Musing of an Epic Virgin

[Jack99]

Tomorrow, my players will be heading towards the third quest in order to score enough faction with the Sultan, which in turn should give them access to the Chamber of Rituals. Little do they know that their path will be diverted once again.

As you might know (if you have reading this thread), they are currently holding captive a high priestess of Grazz't, who is none other that his lover as well, in the Church of Kord in their home town of Drahar. When they stole her right under his nose and fled home, both an Aspect of Orcus and an Aspect of Demogorgon showed up to claim her. And right after the Swords of Drahar killed them, an Aspect of Grazz't showed up. Since they all died, they are all banned from the mortal world for 101 years. But that doesn't mean Grazz't has given up on getting his bride-to-be back. He has been plotting, working on getting demons into the mortal world, ready to strike.But demons are hard to control, especially when they are a world away. And with the Swords deeply engaged in the City of Brass, and getting closer to their goal, which will cost the high priestess her life, Grazz't has decided that he can not wait any longer.

In order to get the girl back, he is sending one of his right-hand demons, a nasty fellow named Duality. Duality and a small army of demons will invade Drahar and cause havoc, going for the Church of Kord in order to get the girl.

So, at some point, the Swords will receive a call from Trevor, the high priest, mentor and best friend of the Swords, that demons have invaded Drahar. They will rush back and have to fight their way through a city in chaos, only to find Trevor dead on the altar and Duality in the middle of making a portal back to the Abyss with the girl in tow. Or at least that will depend on their actions.

In order to really put pressure on my epic players, the whole situation will be put under a time limit. There will be several encounters on the way (unless they do something I do not expect) to the church, some optional (save the mother defending her children), some not so optional.

They will have 14 minutes to get to the Church, which includes 5 encounters and 5 minutes of running. This should leave them enough time to take one short break, but depending on when they take it, Trevor will be dead when they arrive.

Warning
Minute 1: Open portal to Drahar, to Torn's father's mansion (A house rule allows players to speed up casting of rituals by pouring more residuum into the ritual. Twice the residuum halves the casting time, cumulatively, down to 1 minute).
Minute 2: Fight with Demons which have killed Torn's father (he gets tossed his father's head in his face when he steps through the portal)
Minute 4: Duality starts casting his portal.
Minute 5: A lone surviving priest is hiding in the church and uses the church sending stones to warn the Swords that Duality has the high priestess and is about to leave.
Minute 9: Trevor gets killed on the altar of his beloved church (which means the players can only save him if they do not take a break on the way)
Minute 14: Duality finished his portal and leaves with the drow high-priestess

Overall, I am hoping that the pressure creates some tension and pushes the players to not save all their good stuff for the last encounter, making it even harder. Should be fun...

 

[davethegame]

Overall, I am hoping that the pressure creates some tension and pushes the players to not save all their good stuff for the last encounter, making it even harder. Should be fun...

Very cool, consider the idea stolen!

 

[Jack99]

Very cool, consider the idea stolen!

Yeah, and it worked all too well. The adventure pretty much happened as I had figured. They hurried and cast a quickened portal (bye-bye 40k residuum), fought their way through the encounters, skipping the one with the mother begin the demons to not kill her child, arrived at the church 9 rounds before their good friend Trevor would die, thus saving him, but then it all went to hell. Instead of taking the strong hint that they had enough time to take a short rest, they pressed on, and the cleric forgot to use healing sun to at least heal all up, which resulted in them going into the final n+4 battle with 4 battles under their belts and no rest. Needless to say, they were wiped. For a while it didn't even look close, but a strong finish (3 crits in a row) from the fighter (last man standing) almost turned the battle.

But in the end, they died- so game over, new campaign.

It was great fun playing from 1-22, but it definitely taught me a couple of things.

I am a heroic DM, that's for sure. And oh boy I loathe the 4e economy.

 

[davethegame]

But in the end, they died- so game over, new campaign.

I know we've talked about this before, but boy, I couldn't even imagine doing that to my players

 

[Jhaelen]

But in the end, they died- so game over, new campaign.

It was great fun playing from 1-22, but it definitely taught me a couple of things.

I am a heroic DM, that's for sure. And oh boy I loathe the 4e economy.

Wow!

I can't think of anything else to say, right now.

Except: thanks for sharing, this was quite intriguing!

 

[Stalker0]

So Jack share with us some overall thoughts.

How did you like high level 4e?

Did you feel that the "sweet spot" was truly extended over a longer period of time?

Did you feel that epic combats were faster,slower, or about the same as lower level combats?

Did it feel "epic?"

How did the math pan out? Were playing hitting pretty well, better than lower levels, worse?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I am a heroic DM, that's for sure. And oh boy I loathe the 4e economy.

That's almost worth its own topic.

Here's my idea at least for magic items:
- Use inherent bonuses
- Certain items only "activate" their properties and powers if you fulfill the minimum level requirement to create it. The benefits improve with player level.

Rituals might be another matter... But maybe moving the gold piece cost into special materials required that don't have exact gp values might help, but it's certainly a little more effort.

 

[Jack99]

So Jack share with us some overall thoughts.

How did you like high level 4e?

I like it - to a certain degree. It was definitely better balanced than any prior edition, and thus more enjoyable to me. It was also much more manageable, or rather predictable. There was just too many options and things you couldn't (or at least I couldn't predict) before. But I also realized as mentioned in a prior post, that I am more of a heroic/paragon (tier) DM. I just plain and simply prefer the stories that you tell at those levels. IN short, I am not sure I attempt to run my next campaign to level 30. It's certainly doable, it's just not my style.

We rarely encounter the grind. We had plenty of long fights, but very few where the result was 100% a given long before the monsters died. It is of course worth noting that I have been tampering with monsters hit points since around level 13, and mostly used a -25% HP +33% damage template. No, for us, the biggest time-eaters was a couple of slow-ish players. Especially the warlock with 125 circumstantial modifiers to everything from AC, defenses, to hit, teleport range etc etc could take ages to figure out what he hit or if he was hit by an attack. He also had issues deciding what to do, but my 20-sec rule mostly took care of that.

Did you feel that the "sweet spot" was truly extended over a longer period of time?

Yes, for us, the sweet spot was (crunch-wise) from 1-19(-ish). It wasn't until the end of the paragon tier that some things became somewhat problematic.

Did you feel that epic combats were faster,slower, or about the same as lower level combats?

Definitely (a bit) slower. You can still manage to have 15-25 minute combats (with a few tweaks) at the epic tier, but not combats that challenge your players. But up to n+0 combats. Of course, many of the changes I instituted (grouped initiative, 20 sec rule, tweaked hit points) were only instituted at paragon or higher. I am starting a new campaign up at 1st level (with the same people) on the 5th of January, so we will see there how things work out with the same rules at the low levels. I expect somewhat quicker combats, simply due to the lack of options available to characters.

Did it feel "epic?"

I think the epic feel can be conveyed by two things. The story and in terms what players can and will do. The story, well that's entirely up to the DM, but yeah, my players felt epic through my campaign. As for the other side of the feel - yes, the powers you get do seem to reinforce that your characters are in Kansas anymore. Did that make any sense?

How did the math pan out? Were playing hitting pretty well, better than lower levels, worse?

It worked great, but I have given everyone a +1/+2/+3 to hit and to defenses at level 5/15/25, to compensate for weapon/implement expertise and the NAD-problem. With those two fixes, things seemed to move along smoothly.

 

[Jack99]

That's almost worth its own topic.

Here's my idea at least for magic items:
- Use inherent bonuses
- Certain items only "activate" their properties and powers if you fulfill the minimum level requirement to create it. The benefits improve with player level.

Rituals might be another matter... But maybe moving the gold piece cost into special materials required that don't have exact gp values might help, but it's certainly a little more effort.

Yeah, that was the plan, unfortunately I have a few players who would prefer not to use inherent bonuses, as it makes magic even more bland (we used a similar system for the last year of 3.5). So I am considering a few other options. But no doubt that something will have to change. Taking away Magic Item creation is another solution I am considering.

 

[ShadowBite]

Great Thread, have really enjoyed reading it. I wanted to ask, I know that you give an hourly breakdown of how long the campaign took but I'm curious how long this campaign stretched out. From what I gather, you guys seem to meet once a week with a few cancellations. Just curious how long it took for you guys to go from 1-22.


And hearing about your 30 min to 1 hour combats makes me salivate, it takes us around +2 hours to get through a battle. Part of this is due to only having a 3 person party but your 20 second rule and monster hp reduction sounds golden.