D&D 4E Running player commentary on PCat's 4E Campaign - Heroic tier (finished)

[WizarDru]

"So...uhh, this is the Mudtunnel?"

"Oh, aye! Only way through tha moontaine, innit?"

"...and you liked it so mcuh, you named the town after it?"

"What? Naye, lad...the emperor's tax man what came throo used it during floode season, true? An' he come through it a powerful mess. Right put out, he were. It were halfin'-made, see?"

"Well, I noticed it was rather...shallow, yes."

"Sure as true, it are. An' the tax man, he were a tallbones, like yoo. Came through all a'crouched and fierce mad, see? Damned the whol' a the town for ruining his fine cloak. I imagine it were right nice when it weren't covered in mud and doong."

""DUNG?"

"Well, we hafllins got our carts to move stuff, yes? Them little ponies....well, we're a farmin' community. Don' mean much to us, but it were market day then and the tax man weren't used to bending for others, see? Cursed us with the name 'a 'MudTunnel' and changed it on the Imperial Roles ever since."

"Oh. What was the town called before?"

"Pig Sty. We figured it weren't no step down. It's a fine tunnel, that."

 

[WizarDru]

Oh sure...and right after I hit 'POST', you put up THAT.

Curse you, PC! =D

 

[Trevalon Moonleirion]

PC, I'm officially stealing your escape from the temple skill challenge. It's amazingly awesome and works very well in my upcoming Chicago gameday event. (I even cited you in a footnote on the handout!) Thanks for posting it for consumption!

 

[Emirikol_Prime]

PC, I'm officially stealing your escape from the temple skill challenge. It's amazingly awesome and works very well in my upcoming Chicago gameday event. (I even cited you in a footnote on the handout!) Thanks for posting it for consumption!

Chicago gameday event? Tell us more! Near Joliet myself and have been trying to find a good group.

Rick

 

[Trevalon Moonleirion]

Chicago gameday event? Tell us more! Near Joliet myself and have been trying to find a good group.

Rick

http://www.enworld.org/forum/genera...icago-gameday-24-november-14th-sign-up-6.html

Post in the thread, or get a hold of our esteemed organizer Buzz, and you can get added to the mailling list. We have a little mini-con about 3 times per year. Next one should be in February or March?

As to my pilfered skill challenge....

What fun! I wasn't quite sure how it would work out, but I felt like it was able to condense a lot of action into a few meaningful rolls. I'd like to do more skill challenges like it, though I'm not sure if I could make one myself that I'd be all that proud of.

One thing that I struggled a bit with how to run the skill challenge was how to exactly run it--I settled on just going around the table in order, and asking everyone what they were doing (skill) and to describe how they were doing it. It'd probably be more consistent with the rest of the rules to just go in initiative order, but going around the table was nice and fast. I also got asked a question that I hadn't throught of beforehand, though I think I'm pretty happy with my table ruling: can you do secondary skills before you've escaped, or are they purely for people that succeed on the challenge before everyone else, and are then able to help? I went with the latter--that the PCs first priority was getting out of the place alive, and that only after they made their successes did they get out.

 

[Rechan]

PCat, what has happened to this game? It's been quiet in here for over a month.

 

[jydog1]

PCat, what has happened to this game? It's been quiet in here for over a month.

I just saw most of the players (and the GM!) this weekend and gave them reminders that people are waiting for their updates. They claimed real-life pressures were causing the delay but the guilt is in place and no doubt gnawing away at them as you read this.

 

[Piratecat]

Quick update, as I've been on sabbatical from the intarwebs for a bit. Game is still going strong! Since we last updated here we've had three games: getting to Mudtunnel, dealing with the problems in Mudtunnel, and leaving Mudtunnel. They were all interesting for different reasons. Let's talk about why:

The first of these games turned out to have been the least fun 4e game I've run. I'm still not entirely sure why; I was in a bad mood, while the players were all feeling silly due to not having played in a month. In addition I don't think I was adequately prepped for plot revelations. While I was shooting for the feeling of a country in chaos and prepping for war, I ended up with a lot of giggling and your mom jokes. (NEVER name a town "Mudtunnel"!) I tossed in a so-so fight against bullywugs as a placeholder, but it wasn't particularly notable either way.

The game after that was fantastic. Zarathustran from the boards (who works over at Penny Arcade) was in town to prep for PAX East. I had him play a discouraged, drunk and nervous halfling assassin who was the last one left alive in the Mudtunnel Grey Guard tower. With the PCs drying him out and propping him up, they engaged in a murder investigation to determine why five people in town (starting with Grey Guard members) had died mysteriously. They linked all the victims to mirrors, were attacked by hideous jellyfish-like psychic alien entities that apparently live in the spaces between the reflections, and had to root out a nest of the things on top of Mudtunnel's largest mansion.

Last game started with the group fighting the "beloved of bullywugs", a repurposed grell that swam instead of flew. It tipped their boat in a dangerous current and they fought it while trying to not get sucked into Mudtunnel's deadly vortex of swirling mud. They then traveled south to the capital city of Bressail; the country is alive with the results of its rebellion against the Caprian Empire. Almost every person capable of fighting is being pressed into service, and rumors abound as to whether the new self-styled King is delusional or not to think he can withstand the might of Capria's forces. At the Grey Guard tower in Bressail, they've been told that they are welcome to use the local ritualist -- but that he hasn't returned from a mission into Bressail's sewers. So, out of the swamp and into the sewers, it appears...

Meanwhile, down at Anonycon in CT I ran a 4e adventure that did some interesting riffing on skill challenges. I'll discuss those later once I have a few minutes.

 

[Piratecat]

In that 4e one-shot ("The Caprian Foreign Legion Goes to Tea") I tried two skill challenge variants. The first involved the PCs desperately trying not to be buried alive in shifting sand. I used a 4 success/3 failure model at very hard DCs, but against limited skills (athletics, acrobatics, nature, dungeoneering, + more if the players could rationalize it.) Thing is, everyone had their own challenge. They could help one another if they chose, though; by sacrificing up to a -8 on their check, they could give half of those points to someone else. Thus as an example, the agile fighter once took -8 to give the gnome bard +4 on their check, pushing the bard out of the way of a collapsing dune (a success) but causing the fighter to be partially buried (a failure.)

This went really well, but a separate challenge for everyone meant that I had to move things fast. I went around the table each round, and noted down successes or failures on the heroes' initiative cards. The group worked together to help the people who had multiple failures, and described their actions really cinematically and entertainingly. If it had been more than a 4/3 challenge, though, it would have gone on for too long.

The other skill challenge was a chase against the bad guy. The PCs were on 3 flying carpets (2 people per carpet), and the bad guy was on one. The bad guy had a head start. I handled this by having the driver of each carpet make an acrobatics or arcana check as a full round action to steer the carpet at high speed; the second rider could roll an assist or make a ranged attack, and if the driver wanted to attack their movement results were halved. I recorded these skill check numbers for each carpet. The bad guy was going to be able to do something awful if he reached a total of 200 before the PCs caught up. He had a 50 pt head start, so the PCs were taking risky shortcuts to try and get additional bonuses on their rolls.

Example: At the start of the chase carpet #1 rolls an acrobatics skill check of 31, +2 for an assist, = 33. Carpet #2 rolls an 18, and the second rider casts a spell at the enemy. Carpet #3 rolls a 26 but wants both PCs on it to attack as a standard action instead of steer, so they get a 26/2=13. The bad guy rolls a 25 for his check, and he had a 50 point head start, so he's at 75. They better catch up before he hits 200!

I liked how this felt. It provided a method for chasing someone without using a tactical grid, gave real value to the PCs' choices (I might increase the "aid another" bonus next time so the 2nd PC's choice matters more), and let everyone try cinematic stunts like leaping from one carpet to another. A win all around.

 

[blargney the second]

I like the sound of that chase scene mechanic - I'm definitely going to have to give that a whirl sometime.

(I might increase the "aid another" bonus next time so the 2nd PC's choice matters more)

I have a standing house rule for aid another: +2 if you hit 10, +3 for 20, +4 for 30, etc. My rationale: if you've got an expert helping you or someone that gets really lucky, it should be more beneficial.
-blarg