Nutation
Explorer
An excuse to transplant this from the Wizards' board, where I was replying to Pauper:
I ran this five times at GenCon.
The final copy is much clearer than the playtest. Explanations of things have changed, and some additional possible PC actions are accounted for. The flow and mechanical details are just about the same, however.
This module generally runs quickly. It fits in the 3.5 hour GenCon slot, unlike some others at the con. Pauper covered the story flow, so I will only get into that where events can branch out and differ. So, spoilers!
.
.
.
.
.
People liked my puppet show, what can I say. There's time available to ham up the acting, throw in some biggoted guard dialog later, and (sometimes) detail the final rioting.
The party arrives at a valley that is the site of burned down halfling homes and some new building. Potentially, they will swallow the story of the humans who are present. ("Elves attacked.") Not likely though, as the PCs can also talk to a human miller and an elf (Deriel) in hiding who have the real story - it was the Red Plumes of Hillsfar.
Here is the first branch point: The PCs are going to go after the Red Plumes, and they will either follow the elf into an ambush or be suspicious. Or go by themselves and have the same fight. The real branch point is whether they surrender, lose quickly, or drag it out. The fight doesn't scale upward, so a very strong party can win or escape.
I'm not real happy with this design. Another module at the convention also had a "supposed to lose" fight as well, so some players saw two of them. Besides the heavy-handed writing, a long fight eats into time, and a fight where some PCs escape then requires complicated management by the DM. I saw pretty much every possible outcome.
So, PCs captured and wheeled off to Hillsfar along with the halflings they were looking for. Depending on the time, they can banter with the evil mastermind, console the halflings, etc. As Pauper observed, though, they probably recover all their resources before the next fight.
Hillsfar is full of crazy people, an indication of the Rage of Demons storyline. PCs get examined and sold at the arena, a scene I prefer not to put a lot of detail into, but it's another RP opportunity.
The arena fight is fun and three-dimensional. I did run this after Epic3 for some players who saw both modules, and they didn't let on about it being a let-down. But, I see the point. More problematic, the enemy halflings probably have too many hitpoints to beat in a straight-up fight. But, the audience riots at some point, and that can easily be before the PCs are in too bad a shape.
(Parenthetically, I had two groups that never got to the arena fight. One was because they were powerful and cut a deal with the Red Plumes, the other because some PCs escaped they wanted to try a breakout the night before. Always say yes to your players by default. For these, I manufactured a setting below the arena in which the guards let out the rabid enemy halflings to deal with escaping PCs.)
One thing Pauper didn't see is other possible interactions with Deriel. She's thrown in with the PCs before the arena fight, despondent because she has lost her drow lover from 3-1 part 2. PCs can treat her like dirt (and she kills herself) or they can cheer her up, earning XP and a possible ally.
At the end of the arena fight, the evil mastermind (see above) d-doors in to pick up the fight while the audience is rioting. Various things can happen. He's powerful enough on his own that I usually leave his guards behind. (Arena guards, actually, not as strong as the Red Plumes.) Some groups beat him (with difficulty); at least one just ran.
At this point, the great escape, entirely in narration. The PCs know where the halflings are to be rescued, down in the utility rooms of the arena. They should just choose that route for their exit. I don't know why a DM wouldn't just decree this to be the plan.
There's an awkwardness as I see it regarding Deriel's drow lover from 3-1. If Deriel was cheered up and survived, the PCs can also rescue him from the arena cages. But, as I understand it, the drow most often dies in the prior module.
In conclusion, I like the storyline except for the manditory loss. That could have just been done with narration, or the whole module could be restructured to avoid it. The fact that at least 2 other stories out there have the same gimmick means, though, that someone likes it a lot. There's plenty of opportunity for RP in this and the time to do it.
We have to wait for future modules for the consequences of the rioting in Hillsfar. Both 3-3 and 3-4 take place in the Underdark. Epic 3 didn't mention it, but that has a narrow scope.
I ran this five times at GenCon.
The final copy is much clearer than the playtest. Explanations of things have changed, and some additional possible PC actions are accounted for. The flow and mechanical details are just about the same, however.
This module generally runs quickly. It fits in the 3.5 hour GenCon slot, unlike some others at the con. Pauper covered the story flow, so I will only get into that where events can branch out and differ. So, spoilers!
.
.
.
.
.
People liked my puppet show, what can I say. There's time available to ham up the acting, throw in some biggoted guard dialog later, and (sometimes) detail the final rioting.
The party arrives at a valley that is the site of burned down halfling homes and some new building. Potentially, they will swallow the story of the humans who are present. ("Elves attacked.") Not likely though, as the PCs can also talk to a human miller and an elf (Deriel) in hiding who have the real story - it was the Red Plumes of Hillsfar.
Here is the first branch point: The PCs are going to go after the Red Plumes, and they will either follow the elf into an ambush or be suspicious. Or go by themselves and have the same fight. The real branch point is whether they surrender, lose quickly, or drag it out. The fight doesn't scale upward, so a very strong party can win or escape.
I'm not real happy with this design. Another module at the convention also had a "supposed to lose" fight as well, so some players saw two of them. Besides the heavy-handed writing, a long fight eats into time, and a fight where some PCs escape then requires complicated management by the DM. I saw pretty much every possible outcome.
So, PCs captured and wheeled off to Hillsfar along with the halflings they were looking for. Depending on the time, they can banter with the evil mastermind, console the halflings, etc. As Pauper observed, though, they probably recover all their resources before the next fight.
Hillsfar is full of crazy people, an indication of the Rage of Demons storyline. PCs get examined and sold at the arena, a scene I prefer not to put a lot of detail into, but it's another RP opportunity.
The arena fight is fun and three-dimensional. I did run this after Epic3 for some players who saw both modules, and they didn't let on about it being a let-down. But, I see the point. More problematic, the enemy halflings probably have too many hitpoints to beat in a straight-up fight. But, the audience riots at some point, and that can easily be before the PCs are in too bad a shape.
(Parenthetically, I had two groups that never got to the arena fight. One was because they were powerful and cut a deal with the Red Plumes, the other because some PCs escaped they wanted to try a breakout the night before. Always say yes to your players by default. For these, I manufactured a setting below the arena in which the guards let out the rabid enemy halflings to deal with escaping PCs.)
One thing Pauper didn't see is other possible interactions with Deriel. She's thrown in with the PCs before the arena fight, despondent because she has lost her drow lover from 3-1 part 2. PCs can treat her like dirt (and she kills herself) or they can cheer her up, earning XP and a possible ally.
At the end of the arena fight, the evil mastermind (see above) d-doors in to pick up the fight while the audience is rioting. Various things can happen. He's powerful enough on his own that I usually leave his guards behind. (Arena guards, actually, not as strong as the Red Plumes.) Some groups beat him (with difficulty); at least one just ran.
At this point, the great escape, entirely in narration. The PCs know where the halflings are to be rescued, down in the utility rooms of the arena. They should just choose that route for their exit. I don't know why a DM wouldn't just decree this to be the plan.
There's an awkwardness as I see it regarding Deriel's drow lover from 3-1. If Deriel was cheered up and survived, the PCs can also rescue him from the arena cages. But, as I understand it, the drow most often dies in the prior module.
In conclusion, I like the storyline except for the manditory loss. That could have just been done with narration, or the whole module could be restructured to avoid it. The fact that at least 2 other stories out there have the same gimmick means, though, that someone likes it a lot. There's plenty of opportunity for RP in this and the time to do it.
We have to wait for future modules for the consequences of the rioting in Hillsfar. Both 3-3 and 3-4 take place in the Underdark. Epic 3 didn't mention it, but that has a narrow scope.
). I had advised him the Ambush encounter needs to be played out straight to the point with a mind to capturing the pcs. 
