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2 other issues:
No save DC was provided for the Bugbear Trickster's Kick Sand ability.
The shaken condition is referenced on page 12. PF2 has no shaken condition.
The standard DC for a level 5 creature seems reasonable, so until we get an answer I'll use DC 20.
For shaken, frightened 1 perhaps is a good stand-in.
But some more official feedback would be appreciated.
Venture-Captain, Tennessee—East Tennessee
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According to https://paizo.com/products/btq02e5o?Pathfinder-Society-Scenario-408-Battle- for-Stars-Fate, Treat it as Frightened 1, where the condition doesn't decrease if it's listed as lasting longer than 1 round.
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Not saying I did it right, but this was how I ran it.
Shaken is a troop condition in Bestiary 3. I reasoned that Brianna was the leader of the troop of bad guys and that her shaken condition was subject to the DC 11 flat check in the troop rules.
I targeted a square AC 5 that was closest to the most PCs, or I picked a PC if they were grouped close together and used their AC making them all PCs within the 5 foot burst roll the reflex save.
The influence successes levels are listed in the scenario, and it tells you how to ramp them up based on the number and levels of PCs at the table on page 5 of the scenario.
Hope this helped.
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Venture-Agent, Online—VTT
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The influence successes levels are listed in the scenario, and it tells you how to ramp them up based on the number and levels of PCs at the table on page 5 of the scenario.
Yes... but which of those thresholds the treasure bundle is based on is not stated. I decided to go with "having successfully influenced that NLC at least once", but I'm afraid this will have a level of variation on that point that it really shouldn't.
Some, but not all, of the NPCs have a threshold that involves handing some object to the PCs, which might be the intended threshold for the TB, but I could also see someone reading it as needing to reach the top threshold.
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Overview of my understanding of timing for the Influence system:
Round 1 : Travel
Rasool / Croll are available as an intro to the system
Round 2&3 : At Camp
Croll, Rasool, Star, Brinna and Induren are available
Star gets 2 free points after this
Round 4: Disorder in Camp
Croll, Rasool, Star and Induren are available
Star gets 2 more points and each other NPC gets 1 point.
Primary Objective is completing the Adventure.
Secondary Objective is getting to 6 with Star
Vigilant Seal mission involves getting to 4 with Induren.
There's a Treasure Bundle for each of "successfully influencing Croll, Induren, Brinna, and Star" (Note that there's no treasure bundle listed for Rasool meaning that the only rewards for influencing him is the desert suit at 2. Without any way of recording the baby name for influence 6 it's largely a meaningless reward although is at least a little sweet.
At the moment we don't know what that means. At least 1 influence? 1st level of influence, max level? Will look at different options.
Influenced at least 1 time is probably not what we're looking for, since except for Brinna that happens basically automatically.
Rasool 2/6
Croll 2/4
Star 1/3/6 (There are also additional story benefits at 9 & 12 that are not listed in the influence block)
Brinna 1/3/5
Induren 2/4
If we subtract out the free influence we need
0/0
1/3
2
1/5
3
= 7 points for first influence level or 13 points for max level.
There are a maximum of 16 rolls while crits are possible, some rolls will likely be used for discovery. Assuming a fairly generous spending of hero points I think 3 points per 4 rolls is generous but possible, meaning we can expect 12 points.
1st level is easy, max level is hard. If we also take away say a 5th of our total rolls for Rasool that means our expected points for the remaining is more like 9.6 meaning max is fairly out of reach.
As noted above 3/4 Influence points per roll is probably above average, especially if players spend some time on discovery, instead of successfully having/guessing good skills.
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For groups of 5 PCs, add 1 Influence Point to the number needed for each threshold that requires more than 1 Influence Point to reach in the listed statistics.
Meaning the thresholds are
Rasool 0/0
Croll 3/5
Star 3 (There are also additional story benefits at 9 & 12 that are not listed in the influence block)
Brinna 1/6
Induren 2/5
If we require level 1 that's 3+3+1+5= 12 points
If it requires max level that's 5+3+6+5 = 19 points.
5 PCs, 3/4 success and 1/5 of rolls on Rasool = 12 expected points. 1st influence level doesn't any leeway and max is basically impossible.
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For 6 PCs add an additional influence point needed for each threshold of at least 4 meaning points are 7+(3/4)(6*4) = 25 points earned.
thresholds for rewards are
Rasool 0/0
Croll 3/6
Star 4 (There are also additional story benefits at 9 & 12 that are not listed in the influence block)
Brinna 1/7
Induren 6
We're going to earn 3/4*4/5*24 = 14.4 expected points
If we only need the first level that's 3+4+1+6= 14 points, little room for error.
If we need max influence it's 6+4+7+6= 23 points needed. Virtually impossible.
tl;dr; Treasure Bundles for "Successfully Influencing" are almost certainty intended for hitting the first influence level of each NPC.
At least 1 influence point is trivial.
Max influence with each NPC is doable but hard with 4 players but is not reasonable with 5 or 6.
1st influence level is somewhat easy with 4 players but has tight but doable math with 5 or 6 players.
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Venture-Captain, Washington—Seattle
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Yes, mine was with 6 players. Online, which for me at least tends to run faster than in-person because people are more focused and not randomly going off and ordering food, etc.
(Also, I agree that 4-04 tends to run longer because of the hexploration, but it's entirely possible to run it in under 4 hours.)
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Agree with logsig. Keep the Oasis fight short and you should be fine. (It has surrender conditions and is easy to do so)
Also you have a lot of control over timing based on how much RP you want with the influence system. I don't think there's a need to cut it short but there's a lot of time control available there
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I'm running this adventure now and we're just entering the final combat. I'm curious how others ran it.
1) The way I read Weapon Systems Activate, it can't be used in the first two rounds of combat because it requires Star to have actions and they don't act in round 1 and are creating the wall of wind in round 2. Is that right?
2) I made the cannons medium-sized creatures mounted on the side of the ship. It seems intentional that with the potions of leaping and the emerald grasshopper provided to the party that can should be able to jump up to the ship and try to disable or destroy the cannons. Did others have PCs who got on board or tried to climb onto the ship?
3) Did you decide that disabling or destroying the shadow cannons was necessary for the PCs to be victorious? (It seems like it)
What do you think?
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I let players disable the cannon(s) from anywhere on the ship which was reached via the elixir of leaping.
Do note the grasshopper does still require a DC 30 athletics check to make the jump.
Might be slightly easier to get there from atop of star if you've got something like a gliding Eidolon or related options that help you gain distance without height.
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Thanks, that's good advice. I'll likely also have the ship descend a bit in altitude to be able to target PCs. The cannons only have a range of 30' -- and if I assume attack modifier to hit is a typo, since there's also a basic reflex save, then they'll need to be within 30' to target PCs (vs. being able to fire longer with modifiers for range).
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Are they saves? Are they attacks? Who knows. Either or both are all reasonable conclusions. (Although reflex save only is the easiest/most sensible way to resolve I think)
I ignored the attack roll and just used the 5ft burst with basic saves. Don't think I noticed the short range though and likely ran them targeting whomever I wanted.
Do note that each cannon only fires 1/round. (Hazard routine/actions can be a bit confusing)