KotS and Irregular Party Size?

[essenbee]

We are running the module unchanged, with 4 PCs who began at 1st level (Eladrin archer ranger, human rogue, human cleric and dragonborn fighter). They are doing very well, and reached 3rd level whilst about 4/5ths of the way through the first dungeon level.

 

[OchreJelly]

We just finished KotS last week. For most sessions I had 4 players but for some there were 3. I would typically eyeball some of the tougher fights and pull out 4 minions or a single standard monster. That was usually enough.

Interestingly the last two encounters I ran pretty much as is against 4 players (all roles were covered too). The party rogue got dropped right near the end of the last fight, but they all managed to survive. It was a tough, but good encounter for 4.

The net effect of running 4 was that they are all pretty close to level 5, even with skipping a few areas.

 

[Nail]

However, I am still trying to gauge the time involved in running KotS. This will be a 1 weekend only run. I am guessing at about 16 hours of game time. I am worried that 16 hours won't be enough to run even 75% of KotS though. How many hours have people put into this when running it?

My first group got to the end of level 1 after 30 hours of gaming.

One weekend.

We called it "4e bootcamp".

There are 24 combat encounters and about 6 role-playing encounters. I usually figure at least 90 minutes per encounter (which includes exploration and "now what?" time). So that's 45 hours worth of gaming goodness in KotS.

Ain't no way yer getting thru it with only 16 hours of playtime.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I am worried that 16 hours won't be enough to run even 75% of KotS though. How many hours have people put into this when running it?

We've gone six sessions (averaging about 5 hours each), so far, and we just completed the encounter with the Zombies, Ghoul & Homunculus. I think we're about done. We're a large group, though, 7 players, with no more than one missing per session, and the encounters are expanded to match, which surely slows things down.

I'd suggest that a lot of encounters could be done away with: the second kobold ambush, the archaelogical dig, and all the cavern encounters, for instance. The undead encounters leading to Sir Keegan could be trimmed down to only one, too, and the Hobgoblins, likewise.

Of course, you still have to get your part to the right level to face Kalarel.

You could skip the Kobolds entirely, start your party at 2nd level, and send them straight to a slimmed-down Keep.

 

[Khaalis]

Thanks for all the great insight to KotS, especially the time estimates of the content and suggestions on how to trim down the basic ideas to slim down the time required, making it more of a single adventure rather than a series of related mini-adventures.