Hi All,
I'm returning to the game after a decades long break. Haven't played since 2e :D
In any case, I consider myself new to DMing. One of my players recruited someone from his vampire the masquerade group to join our group so I must be doing something right, right? And everyone seems to be having fun and coming back for more and they're eager each week.
However, I need some help with Princes of the Apocalypse (PotA). Basically, How do i tie things together? What i mean is, after I get them into the haunted keeps and they've kind of run those. How do i get them into the temples under each keep? And how do i do it without them going straight to the temples from the keeps because my understanding is they'd be outgunned and probably TPK.
Anyways, if anyone that has run it or is familiar with it could help me out I'd be so much indebted to your help. We could PM back and forth or just converse in this thread. I just need help fleshing things out a little, and it's stressing me out because we're almost done the starter adventure (lost mine of phandelver).
What i mean (i think) is what's the hook to get them to go back looking for the temples under the haunted keeps?
Thanks in advance,
R
I have not yet run PotA, but my group is coming up to it soon. This module thrives on being a sandbox, so while some areas are far more dangerous than others there is no right or wrong order of how it should be played. That said, if the PCs find themselves in trouble the DM should provide an escape route or strong indications that they shouldn't continue with their current path. At the conclusion of Scarlet Moon Hall, for example, the designer suggests that a strong force shows up to drive the party away if they are not high enough level to tackle the Fire temple. Or allow them to descend and let them discover this for themselves.
As for connecting the keeps to the temples, I'm not sure what the trouble is. All of the haunted keeps (except Feathergale Spire) have direct routes that lead from the keep to its corresponding temple, so it shouldn't be difficult for your players to find them once they've explored the keeps. I think you're more concerned that they will tackle one of the temples too soon and get smoked, so again you will either need a backup plan to deter them or just allow them to figure things out the hard way. Its one of the joys and challenges of a sandbox.
But I'll assume you want to run PotA in the order of reccommended level advancement for each scenario. That is, Feathergale Spire (3rd), Rivergard Keep (4th), Sacred Stone Hall (5th), and Scarlet Moon Hall (6th); then followed up with exploring the temples - Air (6th), Water (7th), Earth (8th), and Fire (9th). I would emphasize the haunted keeps early in the campaign to get your players' attention on them. You could begin with their arrival in Red Larch where they hear a few rumors (see "Rumors of Evil", pg.22) : the local shepherd (Larmon Greenboot) found strange new graves in the Sumber Hills and the retired merchant Endrith Vallivoe has been flaunting his latest prized dwarven book would be good places to start. Personally, I'd have these occur more organically by the PCs encountering and interacting directly with Larmon or Endrith.This will eventually lead them Shallow Graves (pg.43) and then to Feathergale Spire, but along the way they will discover clues of the other temple factions like the dead earth cultist in Shallow Graves. Or to Womford and then Rivergard Keep, if they follow the dwarf book lead. At any rate, after exploring these two sites first it should prompt them to investigate the other haunted keeps (and you can drop other rumors to nudge them along) as well as indicate that there is a evil cult menace with an elemental theme.
There are a multitude of ways to keep the party moving in the "right" direction here. The module is loaded with Adventure Hooks (pg.12-14), Factions (pgs.14-17), rumors, NPCs galore and side treks that can help steer things, I was really impressed at the extra effort that is made to help DMs run this (like the "Key NPCs" and "Reason to Visit" sections scattered throughout the book). I'd really take advantage of all of it, especially the use of the factions. But aside from all of this, your players may (and probably will) zig when you want them to zag. When this happens, consider what the module says on pg. 75 under Character Advancement: "Encourage the players to take on the challenges in whatever order they wish - let their interests drive the story."
Amen.
Also rmercer, check out this thread at EN World:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?460329-Unsandboxing-Princes-of-the-Apocalypse
It might have some useful tips for you, and be sure to take a look at Fildrigar's document. It may also help.
Thanks Waghalter,
Fildrigar's doc looks helpful (dont' have a chance to fully dive in). I guess i'm struggling with the idea that they do a keep, i need to get them to leave or they get pummled, THEN i need to get them to come back at some point. I suppose the order shouldn't be so bad as someone somewhere pointed out that groups can typically handle challenges 2 CR above what they are?
To be more specific, once they leave feathergale spire (and this is the one really screwing me up) and go to say rivergard, why do they go back to the sighing valley and explore and eventually find the mouth to the temple in the valley? There's the why, but also the how. Red larch npc supplies some timely info?
Thanks for the input so far, appreciate teh time you took to respond.
R
rmercer wrote:
I've got a couple of ideas for the group I'm about to run on this.
Firstly, the plot hooks - the 'Dangerous Information' hook Reaver Ambush can be set up to be on a time limit so the players don't get *time* to explore the Air Temple after Feathergale Spire, even if they discover the temple. They have to rush to the ambush site and that then leads them into Womford Rats and/or Rivergard keep. I'm feeding it to one player that he needs to get to the ambush site before the next new moon (forgive my lack of Faerun knowledge if there are several moons 
). If they try for the air temple I'll just have someone spot the wyvern on top of the ziggurat as an indication they may need a lot of time to get through the city - too long to also make the ambush location in time.
On getting players back to the earlier location (e.g. the air temple later) I'm just going to have a fork in the tunnel below Scarlet Moon Hall. Whichever fork the players take first, it's going to be a long winding underground passage that brings them out in the Sighing Valley. Job done. If they try to go back they might spot some wingwear cultists heading into the chasm entrance. Last resort - tremor and rockfall blocking the way back. A fork in the Scarlet Moon tunnel can, in fact, take them anywhere you want! The scale on the wilderness map is clearly all wrong (google it) and I'm treating the hexes as 4.75-6 miles, so the keeps and temples are close enough together for this.
For Rivergard Keep, the ghouls should keep them back - 6 ghouls in the water, with paralyze, is going to faze any lower level party that doesn't want a watery grave, surely! a 4th level druid can wild shape into a fish and check it out (I am prepared to subtly imitate a fish in order to make this happen if my druid proves unimaginative) or the party can just get driven back.
That just leaves the monastery - again the players exploring the mine tunnels could be railroaded elsewhere quite easily and then caught up in the action elsewhere before they have a chance to get back to the monastery.
I admit, it is a headache and a DMing challenge, especially when the XP don't add up either (random encounters and side treks seem to be the answer), but this thread already has quite a few ideas. Hopefully together we can fill in the blanks left by the otherwise excellent book!
P.S. how do you tell your players not to google the adventure, without putting the idea in their heads that they could google the adventure...!? Say nothing?
P.S. I also last DMed in the eighties...
Thanks again Waghalter. And thank you sim-h. both of you are helping me get ideas churning. 
R
I'm running this currently, and since I'm a new DM I initially struggled with the sanbox nature and my group got a bit stumped, but I've found a thread now.
The main thing that tripped me is that initially your party is trying to investigate a missing delegation, which leads them to one or more of the keeps. The only problem is the Investigation part is kind of dropped really quickly as soon as you get to the keep. Also, the information as to what actually happened is kind of spread about a bit so it's hard to keep track, My group was a bit too thorugh - they investigated ALL of the surface leads, which led them to either Rivergaurd or Feathergale, both in which they met resistence. They decided to clear our Riverguard but they still didn't find anything regarding the delegration which as the DM is where I should have really stepped in, but as a new DM it's really easy to rely on the sourcebook a bit too much.
Anyway, with regards to your actualy question - my group hit the Water keep first, and then descended into the temple. They then got drained of resources pretty quickly so the decided to beat a retreat.
I used the factions as a main driving force here - each character is a member of one or more of the factions, and all the factions basically told them that, they should clear the haunted keeps (the surface outposts) first, and then we'll worry about the subetteranean threat.
Not many of them beleive in this prophecy of Elemental Evil and doom etc... but they agree the cultists themselves are a nusiance, so clearing the surface bases and then rooting them out is what I've got them doing.
What order they do that in I'll leave up to them, but I might try and be a bit more subtle at guiding them towards a specific temple first.
I've also got some custom stuff in there which is aso influencing the story, but that's not important.
My players don't necessarily have the subtlety to deal with the factions, and there's a fair chance they have forgotten about the missing delegation entirely. Instead, they sallied forth on a "save Dessarin Valley from the growing evil" mentality, which drew them to Feathergale Spire. Disguised as a elite but revelrous order of second sons, the players are convinced of the Knights' benevolence, and are hoping to join up. The Air Cult's natural rivalry with Black Earth will rear up, and the hope is that the players will figure it out once the Lord Commander tells them to start targeting Believers in Red Larch. That should kick things into high gear, but I had to basically homebrew an entire Feathergale initiation quest series. My players always know when things are getting Weird when I start reading flavor text out of my notebook rather than the campaign book.
DigitalEccentric: After reading PotA (and soon to run it), I also found the missing delegates only serves as a hook to pull the PCs into the adventure, but then fizzles out. Or at least I can see it being completely overlooked by the players once things start rolling towards the various cult factions. The rumor of the merchant in Red Larch who recently acquired the dwarven book is a good way to keeping the missing delegation in the foreground at first, but after that their relevance is spread pretty thin. I may have an escaped delegate show up at an opportune time for the players, maybe with some pertinent info or something. For RMercer's group, he could use an escaped delegate as a way to pull the PCs in the direction he needs them to go.
tmsmilner: I think that's a terrific development in your game. It adds a lot more intrigue and opportunities for your players to gather insight to some of the cult factions from their point of view. They may learn of the schisms between the various cults and offer some "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" role play. I'd let your players run with it, its these unscripted events that really improve the campaign.