Black Ice Well--experiences?

[LordMelquiades]

Monkey God's Black Ice Well is likely to be the next scenario to be tackled by my group. They will have recently stopped the menace of the Slave Lords, and probably had some R&R back in civilisation before I throw them a fairly compelling hook or two to dive into the adventure. (Plus there's the small matter of bring two party members back from the dead)

I am wondering if anyone has any comments from their experience in either playing in or running the adventure. My group will be 14th level, the most notable thing about them being they are without a cleric--healing magic, a smart druid and a champion (Arcana Unearthed version of a paladin) takes care of healing, but there's not a speck of undead turning ability amongst them. This could prove quite crippling in an adventure that features a fair few undead (all those morghs). They are a reasonably smart group--the players with the wizard and the druid are very experienced--and combat-focused. Also, I use Eberron-style action points with some house rule additions, so the characters have slightly more survivability than standard.

Reading it, Black Ice Well looks very tough, very combat-heavy, and somewhat relentless. Is that how it felt in-game? Are there any areas that dragged, where it felt like it went from one indistinguishable fight to another? We all like combat, but I dislike repetitiveness. Are there any killer bits, where the adventure design tipped over the edge of reasonable? Did anything really not make sense, make the players go "Huh?".

Cheers

 

[Gansk]

I am currently running it now - the party has a cleric, but the undead are rarely turned. Mohrgs have a hard time hitting 14th level characters, so they just patiently hack through them. The cleric has been instrumental with banishment type spells which got rid of a lot of slaadi.

There is a lot of fighting, but we are a combat-oriented group. The fights change just enough make them interesting, with the possible exception of the mohrgs. Generally you have a lot of low CR creatures with a couple of high CR leaders, which attract the party focus. Once the leaders are gone, the encounter becomes a cakewalk. So the occupants look a lot tougher than they really are, especially for 14th level PC's that have good tactics.

 

[LordMelquiades]

Good to know, thanks.

Has anyone heard of web enhancements for this module? I saw a reference to such a thing here, http://ogrecave.com/2002/09/09/black-ice-well-and-more/ , but the site no longer exists. And rather amusingly you get this: http://www.ndparking.com/monkeygodenterprises.com