Pathfinder 1E Paizo, Kobolds, Aliens, and Saw

[Aholibamah]

One of the myths of D&D is that you need to up the level of monsters to suit the pcs. I know that this is because of experience points, but a creative DM can get around that, especially with the ideas 3.5 has presented for experience for completing tasks and adventures, not just for killing stuff.

One of the most effective adventures I did for horror was running "Meenlock Prison" from Dungeon 146, which I actually used for 7th level pcs. Meenlocks are hardly all that tough, and certainly didn't present an adequate purely physical challenge for the pcs. However boy were they freaked out. I fitted it into a side trek the pcs were doing to get a prisoner for questioning about the real adventure they were doing. When they arrived they found the prison was creepy and eerily quiet except for a few half mad prisoners and some escapees who were pretending to be guards in order to make their getaway. Inside the meenlocks were slowly driving the prisoners mad. It was really just pure psychology.

One idea I quite liked in the earlier part of this thread was using pure atmosphere--the bones making up the structure of walls, the stench, the darkness. Make kobolds predatory and just plain evil and players won't consider them minor monsters at all--they'll want to wipe them off the face of the earth.

 

[Rechan]

Howdy, Rechan --

The creepiest segments of Pathfinder 2 were, to me, the cornfield stuff. The ghouls took over a village, then, as people came in, caught them, infected them, and then strapped them to the posts as scarecrows out in the cornfield.

I guess I just got a different impression. Because from what it said, whenever someone got within 30 feet, they'd just leap off their perch onto the people, screaming. Less creepy stalking, more shrieking monstrosity. And after the first or second did it, you'd just start shooting at the scarecrows you came to.

The creepiest part of Children of the Corn, for me, were the utterly, utterly soulless children. So I just didn't get that vibe from the ghouls.

 

[Carpe DM]

yeah -- if I ever run that module, I'm going to run the ghouls as soulless farm kids.

 

[Rabelais]

With new interpretations, a little mis-direction goes A LONG WAY. I love the idea of using Kobolds just a little bit differently. Bleed the PCs with the death of 1000 cuts.

Taren's Ferry is about to have a Kobold problem methinks

 

[rich pett]

Howdy, Rechan --

The creepiest segments of Pathfinder 2 were, to me, the cornfield stuff. The ghouls took over a village, then, as people came in, caught them, infected them, and then strapped them to the posts as scarecrows out in the cornfield.

Can you imagine, at night, through the rows of corn? You look up, and see the scarecrow is suddenly gone from its perch. If the ghouls in that section are not "He Who Walks Behind the Rows," I'll eat my hat.

Huzzah!

Those scarecrows were really good fun to write, I've never seen children of the corn but I think I'll try to find a copy, a few days after I sent the adventure in Dr Who featured some truly wonderful scarecrows so I was flattered by coincidence

The whole adventure really came from chatting to James Jacobs about doing a hammer horror type adventure, they were great films and always playing about in foggy horrible places, also last summer we had a great cornfleld near where I live in England and it was easy to imagine something in the centre watching....

I'd like to do something similar with wererats some time in a city, and hopefully if you go for Escape from Old Korvosa you'll get a similar feeling of being watched but in a much more crowded place and by something much harder to see.

Rich

 

[Jack99]

Even so. I CAN'T WAIT THAT LONG.

Any chance you might sneak a mention of which monsters are getting in the book? Not all, but say, a half dozen mentioned?

From Paizo's webpage regarding said book.

Now, the minds that bring you Pathfinder have applied the same method to ten “classic” monsters, providing complete ecological discussions and adventure ideas involving orcs, ogres, goblins, hobgoblins, trolls, bugbears, and more in this lavishly illustrated, full-color 64-page overview that is both fun to read and fun to use at the gaming table.

I can't wait either...

 

[Rechan]

The whole adventure really came from chatting to James Jacobs about doing a hammer horror type adventure

Hammer Horror?

I'd like to do something similar with wererats some time in a city, and hopefully if you go for Escape from Old Korvosa you'll get a similar feeling of being watched but in a much more crowded place and by something much harder to see.

Escape from Old Korvosa? You mean like, Escape from New York or something?

Regardless, you did a real good job with it. I loved the Misgivings manor. Although I'm not quite sure how the PCs are supposed to figure out that the mold = the haunting presence.

 

[Rechan]

From Paizo's webpage regarding said book.

I can't wait either...

Over On the Paizo Board I asked, and I got this much:

We'll see 3 of the following 4: Medusa, Minotaur, Gnoll and Kobold.

 

[rich pett]

Hammer Horror?.

This page is quite good fun (although it is a bit gruesome if you don't like gothic stuff):

http://usersites.horrorfind.com/home/horror/hammercinema/homepage.html

Escape from Old Korvosa? You mean like, Escape from New York or something?
.

Regardless, you did a real good job with it. I loved the Misgivings manor. Although I'm not quite sure how the PCs are supposed to figure out that the mold = the haunting presence.

Cheers! - Misgivings was good fun, and a good point which begs the question 'do the PCs really have to destroy the shadow stain?' I quite like the idea of the PCs not solving this riddle and the house remaining bad. There are some interesting conjectures about moving into the house over on the Paizo messageboards if you'd care to have a wander over.

Rich

 

[Set]

Kobolds in one game I ran weren't just vaguely related to dragons, they hatched in litters
from unfertilized dragon eggs, and tended to be slavishly devoted to their mother.
The 'wild' kobolds were descended from clans of kobolds who had outlived their draconic
parent (or been thrown out or abandoned by a dragoness who was changing lairs or
whatever), and were savage and vicious, vainly attempting to 'prove their worth' to their
dragon-gods by killing livestock and wild animals with traps and staking them out as tribute
for 'the dragons.' (Which generally ended up being a windfall for the local vulture
population, anyway.)

They also held whatever forces their dragon used as sacred, so a clan of kobolds descended
from a Red Dragoness would have dark reddish tint to their scales, limited fire resistance,
and prefer to kill their prey by putting them in bonfires. Black and Green Dragon-descended
kobolds would gather natural acids (or brew them up with crude alchemy) and sacrifice
their kills by dousing them in acid, etc.

So, two kinds of kobolds, either desperate little packs of savage fanatics, running around
burning stuff, kidnapping people and putting them in bonfires and mutilating cattle to leave
as tribute to the 'gods' who have forsaken them, or organized and servile cultists to a very
real and active dragoness. Woe unto the adventurers who slaughter a band of 'nuisances'
to discover that they were not 'wild...'