Anyone ran a KotS followup?

[Rechan]

Has anyone ran a follow up to Keep on the Shadowfell? I.e. had Kalarel return in any form? If so, what'd you do, both rules wise and story wise?

I'm curious what others have done here, as I'm contemplating the notion.

Sadly, the "Possessing Spirit" template in Open Grave is far too powerful (11th level or above). Because otherwise it makes a nice trick for a returning villain of the Undead-Venerating variety.

One thing I'm contemplating is that, when the rift opens during the ritual, that a few things Escape.

 

[Nebulous]

I plan to have Kalarel return as some sort of undead, maybe first in Thunderspire or afterward, but i have not decided on how exactly i want him to manifest. Or where. Is the Eye of Fear and Flame a monster in 4e yet? I thought i remembered seeing that somewhere. Maybe Dragon magazine.

 

[Rechan]

I plan to have Kalarel return as some sort of undead, maybe first in Thunderspire or afterward, but i have not decided on how exactly i want him to manifest. Or where. Is the Eye of Fear and Flame a monster in 4e yet? I thought i remembered seeing that somewhere. Maybe Dragon magazine.

Article in Dragon entitled "Ashen Covenant".

 

[Verys Arkon]

I brought back Kalarel as the contact between the Ashen Covenant and Paldemar in Thunderspire Mountain. IMC, Paldemar's device is designed to drain knowledge and secrets from the Mages of Saruun as an offering to Vecna in exchange for the secret of the Pyramid of Shadow. The Covenant wants to free Karavakos, who lead the undead that had emerged from the rift under the Keep on the Shadowfell a few hundred years ago.

Mechanically, I leveled him up to 12th, added the Death Master template, and skinned him as a quasi-dead (think Chronicles of Ridick Necromonger). I leveled down Paldemar and replaced the other critters in the final battle of TM with some more undead, to keep the theme going. I had Kalarel flee through a portal to the Shadowfell when bloodied, but Paldemar perished (I leveled him down a bit) which gave the players a sense of satisfaction.

I think I've tied the H series together better than originally written now, but I'm not sure I'll be as successful with the P-series. Anyone have any suggestions from Dungeon (could be older 3.5 issues), that might fit the Ashen Covenant's plots?

 

[Rechan]

Anyone have any suggestions from Dungeon (could be older 3.5 issues), that might fit the Ashen Covenant's plots?

Etheran of Therund was off fighting "A cult in a far off land". He could have been battling one of the Ashen Covenant's cells. Unfortunately, the Covenant sees his death as a sign, and moves in to set up shop in Therund.

The drow in Skalmad's throne room are members of the Drow in P2. There's also a side-trek in Dungeon, of some drow necromancers, which could tie back into the Orcus/Covenant thing going on.

P2 should be relatively easy. P3 apparently takes place, in part, in the Shadowfell, so it shouldn't be too hard there either to sprinkle in some elements. Jack99 mentions how P3 relates to E1 (which deals directly wiht the Ashen Covenant).

 

[filthgrinder]

I've run a follow-up to Keep on the Shadowfell, except, not as you are asking.

My group got TPK'ed during the Irontooth encounter. Our campaign went like this: Bar Fight! from the Forgotten Realms Keep on the Shadowfell article from Dragon. Then they went to the Into the Shadowhaunt, and Against the White Dragon from D&D game day. Then they did all of the "outside" Keep on the Shadowfell encounters, including lots of stuff in Winterhaven.

Irontooth destroyed them.

After that, I had two players quit out. However, the campaign continued. I advanced the timeline 100 years. Since the party failed, I had Kalarel open the rift to the Shadowfell. This caused a huge explosion of energy from the Shadowfell. The entire Valley was covered with dim gloom of undeath. Amries of Undead now wander, nothing grows, Wintervale, Fallcrest, and all the other places where destroyed. Agents of the Raven Queen were eventually able to heal the rift, however, it's is still a doomed land. All these years later, people are starting to venture forth into the Valley once more. Treasure hunters looking for remains of Winterhaven and Fallcrest, relatives looking for their families heirlooms, and those who wish to kill and silence the undead.

Thats how I am running the KotSF follow-up.

 

[Badwe]

Ironically, despite my player’s professed dislike for modules, they ended up latching on to several iconic elements from KotS. They were so enamoured by the mayor from their hometown, I had to make Douvan Stahl a recurring character. Also, much like the penny-arcade group, they found endless amusement with splug. Unfortunately, they also used him to check for traps, ultimately resulting in the goblin’s untimely death, though they kept his head and gilded it to act as a mascot for the bar they opened in the aftermath of KotS.

Back to the original post, I decided to make Kalarel a recurring villain. The PCs had their hometown sacked by an unimaginably large horde of orcs, only to find out after taking refuge in a dwarven mountain stronghold that the many clans of orcs were duped into joining forces with promises of dark power by kalarel, now operating from the shadowfell (likely to be a lich by the time players get to him.) In my campaign - I don’t recall if this was by the book – I had Kalarel be pulled through the portal.

 

[SlyFlourish]

I'm planning to bring Kalarel back and I've had hints strewn about in Thunderspire, Pyramid, and now Trollhaunt. He's going to be a figure when I run Demon Queen later this year and I hope to have him as a villain throughout the entire campaign.

When I introduced Kalarel, I made him more of a twisted serial killer who hunted women Ted Bundy style. His childhood background was just as twisted and, when he ended up banished to the Shadowfell, this was inflicted on him again by Orcus and his demonic minions. Now Kalarel is reborn something even worse and seeks the party for revenge, leaving the bodies of the party's friends in his wake.

It should make for a great villain.

 

[GorTeX]

I've run H1,2 and 3 now (about to start P1 tommorrow). Kalarel was defeated by being forced into the portal. I brought him back as a Lich (leveled to 11 IIRC, and he had a will defense of 31..had to up his int as well) in P3, Pyramid of shadows..I had him take over the bandits on level 1 and turn most of them into Undead. To keep the exp relatively the same, I removed the werewolf. Turned out to be a great encounter (I was worried he was over powered as a Lich). I made it clear that his Phylactery was not in the Pyramid, so they will meet him again.

Currently, I'm considering bringing him back as the main bad guy in P2...either that or as a more powerful version of the Lich that aids the main drow bad guy in P2.

Also the elf spy in H1 (forgot her name), one of my players had 'issues' with, and as I had put a twist in that she was Kalarel's mother (he was a half-elf IIRC..if not, he was in my campaign). She was one of the skeletal archers along with Kalarel the lich...I might bring her back again as well.

One other recurring thing I did...Irontooth TPK'd the original party..which was ok, as they were using the pregens anyway. So, the new party arrives (via escape from sembia--I'm running the series in the Forgotten Realms) and picks up where the other party left off. So, occasionally, I'd throw in the true fate of their 1st Characters. One had been killed outright (so his body was found when they defeated Irontooth), the rest had been captured and sold to the slavers. The dwarf was sacrificed by Kalarel. The Halfling escaped and helped them some in Thunderspire (I used him instead of the halfing in the 1st encounter). The wizard was one of the two captives in the Well of Demons end fight (the other was the sage guy from winterhaven) and got zapped durring the fight. Oh, the dragonborn's skeleton was found in the prisons on the 1st level of Shadowfell keep (in one of the cells next to Splug).

 

[Rechan]

I've made some plot adjustments myself, although just in the peripheral.

I have a gnome feylock player, and his Patron is a powerful Fae of Euphoric Consumption; an eater of dreams, memories, and personality. She is sealed away in the Feywild. The Gnome is tasked to rescue a fey important to his Patron, which is currently bound somewhere inside the Keep.

Another element is an aristocrat from Fallcrest, who hired two of the PCs to escort her to Winterhaven, and to help her find her daughter. She is relative to Padriag, and her daughter was visiting Padriag's; the girl has disappeared. Unknown to the woman, her daughter has joined Karalel's cult (the second level of the Keep is wholly cultists, instead of hobgoblins).

The dragon in the dragon's burial, I decided, was a shadow dragon. This is pertinent because the mirror in the grave site is an artifact, an object Touched by the Raven Queen. It has her reflection caught in it, and thus it is a connection to the Raven Queen that Kalarel is securing for the Ashen Covenant.

I also felt Kalarel didn't appear enough in the module; he just shows up at the end. So, all the "notes" distributed through the module are actually skulls with Magic Mouths, dictating in Kalarel's voice.

Since I think I will not run H3, and I am going to heavily edit H2 so it's not a string of unrelated dungeon crawls, I have room for Kalarel to pop back up (and other elements to creep in), but I got nothing definite, just yet.

One final adjustment I made, just because I wanted to change the Kobold/Irontooth encounter: a betrayal by the TIamat priest that lead the kobolds before Irontooth showed up. The kobold approached the PCs and asked for help; he'll let them into an escape tunnel right into the Kobold nest, and lead them right to Irontooth. So the PCs are going to go all covert. Of course, the place is still trapped and kobold rich, and the hammer is going to drop; but once Irontooth is dead, the key is to get the hell out/i].