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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Alzrius" data-source="post: 5809331" data-attributes="member: 8461">In my campaign, we're in book four, "Blood for Blood," and things are starting to deviate wildly from how the adventure path assumes they'll go.Basically, after the first attack on Tatzlford, the PCs (all of whom are now 9th level) were very hesitant to mount a retaliatory attack on Drelev. This was for several reasons - winter was coming, and ever since the campaign began, I'd been hitting them with fairly substantial penalties where traveling through the cold and snow was concerned.Moreover, they were very worried about interfering in another nation's politics. They'd heard of the problematic relationship between Pitax and Drelev, and wanted no part of it. Moreover, they thought that the initial force sent after the runaway NPC (whose name escapes me at the moment; I changed him into a man named Kieren) were more focused on retrieval and not causing an international incident, so they didn't take it as a pretext to invade.Finally, roughly half the group was of an isolationist stance anyway. They saw little use for going into another nation and destabilizing their government (they did decide to send a spy to Drelev, <a href="http://alzrius.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/the-antisocial-network/" target="_blank">using the espionage rules I wrote</a>, and learned that Drelev's government had largely capitulated to Pitax anyway), particularly since the group has been much more focused on expanding their (two) cities than on claiming more land.The result of this was that roughly six months went by before the group decided to do anything, and even then it only happened after Iomedae appeared in the dream of the group's cleric and told her to bring justice to the corrupt government on behalf of Drelev's people.Even then, the group (of seven players) were split, with four deciding to go and three staying behind. The four who went to Drelev managed to sneak into the city, posing as mercenaries, and set up shop at the Velvet Corner. Their plan was to gather more intelligence - first about the giants patrolling the town at night - before trying to rally the people, but even then they were squeamish about assassinating a head of state.Unfortunately, things got worse. When the stone giants (I changed them to that instead of hill giants, as I'd been anticipating the entire group going to Drelev) left the keep that evening, it was in pursuit of a man fleeing from the keep on horseback.Uncertain of what to do, they decided to act when the giants were moving in for the kill after having managed to down the man. At first things went well for the band of four; they managed to distract five of the six stone giants, and quickly dispatched the first one with relatively few injuries. Unfortunately, the other five quickly realized that they'd been duped, and ran towards the sounds of battle.Even then, the group was holding their own for a bit, but when a giant's critical hit with Power Attack downed the barbarian, things suddenly turned against the group. Eventually, the cleric of Iomedae sent the other two of her surviving comrades away while she faced down the remaining three giants herself, killing one before she was brought down.When the other two returned after an hour or so, the survivng giants and all of the bodies were gone (I didn't tell them, but it's because these stone giants are cannibals, exiled for their criminal ways)...but in their retreat, the giants forgot about the downed rider (he was at the edge of the map). Finding that he was unconscious but alive, the group revived him...only to find that he was the spy they'd sent months ago!The spy informed them that he was riding back after he'd managed to find out terrible news. The barbarian horde that had taken the hostages from Drelev months before had now fully prepared itself for war...and was marching towards the PCs nation. It would be there in about a week.We broke as the ranger of the group used an animal messenger spell to send advanced warning to the others back in their country, and was force marching to try and get back in time to help...</blockquote>

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