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Story Hour
Zad/Wizardru's Story Hour (*final update 11/12*)
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<blockquote data-quote="WizarDru" data-source="post: 3884626" data-attributes="member: 151"><p>If I cherry pick anything from the Shackled City AP, it won't be anything that the PCs would specifically identify. Stat-blocks, mostly.</p><p></p><p>Occipitus in and of itself wasn't a problem. Having an evil NPC the PCs have never met before show up out of thin air and say "Hey, who wants to go the THE ABYSS!?!?" was weak. It was made even weaker by the fact the PCs could survive indefinitely in the abandoned temple in the desert until they could cobble together a solution to get out. Once they were at Occipitus, it seemed ridiculous: the module wants to create a sense of urgency...but then it requires the PCs to travel HUNDREDS OF MILES. Those are two self-conflicting goals.</p><p></p><p>The story hour here doesn't really reflect the last few sessions, in which the heroes fought some custom NPCs I used to replace the weak-sauce assassins of Lord of Oblivion. I tried integrating one of the Cagewrights into the fight, namely 'Fish' Wierjon. It proved frustrating, but got the plot moving, at least. The players did attack the Temple of Wee Jas, but as much because they found out that the Diamonshard Cabal had been wiped out by Orbius and Rhiavadi, with the exception of the newly christened Blackshard Di'Lao and his henchmen. Hilarity ensued, but heroes were driven from the temple by Ike Iverson's forces (though they came VERY close to stopping him).</p><p></p><p>A LOT of stuff happened in the last few sessions that hasn't been reported here, and the campaign finished right after they found out about Vhalantru's true identity by using a Speak with Dead on Jil's corpse.</p><p></p><p>My goal had been to make the cagewrights much more tangible foes who would appear and be dealt with in some force before the heroes tracked them to the lair. Hookface might have shown up when I deemed it approriate, but he'd have to contend with the local Scaled Council representative before doing anything (who had also shown up). Eventually the cagewrights would accidentally release adimarchus...or something. I hadn't quite figured out how to make Adimarchus a credible threat in the scheme of the campaign, per se.</p><p></p><p>The problem with the later modules is they offer up a threat about 10 minutes before the players have to STOP the threat. This becomes a real problem...and part of the root of it is that the campaign is so heavily tied to Cauldron, geographically. High level PCs live on a wider stage than that, and the campaign arc doesn't really handle that. Hell, pathfinder moves on to the big city by the second module (though they go back and forth a lot).</p><p></p><p>When I have some more time, I'll discuss what worked and didn't. But it's worth noting that the best moments of the game all came from stuff NOT in the book. And that's a bit of a problem, for me. (see The Demonskar Ball, Ghost Town, Siege of Redgorge, Bellsin discoving his parentage, etc.)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="WizarDru, post: 3884626, member: 151"] If I cherry pick anything from the Shackled City AP, it won't be anything that the PCs would specifically identify. Stat-blocks, mostly. Occipitus in and of itself wasn't a problem. Having an evil NPC the PCs have never met before show up out of thin air and say "Hey, who wants to go the THE ABYSS!?!?" was weak. It was made even weaker by the fact the PCs could survive indefinitely in the abandoned temple in the desert until they could cobble together a solution to get out. Once they were at Occipitus, it seemed ridiculous: the module wants to create a sense of urgency...but then it requires the PCs to travel HUNDREDS OF MILES. Those are two self-conflicting goals. The story hour here doesn't really reflect the last few sessions, in which the heroes fought some custom NPCs I used to replace the weak-sauce assassins of Lord of Oblivion. I tried integrating one of the Cagewrights into the fight, namely 'Fish' Wierjon. It proved frustrating, but got the plot moving, at least. The players did attack the Temple of Wee Jas, but as much because they found out that the Diamonshard Cabal had been wiped out by Orbius and Rhiavadi, with the exception of the newly christened Blackshard Di'Lao and his henchmen. Hilarity ensued, but heroes were driven from the temple by Ike Iverson's forces (though they came VERY close to stopping him). A LOT of stuff happened in the last few sessions that hasn't been reported here, and the campaign finished right after they found out about Vhalantru's true identity by using a Speak with Dead on Jil's corpse. My goal had been to make the cagewrights much more tangible foes who would appear and be dealt with in some force before the heroes tracked them to the lair. Hookface might have shown up when I deemed it approriate, but he'd have to contend with the local Scaled Council representative before doing anything (who had also shown up). Eventually the cagewrights would accidentally release adimarchus...or something. I hadn't quite figured out how to make Adimarchus a credible threat in the scheme of the campaign, per se. The problem with the later modules is they offer up a threat about 10 minutes before the players have to STOP the threat. This becomes a real problem...and part of the root of it is that the campaign is so heavily tied to Cauldron, geographically. High level PCs live on a wider stage than that, and the campaign arc doesn't really handle that. Hell, pathfinder moves on to the big city by the second module (though they go back and forth a lot). When I have some more time, I'll discuss what worked and didn't. But it's worth noting that the best moments of the game all came from stuff NOT in the book. And that's a bit of a problem, for me. (see The Demonskar Ball, Ghost Town, Siege of Redgorge, Bellsin discoving his parentage, etc.) [/QUOTE]
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