The-Magic-Sword
Hero
So I looked up the encounters:
I'm gonna put aside the fact that you didn't just combine the encounters, you explicitly ignored the text stating that the creatures in the next room don't leave the room, taking for granted the previous creatures, including the Golem there to guard them, have it and continue their religious service.
But even if you did decide that it was stupid for the Dragon Priest and Elekos to not rush out, it didn't occur to you that ignoring that should probably be a trigger for you to alter the adventure for some reason (since you were now intentionally, and not accidentally, in homebrew territory), I'm not sure why it didn't, but that was a major screwball.
Even then, i want to note its only barely an extreme encounter (and only for a party of 4, if you have any more than that its just severe) so its actually something your party can handle with good play, which you've suggested your party doesn't really do... but that kinda makes it a fair loss.
But wanna know something fun? Slap the weak template on any of the three creatures, (you can do this on the fly easily) and the encounter is only severe, eliminate a creature entirely, say one of the two level 7s, the gathering room encounter is only trivial by itself, and everything together is 130 exp, just barely over the Severe Threshold.
This post, including acquiring a pdf off a friend, plating dinner, checking the encounter, and checking the guidelines, took me about 10 minutes.
But even if you did decide that it was stupid for the Dragon Priest and Elekos to not rush out, it didn't occur to you that ignoring that should probably be a trigger for you to alter the adventure for some reason (since you were now intentionally, and not accidentally, in homebrew territory), I'm not sure why it didn't, but that was a major screwball.
Even then, i want to note its only barely an extreme encounter (and only for a party of 4, if you have any more than that its just severe) so its actually something your party can handle with good play, which you've suggested your party doesn't really do... but that kinda makes it a fair loss.
But wanna know something fun? Slap the weak template on any of the three creatures, (you can do this on the fly easily) and the encounter is only severe, eliminate a creature entirely, say one of the two level 7s, the gathering room encounter is only trivial by itself, and everything together is 130 exp, just barely over the Severe Threshold.
This post, including acquiring a pdf off a friend, plating dinner, checking the encounter, and checking the guidelines, took me about 10 minutes.