Book 3 Sanctum Encounter Question

[Xavion333]

So I've been looking over everything, and I've noticed that the Witchbole's Sanctum map is meant to be performed entirely in encounter mode.

How does that work after the PCs defeat a group of enemies, are exploration activities just meant to be banned by GM fiat? Should you spawn random encounters after a little bit if the players start trying to refocus and spend minutes in a room? Since just fast forwarding several minutes is exploration mode so not what you're meant to do, but refocusing then would take 100 rounds and there's no way you're meant to play those out normally.

I'm just really curious how this is intended to play out, or how other GMs interpret it, the idea of an area where you can't perform exploration activities is interesting to me but it's unclear as to how that's actually meant to be executed.

[Cintra Bristol]

I believe you're referring to the text on page 18, under the header Oubliette Encounters. Quoted here for clarity:

Oubliette Encounters text wrote:

As the PCs progress their infiltration, they’ll periodically come across specific locations within the Amaranthine Oubliette that present them with encounters they’ll need to resolve in encounter mode. Unless the PCs take a significant amount of time in one of these encounter areas (more than an hour), time spent resolving these encounters does not count toward the accrual of Awareness Points at the end of infiltration rounds.

I don't read this as "they can't use exploration mode" - I see it as, there are places where they will need to deal with specific issues in encounter mode (e.g. a combat). Once they complete that encounter, they can spend the usual time to Refocus, heal up, etc.; and as long as they don't spend excessive time doing that, it doesn't accrue Awareness Points. Since excessive time was defined as "more than an hour," I feel confident that the PCs can take the time they need to heal etc. without tracking each round.

[James Jacobs]

That's basically us saying that what we present as these areas are meant to play out in encounter mode and the GM shouldn't be distracted by tracking further exploration through the sprawling, immense structure. The Witchbole itself is too big and too complicated to map out in the context of this adventure, so we gloss over the "connective tissue." You can still use exploration activities inside the Witchbole if you want, but as written, they don't have a role since the only things that happen in the adventure are standard encounters.

If you as the GM want to add more encounters in the Witchbole, there's PLENTY of room to do so! But that sort of expansion not only is beyond the scope of the adventure, but risks your players starting to feel like your'e stalling, hitting them with "filler" encounters, or trying to make them waste their time so they won't be able to complete the adventure before Treerazer wins.