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Oh wow. I finished this campaign back in Aug of 23 and promised I’d put out a lessons learned. My bad. Got sucked into DMing the next campaign. Anyway, here’s (finally) my lessons learned from my non-mythic Wrath of the Righteous game.
So I finally finished Wrath of the Righteous and I thought I’d share some lessons learned. I really wanted to run this story, but I’d heard repeatedly that the mythic rules were pretty broken. So I searched around and found some good suggestions on how to run this as completely non-mythic game. Here’s some of the changes I made as well as some of the problems/shortcomings I ran into.
Character Creation
- I wanted this adventure to feel really epic, so I bumped the date from AR 4717 to AR 4727 and all my players were given the option to run descendants from our other completed Adventure Paths.
- To reflect their superior heritage (and help offset the non-mythic rules I’d be using) I allowed 25 pt builds and everyone started with 8000 gp worth of gear, no more than 4000 gp on one item.
- I also used “fast track” xp. By using fast track on a table of 5 players and not changing the number of enemies in the book, I was able to keep the party approximately 1 level above the recommended level of the books. This allowed them to better face the challenges coming despite being non-mythic.
- Also due to their superior training and to reflect being infused with wardstone power, when they had an ability increase (at 4th, 8th, 12th, and 16th) they got to add a +1 to TWO different scores.
- The group knew from the start that they would be using Hero Points and I would be using Mythic Points and Mythic Abilities for the bad guys. Everyone was good with this understanding from the start.
One Overall Change
- I changed “DR epic” a bit based on a change suggested on the boards. I had DR epic apply against ALL attacks (even attacks that normally bypass all DR) unless the attacker is a Tier equal to or higher than the defender. I put this rule out at the start and all the group was good with it.
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BOOK 1
- I started the adventure off with a big battle in Kenabres square. Each of the characters brought a 5th level “bodyguard” who was assigned to protect them. The bodyguards were of course quickly slaughtered by the arriving hordes of dretches, schirs, and babau demons who arrived with the Storm King. The 1st level squires (the PCs) worked to evacuate the civilians while their guards bravely tried to hold off the demons. They saw Teledrelev clash with the Storm King and get beaten and then an earthquake from the Storm King sent them plunging down below the city.
- Most of the rest of book 1 I ran “as is.”
- Once the characters destroyed the wardstone shard and became “mythic” (or “heroic” as I called it), I gave them a replenishing pool of 3 + tier hero points. So at the end of book 1 they became tier 1 and went into book 2 with 4 hero points that refreshed at a rate of 1 point/day. I also allowed them to use their hero points as mythic points as far as powering their campaign traits went.
- I’ll say that the path of the archmage (refreshing magic item charges with a hero point each day) was crazy powerful. If I ran this AP again, I’d probably put some more limits on this ability.
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BOOK 2
- I ran this book pretty much as is as well. My party wasn’t too interested in interacting with “the new guys”, Aron or Sosiel, so I skipped the whole Aron addiction subplot.
- In this book I had the first and second deaths that needed to be saved by hero points so the danger level was still there. Otherwise, the hero points allowed them to feel heroic and they tore through most of the non-boss encounters.
- Despite the recommendation to send Irabeth, Nurah and anyone else the PCs ask to come with them into Citadel Drezen, I only sent Nurah. My group is large enough that I don’t generally allow cohorts so I try to keep extra NPCs out of the initiative rotation and off the battlemat.
- At the end of the book, I had them advance to tier 2 so they got an additional hero point to their pool.
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BOOK 3
- Before I started this book, I printed and laminated a poster of the Wounded Lands to hang on the wall. I covered the map with white paper hexes that I could remove as the group explored. This was an idea I heard from someone on the Kingmaker boards and it worked great. So thanks!
- I also had a couple players that really enjoyed the kingdom building and management from Kingmaker, so I added that component. I had Drezen be a 1 hex kingdom that they started with a castle, barracks and the rest ruined/broken buildings to fill out to large town size.
- While the demon offensive was pushing in the south, I had the PCs form their ruling council and gave them 2 months to start rebuilding up the city. They quickly expanded/claimed the 2 hexes down the riverbed to start rebuilding the village of Keeper’s Canyon.
- While I let them use Kingdom rules to build up/repair the blocks of the city, I also let them use the UC Downtime rules to rebuild critical buildings at the same time.
- After the two months, I had all the various NPCs feed them the quest leads that sent them out into the Wounded Lands and the bulk of Book 3. Having to return to Drezen every month for a Ruling Week made them feel important and also slowed down the exploration some. I think the group spent about 2-3 months exploring the many hexes of the Wounded Lands before they reached the level that triggered Arueshalae’s dream.
- Then there was the Ivory Sanctum. Oh boy did I mess that one up. Up until this point I was facing the same issue as Kingmaker: the group knew they’d have only one encounter per hex, so the group was free to go nuclear on it. Even at Arueshalae’s Redoubt the group blazed through with no challenge at all. So, growing a bit frustrated, I hinted that if they attacked the Ivory Sanctum and fell back, the agents there might flee with any usable intel they were looking for. That meant taking the entire Sanctum in one go… and that was just waaay too much. They got through the east wing just fine, but then they crossed over to the west side and were nearly tapped. They kept pushing south and I had to pull the derakni guard post encounter because the party was nearly running on empty. The mythic vrock I had to softball (he had fled from his normal encounter area, and I think I had him flee again at only half hp) and then Xanthir Vang, I had to remove his mythic ranks altogether. So! Bottom line is don’t do what I did! Allow your party to take a couple shots at the Ivory Sanctum. Come up with whatever you want to keep the leadership from fleeing with the intel in question.
- Finally, since the group was still very vested in the Kingdom/UC rules in rebuilding Drezen, I had another force of dretchs and tieflings attack the city so the group could run a Mass Combat battle to reward them for all the defenses they’d been building up around the city.
- Wrapping up the book I had the PCs advance to Tier 3 heroic. They all added an additional Hero Point to their hero point pool.
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BOOK 4
- Like the previous book, the recommendation is for Queen Galfrey to accompany the PCs into the Midnight Fane. I had her escort the PCs to the Fane and then wait outside to prevent reinforcements from entering as well as guard the other NPCs the group wanted to take with them to the Abyss.
- I’m a big fan of epic journeys. I wanted the trip through the Midnight Islands to feel more epic. I also had a couple characters with pirate backgrounds, so I thought I’d work with that. I said that due to the morphic nature of the Abyss, the islands in the Midnight Islands have a tendency to move making non-greater teleport very difficult. So I had the ritual at the Vazglar shrine “calm” the islands so they wouldn’t move around. Then I added an abandoned town on Vazglar and a sunken ship pierside. A few make wholes later and they were off in their new ship with the NPCs helping to man the ship.
- They had a couple weeks of sailing across the Midnight Sea where I added some fun side adventures then they docked at Alushinyrah. The ship provided them a “home base” to come back to and the NPCs were kept mostly safe staying on the ship. When they needed to move, they sailed the ship up the canals in the city.
- I held off on giving Nocticula’s favors until AFTER clearing the mines. She didn’t seem like the kind to give her reward up front before the job was done.
- The pirate characters were now attached to their ship, so after the meeting with Nocticula, I had her suck the ship down a whirlpool and pop it back up just off the island. They then sailed up the river to the island’s interior.
- I made the fight on the 2nd floor of the mines pretty much all one big encounter due to demon telepathy. Started with the kalavacaus. Then took a couple turns for the foreman and his succubus to grab gear and arrive. Then a couple turns later the teiflings from the barracks at K9 woke up and joined the fight. Then the minotaurs from the mines geared up and flown into the main chamber. The gibrileth demons from the slave pit seemed pretty independent (they have a “run away” morale score, after all) so they stayed out of it and Hepzamirah herself obviously is busy. Altother, this made for a fantastic encounter.
- After the Baphomet/Nocticula encounter is when I had Nocticula arrive and send everyone home and give her boons. (For those curious, she turned the ship into a folding boat so they got to take it with them. Since it’s much less than the 10,000 gp item she can give them, I said that’s fine.)
- Everyone advanced to Tier 4 at the end of the book.
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Book 5
- I gave the party a couple months to run their kingdom while the demonic forces were in disarray after Baphomet’s destruction and his forces retreating. The Wintersun hex chose to join them and queen Galfrey gifted them the three hexes up the river. This brought their kingdom up to 10 hexes and a proper barony.
- Have I mentioned I like epic journeys? Once the group set out into the labyrinth, I had them cross through the Ivory Maze and then the Starflower Hedges. I wanted to have them spend some serious time winding through the mazes to give them an idea how truly big they were.
- I told them due to the shifting nature of the mazes, greater teleport would have some limitations. We called it the “WoW approach”. You could only travel to someplace you’d traveled to physically before (much like a World of Warcraft flightpoint). Or you could travel to a companion’s location if you needed to (you can obviously picture your companions well enough) This slowed them down from just teleporting from Blackburgh to the prison.
- Continuing on their epic journey, I had them travel from Blackburgh, down the Meandering River. (mostly so the Shackles characters could use their ship again.) Then I rolled a random maze shift that reconfigured the mazes. I had them wind through a few more zones before finding a route to the Lightless Maze, the hidden route up to the Breathless Mts and the prison. There were just so many cool maze zones that I wanted them to at least get a taste of the cooler ones.
- Since they knew about the Father’s acid blood and most of them were resisting acid, I made a slight change where his blood was epic acid. It either did 6d6 against the unprotected or 2d6 that burned through all normal resistances. This made him feel a bit more dangerous.
- I used other people’s recommendation that even if freed, Alderpash wouldn’t be able to escape the Abyss. I wanted the party to be able to interact with the Runelord, but I knew there was no way my PCs would go for just setting Alderpash free. He explained since he’d spent so long in the Abyss, his once mortal soul was entangled with the structure of the Abyss. So the group made an alliance with him and freed the old Runelord. Alderpash went on to reclaim a corner of the Abyss to carry out his plans.
- Obviously I didn’t have any intension of my non-mythic characters trying to tackle CR27 Baphomet. The story worked out just fine without his direct combat involvement.
- I didn’t have any PCs that worshipped Iomedae, so Queen Galfrey became the new herald. Everyone else got some story related reward as they moved up to Heroic Tier 5 and got a bigger Hero Point pool.
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Book 6
- After doing the kingdom thing for another month, I had them train up their armies and generated a few demon armies for some mass combat action. The opposition was of course dreadfully overmatched for the outnumbered Drezen defenders, so the PCs knew it would be up to them to take out the demon leadership. They survived one round of mass combat then took out the nalfeshnees attackers. Then they survived another round of mass combat and tackled the invading locust demons and Apovicious. That caused the demons to fall back.
- Aaaand then things started going a bit sideways with the adventure. First you had the Yearning House where the entire building was essentially one big combat. Fighting starts in the debauchery and then everyone else (except Sister Perversion) piles on in. Roll initiative for everyone. This was a daunting fight but a fun one. Meeting Nocticula and beating up Sister Perv felt like a bit of a downswing after the massive brawl before.
- And then things really went downhill. After the upper floors of the Yearning House you have – in fairly quick succession - Mistress Anemora, Terendelev, Lord Stillborn, the Skinned Man and the Storm King. This was where I realized that I was spending waaay more time preparing these fights by looking up what all their abilities were than they were lasting on the game board. I’m only exaggerating a little bit.
- Just the same, the fight against Terendelv was fun. Try to get a game map as big as you can to make sure you can move her around a lot. There’s no reason with her abilities she should be going toe to toe with anyone and slugging it out.
- The Storm King. Oh boy. I think this was the first encounter in the whole AP that would have torn through my non-mythic party. The dual initiatives and mythic power attack meant that a full attack was looking at just a gross amount of damage. With the dual initiative the Storm King got two 5-foot steps before the PC melees could attack and thus couldn’t get their own full attacks. With smite resistance, the paladin was having trouble landing a hit. With the Storm King, I had to really cut back. I essentially stopped using his whip, instead just focusing on the sword attacks. I had him cast chain lightning pretty much every other action and had to cut back on his healing only be ½ of the damage dealt.
- Threshold I ran pretty much as is. I busted out the giant map again for the approach to the roof so the dragon-mounted-raspers became an epic aerial combat. The final fight down on the Roots level was also very epic. Much like the Yearning House there was just a lot of combatants. Overall, the only one I was really worried about was the hekatonkheires titan. Fortunately, I had a sorcerer that recognized that the gated titan was a unique creature and she got in a “diplomacy off” with Areelu to try and out bid the witch to get the titan to leave. That actually turned out to be one of the high points of the final battle since if the titan would have come in on Areelu’s side it would have been game over for the PCs.
- Finally, after taking out Areelu, I had the PCs perform the Worldwould ritual and closed the portal as the finale of the AP. I didn’t think the non-mythic characters would have a whole lot of chance against Deskari himself plus all his guards. Even though the PCs did all finish up at 21st level, Deskari is brutal at CR29. I had them complete the ritual and Deskari reaching out for them before the portal snapped shut.
- As an epilogue, I had all the PCs turned into outsiders to go serve in their gods’ courts except for one that took over as the new Queen of Mendev.
Overall, this was a great AP and was mostly functional as a non-mythic adventure as long as you use Hero Points or some other equalizing measure.
Cheers!