DM wants to abandon RttToEE...(spoilers) - long

[Dark Dragon]

What does CRM mean? Abbreviations are only fun if they're shared.

--G

Crater Ridge Mines (where the four temples are).

 

[Goobermunch]

Thanks.

--G

 

[Gumby]

My players and I were all getting bored with the CRM after going through roughly half of it, so the characters decided to take a break, rent a house in Verbobonc, and create magic stuff.

When they came back, it turned out that the CRM had been invaded by multiple groups of low-level adventurers, who were all fighting each other over "adventuring turf." As the players started to enter the mines, the Champion of Elemental Evil appeared, killed the last few newbies, and told the party (who he was already acquainted with), two things:

1. He was "cleaning house."
2. "Welcome home."

The CRM were completely looted, with only dead bodies strewn around. The PCs had the items required to reach the outer and inner fane, and thanks to some homebrew adventures on the road, were high-enough level to just go on in.

Let your DM know that it's perfectly fine to, for example, just dump the CRM - it only really exists to level up the PCs. The Inner Fane can be still locked up, but perhaps the keys can be obtained by going off to different planes and parleying with elementals or something else.

It's a very long module, and if the DM wants to add things, it's not a bad idea to take other things out.

 

[LGodamus]

Honestly the problem seems to be with the way your DM scaled the adventure rather than with the adventure itself...if he is getting frustrated he needs to adjust it...that is his job after all..

 

[Liminal Syzygy]

Yep, that's often a problem with scaling, is that DMs scale to where EVERY encounter is a "challenge". That quickly becomes exhausting.

Let the PCs mow down or scare off a lot of low level opposition.

 

[Hygric]

The DM over-copmensates for your higher level and then gets annoyed at party deaths? That 'aint the modules fault... especially considering how lethal it can be for characters that are at the level that the module reckons you should be (that IS the modules fault).

As for the CRM, yup, it's huge. My PC's when I ran it only did about half of it (Earth, Air and Fire temples, skipping some of the little bits between and all of the water temple and adjoining areas). If you have the traditional attitude of kick in every door and loot every coppper piece you will be in for a monstrous hack and slash of mind numbing proportions.

 

[Nareau]

I've been running into similar problems with my RttToEE campaign. I feel bad about it, but I've been artificially holding my PC's back from advancing in level for a few sessions...simply because I don't want to get on that downward spiral of having to adjust every single encounter for a group that's too powerful. They've been good sports about it, and we're past the point where I felt it was necessary. But I have felt the need to limit the power levels of the PC's.

You might consider some alternatives:
Let the group play the bad guys for a while. The cult may be involved in other projects throughout the world. Maybe they've got dopplegangers trying to start a war. Maybe they have agents exploring other ways of bringing about the apocalypse. Maybe some of their priests are tracking down the friends and family of the PC's in order to do horrible things to them. At any rate, it might be fun to play a side adventure loosely related to the main plot, just to take a break. My group has done exactly this...twice. Once they played some cultists, the other time they played some reckless "Indiana Jones" types. Both side-treks were a lot of fun, and allowed us to explore more aspects of the adventure than the main dungeon-crawl.

I'm reading stuff into your post, and I apologize if I'm missing the mark. But I agree some others that it sounds like your DM is not so much frustrated with the module, rather with the high-level stuff he's having to deal with. He's having to re-write every encounter, add stuff in, etc. in order to challenge you guys...and it sounds like he's overdoing it. What if the group of PC's you're playing now were to be called off to do something else, more appropriate to their power-level. War, demonic invasion, etc. are all major events that could distract a high-level group. Once they're out of the way, start playing with a lower-level group (you should be about 9th-10th level at this point in the module). Let the DM run the module as written, and it might be more fun.

If you build a group that's focused on disguise, bluffing, diplomacy, knowledge (religion), etc., you can focus more on the investigation and role-playing aspects of the adventure. That may be a more rewarding way for the DM to run it, rather than a bunch of combats.

I hope your campaign can be salvaged. I have had fun with the adventure, and look forward to completing it in the next few months.

And I second that recommendation to have your DM visit Monte's message boards. There are some very creative folks over there, with loads of additional material (FAQ's, errata, maps, etc.) It's only for DM's, so don't go peeking yourself!
http://pub58.ezboard.com/fokayyourturnfrm17

Good luck,
Spider

 

[Mark]

The next DM in charge is me...

...(I have already some adventures, but I don't like them much, most of them are meat grinders..Tomb of Horrors and the like).

The problem is to get some fun back to game...

Any ideas for a good changeover...

When you change over, have everyone create new 1st-level characters and pass them to the player on the right. Sometimes shaking things up in this way helps breath new life into a group. Even if you do not try out this experiment, pick up an adventure with as much or more roleplaying as combat.

Here's my suggestion- Questus - The Whispering Woodwind

Of course, I might be biased...

 

[Dark Dragon]

You might consider some alternatives:
Let the group play the bad guys for a while. The cult may be involved in other projects throughout the world. Maybe they've got dopplegangers trying to start a war. Maybe they have agents exploring other ways of bringing about the apocalypse. Maybe some of their priests are tracking down the friends and family of the PC's in order to do horrible things to them.

Hehe, that's nearly exactly what the DM has done: A demonic doppleganger killed most friends of the PCs in a cruel way and destroyed their castle (it was a funny story to get the castle build). The group has an old wizard's tower in the wild as a secondary HQ, and a few (very powerful) friends are not attacked by the demon (they're druids and live in a very remote area, and one of them is a Chosen of Mielikki). The group would ask the druids for help if things stay that bad.

At any rate, it might be fun to play a side adventure loosely related to the main plot, just to take a break. My group has done exactly this...twice. Once they played some cultists, the other time they played some reckless "Indiana Jones" types. Both side-treks were a lot of fun, and allowed us to explore more aspects of the adventure than the main dungeon-crawl.

Hmm, the cult has nearly reached its goal (we got that information from different sources), so it would be funny but would finnish the story quickly, I guess.

I'm reading stuff into your post, and I apologize if I'm missing the mark. But I agree some others that it sounds like your DM is not so much frustrated with the module, rather with the high-level stuff he's having to deal with. He's having to re-write every encounter, add stuff in, etc. in order to challenge you guys...and it sounds like he's overdoing it. What if the group of PC's you're playing now were to be called off to do something else, more appropriate to their power-level. War, demonic invasion, etc. are all major events that could distract a high-level group. Once they're out of the way, start playing with a lower-level group (you should be about 9th-10th level at this point in the module). Let the DM run the module as written, and it might be more fun.

I think the DM has problems with the module, the rules and a high-level campaign (more with latter, he admitted). Granted, it IS work to build (or refit) a campaign for powerful PCs, but a DM should know that (our DM is familiar to RPGs for over 15 years).

Perhaps a break from RttToEE is a good way to calm things down. The group has caused some havoc and trouble, maybe the cult needs some time to repair the damage done. When we start with new characters in some months, years (who knows), the rookies could test out the cult's strength...

If you build a group that's focused on disguise, bluffing, diplomacy, knowledge (religion), etc., you can focus more on the investigation and role-playing aspects of the adventure. That may be a more rewarding way for the DM to run it, rather than a bunch of combats.

Well, the current group IS already focused on these skills and role-playing is favored over H&S (remember: we tried to talk to the high-priest even when the situation became dangerous. Getting informations from prisoners became soon an important goal, but it was useless in most cases..). An alliance with the Water Temple was an option, but the paladin refused to work with evil persons (and the player followed perfectly the rules), so we went on alone.

I hope your campaign can be salvaged. I have had fun with the adventure, and look forward to completing it in the next few months.

And I second that recommendation to have your DM visit Monte's message boards. There are some very creative folks over there, with loads of additional material (FAQ's, errata, maps, etc.) It's only for DM's, so don't go peeking yourself!
http://pub58.ezboard.com/fokayyourturnfrm17

Good luck,
Spider

Thanks,
I'm not sure if he knows the URL you've posted, but perhaps there's a link from Monte's homepage.

Originally posted by Mark
When you change over, have everyone create new 1st-level characters and pass them to the player on the right. Sometimes shaking things up in this way helps breath new life into a group. Even if you do not try out this experiment, pick up an adventure with as much or more roleplaying as combat.

Hmm, nice idea, but I fear that not all players will agree to that...As a DM, I like mid to high (if not epic) level campaigns with lots of role-playing options, but I'll see what will happen next week-end...

 

[TiQuinn]

That's one of the problems: Even the best strategies resulted in defeat and/or more problems. Dead characters are a part of D&D and each player in the group knows that. But if the PCs keep dying despite best efforts and good role-playing, fun dies, too.

I don't mean to be too critical, but I think your DM is making things too difficult. Part of the DM's job is to make sure everyone's having fun (including himself). I totally believe that DMs need to fudge die rolls if said die roll jeopardizes people's fun. It doesn't sound as if your DM does that too much.

Part of the problem is also the module. I ran quite a bit of the module, and realized that there is a lot of work involved in making the module "live". It's very easy for it to become a linear dungeon crawl, with wide gaps between story developments. A DM really needs to be on top of things, and read the players feelings towards the game. It is a DIFFICULT module to make a campaign out of.