Lord of the Scarlet Tide

Bob the Reaver · Jun 1, 2005

Has anybody converted this adventure to 3.5? Wer going to play this our next session. I need a convert fast. Just looking for some help.

Also has anyone played threw this adventure? Anything, I as the DM, need to look out for?

Chaldfont · Jun 1, 2005

My group played this adventure. We were playing 3.5 but I didn't really convert anything, just used the stats as-is. It worked well.

Things to watch out for:

We discovered, mostly after playing this module, that it gets pretty boring for the players to always fight things that are immune to crits/sneak attacks. One of the more exciting parts of the game is when a player rolls a possible crit. This goes from being fun to being annoying when EVERY creature is immune.

The encounters in the kuo-toan temple are monotonous. The same four or five (IIRC) ghosts over and over again.

That big-ass behir is tough! That encounter is a throwback to the D&D of old when the party might stumble on something far beyond their capability. I love these encounters--it reminds the players that their characters are mortal.

Other than that, its a fun adventure. We had a blast.

kenobi65 · Jun 1, 2005

I DMed it for my group while we were still playing 3E. I concur with Chaldfront's observations...fun mod, but a few things that made it frustrating or repetitive.

Also, IIRC, there's a funky thing with the map. The map says that the numbers are supposed to represent depth below ground...but some of the distances are just outrageous (implying massive drop-offs). I wrote to Dungeon about it, and the author told me that the map was meant to be a bit abstract, and those distance #s were really meant to indicate distance between encounter areas.

James Jacobs · Jun 1, 2005

It's true. The Underdark map for "Scarlet Tide" has some problems. The numbers along the passageways do indeed indicate tunnel distance between encounters.

In any case, looking back on the advenuture I do wish I'd used less ghosts in the main encounter area. I'd recomend that once the ghost encounters start to get old, you stop running them and instead have the PCs encounter some constructs or bound outsiders in the temple. Of course... I also seem to recall that since the adventure was sooooo huge, I might have used the repeating ghosts as a space-saving measure.

Anyway... have fun with the adventure!

CM · Jun 1, 2005

Spoilers:
I ran this with a party of six or seven in 3.5. I gave the scarlet children 50% fortification instead of outright critical immunity, to give the rogues something to do. In return, I upped their regeneration to 5/round. I also gave a Fort save for half damage on the scarlet childrens' breath weapon (in addition to the Reflex save to avoid it) since it's so deadly, and they all have it available.

Since it's pretty much a straight shot from area 8 to 22, my party bypassed areas 11-16 entirely, despite them seeing signs of activity on the far side of area 18.

Once the party set off the spawning pool swarm and had gathered a few clues as to what was going on, I had a veritable army of scarlet children chase them to the relatively safe ground of the temple, to avoid having them pick through the ruins of the city for hours, which I REALLY didn't feel like messing around with.

DarrenGMiller · Jun 1, 2005

This is a very useful thread, since I am planning on running a 3.5 conversion of this adventure in the near future. Any suggestions/insight are more than welcome.

DM

Bob the Reaver · Jun 2, 2005

While at work I looked at the adventure real close and had come to the same conclusion regarding the immunity to criticals. I had decided on a 25% Fortification. But I will go with 50% seeuing how it has already been tested.

Spoliers:
My other problem is that one of the characters is 1/2 celestial. That gives her the ability to cast daylight at will. This is a huge problem. I need to downgrade the susceptibilty to sunlight. Im thinking it just damages the scarlet children. 1d6 a round on a failed save? That would do an average of 3pts of damage a round to each of the scarlet childrwen. Effectifly negating thier regeneration.

I have the adventure set in our Eberron campaign. The scarlet tides comes ashore in the town of Stormreach. The Scarlet lord is an anciant creature trapped in Kyber after the Daelkyr war. It was really fun finding a place for this adventure in Eberron.

Thanks for the Insights.

CM · Jun 2, 2005

Spoilers:

Bob the Reaver said:
My other problem is that one of the characters is 1/2 celestial. That gives her the ability to cast daylight at will. This is a huge problem. I need to downgrade the susceptibilty to sunlight. Im thinking it just damages the scarlet children. 1d6 a round on a failed save? That would do an average of 3pts of damage a round to each of the scarlet childrwen. Effectifly negating thier regeneration.

Since it's weaker than actual sunlight, you could have the scarlet children save to be slowed instead of going dormant entirely in the presence of the daylight spell.

Arnwyn · Jun 2, 2005

James Jacobs said:
I also seem to recall that since the adventure was sooooo huge, I might have used the repeating ghosts as a space-saving measure.

Boo! *hiss* Is it any wonder why some Dungeon consumers get a little nervous when we see anything that looks like it'll take up excess space...?

(Though, it is a pretty good adventure - we use it as-is.)

Asmo · Jun 2, 2005

If I remember correctly there´s a Water elemental down below that´s very tough, we were almost wiped out there.
Our sorcerer did have Horrid Wilting and saved the day.

Asmo