One-shot opportunity

[Elfshire]

I feel like there's been a lot of negative feelings lately toward all the delays on the Zeitgeist stuff coming out. Personally, it doesn't really affect me, as my group usually meets just barely more often than once a month, and it'll probably take them more than a year at their current speed to get from their current point in Chapter 3 up through the end of Chapter 7. Even if it did, I'd like to think I would be easygoing about it - the product I'm getting is definitely worth the amount of money I've put in thus far, and the rare little pieces of it I don't admire are easy enough to buff away with houserules. I'm no stranger to the idea that good writing/planning takes time, often longer than you'd first expect. And you guys have always made it worth the wait - even just reading the pdfs on their own is a great source of inspiration and entertainment for me.

... That said, I've now found myself in a pickle. One of the players at my table has told her friends about how much fun she's having in this campaign, and now I have a smaller group of players who will be in town for the weekend of March 29, and would very much like to run one of the ZG-themed sidequests I've been mentioning to my fellow gamers.

Is there any chance I could get my hands on the text for one of the "side quests," preferably Bonds of Forced Faith? I'd like to spread the Zeitgeist love to some new group, and come away with a story that I can share with my long-term group that will draw them further into the setting. But it's looking like I won't be able to get my hands on most of the pdfs anytime soon.

If it'll sweeten the pot, I'll share the story of how it went, favorite scenes by players, etc.

 

[Morrus]

I think Ryan uploaded the manuscript for Crypta Hereticarum to the Gold forum, but - and I may be mistaken on this - I don't believe he's written Bonds of Forced Faith yet! Absent time travel, that'll put something of a crimp in your plan, unfortunately! (Ryan can correct me if I'm wrong).

 

[Elfshire]

I can make Crypta Hereticarum work for my group, if needed.

I apologize - I assumed Bonds of Forced Faith was written in some form, since it was playtested at GenCon, according to the Aug 22 Kickstarter update.

 

[Morrus]

I can make Crypta Hereticarum work for my group, if needed.

I apologize - I assumed Bonds of Forced Faith was written in some form, since it was playtested at GenCon, according to the Aug 22 Kickstarter update.

Ah, then yeah, it probably exists! (I was actually in that game).

 

[RangerWickett]

I ran the game at GenCon using modified D&D Next rules. I later posted the material I used here: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showth...xt-Play-Test&p=6175324&viewfull=1#post6175324

I basically used D&D Next as written for everything except character creation. Much easier for a convention one-shot, and I got to make more interesting PCs. If that doesn't work for you, email me at ryanznock@gmail.com.

 

[Elfshire]

Oh, sweet, I didn't even see that. DnD Next should work for this group - I'll take a closer look at it tonight. Thanks so much!

 

[Bruize]

I saw this and looked for the Crypta Hereticarum, but I don't see it. Am I right that it's not in the subscriber download area yet? I only ask because my group will be ready to head there in a week or two.

 

[Morrus]

I saw this and looked for the Crypta Hereticarum, but I don't see it. Am I right that it's not in the subscriber download area yet? I only ask because my group will be ready to head there in a week or two.

The initial manuscript is in the Gold subscribers forum, but no, the product does not as yet exist.

 

[Elfshire]

Results

The one-shot session went great.

I had a good mix of players - one or two each from the spectrum of (haven't played DnD at all/Have played a previous edition/Have actually tried playtesting Next). One of my players was from my main game group, and her mind was blown at seeing a character sheet with Harkover's face sitting across the table from her.

Things got off to a slow start, but after some prompting, the players went right into their battle plan, with most everyone having something to offer thanks to the well-designed character sheets that prompted everyone into that initial discussion of what they knew about Contessa and the witches.

With no handy in-game way to track the passing of time, I elected to just have the eclipse occur at 10:47 pm REAL time, with the session starting around 6:30. I set my cell phone to go off each time the moon moved into a new phase, which really seemed to up the excitement factor at the table; everyone knew they only had so much time left to get to the mountaintop. My only regret with this move was that the players' arguments ran a little hotter... in hindsight, I should've backed up the reason to go save Langford with some more incentive, because the party was split over whether to leave her to die and head to the mountain or not.

The battles themselves were a little awkward, which is mostly due to Next being new and half-designed (for instance, the heroes wanted to try drowning Deliria, which was a great idea, except that Next doesn't appear to have rules for that). Everyone seemed to get a huge kick out of their powers, though the least experienced player at the table got stuck with what I thought was the most complex character - Roland. That caused some difficulty.

I redesigned the climb up Cauldron Hill, taking out some of the Climb checks and replacing it with a sort of skill challenge that involved making good use of the king's assembled soldiers. Basically, each player had to roll checks to get past obstacles, and the DC for each was set pretty high. If you fell short on your roll, however, you could get a +1 for each soldier you had assist, though they had to stay behind afterwards (this didn't mean necessarily that they died, probably they're just covering your tracks). I should've fiddled with it more, but it gave the party an excellent reason for trying to keep the soldiers alive during the part of the climb with all the shadow creatures skulking about. Tomas got the idea of using Harkover's fire magic to superheat his ghost urn's contents and turn it into steam to blast them all away!

Due to time constraints, Harkover used his portal to skip over the ledge where Pernicity was hiding, then the party trekked up to the peak. The soldiers stayed behind, as I made it pretty clear they'd be cannon fodder to someone as powerful as the Red Contessa. Lorcan burned his action point to charge into the clearing and leap into the pot (acting on Langston's false information), taking 20 damage and elicting a remark of "Well, thanks for saving me the trouble!" from Contessa.

Having used up all the ghost urn's holy water, the ghost coven was pretty invulnerable to the party's attacks, but its own spells seemed only marginally useful. I had to stop using its Dispel ability after Tomas learned to redirect it to himself, thereby placing the Contessa in its area and making her far less effective. Even so, she managed to get Curse of the Writhing Cauldron on Tomas, which dropped him next turn. Lorcan savagely sliced her with his claymore, to no effect.

"I'm bonded to the WHOLE CITY, fools!" she cried, finally nudging the players into realizing they had to break the ritual first. Melissa realized she had Break Stuff as a skill, and broke the cauldron on her very next turn... 10 minutes before maximum eclipse! The party was pretty beat-up by that point, but Harkover's area of effects started clearing out the goblins, and Amielle's gunshots took down the witch, rolling a massive 35 damage with her musket, which wasn't even a critical. She turned into a blood ooze instead of dying, but even then the party came together and struck her down.

All in all, everyone enjoyed themselves, myself included. And one or two of the players approached me afterward, eager to learn about all the secret things on the character sheets; I think I may very well have encouraged one of them to start up a ZG group of their own!