(Discussion) General Part VII

[Knight Otu]

It would be difficult to write the outline, I agree, and maybe difficult to run. But it might work as a LEW adventure, and enrich LEW as a whole (obviously not the exact same plotline ).
But you won't know for sure until you try. If you want to, that is.

 

[Knight Otu]

Orsal, when you see this, could you please e-mail me?

Just in case the other post gets lost in the shuffle by the time orsal is online.

 

[Rystil Arden]

It would be difficult to write the outline, I agree, and maybe difficult to run. But it might work as a LEW adventure, and enrich LEW as a whole (obviously not the exact same plotline ).
But you won't know for sure until you try. If you want to, that is.

Heh, of course not the same plotline; it couldn't work without the bajillion variant races and classes I created and the exact same party setup (that's another thing: I had them make characters first and then I created the adventure based on their class choices and histories; so really I didn't even do part one of the outline thing that time, D'oh!).

 

[Knight Otu]

Part one of the outlinne could always read "Everyone."
We did not have many adventures where characters where already placed when the adventures were proposed, the most recent ones Kahuna Burger's new adventure (where Sparky's character was already in), and Manzanita's M2, where the old party got a few additional members in the inn before moving on.

 

[Rystil Arden]

Part one of the outlinne could always read "Everyone."
We did not have many adventures where characters where already placed when the adventures were proposed, the most recent ones Kahuna Burger's new adventure (where Sparky's character was already in), and Manzanita's M2, where the old party got a few additional members in the inn before moving on.

Part one of the outlinne could always read "Everyone."

Heehee. So would something like this get past:

1) Everyone can play
2) There's a Jewel that a Whole Bunch of People Want, and Your Job is to Find it First
3) The PCs try to find the Jewel first. Other people also try to find it first.
4) Finding the Jewel and possibly dealing with other people that also want to find it first.
5) If you bring back the Jewel to its owner, you get 5,000 GP to share amongst the party. Also, experience will be awarded based on taking what the crazy DMG chart says, dividing by a large number to keep it reasonable, and giving a little bit of what I took away back as RPing and Story-Based awards

 

[Bront]

Yeah, that's a good idea. Manzanita does that with Monemvassia, I've added a few Sairundani bits into Dance of Souls, and I do have some ideas about an adventure in Sairundan itself. By the way, Bront, did you read the post on Sairundan in the "heap" thread?

No, I'll go check that out.

Edit:
Read it. Interesting. I like the idea. I've played a character from a society like that before, and he was interesting and enjoyable.

I see a lot that is needed to be added to the freefolk (or at least enough to fully characterize them, more than is there now probably). I'll try to reformat it to that format. Untill then I'm also open for any interesting ideas that others may find that will fit into the Freefolk concept. Part of why I post something as a proposal is to bounce it off people here and tweek it. I have lots of ideas bouncing in my head, but I've found I tend to be a bit of a raw writer unless I am consiously try to submit it for review. Plus, Enworld is "our" world, so I don't want to simply turn it into "My world" with a proposal, just add flavor to be used, or a rules idea to fill a need.

 

[Patlin]

Maybe once an adventure is oover, a DM could "donate" the original outline as a sample, with a link to the adventure thread to show what became of it.

The Burning Tower [Concluded]

Original proposal:
Sitting in the Red Dragon Inn, a band of adventurers hears alarm bells ringing. Joe cocks an ear and says "That's a call for a fire brigade!" rushing to the back room, he brings forth a number of buckets. "Any of you lot willing to help?"
Those who do follow the smoke to a tower across town, where a number of citizens have gathered to fight the fire. In spite of all the smoke, however, no fire is to be seen. The tower appears to be the home of a local mage, and crackling mystic energy pours forth along with the smoke. Most of the citizens stay well back from the arcane display. The adventurers are quickly approached by the sheriff, who asks them to investigate the tower and somehow stop the bizarre display, before it spreads to endanger more of the city.
Players should generally be within 2 alignments of LG (CE,CN,NE will generally not fit in, as the mission is to restore order and help others.) All races and classes welcome. I expect, based on my reading of the character thread, that the players will be between 1st and 3rd level.
Victory will be achieved by exploring the tower and shutting down the pyrotechnic display, which will earn a cash reward from the Sheriff (200 gp split amongst the party.) A good local reputation will likely also result from a successful mission. Minor magic such as scrolls & potions will be found along the way. Characters might also be able to gain access to a spellbook, from which any Wizard PCs could learn spells, and potentially win the friendship of a mid level mage.
The tower is defended, and the characters will face challenges such as fighting and/or negotiating with guardians, traps, and at least one puzzle. I intend to scale the encounter level of the challenges based on the number and level of PCs I get... for example, if I get 4 2nd level PCs, I plan to make encounters about EL 3. I'm keeping my options open as I don't know who will volunteer for the mission.

In general, I'm aiming for a fairly short dungeon crawl type adventure... I'm an experienced DM, but not experienced in play-by-post DMing, so I thought I should start with something modest.

Conversation about proposal:
The questions I ask might potentially bring out spoilers. Just an alert for
Manzanita and Nimisgod if they are interested in the adventure.

> > Joe c o c k s an ear and says "That's a call for a fire brigade!"
I fear ENWorld will filter out the second word.

> > The adventurers are quickly approached by the sheriff, who asks
> > them to investigate the tower and somehow stop the bizarre
> > display, before it spreads to endanger more of the city.
Unless I'm not up to speed with the office terms, I think this would be
Frandeth, referenced to in the following thread (post #17):
http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=61171

Empty space for potential spoilers.

[Deleted]

> > Minor magic such as scrolls & potions
> > will be found along the way. Characters might also be able to gain
> access
> > to a spellbook, from which any Wizard PCs could learn spells, and
> > potentially win the friendship of a mid level mage.
That makes it sound that the wizard in the tower can survive. How woul he
take the news that his tower has been somewhat "plundered" by his rescuers?

Yes, I'd like the party to rescue the Wizard. Depending on the extent of the plundering, it might make an interesting role-playing encounter. My initial impression is that the Wizard will overlook the parties use of/purloining of consumable items such as potions and scrolls. He will demand the return of more lasting items, such as various furnishings or art objects, but could be persuaded to give over some or all of these items as a reward if pressed. The wizard isn't terribly well to do, and many of the items in the tower have been damaged, so sacrificing his good will in this manner would not be very profitable. If the party was so foolish as to try and make off with his spellbook, he would react violently and possibly fatally to the party... but I will make sure to make it clear that this would be a Very Bad Idea (tm) and I would not expect it to occur.

> > The tower is defended, and the characters will face challenges such as
> > fighting and/or negotiating with guardians, traps, and at least one
> > puzzle.
What sort of guardian in general do you have in mind?

I'd like to throw in a few construct encounters and some of the traps will be based on summoning spells.

In general, I think I can give the adventure my ok, but wait for at least
one other judge.

 

[Knight Otu]

Heehee. So would something like this get past:

1) Everyone can play
2) There's a Jewel that a Whole Bunch of People Want, and Your Job is to Find it First
3) The PCs try to find the Jewel first. Other people also try to find it first.
4) Finding the Jewel and possibly dealing with other people that also want to find it first.
5) If you bring back the Jewel to its owner, you get 5,000 GP to share amongst the party. Also, experience will be awarded based on taking what the crazy DMG chart says, dividing by a large number to keep it reasonable, and giving a little bit of what I took away back as RPing and Story-Based awards

Well, if that were to fly into my e-mail folders, I'd ask a few questions.
I'd ask about potential members of the Whole Bunch of People, and why they might want the Jewel that a Whole Bunch of People Want, for example (with the understanding that the list does not have t be exhaustive, and that you don't have to use all the examples you offer). I'd ask you not to divide the XP awards, noting that PbP advancement is slow enough as is, but encourage that story-based awards definitely be used. I might also ask about possible backdrops for the search, and direct you to threads where you could read up on those places if it is necessary.

 

[Rystil Arden]

Well, if that were to fly into my e-mail folders, I'd ask a few questions.
I'd ask about potential members of the Whole Bunch of People, and why they might want the Jewel that a Whole Bunch of People Want, for example (with the understanding that the list does not have t be exhaustive, and that you don't have to use all the examples you offer). I'd ask you not to divide the XP awards, noting that PbP advancement is slow enough as is, but encourage that story-based awards definitely be used. I might also ask about possible backdrops for the search, and direct you to threads where you could read up on those places if it is necessary.

Gotcha. As for the XP:

You did see how fast Destiny's Tears is expanding, right? Honestly, if I didn't divide the XP at all and still offered RP-based awards, one of the characters would have levelled up on the first day. :\

That said, I'm OK with doing it the normal way if that's the preferred method, but if there's anything I learned from my first 3E session ever with the DMG (yeah, we tried to play a bit with only the PH for a bit ) where the characters levelled up four times that day, its that not dividing = very fast levels.

 

[Patlin]

That said, I'm OK with doing it the normal way if that's the preferred method, but if there's anything I learned from my first 3E session ever with the DMG (yeah, we tried to play a bit with only the PH for a bit ) where the characters levelled up four times that day, its that not dividing = very fast levels.

That surprises me. We tend to play for almost 8 hours at a time, and I don't think we've leveled up twice in the same session more than once or twice, if that many times. That's playing once every week or two since shortly after 3e came out. I wonder what we are doing differently? Of course, we don't usually use story awards...