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Talwyn Looking around (1/4/03 3:33 pm) Reply	Talwyn's Temple Well guys, finally I will start my own RttToEE campaign. The first session will be next friday, 10th Jan. Actually this is our second attempt (the first time we played the PCs died in the moathouse fighting the Grell who attacked the rope and then took out the heavily damaged PCs at the bottom of the elevator). Ok, something on the cast of characters: Azzedar Silverbeard LG male Gold Dwarf Pal5 of Clangeddin Silverbeard. Ryan Hoar LN male Human Ftr4/Rog1 of Hoar. Goreman TN male Human Sor5. Osborn of Yondalla LG male Strongheart Halfing Clr6 of Yondalla. So far we played to self-written adventures as well as the Forge of Fury (with decents hints to the Temple strewn out here and there). As you might have seen, the campaign is situated in the Forgotten Realms, namely in the Silver Marches. Hommlet stays Hommlet (I replaced this little village on the eastern exit of Silverymoon pass). Rastor will remain Rastor as well and will be located somewhere in the Nether Mountains. Verbobonc is replaced by Sundabar and finally Tharizdun is still Big T (didn't like the idea of replacing him by some half-fitting FR-god like Bane or Ghaunadaur). So far... stay tuned for the 100.000th RttToEE campaign log
The guy from Belgium Here for a while (1/4/03 4:49 pm) Reply	Re: Talwyn's Temple looking forward to it... although it'll be like reading the past if you see what i mean party's looking good... decent distribution of characters... 2 front fighters, one a little roguish, which is goooood! 1 mage 1 cleric that should do the trick! the average level is a bit above the recommended starting level, they should walk through the beginning of the module... unless if you tone it up! but beware the ever lurking trap: if you tone up the module, they'll gain experience even faster so it might spin out of control my advice: you're the dm, you can tone up the challenge and grant lower exp than the book (phb or dmg) recommends or you can run it 'as is' i have toned it up a little, and give my party reduced experience, bu i always make sure it's never overpowered! close sometimes, but never over the top proof: i'm about to enter the crater ridge mines with them and so far, i've only lost 1 character ( a monk ) so have fun, and read other logs for ideas, feel free to leech!
Infiniti2000 Here for a while (1/4/03 11:15 pm) Reply ezSupporter	Re: Talwyn's Temple "proof: i'm about to enter the crater ridge mines with them and so far, i've only lost 1 character ( a monk )" That's funny, me, too! And to the grell (eventually). Good luck, Talwyn!
Talwyn Looking around (1/5/03 5:15 am) Reply	Talwyn's Temple Well, I toned it up last we ran the adventure (because then a party of 5 6th level PCs entered the moathouse). Guess I toned it up a little too much. I replaced the standard gnolls in the moathouse with Orc Bbn1 with a Strength score of 22, Power Attack, greataxe and javelin. Utreshimon was not a blue but a shadow dragon who sucked the levels out of my party... the orcs caused some nice damage and finally it was the grell Very well this time I think I won't throw in more powerful foes but play the existing ones a little more cunning (once the clerics trapped in the MH realize they're under attack, all the monsters will band together in an area easy do defend). I'd prefer an easy kick-off to a TPK like last time.
msherman Here for a while (1/5/03 6:59 am) Reply	Only one death, and to the grell? *Quote:* "proof: i'm about to enter the crater ridge mines with them and so far, i've only lost 1 character ( a monk )" That's funny, me, too! And to the grell (eventually). Good luck, Talwyn! How'd you guys manage to avoid killing someone with Chatrilon? When he attacked while the party was fighting Utreshimon, I tried my hardest to let the party avoid his attack, but he still assassinated the wizard. He was hiding in the bushes, but two party members had made spot checks to see where he'd gone. Then one party member made a listen check to hear him mutter something that sounded like a strange dialect of elvish, coming from the bushes (it was the command word for his wand, which I decided was "disappear" in drow). Then, in the round after Utreshimon was driven off, he snuck up (invisibly) on the wizard, who was separated from the party, and I gave her and one other person (I was generous, he could have picked a longer route that avoided other party members) listen checks to hear him, but they both failed. Then his backstab, and the wizard failed her save. And after all that, I still felt like crap about it, like I was killing her with a deus ex machina instead of an honest fight. :/
The guy from Belgium Here for a while (1/5/03 9:26 am) Reply	Re: Only one death, and to the grell? how did he fail to kill anyone? well let's see... they saved against his death attack which sucked bigtime... he became visible of course and was smashed to pulp by the fighter/cleric... the end of a great assassin, which wasn't so great after all... but now that they are going to rastor and the CRM, victor and his pal will be making short work of both my sorcerer/DD and my wizard, you can count on that
Infiniti2000 Here for a while (1/5/03 10:54 am) Reply ezSupporter	Re: Only one death, and to the grell? The party never brought Chatrilon along with them to the moathouse in the first place. Why would any party bring him? They then talked him out of thinking they would go, and quickly left early the following morning. Chatrilon had no idea until later in the afternoon. He made it there but couldn't get past the dropped portcullis (the party was on the other side). Eventually, he waited, and only found Spugnoir. He did kill Spugnoir, but that was it. Later, in the battle with the bad guys, Chatrilon was heard and spotted by both elves. What can I say? He still made a good account of himself, but never got a death attack on a party member. For more a more detailed account, check out my log. One assassin down, at least three more to go. They are on their way to Nulb, though, and Wat.
The guy from Belgium Here for a while (1/5/03 11:49 am) Reply	Re: Only one death, and to the grell? chatrilon wasn't invited by my party either, so he tried his death attack in hommlet, in the miller's house while two of my characters were isolated from the main group... backstabbed the barbarian, the barbarian saved... chat died... concerning wat, same thing... studies opponents while still ethereal, death attacks party member... party member saves... wat 'dies'... well, in fact, technically, he's still around, but they checked out the inn and left before he rematerialized... the two assassins from the crm's will be my salvation though, going after the mages because their save sucks... evil me
Infiniti2000 Here for a while (1/5/03 3:49 pm) Reply ezSupporter	Re: Only one death, and to the grell? Wat's far more dangerous than Chat, though, because the PC's get a chance to spot an invisible Chat and to hear him coming. I fully expect a PC to die in the hands, er, ghost touch longsword, of Wat. But, that's what they want (the sorceress said she is interested in Blood Magus...go figure). "they checked out the inn and left before he rematerialized..." After "killing" Wat, they didn't burn the hostel? Oopsy...
Talwyn Looking around (1/6/03 4:04 am) Reply	Talwyn's Temple Wat will certainly be a challenge for the party... I'm sure they will be able to defeat him, but I fear he will at least one PC nonetheless. BTW: Wat is listed as a Ghost Rog5/Asn1 but has only CR 6. This should be CR 8 I guess. So lets see: Ryan has AC 18, but will be flat-footed when Wat attacks. So his AC is 15. Unfortunately Wat will perform a touch attack against AC 10 then. He will most certainly hit with this attack and deal damage (1d8 + 4d6 + 1, for an average of 19.5). The damage itself won't be the problem for any character but the sorcerer. The Fort save DC isn't too high either, but there still is the chance... Yummy, I guess Wat will be in for a hard fight. The only problem for Wat could be Ozzi who is very good at turning Undead (after all Cha 1 Compared to Wat, Chatrilon won't be that dangerous. I'll try to let him attack once the characters descend the stairs to area 18 of the moathouse dungeon and are ambushed by the gnolls in this area. Chatrilon will go last and sneak the PC in front of him. Assuming this character will be Osborn or Ryan (because it's only one these two who goes last) let's do the math. Osborn has an AC of 18 but will be flat-footed so his AC will drop to 16. Once the battle with the gnolls has started, Chat uses his Wand of invisibility and sneaks Ozzi. He gains a total attack bonus of +9, so he has a 60% of hitting the halfling for 5d6 + 1 (ave 17.5) points of damage plus the death attack. Again the damage wont take out Ozzi (54 hit points) and the save shouldn't be that great problem either (Fort save +9), but it's a fair amount of damage. After this I think Chat will cast obscuring mist and flee back to area 13 where he will hide and try to ambush the PCs when they come up the stairs again. So far so evil. Guess I have time till friday to figure out some more nasty tactics.
madfox Still here? Wow. (1/6/03 4:09 am) Reply	Re: Talwyn's Temple Neither Wat nor Chat killed a PC in my campaign. When the PCs met Wat, only the fighters went inside the tavern and being dwarves they easily made the save. They then all failed the save against his horrobile face and they fled the tavern never to return. They never took Chat along to the Moathouse. Chat did try to sneak into the room of one of the PCs to steal some of the relics in the PCs possession, but he was discovered. He did manage to get a death attack off, but once again the PC made their save. Chat is still alive and I am contemplating when to use him again.
HeresDaryl Here for a while (1/7/03 2:24 am) Reply	Re: Talwyn's Temple Chat almost killed a cleric PC in my campaign, but the guy made his save and Chat died subsequently. Wat however did kill a cleric PC (different cleric, same player) before the rest of the group fought him off and then burnt the hostel down. I did the same as you regarding big T in the realms...he is after all supposed to be a forgotten, unnamed god, so it makes sense that he would no longer be a deity widely venerated in Faerun. But it means that there is motivation for evil characters to complete the campaign...after all Bane wants to rule Toril with an iron fist, which he can't do if Tharizdun drags the whole world into oblivion!
Zagig Here for a while (1/7/03 3:57 pm) Reply	Re: Talwyn's Temple *Quote:* Tharizdun is still Big T (didn't like the idea of replacing him by some half-fitting FR-god like Bane or Ghaunadaur). Though, you could make Ghaundaur replace the Elder Elemental God. I was reading something by Gygax earlier and I think he said that Ghaunadaur was originally the EEG or something. Makes it less like introducing a whole new God to the Realms.
Kelashein Looking around (1/7/03 5:11 pm) Reply	Re: Talwyn's Temple Madfox! That's really cool that Chat is still kicking IYC. If you can manage to have him stay alive, he could continue to harass the party. He's got a wand of invisibility with several charges...he can change self in any old bar and give them conflicting information....he can tail them invisibly to keep tabs and strike when they're least apt to expect it! When they finally do kill him they'll be really glad they did. Start keeping track of his movements & level him occasionally to keep pace w/party (or based on his own exploits--give him an XP bonus every time he kills someone and lots of XP for tailing the party, etc. Assing your group an EL and give him XP for each encounter with them (half for non-combat encounters). I believe he's a close associate of Victor & Bethe, so if he's still around when they get that far, he can live with them or you could put him in the guest room if he's leveled enough to be considered OutF leadership. I think he's an incredibly rich character and unfortunately was killed in one of his first encounters IMC. Morleah (Cleric of Boccob w/Knowledge & Trickery) was suspicious of Maridosen early on and did some invisible thought detecting at the Welcome Wench and overheard a little conversation between Maridosen & Chatrilon so they turned down his offer of "help". Later, some of the surviving Hommlet/Moathouse personnel ambushed the PCs at the Grove (they had been buying illicit vegetation from Jaroo & Yundi for a while). Jaroo of course sent Yundi off to go fishing on that day & then assumed the shape of Tragge Liftsilver who the PCs had known since 1st lv (they all met because I started the campaign with them being prisoners of Orcs--I was running "The Scar" by Ray Winninger from Dragon #80; an excellent adventure and a great way for a group of characters to meet who would otherwise have nothing in common). Anyway, Maridosen was tending bar when the PCs arrived in town w/Tragge & Sam Noshin (son of Stonemason in Hommlet) and were considered hero's by one of the town's uppitys. They had a feast that night so M knew about the Dwarf & Jaroo imitated him to lure them to the grove where Chat & Vacra were both invisible & the rest hid nearby. Chat's first & only attempt at assassinating my PCs ended with a perfect will save and he was promptly glitterdusted and didn't escape. Oh well. I still have Bethe (Victor got sacrificed by the Water Temple for spying IMC).
Infiniti2000 Here for a while (1/7/03 8:47 pm) Reply ezSupporter	Chat Still Alive Perhaps Chat could be the backup Champion of Elemental Evil. I bet he would make a great half-fire elemental half-water elemental half-earth elemental half-air elemental corrupted assassin.
Talwyn Looking around (1/7/03 10:15 pm) Reply	RE: Talwyn's Temple *Quote:* Though, you could make Ghaundaur replace the Elder Elemental God. I was reading something by Gygax earlier and I think he said that Ghaunadaur was originally the EEG or something. Makes it less like introducing a whole new God to the Realms. That is actually an idea and I'll think about it till friday. I see only one problem, namely that Ghaunadaur has nothing to do with the elements (only the oozes). Anyway my players don't know much about the realms and so I think this would be a possibility. Thanks for the suggestion.
Talwyn Looking around (1/10/03 5:21 pm) Reply	Campaign launched Well, the campaign was finally launched. The characters arrive at Hommlet with Ryan and Goreman heading for a drink (exactly: for a lot of drinks) to Terrigan's. Azzedar and Osborn settle at the Welcome Wench, catching a first glimpse on Elmo, Xaod and Chat. When Ryan and Goreman are eventually extremely drunk, they move on to the Welcome Wench as well where they join their companions. After another drink each I let them make Fortitude saves. Ryan makes his one and gets 2d6 points subdual, Goreman fails and takes 4d6 points subdual, plus... err... vomits the contents of his belly into Ryans empty tankard. After this, Goreman tries to cast prestidigitation in order to splash a cup full of water into Xaod's face. I told him to make a Concentration check, trying to avoid trouble before the adventure had started. Well - Goreman's player rolls a 20 (for a total result of 31)! Prestidigitation works and Xaod gets his face sprayed with water by a totally drunk mage who stands right in front of him and can barely manage to utter the right arcane syllables. So you know Xaod and I'm pretty sure he wouldn't be content with calling the mage a drunken son of some animal. Xaod leaps to his feat, reaches for his sword and knocks the pommel right into Goremans face for 8 points subdual. Goreman - still standing more or less upright - is taken to his room by Azzedar while Osborn apologizes for his comrade with Maridosen and Elmo who rises from his seat to step in. A few minutes later, Rufus and Burne enter the room to take a drink with Elmo. Azzedar and Osborn join the trio and ask some questions about monstrous activities near town. Elmo tells them about the hobgoblins in the Temple and Rufus and Burne make some hints on the dark history of hommlets. The characters get interested and want to know more. Rufus and Burne tell them that they will have to rise early the next day, and so they decide to meet again the next evening. Azzedar finally asks Elmo about interesting shops in town and the latter tells him about Spugnoir's potion shop, the three temples, the trading post and the scrollmaker. The next day, both Ryan and Goreman have a terrible hang-over (bestowing a -2 penalty on all attacks, damage rolls, checks and saving throws). While the two of them decide to stay in bed until the head ache has gone, Azzedar and Osborn start investigating on the Temple in town. They ask a few townsmen and gain some general information, about forces of evil having gathered in the near Temple of Elemental Evil twice in the last two decades. The townsfolk also tell them, that Elmo, I'dey, Rufus and Burne might know a great deal about rise and fall of the Temple. With that information, the two PCs go to the Temple of Helm (replacing Cuthbert), to interview I'dey on the matter. They meet Calmer who tells them he will try to arrange an audience and asks them to come back in the afternoon. Ozzi and Azzedar also visit the Temple to Mielikki (replacing Ehlonna) only to find out, that the priestess isn't very forthcoming towards people of other faiths. In the afternoon, they return to the Temple of Helm, where Calmer tells them that I'dey is very busy at the moment and offers the PCs an audience in four days. The PCs finally return to the Welcome Wench, where they meet Ryan and Goreman again who have recovered almost completely. Later in the evening, Elmo, Rufus and Burne enter the inn again and spend the evening with the PCs (you know, they have all great Cha scores and appear very trustworthy (most of all Azzedar and Osborn)) Rufus and Burne tell the PCs the story of the Temple as they know it. They reveal some bits of knowledge about Zuggtmoy (a name my players laughed at with tears in their eyes as it can be seen as a very stupid play on word in German (at least in the Bavarian dialect)). After they stopped laughing again (which took about a quarter hour - damn those old kids), they listened to the rest of the story and finally said good night. This is when Chat introduces himself. He heard that the PCs plan to go to the Old Temple and asks if he might join them. They seem to trust him and finally allow him to go to the Temple with them the next morning. With sunrise, the PCs leave Hommlet and reach Nulb at sunset without any REs (I use the Silver Marches encounter tables instead of the encounters near Hommlet from RttToEE). My description of Nulb evidently scared them off, setting up camp just outside the ghost town, where they slept through a night without any encounters either. The next morning, the group passes through Nulb without any further inspections of the intact buildings or the ship - not knowing that Lareth is watch them as they move on. Later I will have Lareth try to scry on the PCs to learn something about those strangers heading for the Temple. The PCs eventually reach the Temple, going straight in through the main door, killing the guards in Area 1 within 2 rounds and the supportive troops from area 5 in just that time. Chat managed to display his skills here, with a well placed sneak attack against one of the Hobgoblins. Nonetheless, Azzedar used Detect Evil on the Assassin whom I decided not to have used his scroll yet (which was actually a damn mistake because later on, the paladin wouldn't have checked again, if Chat didn't appear to be evil). The character's next action was to investigate to temple court, checking out area 3, were Osborn and Goreman crawled through the tunnel, killing Alubya in a lengthy but harmless battle. The session ended at this point because Goreman's player will be snowboarding tomorrow, having to rise at 6 am. Very well, a nice start for the campaign. The player's did a lot of roleplaying with Elmo, Rufus, Burne, Maridosen, Chat and Calmer and heading for the Temple first is perfectly ok. My question is: I forgot about Chat's scroll of undetectable alignment which actually might be a great mistake because now, Azzedar knows he's evil (although he didn't inform his companions so far). Chat in turn did not spot the paladin using detect evil. I guess I can do nothing in this situation, as Chat is not aware of it. I'll try to make it a little less fatal for Chat who should somehow notice, Azzedar knows about his malicious intentions. Any ideas on this? Once he notices, how should Chat behave to regain Azzedar's trust?
maddman75 Here for a while (1/10/03 7:16 pm) Reply	Re: Campaign launched I'd jsut play chat up as eager to get some loot. The pally will decide (most likely) that he's just a typical greedy mercenary. Still won't want him in the party, but might not suspect that he's an assassin. Since we're all discussing Chat, here's how it went down with my party. They never went to Nulb. After hearing the word 'wraith' they wanted nothing to do with the place. Chat warned them off the Moathouse, so they went to the Temple instead. While he was talking about this, the CN halfling rogue picked his pocket! Got the scroll and a potion, but (thankfully) not the wand. Next, the moathouse, though they didn't trust Chat and told him they were going somewhere else. In the moathouse, the halfling died after slinking off by himself and getting caught by a ghast. Paralyze, CDG, leave his head on a spear. He also dumped out one potion and crushed the vial, filling a healing potion with the broken glass. He meant to leave it for them to find, but alas they killed him first. Still, they took the potion. Back in town, they confronted Chat after seeing the journal. He said "uhhh, it must have been some other Chatrilion". That night, the dwarven fighter woke with Chat's hand over his mouth and a dagger sliding across his throat, Chat saying 'Told you to stay away from the Moathouse'. Should have known better than to try and assassinate a dwarf! He then got initiative and used his wand to go invisible. Unfortunately, the druid's dire badger could smell him, and tracked him back to the Mill. Big ol' fight. Lots of dead cultists. But it had the proper effect - they were screaming for Chat's blood.... Sorry for the hijack, didn't mean to be so long-winded ------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense." -- Buddha "Nothing's a cliche when it's happening to you." -- Max Payne
baeleth Looking around (1/11/03 10:17 pm) Reply	Re: Only one death, and to the grell? Neither Chat nor Wat were able to kill anyone in my game. Chat actually helped fight the blue dragon, realizing that it must have his comrades trapped. afterward, though, he attempted to assassinate the gnomish druid in the secret passage. she made the save & a great close quarters fight ensued. He was able to kill Redithidoor (who begged his way into the party) before he passed on though. Wat also was unable to kill anyone... he did do serious damage to most of the party w/ his horrific appearance. between him, Lareth & the other undead in Nulb, everyone was hurtin' pretty badly. They were miffed enough to spend the time to burn down every inch of Nulb except for the inn that Wat was bound to... they kept that up to use as a way station. Imagine the look on their faces when they came back 2 weeks later only to find that Wat had come back. he he he he he.
Kelashein Here for a while (1/12/03 2:17 am) Reply	Re: Only one death, and to the grell? To get Chat back in, simply reinvent him. Chat moves on down the road (to Rastor, of course). Have him out of play for about a week. Then he can return in different armor and a different getup with a new name (why not Unosh?) The guy's got +10 to disguise and access to Change Self. He can be a different person whenever he wants for a short time. For example, some elf nobody has ever seen in Hommlet could make an attempt on a PC's life in broad daylight (say, in the stables) who then ducks around a corner and becomes Invisible. They'll start to catch on to the idea that it's the same guy coming after them over and over but they probably won't know that it's "Unosh" or their former sword-arm, Chatrilon. Of course, they'll figure it out eventually but they'll be extremely thrilled with themselves when they do. And while Chat is in Rastor, he might report in to Naquent and she might pitch in some dough for a couple more scrolls of Undetectable Alignment (to be used with various cover identities) and scold him to always be prepared to use it. If she thinks it's important enough, she even might use the Tourbillion to transport him to Verbobonc to get a Wand of Undetectable Alignment. Kind of unlikely at this point because they haven't even figured out the significance of the Moathouse just yet. But if he makes ANOTHER return trip to the Fanes, Naquent might give him some Capital and a trip to Verbobonc. His next ID could even be a Fighter from V who's heard there was some trouble hear-abouts (all innocent-like).
Talwyn Looking around (1/12/03 11:26 am) Reply	Campaign launched Thank you everyone for the suggestions, I'll think about them till our next session (which will unfortunately not take place before Jan 31). The idea with the cover identities is great, so I think I will have Chat clear out the Old Temple together with the party and then depart for some "important business". Some time after that (probably shortly before the PCs set out of Hommlet for the Moathouse).