Here's my problem: I'm new to the whole treasure parcel system, and I can't find any good places to put the treasure in this module. The only place where it seems anything but good old fashioned gold would be found is the endgame section at the ziggurat. Surely there must be some way to divy out the goods?
Does anyone have tips on working the rewards into this module?
I agree, though, it does seem very hard since so much of the module is RUSH RUSH RUSH.
The Airship Crash and the Lighting Rail Fight were incredibly well-received by my group when I ran it originally.
A problem I'm having in deciding what to give my players is that I'm rather dedicated to fitting the rewards for the situation, and the begining of the module really doesn't have anywhere to find items. It goes from Viorr (which I guess could have a small armory of things, except it's really early in the adventure) to chasing Grilsha and Lucan, which doesn't have a lot of space for finding a cache of anything. I imagine my rogue will want to picpocket the hell out of the Masquerade, so maybe I can give him some art objects then. If my PCs want to loot the dead in the wreckage of the Airships, I could give them some things, I suppose.
The only place that seems really made for giving out parcels would be the ziggurat. I guess if the PCs are starved for gold and weapons by that time, it could be like a major windfall, (especially since I want them to explore the lower chambers to open up some plot hooks for later in the campaign).
Another problem I'm running into is since I'm making the encounters myself, and my players are level 4, I'm not sure where to put the 'level up' points.
Ok. If you can fiddle with it for a bit, you could have dominated minions protecting the two on the carriage chase scene; they buy just enough time for Grilsha to blow a convenient bridge, and escape. Then, they'd have a reason to loot the dispatched minions. You can probably fit two items and some money here, so 3 parcels.
The Masquerade would indeed be a good place to put a parcel or two of money, either in coin or in jewelery. We'll figure one parcel; that's a lot of pickpocketing. Make an easy skill challenge for him; a few rolls of thievery, some bluff, etc.
So, that's 4 parcels so far, two items, two money.
The airship is probably a good place to get another parcel of each, so 6 parcels, three items, three money. So, yeah, that leaves another item, and three money/potion parcels left.
How is that sounding? It might be good to move a parcel from the carriage chase to the ziggaraut, to reward them for exploring more.
Do things like "you go into town and the weaponsmith has X magical item you want" count as a parcel, or is it considered bad form because they're paying for it? I could always have them waylaid by someone in the interim between airship crash and lightning rail departure...Perhaps Grilsha, surviving the airship crash, or one of the Kick In The Door encounters? That's 7. That's three in the ziggurat, and maybe I'll have them sometime i nthe Ziggurat, hopefully giving them another Daily o use on Lucan, or leveling up right after killing Lucan, leaving me with another parcel or (maybe maybe) two in th lower levels of the Ziggurat (A byeshk weapon perhaps).
Thank you. That's made my day. I mean, now I have to re-evaluat the level of my next section of campaign, but it's probably all for the best.
Now, if you REALLY want them to level, you could have them level on the Lightning Rail ride before the 'forged attack, or during the time they're on the airship.
Any other questions? What are your player's wishlists?
And then he looked towards the back of the train, where he saw Lucan running.
I, as the DM, saw the lightbulb in his eyes turn on, and he turns to the ranger, and says, "hand me a javelin".
When the light guys had just gotten on the top of the train, they, being nerds, calculated the speed of the train. 30 miles an hour is a boatload of squares per round. He cast levitate on himself (or some such), so I ruled that he could, if he wanted to, just maintain altitude. He grabs the javelin, pushes off, and couches it underneath his arm like a lance.
It was pretty damn cool.
I've been trying to think of ways to include Dura ir'Matellen in this adventure, since I'm running Eyes of the Lich Queen afterwards. So far I've replaced Garrow with Dura, since the PCs won't know her yet. Can anyone think of any other ways/places to use her?
Hmm. Now, do you just want to forshadow Eyes of the Lich Queen, or do you want Dura to become a reoccurring villain? I mean, you could just have the PCs meet Dura on the Lightning Rail, figure out she's EC and up to no good, but don't actually have any combat with her and her group....I dunno. Garrow didn't have that big a role. Of course, if they miss the airship, it would make Dura's presence, and offer of help, all the more sinister.
That said, I think you have the right idea with both Arielon and the final fight with Lucan. Concerning the latter, if you make him a solo, and deploy him as a solo, the fight will probably not be that interesting. But, make him a below-party-level solo, or even a above-party-level elite, and throw some other standard monsters in there, and you have a much more dynamic combat. Depending on how you want to handle Lucan, he'd be either a skirmisher or a lurker (my vote is more towards the former), so if you pair him with some soldiers or brutes, well, he can be very mobile while his undead lackeys are engaging some of the PCs.
My group is:
-Malin d'Lyrandar, Storm Sorcerer Scion of House Lyrandar with a Mark of Storm
-Brakiss, Last of the Bluescales, the last member of a hidden Q'barran Dragonborn Barbarian tribe.
-Kiirus Vaeri, human Artful DOdger Rogue, on parole from a Sharn prison by the good graces of the Dark Lanterns
-Erik Fairblade, human Aundairan Swordmage veteran of the Last War
- Diraan, human Silver Flame Cleric, (DMPC healbot because no one wanted to be a leader)
I sent them up against 4 Fey Panthers instead of a Dire Ape, and they did really well there. I gave them 2 Gnoll Huntmasters and 4 Hyenas as a random encounter, and that went well, with them sustaining only minor damage, although the Sorcerer almost went down. THey were down one guy for the Carriage Battle (Sorc had to take a break), and I took your advice in beefing it up. 6 Human Lackeys, 3 Gray wolves once Lucan woke up, and my Lucan and Grilsha are no slouches. I'm proud of my players. I ad-hoc'ed mounted combat relative to the coach as an expedient. After getting some amazing Stealth checks, Kiirus manages to take down two Lackeys with oppurtunity attacks without being seen, and avoiding every attack Grilsha made. Brakiss and Erik fought off the other Lackey's and when Lucan woke up, the wolves. As the carriage approached the ravine, Kiirus rode up alongside it and tried to unlock the side door from horseback, and almost made it. Suddenly, he hears a click, the door opens and he narrowly (margin of 1) avoids being skewered by the Soul Blade. He uses Duelist's Flurry to drag Lucan out of the carriage and onto the bridge, just as Grilsha passes over it and Burning Hands it. Lucan's regen handles the ongoing damage, but Kiirus's horse bucks him onto the bridge. Kiirus's player looks at me deviously and says that he leaps to safety as the bridge collapses, dropping Lucan to his death, but I merely stare back and say that as Kiirus stares up from the ground through the flames, he sees Lucan dissapate into mist and float away.
The look on their faces was priceless. THe rest of the guys pull up short of the ravine and dismount to deal with the wolves. It's a quick fight.
Lots of fun. As soon as the Sorc's player and The Swordmages' do, we'll do a little searching in Trolanport, a run in with the Sahuagin, and probably stop right before they go to the ball at the Embassy.
Now, have you had Dura make her appearance yet? Or were you planning to have that later, on the Lightning Rail?
Ugh, I just realized that your DMPC is Diraan, a Silver Flame cleric; do I detect a bit of Blade of the Flame? I wasn't a fan of that series.
Oooooo, idea for the airship: if the PCs are successful in locating Grishilda, you can dramatically back her into a corner, they demand to know where Lucan is, she yells back something about protecting her brother...AND THEN THE PIRATES ATTACK!
Now, you doing anything special for the ballroom fight?
Keep us updated, and good run so far!
The rogue had to leave before the swordmage and sorcerer got back, so we decided that upon arrival at Trolanport, he saw some Wanted Posters with his name on them, so he's staying at the inn until it's Party Time (where I'm sure I'll get some nice RP out of the Guards and him, "Hey, you look familiar. Do I know yo-" "No, certainly not; Look over there, someone with secrets").
The Barbarian, Swordmage and Sorcerer took on a Complexity 2 Skill Challenge I cooked up to find out information about 'krell'. They've found out all the particulars, dress code, invite only, embassy, Neya ir'Krell, and then ran into a gang of Sahuagin (2 raiders and 5 guards. the Barbarian almost went down) and had to fight them off in an alley. It ended with the last Raider, down to 13 hp, running away to get to the docks to jump in and swim away. He's standing on the edge, the Barbarian's turn comes up.
Now, Brakiss, Last of the Bluescales, the Dragonborn Barbarian has been pincushioned and beaten by the Sahuagin during this fight. He's down to 7 HP, and he's pissed. In a previous round, he dropped his Thundering Handaxe +2 (yea, he got the Parcel 1) so that he could get in another attack and Dragon Breath on some guys. So, he's holding his Maul, knowing that the guy is too far away for a charge, with his handaxe at his feet. Minor action to stow maul, move a ction to pick up Handaxe, Standard action to throw. maxed out his damage for 12. He's trying to make the tough decision between using the Daily power on the hit or not, when he spots something on his sheet.
Brakiss's player, my Ten year old brother, looks up at me and says "Brakiss is so angry at this guy because of his wounds, that he throws the axe just that much harder. I get a +1 damage for being bloodied".
We described it as the axe splitting the Sahuagins head and crashing into the waves before the body did, before propelling itself back into his hand with a thundering boom.
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In regards to the Ball, besides having Diraan probably die and introducing a DMPC that I like better (Veteran Karrnathi Inspiring Warlord with a hint of Lazy-ness, or maybe a Korranberg Chronicler Bard), I'm not sure. The guys seem to think that the d'Lyrandar Scion should have no trouble getting in, with his cloth armor, lots of money, etc. They're also planning on using some of the leather armor they found on the gnolls they killed to get Diraan and Brakiss in, seeing as heavy armor is not allowed. Brakiss's player suggested the Swordmage use his Assault Aegis on some kitchen staff as they go inside, and then have one of the party get in a brawl with him to let the Swordmage teleport into the kitchen, which is so cool I'm trying to figure out how to make it work.
When I ran the mid, my players took "masquerade," turned it up to 11, and interpreted it as a full-on costume ball. My Cannith artificer made a Gorgon costume, my Favored Soul went as an angel, complete with breastplate and sword, my Warforged Fighter DMPC was dressed up as a fire elemental by the party, and I forget what the fourth went as.
How do you handle extended rests in this adventure?
If you try to run every encounter, one fits after the Ball or the Airship crash. Personally, I'd like to come up with a way to get this done without any extended rests. I end up making things a bit harder, and the PCs get a few surges back on the Airship. One thing I like about this adventure is that the PCs know they're saving Dailies for Lucan. There's none of that "Is this the last room?" "Will the last encounter be easier than this one?"
What are the dimensions of your ballroom/extended embassy and airships? The ballroom can always be inflated, but I find the airship dimensions in the print adventure far too constrictive and claustrophobic but what should I do, widen all the halls to three squares? Normally I just keep the action on the deck where there's room.
Due to time and difficulty running them, I cut some encounters. As I see it, running this adventure only requires three, the Ball, the Airship, and Ziggy Stardust. The Greenhouse can be hammy and if you want to cut down on the need to rest, can be removed. I also don't like the Road encounter. This is mostly my shortcoming as a DM
As for extended encounters, you have one after the Road encounter, one as they are flying on the Airship (after the ball and the fight on the airship platform), one on the Lightning Rail (after the airship crash and the lighting rail platform), and potentially one after the Lighting Rail fight. Of course, since there are rests so frequently, you can make the encounters harder.
- For the ball, my players sent out the DMPC to get noble outfits and masks, so they were all properly attired. When they showed up, the Sorcerer disguised his dagger implement as a hair ornament, and the Rogue aced some stealth checks to hide a magic shuriken and dagger. The Barbarian elected to carry his Skull Mask item as his masquerade disguise and leave his weapons at the inn. The Swordmage brought his bastard sword and let it be taken away into the guardhouse. The Sorcerer gave me a great rant about being asked about invites while his Air Elemental familiar picked up invites from the box, which ended with "...and she[Neya]'s really hot."
At the ball, the rogue went thieving (finding parcel 10), and then fasked about gambling. I told him there was a game of Conqueror in the corner between a man in a bone mask and some sad looking guys. He got into that for most of the ball, while Swordmage sat next to Neya ir'Krell for most of the night without knowing it (he asked for a 'busty' chick to talk to, and didn't ask them about Neya. He's a bit of a problem player sometimes). The Barbarian asked around for information at the Bar, the Sorcerer went and talked tothe musicians. Each found 1 clue, then eventually they found her after she had talked to Lucan. They sent the DMPC to talk to her while they convened. The rogue lost money to the Conqueror player, and just as the DMPC came back and told them that Lucan was indeed at the party, the fight broke out. The highlights? Diraan the DMPC spent the whole fight dominated and walking towards Lucan (he got hit by a Sleep Spell from Grilsha, as did the Rogue. The Barbarian failed his first save, and woke up three rounds later) only to be Blood Drained to single digits, blasted by Grilsha into negative hit points near the end of the fight. As he dropped, the entire team converged on Lucan, who looked each of them in the eye, and then used his action point to attack twice, stabbing the downed Cleric with the Soul Blade, and twisting it. He died. Grilsha went next and Expeditious retreated them away. Also, watching the team trying to figure out the whole Meena thing was hilarious. Sorcerer took Diraan's death pretty hard, and now carries his Holy Symbol.
- The Conqueror player, a Karrnathi Warlord named Roan Arathane, joins the group on the Docking tower, giving the Barbarian a move immediately. After everyone got to the airship except Roan, Sorcerer used his daily to slide 4 all remaining enemies off the docking berth. Sorc (a Lyrandar Scion) uses some diplomacy to keep them on the ship, and they engage in some character building. As they all (except Roan) wrestle in the dining area, Grilsha walks in. They immediately give chase. the end up splitting up to check both a room she tried to get in, and below decks where she tried to shake them off. Swordmage and Barbarian corner Grilsha on the bow of the ship, as the Sky Raiders attack!
This fight was brutal. Rogue went to negatives, Roan went to single digits, Sorcerer spent 4 rounds dominated, Lucan abandoned Grilsha as the Jade's Fury rammed the Cloud's Destiny, Swordmage lost Lucan at the very end after smacking him with his daily. Barbarian tried for 2 rounds to Stabilize Rogue, and finally did. The whole fight ended with Roan, Brakiss, and Erik (barb and swordmage) jumping to a skiff, floating over to pick up Kiirus and Malin after they got knocked down during the collision, then a newly-in-control-of-self Malin convincing everyone to pick up Grilsha, who was kneeling on deck going through a meltdown. They then circled the falling wreckage, listening to the duel of the elementals, the screaming of passengers and the roar of burning wreckage (In my head there was orchestral sad music playing). They landed, and found Cap. Morgis's body a few hundred feet from the wreckage (Lucan had killed him as he left), and his Bracers of...I can't remember. Level 7.
- The Sterngate platform fight went quickly. I threw 4 Orien guards and a few Vampire Fleshrippers at them. Quick fight, everyone made it to the train. Malin is taking a sort of responsibility for Grilsha, not letting her out of his sight.
On the train, I did have them meet with Dura in the lounge, and she knew who they were. She revealed a little bit about the Emerald flame, since they hadn't figured anything out about the sky raiders. They dont like her, but I haven't really given them any attachment to the character, because we were all really tired after playing all night. I ended with the Warforged attacking: "For the Lord of Blades!"
WHew. Lot of stuff. My players are pissed at Lucan; It's personal. They like the new DMPC, Roan. They've picked up Grilsha, who I'm not sure what to do with. And next session is next tuesday, so they should finish the adventure then.
@BLY: I've given them the rests when the game indicates they have 8 hours. That is, I gave them one after the Greenhouse fight, one after the Carriage fight (I also did the bridge thing), One after the Docking Tower fight, and one after the Airship Battle, and one after the Lightning Rail Station fight. I'll probably give them a short rest after lightning rail fight.
Giving them a short rest after the Lightning Rail makes sense.
As for what to do with Grishila, well, it just proves that the PCs will always find ways to surprise me. My Grishila died on the airship fight; somebody critted her and splattered her across the deck. Mmm.....you said she had a breakdown; why? She might be worth a little extra cash to the Dark Lanterns, they can interrogate her to find out what Lucan said to her....
Now, how are you going to run the Lightning Rail fight? Anything special or flashy?
I'm gonna do what I think you suggested, and have them duel the warforged in the back, then have Lucan appear to split them up as he runs off, then have them run into the warforged in the front to split them up again as Lucan goes out the top, So that my PCs have two groups in the train and one on the top (meaning they'll be split a little thin, so I may have to reconsider that). Then Lucan will take the slowing train as his cue to run off, and my pcs will find Boots of Spider Climbing on one of the halflings, and Burning Gauntlets on a warforged.
That sound fun?
Now, concerning splitting the party, I would say have Lucan appear when they defeat the back 'forged. That way, the entire party runs forward, and when they get in the front, they split depending who wants to chase Lucan on the top (while dodging halfling javelins) and who wants to fight more 'forged to save the train. That way, you have only two groups, so they can probably support each other adequately.
Of course, this is all one encounter with no short rest, so it could be.....interesting. Remember to keep that in mind when creating the XP. Oh, and if the PCs on top of the train end up standing in one place, well, when I ran a lightning rail fight, I put a hazard. A cart is 120 feet long, so divide it up into however many sections you want (more than 1, BTW), and every turn at initiative 0 roll a dice to decide where the arcs of lightning will appear. That'll be where they appear next turn; this turn, they will just smell ozone strongly, so they can try to get the hell out of the way, or push enemies into where they think the arc will be. Of course, this works best if you have a stand-up fight, so you could elect to have some of the halflings jump down off their glidewings, and some of them make passes over the train throwing javelins.
www.pen-paper.net/rpgdb.php?op=showcreat...
It looks like he has a good amount of stuff in Dragon, but I'm not sure what are adventures and what are articles.
Oh, and Explorer's Guide was a pimpin' good book!
It would be nice if he came by and gave his opinion on this conversion.....
Noonan of course! If I had my copy in front of me I would not have bothered asking since he is well known. Thanks for the info though.