Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Dempster 02-18-08, 03:55 PM	With LG sadly coming to an end later this year I thought it might be interesting to see what players considered to be the best and worst things about LG. For me... The best: Actually being able to Play..I almost always have to GM if I want to game. Being able to just go somewhere and play without all of the hassle of writing an adventure and finding players is great. I think play opportunity is the main reason I am in the RPGA. I also have to give a big thumbs up to the CY 597 changes, specifically for access. The worst: Poorly prepared judges. Watching someone flip through a mod and apologize for not having seen the mod before really saps the excitement out of the air. Also unturnable undead. APL 8 monsters with 17 hit dice , +4 turn resistance, in an unhallow spell are just insulting.
amysrevenge 02-18-08, 04:07 PM	The best: the universality of the game - which let me find friends and play D&D in the 4 communities in which I lived during the course of the LG campaign, and gave me the chance to play with new friends in a dozen or so locations to which I traveled for other non-gaming reasons. Lesson learned: make sure that future living campaigns encourage the same sense of community, and the same universality of play. The worst: the rate at which the campaign rules changed, and the often dramatic extent of these changes. Lesson learned: make sure that the meta-rules for future living campaigns remain as stable as possible - incorporate new game rules sources as they come up, but try not to change the fundamental paperwork or other out-of-game procedures unless absolutely necessary. Big Mike Calgary
Hariman 02-18-08, 09:04 PM	The Best? Learning how to make effective characters that help the party. Also, Mods that stick out as extra fun (Like Desecrators of the Lords Tomb.) The Worst? The process of learning from the bad characters you make. And lousy mods that make you want to explain how to write balanced and APL appropriate encounters to the mod writer and editor. Hariman PS: Having the party come together and beat a brutal extra encounter is good. Having to wait a month for the extra AR is bad. But like I said, getting the Extra AR is good. As soon as I get the extra AR.
solbergb 02-20-08, 06:51 PM	The Best: All the gaming you can handle, plus exposure to a wide variety of playstyles, GM styles and author styles. There is a certain critical mass of both content and campaign enthusiasm in the form of authors, GM's and convention organizers that must exist for this to happen. The Worst: poorly written modules run by unprepared judges for players who aren't very interested in the adventure and just want the AR. Note that all 3 of these at once is very rare, at least in my experience, and often even one of these 3 elements being "good" can save a game. If at least two are "good" the game is likely going to be fun. If all 3 are "good", the game will be memorable.
Churcher 02-21-08, 12:24 AM	The Best: Getting to learn all the different rules of D&D. Really, my first "campaign" was actually LG, so it does hold a bit of a speical place for me. Also, all the people I got to meet while playing is really cool. Going to a convention and meeting a ton of people. Not to mention having the cool story of running from an APL4 table to an APL6 table (Thanks Cause Fear. Thanks.) and actually doing BETTER on the APL6 table!! Oh, and meeting the Halfling from Geoff who sold me a potion of CLW in the middle of a mod! I still have it! Worse: Badly written mods, as been stated before. A Meta-Regional mod had a Death-Beaming Hippo (No idea what the name is...) which had 5 Death Rays! It was later confirmed that it was supposed to ONLY have 1, and our friend's death was overturned. Also, with the end of the campaign, a lot of Higher-Ups have kinda given up on the support end. Our MetaCampaign stuff really hasn't evolved since the annoucement, but it's a natural reaction to it, so no worries there. (But our Commandant disappared! Yay storyline! Course, you didn't hear it from me...) Last thing, the access system...while not BAD, wasn't great either. It kinda sucks when my Barbarian gets access to Drunken Master. Or my MASSIVE amounts of Magical items keyed to spellcasters on my Archer. But, it happens.
Redfist 02-21-08, 12:31 AM	I swear I must be in the minority. I generally like most LG mods. Even more so since writing a few of them. Doing so really makes you appreciate the effort put in by other authors.
amysrevenge 02-21-08, 12:39 AM	I swear I must be in the minority. I generally like most LG mods. Even more so since writing a few of them. Doing so really makes you appreciate the effort put in by other authors. Meh. A prepared DM with a good attitude makes a poorly written module seem fantastic. An unprepared DM with a bad attitude makes a well written module seem like crap. A prepared DM with a bad attitude or an unprepared DM with a good attitude (the latter unfortunately is where I would usually place myself) can make any module seem average, regardless of the quality of the mod. An anecdote: I've heard, about the same one of my own modules, both "that was the best written module I've ever seen" and "that was the worst written module I've ever seen". In neither case had the person making the comments actually read the module, and neither of them knew that I was the author. lol Big Mike Calgary
JamesMaissen 02-21-08, 01:02 AM	The best: Meeting wonderful people around the country.. hands down the best part of LG. The next best come as corollaries to this in observing gaming communities. playstyles and even folklore rules. The worst: The random (and mercifully few) judges that should never have been judges in the first place. The mercurial aspect of many of the campaign rules. The randomness of item and other rules item access in the game creating a very uneven feel to the game. -James
NiTessine 02-21-08, 10:35 AM	The Best: meeting new gamers all over Europe, playing memorable games, getting to write stuff and generally having a great time with the campaign over the last four years. The Worst: A certain metaregional that was quite simply the worst module for any RPG that I have ever read. And I've read a lot. Gods, even the font was bad.
Hariman 02-23-08, 08:31 AM	I've heard, about the same one of my own modules, both "that was the best written module I've ever seen" and "that was the worst written module I've ever seen". In neither case had the person making the comments actually read the module, and neither of them knew that I was the author. lol Big Mike Calgary I actually know a couple mods like that. It can really depend on the DM and the Party. And heaven help the opinion of the mod if the party gets TPK'd.
kjenks 02-23-08, 01:33 PM	Ditto James.
amysrevenge 02-24-08, 11:22 AM	I actually know a couple mods like that. It can really depend on the DM and the Party. And heaven help the opinion of the mod if the party gets TPK'd. It's funny - back in the days when we still voted, the only time that both I scored "perfect" as a judge and the module scored "perfect" was also the only TPK I ever presided over. Big Mike Calgary
Hariman 02-29-08, 07:26 PM	It's funny - back in the days when we still voted, the only time that both I scored "perfect" as a judge and the module scored "perfect" was also the only TPK I ever presided over. Big Mike Calgary Interesting. I've seen a few well written mods that just needed the combats edited to make them less brutal. I had a party spend about 9 hours making it through a certain two rounder that had brutal battles, (the worst) and a great sense of triumph as the absurd final enemy fell to a glaive crit and a failed massive damage save. (The best.) The enemy had over +14 on it's fort save too!
solbergb 02-29-08, 08:34 PM	As "brutal encounters" depend heavily on party mix, it is quite difficult to say a module is more dangerous than usual without doing a lot of test battles or running it many times. Also many modules are only unusually dangerous at one or two APL's, generally a sign of bad scaling not caught by whatever playtests were done. (any module which scales from medium to large to huge elementals in APL4, 6 and 8 will have severe shifts in danger levels between APL4 and APL8, for example, but the APL2 vs small will be more like APL4, and APL10-12 vs greater/elder will be more like APL8 if a touch easier, than APL6, which is the only one not unusually easy or hard...and all that said, parties who are unusually good at targeting the weaknesses of elementals will still have an easy time with encounters that are near TPK's for many parties) One module I was involved in extensively playtesting ended with a simple formula. The more arcane the party had, the better, with druids counting as about half an arcane. Wasn't for the blasting or battlefield control either. Had to do with being able to target and light up large numbers of sneaky and dangerous enemies, plus coping with various mobility-related issues. "balanced" parties often struggled a bit. Whereas one weak playtest party (by levels and "balanced party" considerations) that was all arcane or druids had an easy time of it.
kuelthador 03-03-08, 12:10 PM	An anecdote: I've heard, about the same one of my own modules, both "that was the best written module I've ever seen" and "that was the worst written module I've ever seen". In neither case had the person making the comments actually read the module, and neither of them knew that I was the author. lol Big Mike Calgary That's happened to me more than once. And whats funny is that both times, the complaints from one person were the praises from another. "I hated the puzzles" from one person was a "the puzzles were ingenious!" from another. "It was way too dwarf-centric" from one person, and "I loved the dwarf theme" from another. It's all about taste. Hell, I once overheard someone say "I hate this mod. There's too much role playing in it." I wept.
Hariman 03-04-08, 09:56 PM	As "brutal encounters" depend heavily on party mix, it is quite difficult to say a module is more dangerous than usual without doing a lot of test battles or running it many times. Also many modules are only unusually dangerous at one or two APL's, generally a sign of bad scaling not caught by whatever playtests were done. (any module which scales from medium to large to huge elementals in APL4, 6 and 8 will have severe shifts in danger levels between APL4 and APL8, for example, but the APL2 vs small will be more like APL4, and APL10-12 vs greater/elder will be more like APL8 if a touch easier, than APL6, which is the only one not unusually easy or hard...and all that said, parties who are unusually good at targeting the weaknesses of elementals will still have an easy time with encounters that are near TPK's for many parties) One module I was involved in extensively playtesting ended with a simple formula. The more arcane the party had, the better, with druids counting as about half an arcane. Wasn't for the blasting or battlefield control either. Had to do with being able to target and light up large numbers of sneaky and dangerous enemies, plus coping with various mobility-related issues. "balanced" parties often struggled a bit. Whereas one weak playtest party (by levels and "balanced party" considerations) that was all arcane or druids had an easy time of it. File this under "Worst". The TPKs (or party defeats) that I've seen usually involve at least one of five things: 1: Lack of a party role. Not having a cleric or a wizard/sorcerer/warmage or perhaps a druid is a big no-no. 2: Lack of party cohesion. Sometimes the party can get away without teamwork. Other times, the party will just get creamed. 3: Lack of preparedness. No cold iron/silver, no magic weapons, no holy waters/alch fires/tanglefoot bags. No reach weapons. No ranged and/or slashing/bludgeoning/piercing weapons. Thousands of extra gold, but no magic armor. No spare scrolls of "See Invis" (And glitterdust, if you don't have it as a spell.) No "happy sticks" (CLW Wands) for the cleric. The list is nigh endless, but lacking crucial items is often a factor. 4: Sheer stupidity: Nuff said. 5: A run of Bad luck. Or one missed roll. Or a greater shadow critting someone. 6: A brutal or badly written encounter. They're there, and tougher encounters can swing both ways depending on the party mix. (I've seen an APL 10 mod get almost cakewalked because we had 4 sorcerers and 2 clerics.) Any one of these is a bad thing. Two or three of them together is usually TPK territory. Hariman PS: For a "Best"? I nominate: A sorcerer getting grabbed by evard's black tentacles, casting grease on himself WHILE GRAPPLED (Go Skill Focus Concentration!), and escaping the grapple without help. It's nice to know my sorcerer can do that.
_metz_ 03-04-08, 10:37 PM	A sorcerer getting grabbed by evard's black tentacles, casting grease on himself WHILE GRAPPLED (Go Skill Focus Concentration!), and escaping the grapple without help. It's nice to know my sorcerer can do that. He can't. Read the Grapple rules. Cast a Spell: You can attempt to cast a spell while grappling or even while pinned (see below), provided its casting time is no more than 1 standard action, it has no somatic component, and you have in hand any material components or focuses you might need. Any spell that requires precise and careful action is impossible to cast while grappling or being pinned. If the spell is one that you can cast while grappling, you must make a Concentration check (DC 20 + spell level) or lose the spell. You don’t have to make a successful grapple check to cast the spell. Just letting you know. Also Grease is a waste of a spell on a sorceror imo...
MatteBlack 03-04-08, 10:47 PM	It's too bad that mods often come up well written but, get out to the DMs and events late. I love playing in new mods and am happy to have them available but, a hold up in one of the many steps they must go through in writing, approval and printing means unsettled or unprepared DMs who might not be in the best mood because of it, late arriving ARs and additionally chaotic mustering which all can suck the fun out of very good mods and DMs.
kinevon 03-04-08, 10:50 PM	He can't. Read the Grapple rules. Cast a Spell: You can attempt to cast a spell while grappling or even while pinned (see below), provided its casting time is no more than 1 standard action, it has no somatic component, and you have in hand any material components or focuses you might need. Any spell that requires precise and careful action is impossible to cast while grappling or being pinned. If the spell is one that you can cast while grappling, you must make a Concentration check (DC 20 + spell level) or lose the spell. You don’t have to make a successful grapple check to cast the spell. Just letting you know. Also Grease is a waste of a spell on a sorceror imo... Possibilities: Feat: Eschew Materials - removes M from a great many spells Metamagic Feat: Still Spell - removes the S portion Metamagic Feat: Quick Spell - reduces the increased casting time from using Still Spell As to Grease being a waste: It takes (gasp!) imagination, but it is an amazingly useful spell, since it has a shot, at any level, of causing an opponent to wind up prone. And any bonus to hit, extra AoOs, and penalties to your opponent's To Hit are never a waste. Also, on Sorcerors: By the time you have to worry about Evard's Black Tentacles, I sincerely doubt that you would get much benefit from very many other of the zero level spells. Light? Heh. Flare? Riiiight. At this point, you would be better with some of the more unusual cantrips, and the imagination to make use of them.
boolean 03-05-08, 01:13 AM	One of the really good things about Grease is that it requires a skill check to avoid in certain situations. A 6th level fighter will have a reflex save 2-3 points higher than he did at 1st level. His balance check however, will usually be the same, or worse (changing from chain mail to full plate, for example.) It depends on your region how often heavily armored humanoids appear as opponents, of course.
copperwyrmling 03-05-08, 01:43 AM	Just letting you know. Also Grease is a waste of a spell on a sorceror imo... Nononono! Grease is one of the best L1 spells out there, especially combined with Sculpt Spell. The Balance check mechanic makes it very good at hindering the movement of large and clumsy monsters - it doesn't matter if they save or not, they still can't move without (for most monsters) a Dexterity check, and those tend to go down as CR goes up (and enemies get bigger). Also, it's a great enabler spell for sneak-attackers (see below). Possibilities: Feat: Eschew Materials - removes M from a great many spells Metamagic Feat: Still Spell - removes the S portion Metamagic Feat: Quick Spell - reduces the increased casting time from using Still Spell You need Rapid Metamagic actually, which requires 12 ranks in Spellcraft. It is possible the sorcerer in question had Eschew Materials, Still Spell and Rapid Metamagic, in which case yeah, the scenario works - and it really should, with that much effort being put into casting while grappled ;) As to Grease being a waste: It takes (gasp!) imagination, but it is an amazingly useful spell, since it has a shot, at any level, of causing an opponent to wind up prone. And any bonus to hit, extra AoOs, and penalties to your opponent's To Hit are never a waste. Also, on Sorcerors: By the time you have to worry about Evard's Black Tentacles, I sincerely doubt that you would get much benefit from very many other of the zero level spells. Light? Heh. Flare? Riiiight. At this point, you would be better with some of the more unusual cantrips, and the imagination to make use of them. Well, Grease is L1, not L0 ;) But you're missing the silliness that is Grease. It's a win-win spell. If the opponent fails their save, they're prone (and at -4 on attack and AC). If they pass their save, they're balancing, and hence flat-footed unless they have 5 ranks in Balance. It's like Mass Greater Invisibility from the perspective of sneak attackers ;) You can also use it for disarm and as a grapple defence. It's very versatile and well worth a spot in most sorcerers' spell selections (Azrien doesn't have it, but that's mostly a flavor/style thing - it would be a great spell for her). Min, my gnome sorcerer, does have Grease, and it has quite literally broken mods (one in particular, where she used Grease to make the BBEG drop the plot item, then she invoked a timestop favor and flew away with it). She just found access to lesser rods of sculpting, too :)
copperwyrmling 03-05-08, 02:01 AM	Oh, and since I'm posting here, I should probably mention my "best and worst". The best: the amazing people I've met through this game, and the stories I can tell as a result. In particular, I'm thinking of the people in Europe, Asia and throughout the US (but especially California) who I would never have met except through online LG play - you know who you are :) It's been a joy to play with you all. The worst: there actually hasn't been much bad. I love LG. Most scenarios are well-written and pretty easy to read and run. Most GMs are reasonable and try their best to create a fun experience. Most players are really nice people. However occasionally exceptions show up, and that's led to a couple of unpleasant experiences. I'm also not a huge fan of LG's access system, although I thought the 597 LGCS was an immense improvement - just as one example, I think it would be good to allow some system for noncasters to regain lost access (e.g. "tracking down the item requires TUs equal to (item's price)/5000gp, minimum 1, you must still pay full price" - similar to crafters except without the XP cost and with no discount).
_metz_ 03-05-08, 06:26 AM	You can also use it for disarm and as a grapple defence. It's very versatile and well worth a spot in most sorcerers' spell selections (Azrien doesn't have it, but that's mostly a flavor/style thing - it would be a great spell for her). Min, my gnome sorcerer, does have Grease, and it has quite literally broken mods (one in particular, where she used Grease to make the BBEG drop the plot item, then she invoked a timestop favor and flew away with it). She just found access to lesser rods of sculpting, too :) Agreed that grease is funky, but there are so many other options. I think its a cool spell, but not the be all end all. By high APLs everything is flying, and there is so much more that you can do in your round than that. In lower level games, can you really spare the spell known?... As to kinevon, the OP might have mentioned those feats as the defining factors in casting grease, rather than skill focus if he had them. (just quietly)
RanielK 03-05-08, 10:57 AM	File this under "Worst". The TPKs (or party defeats) that I've seen usually involve at least one of five things: 3: Lack of preparedness. No cold iron/silver, no magic weapons, no holy waters/alch fires/tanglefoot bags. No reach weapons. No ranged and/or slashing/bludgeoning/piercing weapons. Thousands of extra gold, but no magic armor. No spare scrolls of "See Invis" (And glitterdust, if you don't have it as a spell.) No "happy sticks" (CLW Wands) for the cleric. The list is nigh endless, but lacking crucial items is often a factor. 6: A brutal or badly written encounter. They're there, and tougher encounters can swing both ways depending on the party mix. (I've seen an APL 10 mod get almost cakewalked because we had 4 sorcerers and 2 clerics.) Yeah, these two combined can be truly brutal (Troll with fighter levels and no alcy fire or acid). Though, I'm amazed at how little I spend in consumables and still manage to gut it out past tough encounters with what I've got. I definitely feel the community is a pro. APL appropriateness in some mods is a very strong con. Remember, environment affects the EL of the encounter especially if the monster can ignore it or gain from it and the party is automatically hurt by it. Air elementals inside tornados or huricane force winds anyone?
amysrevenge 03-05-08, 12:24 PM	(One more worst: the "VTF special" - everything, and I do mean everything, gets one Warrior level because it doesn't increase the CR. Troll barbarians? Of course. Outsiders? Yup. Mindless constructs? Sure, why not. The wizard's spell component pouch? Might as well.)
tvknight415 03-05-08, 05:40 PM	Best: LG back in year one (it was regional, with core-rules only, and individual item certificates that meant not every PC is going to walk our of a mod with the uber-item). Worst: What LG became after year one (the rules bloat, non-core stuff added, yearly conversions, and the unrealistic treasure system).
solbergb 03-05-08, 09:07 PM	He can't. Read the Grapple rules. Just letting you know. Also Grease is a waste of a spell on a sorceror imo... Well...unless you have rapid metamagic and still spell (as my sorceress does). But that's a minimum level 12+ trick. Kobolds can do it earlier, as can folks who swapped out their familiar for the NONC alternate class ability. Then still spell is pretty keen on a sorc. And yeah, grease has a material component. I never noticed because my only char that can cast it has eschew materials. But that also would be a consideration. (My sorceress now will just cast in a grapple unless burning higher spell slots, making concentration checks or personal danger dictates that she escape) And grease is NOT a waste of a spell on a sorc. It's one of the most versitile spells in the game and it remains useful at level 15 even if the enemy makes his save. It's just not a useful grapple defense on the sorcerer unless she casts it BEFORE getting grabbed, and after APL6, it's usually not enough unless cast on a party member who has a pretty good grapple score or escape artist score already.
Hariman 03-07-08, 01:41 AM	Agreed that grease is funky, but there are so many other options. I think its a cool spell, but not the be all end all. By high APLs everything is flying, and there is so much more that you can do in your round than that. In lower level games, can you really spare the spell known?... As to kinevon, the OP might have mentioned those feats as the defining factors in casting grease, rather than skill focus if he had them. (just quietly) YES A SORCERER CAN! My sorcerer Lukas has grease as a spell, uses it often, and LOVES it! It's a great spell that either leaves your enemy flat footed OR knocks them prone. Not to mention the added benefit of "cast it on yourself/others" to help with evard's or grapplers. The prior "Best" of killing the big bad via a barbarian crit came from a crit that only confirmed because the beastie had fallen on the grease. Not to mention that the beastie also spent an entire round unable to move because of the grease, which saved the party from it's absurd full attack routine. Now I understand that I'll probably end up using it less at higher APLs, but it's still a GREAT spell that's been a lifesaver more than once.
solbergb 03-07-08, 09:54 AM	Now I understand that I'll probably end up using it less at higher APLs, but it's still a GREAT spell that's been a lifesaver more than once. Don't count on that. You just quicken it instead. (whose sorceress's typical attack routine vs humanoid enemies is quicken sculpted grease followed by sculpted evards even at level 15. It's also useful to make enemies flatfooted for her TK violent thrust attacks, to make golem encounters comical and to slow down big, clumsy, groundbound creatures without using a major resource)
Hariman 03-12-08, 10:32 PM	Don't count on that. You just quicken it instead. (whose sorceress's typical attack routine vs humanoid enemies is quicken sculpted grease followed by sculpted evards even at level 15. It's also useful to make enemies flatfooted for her TK violent thrust attacks, to make golem encounters comical and to slow down big, clumsy, groundbound creatures without using a major resource) And my Sorc will have the skill points to take Rapid Metamagic!
dkay807 03-14-08, 08:43 AM	Best: Pretty much most of LG - the passion that players, authors, administrators, and DMs have for the game and the community that has formed around the game are big ones. Relationships formed between players and the convention vacations are also great. Hell, I was able to start my career thanks to someone I met playing LG! Worst: People that really shouldn't be judging modules due to lack of aptitude or experience or both, but still do because they love to (god bless their souls), like **** ***** *****. A good and motivated judge, however, can make almost any module a fun time.
Stnkfist 03-18-08, 01:15 AM	Best: Playing with so many skilled roleplayers from all over the world. Worst: A mod I played at open fiesta Origins. *shuffles through ARs* PAL6-05 Heart of Winter set in the theocracy of the Pale. For those of you that this is in region, im very very sorry. This was the most unbalanced mod I ever had the displeasure of playing in. Granted it did not help the DM was a pretty big jerk, most of the frustration came from the mod itself. The guy sitting next to me said "I'm going to find the guy who wrote this thing, and take a crap in his shoes."
Fsi-Dib 03-18-08, 03:07 AM	Best: All those inside jokes that were born in games. All those memorable fights and NPCs. The songs we sang (especially "Fiendish Giant Praying Mantis", sung by the tune of Deck the Halls)... it's all good. Worst: Seldomly encountered obnoxious players, way too often encountered horrible scenarios (I look particularly maliciously at certain writers, whom I don't want to name here)...
Dempster 03-18-08, 01:27 PM	The guy sitting next to me said "I'm going to find the guy who wrote this thing, and take a crap in his shoes." Oh if I had a dollar for every time I felt that way about a mod......I would have 3 dollars.
TetsujinOni 03-18-08, 02:03 PM	Best: Playing with so many skilled roleplayers from all over the world. Worst: A mod I played at open fiesta Origins. Isn't it usually a decision by the judge to run not-fun mods as their regional representation in open fiesta play? What the heck were they thinking?
Redfist 03-18-08, 03:15 PM	I played an Open Fiesta mod 2 years ago at Winter Fantasy. Apparantly the judge decided to run that particular mod because of the "OH MY GOD, LOOK AT THAT ACCESS!!! WHAT WERE THEY THINKING???" factor. I've never... ever... seen an AR like that before or after. I didn't know in advance and almost felt dirty accepting the AR. Almost. :D
Lomiat 03-19-08, 12:43 AM	Speaking of the community of gamers, I have now traveled to several regions and have been to at least one convention specifically to meet people with whom I'd played online. And most of the people I met at that convention have expressed interest in traveling to my hometown to play Shield Lands adventures. This presents me with a pair of observations: 1) the gaming has allowed me to meet people I'm happy to call friends (or at least "friendly acquaintances"), and 2) the regional system has provided sufficient incentive for numerous rewarding excursions to different states. ... And since no one has extolled the virtues of LG's regional system as one of the "bests," let me be the first to celebrate the myriad regional flavors and all of the authors committed to supporting their regions' vision and story lines.
iskurthi 03-19-08, 10:52 AM	... And since no one has extolled the virtues of LG's regional system as one of the "bests," let me be the first to celebrate the myriad regional flavors and all of the authors committed to supporting their regions' vision and story lines. I have to agree - the regional system was one of the things I really like about LG. I think we're going to miss it when it's gone.
Reylance 03-19-08, 12:11 PM	Good: The quantity of modules. Being able to go anywhere from Albany to Atlanta to Austin to Albuquerque and play your characters. The overall consistency of the play experience. The fun. The many selfless judges and convention organizers. Bad: Year 1's ridiculously high upkeep costs and ridiculously low rewards. (The original Circle should have paid attention to the DMG wealth guidelines.) Bad: Initial disparities in rewards (*cough*ring of shield*cough*) and access (mostly fixed by the end of Year 2). Bad: Lack of clarity in campaign documentation that should be easy to fix. (Say "The following expenditures of TU require paying upkeep. The following expenditures of TU don't require paying upkeep." Say "In any event that is not a module, such as an interactive, PCs receive rewards and access for the APL equal to their level, or their level minus one if odd, with first level PCs receiving APL 2 rewards.") Bad: Secret Triad-level documentation. Interactives were very inconsistent from region to region, but I don't know the rules that govern them, so I can't comment on whether they're being done wrong or right. Bad: Triad members or judges with adversarial attitudes towards the players. Bad: Seeing all sorts of cool character ideas that you can't develop, since you can't guarantee a key bit of limited access. Bad: The RPGA-level bottleneck for module approval in Year 1-2.
RanielK 03-19-08, 12:20 PM	Best: Playing with so many skilled roleplayers from all over the world. Worst: A mod I played at open fiesta Origins. *shuffles through ARs* PAL6-05 Heart of Winter set in the theocracy of the Pale. For those of you that this is in region, im very very sorry. This was the most unbalanced mod I ever had the displeasure of playing in. Granted it did not help the DM was a pretty big jerk, most of the frustration came from the mod itself. The guy sitting next to me said "I'm going to find the guy who wrote this thing, and take a crap in his shoes." Sorry about that. You were probably on my table. That last encounter was brutal. Course it didn't help that the Judge goofed and read the wrong stat block through half the encounter. God bless him he came down with a case of the dyslexia all of a sudden. The real problem was not going through all the other mods first and seeing just how much the players had succeeded at hosing over the BBEG and earned his ire. Not fun for a random group o' guys who were just lookin' for a good table.
RanielK 03-19-08, 12:22 PM	Isn't it usually a decision by the judge to run not-fun mods as their regional representation in open fiesta play? What the heck were they thinking? No, the judge was a friend and I was a former Palish prisoner, er, resident. I had started that series when it first premiered and wanted to play out the rest. He was doing me a favor running it. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get a full table, so some straglers came in unprepared for the evil that is the Pale. muhahaaaa
TetsujinOni 03-19-08, 12:57 PM	No, the judge was a friend and I was a former Palish prisoner, er, resident. I had started that series when it first premiered and wanted to play out the rest. He was doing me a favor running it. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get a full table, so some straglers came in unprepared for the evil that is the Pale. muhahaaaa OK, that makes a *lot* more sense... There's only two KEO7 adventures I'd consider offering for an open fiesta slot, precisely because of the context issues you cite...
dkay807 03-19-08, 02:18 PM	OK, that makes a *lot* more sense... There's only two KEO7 adventures I'd consider offering for an open fiesta slot, precisely because of the context issues you cite... That's funny.. I wouldn't want to embarrass Keoland by running ANY of the Year 7 content during a Fiesta slot, simply because of how bad it is. And Keoland isn't even my region. Castlefall was okay, but the rest is just not very good. Keoland was the place to be in Years 2 and 3, then it began to go downhill. If I could, I would run any Year 5 Bissel module in a Fiesta slot. Year 5 in Bissel was legendary (not including BIS5-01). This brings me to my point... The Best: Bissel in Year 5 (especially towards the end), Keoland in Years 2 and 3. Geoff in Years 2 and 3 (Year 5 was pretty good too, but I haven't been back since). BK in Years 5 and 6 rocked from what I gathered, I wish I could have experienced more. The Worst: Bissel at the beginning of Year 6, Keoland in Year 7 (and so far 8). Most of the Core modules. The "Worstest": Sheldomar Valley ALL OF THE TIME (except in Year 4 and hopefully a bit towards the end of Year 7 and beginning of Year 8, but I can't comment much on that... ;))
rpgdcj 03-19-08, 04:58 PM	The "Worstest": Sheldomar Valley ALL OF THE TIME (except in Year 4 and hopefully a bit towards the end of Year 7 and beginning of Year 8, but I can't comment much on that... ;)) I can comment on that. I've only played one Sheldomar to date, and that was SHE7-06 A Topaz is Forever, written by dkay807. And I have to say, if that was my introduction to the Sheldomar, it was an awesome one. I had heard so much FUD about Sheldies, and yet to be challenged in a good way was such a pleasant surprise. If you get a chance to play it, do so. Be ready for fun and challenge! Having said that, I hear SHE8-01 Severance is out to kill as many PCs as possible. Rumor has it the author tries to tailor the encounters to the weaknesses of the party. :D
dkay807 03-19-08, 07:19 PM	I can comment on that. I've only played one Sheldomar to date, and that was SHE7-06 A Topaz is Forever, written by dkay807. And I have to say, if that was my introduction to the Sheldomar, it was an awesome one. I had heard so much FUD about Sheldies, and yet to be challenged in a good way was such a pleasant surprise. If you get a chance to play it, do so. Be ready for fun and challenge! Having said that, I hear SHE8-01 Severance is out to kill as many PCs as possible. Rumor has it the author tries to tailor the encounters to the weaknesses of the party. :D Shush, enough of that ;). I'm not paying people to say that, I swear. Go play the other year 7 Sheldies so that you can complain like the rest of us! All this hype about SHE8-01 is going to lead to a letdown next weekend! People might hate it! it might be too hard... or not hard enough! Who knows!? Anyway... supposedly, we're going to have two other Year 8 SHE modules, each two rounds, and I have some high hopes for them. From what I hear from our meta-rep, the proposals are good and they're written by some really strong authors. I'd love to see our meta-region go out on top.
Hariman 03-19-08, 07:52 PM	I can comment on that. I've only played one Sheldomar to date, and that was SHE7-06 A Topaz is Forever, written by dkay807. And I have to say, if that was my introduction to the Sheldomar, it was an awesome one. I had heard so much FUD about Sheldies, and yet to be challenged in a good way was such a pleasant surprise. If you get a chance to play it, do so. Be ready for fun and challenge! Having said that, I hear SHE8-01 Severance is out to kill as many PCs as possible. Rumor has it the author tries to tailor the encounters to the weaknesses of the party. :D SHE 7-06, A Topaz is Forever, was fun. A bit brutal, but fun.
Timlagor 03-20-08, 10:22 AM	Bad: Secret Triad-level documentation. Interactives were very inconsistent from region to region, but I don't know the rules that govern them, so I can't comment on whether they're being done wrong or right. QFT
MwaO 03-20-08, 10:31 AM	I can comment on that. I've only played one Sheldomar to date, and that was SHE7-06 A Topaz is Forever, written by dkay807. And I have to say, if that was my introduction to the Sheldomar, it was an awesome one. I had heard so much FUD about Sheldies, and yet to be challenged in a good way was such a pleasant surprise. Go play SHE7-03 Night of Madness. That'll reset your expectations back to what they should be. Most awful mod ever. We walked it, but I'll never get those 4 hours back... The best of LG is getting to play with different tables - when you get to the right table and judge, it can be amazing.
dkay807 03-20-08, 11:03 AM	Go play SHE7-03 Night of Madness. That'll reset your expectations back to what they should be. Most awful mod ever. We walked it, but I'll never get those 4 hours back... The best of LG is getting to play with different tables - when you get to the right table and judge, it can be amazing. Well, the thing with that module is... it had the potential to be very cool. Sadly, it was poorly structured and the ending was ATROCIOUS. Absolutely atrocious. No module should end like that one did. Our DM was so befuddled by the final encounter (he ate the module while running it at a convention) that when he got to that part, he made us take a 30 minute break so he could re-read it. When we came back, he just said "Listen, this is the dumbest thing ever. Here, read what the module tells me to do. Here are the ARs - circle what you think is appropriate." Yeah... it was that bad.
MwaO 03-20-08, 11:21 AM	Well, the thing with that module is... it had the potential to be very cool. Sadly, it was poorly structured and the ending was ATROCIOUS. Absolutely atrocious. No module should end like that one did. Our DM was so befuddled by the final encounter (he ate the module while running it at a convention) that when he got to that part, he made us take a 30 minute break so he could re-read it. When we came back, he just said "Listen, this is the dumbest thing ever. Here, read what the module tells me to do. Here are the ARs - circle what you think is appropriate." Yeah... it was that bad. I've heard of several tables where the mod basically has to say, "No, despite that being an extremely logical way of dealing with the final encounter and avoiding the stupid choice I offered you, it doesn't work(because I say so), and because you didn't choose to do the stupidest thing ever, I'm going to punish you."
RanielK 03-22-08, 01:21 AM	I can comment on that. I've only played one Sheldomar to date, and that was SHE7-06 A Topaz is Forever, written by dkay807. And I have to say, if that was my introduction to the Sheldomar, it was an awesome one. I had heard so much FUD about Sheldies, and yet to be challenged in a good way was such a pleasant surprise. If you get a chance to play it, do so. Be ready for fun and challenge! Having said that, I hear SHE8-01 Severance is out to kill as many PCs as possible. Rumor has it the author tries to tailor the encounters to the weaknesses of the party. :D I played to Sheldies at a con (total experience with them). The first, the GM pulled the punch and we barely escaped with a TPK. Don't know what it would have been like if he hadn't pulled his punches. Maybe the mod authorized him to kill the players? The other was Topaz. We ran that as more roleplay intensive and talked our way out of every damn combat in the mod. Go go Gadget Face! It was fun.
dkay807 03-23-08, 12:27 AM	I played to Sheldies at a con (total experience with them). The first, the GM pulled the punch and we barely escaped with a TPK. Don't know what it would have been like if he hadn't pulled his punches. Maybe the mod authorized him to kill the players? The other was Topaz. We ran that as more roleplay intensive and talked our way out of every damn combat in the mod. Go go Gadget Face! It was fun. I'd like to know who your judge was for Topaz. Of the 5 combats in the mod, you can definitely talk your way out of one, possibly another, and the other three are guaranteed fights. Whoever ran your table either didn't read the mod, or disregarded the way it was written. In any case, I'm glad you had fun.
roir1k 03-23-08, 12:50 AM	I played to Sheldies at a con (total experience with them). The first, the GM pulled the punch and we barely escaped with a TPK. Don't know what it would have been like if he hadn't pulled his punches. Maybe the mod authorized him to kill the players? The other was Topaz. We ran that as more roleplay intensive and talked our way out of every damn combat in the mod. Go go Gadget Face! It was fun. Having helped write that module I can say with nearly absolute certainty that you cannot talk your way out of two of the combats. One of them you could maybe possibly talk your way out of it with an absolutely ridiculous result and the appropriate roleplaying, but it is highly unlikely. Two of the combats, sure, they could be resolved with appropriate interaction. It sounds as if your GM cheated you out of what are some very entertaining battles. As far as Keoland Year 7's are concerned... I'm biased, but Keo7-01 is a pretty good time.
RanielK 03-23-08, 01:23 PM	Having helped write that module I can say with nearly absolute certainty that you cannot talk your way out of two of the combats. One of them you could maybe possibly talk your way out of it with an absolutely ridiculous result and the appropriate roleplaying, but it is highly unlikely. Two of the combats, sure, they could be resolved with appropriate interaction. It sounds as if your GM cheated you out of what are some very entertaining battles. Could be. I do know that one guy tried to be an ass around one of the other "parties" in the mod.* We most definitely roleplayed our way out of that potential fight. Though I was accussed of molesting our contact afterwards. She wasn't happy. *shrug* save a girl's life and she complains about a little pinch on the butt. I could go on, but I think I may have revealed too much already. Oh, and we did have some fights, just not six fights that a two rounder should have. *He also quipped five seconds before we were supposed to use one of the little mcguffins to keep us from being killed on sight that he'd destroyed it while we weren't looking. "Oops! Sorry guys!" Our response ran along the lines of "we'll send you in first to get eaten and while they're distracted we'll mop them up." He then suddenly remembered that he hadn't fsk'ed up that much.
Fsi-Dib 04-07-08, 03:34 AM	I know it's not nice to point at certain modules, but no one has dared to say the name of the module due to a fear of .. well, something. Because it's the Module That Shall Not Be Said Aloud? I did mention earlier that LG was filled with horrible modules but this ... I'm speaking of TSS5-02: Seeds. This module resulted in one player permanently leaving the Living Greyhawk scene, saying something to the direction of "Since the scenarios are starting to become like this, I have no point playing. Good luck , you guys." And indeed, we haven't seen him since. We played the first encounter ... during the surprise round we lost two members of our party. We ran. We continued, and frankly, all of the players and the DM saw every encounter as dumb. We then collectively chose that "This never happened". No ARs, no exp, no gold, nothing just happened, we never played it. No one in this region was allowed to play it nor say the module's name. Even when I got my hands to the module and ... I- I really don't want to talk about it. I merely mourn why I never got the chance to write a module. Why this?! WHY?! Oh, the memories, they haunt me...
Hariman 04-07-08, 01:04 PM	I know it's not nice to point at certain modules, but no one has dared to say the name of the module due to a fear of .. well, something. Because it's the Module That Shall Not Be Said Aloud? I did mention earlier that LG was filled with horrible modules but this ... I'm speaking of TSS5-02: Seeds. This module resulted in one player permanently leaving the Living Greyhawk scene, saying something to the direction of "Since the scenarios are starting to become like this, I have no point playing. Good luck , you guys." And indeed, we haven't seen him since. We played the first encounter ... during the surprise round we lost two members of our party. We ran. We continued, and frankly, all of the players and the DM saw every encounter as dumb. We then collectively chose that "This never happened". No ARs, no exp, no gold, nothing just happened, we never played it. No one in this region was allowed to play it nor say the module's name. Even when I got my hands to the module and ... I- I really don't want to talk about it. I merely mourn why I never got the chance to write a module. Why this?! WHY?! Oh, the memories, they haunt me... I think that I'll be happy having only encountered KEO6-02: Forest of Ribbons (post errata, thankfully) and SHE 6-01: Flesh Torn Asunder. Ribbons was tough, but FTA was brutal and poorly written. But the blurb on "Seeds" is more disconcerting than player word of mouth warnings that certain modules can be deadly.
Redfist 04-07-08, 01:18 PM	As a general rule, I try not to badmouth modules - even ones where I believe they could've been much much better. Authors put a lot of work into writing their modules. I'm all for giving PRIVATE constructive criticism for them to consider when writing their next, but bashing someone in PUBLIC serves no purpose *for me*. However, the same act does serve to make someone else feel awful (the author). Seems like a lousy trade to me. *shrug*
TetsujinOni 04-07-08, 01:37 PM	I think that I'll be happy having only encountered KEO6-02: Forest of Ribbons (post errata, thankfully) and SHE 6-01: Flesh Torn Asunder. Ribbons was tough, but FTA was brutal and poorly written. But the blurb on "Seeds" is more disconcerting than player word of mouth warnings that certain modules can be deadly. Y'know, I keep seeing the assertion that Ribbons was a difficult mod... I just didn't see it, either as a player or judging it.
Fsi-Dib 04-07-08, 01:50 PM	As a general rule, I try not to badmouth modules - even ones where I believe they could've been much much better. Authors put a lot of work into writing their modules. I'm all for giving PRIVATE constructive criticism for them to consider when writing their next, but bashing someone in PUBLIC serves no purpose *for me*. However, the same act does serve to make someone else feel awful (the author). Seems like a lousy trade to me. *shrug* I agree, it's not kind or funny. It was over 100 pages long two-round module, after all. However, I'm baffled no one else in the Meta-Region said all that much bad about it (Though Nyrond.org has it rated at 1.81). Guess we're just a loud-mouthed lot. But I don't wish to be too moralist about it either. Movies and books both get reviews, some of them bashing them horribly. Why should the LG modules be all that different? I can take harsh criticism, provided it's constructive .. hm, well, I didn't really make constructive criticism about the module. It'd be too late to do that, but the main points would be: * Don't describe what PCs feel. * Don't abuse imbalanced templates and unassociated class levels (Tauric Displacer beast/drow cleric 3, this is CR 7? And it's prebuffed, and comes with two companion, both CR 6 or so. At APL6.) * Give more options to the PCs on handling the encounters (Untrackable Redcaps, even though you have maxed Survival) * Avoid using rule-technical things that don't make sense. Subdual damage to an Earth elemental to get it killed? * Keep the Read Aloud texts consistent. No two-column long, please. I could name a lot more scenarios I find sub-par, but really, I'm not here to bash nearly every core scenario I've played, am I?
MwaO 04-07-08, 04:16 PM	Y'know, I keep seeing the assertion that Ribbons was a difficult mod... I just didn't see it, either as a player or judging it. Ribbons, before errata, had a Greater Invisible(via item that lasts 2-12 rounds) prebuffed, Flying spellcaster who hit the party with Evard's and Stinking Cloud at APL 6 via basically auto-surprise. That's not even talking about the terrain and visibility issues from the Dreadwood. The Barghest meant if the party tried to run, leaving someone behind, that unlucky person would get perma-killed. If the party got crippled due to the Evard's, the party could extremely easily be in the position of running(getting someone permakilled for certain) or risking TPK.
Timlagor 04-07-08, 08:37 PM	RE: SEEDS Yes the author screwed up with the Tauric stuff (in fact that took at least 2 people to manage; the original didn't count them as non-associated). However: - Seeds had a great story and we had a lot of fun with it* - Box text is meant to be paraphrased where appropriate (and I dislike being told what I feel too but it wasn't that major a problem) - We didn't realise you could do nonlethal to elementals either the first time round but that's a player problem and it did make sense and you were given a hefty clue. - It was described as dangerous in the blurb * We had a major problem with the Tauric Drow (and you're right that the Casters aren't close to that CR; esp at higher APLs; they'd have been higher CR as straight Drow!) but our GM overturned that Fight when we worked out the EL. We did discusss this module at length with both author and reviewer who acknowledged that they had messed up somewhat. Ettercaps are ridiculous for the +1 to attributes they get every HD (and multiple HD per CR iirc) but that wasn't the author's fault. The Tauric Drow Displacer Beasts certainly marred Seeds badly but it doesn't even come close to the same category as Something of Value (since we're naming mods ;)) or even Dominion. (don't play either unless you're a rabid completist like me)
NiTessine 04-07-08, 09:41 PM	- We didn't realise you could do nonlethal to elementals either the first time round but that's a player problem and it did make sense and you were given a hefty clue. Erm. Said clue was the text "IMMORTAL", in Terran, carved on the chest of the earth elemental. An essentially amorphous creature, mind you. In addition to conjuring up images of a Norwegian metalhead elemental, it's just clumsy. While I could elaborate on what I precisely think of Seeds, the author lives close enough to personally visit violence upon my person, and for this once, I'll keep my mouth shut. Besides, I already had one flamewar about it, on the Splintered Suns group, when the events Fsi-Dib described first came to pass. Something of Value, though... there's something very wrong on a fundamental level about that module and the underlying philosophy of adventure writing. I do not wish to have anything to do with it, but unfortunately promised to run it to the local group before I'd read it. I hope they don't hate me too much afterwards.
Samwise 04-07-08, 10:20 PM	Something of Value, though... there's something very wrong on a fundamental level about that module and the underlying philosophy of adventure writing. I do not wish to have anything to do with it, but unfortunately promised to run it to the local group before I'd read it. I hope they don't hate me too much afterwards. Really? It is the same one that went into the final Greyhawk story arc, so you had best avoid that one too in such a case. And I wrote that last encounter just for Sampo. Oh well.
_metz_ 04-07-08, 10:59 PM	Something of Value, though... there's something very wrong on a fundamental level about that module and the underlying philosophy of adventure writing. I do not wish to have anything to do with it, but unfortunately promised to run it to the local group before I'd read it. I hope they don't hate me too much afterwards. Ah, I beleive you are referring to Nothing of Value Occasionally, module writers need to be taken out and beaten with sticks. Its a very rare occasion, but in that case... just the number and LEVEL of issues with the module were just... mindboggling. It was as if it was a module designed to punish rational thought and standard psychological reactions, and reward metagaming. Lets not even mention the final encounter, worst premise ever. Like I said: sticks. beaten. For Samwise: If you wrote that encounter Samwise I am shocked; because you produce much better thought out, quality stuff normally. Although punishing Sampo is always a good reason, that encounter/mod punished the whole LG populace, except the rare metagamers/people who knew the cert (I later found out I was in a party in this category so missed the massive disfavour out of other people cheating, I personally would have gotten it if given the chance) That module is one of the low points of LG for me, a module with a BAD premise, really bad interaction between NPCs, boxed text dialogue that ropes PCs into bad situations and essentially very few chances to do the 'right' thing in the writer's eyes. The module even encourages the DM to ensure they cannot do the "right" thing. Finally, there is next to no rewards for all the ridiculous stuff that happened. So the underlying premise of the module is quite bad, regardless of which way you go really. A real low point in all honesty, and the issues with it *should* have propped up in editing/playtesting. That mod would have been rejected/edited in most regions.
Samwise 04-07-08, 11:22 PM	Like I said: sticks. beaten. As long as I get my sticks to defend myself. :cool: And nothing in it is designed to punish rational thought or "natural" reactions. It will wind up punishing irrational thoughts of entitlement and unnatural metagaming reactions attempting to out-think the whole thing, but that was never the intent of the adventure. It was intended as a minor expedition into what happens when you are the encounters in someone else's adventure, and you decide whether to follow your boxed text or not. Yes, I forgot about one spell, and I did not properly account for one set of favors. Those were indeed errors I should have avoided, and probably could have with minimal text. Beyond that, Soiled Souls is much better. If you wrote that encounter Samwise I am shocked; because you produce much better thought out, quality stuff normally. Although punishing Sampo is always a good reason, that encounter/mod punished the whole LG populace, except the rare metagamers/people who knew the cert (I later found out I was in a party in this category so missed the massive disfavour out of other people cheating, I personally would have gotten it if given the chance) I wrote the whole thing. It was not to punish Sampo, or anyone else. As for getting the disfavor, all I can express is shock. I will have to explain privately as I cannot explain further without it being a spoiler. Finally, there is next to no rewards for all the ridiculous stuff that happened. So the underlying premise of the module is quite bad, regardless of which way you go really. Next to no rewards? That AR is very nicely loaded up for anyone completing it.
Surgebuster 04-07-08, 11:29 PM	Ah, I beleive you are referring to Nothing of Value Occasionally, module writers need to be taken out and beaten with sticks. Its a very rare occasion, but in that case... just the number and LEVEL of issues with the module were just... mindboggling. It was as if it was a module designed to punish rational thought and standard psychological reactions, and reward metagaming. Lets not even mention the final encounter, worst premise ever. Like I said: sticks. beaten. Look, I really enjoyed the first half of Something of Value and I can certainly see where the wheels came off. The problem is, as Sam alluded to, that certain events had to take place that laid the foundation for the future. Unfortunately, anyone playing the adventure had no idea of these future developments and that seemingly arbitrary elements would make sense in retrospect (albeit almost two years later). As I see it, shoehorning future plot development into the structure of a stand-alone adventure did not work. I can't blame the author for that as he is beholden to other people that make those decisions. That being said, I am on record for stating that only one LG adventure has ever given me the impression that a combat was intended to kill PCs. Superior Invisibility and metamagic loopholes will do that. :( Joe
Fsi-Dib 04-07-08, 11:30 PM	However: - Seeds had a great story and we had a lot of fun with it* - Box text is meant to be paraphrased where appropriate (and I dislike being told what I feel too but it wasn't that major a problem) - We didn't realise you could do nonlethal to elementals either the first time round but that's a player problem and it did make sense and you were given a hefty clue. - It was described as dangerous in the blurb Well it's good to hear *you* liked it. Though it seems it still needed heavy modification on the DM's part. Sure, the blurb mentioned it was dangerous, but making overpowering monsters "just because" isn't really what I'm looking for. I'll leave Seeds alone and move on to something else... yeah, you guessed it, other scenarios. Or actually, adaptables. I've understood that these adaptabled adventures have great success over at some other place. I can't understand what's great about them; they all seem to be endless pointless encounters one after another. Nevermind the experience, I'm not after that. Actually, wasting a lot of time with a bad plot and mindless encounters isn't worth, really. Just for the record; I won't be playing any more adaptables. Not for the xp.
_metz_ 04-07-08, 11:53 PM	As long as I get my sticks to defend myself. :cool: And nothing in it is designed to punish rational thought or "natural" reactions. It will wind up punishing irrational thoughts of entitlement and unnatural metagaming reactions attempting to out-think the whole thing, but that was never the intent of the adventure. It was intended as a minor expedition into what happens when you are the encounters in someone else's adventure, and you decide whether to follow your boxed text or not. Yes, I forgot about one spell, and I did not properly account for one set of favors. Those were indeed errors I should have avoided, and probably could have with minimal text. Beyond that, Soiled Souls is much better. I wrote the whole thing. It was not to punish Sampo, or anyone else. As for getting the disfavor, all I can express is shock. I will have to explain privately as I cannot explain further without it being a spoiler. Next to no rewards? That AR is very nicely loaded up for anyone completing it. Well Sam, I hope that it makes sense in retrospect, I have yet to meet another party apart from mine that did not get the box texted disfavour, so yes, I do have a problem with it. **spoiler removed** I don't like standalone random disfavours. If it is part of a plot arc, then I hope it resolves itself. I actually did enjoy it when I played it, right up until the final encounter. When running it, my opinions changed MASSIVELY. In any case Sam, if there was something I missed, please PM me, and we can discuss it. I can see some of it tying in now, nonetheless, it was a shcok by itself, and maybe it was not your fault, but there where in my opinion three massive flaws in that module that epitomised box text roping the PCs into decisions that they must undertake, then punishing them for it. Not a fan really, roleplaying games aren't about being forced into punitive situations, ideally there is choice.
boolean 04-08-08, 12:13 AM	Something of Value, though... there's something very wrong on a fundamental level about that module and the underlying philosophy of adventure writing. I do not wish to have anything to do with it, but unfortunately promised to run it to the local group before I'd read it. I hope they don't hate me too much afterwards. I recommend you break your promise. Offer to run something else instead. I ordered for a local game day, without having played it. It took me several days to read from front to back, because I could only read it for a few minutes at a time. The urge to throw the entire module across the room would build up to the point where I would _have_ to stop reading and go do something else. After I finished reading it I decided I would never run the module. I disliked it that much.
Samwise 04-08-08, 12:17 AM	Unfortunately, anyone playing the adventure had no idea of these future developments and that seemingly arbitrary elements would make sense in retrospect (albeit almost two years later). As I see it, shoehorning future plot development into the structure of a stand-alone adventure did not work. I can't blame the author for that as he is beholden to other people that make those decisions. No, I was beholden to myself for that. I added an encounter to explain the last encounter, but . . . forgot to add a place where that was explained to players. I generally include that in the second basic problem (forgetting those favors). That being said, I am on record for stating that only one LG adventure has ever given me the impression that a combat was intended to kill PCs. . . . :( Joe If it was, I must have done something wrong. To date, I have not managed to kill anyone with that encounter. I tried, but iminent character death inspired players have always managed to thwart me utterly.
MwaO 04-08-08, 12:19 AM	Well Sam, I hope that it makes sense in retrospect, I have yet to meet antoher party apart from mine that did not get that massive disfavour, so yes, I do have a problem with it. (Same as the wanted by the slavelords AR entry that you got for completing a module, that oddly enough, still has not gone away despite killing the slavelord responsible...) In Sam's defense(not that he can't defend himself), we did have something of a wacky play test weekend. There was some things that had happened that had nothing to do with D&D. I think most of our table was more concerned about making sure one of the players was okay - rather than whether or not Sam's mod made sense.
Fsi-Dib 04-08-08, 12:19 AM	Metz, remember sblock tags, please? I haven't played the module yet, and don't intend to get spoiled in any case. I also heard of some encounters which were scrapped entirely in development. Dinosaurs in urban environments? Waaaaait... how can anyone even think of that? I recommend you break your promise. Offer to run something else instead. I ordered for a local game day, without having played it. It took me several days to read from front to back, because I could only read it for a few minutes at a time. The urge to throw the entire module across the room would build up to the point where I would _have_ to stop reading and go do something else. After I finished reading it I decided I would never run the module. I disliked it that much. I guess he has already read the module. We made a vow to play it while drunk. Or getting seriously drunk afterwards. Or give a consolation to the DM. Something of value, anyways. ;) Also, now I'm curious.
Vamroc 04-08-08, 01:06 AM	Ribbons, before errata, had a Greater Invisible(via item that lasts 2-12 rounds) prebuffed, Flying spellcaster who hit the party with Evard's and Stinking Cloud at APL 6 via basically auto-surprise. That's not even talking about the terrain and visibility issues from the Dreadwood. The Barghest meant if the party tried to run, leaving someone behind, that unlucky person would get perma-killed. If the party got crippled due to the Evard's, the party could extremely easily be in the position of running(getting someone permakilled for certain) or risking TPK. You forgot about the four headed Hydra with True Strike as a spell like ability for each head and three Teifling Rouges with Keen Scimitars AT APL 4 IN THE FIRST COMBAT. I'll never forget it OUR DRUID ran away on a warhorse insert expletive laden tirade here. Which allowed two Teifling Rouges to flank me a lvl 5 lvl Wizard 1 lvl fighter in Mage Armor turning me effectively into chocolate covered cherry. So I end up five footing and Magic Missiling them as I used my only 3rd level spell against the Hydra. Then one of them confirmed a Crit and dropped to neg 4 but that left The Hydra to eat all but one ally. Our DM made sure the DRUID that ran away was killed by the Hydra which was awesome because one of it's heads crit'ed. Our lone survivor was a Cleric who made his Stabilization roll and was found by towns folk.
Samwise 04-08-08, 01:09 AM	I also heard of some encounters which were scrapped entirely in development. Dinosaurs in urban environments? Waaaaait... how can anyone even think of that? Do not ask me. I never thought of anything like that.
Vamroc 04-08-08, 01:34 AM	Do not ask me. I never thought of anything like that. Probably same guy who thought an Awakened Dire Bear with fifteen levels of druid was great idea.
Mattastrophic 04-08-08, 01:35 AM	To date, I have not managed to kill anyone with that encounter. I tried, but iminent character death inspired players have always managed to thwart me utterly. My own case is probably as close as you'll see! That encounter had me coming back from -62, a personal record! By the way, I've said it in the past, and I'll say it again: Something of Value is awesome. One of my favorite Cores, actually. Good job, Sam! -Matt
Fsi-Dib 04-08-08, 01:38 AM	Do not ask me. I never thought of anything like that. This example wasn't your doings. :) You forgot about the four headed Hydra with True Strike as a spell like ability for each head and three Teifling Rouges with Keen Scimitars AT APL 4 IN THE FIRST COMBAT. I'll never forget it OUR DRUID ran away on a warhorse insert expletive laden tirade here. Which allowed two Teifling Rouges to flank me a lvl 5 lvl Wizard 1 lvl fighter in Mage Armor turning me effectively into chocolate covered cherry. So I end up five footing and Magic Missiling them as I used my only 3rd level spell against the Hydra. Then one of them confirmed a Crit and dropped to neg 4 but that left The Hydra to eat all but one ally. Our DM made sure the DRUID that ran away was killed by the Hydra which was awesome because one of it's heads crit'ed. Our lone survivor was a Cleric who made his Stabilization roll and was found by towns folk. I feel sick. It feels like the author thought D&D is all about DM vs. players, which it is not. Everyone should know this.
Surgebuster 04-08-08, 01:39 AM	My own case is probably as close as you'll see! That encounter had me coming back from -62, a personal record! By the way, I've said it in the past, and I'll say it again: Something of Value is awesome. One of my favorite Cores, actually. Good job, Sam! -Matt We had two dead and one in a forcecage before any PC took a second action (flat-footed Cleric couldn't get off a Delay Death and was the second casualty at any rate). It was the 'superior' that did us in after that. :( Joe
Madfox11 04-08-08, 08:25 AM	Before being overly harsh on an author take a step back and take some time to think about the situation. Few authors and no reviewers are out to kill PCs. It is relatively easy to make a mistake in encounter design and to miss that mistake in playtests. Dozens of tables just spot more then two tables especially in regards to combat. We have to trust on the CR in the MMs until proven otherwise. I still feel bad about a certain crocodile encounter (luckily 50% of the tables never had that encounter) and the tauric displacer beast of Seeds also fall into this category (and yes, the playtests, slot 0 and the table I run had no more problems with the tauric displacer beasts than could be expected from an EL = APL +3 encounter).
NiTessine 04-08-08, 09:02 AM	It's pretty safe to say that Something of Value was meant to be this way, though. "Encounter x is the most dangerous fight of the adventure. It is quite likely, especially if [CENSORED] that he can kill a PC. Further, it is quite likely at APL 14 and 16 that if [CENSORED] [the party will] probably have very little chance of defeating him. This encounter is supposed to be lethal." - page four of the adventure.
Simpi 04-08-08, 10:02 AM	And I wrote that last encounter just for Sampo. Oh well. Well, I never got there due to inter-party conflict where Paulus Hume (my ranger) went on his merry away from annoying do-gooders which were the rest of the party :D As you can quess this was an online game. Sampo Haarlaa Naerie Triad
Timlagor 04-08-08, 12:05 PM	We didn't find SoV particularly deadly (don't remember how we dealt with invisible guy).. just bad. "irrational thoughts of entitlement and unnatural metagaming reactions attempting to out-think the whole thing, but that was never the intent of the adventure" strikes me as a grossly inappropriate description for seeking out all the known good and honourable people in greyhawk and asking their advice. We ended up giving the books to the Knights iirc because we suspected the books contained information that might priove essential to countering the badness ..didn't stop Tenser sending his minions out of the blue regardless of how many paladins or favours of Tenser the party might have had. Temple of Pelor was hopeless and apprently it made no difference who you gave the books to anyway! -Choo CHOOOO! The disfavour is also obnoxious but the AR is just a minor detail on the end as far as I'm concerned. Great way to start a module though :/
Mattastrophic 04-08-08, 12:34 PM	It's pretty safe to say that Something of Value was meant to be this way, though. "Encounter x is the most dangerous fight of the adventure. It is quite likely, especially if [CENSORED] that he can kill a PC. Further, it is quite likely at APL 14 and 16 that if [CENSORED] [the party will] probably have very little chance of defeating him. This encounter is supposed to be lethal." - page four of the adventure. I'm glad you said that. For you've just shown an example of what I consider the worst of LG: Overaccomodation of sub-par PCs, at the expense of the rest who can both handle... well, the way the game itself is written! In this example, I find it very sad that anyone would complain about APL 14 and 16 being lethal. If high APLs weren't lethal, (which in most cases, it isn't) then every module would be a cakewalk (which in most cases, they are). Details of COR6-17 Something of Value follow: The complained-about example features a encounter that's a complaint magnet: a CR=APL+2 single arcane spellcaster. (The encounter itself is EL=APL3 due to "preparations." I personally think the +1 shouldn't have been applied, because single arcane-spellcaster encounters have to be "prepared" for their CR be valid. But Sam did, so in all reality he was going easy on us!) Now why's it a complaint magnet? Because the caster is competent. And just as competent arcane spellcaster PCs kill bad guys, competent NPC arcane spellcasters kill players. That's how the game is written. If they can't neutralize players very quickly, they get run through in round 1 by the PCs, like with every other incompetent arcane spellcaster encounter in LG. So what a complainer about this encounter is actually asking for is for authors to remove arcane spellcasters from encounters. That's just silly. It's APL 14 and 16! The two APLs where authors and DMs should not hold back on providing a challenge. In short, due to overaccomodation, high APL play is, at least from my own perspective, too easy to accurately represent high-level challenges. Which reminds me, another worst of LG: -Overaccomodation of low-level play at the expense of the rest. Notice the sheer amount of effort that was put in to Greyhawk Ruins, including a sourcebook longer than the LGCS as well as 11 adventures thus far. Then notice how the Circle failed to release one module a year for the high-level game. A quick count shows me that among the Adaptables, Greyhawk Ruins adventures, and Cores, 39 cannot be played by a 12th-level character, leaving 41 that can be. I find it sad that the campaign has gone the route of offering less and less play opportunities to the players (and PCs) who stick around, especially in the wake of Adaptables, where a brand-new player can (and as I've seen, does) reach levels of unplayability very quickly. In short, the APL caps are too frakin' low. So what we have here is a campaign where half of the play opportunities are only accessible to low-level characters, and the other half has for the most part become way too gentle due to overaccomodation. -Matt
Hariman 04-08-08, 12:39 PM	For the record, year 6 Keoland and Sheldomar valley mods were retired at the end of last year. As a general rule, I try not to badmouth modules - even ones where I believe they could've been much much better. Authors put a lot of work into writing their modules. I'm all for giving PRIVATE constructive criticism for them to consider when writing their next, but bashing someone in PUBLIC serves no purpose *for me*. However, the same act does serve to make someone else feel awful (the author). Seems like a lousy trade to me. *shrug* Constructive criticism? I'm pretty sure that was already handled via the players in my area with a little more pull than what I have, among others. Forest of Caverns is the next in the series and it's better, though still difficult. BUT, Forest of Caverns is still active, so let's not spoil it. Y'know, I keep seeing the assertion that Ribbons was a difficult mod... I just didn't see it, either as a player or judging it. For the sake of staying on topic, I'll PM you the explanation. Ribbons, before errata, had a Greater Invisible(via item that lasts 2-12 rounds) prebuffed, Flying spellcaster who hit the party with Evard's and Stinking Cloud at APL 6 via basically auto-surprise. That's not even talking about the terrain and visibility issues from the Dreadwood. The Barghest meant if the party tried to run, leaving someone behind, that unlucky person would get perma-killed. If the party got crippled due to the Evard's, the party could extremely easily be in the position of running(getting someone permakilled for certain) or risking TPK. Wow. Now I'm really happy that I played it post errata. Back to the topic at hand: A mod that is part of the "Best of LG" is Riders of the Grave. It's still active so the most I can say is that it had a great story and fun/challenging combats. The Price of Hospitality was another great mod. Fun NPCs, good plot and a desire to see the storyline continued. (Or at least to see the characters again.)
Samwise 04-08-08, 12:48 PM	Probably same guy who thought an Awakened Dire Bear with fifteen levels of druid was great idea. The closest I ever came was a guy who ran a chat based game and had a druid who preferred staying in the form of a rabbit. I used that experience to write up the scenes in Pindangoogly, including the rabbits, for John M. Baker in Never Mined way back when the campaign began. But all those rabbits did was hop around and tell you where all the kobolds were if you thought to talk them and did not eat them.
Samwise 04-08-08, 01:04 PM	It's pretty safe to say that Something of Value was meant to be this way, though. "Encounter x is the most dangerous fight of the adventure. It is quite likely, especially if [CENSORED] that he can kill a PC. Further, it is quite likely at APL 14 and 16 that if [CENSORED] [the party will] probably have very little chance of defeating him. This encounter is supposed to be lethal." - page four of the adventure. Yes it is. That one encounter was supposed to reflect a particular concept that was supposed to be lethal. That is in contrast with hundreds of other LG encounters with the same intent that players barely notice. The irony of that in hindsight is, the first time I ran that outside of playtest, the players did not have what I expected was required, and they rolled over the encounter anyway. So much for my assessment of that one! I find it peculiar that people would complain about a direct warning as to the difficulty of an encounter even while complaints are being made about encounters that are too difficult with no particular note for the DM.
NiTessine 04-08-08, 01:15 PM	I'm glad you said that. For you've just shown an example of what I consider the worst of LG: The encounter is a complaint magnet because it's supposed to kill, not challenge. One of the writers has elsewhere described the higher APLs as gratuitous and egregious abuse. It's bad design and encourages an adversarial relationship between the DM and the players, which I've never seen result in an enjoyable game. It's the equivalent of "rocks fall, everyone dies", an arms race that can only end in TPK. Additionally, the background explanation for the encounter is... well, put it this way: last year, one of the Naerie regional writers turned in a first draft that heavily featured elements like that. The writer got immediately canned and the module written from start to finish by another person.
Samwise 04-08-08, 01:16 PM	We didn't find SoV particularly deadly (don't remember how we dealt with invisible guy).. just bad. "irrational thoughts of entitlement and unnatural metagaming reactions attempting to out-think the whole thing, but that was never the intent of the adventure" strikes me as a grossly inappropriate description for Actually, it does not refer to that. It refers to people doing the exact opposite of that because they figure that is what is presented to them as the adventure, and they never move beyond it. The disfavour is also obnoxious but the AR is just a minor detail on the end as far as I'm concerned. It seems I confused which disfavor _metz_ was talking about. I will note, when I wrote that, there was exactly one active or expected adventure at that APL that the referenced disfavor would affect - Something of Value. It was supposed to have absolutely no real effect, as no adventure would ever qualify for it again. Go figure a few others plus adaptables would suddenly appear, and it would suddenly have an affect. Great way to start a module though :/ That is not the start of the adventure. The start of the adventure is there for a very specific purpose.
Samwise 04-08-08, 01:38 PM	The encounter is a complaint magnet because it's supposed to kill, not challenge. One of the writers has elsewhere described the higher APLs as gratuitous and egregious abuse. It's bad design and encourages an adversarial relationship between the DM and the players, which I've never seen result in an enjoyable game. It's the equivalent of "rocks fall, everyone dies", an arms race that can only end in TPK. That encounter has never been a complaint magnet that I have heard about. People have made it clear that it was hard and pushed them to their limits, but it was typically followed with appreciation for something that was a challenge without egregiously abusing templates or advancing creatures or what not. I have not gotten a swarm of "You evil murdering heathen, how dare you write something like that?" comments. Additionally, the background explanation for the encounter is... well, put it this way: last year, one of the Naerie regional writers turned in a first draft that heavily featured elements like that. The writer got immediately canned and the module written from start to finish by another person. Then you should not run the adventure. If you are really find it so outrageous that the creatures in an encounter would actually have a direct and openly stated goal of wanting to win and kill the PCs, and you are so committed to hating the adventure, just do not run it. It is unlikely you will be able to get past your own biases to run it properly and let the players have a good time.
Samwise 04-08-08, 01:42 PM	Well, I never got there due to inter-party conflict where Paulus Hume (my ranger) went on his merry away from annoying do-gooders which were the rest of the party :D As you can quess this was an online game. Sampo Haarlaa Naerie Triad Blasted do-gooders! :P And I so wanted you to enjoy that encounter. :D
Fsi-Dib 04-08-08, 02:16 PM	Ahem, it was the Naerie regional that originally featured those dinosaurs in urban environment. At least so I've heard. As for Matt, well, our views differ greatly. I, myself, loathe APL 10 minimum scenarios. APL 2-8 modules can be played by just about anyone, so I find them much more enjoyable. You can always start a new character, right? I'd get very bored if I'd stick to my Krrnkar all the time. And you'd probably hang yourself if you knew what kind of scenarios we have here. At least two scenarios can be completed without a single combat. I also hear that some group chose to go to sleep to a tavern and wait for the plot train, which eventually went past during the night. The DM gave empty ARs. Our gaming style just differs very, very, very much from the generic populace.
NiTessine 04-08-08, 02:28 PM	That encounter has never been a complaint magnet that I have heard about. This raises an interesting question... do LG authors in general get much feedback or criticism of their modules from the playerbase at large? I've gotten zip, and I know Simpi often bemoans its lack as well, even for his Cores and metaregionals. It's a good tool, constructive criticism. It tells the author when he's screwed up and allows him to improve as a writer. There are a couple who I've seen actually got worse as time went on (you're not one of them, but then, I've only read one of your modules). I think here's something that the LFR team might take a good, long look at.
smerwin29 04-08-08, 03:02 PM	This raises an interesting question... do LG authors in general get much feedback or criticism of their modules from the playerbase at large? I've gotten zip, and I know Simpi often bemoans its lack as well, even for his Cores and metaregionals. It's a good tool, constructive criticism. It tells the author when he's screwed up and allows him to improve as a writer. There are a couple who I've seen actually got worse as time went on (you're not one of them, but then, I've only read one of your modules). I think here's something that the LFR team might take a good, long look at. This is a good question that deserves its own thread.
magebeast 04-08-08, 04:39 PM	My least favorite scenario I cannot remember the name of and the ARs are gone because that character is dead. It was (I believe) a year 4 that involved a vampire spawn at APL 2. The mod itself was completely run on the rails. You had like a whole day and all sorts of places that the author would let you run around to but you were incapable of moving the action forward. You could talk to a bunch of people, but none of it was helpful or in any way prepared you for the encounter. Choosing to go to the inn and sleep at the beginning of the day was as effective as wasting a whole bunch of time in the slot talking to people.
garyjohnson 04-08-08, 06:01 PM	And nothing in it is designed to punish rational thought or "natural" reactions. I found I had a number of significant problems with the scenario, including places where I felt it penalised rational behaviour. Tenser's herald is rude to the PCs, DMs are instructed to make him ruder if the PCs are willing to cooperate with him because he serves a known champion of lawful good The scenario assumes the PCs either agree with Saal or kill him, and DMs are instructed to make it hard for PCs to take other actions, such as capturing him The scenario structure ensures the PCs receive the Lord Mayor's disfavour - nothing the PCs can do changes this, even if the Diplomacy Monster made the Lord Mayor helpful when they met All significant plot developments/encounters in the scenario are triggered by NPCs - for example, the PCs can't find Saal until a "random high-level NPC" turns up and tells them what to do next. There are roadblocks that only open up when an NPC tells the PCs what to do next. Tenser sends the angels to punish the PCs because his herald was rude to them - again, nothing the PCs can do changes this. Also, the angels come across as particularly "Lawful Stupid" - one player quipped that they should be "moronic devas", not Movanic Devas, for being so inflexible and for still wanting to kill someone who moved them from hostile to helpful. There were things I liked about the scenario as a DM. I liked that the scenario provided very flexible interaction situations with the NPCs who were interested in acquiring the books. I liked that the combat in the streets of Greyhawk had opponents who would fight each other, given half a chance - that's an effective way to demonstrate that "the bad guys" aren't a monolithic alliance. However, these things don't outweigh the things I disliked: the blatant "this scenario is scripted to penalise you no matter what you try and do" elements; making the good NPCs with the most on-screen time rude, aggressive, and uncooperative; and the inflexible scenario structure that includes lots of "don't let the PCs do X, it breaks the script". It was intended as a minor expedition into what happens when you are the encounters in someone else's adventure, and you decide whether to follow your boxed text or not. I think that's a useful insight into your intention as the author, and I wish you'd included that in the Preparation for Play section of the scenario. In general, I wish more authors included information about their intentions in their scenarios - it's very useful when trying to figure out what tone or emphasis I should be placing on events in the scenario when I'm running a game. Cheers, Gary Johnson
Maesto 04-08-08, 07:10 PM	The module referred to in the above post is "Key to the Grave", I think... Anyway, I thought I'd post here in defence of Something of Value. It may just have been my party and/or GM (all of whom were excellent), but I really enjoyed the game. I'm not sure how to avoid the auto-disfavour (and I have read and run the mod), and I think that the final combat was poorly conceived in comparison to the rest of the module, but I didn't think it was all that bad.
Fsi-Dib 04-09-08, 12:23 AM	Ah yes, Key to the Grave. My poor, crappy Enchanter died in the swarm attack. Wasn't prepared well enough. I don't really think the vampire spawn was the thing to worry about. Later I heard they dealt it by pouring a barrelful of holy water into his coffin or something similar. Though yeah, energy drain at 2nd level is harsh.
Madfox11 04-09-08, 07:40 AM	My least favorite scenario I cannot remember the name of and the ARs are gone because that character is dead. It was (I believe) a year 4 that involved a vampire spawn at APL 2. The mod itself was completely run on the rails. You had like a whole day and all sorts of places that the author would let you run around to but you were incapable of moving the action forward. You could talk to a bunch of people, but none of it was helpful or in any way prepared you for the encounter. Choosing to go to the inn and sleep at the beginning of the day was as effective as wasting a whole bunch of time in the slot talking to people. Which is a clear example of the DM running the adventure incorrect and not the adventure itself being in error. I do think the vampire was a bit inappropiate for the APL since even a lucky hit could kill PCs and turn them into vampire spawn which forced the DM to take certain precautions. The investigation though DID have a purpose: learning what was going on, preparing for your opponent and attacking him when you were ready (and not on his conditions). The reason it did not work very well in some cases is the fact that the players usually knew more about the monster than the PCs and the players had problems keeping the meta-game information seperate.
Timlagor 04-09-08, 08:02 AM	I know of KttG tables that got to the vampire spawn in the daytime. There was another at APL2 in a Core (full Vamp at APL4!) as well ..one of the Tiger in Ahlyssa series iirc. In case my 'smilie' confused anyone, I did think SoV had a very good start ..just a steep descent after that.
Mattastrophic 04-09-08, 11:56 AM	And you'd probably hang yourself if you knew what kind of scenarios we have here. At least two scenarios can be completed without a single combat. Actually... My favorite modules are the ones which succeed at doing what they set out to do. One example was a Year 5 Geoff module called The Weight of Words. It was six hours of all talking, with zero combat. The conclusion even rewarded avoiding combat. And I heavily enjoyed it, because it succeeded at being an all-talking module. On the other hand, that year 7 Core Second Chances... My party managed to use our Charisma-based skills so well that we missed an encounter completely... and thus lost all the access on the AR. A module that inflicts punishment for success? Not a good module. Something of Value successfully created a no-way-out situation... by offering no way out. Garyjohnson posted that he believes Diplomacy should have gotten you out of a disfavor. But then it wouldn't have been a no-way-out module. I enjoyed Something of Value because there really was no way out. And on a related note, Key to the Grave's vampire spawn at APL 2 is what made it fail at being what it set out to be: a baby-level "Welcome to Living Greyhawk" module. -Matt
Vamroc 04-09-08, 12:15 PM	I know of KttG tables that got to the vampire spawn in the daytime. There was another at APL2 in a Core (full Vamp at APL4!) as well ..one of the Tiger in Ahlyssa series iirc. In case my 'smilie' confused anyone, I did think SoV had a very good start ..just a steep descent after that. That reminds me of SHE-6 01 Flesh Torn Asunder and the stupid UNDERGROUND fight with the full vamp who's also a seventh level wizard at APL 6. Check this he knows your coming then goes invisible and waits till you open the door. Oh and to get to his crypt you must walk down a 10ft wide 30 ft long tunnel that slopes down hill. Only three members of an eight person table managed to ecape The Evard Black Tentacle. There's nothing in the mod that tells you the BBEG is a vamp either so we figured 2 sixes 1 five 2 fours and a couple of tag along ones and two we should be fine. That fight took FOREVER and our DM was kind enough to stop the Evard's as each of the charactors in it went negative. Then I got the AR and was P.O'ed that I couldn't play my 6th lvl Wizard 1 lvl fighter (needed him to make a RHOD table before T.U. got eliminated) THAT SPELL LIST WAS SICK.
garyjohnson 04-09-08, 04:53 PM	Something of Value successfully created a no-way-out situation... by offering no way out. Garyjohnson posted that he believes Diplomacy should have gotten you out of a disfavor. But then it wouldn't have been a no-way-out module. I enjoyed Something of Value because there really was no way out. I'll have to disagree with you on this one, Mattastrophic: the scenario could easily have been written so that it didn't mandate that NPC's disfavour, and it wouldn't have affected the main plotline of the scenario. I'm sure the scenario could have that NPC remain indifferent to the PCs throughout the scenario, removing the AR item entirely, and the rest of the scenario would play out in exactly the same way. I think this is also a point where an individual's authoring/DMing philosophy becomes important. For example, I think it's important to focus on what the PCs do to affect the plot of the scenario, even when (as Samwise explained earlier in the thread) the theme of the scenario is that the PCs are pawns in someone else's story. I'm fine with a scenario that sets up a "no way out" situation - but I think the scenario should allow the PCs to find whatever way(s) out they're capable of finding, and not make the PCs follow the one scripted way out, as directed by NPCs. For me, this is an extension of the principle that the author should always at a minimum explain the opponents' motives, and preferably explain what happens if the opponents' attitude is changed by the PCs (using Diplomacy, Intimidate, charm person, and so on). That is, the author should assume that at least some PC groups will find other ways of dealing with an opponent than just combat. Likewise, I think the author should assume that some PCs will find other ways of dealing with a no way out plot situation, and allow the PCs to succeed. Naturally, your mileage may vary. Roleplaying preferences are just that - preferences. I think my preference creates more potential for more tables to have more fun, but all I have to back that up is a small collection of anecdotal evidence. :) Cheers, Gary Johnson
solbergb 04-09-08, 07:10 PM	The irony of that in hindsight is, the first time I ran that outside of playtest, the players did not have what I expected was required, and they rolled over the encounter anyway. So much for my assessment of that one! If that was our table.....well some of that was luck we were greatly aided by the fact that both of the first two targets were immune to the effect the bad guy tried. He also made understandable but incorrect meta-assumptions about my PC based on what I looked like that resulted in a target selection or spell selection that took him out of his offensive game (he either used a less powerful option, or he targeted people who could be easily healed and were not critical to his survival). This gave us the opportunity to come up with a plan to win, and being experienced players, we didn't panic and tried stuff until it worked, using our action-advantage over a lone opponent ruthlessly. Eventually our tricks came together, we pinpointed him and he was neutralized entirely before he got to act again. It was a long and tricky fight though. I wouldn't characterize it as "rolled over". We on our part wasted several actions doing the stuff that would work vs the normal version of his primary defensive spell. I found that encounter memorable and pretty appropriate to the plot. When they send people to kill you, they should be a threat to kill SOMEONE! While this can be hard when limited to APL+3, it is nice to see the assassins in their own minds could reasonably make an attempt and escape with their lives, succeed or fail. That sort of thing is why I liked the Invisible Stalker encounter in It Never Rains in Nyrond and disliked the Tiger assassin encounter in Tiger In Ahlissa. The former was the right kind of enemy to send after a party in a hurry that made a mess in the playground of someone who either was a powerful spellcaster to bind/ally an extraplanar tracker or had contacts with same. The latter was pretty much a joke....if he succeeded in killing anyone it was a suicide run. All we could think of was that his employers were misinformed about the party power level, similar to the "level 2 party with 6 people, three war dogs and two warhorses is ambushed by four level 1 rogues" encounter I saw once. These ambushers were on serious drugs :) I didn't like the final encounter much. All of the interactions with the hiring NPC and his minions showed nothing but arrogance, which is just plain stupid on the scale of APL14-16. While the primary character is epic, his minions are not and by the time the adventure takes place, most PC's are known in Greyhawk to some extent and with several recent battles in the city, their current power level should not be treated as arrogantly as your typical APL4 party. They are powerful enough to hit back in quite a variety of subtle ways, not directly...they're still weak against any epic opponent, but they could do a heck of a lot of damage if sufficiently irritated to any other interests he might have. The being sent after the PC's has no chance of doing serious injury to them, much less kill them, unless they don't fight back. It would actually make more sense to have one of the enemies of the person who sent it call up such a being, send it and order it to claim it was from the other guy to make him look bad, although given the restrictions of those creatures, it probably could not accept such an order.
Hariman 04-09-08, 09:06 PM	That reminds me of SHE-6 01 Flesh Torn Asunder and the stupid UNDERGROUND fight with the full vamp who's also a seventh level wizard at APL 6. Check this he knows your coming then goes invisible and waits till you open the door. Oh and to get to his crypt you must walk down a 10ft wide 30 ft long tunnel that slopes down hill. Only three members of an eight person table managed to escape The Evard's Black Tentacle. There's nothing in the mod that tells you the BBEG is a vamp either so we figured 2 sixes 1 five 2 fours and a couple of tag along ones and two we should be fine. That fight took FOREVER and our DM was kind enough to stop the Evard's as each of the charactors in it went negative. Then I got the AR and was P.O'ed that I couldn't play my 6th lvl Wizard 1 lvl fighter (needed him to make a RHOD table before T.U. got eliminated) THAT SPELL LIST WAS SICK. That is, undoubtedly, the mod and encounter that he is talking about. Where I'm at, it's nicknamed "PCs Torn Asunder" or "Parties Torn Asunder". Let's see, that Vampire had: Evard's, Fireball, Glitterdust, Enervation, Invisibility and more. Every spell that vampire had was a spell that PCs love to use. All used in concert to shaft the party as much as possible. And the vampire summons a couple swarms before you enter. Any mod that includes instructions that say "Let the party waste an hour or so before triggering encounter x." is part of the worst of LG. My party got shafted by a slew of failed glitterdust saves (Always pack a potion of remove blindness!) and our main tank being suggested into sitting on the ground. It took a Timestop favor to prevent a TPK. And even that resulted in 4 of 6 PCs dead. That mod left a very bad taste in my mouth. On the best side, and I probably mentioned this before, switching characters to a much more effective sorcerer has been one of the highlights of my LG experience. The immediately apparent effectiveness of my sorcerer over my prior character makes him that much more fun to play. Now I just need to keep him from becoming exactly like the other 2 or 3 sorcerers in the area. Hariman PS: Those of you with longer memories might remember me trying to prove that a mod with a Vampire/Wizard7 at APL 6 was a bad mod. Without being able to post any spoilers. Flesh Torn Asunder was that mod. And I'm sorry to turn this thread into a vent fest. Hopefully the bitterness will clear up soon. (And not just mine.)
Timlagor 04-09-08, 10:03 PM	It's very easy to write a 'no way out' module if you simply proscribe there being any way out ...rather harder if you actually have the world (NPCs) respond rationally to player-character actions. [No module kills players! ..just the characters]
_metz_ 04-09-08, 10:23 PM	[No module kills players! ..just the characters] [No module kills players: _I_ kill players] hehehehe... Don't forget the GM influence...
Drezden 04-10-08, 12:47 AM	I have to agree with Matt's post (the blacked out one) - at least the NPC in question was built somewhat effectively. So many bad guys are just plain lame (pushovers). As effective as the NPC was built, he was still fairly easy for a competant party of APL14-16 adventurers. I played the APL14 playtest (where he was harder than the finalized version) and the NPC was still dead before the end of the first full round. I thought Sam was going to cry. :) Daren
Vamroc 04-10-08, 02:44 PM	You can build an NPC to be effective without him being sooo broken that the DM is the only one having fun. If we were all at six or eight then that fight might have been bit easier but he's still waaaay over the appropriate APL so I don't even want to think about 12-16.
Surgebuster 04-10-08, 06:58 PM	As effective as the NPC was built, he was still fairly easy for a competant party of APL14-16 adventurers. I played the APL14 playtest (where he was harder than the finalized version) and the NPC was still dead before the end of the first full round. I thought Sam was going to cry. :) I'm interested to know how you got around the superior invisibility issue, considering only true seeing reveals it. Mass True Seeing isn't a spell as far as I am aware. Quite how someone with an epic hide modifier for a surprise round along with a high initiative modifier dies before the end of round one without taking at least one PC with him is puzzling. My conjurer was -15 in the surprise round, with the cleric around -12 in the first action of round one...following specific tactics as outlined in the mod. Joe
Maesto 04-10-08, 11:23 PM	Spoilers on what happened on our table... On our table, by the top of round two, he was grappled with telekinesis by the guy with true seeing, and plonked in a silence spell by the cleric. Granted, we had a near miss as he tried to assassinate the only person who could see him. Other tables I've heard of readied area greater dispel magics targetted where the spells of doom originated from.
Drezden 04-11-08, 12:24 AM	Ok, here you go ... Surprise Round He hits Cleric with Maximized Empowered Orb - Cleric goes "oww" My wizard plays Feign Suprise and Casts True seeing Sam goes, "You carry that TOO!?" I say, "Yes, I am a diviner." Round 1 He hits me with Big Orb - I go, "Wow, I actually got hit" But I have 150+ HPs with buffs so I am fine. I debate whether to use Quicken True Strike or Scorching Ray - use True Strike and then hit him with Sudden Maximized, Empowered Orb - which knocks him very, very low. [If I had opted for S Ray he would have died] Spellsword casts Mass Fly Cleric cast True Seeing on BDF BDF flies up and obliterates Bad Guy. Sam gets sad puppy dog look. lol There you go. Daren I'm interested to know how you got around the superior invisibility issue, considering only true seeing reveals it. Mass True Seeing isn't a spell as far as I am aware. Quite how someone with an epic hide modifier for a surprise round along with a high initiative modifier dies before the end of round one without taking at least one PC with him is puzzling. My conjurer was -15 in the surprise round, with the cleric around -12 in the first action of round one...following specific tactics as outlined in the mod. Joe
Vamroc 04-11-08, 01:51 AM	I'm interested to know how you got around the superior invisibility issue, considering only true seeing reveals it. Mass True Seeing isn't a spell as far as I am aware. Quite how someone with an epic hide modifier for a surprise round along with a high initiative modifier dies before the end of round one without taking at least one PC with him is puzzling. My conjurer was -15 in the surprise round, with the cleric around -12 in the first action of round one...following specific tactics as outlined in the mod. Joe They might have used Limited Wish or Wish to remove the superior invisibility (provided they had a PC with the spell) then cast delay death on the 15 lvl beat stick who Hasted would get like 6 attacks doing well over fifty damage on each one forcing the BBEG to make 6 straight massive damge saves.
Surgebuster 04-11-08, 02:18 AM	They might have wished away the superior invisibility then cast delay death on the beat stick who Hasted would get like 6 attacks doing about 450 pts total then the BBEG failed his masive damage save which kills him. Think that's not possible an Enlarged Half Orc Fighter with a Belt of Giant Strength will have at least a +9 bonus to damage on strength alone. Of course he would have Improved Critical with a Sacred Scabard TO AUTO CONFIRM and the weapon of choice a Starmetal Great Sword with Evil Outsider Bane. With all the buff's up 9D6 +30 is possible on a critical, and all the 15 lvl Fighter has to do is roll a seventeen on each attack. If he take average damage which comes out to be 75 per hit add that up six times and Blam 450 point's so in theory he could do EVEN MORE and then there is the rest of the party. Yeah, because the flying spellcaster that is making attacks from 100 ft away would willingly get within melee range, because of course he is too stupid to move after casting a spell (it's not like he would think to be hasted while flying invisibly either, remember this guy is an idiot in this little fantasy) And of course every LG player is always happy to give away xp and cast a limited wish on a hunch that the macguffin is using an 8th level buff rather than a 4th level one. :rolleyes: It isn't like the party knows he's coming either, so minute and round buffs aren't up. There's a reason he picks the time and place... This could go on for ever but quite simply, as written, targeting casters who are relatively unbuffed, I can't see it being anything but incredibly tough. Even assuming everyone somehow performs the (unlikely) perfect action and that they actually have the perfect counters memorised and do so in the perfect order. Unless the macguffin is poorly run by the DM of course... Joe
Mattastrophic 04-11-08, 01:36 PM	*deleted*
dkay807 04-11-08, 01:58 PM	Long story short, the dude can be a problem and PCs can die. We had an almost-death due to one of our clerics having Shield Other on a guy with crappy saves (half PUG). I've read the mod thoroughly and have run it. The guy won't do too well against a party of strong players, playing PCs equipped to deal with most situations. Against your standard party, he'll kill numerous PCs and possibly pull off a TPK.
solbergb 04-11-08, 02:07 PM	I'm interested to know how you got around the superior invisibility issue, considering only true seeing reveals it. Mass True Seeing isn't a spell as far as I am aware. We didn't have true seeing. We had a cleric of Joramy, who runs energy immunity fire all the time. We had another cleric who had a L7 slot open and decided to try filling it the night before with the same spell. We also had a monk, a bear warrior and a rogue. Surprise round, big zap hits cleric of Joramy, who is immune. Init, big round hits cleric of Pholtus, who is also immune. Party wastes actions doing all the usual anti-invisibiltiy things. In the process, the monk is flying and gets a silence effect. Bad guy switches to force effects, which do enough less damage that we can keep up on healing. Rogue makes active listen checks to try to pinpoint the bad guy. We start moving a silence field into his general area so every round he has to move out to cast (move+shoot is better for pinpointing than shoot+move). For variety, the clerics start lighting up the general area he's in with area spells. One thing the caster didn't do is try to take out the flying, silenced monk. He assumed I had a massive touch AC. I did not :). But I could survive one of his mega-nukes and probably pick up some healing if I was careful, and doing that would have allowed him to flee or regain the initiative, instead of pounding away at the clerics. A few rounds in the rogue gets a good listen check and pinpoints him and communicates this to the party. By now the barbarian is airwalking and both he and monk are in range. Barbarian goes over and attempts a grapple and misses on the concealment, but that pinpoints the square for the silenced monk, who does the same and makes the concealment. Caster is silenced and grappled. He proves to have no way out on his next turn and doesn't survive to do anything else.
Vamroc 04-11-08, 02:49 PM	It's not a hunch if the party has a competent 15th lvl wizard it who would have cast Fly on the beat stick who would have had at least one level of barbarian. This gives him a speed of forty in +1 mithril full plate now he's enlarged that gives him TEN FOOT REACH. I did say hasted so he could fly 40 up then double that as he flies downward toward the target to attack rage and beat the snot of the wizard without breaking a sweat he would also get a bonus to attack for having higher ground. The rage would push his strength damage to +11 distance traveled 120 feet. Also he doesn't care what his AC is because of DELAY DEATH and a fighters fort save at fifteenth level can easily make the fort save for disintegrate or Finger of Death should the BBEG have them readied.
solbergb 04-11-08, 04:53 PM	Yeah, because the flying spellcaster that is making attacks from 100 ft away would willingly get within melee range, because of course he is too stupid to move after casting a spell (it's not like he would think to be hasted while flying invisibly either, remember this guy is an idiot in this little fantasy) There are ways to force him to move and cast, rather than cast and move. See my spoilerblock on this for what we did. If the party has an archer, one round of pinpointing and he's probably dead meat. (level 15 archers can generally do plenty of damage even if half miss, or have woodland archer so first hit that beats concealment means the rest hit). If he's moving, listen checks can be used to pinpoint. Heck even spot checks can be used, as invis only grants a big bonus to hide and autoconcealment, that's no guarantee vs a ranger with maxed ranks, decent wisdom and spells/equipment that boost his bonuses to spot, given that the arcanist is only likely to have his dex to boost his hide skill, and is possibly getting a -5 for moving full speed. Even without an archer, one round of pinpointing allows tactics like "dim door the beatstick next to the guy, and have him swing 6 times...". We got him with our tanks moving themselves to the pinpoint location and toughing out miss chances. But with the action advantage we had, it was a matter of when this would happen, not if. He was incapable of outdamaging our healing, and to even try he had to ignore the spotter and the two beatsticks until they got lucky.
Maesto 04-11-08, 05:44 PM	If the party has an archer, one round of pinpointing and he's probably dead meat. (level 15 archers can generally do plenty of damage even if half miss, or have woodland archer so first hit that beats concealment means the rest hit). If he's moving, listen checks can be used to pinpoint. Heck even spot checks can be used, as invis only grants a big bonus to hide and autoconcealment, that's no guarantee vs a ranger with maxed ranks, decent wisdom and spells/equipment that boost his bonuses to spot, given that the arcanist is only likely to have his dex to boost his hide skill, and is possibly getting a -5 for moving full speed. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't superior invisibility get around the problem of listen checks?
solbergb 04-11-08, 05:59 PM	I don't think it makes you silent. It does not have the same wording as beguiler/bard spells that do that sort of thing. Without exact wording in front, I can't be certain but if I remember correctly it is like this: You can't be detected with blindsight/sense/scent. Things like faerie fire and glitterdust fail. I think it also masks your spellcasting noise explicitly. But if you move, you make the usual amount of noise. There is also the issue that he's casting orbs. Our GM ruled that we could not pinpoint him after casting by where the orbs came from, but at my table it wouldn't even take a spot check (the orb doesn't get the benefit of superior invis, it is perfectly visible and starts from the caster spot per spell description even though mechanics are slightly different from ray...you could ready a ranged attack that would go off after his orb did into the square that the orb appeared from) Our GM did rule instead though that movement caused normal listen mechanics. He was greatly aided by range modifiers, as the rogue doing the spotting wasn't flying.
Maesto 04-11-08, 06:08 PM	Sure - the orbs give away his location, which is why cast and move was so important. (I may make it a DC 0 spotcheck modified by distance; orbs are pretty small ;)). Re sound: "masks image, scent and sound alike, concealing the subject from all senses except touch". It doesn't explicitly say that it overrides the listen mechanics, but does specifically mention "undetectable by scent, blindsense, tremorsense, and blindsight".
twells 04-11-08, 06:46 PM	Sure - the orbs give away his location, which is why cast and move was so important. (I may make it a DC 0 spotcheck modified by distance; orbs are pretty small ;)). Re sound: "masks image, scent and sound alike, concealing the subject from all senses except touch". It doesn't explicitly say that it overrides the listen mechanics, but does specifically mention "undetectable by scent, blindsense, tremorsense, and blindsight". There is a reason it is an 8th level spell ... you should not be able to detect the recipient with listen checks as the spell specifically indicates it masks sound. My 2 cp
Samwise 04-11-08, 07:11 PM	Sure - the orbs give away his location, which is why cast and move was so important. (I may make it a DC 0 spotcheck modified by distance; orbs are pretty small ;)). Hence why I did not do a last minute tweak to give him invisible spell from Cityscape which came out two months earlier. I would have smacked myself for that bit of nastiness. Drezden: I dispute any such looks! Although you nearly were to blame for the above mentioned redesign almost happening because of that. And again, solbergb's group demonstrated rather thoroughly just how wrong my expectation was about how easily that encounter could become a lay-down TPK.
MwaO 04-11-08, 11:11 PM	Drezden: I dispute any such looks! Although you nearly were to blame for the above mentioned redesign almost happening because of that. Sam, you were giving out those looks all weekend... You do realize that my Bard had never ever ever attempted to get above a +30 or so in diplomacy check before you challenged him to get a +60 ;)
Samwise 04-11-08, 11:26 PM	Sam, you were giving out those looks all weekend... You do realize that my Bard had never ever ever attempted to get above a +30 or so in diplomacy check before you challenged him to get a +60 ;) Ah, but your bard always inspires those looks, for pretty much everything he does. So the circumstances were completely different.
Vamroc 04-12-08, 02:29 AM	I don't think it makes you silent. It does not have the same wording as beguiler/bard spells that do that sort of thing. Without exact wording in front, I can't be certain but if I remember correctly it is like this: You can't be detected with blindsight/sense/scent. Things like faerie fire and glitterdust fail. I think it also masks your spellcasting noise explicitly. But if you move, you make the usual amount of noise. There is also the issue that he's casting orbs. Our GM ruled that we could not pinpoint him after casting by where the orbs came from, but at my table it wouldn't even take a spot check (the orb doesn't get the benefit of superior invis, it is perfectly visible and starts from the caster spot per spell description even though mechanics are slightly different from ray...you could ready a ranged attack that would go off after his orb did into the square that the orb appeared from) Our GM did rule instead though that movement caused normal listen mechanics. He was greatly aided by range modifiers, as the rogue doing the spotting wasn't flying. Let's see Rod of Silent Spell on a Orb while Greater Invisible and under the effect of Overland Flight would make detection of the caster impossible. This way even after you see the Orb the guy who cast it could be on the opposite side of the room. Now imagine that with a Delayed Blast, Energy Substituted (Electricity), Sculpted Spell, Fireball. Be lucky your PC's got hit with the Orb.
Hariman 04-12-08, 09:21 PM	And again, solbergb's group demonstrated rather thoroughly just how wrong my expectation was about how easily that encounter could become a lay-down TPK. I recently played a mod that was a near TPK for one party in my area. One of the players from that party was watching my group go through the mod in question. We practically waltzed through it and just about danced on the final enemy's broken body. BUT, we were lucky. A couple failed saves or a missed attack roll or two would have made the last combat much harder. I wish I could say which mod. But it is, of course, active. And it's a good mod too.
solbergb 04-14-08, 06:52 PM	Sure - the orbs give away his location, which is why cast and move was so important. (I may make it a DC 0 spotcheck modified by distance; orbs are pretty small ;)). Re sound: "masks image, scent and sound alike, concealing the subject from all senses except touch". It doesn't explicitly say that it overrides the listen mechanics, but does specifically mention "undetectable by scent, blindsense, tremorsense, and blindsight". Well, that interpretation works equally well to what we actually did, the rogue would have pinpointed him earlier, since we forced him into move+cast by about round 2. From a mechanics standpoint I like that interpretation better, but the way Samwise ran it for us, the outcome was identical.
cycloptic_squirrel 04-15-08, 01:47 PM	Ah, let's see... The best I've enjoyed creating interesting characters and meeting other unique characters. I've found that my LG characters have richer personalities simply because they interact with so many different people. Every new table I sit at, my characters usually delvelop a new facets as they react to the other personalities they're exposed to. While far from perfect, the uniform ruleset has facilitated meaningful discussions about the game mechanics, character builds, and power comparisons. Outside of LG I frequently run into the problems that different (home) campaigns have different standards, expectations, and demands. The regional system has given me a reason to travel and meet new people at cons. Also by dividing Greyhawk into regions, the population was small enough to feel that you can affect local plotlines and make the region your own. The worst There's not too much that really bothers me about LG. There are a few things that irk me, but I feel that they are outweighed by the positives. The sole exception is the fact that it's all going away instead of a campaign restart in 4th.
NiTessine 04-20-08, 03:06 PM	Then you should not run the adventure. If you are really find it so outrageous that the creatures in an encounter would actually have a direct and openly stated goal of wanting to win and kill the PCs, and you are so committed to hating the adventure, just do not run it. It is unlikely you will be able to get past your own biases to run it properly and let the players have a good time. Well, I ran it yesterday. We had great time, proving that a sufficiently large supply of alcohol can make even the worst of adventures a fun experience. Figuring out who the NPCs were based on was also amusing, but I'm fond of obscure inside jokes. I didn't get Eri in'Borca, though. Who was that? The "killer encounter" lasted for about two rounds, with predictable results, incidentally.
Fsi-Dib 04-20-08, 03:35 PM	Eh, um, I was in that game. Pretty much every encounter was ridiculous with pointless leads, and the 'killer encounter' was simply badly designed. I really don't want to elaborate it specifically; others have probably done it already. If one can't learn from criticism, one will never improve. Then again it wasn't as bad as INT7-04 Ritual of the Damned ... OH MY !"#¤%&/( IT WAS HORRIBLE! I have the module with me and it just baffles me how something like this can EVER BE GIVEN TO PUBLIC?! For one the plot could be thought over more than nil times, and the events shouldn't be so incredibly STUPID. Why did this have to be?! WHY?! Edit: Oh, but we indeed had loads of fun. On the modules' behalf, of course. It was as if we had drunk a keg of strong beer while watching an Uwe Boll marathon.
katrick 05-13-08, 01:28 PM	Best of LG, sitting at a different table in a different place with 6 other different people, every game,fun,fun,fun. Worst of LG, finally getting my head around 3.5 and the LGCS then, kaboom. Best mod ever,Pits of Azak-Zil; It had the fear, the excitement, the rush, even a plot, though the climax was perfect. Greyhawks buffest cleric missing on a Nat 20; 0gp Non-masterwork cold iron bolts 1/rd from the 14th rogue; 2gp Gaseous form to look under doors; 750gp Blocking the baddie with Wall of Force; 1125gp Dropping the wall of force so the bbeg gets a go; 1 round Watching the author(GM's) face as he tries not to swear in front of a six year old when the bbeg rolls a 1 vs a readied disintigrate; priceless!! Worst mod ever, "The plot which was not meant to be known" followed closely by "Tiger in Alyssa" Best start to a mod ever, Wizards of Mass Destruction TUS 3-#/Flames of War, whilst at the local arena attending a rally, two elves blow a hole in the ceiling fly through, scream their demands and simultaneously detonate their necklaces of fireballs. Begin putting out the flames of war. katrick
dkay807 05-14-08, 09:29 AM	Best of LG, sitting at a different table in a different place with 6 other different people, every game,fun,fun,fun. Worst of LG, finally getting my head around 3.5 and the LGCS then, kaboom. Best mod ever,Pits of Azak-Zil; It had the fear, the excitement, the rush, even a plot, though the climax was perfect. Greyhawks buffest cleric missing on a Nat 20; 0gp Non-masterwork cold iron bolts 1/rd from the 14th rogue; 2gp Gaseous form to look under doors; 750gp Blocking the baddie with Wall of Force; 1125gp Dropping the wall of force so the bbeg gets a go; 1 round Watching the author(GM's) face as he tries not to swear in front of a six year old when the bbeg rolls a 1 vs a readied disintigrate; priceless!! Worst mod ever, "The plot which was not meant to be known" followed closely by "Tiger in Alyssa" Best start to a mod ever, Wizards of Mass Destruction TUS 3-#/Flames of War, whilst at the local arena attending a rally, two elves blow a hole in the ceiling fly through, scream their demands and simultaneously detonate their necklaces of fireballs. Begin putting out the flames of war. katrick Haha.... Flames of War was an AMAZING module... I have to admit. What a clever and fun concept. Bravo for remembering it and bravo to the author (JP? I don't even remember anymore... I played it during its premiere at Festival '03).
dkay807 05-14-08, 09:32 AM	I recently played a mod that was a near TPK for one party in my area. One of the players from that party was watching my group go through the mod in question. We practically waltzed through it and just about danced on the final enemy's broken body. BUT, we were lucky. A couple failed saves or a missed attack roll or two would have made the last combat much harder. I wish I could say which mod. But it is, of course, active. And it's a good mod too. Hmm... would I know this module?
Hariman 05-14-08, 10:29 PM	Hmm... would I know this module? You might. The other party in question left the dwarven cleric behind and by the time he caught up half the party was down. Falling under the "Best" category is: Creaming 4 bone devils at APL 8. The level 10 Radiant Servant had a lot to do with living through that, but the Haste Bomb didn't hurt either. Fireballing a Drow Cleric/Wizard duo in the first round of combat and triggering a "That was Anticlimactic!" moment as they both fail their saves and burn.