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I took the advice to pick rewards for the part of 6th level items appropriate to each individual character, and that went over really well. I super like this aspect of treasure reward design in the new AP's. It's a bit more work for me to try to find things that each individual party member would like, but the excitement they all showed when they got something cool that worked well with their character concept was really gratifying.
Before I started my campaign I sent a questionnaire to each of my players about their characters. One of the questions was "Do you desire a mid/late game magic item/feat/spell/power and if so, which one?" That helped me immensely when I was doing prep for this book.
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I think it is meant like raising shields in Star Trek, where raising the shield means turning it on and lowering the shield means turning it off.
"Adventurers are approaching. Shields up!"
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There are indeed hints in the beginning of the adventure, both from the broken pillar at Huntergate and a conversation with Nketiah.
Though the statue is both broken and incomplete, a PC who succeeds at a DC 22 Arcana, Occultism, or Religion check to Identify Magic can discern a vague impression of what the pillar was meant to do: amplify divine power and channel it back to an unknown focus, while also directing an unknown magical effect at any creature with local Ekujae heritage.
“When I studied the broken pillar that the Cinderclaws left behind in the temple after we drove them off, I could tell that some of it was meant to channel power against my people in particular. The Darkness has a grudge against us, and I think the Cinderclaws are using the power of that grudge to keep the Ekujae from striking back against them where it matters most: at the seat of their power. So, what would you say if I asked you to investigate the jungle to the east? If I am wrong and you end up blind, I promise to heal you—free of charge!”
This sounds more like a general question than an AoA one, but what is your party comp like? How do they utilize their "third action"? What spells do they buff and debuff with?
It seems that many players coming from PF1 to PF2 are having a lot of trouble adjusting to the system. I'm surprised that people went down to Malarunk because at my table (and from what I've been hearing), he was a cakewalk compared to the barghest.
Quick Edit: I'm seeing posts from the Play test that suggest you should add +1 to your AC per character level, I'm imagining that is a relic of the playtest and not applicable to AoA. Clarity there would help too!
This should be rolled into proficiency. If you're skipping that, then yeah, everyone has WAY lower AC than they should.
Are my players under-levelled gear/armor wise, and we don't understand the rune system? (Chimera rolled a natural 6 and was able to blast away my rogue / rolled a natural 2 and passed a save DC), or do I need to executively take 10% off of every enemy's stat block to make it feel fun.
Hold on, let me see here... Casters should be level 8 at this point and have expert spellcasting. That puts their DCs at 25-26 (in case your team isn't really optimizing). A chimera's best save is it's Fortitude at +18. It should definitely fail on a 2.
But if you take away level from proficiency... That DC falls to 17 - 18, well within bounds for the chimera to make all of his saves. Are you guys not adding level to proficiency? If that's the case, how has anyone made it this far?
Alright, let's see. Let me open with: I don't know HeroLab and haven't used it before. So that's where I'm coming from. But this...
We're running the game via HeroLab, so I assumed every level-up would be increasing their AC accordingly (increasing proficiency in an armor class increases AC, but just leveling up from 7-8 doesn't add +1 to your AC, at least according to HeroLab).
...definitely doesn't seem right.
PCs at level 8 should have their ACs hovering somewhere around 25 to 27. If HeroLab isn't giving you a bonus at every level for AC, it sounds like something is wrong. Proficiency is level + (trained/expert/master/legendary) and applies to most everything in the game.
For the DC, my Cleric rolled a Daze spell that the Chimera cleared with a natural 2. In fairness, my Wizard landed a Phantasmal Killer the very same combat, so my issue with the Saving throws is less pronounced then my party-wide AC being very easy to hit.
I'm more confused now! Will is the chimera's weakest saving throw, with only a +14. That means that the cleric's spell DC is... 15 or lower? Spell DC should be calculated as 10+proficiency+key (in this case Wisdom). If that Cleric has an 18 Wisdom, it looks like...
DC 10 + prof (8 level + 4 expert) + 4 Wisdom for a total of DC 26. While it's still not incredibly difficult for the chimera to save, it's definitely a sight better! I would take a look at your cleric's sheet and make sure he has things calculated properly.
I have a feeling that if AC feels like it's too low, then maybe there's a miscommunication somewhere. Whether it's HeroLab or not, not adding in your level to proficiency is tantamount to suicide. Check the numbers on it. They're not too hard to calculate without the program.
In second edition PCs getting the dying condition shouldn't be rare, but PC death should be. So I have to ask what is killing them. Are PCs not aiding their fallen comrades? Are they not using hero points? Are they not healing up between fights? Are you having foes always attack downed PCs to finish them off? Any of these could contribute to the deadliness of the game.
Tactically - the Paladin soaks up damage by wading into the middle, while the wizard and cleric both free cast as best they can (though the Cleric acts as our second tank). The rogue does buckets of damage, but always manages to be between the boss and a bad place, and take a licking for it. The bard has negligible combat influence, though numerically his inspiring performances do account for a lot of the party damage.I think this is some of the issue. In P2e, it's really hard to just go in and tank stuff. Enemies' first attacks in higher challenge fights just hit too easily, and the second attack is often better than 50/50 on hitting, too. It also sets up the "tank" to be hit with the bosses' strong 2- and 3-action attacks.
This. In P1e, your goal was to get your melee PC(s) right next to the enemy as soon as possible and stand there toe-to-toe trading hits. That will get you dead(ish) fast in P2e. Except against enemies with AoO, which are fairly rare in P2e, you want to move in, hit, and move away again; that forces the enemy to spend an action moving as well instead of just inviting him to hit you three times. No PC has high enough AC or enough hit points to take 3 hits a round, round after round. The game is designed to be much more mobile than P1e.
Debuffing the enemy is huge in the new edition. Even if it's just a Demoralize as a third action from a back-row guy to give them Frightened 1, that's a -1 penalty to hit, to saves, to AC, etc., that can make it less likely to be hit, or critically hit, or more likely to hit, or critically hit. Taking away enemy actions is even more effective.
It really is a huge paradigm shift when you're used to P1e. My groups are still in book 1, and I'm trying to remember to show them, via the NPC Alak, how the game is tactically different. I tend to fall back on P1e tactics myself, i.e., "Alak readies a Strike when the enemy gets in range," rather than think to have him use an action to Demoralize, etc., along with his Ready.
Triple hit from charau-ka butcher - they should try to be mobile and not stand right next to melee opponents. If they win initiative it is pretty much a bad idea to spend one or more actions walking up to an opponent, thus giving that opponent three actions to use attacking. They probably should have figured this out by the middle of book 2.
Do they not use treat wounds between fights? That removes the wounded condition on a success. My party has two PCs using medicine and they're pretty much always healed up between fights, with magic being used during a fight if necessary.
The PC's do aid each other when downed, but without resorting to a full night's rest after every combat encounter, they're walking into the next room of a dungeon balancing some sort of wounded condition.
Is the party using a 10 min Treat Wounds after a fight? That removes the wounded condition (in addition to healing a fair bit).
Smart PCs should virtually *never* be moving on with a wounded condition.
My party still has the tactics in pf1 mode, they love to put the fighter next to the big monster and trading blows.... So I do a lot of damage because critical now do happen a lot.
But they are making it as a team still, the fighter usually does intimidating strike and almost never goes for the hail Mary of the third strike, the rogue loves to give frightened to enemies and also goes in melee because can get enemies flat footed easily.
The sorcerer is the most newbie of the loot and she is still struggling that spells are not just for damage, learned that with the dragon pillars, her being able to put everyday Dispel Magic as a signature spell made somes fights easier indeed!
And there is a cleric who is becoming expert in healing.
So they had hard hard fights but never was yet the danger of a TPK.
But next session onward for the Clay Golem...... I am worried about that.
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There are indeed hints in the beginning of the adventure, both from the broken pillar at Huntergate and a conversation with Nketiah.
Though the statue is both broken and incomplete, a PC who succeeds at a DC 22 Arcana, Occultism, or Religion check to Identify Magic can discern a vague impression of what the pillar was meant to do: amplify divine power and channel it back to an unknown focus, while also directing an unknown magical effect at any creature with local Ekujae heritage.“When I studied the broken pillar that the Cinderclaws left behind in the temple after we drove them off, I could tell that some of it was meant to channel power against my people in particular. The Darkness has a grudge against us, and I think the Cinderclaws are using the power of that grudge to keep the Ekujae from striking back against them where it matters most: at the seat of their power. So, what would you say if I asked you to investigate the jungle to the east? If I am wrong and you end up blind, I promise to heal you—free of charge!”And they learned that, or perhaps forgot between sessions. They definitely were given that information but as one of them told me "we're dumb. We're not good at puzzles
*face palm*
To help with player amnesia, at the start of each of my sessions I give a quick recap of where the game is currently at. Sometimes I'll ask a player to do this as it gives me an idea of what they think is important; if something is missing I'll fill in the blanks. I also type up session notes into a Google document that is shared with the group so that they can refresh themselves on the entire campaign any time they need to.
The PC's do aid each other when downed, but without resorting to a full night's rest after every combat encounter, they're walking into the next room of a dungeon balancing some sort of wounded condition.Is the party using a 10 min Treat Wounds after a fight? That removes the wounded condition (in addition to healing a fair bit).
Smart PCs should virtually *never* be moving on with a wounded condition.
Yeah this jumped out to me too. Also, I'm not sure if they are running hero points right but I suspect not.
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The rules on Hexploration here and in GMG are a little confusing for me! It seems it is saying it takes two days to travel to a new hex of difficult terrain in the GMs Guide, and then two days to explore it, in the Adventure Path it says you can travel through two jungle hexes in one day.
Is there a chance that the PCs will bump into things in the hex without reconnoitering it?
Some sort of consistent answer would be great before my group reaches this point.
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Remember that when it comes to rules, specific overrides general. In this case the rules in Cult of Cinders are specific while those in the rulebooks are general. If you feel like justification is needed, then perhaps this part of the jungle is unlike other areas (somewhere between normal and difficult terrain, perhaps).
So I think I'm gonna reduce the distance across a hex to 5 miles, which works pretty well to make the math line up with normal travel speeds in the CRB and the rules for exploring a 12 miles hex in the GMG. The fighter in heavy armor would technically slow the group down a bit, but not enough for me to care. So the effect is I'll be using the 2 hexes a day at full march, 1 hex a day for exploration that the AP describes.
But I also have some exceptionally fast characters in the same party. The monk has a 45 foot move speed, and the elven ranger has a 35 foot move speed. The ranger is also very well specced for scouting the forest, between Terrain Stalker, Trackless Step, Goodberry, and quite possibly Favored Terrain as her 6th level feat. If she takes Favored Terrain, and therefore ignores difficult terrain, she should be able to employ an activity like Search or Recointer. That would let her explore 2 hexes in a day while the rest of the party marches at full speed. With her already high speed and other Ranger features nd skill feats, I'm kind of inclined to let her approach most encounter sites stealthily, giving her opportunity to observe and scout the encounter and report back to the party, much like Renali or Chioma can do.
Anyone think this is a bad idea? I don't think it is quite RAW but she has so many relevant advantages that the NPCs don't even have, it seems weird that she can't pull what they do off.
At my table, the speed of the exploration was really only important for figuring out how many times they had to make camp, and therefore risk exposure to dysentery and malaria.
Though I'm considering giving Heuberk Thropp in the next book some extra information/resources if the party takes too long, to represent Thropp having extra time to settle in at Breachill.
I couldn't find this question so here goes. Do the dragon pillars have a 360 degree of sight, or can the head turn? Or could PCs approach from the backside?
Thanks!
In my game, the heads can turn 360 degrees. It makes for a fun moment when they know they've been seen and need to roll for initiative when the dragon head slowly rotates to face the players and blasts off an eye beam.
I also had the Dragon Pillars have 360 degree of sight, but alas, when you have a sorcerer in the party with Dispel Magic as a extra signature spell for each day... poor dragon pillars....
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I also had the Dragon Pillars have 360 degree of sight, but alas, when you have a sorcerer in the party with Dispel Magic as a extra signature spell for each day... poor dragon pillars....
"Extra"?
Signature spells don't give extra casting? It just let them cast that spell using slots of any available level for heightening without needing to know it at that level... (Well... you *could* call using other level's slot as extra compared to the spells that are stuck at their levels...)(Unless it's an houserule that you have, but then mentioning the houserule would help alleviate possible confusion)
I also had the Dragon Pillars have 360 degree of sight, but alas, when you have a sorcerer in the party with Dispel Magic as a extra signature spell for each day... poor dragon pillars...."Extra"?
Signature spells don't give extra casting? It just let them cast that spell using slots of any available level for heightening without needing to know it at that level... (Well... you *could* call using other level's slot as extra compared to the spells that are stuck at their levels...)
(Unless it's an houserule that you have, but then mentioning the houserule would help alleviate possible confusion)
At level 4 she took the class feat Arcane Evolution:
Your arcane legacy grants you an exceptional aptitude for intellectual and academic pursuits. You become trained in one skill of your choice. Additionally, you keep a book of arcane spells similar to a wizard’s spellbook. You add all the spells in your spell repertoire to this book for free, and you can add additional arcane spells to the book by paying the appropriate cost and using your Arcana skill, similarly to how a wizard can Learn Spells to add those spells to his spellbook.
During your daily preparations, choose any one spell from your book of arcane spells. If it isn’t in your spell repertoire, add it to your spell repertoire until the next time you prepare. If it’s already in your spell repertoire, add it as an additional signature spell for that day.
So during the whole stay in that region she always picked Dispel Magic as her additional signatura spell for the day, because her signature 2nd level spell is Acid Arrow.
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I also had the Dragon Pillars have 360 degree of sight, but alas, when you have a sorcerer in the party with Dispel Magic as a extra signature spell for each day... poor dragon pillars...."Extra"?
Signature spells don't give extra casting? It just let them cast that spell using slots of any available level for heightening without needing to know it at that level... (Well... you *could* call using other level's slot as extra compared to the spells that are stuck at their levels...)
(Unless it's an houserule that you have, but then mentioning the houserule would help alleviate possible confusion)At level 4 she took the class feat Arcane Evolution:
Your arcane legacy grants you an exceptional aptitude for intellectual and academic pursuits. You become trained in one skill of your choice. Additionally, you keep a book of arcane spells similar to a wizard’s spellbook. You add all the spells in your spell repertoire to this book for free, and you can add additional arcane spells to the book by paying the appropriate cost and using your Arcana skill, similarly to how a wizard can Learn Spells to add those spells to his spellbook.
During your daily preparations, choose any one spell from your book of arcane spells. If it isn’t in your spell repertoire, add it to your spell repertoire until the next time you prepare. If it’s already in your spell repertoire, add it as an additional signature spell for that day.
So during the whole stay in that region she always picked Dispel Magic as her additional signatura spell for the day, because her signature 2nd level spell is Acid Arrow.
Aaaah! It's just an "extra signature spell", not an extra casting. Ok. Sorry for the misunderstanding. :x
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Just a little anecdote from my game today. My players visited the Ekujae elves today, and when they encountered Harriet and the druid made his Nature check to recall information about lions that "nor are they known for living in trees", another player sent me this photo he had himself recently taken on vacation in Tanzania, and the uncanny similarity to the picture of Harriet in the adventure had us all chuckling.
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That's an awesome picture!
My group almost had a TPK last night. We play 3-hour sessions and this was their FOURTH session at the mine. In the first one they killed the vrock and scouted the mine. In the second one they parlayed with Hezle, convinced her to leave and reunite with the Thornscales, released the mokele-mbembe, and in the aftermath cleaned up the remaining butchers, boggard swampseers, and low-level cannon fodder. In the third, the cultists from the mine itself charged the weakened party and the players finished them off. The third session ended with the ranger elf sharpshooter climbing to the top of the dinosaur's cage and loosing an arrow at the dragon pillar. The naunets, protective of the pillar, erupted from the water and flew at the depleted party members...
Those naunets are freaky, freaky creatures. I think the players were startled that they were in such a serious encounter when they thought they were doing clean-up duty and disposing of the pillar, so they were far more disorganized and had worse tactics than usual. Mid-combat they decide to retreat, and head straight through a corner of the mudpile, rousing the mud spiders. And suddenly it's a two-front battle. When the dust settled, an animal companion was dead, and everyone else was either Wounded 2 or down. Whew.
I really can't envision the mine being anything else but a war of attrition and eventually a big, chaotic scrum. Has anyone's party done more ninja-like hit-and-run tactics the whole time?
(Oh, and I should note that we have 5 players who are quite experienced role-players, so I tend to use Elite templates for almost all creatures and often even then beef up the number of opponents. It's something they specifically requested -- challenging, life-or-death fights where the outcome isn't always certain)
I'll report back on Friday, which should see my players first enter the mine area. Hopefully they get clever!
My party did the mines recently and it was a weird combination of 'hit and run tactics' and 'comedy of errors'.
The first thing the party did was explore the mud pile. The spiders ended up hitting way above their weight and the party retreated immediately. The next attempt, they snuck up to the mokele-mbembe first. I've let my party take the Animal Trainer archetype from Extinction Curse for use with the wargs, so the Swashbuckler could talk to animals via the Beast Speaker feat. He did Not Great and ended up accidentally goading the mokele-mbembe into attempting to escape its cage, which it succeeded at doing. The swashbuckler then sprinted across camp, mokele-mbembe in tow, leading it towards the cultists. Eventually, the Swashbuckler was able to duck into the surrounding jungle, and the mokele-mbembe was left to trample over some cultists. The party joined the fray when it became obvious the beast was losing, and that's when the Vrock joined in. The Vrock nearly killed all of them, but they all escaped with their lives in the end.
The next day (after a level up), the party returned prepared for the Vrock. True Strike + 4th level Searing Light from the Warpriest of Gorum crit and nearly took out the Vrock in one blow. Cold Iron weaponry from befriending the Ekujae was enough to finish it off. At this point, the only cultists alive are Hezle, and the ones working near the pillar. I allowed a creative interpretation of the Glyph of Warding spell to accomplish the following: put Gravity Well on a glyph placed on a barrel of black powder taken from Pendergrast, roll it down the hill so that it collides with the pillar, which triggers the gravity well. The fuse would be timed to detonate the barrel after gravity well went off. The result: most of the cultists were pulled closer towards the bomb's area of effect, and the fight afterwards was very short.
Side note: Sphere of Resilience is really good at dealing with the pillars that don't do damage.
The party was polite enough to Hezle that their encounter with her did not turn violent. Not to mention the fact that Hezle saw them demolish the Vrock; she saw no reason to risk her life against such clearly powerful foes to serve a now dead taskmaster. Hezle was a really good opportunity to have some roleplaying in the jungle, as well as convey some information about the nature of the dragon pillars, the existence of Kyrion, and the location of the Fortress of Sorrow.
Chapter 3: my sense of the mine was that if a fight broke out anywhere, the whole mine would be aware and charge the party. That was a bit much. Instead, I had the kobolds revolt. This is how I handled it. The sickly kobolds met earlier in the adventure were cured by the party's cleric. They were so thankful and enamored by him that he took the opportunity to convert them to the religion of Torag. Later, behind the scenes, those same kobolds went back to the mine to rally Hezle and the rest of the kobolds. By the time the party found their way to the mine, the revolt was in full swing. I set it up as an encounter of increasingly difficult waves of enemies as the cultists try to stop the revolt. I even introduced the party to Belmazog there as she had a duel with Hezle. She eventually was run off into the jungle by a rampaging mokole mbembe. The surviving kobolds hailed the cleric as a hero.
Chapter 4: the party found their way to the cultists' HQ very early in the book, before they had deactivated any pillars. They proceeded to find ways to get in. The ranger attempted to swim underneath the barrier. He became a permanent statue. Instead of having the player roll a new character, I dropped the hint that the elves might have a cure. The rest of the party then dragged his statue all the way back to the elves. They got dysentery on the way and ran into some drakes, but they made it and the ranger was cured and brought back to life.
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I'm well into cult of cinders. The group I'm working with is uncomfortable with more serious character roleplay but still -loved- the first section and really enjoyed an extended non-combat section with elaborate work going into hooking up two of the NPCs.
They then hilariously beetled right past the first dragon pillar (despite multiple hints as to its location) and just hit straight for the camp. Half of the group had dysentery and the encounter blew up spectacularly for them as they released the Mokele-Mbembe, attacked the butchers, and put the entire camp on alert before fleeing for their damn lives.
Nobody died but it was a hell of a introduction. Prepping for the next game where they make another go at the camp.
The group are also still fighting like PF1 and are starting to understand that tactics matter far, far more than just lining up the heavies and trading blows. I'm very curious to see where they go from here.
My only complaint about the adventure is not the lack of random encounters, but the lack of -ideas- for additional jungle encounters. I'm not intimately familiar with every possible critter in the rainforest and at points where the PCs should have been hitting an encounter I was blanking.
Although this entirely something I could correct with more prep, some guidance from the AP would be appreciated. We can have a balance between wandering monster tables which I'm happy to leave in the past, and "they should probably have some other encounters".
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I'm well into cult of cinders. The group I'm working with is uncomfortable with more serious character roleplay but still -loved- the first section and really enjoyed an extended non-combat section with elaborate work going into hooking up two of the NPCs.
They then hilariously beetled right past the first dragon pillar (despite multiple hints as to its location) and just hit straight for the camp. Half of the group had dysentery and the encounter blew up spectacularly for them as they released the Mokele-Mbembe, attacked the butchers, and put the entire camp on alert before fleeing for their damn lives.
Nobody died but it was a hell of a introduction. Prepping for the next game where they make another go at the camp.
The group are also still fighting like PF1 and are starting to understand that tactics matter far, far more than just lining up the heavies and trading blows. I'm very curious to see where they go from here.
My only complaint about the adventure is not the lack of random encounters, but the lack of -ideas- for additional jungle encounters. I'm not intimately familiar with every possible critter in the rainforest and at points where the PCs should have been hitting an encounter I was blanking.
Although this entirely something I could correct with more prep, some guidance from the AP would be appreciated. We can have a balance between wandering monster tables which I'm happy to leave in the past, and "they should probably have some other encounters".
Yeah, I feel you there. I think they threw us a light template with the additional jungle creatures in the book, like Living Saps and Asanbosans. There might be one or two more. I threw in some stuff like the Deinosychus or whatever. Just taking jungle-appropriate monsters plucked from the Bestiary and turning them into encounters really worked just fine!
Obviously a little late to help you, but I found random encounters in a place as thematic as the deep jungle to be pretty reasonable!
Chapter 3: my sense of the mine was that if a fight broke out anywhere, the whole mine would be aware and charge the party. That was a bit much.
The sense of the mine was indeed the opposite, as described in the AP, the mine was never intended to put all those encounters in the same spot.
I'm having no problems going with the AP as it is written.
Going for the Quarry on Book 3.
So do the dragon's priests move at half speed while tracking? Because that would be the rule without a feat or something that says otherwise, and that means they probably move at the same speed at the party (at best) and would follow behind taking the same route. Unless the party stops at the mines for a few days or something, how do the priest search parties catch up.