Mongoose's "The Drow War I - The Gathering Storm"

[Man-thing]

Mark Gedak and his team did the majority of the Drow War playtesting, and they were VERY thorough.

Thanks. We enjoyed part one and two immensely and are just delving into 3 now.

 

[Man-thing]

That would work - he also posts here, I think.

Yep, posting right now in fact.

 

[johnsemlak]

Are these two items the same?

At Amazon.com

at Drivethrurpg.com

 

[Cavalorn]

Are these two items the same?

The Amazon one has the wrong cover shown and the wrong author listed, but appears to be the same book. They are probably going off old preorder data. The DriveThruRPG one is definitely the right product.

 

[JamesL85]

Cavalorn, I have a couple of questions for you.....Or maybe for any one that has or is running this campaign.

SPOILER:

Spoiler

I've read almost all the way through (I'm in Appendix 2 now) and the main thing that's been bothering me is how I'll handle character death. How can I plausibly bring in a new Starborn character if one of the players dies and either doesn't want to come back, or can't for some reason.

The other question involves the Signature Items. When you gain a plus on an item due to level gain, can you save that plus until you want to spend it on a +2 or +3 ability, or do you spend it on a +1, and then trade that ability the next time you get a plus one and but a +2?

OK.....Now I guess I have 3 questions.....We'll put the first and second together and ask about the Signature Item for a dead character. Are the signature items meant for just one character, or any of the Starborn???

Sorry if my questions were answered somewhere in the module, I've been reading it off and on when I get a little spare time. Thanks for the help.....

James

 

[catsclaw227]

Yep, posting right now in fact.

Hi Mark --

How much time did your party spend in Saragost before going off to the Lost Villages (CH 4)?

Did they try to take on the Drow on the ship?

CC

 

[catsclaw227]

Cavalorn, I have a couple of questions for you.....Or maybe for any one that has or is running this campaign.

I handled death (and the addition of a new player) by having them come through a node, as the Goddess "revives" new stars to help her in the defeat of the host.

I added 2 new players this way, and gave them some background about how they stumbled along to find the party.

 

[Man-thing]

It is important thant the players learn the importance of the nodes. It must be made clear to them in Saragost if they haven't found it out some other way.

Essentially are you need to do is take the dead to a node to get them brought back to life. In book I there are a lot of nodes so its not that inconvient. I think it notes in The Ragged Man that Starborn in possession of their signature items can sense the existance of a nearby node (could be wrong on this though).

Signature items - spend the bonuses right away. You can reconfigure your weapon at each level.

Signature Items and Starborn - each starborn can configure a signature item in a unique way. I think if your players start swapping weapons I would rule that after a signature item has been first augmented by a player it takes 1 week to attune to a new wielder.

I believe the idea was that you would talk to your players ahead of time and find out what types of weapons they planned to use regularly and use these are your signature items.
(of course it doesn't have to be weapons, it could be armour or even items [with some work])

 

[Man-thing]

Hi Mark --

How much time did your party spend in Saragost before going off to the Lost Villages (CH 4)?

Did they try to take on the Drow on the ship?

CC

Probably not as long as we should have. We did "Warning the Council", "Alchemist's Warehouse", "The Ratmasters" but my party was itching to move so we saved the drow plots until just before the battle.

I think this was a bad decision because we found ourselves underpowered for Vannondale and did not win a powerful ally.


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One important thing to note is that the module is really two parts, once you leave Saragost after the war the tone becomes much darker and the risks noticely increase (though still managable). Do everything you can to earn experience before leaving Saragost. Plus some genuinely creepy moments in the Ragged Man section.

 

[Waylander the Slayer]

The module is very well designed - how would you recommend getting rid of the starhost stuff. I discussed with my players and they will absolutely never play anything so linear where the player characters cannot die and are the "chosen ones".