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<blockquote data-quote="MerricB" data-source="post: 5868816" data-attributes="member: 3586"><p>Well, we've finished the Bastards of Erebus - in total it took us 5-1/2 hours of play. I'm am extremely unimpressed by the module - the overall story and some encounters were fine, but the writing and editing were both dreadful.</p><p></p><p>We began where we left off, meeting the other members of the rebels. That didn't take long, as we mostly ignored them. Then we had the problem of determining if it were the next day or not; the structure of the adventure demands that it is, but it isn't clear from the text. So, the group gained information about the prisoner transport taking the rebel leader out of the city, and following Janiven's request, came up with a plan for rescuing them.</p><p></p><p>The planning didn't take too long, but it was very entertaining. Then we had the actual rescue, which played extremely well - the group started by taking out the Hellknight with the ballista with several well-aimed shots, then putting the leader of the Hellknights to sleep, and basically defeating all of them without too much trouble.</p><p></p><p>With Arael rescued - and the group now calling themselves the Rebel Alliance (as it was too good to pass up, with no-one liking "Children of Westcrown") - they took a week off to recuperate. Oh, and to return the horses, where they met a distinguished and arrogant actor. That played really well, with conflict providing good role-playing.</p><p></p><p>Everyone had reached second level... except I then realised that the XP table had a major change on it and they hadn't. So I just made them all 2nd level anyway (a bonus 500 XP) rather than (a) running more pointless sewer encounters or (b) running a side quest described in the module but not written (as it should have been).</p><p></p><p>Then they went up against the Bastards of Erebus - a group of tiefling thieves who had been preying on the populace of Westcrown. Further troubles with the adventure began to surface, the first being that there was no map of the streets and buildings surrounding their lair, despite sneaking up on them and planning an ambush being and important part of the adventure (and the possibility of finding one of the secret entrances into the lair). </p><p></p><p>First, they took out the tiefling on watch in the bell-tower: two perfectly aimed arrows and a magic-missile did for him. Then (aided by the monk) they ascended the belltower, then descended into the lair and slew the surprised tiefling watch party.</p><p></p><p>Descending into the tunnels beneath the lair, they fought more tieflings and their "mummy" sorcerer companion, who <em>charmed</em> the monk into running away - but he and his friends fell to the other three PCs (Lee's cleric couldn't make this session). Then they found the kennel with four, no two wolf skeletons. Except that Pathfinder doesn't have stats for wolf skeletons, as they were omitted from the final bestiary.</p><p></p><p>Not particularly impressed by this, I was even less impressed when I realised that the underground map was actually missing parts of its key (where is G8 on the map?). Editing in this module? Absolutely dreadful.</p><p></p><p>Still, most of the adventure was still there, so the group headed north, after retrieving the monk, took out some hell dogs (although they knocked the monk down to negative hit points), and then Greg made the inspired decision to search for secret doors, finding the secret entrance into the leader's lair. </p><p></p><p>The leader of the tieflings didn't get much of a chance to act, as Tim successfully used the sleep spell on him! (He had a 20% chance of failing the save, but did so anyway). The two wolf skeletons with the leader were soon slain, and the group then turned their attention to the main barracks of the tieflings, where a fighter and four rogues waited for them... but given the ranged fire-power of the group plus Michael and Dave waiting on either side of the door for the tieflings to enter, the tieflings never had much of a chance. Good tactics and a choke-point worked wonders, though there was a short moment of real tension when Dave was knocked out, only to be revived by Tim's sorcerer giving him a potion of cure light wounds.</p><p></p><p>The final group of tieflings approached, considered the situation, then fled. The group were victorious!</p><p></p><p>And that was that. The group reached 3rd level, and we'll move on to the Sixfold Trial either next week or the week after (depending on how Easter interferes).</p><p></p><p>Although we had fun with the adventure, as a DM I would rate it as a lousy four out of ten; the first half requires rewriting, the second half needs an exterior map and the whole requires editing. There aren't really enough thought-out encounters in this adventure. I'm hoping the state of affairs improves with the Sixfold Path.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="MerricB, post: 5868816, member: 3586"] Well, we've finished the Bastards of Erebus - in total it took us 5-1/2 hours of play. I'm am extremely unimpressed by the module - the overall story and some encounters were fine, but the writing and editing were both dreadful. We began where we left off, meeting the other members of the rebels. That didn't take long, as we mostly ignored them. Then we had the problem of determining if it were the next day or not; the structure of the adventure demands that it is, but it isn't clear from the text. So, the group gained information about the prisoner transport taking the rebel leader out of the city, and following Janiven's request, came up with a plan for rescuing them. The planning didn't take too long, but it was very entertaining. Then we had the actual rescue, which played extremely well - the group started by taking out the Hellknight with the ballista with several well-aimed shots, then putting the leader of the Hellknights to sleep, and basically defeating all of them without too much trouble. With Arael rescued - and the group now calling themselves the Rebel Alliance (as it was too good to pass up, with no-one liking "Children of Westcrown") - they took a week off to recuperate. Oh, and to return the horses, where they met a distinguished and arrogant actor. That played really well, with conflict providing good role-playing. Everyone had reached second level... except I then realised that the XP table had a major change on it and they hadn't. So I just made them all 2nd level anyway (a bonus 500 XP) rather than (a) running more pointless sewer encounters or (b) running a side quest described in the module but not written (as it should have been). Then they went up against the Bastards of Erebus - a group of tiefling thieves who had been preying on the populace of Westcrown. Further troubles with the adventure began to surface, the first being that there was no map of the streets and buildings surrounding their lair, despite sneaking up on them and planning an ambush being and important part of the adventure (and the possibility of finding one of the secret entrances into the lair). First, they took out the tiefling on watch in the bell-tower: two perfectly aimed arrows and a magic-missile did for him. Then (aided by the monk) they ascended the belltower, then descended into the lair and slew the surprised tiefling watch party. Descending into the tunnels beneath the lair, they fought more tieflings and their "mummy" sorcerer companion, who [i]charmed[/i] the monk into running away - but he and his friends fell to the other three PCs (Lee's cleric couldn't make this session). Then they found the kennel with four, no two wolf skeletons. Except that Pathfinder doesn't have stats for wolf skeletons, as they were omitted from the final bestiary. Not particularly impressed by this, I was even less impressed when I realised that the underground map was actually missing parts of its key (where is G8 on the map?). Editing in this module? Absolutely dreadful. Still, most of the adventure was still there, so the group headed north, after retrieving the monk, took out some hell dogs (although they knocked the monk down to negative hit points), and then Greg made the inspired decision to search for secret doors, finding the secret entrance into the leader's lair. The leader of the tieflings didn't get much of a chance to act, as Tim successfully used the sleep spell on him! (He had a 20% chance of failing the save, but did so anyway). The two wolf skeletons with the leader were soon slain, and the group then turned their attention to the main barracks of the tieflings, where a fighter and four rogues waited for them... but given the ranged fire-power of the group plus Michael and Dave waiting on either side of the door for the tieflings to enter, the tieflings never had much of a chance. Good tactics and a choke-point worked wonders, though there was a short moment of real tension when Dave was knocked out, only to be revived by Tim's sorcerer giving him a potion of cure light wounds. The final group of tieflings approached, considered the situation, then fled. The group were victorious! And that was that. The group reached 3rd level, and we'll move on to the Sixfold Trial either next week or the week after (depending on how Easter interferes). Although we had fun with the adventure, as a DM I would rate it as a lousy four out of ten; the first half requires rewriting, the second half needs an exterior map and the whole requires editing. There aren't really enough thought-out encounters in this adventure. I'm hoping the state of affairs improves with the Sixfold Path. [/QUOTE]
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