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This is a spoiler-filled resource thread for GMs running the Attack of the Swarm Adventure Path, specifically for the third adventure, "Huskworld."
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All GM Threads in this series:
1 - Fate of the Fifth
2 - Last Refuge
3 - Huskworld
4 - Forever Reliquary
5 - Hive of Minds
6 - God-Host Ascends
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"Treasure: The statuette on the desk depicts an adorable version of Hylax appropriate for children’s programming. A holographic banner scrolls over her head displaying inspirational messages in Shirren like “You can do it!” and “The Forever Queen believes in you!” It functions as a mk 2 computer idol (Armory 120)."
5/5 Stars
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Anyway, now that I have had time to think about it and review it...
I think the starfinder APs not reserving pages to NPC articles is really big problem actually. Like if paizo can't add few more pages to adventures to give space to them, I start considering it actually being better to cutoff articles to give space to them :/
There are five new named npcs in book. Three of them are illustrated and we spend enough time to learn anything about them. Only one I can think of what they are like as person and that is the least important one out of three.
Let's start with Etchiax. What do I know about Etchiax? Uh... She is Hescamu's right hand and becomes leader of company if Hescamu dies? She is pretty soldiery and I guess she is dedicated to the cause?
Yeaaaaaaaaah, I have no idea who the heck Etchiax is as person, what she did before swarm came or why she is fighting.
Hescamu is Glade Company's leader and besides doing lot of things with, to quote adventure, enthuasism, I don't really know anything about them besides them being brave enough to go to with pcs.
Jadvata in other hand, whose role in story is to give information about university, we learn they are engineer, student in university and really bored at lectures and did lots of pranks. (which they seem bit embarassed about)
That isn't really much, but its still way more information than what we learn about the two other characters with more screen time. Heck, I would say I know more about Jadvata than I remember about Commander Najiri aka Party's commanding officer.
Its really hard to make NPCs interesting or get attached to them when you barely learn anything about them. Next book thankfully does much better job at making NPCs you can get attached to, but even then its mostly because next adventure is roleplaying focused.
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I made a super rough timeline of the Shirren Exodus, to give my players a visual representation of Galchak's Research once it's recovered. Sharing in case others want one!
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Anyway, now that I have had time to think about it and review it...
I think the starfinder APs not reserving pages to NPC articles is really big problem actually. Like if paizo can't add few more pages to adventures to give space to them, I start considering it actually being better to cutoff articles to give space to them :/
There are five new named npcs in book. Three of them are illustrated and we spend enough time to learn anything about them. Only one I can think of what they are like as person and that is the least important one out of three.
Let's start with Etchiax. What do I know about Etchiax? Uh... She is Hescamu's right hand and becomes leader of company if Hescamu dies? She is pretty soldiery and I guess she is dedicated to the cause?
Yeaaaaaaaaah, I have no idea who the heck Etchiax is as person, what she did before swarm came or why she is fighting.
Hescamu is Glade Company's leader and besides doing lot of things with, to quote adventure, enthuasism, I don't really know anything about them besides them being brave enough to go to with pcs.
Jadvata in other hand, whose role in story is to give information about university, we learn they are engineer, student in university and really bored at lectures and did lots of pranks. (which they seem bit embarassed about)
That isn't really much, but its still way more information than what we learn about the two other characters with more screen time. Heck, I would say I know more about Jadvata than I remember about Commander Najiri aka Party's commanding officer.
Its really hard to make NPCs interesting or get attached to them when you barely learn anything about them. Next book thankfully does much better job at making NPCs you can get attached to, but even then its mostly because next adventure is roleplaying focused.
Right there with you. Ran the Clade Company and like... I can't get attached to them, or have any information to feed into the PCs to get them interested in the company members. A similar problem happened in Book 3 of Threefold Conspiracy.
This AP could have done a lot more with the NPCs in Books 1 and 2 as well. I got the players to hate Zantos, but beyond that? The people on the Terminus Wild... meh. the rest of the Fifth? Nothing to grab onto.
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Coming up on the final session of this book... anyone else underwhelmed by the climax? I want to spice it up, but the map is kinda blah, and there's no like, SWARM of The Swarm, threatening to kill everyone.
Or like... a mission for the Clade Company to seize some key location, like a space port or a fortress or I dunno.
Basically looking for inspiration for this final part of the book.
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Coming up on the final session of this book... anyone else underwhelmed by the climax? I want to spice it up, but the map is kinda blah, and there's no like, SWARM of The Swarm, threatening to kill everyone.
Or like... a mission for the Clade Company to seize some key location, like a space port or a fortress or I dunno.
Basically looking for inspiration for this final part of the book.
I had the same feeling and this is how I fixed it. The combat with the PCs isn't changed. They still fight 2 eschutides and a Mindreaper until theres only 1 left, then the Thresher Prince comes down (who is BRUTAL, btw). At the end, it was the Mindreaper and the Thresher Prince versus the PCs and I had the Mindreaper use mystic heal on the Thresher Prince a couple of times.
The problem here isn't that the PCs should be fighting a swarm of enemies, its that it's not obvious how much Clade Company is doing to assist. I added about 6-8 Dredger Troops around the outside edge of the map and had a bunch of Clade Company NPCs go and hold them off. At the end of every round I would describe how their battle was going while the PCs fought off the high level threats in the middle of the outpost. I was considering rolling a d20 to determine how the Clade Company fighters were doing against the troops, but decided it wasnt necessary because just having all those mass tokens surrounding the PCs added enough tension to the scene. It also allows for some dynamic change to the combat if your PCs are somehow rolling over their targets with ease - components of the troop or a whole troop could break through into the PC's high priority fight.
It's been awhile, and I think mechanically I didn't end up changing much. Maybe added a few more mooks.
I did spice everything up by adding narration about some goblins who had helped the group earlier returning and doing a bombing run on the Swarm. I never bother to actually roll for NPCs assisting a fight, but yeah, I had the Clade Company doing some of the fighting as well.