Adventure path
I've been running the adventure path for awhile now. The characters are just about to start Zenith Trajectory.
Here are some of my thoughts on it (Spoilers below):
**********Spoilers************
- My players never figured out the gnomish doors in the first adventure and they left about 50% of the complex unexplored.
- In the first adventure, if no one knows undercommon or gnomish you're kind of screwed. They can't talk their way out of some of the hard encounters. I had the mobs know some pidgeon common to make it less deadly.
- The grell was very tough. I made some decisions during that fight to give the party a chance.
- The final bad guy in the adventure was also very tough. That's been noted on previous threads. I had Meerthan send aid to the party by summoning a celestial that could teleport without error to the party. At this point Fellian and Fario had already joined the party and so were able to take advantage of their Rary's. Even with the help, they couldn't take the dwarf down. It was a long grueling fight of the dwarf chasing the party around after people who were faster then him.... eventually the dwarf camped the elevator out.
- You've got to decide how the elevator works cause players try annoying things. Can each level be thrown to move the elevator? What if levers are thrown in the middle of the ascent? It's annoying, heh.
- For the second adventure there were some deaths in the group, Fario died from a crit from the big baboon.
- The whole baboon encounter was pretty fun because it felt like Knights of the Dinner Table... especially when the characters were thinking they'd caught lycanthropy from the baboons.
- In my game, the party rested after the baboon fight, and the druid in the basement died of cold exposure while they rested. BTW, the the druid/monk/bard isn't really legit. Monk is lawful and bard can't be lawful. Suggest making her an ex-monk or ex-bard.
- On the way back to town I had Alek show up on the way back to foreshadow some of his dilemma from the fourth adventure.
- The Storm Blades got in a scuffle with the characters in a tavern. Of course, the Storm Blades paid off the local guards to not come to break things up until they were called. The Storm Blades goal was to just make the characters look bad. They did what they could to start a fight, always doing subdual damage. One thing that worked out really well was that I had the thief enter in the back and dip an arrow in a vial while one of the players could see him. The players assumed he was using poison and started to open up on the Storm Blades using lethal force. The Storm Blades retreated crying foul, and called for the guards. The guards came and arrested most of the party. Witnesses saw the party using lethal force while the Storm Blades were just dueling more or less fairly.
- The underground fortress of the Ebon Triad was an interesting adventure... but the part that is kind of silly is that it doesn't cover what happens past initial alarms being thrown. It's very unlikely that a party will take out the entire fortress in one go. So you have to account for the fact that the party will rest in the middle of their assault. In my game, the party took out Triel and her gang and most of the thugs. Obviously, the undead are likely to remain static. However, I had the wizard get away while the party rested.
- Since the wizard escaped in my game, the party was beset upon a couple weeks later by an assassin squad of Ebon Triad folks. The wizard again got away. The Ebon Triad in my game will have some difficulty funding anything soon again.
- I highly recommend changing the name of the cleric of Kord. Asfelkir is a name that is open to abuse and people will burst out laughing everytime they hear it. Unfortunately, I did not catch the name before I said it out loud. :/
- I recommend that you foreshadow the church of wee jas being bastards. Especially the very poorly named cleric... I can't recall the name right now... but it's so silly. It's like "Jed the cleric" or something. Change his name.
- There isn't much loot in the adventures so far, so I've had the Striders send some care packages.
- For the third adventure, I plan on having more then one umberhulk. One umberhulk would go down in about 2 rounds with my 8 player group.
- The citizens in my Cauldron think that their are ghosts that inhabit the city that cause people to do things that they don't want to do... this is to explain the frequent charming that certain personages employ.
One of the biggest things about the adventures is that any foreshadowing you can do of future adventures will be good. Foreshadow Alek's plight, the Smoking Eye, the Ebon Triad, The Chisel, and the fancy noble meeting place in the third adventure. Adding these things in before they are the focus of the adventure will give a much better feeling of continuity.
One thing that bugs me about the fifth(?) adventure (test of the smoking eye) is that the entire adventure is based around the party agreeing to help and trust an NPC who detects as evil.
That's the stuff I can think of right now. Hope some of it helps!
