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[ZEITGEIST] The Continuing Adventures of Korrigan & Co.
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<blockquote data-quote="gideonpepys" data-source="post: 7569416" data-attributes="member: 79141"><p><strong>Adventure 11, Act One, DM Notes</strong></p><p></p><p>This section of adventure 11 will go down in my personal ‘Annals of Misunderestimation’, second only to our seven-month run at Diaspora. I thought it would take three weeks! Uru would benefit from the sidebar that recognises Urban Empaths can sidestep most of the initial hurdles in Ursalina, the group would make a beeline for the Triunfo, have a showdown with Sijhen, and that would be that.</p><p></p><p>Just before Christmas, it emerged that Uru, Rumdoom and Quratulain would be away for a few weeks. That gave me the wicked idea of sending them on ahead and subverting the sidebar: the Urban Empath’s powers would now see Uru dominated by the gidim, and used to bring down his allies. I would then replace them in the line-up with cool NPCs who I wanted to bring along anyway.</p><p></p><p>Still, I didn’t think the section would take that much longer. Especially when the PCs demonstrated their high-level abilities, tracked Hildegaard down in the very first session, and then headed straight for the Cadagyr Estate. They sent Leon in on his own (disguised as Glaucia) only for him to get spooked and flee. Then they teleported away – trying to leave the city and go back to the Coaltongue, which triggered the gidim teleportation contingency. As two more players were suddenly absent, I decided to abduct them as well! (Rationale to come later…)</p><p></p><p>After their auspicious start, we then had a few weeks where they buzzed around the city investigating every area and location, even a few I added along the way. It got to the point where one player said, “It feels like we’re not getting anywhere”. (I think they expected to find the answer in the Ob lighthouse and were nonplussed when the Ob turned out to be horrified bystanders.) I reminded them that they had found one centre of gidim activity in week one (the estate), ran away, and never went back there!</p><p></p><p>So they went back there. Cue big fight. Then, having grilled poor Lord Cadagyr, they finally headed for the Triunfo where – much to my astonishment – instead of thoroughly investigating the college before trying (and probably failing, painfully) to access the living metal sphincter, they went straight for the thoughtlocked door and – through a combination of player smarts, high skills, and XP rerolls – opened the darned thing.</p><p></p><p>I wasn’t expecting that at all – to the point that I hadn’t even prepped the fight on the leviathan! (Bad DM! Naughty DM!) Still not sure if I misread the text, and if the thoughtlocked sphincter leads directly to the flesh fens, but whatever – they were now on board the alien ship without first going through the caves (and split their already ragtag bunch in two when the sphincter closed).</p><p></p><p>This threw me somewhat – not because I hadn’t prepped; I can usually roll with the punches in Cypher System – but because unbeknownst to the party, they were now up against the augmented defences of the alien ship (i.e. their missing friends) who I had expected them to encounter separately in the cave. Oops! They had lulled me into a false sense of security with all their wandering around, and suddenly we were facing a possible TPK!</p><p></p><p>We broke early (just half an hour early) so I could decide what to do. In the end I went with, ‘Screw it, let’s see what happens’…</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="gideonpepys, post: 7569416, member: 79141"] [b]Adventure 11, Act One, DM Notes[/b] This section of adventure 11 will go down in my personal ‘Annals of Misunderestimation’, second only to our seven-month run at Diaspora. I thought it would take three weeks! Uru would benefit from the sidebar that recognises Urban Empaths can sidestep most of the initial hurdles in Ursalina, the group would make a beeline for the Triunfo, have a showdown with Sijhen, and that would be that. Just before Christmas, it emerged that Uru, Rumdoom and Quratulain would be away for a few weeks. That gave me the wicked idea of sending them on ahead and subverting the sidebar: the Urban Empath’s powers would now see Uru dominated by the gidim, and used to bring down his allies. I would then replace them in the line-up with cool NPCs who I wanted to bring along anyway. Still, I didn’t think the section would take that much longer. Especially when the PCs demonstrated their high-level abilities, tracked Hildegaard down in the very first session, and then headed straight for the Cadagyr Estate. They sent Leon in on his own (disguised as Glaucia) only for him to get spooked and flee. Then they teleported away – trying to leave the city and go back to the Coaltongue, which triggered the gidim teleportation contingency. As two more players were suddenly absent, I decided to abduct them as well! (Rationale to come later…) After their auspicious start, we then had a few weeks where they buzzed around the city investigating every area and location, even a few I added along the way. It got to the point where one player said, “It feels like we’re not getting anywhere”. (I think they expected to find the answer in the Ob lighthouse and were nonplussed when the Ob turned out to be horrified bystanders.) I reminded them that they had found one centre of gidim activity in week one (the estate), ran away, and never went back there! So they went back there. Cue big fight. Then, having grilled poor Lord Cadagyr, they finally headed for the Triunfo where – much to my astonishment – instead of thoroughly investigating the college before trying (and probably failing, painfully) to access the living metal sphincter, they went straight for the thoughtlocked door and – through a combination of player smarts, high skills, and XP rerolls – opened the darned thing. I wasn’t expecting that at all – to the point that I hadn’t even prepped the fight on the leviathan! (Bad DM! Naughty DM!) Still not sure if I misread the text, and if the thoughtlocked sphincter leads directly to the flesh fens, but whatever – they were now on board the alien ship without first going through the caves (and split their already ragtag bunch in two when the sphincter closed). This threw me somewhat – not because I hadn’t prepped; I can usually roll with the punches in Cypher System – but because unbeknownst to the party, they were now up against the augmented defences of the alien ship (i.e. their missing friends) who I had expected them to encounter separately in the cave. Oops! They had lulled me into a false sense of security with all their wandering around, and suddenly we were facing a possible TPK! We broke early (just half an hour early) so I could decide what to do. In the end I went with, ‘Screw it, let’s see what happens’… [/QUOTE]
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