RangerWickett
Legend
We have nothing at all planned long-term for the arsonists. Have at 'em.
ZEITGEIST The Flint Irregulars, whose portraits you may have seen
Ajar
Explorer
Four sessions in a row without a fight, and my players keep telling me how much fun they're having. Great work, guys. 
This one was actually last week, I just hadn't had a chance to make notes. We're planning to play again on Wednesday night.
Session Overview (Digging for Lies, Act 1)
When we ended last time, Bela's former squadmates had contacted the party and asked them to look at an unusual murder scene. In the basement of a steel mill, they found a dessicated corpse and a shattered golem. They spent quite a lot of time examining the scene, and were able to draw some reasonable conclusions, including links to whatever group Macbannin was working with/for.
From there, they went to meet with Dr Xambria Meredith. She was interested in talking to the RHC, especially since the constables mentioned that they planned to go to the dig site. She spoke about what happened there, albeit with some difficulty, gaps, and odd pauses where she stared off into space or questioned them about phantom noises. Once they moved on to questions about the Ancients in general, she became much more enthusiastic, although she was forced to admit that her theory about them is somewhat speculative and has only circumstantial evidence to support it.
DM Notes
I took this opportunity to give my players a nudge about using checks other than Perception when investigating crime scenes. When someone asked to examine the body using Perception, I explicitly called for a Heal check instead. This led to a small flurry of other ideas from them and they ended up uncovering a fair bit of information. OTOH, they're investing in a couple of diadems of perception or something like that with their level 6 stipend.
I did give the PCs Insight rolls to recall that they had seen someone with Magneto-like powers before, because the scene with Quital happened a long time ago, but it isn't something their characters would have forgotten. I wasn't sure if it would be better to do that or to wait until Quital shows up again and enjoy watching the light bulbs going on, but as it turned out, it got the players thinking and speculating about the big picture, which they seemed to enjoy. For other DMs, I'd say make the judgment based on your players and what you think they would enjoy more.
I had spent a lot of time preparing for the meeting with Xambria, and had extensive character notes on how to play her and what knowledge she had/was willing to share. I tried not to overplay her odd behaviour, for a couple of reasons: first I wanted to leave the PCs wondering whether it was a result of the trauma, of Distant Madness, or something else; second, I wanted to stretch my DM acting range a bit and try for genuine pathos. I think it was successful, although I haven't asked the players about it yet.
Questions
No questions this time, but then I haven't read Act Two in detail yet, so I may come back with some about the dungeon crawl.
This one was actually last week, I just hadn't had a chance to make notes. We're planning to play again on Wednesday night. Session Overview (Digging for Lies, Act 1)
When we ended last time, Bela's former squadmates had contacted the party and asked them to look at an unusual murder scene. In the basement of a steel mill, they found a dessicated corpse and a shattered golem. They spent quite a lot of time examining the scene, and were able to draw some reasonable conclusions, including links to whatever group Macbannin was working with/for.
From there, they went to meet with Dr Xambria Meredith. She was interested in talking to the RHC, especially since the constables mentioned that they planned to go to the dig site. She spoke about what happened there, albeit with some difficulty, gaps, and odd pauses where she stared off into space or questioned them about phantom noises. Once they moved on to questions about the Ancients in general, she became much more enthusiastic, although she was forced to admit that her theory about them is somewhat speculative and has only circumstantial evidence to support it.
DM Notes
I took this opportunity to give my players a nudge about using checks other than Perception when investigating crime scenes. When someone asked to examine the body using Perception, I explicitly called for a Heal check instead. This led to a small flurry of other ideas from them and they ended up uncovering a fair bit of information. OTOH, they're investing in a couple of diadems of perception or something like that with their level 6 stipend.
I did give the PCs Insight rolls to recall that they had seen someone with Magneto-like powers before, because the scene with Quital happened a long time ago, but it isn't something their characters would have forgotten. I wasn't sure if it would be better to do that or to wait until Quital shows up again and enjoy watching the light bulbs going on, but as it turned out, it got the players thinking and speculating about the big picture, which they seemed to enjoy. For other DMs, I'd say make the judgment based on your players and what you think they would enjoy more.
I had spent a lot of time preparing for the meeting with Xambria, and had extensive character notes on how to play her and what knowledge she had/was willing to share. I tried not to overplay her odd behaviour, for a couple of reasons: first I wanted to leave the PCs wondering whether it was a result of the trauma, of Distant Madness, or something else; second, I wanted to stretch my DM acting range a bit and try for genuine pathos. I think it was successful, although I haven't asked the players about it yet.
Questions
No questions this time, but then I haven't read Act Two in detail yet, so I may come back with some about the dungeon crawl.
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Ajar
Explorer
Five sessions without a fight!
Session Overview (Digging for Lies, Act 1/2)
This session covered Act 1 cleanup and travel to the Ziggurat of Apet. After the meeting with Xambria, the PCs received stipends for the upcoming trip (and leveled up to 6), and did some shopping. Most of the mundane and common items were readily obtained, but a few of the less common requests required some time spent hunting around the more obscure shops, which in turn meant delaying their departure by a day.
The next morning, a couple of constables were approached by nosy neighbours, with eerily similar news: their residences appeared to be under surveillance by ne'er-do-wells.
While Reginald and Bela hunted around Flint for a pair of magical goggles and a psionic orb, the other constables obtained a cart and hauled the bodies of the otherworldly monsters to a Risuri military outpost. They were greeted by Tolyayle, one of Murdok's military college friends, who turned out to be working for the colonel who requested the cadavers. Tolyayle listened to Murdok's description with interest, and promised to forward the military's findings to the RHC.
En route, Vesta told the others about the letter he'd received instructing him to kill Rock Rackus. He believed it to be a fake, because the Vekeshi don't normally communicate in this manner. The constables agreed to alert the local police (holding Rock Rackus on suspicion of muder/manslaughter) to the possibility of an attempt on his life, without mentioning the Vekeshi. In light of the recent high-profile deaths at RHC HQ, they were able to persuade the police to transfer Rackus to a maximum security cell and post additional guards.
The PCs told the same story to Delft, who was (secretly) somewhat suspicious, but believed them because they have so far played things very straight with him (generally leaving nothing out of their reports).
Murdok returned home to talk to Agnes Mildew, her nosiest cat lady neighbour with a fondness for decorative spoons, and persuaded her to keep an eye on Murdok's place while she was out of town -- in exchange for a decorative spoon from Bole, of course.
Then they set out, renting most of a car on the red-eye overnight train to Bole. Bole proved to be a quiet backwater, where they actually had to wake up the duty officer at the RHC office to ask some questions. He'd heard about the expedition, but only thirdhand, so he didn't have any useful information for the PCs. He did tell them about their biggest local headache, a dispute over logging rights in an area east of Bole, between a new conglomerate and the forest fey.
Then it was onward to Agate. Some asking around in Agate corroborated Xambria's story, but also revealed that a well-equipped group had passed through quietly a couple of weeks ago, removing something that sounded suspiciously like a giant golden seal.
Not to be deterred, the constables hired pole boats and pressed on into the High Bayou. Thanks to Murdok's uncanny navigation abilities (unerring internal compass), they made the best possible time to the campsite and were only mildly fatigued upon arrival.
The sight of the ziggurat, however, was another matter. There was a wrongness about it that assaulted their minds, leaving three constables (Bela, Murdok, and Viveen) afflicted with Distant Madness...
DM Notes
I had fun with the country bumpkin RHC officer in Bole, snoring in my chair until the players "woke me up," and dropping my best Canadian y'alls on my American players.
I also had fun describing the High Bayou to the PCs. They were pretty disgusted by the giant webs and white crocodiles. I'm looking forward to the flood in the Ziggurat...
No one thought of the Voice of Rot, even after my repeated mentions of fey (red flags along the train tracks, the logging dispute) so that reveal will be pretty fun.
I prepared the entire Ziggurat sequence ahead of time in MapTool, integrating token vision for the first time. We tested it this time even though they didn't actually reach the Ziggurat, and got the fog of war to work correctly with dynamic light sources and PCs with normal or low-light vision. I've integrated the trap labels into a hidden background layer so that I can reveal one trap at a time as the PCs discover/encounter them. I think that's going to make the actualy dungeon crawl really cool.
For now, I'm just using drawing to show the rainbow puzzle, but I'm considering creating tokens for the bridges, since it's easier to hide/show a token than it is to draw/erase a shaded object. That probably won't take too long once I find the right tokens, and it should make the puzzle easier to run. I do have the updated rainbow puzzle image from the thread here, so I should be able to run the puzzle correctly.
I'm pretty excited about running an actual dungeon crawl for the first time in the campaign. Especially a trap-riddled dungeon with a timed escape at the end. I think my players are somewhat concerned for their safety, and they should be...
Session Overview (Digging for Lies, Act 1/2)
This session covered Act 1 cleanup and travel to the Ziggurat of Apet. After the meeting with Xambria, the PCs received stipends for the upcoming trip (and leveled up to 6), and did some shopping. Most of the mundane and common items were readily obtained, but a few of the less common requests required some time spent hunting around the more obscure shops, which in turn meant delaying their departure by a day.
The next morning, a couple of constables were approached by nosy neighbours, with eerily similar news: their residences appeared to be under surveillance by ne'er-do-wells.
While Reginald and Bela hunted around Flint for a pair of magical goggles and a psionic orb, the other constables obtained a cart and hauled the bodies of the otherworldly monsters to a Risuri military outpost. They were greeted by Tolyayle, one of Murdok's military college friends, who turned out to be working for the colonel who requested the cadavers. Tolyayle listened to Murdok's description with interest, and promised to forward the military's findings to the RHC.
En route, Vesta told the others about the letter he'd received instructing him to kill Rock Rackus. He believed it to be a fake, because the Vekeshi don't normally communicate in this manner. The constables agreed to alert the local police (holding Rock Rackus on suspicion of muder/manslaughter) to the possibility of an attempt on his life, without mentioning the Vekeshi. In light of the recent high-profile deaths at RHC HQ, they were able to persuade the police to transfer Rackus to a maximum security cell and post additional guards.
The PCs told the same story to Delft, who was (secretly) somewhat suspicious, but believed them because they have so far played things very straight with him (generally leaving nothing out of their reports).
Murdok returned home to talk to Agnes Mildew, her nosiest cat lady neighbour with a fondness for decorative spoons, and persuaded her to keep an eye on Murdok's place while she was out of town -- in exchange for a decorative spoon from Bole, of course.
Then they set out, renting most of a car on the red-eye overnight train to Bole. Bole proved to be a quiet backwater, where they actually had to wake up the duty officer at the RHC office to ask some questions. He'd heard about the expedition, but only thirdhand, so he didn't have any useful information for the PCs. He did tell them about their biggest local headache, a dispute over logging rights in an area east of Bole, between a new conglomerate and the forest fey.
Then it was onward to Agate. Some asking around in Agate corroborated Xambria's story, but also revealed that a well-equipped group had passed through quietly a couple of weeks ago, removing something that sounded suspiciously like a giant golden seal.
Not to be deterred, the constables hired pole boats and pressed on into the High Bayou. Thanks to Murdok's uncanny navigation abilities (unerring internal compass), they made the best possible time to the campsite and were only mildly fatigued upon arrival.
The sight of the ziggurat, however, was another matter. There was a wrongness about it that assaulted their minds, leaving three constables (Bela, Murdok, and Viveen) afflicted with Distant Madness...
DM Notes
I had fun with the country bumpkin RHC officer in Bole, snoring in my chair until the players "woke me up," and dropping my best Canadian y'alls on my American players.
I also had fun describing the High Bayou to the PCs. They were pretty disgusted by the giant webs and white crocodiles. I'm looking forward to the flood in the Ziggurat...
No one thought of the Voice of Rot, even after my repeated mentions of fey (red flags along the train tracks, the logging dispute) so that reveal will be pretty fun.
I prepared the entire Ziggurat sequence ahead of time in MapTool, integrating token vision for the first time. We tested it this time even though they didn't actually reach the Ziggurat, and got the fog of war to work correctly with dynamic light sources and PCs with normal or low-light vision. I've integrated the trap labels into a hidden background layer so that I can reveal one trap at a time as the PCs discover/encounter them. I think that's going to make the actualy dungeon crawl really cool.
For now, I'm just using drawing to show the rainbow puzzle, but I'm considering creating tokens for the bridges, since it's easier to hide/show a token than it is to draw/erase a shaded object. That probably won't take too long once I find the right tokens, and it should make the puzzle easier to run. I do have the updated rainbow puzzle image from the thread here, so I should be able to run the puzzle correctly.
I'm pretty excited about running an actual dungeon crawl for the first time in the campaign. Especially a trap-riddled dungeon with a timed escape at the end. I think my players are somewhat concerned for their safety, and they should be...
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Ajar
Explorer
Short session last night due to technical difficulties. The players explored the camp, then (finally) entered the ziggurat. Murdok immediately used a grappling hook and rope to snag one of the golden chains from the ceiling carvings, but was disappointed that doing so didn't trigger anything.
They explored the east path, found the closed double doors, and checked them for traps, finding none. Then, they immediately turned around and went the other way, walking right into the first flame burst trap.
They were blasted badly enough by that to retreat to the entrance and take a short rest. Vesta went back and tried an Arcana check to suppress the trap, but failed and got blasted again. They didn't consider trying anything with the symbol, or really anything at all not involving a skill check, which I think is partly on me -- I was almost pure mechanics once they went inside.
I haven't run a dungeon crawl in years, so that may be why, but I wasn't happy about it. I'm going to spend some time this weekend rereading the ziggurat area descriptions and trying to use more descriptive language in play next week.
I've written up personalized vision emails to send to each player, but I'm saving them until they get a little further along.
They explored the east path, found the closed double doors, and checked them for traps, finding none. Then, they immediately turned around and went the other way, walking right into the first flame burst trap.
They were blasted badly enough by that to retreat to the entrance and take a short rest. Vesta went back and tried an Arcana check to suppress the trap, but failed and got blasted again. They didn't consider trying anything with the symbol, or really anything at all not involving a skill check, which I think is partly on me -- I was almost pure mechanics once they went inside.
I haven't run a dungeon crawl in years, so that may be why, but I wasn't happy about it. I'm going to spend some time this weekend rereading the ziggurat area descriptions and trying to use more descriptive language in play next week. I've written up personalized vision emails to send to each player, but I'm saving them until they get a little further along.
Ajar
Explorer
Second session in the ziggurat on Friday went much better. I was a lot more descriptive about the traps, and while the players still didn't think to try any non-skill check interactions with the traps, I think that's okay -- they did describe their skill checks in world terms, and sooner or later one of them will make a Perception check high enough to be tipped off to the hooks that are built in to each trap, and once that happens they'll start thinking about the other ones.
They continued their exploration of the eastern passage, displaying a surprising amount of paranoia about what could be behind the double doors on the western route. They were very concerned about why the archaeologists or Cauis' expedition would have bothered to close the doors behind them. I hadn't intended to make them paranoid (all I said was "You find no traps, but no traps go off..."), but I did take a certain perverse enjoyment in blasting them with fire traps, crushing them with illusory falling rock traps, tricking them with illusory bottomless pit traps, and stabbing them with spear traps... all the while chuckling to myself about how they had chosen this path versus the puzzle/encounter that's behind the double doors, which would have been trivial to solve for my party of 5 that includes 3 engineers possessing or working on postgraduate degrees.
The dungeon has proven to be quite well-designed so far, and my players are really enjoying the fact that I set up dynamic lighting for the dungeon map in MapTool, so areas are revealed automatically as they move their tokens, depending on what kind of light source the PC is carrying and what kind of vision they have.
Roll20 recently added dynamic lighting as a beta feature, and once it's stable we'll most likely switch over. Roll20 is a lot less fiddly than MapTool, and I have plenty of art assets for it courtesy of having been a TableTop Forge Kickstarter backer (they ended up merging).
*
The encounter with the bizarre creatures in the illusory bottomless pit trap room was very interesting. Bela was the only one who failed his save, and so he believed he was falling. None of the PCs attempted to disbelieve the trap initially, so they just let Bela fall and continued fighting the monsters in the increasingly small amount of available floor space. It wasn't until Viveen was crawling along the wall (and getting stabbed by spear traps) that it occurred to her that the floor might not be real. A Dungeoneering check suggested that the chamber was improbably constructed, opening up Wisdom checks for everyone to disbelieve the trap. Bela was very relieved to realize he was just lying prone on the floor and not one round of psychic damage from being KOed and gaining a mind scar from Distant Madness.
They continued their exploration of the eastern passage, displaying a surprising amount of paranoia about what could be behind the double doors on the western route. They were very concerned about why the archaeologists or Cauis' expedition would have bothered to close the doors behind them. I hadn't intended to make them paranoid (all I said was "You find no traps, but no traps go off..."), but I did take a certain perverse enjoyment in blasting them with fire traps, crushing them with illusory falling rock traps, tricking them with illusory bottomless pit traps, and stabbing them with spear traps... all the while chuckling to myself about how they had chosen this path versus the puzzle/encounter that's behind the double doors, which would have been trivial to solve for my party of 5 that includes 3 engineers possessing or working on postgraduate degrees.
The dungeon has proven to be quite well-designed so far, and my players are really enjoying the fact that I set up dynamic lighting for the dungeon map in MapTool, so areas are revealed automatically as they move their tokens, depending on what kind of light source the PC is carrying and what kind of vision they have.
Roll20 recently added dynamic lighting as a beta feature, and once it's stable we'll most likely switch over. Roll20 is a lot less fiddly than MapTool, and I have plenty of art assets for it courtesy of having been a TableTop Forge Kickstarter backer (they ended up merging).
*
The encounter with the bizarre creatures in the illusory bottomless pit trap room was very interesting. Bela was the only one who failed his save, and so he believed he was falling. None of the PCs attempted to disbelieve the trap initially, so they just let Bela fall and continued fighting the monsters in the increasingly small amount of available floor space. It wasn't until Viveen was crawling along the wall (and getting stabbed by spear traps) that it occurred to her that the floor might not be real. A Dungeoneering check suggested that the chamber was improbably constructed, opening up Wisdom checks for everyone to disbelieve the trap. Bela was very relieved to realize he was just lying prone on the floor and not one round of psychic damage from being KOed and gaining a mind scar from Distant Madness.
Ajar
Explorer
Last night, the constables reached Area 10: the seal room. They proceeded somewhat cautiously, intentionally triggering the spear traps and then trying to grab the spears from the mummies and stab them through the spear holes. When they got to Area 10, they lifted up the carpet and found the symbol of Nem, but when they didn't immediately detect any traps in the vicinity, they decided to just head into the room anyway. It wasn't long afterward that they triggered the toxic flood and dead rising traps.
Reginald did touch the false seal, and figure out that it had been brought here by Caius' expedition from somewhere else in the ziggurat, and they also studied the protection rituals around the seal. But shortly thereafter, Vesta and Bela saw the water flowing down the hall, so the party decided to get moving.
They didn't want to go back the way they came, so instead they headed down the middle passage, which naturally turned out to be filled with traps. They got midway down the passage when we stopped, so next time they'll reach the foyer again and find the beefier mummies waiting for them.
After all of my painstaking MapTool setup, they have completely avoided the rainbow puzzle room. Although since they also haven't found the map room and therefore have no idea where the next Ziggurat is, they may end up going back into the Ziggurat of Apet after escaping (?) the flood.
Reginald did touch the false seal, and figure out that it had been brought here by Caius' expedition from somewhere else in the ziggurat, and they also studied the protection rituals around the seal. But shortly thereafter, Vesta and Bela saw the water flowing down the hall, so the party decided to get moving.
They didn't want to go back the way they came, so instead they headed down the middle passage, which naturally turned out to be filled with traps. They got midway down the passage when we stopped, so next time they'll reach the foyer again and find the beefier mummies waiting for them.
After all of my painstaking MapTool setup, they have completely avoided the rainbow puzzle room. Although since they also haven't found the map room and therefore have no idea where the next Ziggurat is, they may end up going back into the Ziggurat of Apet after escaping (?) the flood.
gideonpepys
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but they should be able to get that information from the documents found with Caius Bergeron. They could also follow Xambria even if they don't find that information either. There's more than one way to skin a cat!
It might also be fun to have Xambria reference the Rainbow puzzle and the map room when they meet her out atsea (so they know what they missed).
Sound of Azure
Contemplative Soul
So I wasn't the only one, haha! My group managed to avoid everything except the middle corridor, the map room, the false seal room (disabling the water trap), and the main seal room. The traps weren't even a problem with a high wisdom elf monk spotting everything, and the party getting a lot of advice from their "rock star" friend, Rock Rackus- who they'd dragged along due to his bragging about beating the Jiese ziggurat.
Yeah, this is good advice.gideonpepys said:
Ajar
Explorer
The constables did manage to escape the ziggurat with no deaths. They did open the door to the rainbow room, so they at least saw the puzzle (and as I predicted, immediately grasped the solution). Not wanting to battle their way through the room as the toxic flood approached, though, they closed the door and retreated out of the ziggurat.
They thought the Voice of Rot was very cool. It took them some discussion before they began to grok its message, but they came to relatively accurate conclusions -- somewhat surprising given the minimal information they gained from the ziggurat, but nice to see.
When we stopped, they were deciding whether to reenter the ziggurat or escape the bayou on their boats. I didn't see a mention in the adventure of whether the toxic flood trap resets/drains, or if the ziggurat will just stay flooded now. I know one DM posted that he had the VoR tell the PCs to go back into the ziggurat because there was more to learn, but I think gideonpepys and Sound of Azure are right that this isn't strictly necessary.
They do have some Water Breathing scrolls that they kept from the Axis Island expedition, but I don't think they have a way to resist both poison and necrotic damage, so the flooded ziggurat would be inaccessible barring some exceptionally clever idea that I've missed. I think that actually sends an important message to the players: things can be changed irrevocably by their actions.
They thought the Voice of Rot was very cool. It took them some discussion before they began to grok its message, but they came to relatively accurate conclusions -- somewhat surprising given the minimal information they gained from the ziggurat, but nice to see.
When we stopped, they were deciding whether to reenter the ziggurat or escape the bayou on their boats. I didn't see a mention in the adventure of whether the toxic flood trap resets/drains, or if the ziggurat will just stay flooded now. I know one DM posted that he had the VoR tell the PCs to go back into the ziggurat because there was more to learn, but I think gideonpepys and Sound of Azure are right that this isn't strictly necessary.
They do have some Water Breathing scrolls that they kept from the Axis Island expedition, but I don't think they have a way to resist both poison and necrotic damage, so the flooded ziggurat would be inaccessible barring some exceptionally clever idea that I've missed. I think that actually sends an important message to the players: things can be changed irrevocably by their actions.
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