Barrow of the Forgotten King for larger group

[carborundum]

I'll be running Barrow of the Forgotten King in about 10 days over a whole weekend. There are 6 confirmed players and I'm wondering how best to scale it up. They've already got 2nd level characters ready, point buy 28 points and equipped with 500gp each.

I'd appreciate tips from people who have ran this in the past.

Are there any specific opponents you recommend I boost? I was thinking on adding 1 or 2 mooks per encounter, and giving maxed hit points to the single creature encounters, and maybe also a non-specified +1 or +2 to hit/ save/ AC.

Are there any areas you think I should enlarge to avoid compromising villain mobility?

And ... just tips please!

 

[Grymar]

Be careful on buffing it too much. I ran 4 2nd levels through it and dropped a few of them into the negatives three or four times. It is a tough little adventure. Especially the ogre skeleton...that can one-shot a lot of characters and if your party doesn't have anything to bypass its DR, it can be a long hard fight.

As you move on, though, add a mook per group combat. The varags are nice to fight and adding another won't hurt. You may also want to rebuild the final battle, I thought it was a bit easy as written, especially compared to the rest of the adventure.

Overall, though, it is a great little module. Good luck.

 

[questing gm]

Thanks for the heads up.
I'm about to run this one too, after my group of 6 1st levels complete the Scourge of the Howling Horde, which should take them to 2nd level with a few extra XP.

 

[Rauol_Duke]

No Need...

I started running this adventure for a group of 7 PC's the other weekend and it went fine as written. In fact (Spoiler ahead...)

the Ogre Zombie was nearly a TPK for them... SLAM!!!

If you feel they are having too easy a time of it, maybe increase the number of some of the low CR mooks by one or so, but I wouldn't do too much. The adventure is pretty challenging as is...

 

[regularjoe]

From a player perspective, we started the it with seven 2nd level characters and it's been a grind. Aforementioned ogre skeleton killed a member and it's been touch and go every fight. I don't think the encounters need to be scaled up - just my two cents.

 

[wolff96]

We had a lot of fun with it. One arcanist, one rogue... and three clerics. (No, we didn't know the module ahead of time.)

Suffice to say, it wasn't that bad of a module for our gang. One of the clerics has the feat that can maximize all healing done until the end of his next round -- three clerics firing off maximized heals and just about any undead is dust. (The particular undead foe mentioned in Rauol_Duke's post didn't have a chance.)

 

[Grymar]

Good point, a cleric heavy group will do well in the first half of the barrow. Even then, there are some great battles later on where unusual terrain is used...it can be a real challenge.

 

[carborundum]

Thanks for the tips. I'll take it slowly since they'll basically grind until someone dies then send a runner for a replacement while they sleep
I'll read up on terrain rules too - good tip!

So far it looks like 3 rogues, 2 fighters and a wizard They're in trouble!

 

[Grymar]

Yeah, they'll have a hard time through the start. Once they get to the living foes, they should do well though. They'll still be better off than my party: 1 rogue/barbarian, 1 druid, 1 ranger, 1 bard. Can you say squishy?