Suggestions for running the Forge of Fury?

[Darren]

I haven't run this one yet myself, but there is a good chance it will happen in the next campaign early next year. After a lot of thought, I've decided that if I run it I'm keeping the roper, but not giving it the almost certain automatic surprise as described in the adventure.

I'll alter things a bit to give PCs a chance to see what they are getting into by putting some phosphorescent fungus in the cavern. This way a PC peeking around the corner has a chance to notice the fishing going on without bringing in a lantern or torch.

Also, the roper will be humming and/or singing to itself a bit while fishing.* That way they can be sure to know there is something intelligent in there that might be worth talking to. Describe the fish as feebly struggling as if has no strength left too, and the very large gaping maw that swallows it. After that I consider the players fairly warned.

This is in part because I plan to pull no punches with Nightscale, and will be surprised if a PC doesn't get knocked into the water at some time. I'll be "nice" by letting the roper fish out any PCs swept downstream. If it finds out they are fighting a dragon, it agrees to let them go only if they promise to bring back some dragon meat....


[size=-2]*specifically, Gollum's fishing song from Book 4, chapter 2, in LotR:TTT
My group is laid back enough that I'm certain I will not come under assault from a ranged dice attack by incorperating a singing roper. YMMV, of course...
[/size]

 

[Sfounder]

Thank you everyone for the advice. Everyone at the table has at least 15 years gaming experience, and they're a pretty crafty lot.

Should be fun!

The party is:

Dwarf fighter 1/Cleric of Moradin 2
Human Rogue 1/Fighter 2 (Uses a guisarme)
Elf Sorceror 3
Half-elf bard 2/Fighter 1
Human Rogue 2/Swashbuckler 1

 

[iwatt]

Unless your PCs have way too much fire based damage, the roper is unbeatable. Just metagame and take the sorc hostage. (drag him through the water to the roper. Then start talking. They should get the message easily enough.

The fight with the Dragon was a cakewalk for my party. The sorc's familiar is a celestial Owl. Who easily spotted the dragon. Since he speaks celestial, the sorc could get a failry good description of the creature. since he rolled a 20 (30 total) in his Knowldege Arcana I had to be fairly explicit in what info I could give (i.e. acid damage, swimming, pretty young). They then proceeded to cast Enlarge, Shield of Faith, Light, Bull's Strength, Cat's Grace, Endurance, Acid Resistance 10, Magic Vetsment and Water Walking on the High Dex Barbarian. The plna was simple. Ride in, wallop the Dragon hard while otehr missiled him. When The dragon tried to leave when down to 40 hp. The Barbarian went for the treasure trove. I then commited the mistake of closing in for a breath attack. The barbarian charged and landed a critical hit while Powerattacking. Did something like 60 points of damage. Goodbye Dragon.

By the way, I think through all the descriptions of other people's experiences, that Dragion has received way to many critical hits . I'm not the first DM to have the dragon felled by a lucky blow.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

Unless your PCs have way too much fire based damage, the roper is unbeatable.

I'll second this. Quite frankly, I simply do not believe the people who say their PCs were able to beat the roper. They either fudged deliberately or screwed up. If run as written, the roper is simply too tough for a group of 3rd, maybe 4th, level heroes.

If your group is the kind that is willing to be extorted, then the encounter can be run and only mildly fudged, by following the previous advice (Have the roper take a prisoner and offer to talk, itself.) If your group, like mine, will barely negotiate at all, and absolutely refuses when "forced," you'll do well to remove or replace the roper encounter. Otherwise you're looking at a TPK.


Jeff

 

[diaglo]

the front door is a doozy. the high DC for such a low level party can be a stopper... unless someone has a lucky die.

read the story hour in my sig around pages 8-10 or so.

 

[ares71]

When I ran it, my PC's were initially having an easy time. The Barbarian and Monk got "bored" while the rest of the party was going to rest and recover spells. They went exploring my themselves and ran into the roper. (heh, heh).

I decided to be generous and let him parley with them. He offered to not eat them immediately, if one of them would leave and bring back more food (preferabbly elves) and he would keep the other one hostage. They decided they wanted no part of that. They tried to make a break for it, and failed badly. Roper got both of them. I made the players roll to see who he would eat first. The monk lost and was devoured. The Barbarian managed to break free and jumped in the river to escape. Almost drowned, but kept rolling fantastic Swim rolls. He lived, but barely. Lost all his equipment too, either dropped by the Roper, or lost in the river. Needless to say the group never split the party again.

When the were a little tougher, they came back to get some "payback" on the roper. They spent a huge amount of gold to have an NPC mage make a maximized fireball scroll for them, which the party mage used to full effect.

 

[HeathcliffeSlocumb]

My group loved FoF

The Forge of Fury was the first 3.0 adventure I ran for my group several years ago. I thought it was by far the best WOTC adventure published for 3.x, and everybody enjoyed it.

As mentioned by other posters above, my players were blindsided by the roper. They did some colorful role-playing to get out of that situation, though 1 PC died. Do your best to indicate the danger of the roper, maybe put some half-eaten bodies nearby or duergar scrawlings indicating "Danger Ahead".

My players easily defeated the dragon, which somewhat surprised me.

Have fun, and let us know how it goes.

 

[iwatt]

the front door is a doozy. the high DC for such a low level party can be a stopper... unless someone has a lucky die.

read the story hour in my sig around pages 8-10 or so.

I thought so too. But my palyers keep surprising me with their randomness. I though they'd go for the frontal charge and be stopped by the door. But they imediately found the back entrance and took the Trogs and the orcs by surprise (specially because I didn't handle them that well since I wasn't perpared).

Later on, I ran the Black Fury adventure form the Silver marches book, and instead of scouting or entering carefully, (which I of course had studied up for) they charged straight through the entrance, and ended up fighting the Huge zombie underwater

Now I just wing everything

 

[iwatt]

I'll second this. Quite frankly, I simply do not believe the people who say their PCs were able to beat the roper. They either fudged deliberately or screwed up. If run as written, the roper is simply too tough for a group of 3rd, maybe 4th, level heroes.

Jeff

Actually, It can be done, but it involves very good intelligence (about the roper's presence, it's weakneses and strengths) and also a lot of luck. Like yourself, I think it's smacks of DMs been lenient and players metagaming like nobody's business. A very cautious group with insanely high Knowldege checks (wizard aiming for Loremaster) and excellent scouting (Halfling Rogue for example), coupled with a sorcer with Fire substituted Melf's acid arrow (when would that happen ) and a fighter carrying all the alchemist fire rescued from the trap should maybe be able to beat up on the properly handled Roper without "cheating". Except that there isn't any space from which to aim at the roper that isn't within his reach.

 

[Mark]

Suggestions for running the Forge of Fury?

A good supply of body bags. (from the movie First Blood)

Or replacement characters, depending on how lenient a DM you happen to be...

I fooled them, though. I substituted an Abyssal Dire Toad for the big bad guy. Same CR, same environment, much more fun when it ate one of the party members.

Nice.