Wrathamon
Adventurer
I just finished running this adventure and it went fairly well. The group had fun which is what really matters. It was a bit hack and slash heavy for my group but they still had good times.
They were a smaller group... 3 players and 1 NPC (see below) and they finished just shy of level 14.
I very rarely had to scale down an encounter. Couple I had to, some on the fly. They are pretty obvious which ones... but a few are tricky. You have to read the encounters carefully to see all the nuances to potential threats.
The group was not very prepared for Trolls... You think the title would have clued them in, but once they retrained the trolls went down easy.
[sblock] If the group does not Fire or acid powers they will have a hard time... if they have nothing... I might say they wont be able to kill them without some DM intervention or fudging... because of the Troll Healing. If they have fire and acid at wills... the trolls will go down easy.
My group retrained but were bummed cause there isnt very many trolls near the end of the adventure and they felt like they retrained for nothing.
[/sblock]
There are a couple TPK potential encounters depending on when the Players encounter them...
[sblock] my group almost died at the Roper as they tried to hide to rest for the day [/sblock]
I found several of the encounters to be very memorable
[sblock] Roper was brutal... the fight with the Fomorian was epic. I actually felt this was more like a final Boss round then Vard. The toughest fight was the Hags - they were fully rested and still had a tough time. [/sblock]
I agree that Skalmad could be repetitive... I just didnt use all of his bag of tricks in the first encounter.
Bax issues... the Killer NPC
[sblock]by the way is superman - he might be too powerful to "add" to most parties, as he does way more damage then most PCs and is very hard to hit with superior defenses. If it wasnt for him they would have died... Bax ended up getting killed by Vard in the last battle.[/sblock]
My group did not go back to town... and because of that skipped a 3rd of the adventure and some very cool encounters that I will have to re-purpose.
[sblock] I was thinking of using those encounters as part of a fomorian cyclops invasion on Cedulion in the feywild... the group has to get back to the normal plane some how! I would have to make sure to scale the encounters properly since one formorian is formidable. Any thoughts on how to convert the troll invasion of moonstair to a formorian invasion of an eladrin city? [/sblock]
Overall, it was a fun adventure... not a lot of investigation ( the swamp journey could have lots depending on the DM, but as written for novice DMs they may just blow through it) my group still doesnt get skill challenges (and I am still trying to find the best method to run them), but I tried to play up the vastness of the swamp, and the great potential to get lost. The warren wasnt too big to become a grind (like KotSF). Unfortunately, the town encounters didnt happen, but the feywild mixed things up. I felt some of the encounters there were pretty weak compared to the others. It felt a bit disjointed. Couple interesting Puzzles that could make certain encounters "grind" if the party doesnt pick up on the clues. Btw I recommend the web enhancement encounters as they added a bit more backstory for me to play with.
I'm looking forward to P2 and see how it goes.
They were a smaller group... 3 players and 1 NPC (see below) and they finished just shy of level 14.
I very rarely had to scale down an encounter. Couple I had to, some on the fly. They are pretty obvious which ones... but a few are tricky. You have to read the encounters carefully to see all the nuances to potential threats.
The group was not very prepared for Trolls... You think the title would have clued them in, but once they retrained the trolls went down easy.
[sblock] If the group does not Fire or acid powers they will have a hard time... if they have nothing... I might say they wont be able to kill them without some DM intervention or fudging... because of the Troll Healing. If they have fire and acid at wills... the trolls will go down easy.
My group retrained but were bummed cause there isnt very many trolls near the end of the adventure and they felt like they retrained for nothing.
[/sblock]
There are a couple TPK potential encounters depending on when the Players encounter them...
[sblock] my group almost died at the Roper as they tried to hide to rest for the day [/sblock]
I found several of the encounters to be very memorable
[sblock] Roper was brutal... the fight with the Fomorian was epic. I actually felt this was more like a final Boss round then Vard. The toughest fight was the Hags - they were fully rested and still had a tough time. [/sblock]
I agree that Skalmad could be repetitive... I just didnt use all of his bag of tricks in the first encounter.
Bax issues... the Killer NPC
[sblock]by the way is superman - he might be too powerful to "add" to most parties, as he does way more damage then most PCs and is very hard to hit with superior defenses. If it wasnt for him they would have died... Bax ended up getting killed by Vard in the last battle.[/sblock]
My group did not go back to town... and because of that skipped a 3rd of the adventure and some very cool encounters that I will have to re-purpose.
[sblock] I was thinking of using those encounters as part of a fomorian cyclops invasion on Cedulion in the feywild... the group has to get back to the normal plane some how! I would have to make sure to scale the encounters properly since one formorian is formidable. Any thoughts on how to convert the troll invasion of moonstair to a formorian invasion of an eladrin city? [/sblock]
Overall, it was a fun adventure... not a lot of investigation ( the swamp journey could have lots depending on the DM, but as written for novice DMs they may just blow through it) my group still doesnt get skill challenges (and I am still trying to find the best method to run them), but I tried to play up the vastness of the swamp, and the great potential to get lost. The warren wasnt too big to become a grind (like KotSF). Unfortunately, the town encounters didnt happen, but the feywild mixed things up. I felt some of the encounters there were pretty weak compared to the others. It felt a bit disjointed. Couple interesting Puzzles that could make certain encounters "grind" if the party doesnt pick up on the clues. Btw I recommend the web enhancement encounters as they added a bit more backstory for me to play with.
I'm looking forward to P2 and see how it goes.
