Cauldroun/Shackled path Dungeon series?

I will soon start the Shackled path series of adventures from the Dungeon magazine..

I was wondering what advice can you give?any particular stuff I should watch out for?

Any online resources/play aids for it?

Many of the ELs (Encounter Levels) are seriously out of whack for the suggested character levels. e.g., the climactic "boss" encounter at the end of the first adventure is something like EL 8 -- for PCs who are probably 3rd level at best.

There are some time limits built into the adventures, but you will probably need to relax those in order to give the PCs a chance. Otherwise the PCs will never have a chance to rest and heal, or to craft items between adventures.

The level of treasure and magic seems okay, although the PCs need to be very thorough in searching every nook and cranny if they want to find everything. Detect secret doors will be exceedingly useful.

The PCs should stay on good terms with one of the churches in Cauldron (St. Cuthbert, Pelor, Kord) in order to have access to cheap healing magic and items.

Hope this helps!

anyone done playaids or other things I might use?

My suggestions:

Take away Kazmojen's proficiency with his urgrosh and have him stick to his claws - with the urgrosh, he'll slaughter your party, taking down most PC's in a hit or two, and he's got two. Without it, he's more of an interesting challenge. I'd replace his urgrosh feats with something else.

Try to have the bad guys gang up on the PC's. The first level of the dungeon is filled with encounters consisting of a single skulk, or a pair, and they tend to go down to a single hit. If you have them act a little more dynamically, larger fights can turn out to be more fun.

Check out JollyDoc's Shackled City in the Story Hour Forum. This will give you many tips and playtested pitfalls for all of the modules in Shackled City.

gfunk said:

Check out JollyDoc's Shackled City in the Story Hour Forum. This will give you many tips and playtested pitfalls for all of the modules in Shackled City.

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Plus cool PCs!

hey Gfunk I started reading the SHakled path story hour..very nice..
I only have one question:

Did you only played shakled path adventures or did you mixed others (like The Back Egg adventure)?

nahualt said:

hey Gfunk I started reading the SHakled path story hour..very nice..
I only have one question:

Did you only played shakled path adventures or did you mixed others (like The Back Egg adventure)?

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Black egg was mixed in to buy time (they were finishing modules before the next was published) and to boost XP.

I am running it with 6 PC's and they managed the first (Life's Bazaar) quite well (only 3 or 4 down and dying ), but bear in mind this is a tough series and consider awarding "story xp" to keep the group up with the modules.

Starting level?

Will it spoil the adventure too much if I start the characters at a higher level? like 3 or 4?

even making the apropiate adjustements to the CR of enemies, would the added abilities of the characters (4th level vs 1stlevel) spoil any encounters?

I really want to know you opinions, my gaming group wants to start at least at 3rd level..