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I think you're supposed to roll once and use that result for all the faction leaders. That way, you'll never double up on one location.
Perhaps a daft question but aren't the PCs supposed to be in factions at the start and have trained with key members of the society. So why is the initial Society check to identify people needed? Or have I misinterpreted something
For the Fleshforge creature - how would the PCs know that they can try a Sense Motive check to determine it's behaviour and that it can be distracted? I guess an outcome of a Recall Knowledge?
And as for Haunts (and this might be a general 2E question) but can they only be disabled by someone who beats the Stealth DC. Or can party members share the info to allow less perceptive ones to help?
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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For the Fleshforge creature - how would the PCs know that they can try a Sense Motive check to determine it's behaviour and that it can be distracted?
I don't think you're supposed to require a special action for that, it's more something that the players could just notice by being there. So if they come into the area and don't immediately start combat, I'll roll secret Sense Motive checks behind my GM screen.
I guess an outcome of a Recall Knowledge?
I really wouldn't lock text in scenarios that says "the players can do X" behind extra barriers that aren't explicitly written into the scenario. I think these are generally intended to just be available. This one looks like a good candidate for a Secret check, because the players should only know about it if they pass it.
And as for Haunts (and this might be a general 2E question) but can they only be disabled by someone who beats the Stealth DC. Or can party members share the info to allow less perceptive ones to help?
I think pointing them out (perhaps using the Point Out action) is fine.
Venture-Captain, Colorado—Denver
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Got my first TPK tonight running this. They ran into the Dreg and between some bad tactics, bad rolls, and lucky GM rolls, I got them all to dying 1 or 2. At this point, if they stabilized, by rolls or hero points, I wasn't going to kill them permanently. Fortunately, they all stabilized, so I had the creature stop attacking once they went down, being that it's pretty unintelligent and probably thinks that the threat is gone.
The PCs awoke in the Grand Lodge in hospital beds, discovering that the smugglers recognized them as Society members, and not wanting to draw the ire of the Society, decided to drop their unconscious bodies at the local "fire department" unwanted baby drop-off. They left a note in the PC's pockets explaining that "we could have killed you, but we don't want problems with the society." Basically, don't hunt us down and kill us please. The PCs wanted to venture back to the ship, but I told them the smugglers, having been discovered, have already moved their operations leaving no trace.
The PCs had already finished the other 3 parts, so they got 8 treasure bundles, failed primary, succeeded secondary.
All in all, it was a satisfactory ending for everyone, with no real player deaths, the real fear of death, and hopefully some lessons learned.
Venture-Lieutenant, Nebraska—Bellevue
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Got my first TPK tonight running this. They ran into the Dreg and between some bad tactics, bad rolls, and lucky GM rolls, I got them all to dying 1 or 2. At this point, if they stabilized, by rolls or hero points, I wasn't going to kill them permanently. Fortunately, they all stabilized, so I had the creature stop attacking once they went down, being that it's pretty unintelligent and probably thinks that the threat is gone.
The PCs awoke in the Grand Lodge in hospital beds, discovering that the smugglers recognized them as Society members, and not wanting to draw the ire of the Society, decided to drop their unconscious bodies at the local "fire department" unwanted baby drop-off. They left a note in the PC's pockets explaining that "we could have killed you, but we don't want problems with the society." Basically, don't hunt us down and kill us please. The PCs wanted to venture back to the ship, but I told them the smugglers, having been discovered, have already moved their operations leaving no trace.
The PCs had already finished the other 3 parts, so they got 8 treasure bundles, failed primary, succeeded secondary.
All in all, it was a satisfactory ending for everyone, with no real player deaths, the real fear of death, and hopefully some lessons learned.
Nicely done. I have run it four times and every time rolled insanely low for the Dreg's initiative. He's only lasted long enough to attack back twice. Dice can be so fickle. I like your story-based answer to the TPK.
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Venture-Captain, Colorado—Denver
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Nicely done. I have run it four times and every time rolled insanely low for the Dreg's initiative. He's only lasted long enough to attack back twice. Dice can be so fickle. I like your story-based answer to the TPK.
Thanks! It made reporting a bit... difficult. I crossed off the Killed/Pacified part on the chronicle sheet, since neither ended up happening. Wasn't sure how else to handle that part, especially since we don't yet know what role that might have in a future scenario. In hindsight, I probably should have noted on the chronicle that the monster killed them, so the GM that runs whatever scenario that ties in to knows, but alas, too late. Shouldn't be too significant, hopefully.
That dreg just hits so hard, and they got the reach tentacle variant, so I was able to just hulk smash the people next to him and reach out to the others just out of reach. They were 6 HP away from killing it, too!
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For the Fleshforge creature - how would the PCs know that they can try a Sense Motive check to determine it's behaviour and that it can be distracted?I don't think you're supposed to require a special action for that, it's more something that the players could just notice by being there. So if they come into the area and don't immediately start combat, I'll roll secret Sense Motive checks behind my GM screen.
This is how I ran it... and why it is good to have the PC's bonuses for certain things (especially perception) ahead of time.
That way, you can just roll, and then give people information that they learn.
And as for Haunts (and this might be a general 2E question) but can they only be disabled by someone who beats the Stealth DC. Or can party members share the info to allow less perceptive ones to help?
If anyone has detected it (just like with a trap), then others should be able to take advantage... the key is if combat/initiative has started, I would require the point out action, allowing them to know what was going on. In Exploration mode, I'd let a PC just point it out.
However, this assumes that everyone can detect the haunt's location...
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Prepping this for Outpost III, and I'm trying to include as many visual aids as possible. I found the flag for Taldor from the Community Use package, but can't find a coat of arms for their Navy.
Might anyone else know of one? Or do you think the Taldan flag will suffice? Or should I just leave it...
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I've got some follow-on questions after preparing this for a low-tier game. It seems like the amount of disease effects in the scenario is rather punishing for a low-tier game that may well be some players' first times (especially since, keeping with PF1 and SFS, diseases kill you if not removed by the end of the scenario). And it's not like those Fort DCs are trivial, either.
I'm really feeling like I should reshuffle my missions so my players aren't fighting the cacodaemons. I'd hate to be the GM that kills someone's first Pathfinder character because of some bad Fortitude saves and the fact that Org Play Guide didn't say how much fame Remove Disease costs (and 18 gp for a level 1 character is asking a lot, even if you pass the boot).
How have other people handled this?
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How have other people handled this?
By following the PFS2 Guide to Organized Play.
The Pathfinder Society has resources to take care of its members, and many of the possible negative effects an adventurer can be subject to during an adventure are assumed to be taken care of during Downtime. The exceptions to this are death, permanent petrification or polymorph effects, curses, and permanent negative conditions (Core Rulebook 618–623) acquired during the course of the adventure
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How have other people handled this?By following the PFS2 Guide to Organized Play.
The Pathfinder Society has resources to take care of its members, and many of the possible negative effects an adventurer can be subject to during an adventure are assumed to be taken care of during Downtime. The exceptions to this are death, permanent petrification or polymorph effects, curses, and permanent negative conditions (Core Rulebook 618–623) acquired during the course of the adventure
I'll admit I missed the exact language in scanning the guide and assumed diseases fell under "permanent negative conditions" (especially because most don't list a duration so they can be rather persistent, and because cacodemonania causes Stupefied 2--one of the negative conditions listed between the pages of 618-623--until it's cured). I guess it's unclear to me what types of effects cause "permanent negative conditions."
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Disease is not listed as a permanent negative condition.
Once you cure the disease the stupefied goes away.
Example of Permanent Negative Condition:
Paralyzing Touch (arcane, curse, incapacitation, necromancy) A creature damaged by the lich’s hand Strike must succeed at a Fortitude save against the lich’s spell DC – 4. The creature becomes paralyzed for 1 round on a failure. On a critical failure, the creature is paralyzed permanently, falls prone, and seems dead. A DC 25 Medicine check reveals the victim is alive.
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You get 4 no matter how the players did.
You get all treasure bundles no matter how the players did.
This is to create no incentive for the GM to influence the game.
You definitely fill out a Chronicle for yourself/a character of yours.
I don’t have the scenario handy but “Reporting Instructions” (I.e. what to check of ABCD) are on the last page of the scenario text (or maybe just under the treasure bundle table).
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Those are not reporting instructions, those are chronicle instructions. You should indicate on the chronicle whether the PCs killed or pacified the fleshforged creature and what happened to Tavvar.
The Reporting Notes are on page 26 with the description of the Primary and Secondary Objectives. Check A if Tavvar was recruited to the society and B if she died.
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Ah, no, it is about the ritual saves.
Along that vein, they always get hit by the wisps and always fail saves, but that was not addressed. There's certainly an in game logical reason but I don't know how it plays with the balance. I never could keep a wisp alive long enough.
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One of our Age of Ashes players needed surgery and was out a week, so we decided to play our first PFS module with the remaining 4 players, me as GM. It wasn't officially sanctioned -- just making a bunch of level 1 newly-minted Pathfinders and following the story through the gala to the four quests.
The gala was fun but took a LOT of work for me as the GM to get up to speed on the PFS and Absalom as a setting. For a group new to Pathfinder (AoA is our first foray), this feels like a brutally difficult entry point. As others have noted, there are few handholds for each conversation. I also didn't get any real sense of this being the Faction leaders' first event as Faction leaders or the rebirth of the PFS after turmoil, so I tried to work all of these elements into the setting. I gave their "additional rewards" as rewards upon the completion of each mini-quest, since they reported back to the Grand Lodge after each mission and it felt weird to just say "thank you."
On the missions:
- The Flotsam Graveyard one was a fun setting but boring as a quest. One of the characters had Underworld Lore and was able to identify the smugglers' efforts. On the spot I let him name the organization, and now the "Winking Eye" is operating in Absalom and a fun spot for future adventures.
- The haunted house was great fun and almost resulted in a TPK as the zombies pulled themselves free of the floorboards and attacked after several Hazards. Also, I used the "crime lords" backstory to further solidify the Winking Eye as a thing.
- The Blakdos Museum was my favorite mission and the ritual hazard was both compelling and fun for everyone with lots of drama.
- The mechanics of the Statue Street mob/mob bosses were a little clunky, but thankfully I have a veteran group of roleplayers and we had a lot of fun with it. The goblins attacked at the end, resulting in another fun thread to pick up later (the whistleblower's threat to the city).
Both players and characters were astonished that there was no gold reward at the end, and instead they got engraved wayfinders. It made for a PERFECT closing to this ragtag group that think the PFS are now a bunch of loonies, though.
My general feedback is that the scenario is poorly organized (I had to keep flipping from the quest in the module to the back sections outlining how each hazard worked, for example) in an effort to be replayable. I appreciate the complexity of replayability, but I wish it was a tighter story and better introduction both to the Pathfinder Society and Absalom.
Also, how on earth do you do this scenario in 4 hours?! It took us around 9 hours start to finish. We're admittedly a role-playing heavy group who gets deep into character and enjoys a good XP-less side quest, but it's difficult to imagine how you'd navigate through a heavy RP heavy gala with 4 missions so quickly without making the whole thing perfunctory.
All of that said, we're excited to jump back into PFS scenarios when another member needs to be gone for a bit. I've read through The Mosquito Witch, which seems excellent.
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MagicJMS I've GMed this one... 7 times. I've got some thoughts and feedback based on your descriptions that may help your next game be even more awesome:
Fitting 1-01 into 4 hours is tough but 9 seems exceptionally long.
I try and wrap up the gala and everything involved with it in about 30 minutes and then spend 45 minutes on each quest. Inevitably things take longer in places but I've got a plan to get through things in 3:30 leaving me 15 minutes of flex time and 15 minutes for wrap up and paperwork at the end. With a 5 hour slot things become a lot easier.
Returning back to the lodge after each quest of course would eat up significantly more time RPing each of those interactions but not impossibly so. Could be helpful to have Janira approach them after the first return and suggest to avoid showing favoritism they complete all the quests before reporting in but reminding them they are always welcome to come crash in the barracks if they need a rest.
When running PFS scenarios rather than flip back and forth I always print out the stat blocks separately (or open in a new window running virtually) so there's no flipping back and forth. It's an issue even in non repeatable, but the stat blocks are all conveniently in an appendix for exactly this purpose. (The museum hazard is a particularly difficult read with it's info split between the 2 sections)
As for the rewards since you're not running PFS do them however you want. The nature of organized play leads to some abstraction in treasure, but not one that you're bound to or that makes sense outside of that context.
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MagicJMS I've GMed this one... 7 times. I've got some thoughts and feedback based on your descriptions that may help your next game be even more awesome:
Really helpful PFS guideposts, Pirate Rob. Thank you!
As for the 9 hours, yeah... Like I said, veteran role-players. The gala took 2 hours. After the third mission there was a 45 minute tavern conversation. The carriage ride back to the Lodge one time turned into a character convinced the carriage driver was fey. It's quite intimidating as a GM to know how deep they want the setting to go (and hooray for Absalom where I can use any accent I want from character to character!), but the group does usually end up telling a compelling story.
Venture-Agent, California—Silicon Valley
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So I'm running this for the second time this week, but the first time in VTT. I've noticed a couple of things that make no sense here:
Shadow Wisps are Tiny, meaning they need to enter an enemy's square to use their melee strike. This makes their Shroud ability never work since they can't strike an "adjacent creature".
The Unkillable Zombie Brute has all the correct stats except for some reason has all the attacks of a Zombie Hulk, including the 15 foot reach of the melee attack. This attack is normally only 15 feet because the Hulk is Huge. Also the damage is not adjusted from the standard Hulk's 2d10+9, which is a level 6 creature. Should the Brute should only have the standard Fist attack with Improved Push and only do 1d12+5 damage? The addition of these attacks should make the creature a higher level than level 3, and it's quite deadly for a low level party.
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Shadow Wisps are Tiny, meaning they need to enter an enemy's square to use their melee strike. This makes their Shroud ability never work since they can't strike an "adjacent creature".
Monster statistics seem to only list reach for attacks if it is other than 5ft. You can observe this in, for example, all large monsters having reach 10ft explicitly spelled out. Tiny creatures "typically" have a 0 feet reach, but there's actually nothing saying that you should "run their reach as 0 feat unless told otherwise" so, it appears that the wisps do reach to adjacent square.
(Sidenote: A quick search didn't actually find any tiny creatures which had 0 feet reach so not sure if this is intended or not).On the chance that you do decide to run it as 0 feet reach (a fair assesment, I think) you should note that the shroud ability doesn't say anything about adjacent squares, merely that the creature needs to be adjacent. I'd argue that if they can punch you, you're definitely adjacent to them, even if you are in the same square instead of an adjacent square. So, their ability works just fine, regardless of what reach you use for them.
Considering that the ability specifically says that they'll step into the square, and that they don't have a reach listed, they should probably be run just like any other creature - defaulting to 5ft reach. That's how everything else works, and using that 5ft reach their ability makes sense.