Noumenon
First Post
Warning: somewhat spoilery here.
The Wizards 3.5 update is here. This was the first adventure I ever DMed, which was about three months ago! I love all the stuff that is "just magic," like the unsupported river and the boiling bubble. It's a lot more fun than fully realistic environments to me.
I actually took over this adventure from another new DM who thought "incubation period 1d4 days" meant "fail your Fort save, go unconscious 1d4 days." A ten-foot dropoff into some water knocked the fighter unconscious -- and the cleric who followed him in -- and the dwarven monk who followed him in -- and my wizard used two karma points and was still knocked unconscious on the third go. So we lost two dead guys, one unconscious for days and I was blinded by the "puddle o' doom." Later on, when they met the halfling explaining how he got into the dungeon, I had him say, "I came here with my six brothers, and the first one fell into the water. So the next one jumped in after him, and the next one jumped in after him, and... long story short, Keraptis captured me and I'm the only one left!"
One problem with the adventure is that the boxed text describing the "boiling bubble" is completely undescriptive and I had no idea of the actual coolness of the setting. Show your players the map with the side view if you have to, because we all almost died due to my idea of puncturing the force field and swimming around to the back.
One thing I did not get is how some carefully built challenges are totally undeadly (a single harpy with a club) and tossed-off ones are completely evil. There's a symbol of insanity here, it takes a 7th level spell to reverse the effect, the DC is so high the barbarian needs a natural 20 and the high-Wisdom, dwarf, still minded monk (practically a Will save build) only has a 50-50 shot. And yes, you're going to have to fight a major enemy before you can get back to town and cure this.
I knew my group would just spider climb around the room with the platforms hanging from chains, so I added another adventuring party crossing the room. My plan was for a ranged battle from the platforms with shurikens and shrieking arrows, but my cleric ended up actually using water walking and protection from energy to save the dwarven ranger from the boiling mud, and she later became his girlfriend.
Two threads I started while going through this adventure are Legacy Weapons from White Plume Mountain - How do they work? and Can Air Elementals attack ten times a round in whirlwind form? Of course my group skipped the room with the Air Elemental entirely and my cleric rolled a "3" trying to dominate Blackrazor and gave up trying.
The Wizards 3.5 update is here. This was the first adventure I ever DMed, which was about three months ago! I love all the stuff that is "just magic," like the unsupported river and the boiling bubble. It's a lot more fun than fully realistic environments to me.
I actually took over this adventure from another new DM who thought "incubation period 1d4 days" meant "fail your Fort save, go unconscious 1d4 days." A ten-foot dropoff into some water knocked the fighter unconscious -- and the cleric who followed him in -- and the dwarven monk who followed him in -- and my wizard used two karma points and was still knocked unconscious on the third go. So we lost two dead guys, one unconscious for days and I was blinded by the "puddle o' doom." Later on, when they met the halfling explaining how he got into the dungeon, I had him say, "I came here with my six brothers, and the first one fell into the water. So the next one jumped in after him, and the next one jumped in after him, and... long story short, Keraptis captured me and I'm the only one left!"
One problem with the adventure is that the boxed text describing the "boiling bubble" is completely undescriptive and I had no idea of the actual coolness of the setting. Show your players the map with the side view if you have to, because we all almost died due to my idea of puncturing the force field and swimming around to the back.
One thing I did not get is how some carefully built challenges are totally undeadly (a single harpy with a club) and tossed-off ones are completely evil. There's a symbol of insanity here, it takes a 7th level spell to reverse the effect, the DC is so high the barbarian needs a natural 20 and the high-Wisdom, dwarf, still minded monk (practically a Will save build) only has a 50-50 shot. And yes, you're going to have to fight a major enemy before you can get back to town and cure this.
I knew my group would just spider climb around the room with the platforms hanging from chains, so I added another adventuring party crossing the room. My plan was for a ranged battle from the platforms with shurikens and shrieking arrows, but my cleric ended up actually using water walking and protection from energy to save the dwarven ranger from the boiling mud, and she later became his girlfriend.
Two threads I started while going through this adventure are Legacy Weapons from White Plume Mountain - How do they work? and Can Air Elementals attack ten times a round in whirlwind form? Of course my group skipped the room with the Air Elemental entirely and my cleric rolled a "3" trying to dominate Blackrazor and gave up trying.
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