fire forest

So I'm headed for the climax in the Fire Forest. The group has agreed to deals with both bad guys but have not yet met Tijann. At this point they are preparing to head down river to the village (prompted by Indominability.

What I'm wondering involves the encounter with Nelle. It's strictly an info dump for the Trilla, though it doesn't seem a crucial one, though I may have missed something. The big thing is that I don't see any reason for the party to head that way. There's a brief mention of her in some notes but no directions telling where she is or why she might be essential.

Is she just there to discourage PCs from leaving if they get that far? Is there some clue I'm missing?

Edit: So location is mentioned but my players didn't really bite. Is any of her info crucial? Most of it seems available from other sources or not essetial.

I skipped Nelle entirely. Didn't miss the encounter in the slightest. Feel free to leave it out if you think that will work better for your group.

Actually yes. It was specifically designed to discourage just walking away from the whole conflict.

I changed the layout of the forest a bit (from what I could tell, anyway - the explanations of it are a little vague and the map of the forest shows only about half the stuff it ought to show[1]) specifically to make it more likely the PCs would encounter Nelle and it still didn't happen. They only learned of her existence toward the very end, and most of the information she gives, they either got from Timbre instead or didn't get at all. It doesn't seem to have done the overall experience any harm.

There is a lot of detail in the WotBS series that is nice to have in case you need it, but is likely to be bypassed by most groups. As far as I'm concerned, that's just fine; I'd rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it, and WotBS is the first series of D&D adventures I've seen that tends to err in the former, rather than the latter, direction.



[1] A similar concern crops up in the third adventure - where the hell is Vidor? Even the 4E version, which contains a much more detailed map of Dassen, doesn't show it.

In the end I ended up ignoring Nelle. The PCs never went in that direction, never had any intention of abandoning the forest to its fate (ultimately making a deal, at one time or another, with all three factions) and never made any connection to Nelle's mention in notes they found.

On a similar note, I just finished the finale in which two PCs were killed by Indominability in the village. So, okay, we have two characters killed and then fused with the big guy, thus gaining his powers at death, right? So now they're on fire but not really dead. Less than a minute later, I is killed, ending the fire forest, all of the village must submerge before burning to death. Not enough time has taken place for I to inflict his will on them or rekindle. Referring specifically to this passage:

"If a hero dies, it takes time for Indomitability to overcome the hero’s will and begin the changes. Upon death, regardless of the hero’s current hp total, he is automatically brought to 0 hp. One hour later, Indomitability attempts to overcome the hero’s mind (+12 vs. Will; the hero rekindles and obtains all of Indomitability’s properties, powers, and auras). If Indomitability fails this attempt, the hero remains “dead” until he is rescued."

Do they gain any of his powers? Do they ignite? Or are they just rescued by the party after the fight, no harm, no foul?

corwyn77 said:

In the end I ended up ignoring Nelle. The PCs never went in that direction, never had any intention of abandoning the forest to its fate (ultimately making a deal, at one time or another, with all three factions) and never made any connection to Nelle's mention in notes they found.

On a similar note, I just finished the finale in which two PCs were killed by Indominability in the village. So, okay, we have two characters killed and then fused with the big guy, thus gaining his powers at death, right? So now they're on fire but not really dead. Less than a minute later, I is killed, ending the fire forest, all of the village must submerge before burning to death. Not enough time has taken place for I to inflict his will on them or rekindle. Referring specifically to this passage:

"If a hero dies, it takes time for Indomitability to overcome the hero’s will and begin the changes. Upon death, regardless of the hero’s current hp total, he is automatically brought to 0 hp. One hour later, Indomitability attempts to overcome the hero’s mind (+12 vs. Will; the hero rekindles and obtains all of Indomitability’s properties, powers, and auras). If Indomitability fails this attempt, the hero remains “dead” until he is rescued."

Do they gain any of his powers? Do they ignite? Or are they just rescued by the party after the fight, no harm, no foul?

Click to expand...

... what?

That sounds like one of those weird and poorly thought out additions for the 4E version. There's nothing remotely like that in the original, and it makes no sense, at least to me.

At least in the original, the party will typically have Indom's boon at that point (even if fighting him - I has better things to do with his actions than withdraw it) and so it should be very hard for any of them to die permanently there. They'd have to drop at least twice over the course of that day for it to happen, maybe a lot more depending what else the party is capable of. So at least in the 3.5 world, my response to your scenario is that it shouldn't happen in the first place unless something very unusual is going on.