon and away from the rest of the party (okay for a melee character, perhaps, but dangerous for a caster or operative). In order to start the encounter alongside the other PCs, a captured PC must be smuggled out of captivity (a separate form of major aid from Ekkerah per rescued PC, and since the players can only earn a maximum of 3 forms of major aid they should carefully consider who they want smuggled out and who must stay with the other Starfinder captives). PCs smuggled out by Ekkerah get their gear returned to them automatically.
|
The chase seems like it could be exciting. I like the idea of the horde of jinsul trying a grab one of the characters.
Once a character is grabbed, the rest of the group needs to do sufficient damage to the horde (15 or 30 hit points of damage depending on tier), but I don't see values for EAC or KAC. Are characters assumed to automatically hit? Should area of effect weapons do extra damage (similar to a swarm's vulnerability)?
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
The chase seems like it could be exciting. I like the idea of the horde of jinsul trying a grab one of the characters.
Once a character is grabbed, the rest of the group needs to do sufficient damage to the horde (15 or 30 hit points of damage depending on tier), but I don't see values for EAC or KAC. Are characters assumed to automatically hit? Should area of effect weapons do extra damage (similar to a swarm's vulnerability)?
Good catch, that was an oversight on my part. My intent was to have the horde's EAC and KAC reflect the jinsuls of the appropriate subtier (fanatic jinsuls have EAC 11, KAC 13 in Subtier 3-4, bloodthirsty jinsuls have EAC 14, KAC 16 in Subtier 5-6); I must have missed that I didn't carry those values from encounter B over to the Jinsul Frenzy.
If running the scenario RAW, you could certainly assume each attack automatically hits (there are plenty of targets as the jinsuls descend on the PCs). The damage thresholds for freeing the PCs may be a bit low to really threaten the PCs, but mechanically it should work fine.
How do you pronounce Kohkleim? Is it coke-lime or koh-klime?
What was the motivation behind modeling the jinsul horde on a vehicle chase, instead of the "group escape chase" mechanics that have been so successful in PFS?
The second one (koh-klime).
The short answer to why I used the vehicle chase rules instead of group chase rules like in PFS is that the vehicle chase rules are in the Starfinder Core Rulebook, and since this was my first SFS scenario I didn’t want to rock the boat too much.
That said, by my reading the vehicle chase rules derived a lot of their mechanics from what worked in chases used in Pathfinder, so it wasn’t that far a jump between the two systems. Since the PCs have the opportunity to use a vehicle if they do well during the initial investigation, it made more sense to me to fit non-vehicle options into the Starfinder vehicle chase rules than to try to hybridize PFS chase mechanics with a Starfinder setup and also include a vehicle option. Ultimately I did try to draw on the best of both worlds (Kaava Quarry and The Infernal Inheritance were both references for me), and I think the differences between starfinder’s vehicle chase rules and the tweaked chase rules used in later PFS scenarios are fairly superficial.
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I suppose the vehicle chase does allow you to do some things more naturally than the "reverse chase" rules - like allowing characters to be picked off halfway, which is a cool idea and will scare the beejezus out of them.
My quibble is mostly that the vehicle rules seem a lot more complicated to me than the reverse chase rules, they're essentially a third game (next to normal combat and starship combat) with a separate turn structure and separate basic actions. Whereas reverse chase is just some teamworked skill checks, much simpler. I think the rules for vehicle chases are not widely understood - I have trouble with them myself. I spent a lot of time making a fits-on-a-page summary for them for The Scoured Stars Invasion. To make things more confusing they're subtly different from vehicles in tactical grid combat which steepens the overall learning curve again.
That said, I have specific questions about how the chase is supposed to go:
* Normally vehicles impose a penalty to pilot checks, apart from the vehicle's item level being factored into the DC. Neither the PCs nor the horde have such a penalty. Won't that shift the real difficulty in unforeseen ways?
* The rules you outline assume PCs stay together. What if they split up, for example because an operative with 60ft speed thinks he can distract the horde?
* What happens if a second PC retries a failed leader check? If he succeeds, can the whole group still advance?
* Engaging normally takes an extra pilot action. Does that mean that if the swarm tries to keep pace with the PCs and engage one, that it has to split actions at a -4 to both? If we assume the PCs Evade every round (it has the same DC as Keep Pace so why not) then the horde would be going up against KAC+2 with a +4 on the 3-4 tier (+7 on high tier), which seems like a very long shot.
* Are the PCs considered in engagement with each other? Otherwise, do they first need to engage with the PC before being allowed to attack the swarm in melee to either free their friend or destroy the swarm outright?
* Conversely, if all the PCs are by default considered engaged with each other, doesn't that imply that if the swarm engages one, it engages all of them?
* If the PCs engage the swarm to aid a friend in melee, are they automatically captured if they don't destroy/break free in the next round?
* Was it intended that you must shoot people free that are about to be captured or is melee violence acceptable?
* Do single-target attacks (like a laser pistol or mind thrust) work against the swarm?
* Normally, if PCs are in vehicles, engagement is determined against a vehicle. If the PCs use the street crawler, the scenario says that it becomes "a conventional chase" - so what does that mean for engagement? Can the swarm engage the entire vehicle and take it captive, potentially capturing all PCs at once? If the vehicle is engaged, can the PCs Break Free from the whole engagement? Can PCs jump ship and abandon the vehicle?
---
I like the idea of the horde chasing the PCs, but the vehicle chase rules give me a headache. I'm running this tonight after promising after a Con this weekend that I'd be the one to keep the weekly game running while other people recuperate. I'm annoyed that I got this complicated thing sprung on me. At the very least it should have had the Vehicle tag.
My quibble is mostly that the vehicle rules seem a lot more complicated to me than the reverse chase rules, they're essentially a third game (next to normal combat and starship combat) with a separate turn structure and separate basic actions.
That's a fair concern. I approached this seeing the vehicle chase rules as the "chase rules 2.0" intended for use in Starfinder, with modifications thrown in as necessary. Feedback like this helps authors and editors course-correct depending on what players and GMs want, whether that means revisiting some of the classic chase setups for non-vehicle scenarios or providing appropriate guideposts for scenarios that will feature chases (such as including the Vehicle tag, as you mentioned). For what it's worth, I'll try to answer your specific questions as best I can here.
Normally vehicles impose a penalty to pilot checks, apart from the vehicle's item level being factored into the DC. Neither the PCs nor the horde have such a penalty. Won't that shift the real difficulty in unforeseen ways?
Some vehicles do impose a penalty, and some don't. For example, the Level 4 Police Cruiser provides a +2 bonus on Piloting checks. To try to keep things simple, PCs escaping on foot have a +0 bonus to Leader actions (in lieu of Pilot actions) and take a -0 penalty on attacks.
The rules you outline assume PCs stay together. What if they split up, for example because an operative with 60ft speed thinks he can distract the horde?
Since the "horde" is an abstraction, it is possible to make PCs stick together for the purpose of the chase. Much like how commandeering the street crawler doesn't ensure escape because jinsuls are popping up everywhere, a fast PC who tries to take a separate route could suddenly realize that a bunch of jinsuls emerged from tunnels right in the direction he was travelling, forcing him to go back towards the rest of the group. If a player really wants to play the self-sacrificing hero, they could "break off" into a separate "vehicle" that takes its own Leader actions and makes its own decisions, possibly slowing down so the rest of the party can get ahead. Since the rest of the PCs automatically advance one zone if a PC is captured (regardless of whether or not the captured PC is in the same "vehicle" group as the rest of the party), this decision could push the PCs two zones ahead of the horde and allow the rest of the party to escape.
What happens if a second PC retries a failed leader check? If he succeeds, can the whole group still advance?
Yes, a second PC who succeeds on a retried Leader action despite the -4 penalty allows the action to take effect, which includes advancing if the action was to keep pace or speed up. Ideally that should allow the PCs a reasonable chance to advance and keep the encounter moving, but speeding up is unlikely so the horde can keep up and remain a threat.
Engaging normally takes an extra pilot action. Does that mean that if the swarm tries to keep pace with the PCs and engage one, that it has to split actions at a -4 to both? If we assume the PCs Evade every round (it has the same DC as Keep Pace so why not) then the horde would be going up against KAC+2 with a +4 on the 3-4 tier (+7 on high tier), which seems like a very long shot.
The rules for engagement are different in this modified chase, since the characters aren't actually in vehicles. Page 14 says, "To engage in this modified chase, the jinsuls must make an attack roll (+8 in Subtier 3–4, +11 in Subtier 5–6) to overcome the target PC’s KAC." Essentially, the horde collectively uses a move action to take a Leader action (typically Keep Up or Speed Up, depending on their relative position to the PCs) then uses a standard action to attack a random PC with the attack bonuses outlined above.
I apologize for how the flow of actions in a combat round intersect with the flow of actions in a vehicle chase round; I know characters typically make their full combat round of actions during the Combat phase of the chase round, but since the PCs likely need to be moving on foot in this situation I needed merge the two round structures into one. I did this for the PCs by removing their move action if they are traveling on foot (they must spend the move action following the leader), but the jinsul horde wasn't as clear.
Are the PCs considered in engagement with each other? Otherwise, do they first need to engage with the PC before being allowed to attack the swarm in melee to either free their friend or destroy the swarm outright?
The PCs are generally considered a single "vehicle" unit, so if one PC is engaged the party's unit is engaged for the purpose of the vehicle chase rules. PCs can make melee attacks against the horde to free an engaged ally.
However, if a PC wants to make melee attacks against the horde as an offensive tactic, the PC must engage the horde, which puts them at risk of being captured (a PC is captured if it remains engaged with the horde for one whole round, regardless of damage output - there are simply too many jinsuls piling on for a single PC to fight them all off). If the whole party consents to this strategy, they can engage as a unit, in which case the action plays out as if the horde had successfully engaged the attacking PC rather than a random PC. If only one PC wants to Leeroy Jenkins the horde, the GM should consider having this PC split off as their own "vehicle" as I described above for your second question.
Conversely, if all the PCs are by default considered engaged with each other, doesn't that imply that if the swarm engages one, it engages all of them?
In a manner of speaking, yes. From the PCs' perspective, being engaged to the horde is the same as being engaged to a vehicle; they can make melee attacks against the horde, and can escape with a Break Free action. Where it differs is the outcome of continuing engagement. In a normal vehicle chase, failure to disengage would cause the engagement to spill over into the following round, allowing occupants in the engaged vehicles to keep taking appropriate actions. In this modified chase, when the horde engages the PCs a single PC is randomly selected as the main target. If the PCs can't successfully disengage within 1 round (by a Break Free action or dealing enough damage), the horde automatically disengages from the PCs, taking the target PC with them. The remaining PCs get to advance one zone automatically as the horde converges on the captured PC.
If the PCs engage the swarm to aid a friend in melee, are they automatically captured if they don't destroy/break free in the next round?
When the engagement begins, the only PC at risk of capture is the one targeted by the horde (random PC if the horde initiates the engagement, or the attacking PC if the PCs initiate the engagement). Any PC can use melee attacks to beat back the engaging horde, but if they don't succeed only the targeted PC is captured; the rest are disengaged and automatically advance one zone.
Was it intended that you must shoot people free that are about to be captured or is melee violence acceptable?
Melee violence is acceptable if a PC is engaged; only ranged weapons are acceptable if the PCs want to damage the horde while not engaged. That being said, PCs following the leader must spend a move action, so switching to a melee weapon if a PC was previously using a ranged weapon could be tricky.
Do single-target attacks (like a laser pistol or mind thrust) work against the swarm?
Yes, single target attacks affect the swarm normally (the PCs simply kill the jinsuls closest to them, giving the party more room to maneuver).
Normally, if PCs are in vehicles, engagement is determined against a vehicle. If the PCs use the street crawler, the scenario says that it becomes "a conventional chase" - so what does that mean for engagement? Can the swarm engage the entire vehicle and take it captive, potentially capturing all PCs at once? If the vehicle is engaged, can the PCs Break Free from the whole engagement? Can PCs jump ship and abandon the vehicle?
Using the street crawler converts the encounter into a conventional chase for the purpose of a using Vehicle Chase round as written in the Core Rulebook and using Piloting actions in lieu of Leader actions. The modified rules for the horde engaging individual PCs remains unchanged, though driving the street crawler makes it tougher for the jinsuls to engage (on page 14, "The street crawler’s lack of siding means the jinsuls can still attempt to engage a target PC within the vehicle, albeit with a –2 penalty.") This means if the jinsuls engage a random PC on the street crawler, the street crawler is engaged for 1 round; if the PCs fail to Break Free or deal enough damage to the horde, the engaged PC is pulled off the street crawler and captured.
I honestly never considered the PCs jumping ship if they commandeered the street crawler, so I guess that would be up to the GM. If I were running the game and the PCs wanted to do this, I might use abandoning the street crawler as an optional trick Pilot action to create a new active hazard for the horde (if the PCs jump off while launching the street crawler into the mass of jinsuls) that then reverts the chase to the modified chase rules.
-------------
I hope that helps. I appreciate your questions, they will certainly help me assess my work on any future scenarios (anyone whose played my previous PFS scenarios knows I like crunch and I tend to make things pretty complicated, much to the chagrin of new GMs).
|
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Ran tonight - it was a fun session. The detail about the warlords lashed to the prows of starships in particular went down very well.
Of course my players did something I didn't expect; they showed up with their own vehicle. Which seems very reasonable for exploring a moderately big piece of surface. This kinda threw the chase for a loop since as a L1 item the buggy was very easy to pilot, and I figured as a "conventional chase" Pilot was the check for all of it. However, the horde also had an easy time engaging its very modest KAC. The second time they engaged it, the buggy was also in the big open field and while the PCs were preparing to try to scrape them off the hull so to speak, lightning obliterated the L1 buggy. After that they had a tussle and dealt enough damage to scatter the horde (ring of fangs shenanigans).
This is the second time or maybe even third time in a chase scene where it seems damaging the opponent takes prime place. First time was in Scoured Stars Invasion where the party shot the wurm to bits. Second time in Save the Renkrodas where the party/environment dealt 90 damage to Vossi during the chase before actually getting to the combat. And here, the PCs scattered the horde well before reaching the finish line. It makes me wonder if it isn't a bit too easy to just defeat the enemy instead of winning the chase.
This is the second time or maybe even third time in a chase scene where it seems damaging the opponent takes prime place. First time was in Scoured Stars Invasion where the party shot the wurm to bits. Second time in Save the Renkrodas where the party/environment dealt 90 damage to Vossi during the chase before actually getting to the combat. And here, the PCs scattered the horde well before reaching the finish line. It makes me wonder if it isn't a bit too easy to just defeat the enemy instead of winning the chase.
This is really good to know; I was worried that triple-digit HP for the horde made it unbeatable through damage. Hearing your account helps set reference points for future scenarios to make it challenging.
|
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Now that I've got time to read your answers in full, I think what I ruled during the session and what you wrote isn't very far apart. I stand by my point though that the vehicle rules are not a simple matter for the GM to use.
The biggest difference I ended up with is that I missed that the horde could engage the PCs while they were inside the street crawler, directly, without first engaging the crawler. Since in my game they were using one PC's exploration buggy which doesn't seem to be fully enclosed, I could have done that instead of engaging the buggy.
I think "engage" is a bit of a misnomer. It works so differently from the normal engage action in vehicle combat that it's more confusing than helpful;
* It bypasses the vehicle and goes to a PC in the vehicle
* It's not really transitive; if the swarm "engages" one PC it doesn't also drag off the others and it automatically breaks free the next round with the PC in tow.
* There's no -4 for the swarm using both a Leader action and engaging a PC.
---
Overall it was a very enjoyable scenario. The little details like leaders lashed to the prows, the autocannibalistic frenzy of the horde after taking enough damage, and jinsuls on the altar firing their flamethrowers just wherever really set a tone. I'm also a big fan of these "show, don't tell" scenarios that actually let you piece together a picture of what's going on through bits and pieces, rather than just telling it to you in exposition. Very nice.
My group had an operative and a technomancer and they did fairly well on skills, although they failed to see the first group of jinsul on time and so didn't get a chance to do some wildlife observation. They severely failed about 7 mysticism checks during the overland phase (...kept trying...) and that dealt quite a lot of damage. But they did well on the culture and engineering checks and the whole party ended up just managing 3/5 goals to earn their secondary success point.
The skill DCs proved quite steep for a 4-player party in high tier. The high quality of Ekkerah's gear offerings was appreciated. Surprisingly, they didn't manage the Diplomacy but did manage to scrape up a successful Intimidate and Bluff. Considering the DC 27 there probably includes expected Aid Another bonuses, should that DC maybe be scaled down for 4 players?
|
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Another comment, on the combats. The 5-6 subtier includes one combat against CR 2 enemies and one against CR 3 enemies. This really feels like a waste of time. At this subtier a considerable number of PCs are getting DR through either a feat or an armor upgrade, and even if the enemies manage to hit their AC they're not doing enough damage.
The lighting strikes were considerably more painful. In the final fight, it's more the threat of any captured NPC starfinders getting hurt that adds tension than the quality of the mooks.
The Kohkleim's blindsense is a bit weird. It gains blindsense against creatures inside the fog clould. So inside it's cloud, it can't actually see out. Also, it still suffers miss chance (20% at 5ft, 50% at 10ft) when making attacks or AoOs. As I understand, since blindsense is an imprecise sense, it probably also can't target people with lightning strikes through 10ft of mist so it'd have to provoke to use it's "fry everyone" ability.
(One NPC starfinder got fried as collateral damage when I used arcing surge on a PC; the rest of the starfinders were pretty frazzled by the time they got freed too. That did definitely add tension to the fight.)
Now that I've got time to read your answers in full, I think what I ruled during the session and what you wrote isn't very far apart. I stand by my point though that the vehicle rules are not a simple matter for the GM to use.
The biggest difference I ended up with is that I missed that the horde could engage the PCs while they were inside the street crawler, directly, without first engaging the crawler. Since in my game they were using one PC's exploration buggy which doesn't seem to be fully enclosed, I could have done that instead of engaging the buggy.
I think "engage" is a bit of a misnomer. It works so differently from the normal engage action in vehicle combat that it's more confusing than helpful;
* It bypasses the vehicle and goes to a PC in the vehicle
* It's not really transitive; if the swarm "engages" one PC it doesn't also drag off the others and it automatically breaks free the next round with the PC in tow.
* There's no -4 for the swarm using both a Leader action and engaging a PC.
That's fair. In hindsight I probably should have used a different term for the offensive action taken by the horde - something like "grab" or "grapple" instead of "engage," just to help draw a distinction between their unique action and the typical vehicle chase rules.
The skill DCs proved quite steep for a 4-player party in high tier. The high quality of Ekkerah's gear offerings was appreciated. Surprisingly, they didn't manage the Diplomacy but did manage to scrape up a successful Intimidate and Bluff. Considering the DC 27 there probably includes expected Aid Another bonuses, should that DC maybe be scaled down for 4 players?
Yes, several of the check DCs are high because A) the PCs are in hostile territory, and B) there is a baseline expectation that PCs will be reasonably competent on Aid Another checks, which are almost universally applicable throughout the investigation and the conversation with Ekkerah. I did knock down the skill DCs in the 4-player adjustment for the investigation part, so not doing so with Ekkerah as well was an oversight on my part.
Ekkerah's gear was selected to help shore up the PCs for the final boss if they got walloped during the earlier sections, and to give the PCs access to weapons capable of bypassing the demon's considerable defenses if they didn't already have some. It's more vital for low subtier groups squaring off against a CR 7 demon, but I'm glad your players appreciated it as well.
The 5-6 subtier includes one combat against CR 2 enemies and one against CR 3 enemies. This really feels like a waste of time. At this subtier a considerable number of PCs are getting DR through either a feat or an armor upgrade, and even if the enemies manage to hit their AC they're not doing enough damage.
The lighting strikes were considerably more painful. In the final fight, it's more the threat of any captured NPC starfinders getting hurt that adds tension than the quality of the mooks.
This was by design. The remaining occupants of Rax are the jinsuls who didn't make the cut for the jinsul military that returned to the Scoured Stars. As result, they were supposed to be a bit easier to handle in combat compared to the foes in 1-99, 1-23, and other jinsul scenarios. They should only be a real threat when faced in large numbers, even at the lower subtier (though the combats are arguably a bit more dangerous for level 3-4 characters). This is further reinforced by their terrible tactics (the ones with flame rifles don't care about catching allies in friendly fire).
The kohkleim should be far and away the most dangerous foe in the scenario. Since it's capable of throwing lightning at the PCs from the minute they crash on Rax, it's quite possible that the demon chipped away the PCs' health for quite a while when the party finally encounters jinsuls. I made the early combats comparatively tame for their CR to lower the likelihood of a TPK if the PCs come into the fight having been severely whittled down by the lightning strikes. It sounds like I may have lowballed the challenge since your players got hit with lightning quite frequently early on and still beat the jinsuls fairly easily, but based on the permutations I ran it seemed like a solid setup while I was writing the scenario. I'll keep the difficulty of the fights in mind for any additional projects I get.
The Kohkleim's blindsense is a bit weird. It gains blindsense against creatures inside the fog clould. So inside it's cloud, it can't actually see out. Also, it still suffers miss chance (20% at 5ft, 50% at 10ft) when making attacks or AoOs. As I understand, since blindsense is an imprecise sense, it probably also can't target people with lightning strikes through 10ft of mist so it'd have to provoke to use it's "fry everyone" ability.
Blindsense is an imprecise sense, but the kohleim gets blindsight against creatures within its fog clouds. Blindsight is a precise sense, so it should not suffer any miss chance against any creature in the fog, even if it's invisible or otherwise obscured. The "fry everybody" option just turns its lightning strikes & arcing surge into wider AoE weapons when used against enemies in the cloud.
That being said, you are correct that the kohkleim can't see out of the fog if it's inside. I envisioned the kohkleim using the fog to conceal itself while using defensive abilities (e.g. summoning an ally), then coming out to target enemies if they aren't in fog clouds of their own. If possible, the kohkleim would try to catch many enemies in additional fog clouds so it could see them without needing to emerge from its own protective cloud.
Overall it was a very enjoyable scenario. The little details like leaders lashed to the prows, the autocannibalistic frenzy of the horde after taking enough damage, and jinsuls on the altar firing their flamethrowers just wherever really set a tone. I'm also a big fan of these "show, don't tell" scenarios that actually let you piece together a picture of what's going on through bits and pieces, rather than just telling it to you in exposition. Very nice.
Glad you liked it! I was going for a post-apocalyptic, "Mad Max" atmosphere with a touch of "Walking Dead"-style piece-together-the-past vibe. I'm thrilled that seems to be coming across well.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ran this on monday; low tier. It's tough but fun to run, and has a lot of things that need to be kept in mind (with a couple of failures on my part). We have a 3.5 hour timeslot, and it was barely adequate for this scenario. High tier would have been too long. The players seemed to like it a lot.
The +2 per phase increase in the investigation phase may be a bit heavy. The players split between every skill, but not evenly. Most of them stuck to their teams through all seven phases of the investigation (6 for travel, +1 for following the tracks). They managed to get 1 success in Culture, 4 in Engineering/Physical Science, 2 in Mysticism, and 4 in Perception/Stealth.
Tracks were followed. Encounter A was avoided. Encounter B was brief but set the mood very well with the jinsuls torching each other along with everything in sight. Then it was time for the main event.
I'm still not confident that even half the players understood the chase mechanics, and there was no time to go through them in detail in our timeslot. Since they knew how to drive, they took the crawler. As they didn't have to use a move action, they could make full attacks at alarming rate. The swarm managed to engage twice. The first time it was rebuffed easily, but things got really interesting when one solarian got engaged. Another solarian readied black hole to pull the engaged solarian. The engaged solarian then jumped straight up, supernovaed, and was pulled back to the crawler. Essentially the PCs were covered in crabs, and then one of them punches clear of the vehicle, dragging with her a ball of jinsuls which explodes all over the landscape.
The swarm managed to replenish their numbers in the pits, and the PCs were caught by surprise by the rooftop RPGs which blew out the vehicle. They were engaged for the third time, but easily exceeded the 100-hp limit and the swarm fell upon itself and the chase was over.
The scenario might have benefitted from short note about how weapon properties like blast, line, or explode affect the swarm.
Ekkerah was a surprise to the players. They were even more surprised by the loot being incredibly useful in this scenario.
Kohkleim managed to summon fog, a buddy, and some lightning, but by then four flight-capable characters were on the top level and in melee. AoOs denied SLAs, and after a couple of vicious melee rounds, the players were victorious.
Funny you should mention Mad Max. After chitin-built cars and flamethrower-wielding lunatics the players were fully in Fury Road mode, with a mandatory "Witness Me!" when the solarians did their thing. They also got a kick out of comparing local jinsuls to goblins. Both have pets that certainly are not dogs, build things from scrap, like fire, burn written things, and seem to be both cannibalistic and crazy-stupid.
|
|
Funny you should mention Mad Max. After chitin-built cars and flamethrower-wielding lunatics the players were fully in Fury Road mode, with a mandatory "Witness Me!" when the solarians did their thing. They also got a kick out of comparing local jinsuls to goblins. Both have pets that certainly are not dogs, build things from scrap, like fire, burn written things, and seem to be both cannibalistic and crazy-stupid.
I wonder if this informed the name of the Personal boon on the Chronicle sheet...
|
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
|
The scenario might have benefitted from short note about how weapon properties like blast, line, or explode affect the swarm.
I went with the middle solution. Single-target things can affect the swarm, multi-target things don't get bonus damage. My idea is basically that the swarm is so big that even area things don't cover the whole swarm, while single-target attacks can blow out the brains of the particular frontrunner jinsuls that are holding on to PCs.
|
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Blindsense is an imprecise sense, but the kohleim gets blindsight against creatures within its fog clouds.
I missed that! I saw "blindsense (fog cloud) 300ft." in its statblock, and didn't notice that the Su ability actually discussed a separate situation where the sense turned into sight. Because blindsense (fog cloud) was already unusual enough that I thought it merited that particular paragraph to explain it.
Is there something I'm missing in its combat stats? Its to-hit seems rather low for a CR 7 creature, as well as its damage.
Something that took a lot of bite out of it was that 2/4 PCs heard about lightning storms in the briefing and immediately slotted Mk1 electrostatic fields. Of course, they were also soldiers with Enhanced Resistance (DR 6/-). So the Kohkleim's 1d8+9 E/S melee damage wasn't going to cut it, because it'd be reduced by 11.
As I said, the tension in the fight came from them having to protect the captured starfinders from collateral damage, not because they themselves were in real damage. Which isn't that bad, when you put some urgency into that as a GM. But next time I think I need to make sure those captives have names and a 5-second introduction to the PCs before all the teams board their landing shuttles.
|
I have a question about the investigation phase of the scenario.
I get the mysticism, engineering/physical science and culture checks okay. But when do the PCs get to make the perception checks?
I know they get to make one check at the start of Roaming Hunters (p. 7). However in the development section (p. 10) of that encounter it says:
The PCs can attempt Perception and Stealth checks to learn about the jinsuls as described in the Investigating the Enemy
Is this a new option open to PCs for each hour of progress?
Or is this a one off set of rolls they make?Or is this just based off their initial perception check at the start of encounter A?
Venture-Captain, Georgia—Atlanta
|
On page 6, in the Hazards section, It mention PCs can attempt survival skill checks to gain a bonus to their Fort save and may be able to apply it to other characters via the Survival skill, but I'm not seeing the specific DC for this check (unless it rolls into the DC 15 + 1 per previous check), what the potential bonus is, nor what the DC for the Survival skill check to apply the bonus to other characters should be (unless it also falls into the DC 15 + 1 per previous check).
I have a question about the investigation phase of the scenario.
I get the mysticism, engineering/physical science and culture checks okay. But when do the PCs get to make the perception checks?
I know they get to make one check at the start of Roaming Hunters (p. 7). However in the development section (p. 10) of that encounter it says:
The PCs can attempt Perception and Stealth checks to learn about the jinsuls as described in the Investigating the Enemy
Is this a new option open to PCs for each hour of progress?
Or is this a one off set of rolls they make?
Or is this just based off their initial perception check at the start of encounter A?
Correct, this is a new option available for each hour of progress after the Roaming Hunters encounter. So let's say, hypothetically, the PCs succeeded on 2 Survival checks to travel efficiently, so their total travel time to get to the city is 6 hours. Roaming Hunters occurs at hour 3 of travel, so each hour after that (hours 4-6) the PCs can use Perception or Stealth in a manner identical to Culture, Engineering/Physical Science, or Mysticism to learn more clues about the jinsuls.
Even if the PCs do exceptionally well and navigate their way to the city in the quickest possible time (4 hours), they can still learn all the clues available via Perception or Stealth by doing well in Roaming Hunters. The Development section for that encounter on page 10 states, "For every 5 by which the result of the PCs’ Perception check exceeds the DC to notice the jinsuls, or for their Stealth check to observe them, the PCs glean one clue listed below about the jinsuls’ behavior patterns." So let's say a Subtier 3-4 group took the extra hour to track the jinsuls and got a +8 on the Perception check at the start of the Roaming Hunters encounter. The party rolls very well and gets a 25 on a Perception check to spot the jinsuls, with the +8 bonus bringing the final result to 33. This is followed by a 24 on the Stealth check to observe the jinsuls from hiding. The Perception result is over 10 more than the DC (21 in Subtier 3-4), while the Stealth check is 5 more than the DC (19 in Subtier 3-4), so the PCs automatically earn 3 successes and 3 clues associated with Perception/Stealth after encounter A. Even if the PCs only have 1 more hour of overland travel, they could still earn the last clue during that travel time (and even if the PCs don't get every clue then, they can learn all the pertinent information from Ekkerah later).
On page 6, in the Hazards section, It mention PCs can attempt survival skill checks to gain a bonus to their Fort save and may be able to apply it to other characters via the Survival skill, but I'm not seeing the specific DC for this check (unless it rolls into the DC 15 + 1 per previous check), what the potential bonus is, nor what the DC for the Survival skill check to apply the bonus to other characters should be (unless it also falls into the DC 15 + 1 per previous check).
The DC to improve resistance to the weather (potentially for multiple travelers) is based on the Survival skill rules in the Core Rulebook (page 148). The DC is 15 and one check determines the success of your efforts for a single day. If you succeed at the check, you gain a +2 bonus to Fortitude saving throws against severe weather while moving up to half your overland speed (you can't stay put and earn the +4 bonus for the purpose of this scenario). You can grant this bonus to one other creature for every 1 point by which your result exceeds the DC. You can’t take 20 on Survival checks to endure severe weather.
Oh, another question.
The investigation DCs increase by 2 for each attempt according to the scenario. Is that what was intended, or just per success?
I'm not sure why a low skill PC failing to notice something would make it harder for others to do so.
it is per attempt, but the intent is that since the investigation takes place over the course of an hour per attempt a PC isn’t limited to only making their own check. All PCs should be able to aid another to bolster even relatively low rolls.
|
|
Ahhh, I've been doing it wrong. So each PC can also aid-another as well as leading a check?
Can they aid-another everyone, or just one other character?
Or is it that as a group they get to make a check for every one of the three (and after three hours, four) categories. So they will have a lead (character with the best bonus) and as many assists as they can get.
That would certainly make a bit more sense, and now I'm rereading it, I'm thinking that might be what you intended.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Ahhh, I've been doing it wrong. So each PC can also aid-another as well as leading a check?
Can they aid-another everyone, or just one other character?
Or is it that as a group they get to make a check for every one of the three (and after three hours, four) categories. So they will have a lead (character with the best bonus) and as many assists as they can get.
That would certainly make a bit more sense, and now I'm rereading it, I'm thinking that might be what you intended.
Correct. Every character could theoretically aid every other character on their checks - the investigation is a team effort, after all. The only limitation is that a PC can’t be the primary skill roller for more than 1 skill per hour. The best way for the players to “ensure” success would be for all PCs to aid each primary PC on one skill check per skill per hour.
PS: I like how when you and I have a conversation our avatars look like they are shooting lightning back and forth.
|
May be a dumb question, but: if the PCs convince Ekkerah to help them, and the PCs ask for the Minor Aid option of giving items to the PCs, does Ekkerah give them everything listed in the treasure section? Or do the PCs get to choose 1 item (or group of items, like the two semi-auto pistols, all ammo rounds of a particular type, etc.) from those available for each time they take that Minor Aid option?
I'm pretty sure they get everything at once, based on the comments above, but want to make sure. Especially in High Tier, that is pretty awesome loot for getting one NPC to indifferent and then passing a single (admittedly high) check.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
May be a dumb question, but: if the PCs convince Ekkerah to help them, and the PCs ask for the Minor Aid option of giving items to the PCs, does Ekkerah give them everything listed in the treasure section? Or do the PCs get to choose 1 item (or group of items, like the two semi-auto pistols, all ammo rounds of a particular type, etc.) from those available for each time they take that Minor Aid option?
I'm pretty sure they get everything at once, based on the comments above, but want to make sure. Especially in High Tier, that is pretty awesome loot for getting one NPC to indifferent and then passing a single (admittedly high) check.
Correct, they have access to any of Ekkerah's toys if the PCs use one form of minor aid to get gear. I wrote it pretty much knowing that most groups would ask for equipment, which was fine by me since the lion's share of the scenario's reward payoff comes from Ekkerah and I didn't want PCs to get short-changed for loot during an adventure that takes place on a world that doesn't use Pact World credits. I also needed to make sure that any group woefully unprepared to fight a demon (which has tons of resistances) would have a chance to get weapons capable of bypassing its DR without too much hassle, so as to avoid the risk of a TPK.
If your group wants to play "hard mode" I wouldn't mind limiting them to only one type of gear per minor aid, but that's entirely optional.
|
Venture-Captain, Minnesota
|
So this is a modified vehicle chase.
If they pilot a vehicle what are the DCs they have to hit? If we follow the Vehicle Chase rules, the DC of piloting + a 2nd level vehicle seems much lower than the DCs to advance using party level + appropriate skill using vehicle chase rules.
So this is a modified vehicle chase.
If they pilot a vehicle what are the DCs they have to hit? If we follow the Vehicle Chase rules, the DC of piloting + a 2nd level vehicle seems much lower than the DCs to advance using party level + appropriate skill using vehicle chase rules.
Correct, the Vehicle Chase rules mean it's easier than expected. That's by design, it's supposed to be easier as a reward to the PCs for doing well during the investigation (granted it's probably lower than it should be, especially for the higher subtier; that's my mistake, which I attribute to being relatively new to Starfinder). Even though using the street crawler doesn't guarantee escape, it is faster than the horde traveling on foot. There are plenty of active hazards capable of wrecking the street crawler, so PCs may only have the easier DCs for a short time anyway.
Cool beans. And thanks for all the swift answers. GMing this tonight!
No problem, I’m happy to help. I know my adventures tend to be crunchier than stale bread, so I try to be available to clarify what I can. I am trying to make my mechanics more user-friendly, but I’m still polishing my Starfinder skills so this one was a bit rougher around the edges.
|
Venture-Captain, Minnesota
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I suffered a number of problems last night, that were compounded by my having a particularly rowdy table next to mine, and so half my table was losing context all the way through just to the white noise. This likely affected our entire experience. My party still managed to have a good time, but I felt like my ability to sweep them into the story was hampered as a result. :(
I loved the investigation sequence, though my party was confused about how we were finding this information en route to the city. I had to keep mentioning bits of ruins and shrines and way stations that provided clues.
Loved the lightning, cold and perception mechanics that basically made it impossible for the party to keep environmental protections up the whole way through. The first two jinsul fights were a waste of time though. My party went through them like they were paper, and they wasted precious game time that could have been spent on the swarm encounter, making the investigation clearer, and then the final fight. At high tier, this was an adventure that I managed to end with only 20 minutes to spare -- and I am a GM that excels at pacing and prep. I think this will run long for most GMs. If this were not SFS, I would have clumped them into a single encounter.
I do think that this scenario could easily kill player characters who are playing up. The lightning made my party really worried about their survival, but it's good to provide challenge.
I was really confused by the map on Encounter B. Where are the fires? Where is the party? Where are the jinsuls with their vehicle ready to crash the party? Because of this, though we had a large map, the party and the jinsuls clumped in the one location that made sense. I would have put the party nearer the center of the map if it weren't for the description of the whole city being on fire. This is something that I should have clarified with you in advance. Did I miss something here, and what was it?
I did love the chase scene, but my goodness, the layers of complication there on an already complicated game mechanic led to some confusion of my party members -- I had a handout about how vehicle chase scenes work, but I really needed to have adapted it to this specific scenario. I pulled it off, but I feel like I needed another week or week and a half to prep this thing.
I loved Ekkerah. Were those leg blades ones that he had pulled out of his own body? Is that why he has stumpy legs and is covered in bandages?
The final fight was pretty epic.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Loved the lightning, cold and perception mechanics that basically made it impossible for the party to keep environmental protections up the whole way through. The first two jinsul fights were a waste of time though. My party went through them like they were paper, and they wasted precious game time that could have been spent on the swarm encounter, making the investigation clearer, and then the final fight. At high tier, this was an adventure that I managed to end with only 20 minutes to spare -- and I am a GM that excels at pacing and prep. I think this will run long for most GMs. If this were not SFS, I would have clumped them into a single encounter.
I can understand that, and it was something that caused me some consternation. I wanted to emphasize that the jinsuls still on Rax were the military chaff, not strong or disciplined enough to warrant a place in the main jinsul force currently occupying the Scoured Stars. Mathematically the best way to reconcile weak individuals with encounters challenging to mid-level players was to increase the number of low CR enemies, but I'm quickly learning that doesn't always hold true in Starfinder. I think the balance works better in the low subtier, but I sympathize with the feeling that the early combats were a waste of time in the high subtier.
In a lot of ways I think my writing for this scenario slanted more towards the low subtier than the high subtier. I designed the kohkleim to be a boss monster worthy of the jinsul home planet, but I needed to make sure it wouldn't be too deadly for a party of level 3-4 PCs. As a result I erred on the side of weaker mooks and treasure specifically selected to provide an edge against a high CR demon. I think I was probably too focused on making the low subtier survivable, and as a result certain encounters in the high subtier come across as pretty tame. Low level PCs trying to play up get the worst of both worlds, which is why this scenario is particularly dangerous to out-of-tier PCs (as you mentioned).
I was really confused by the map on Encounter B. Where are the fires? Where is the party? Where are the jinsuls with their vehicle ready to crash the party? Because of this, though we had a large map, the party and the jinsuls clumped in the one location that made sense. I would have put the party nearer the center of the map if it weren't for the description of the whole city being on fire. This is something that I should have clarified with you in advance. Did I miss something here, and what was it?
This encounter probably would have been better with its own map, but I dedicated my entire map budget to the final battle. I sifted through a number of pre-published Paizo maps to find which one would work best, and the Flip-Mat: Tech Dungeon made the most sense. That being said, I still ended up wasting a lot of space on that map.
Based on the orientation in the scenario PDF, I would have the party start near the structure wall in the southwest corner of the map, and have the jinsuls crash the street crawler in between the three sections of broken wall (where the white-ish debris is on the map) as if approaching from the southwest. The crash might cause some of the interior wall to collapse as per the Hazards section, allowing combat to take place in the bottom left quarter of the map with a few broken pieces of wall still standing to provide cover.
The fires are descriptive concerning the city at large; there are no fires on the combat map per se. If you wanted the party to start from the center of the map (as if they were exploring or hiding inside the building before combat), that would have been fine and they would not have been at risk of fire damage.
I did love the chase scene, but my goodness, the layers of complication there on an already complicated game mechanic led to some confusion of my party members -- I had a handout about how vehicle chase scenes work, but I really needed to have adapted it to this specific scenario. I pulled it off, but I feel like I needed another week or week and a half to prep this thing.
Yeah, I was trying to synergize chase scenes that I really liked from PFS (specifically Kaava Quarry and The Infernal Inheritance) with the Starfinder-specific rules, since I didn't want to stray too far from the Starfinder Core Rulebook on my very first SFS assignment. It was a gamble, and I think I may have ended up falling short of my intentions. If I could do it again I probably would have lobbied to add the Vehicle tag to this scenario and made vehicle use (the street crawler and any PC-owned vehicles) more prominent throughout the scenario, so as to not diverge so much from the intended use of the ruleset. I'll keep that in mind moving forward.
I loved Ekkerah. Were those leg blades ones that he had pulled out of his own body? Is that why he has stumpy legs and is covered in bandages?
I'm glad you liked him, I had a blast writing his dialogue. Fun Fact: I originally wrote his dialogue only ever using the past tense and intentionally screwing up complex verbs (e.g. "goed" instead of "went") in an effort to show that he learned Common under sub-optimal conditions; it seemed to me the strong military tradition in jinsul society would have made initial translations lean heavily on the past tense, so I figured that's all Ekkerah ever learned to conjugate. The dev team streamlined his dialogue to make it less burdensome to read, which I totally get.
His description says he's missing one leg (down to 5), and based on the page layout of his artwork I think the intent was for Ekkerah's picture to be his "headshot," like Jadnura's in the mission briefing. Ekkerah's legs aren't stumpy so much as excluded from the illustration. Given the bizarre jinsul anatomy I think Bryan Syme did an outstanding job on his "portrait" of Ekkerah (along with everything else - I'm super thrilled with how the art for this scenario looks).
I figured the leg blades he offers as weapons were simply scavenged, but given his disillusionment with Dhurus' leadership I really like the idea that he pulled out his own augmentations in protest. His wrappings were meant to be a "robe," but since jinsul anatomy makes an actual robe pretty cumbersome I desribed it as something closer to a long scarf.
Irony, to me, is due to how much my party had trumped the the initial combat encounters, and managed to blaze through the chase without ever getting into "melee" with the swarm. When we got the aid options, we rolled really well and got the major aid... Which meant we looked at the loot... and then at arming the Starfinders... Pretty much unanimously agreed to arm the Starfinders rather than collect the loot...
Electric, and plasma (half Electric half Fire) weapons were the primary source of of damage around the table... Which meant we wiped the jinsuls easily... (enough so that the armed Starfinders was... unnecessary) and pretty much chipped for 1-3 points of damage on the demon.... Whith DR and/or Electric resistance against attacks back around the table. It really did turn into a long slog, but victory was ours.
I'm glad you got some mileage out of the other major aid options. Did you feel like they were helpful? I didn't want the gear to overshadow everything else so I did try to make Ekkerah's contributions to the fight meaningful, but I couldn't playtest all of them.
Contributor
|
I used the Warmonger Devil from the recent Pathfinder Battles: Ruins of Lastwall set. My players were appropriately afraid! ;)
|
|
There's some discussion on the FB group right now about this mission.
Specifically, what's the proper resolution for this situation:
1) PC get grabbed & taken captive, being stripped of their gear in the process.
2) PCs fail to sway Ekkerah sufficiently to regain that gear.
Is the affected PC just hosed, so far as reclaiming their confiscated gear? Can they spend 5 Fame to get their gear recovered? Should it just 'magically' respawn in the PCs inventory post-mission?
Thoughts? Thursty?
|
|
I am the GM of Joe Jungers post. If the scenario would have mentioned that the gear was near the last boss she would had try to recover it before escaping on Jadnura's gunship.
Would like to know if the player has a chance to recover her gear after I table ruled that the gear was lost.
It would be greatly appreciate a response.
I am the GM of Joe Jungers post. If the scenario would have mentioned that the gear was near the last boss she would had try to recover it before escaping on Jadnura's gunship.
Would like to know if the player has a chance to recover her gear after I table ruled that the gear was lost.
It would be greatly appreciate a response.
Good catch, I forgot to add that explicitly in the text. Any gear possessed by captured PCs is added to the offering described in the treasure section of area C. Captured PCs should be able to recover all their gear if the party defeats the kohkleim.
Thanks Nick - I'm sure someone from that table is much happier now.
No problem. I could have sworn I added that, but I went back through the text twice and couldn't find it. Glad it got cleared up here.
If the PC's cast a spell into the horde , what is the horde saves values? I am defaulting to the fanatics values at the moment.
That's a fair ruling, I would do the same. Though an AoE damage spell could also have the jinsuls automatically fail, since it's kind of swarm-like given all the jinsuls are crawling over each other to reach the PCs.