Sir Cirdan
2013-02-26, 06:50 PM
Hello everyone,
It's come to my attention that there hasn't been much work done in converting RHoD to Pathfinder, which I find quite surprising. This isn't a true campaign journal though, as I will be doing the initial encounters from memory, (my players are almost finished with Part 2) and I will be focusing mostly on combat.
I actually enjoy the character creation process, so I have spent many hours rebuilding virtually every NPC in RHoD for Pathfinder from the ground up.
At this point I would like to say a thank you to Saintheart for his excellent guide to running RHoD. http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=171284
For simplicity, my campaign is being run in the Elsir Vale, as is. The world around it hasn't really been laid out yet, as it isn't necessary for the purposes of the campaign. If the campaign progresses beyond this adventure, I will probably plop the Elsir Vale into the middle of one of the unmapped continents of Golarion.
My campaign started with 4 players at level 6:
A half-dragon elf monk
An Elf Ranger (specializing in Archery)
A Human Bard
and a Human Oracle of Battle (Ironically named Flower, due to the wasting curse)
The Marauder Attack
This encounter consists of 6 hobgoblin regulars (Fighter/2,w/ Scimitar, Chainmail, and Shield) with a Hobgoblin Cleric (Cleric/5) and a Hobgoblin Bladebearer (Fighter/5 w/ two +1 Gladius and +1 Breastplate) and Two hellhounds I replaced with Dire Wolves.
Tactics: I ran the scenario by the book and it was a fairly grueling fight for them, mostly because of the sheer numbers involved.
The Bladebearer got tripped by the Oracle, and died before he could get a full attack in. Disappointing.
The main virtue of the hobgoblin regulars was their hitpoints, since in my campaigns, *everything* gets max hp. They did a little damage to everybody though.
The Dire Wolves hardly did a thing. Their attack rolls were just too low to hit. Probably still better than hellhounds though.
The cleric did decently enough. He channeled negative energy at the party when he got surrounded which hurt them more than they expected.
Jorr
I made Jorr a lvl 6 Ranger with Rapid Shot and Crossbow mastery. It's a little cheesy to have a crossbowman get off 3 bolts a round, but mechanically possible. Deadly Aim for extra goodness.
The Hydra
I made the hydra a 5-headed pyrohydra since the stats were easier to come by. The 5 attacks made the party have an UH-OH moment when the Oracle almost went down, but the party beat it fine
Vraath Keep
The party was smart and tried to sneak up on the castle, since the book says nobody is on guard duty. Yet right when they got close the Oracle in his heavy armor botched his stealth roll and the goblin warg riders (Fighter/4 Dragoon Arch. with Mounted archery build) heard something and got up to check out it out. There was enough noise from the ensuing fight that the manticore got woken up and the Hobgoblin Veterans (Fighter/ 4 Phalanx Soldier Arch with longspear, shield, and shield wall feat) They proved a good counter to the reach that the Oracle had with enlarge person, but the ranger did substantial damage to them from distance. The bard was their bane however: despite the ironwill feat, glitterdust with a rod of persist spell blinded the entire group, leaving them fumbling to get back inside the barracks and away from the archery fire.
Karlikan didn't disappoint. A single level of Barbarian adds one to the CR of a minotaur, but probably is worth a CR+2. He brought the Oracle down near death with a savage cut before the combined blows of the party brought him down.
This is when wyrmlord Koth stepped in. He'd buffed himself up when he heard battle outside the door, and was ready for a fight, though was taken aback that his Lieutenant was dead. I decided to have fun when building him and made him a magus/7, which brought his CR to 7, since the Bugbear HD and magus levels stack poorly. At lvl 7 he could get off 3 attacks a round (which didn't help much against the half-dragon monk's ridiculous AC) and a fireball, which caught most of the party in the blast. The fireball killed Flower the Oracle:smallfrown:Shortly thereafter Koth made good his escape by downing a potion of invisibility and using a scroll of fly to go up and out the tower.:smalltongue:
At this point the party was lvl 7 and went back to Drellin's Ferry and was joined by a wizard that liked to spam fireballs. At the same time the Oracle's character was replaced with a druid (he did not want to be raised for Roleplaying reasons). They also discussed Koth's map (which they did capture) with the town council, who they were able to convince to evacuate the town.
Skull Gorge Bridge
This fight should have been really tough, but it turned out to be a cakewalk for the PCs. I had 2 Hobgoblin regulars outfitted as archers on each of the towers and 8 veterans and 2 sergeants (Fighter 5 tactician Archetype) in the camp on the far side. Plus 2 dire wolves. And Ozy. The Half-Dragon monk lured Ozy away from the bridge and cleverly got him to following him down along the road, where the party was waiting in ambush.
The druid's lion got him in a grapple and he never got out alive.
From there the ranger and the flying monk took out the regulars on the tops of the towers and the wizard pretty much wiped out the hobgoblins at the camp with a couple fireballs.
After speaking to the town council, the party was divided on whether or not they should destroy the bridge. In the end they destroyed it. The party split thereafter for a time, with part going to secure an alliance with the Twisktusks and the Ranger going to scout the army gathering at cinder hill.
It's come to my attention that there hasn't been much work done in converting RHoD to Pathfinder, which I find quite surprising. This isn't a true campaign journal though, as I will be doing the initial encounters from memory, (my players are almost finished with Part 2) and I will be focusing mostly on combat.
I actually enjoy the character creation process, so I have spent many hours rebuilding virtually every NPC in RHoD for Pathfinder from the ground up.
At this point I would like to say a thank you to Saintheart for his excellent guide to running RHoD. http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=171284
For simplicity, my campaign is being run in the Elsir Vale, as is. The world around it hasn't really been laid out yet, as it isn't necessary for the purposes of the campaign. If the campaign progresses beyond this adventure, I will probably plop the Elsir Vale into the middle of one of the unmapped continents of Golarion.
My campaign started with 4 players at level 6:
A half-dragon elf monk
An Elf Ranger (specializing in Archery)
A Human Bard
and a Human Oracle of Battle (Ironically named Flower, due to the wasting curse)
The Marauder Attack
This encounter consists of 6 hobgoblin regulars (Fighter/2,w/ Scimitar, Chainmail, and Shield) with a Hobgoblin Cleric (Cleric/5) and a Hobgoblin Bladebearer (Fighter/5 w/ two +1 Gladius and +1 Breastplate) and Two hellhounds I replaced with Dire Wolves.
Tactics: I ran the scenario by the book and it was a fairly grueling fight for them, mostly because of the sheer numbers involved.
The Bladebearer got tripped by the Oracle, and died before he could get a full attack in. Disappointing.
The main virtue of the hobgoblin regulars was their hitpoints, since in my campaigns, *everything* gets max hp. They did a little damage to everybody though.
The Dire Wolves hardly did a thing. Their attack rolls were just too low to hit. Probably still better than hellhounds though.
The cleric did decently enough. He channeled negative energy at the party when he got surrounded which hurt them more than they expected.
Jorr
I made Jorr a lvl 6 Ranger with Rapid Shot and Crossbow mastery. It's a little cheesy to have a crossbowman get off 3 bolts a round, but mechanically possible. Deadly Aim for extra goodness.
The Hydra
I made the hydra a 5-headed pyrohydra since the stats were easier to come by. The 5 attacks made the party have an UH-OH moment when the Oracle almost went down, but the party beat it fine
Vraath Keep
The party was smart and tried to sneak up on the castle, since the book says nobody is on guard duty. Yet right when they got close the Oracle in his heavy armor botched his stealth roll and the goblin warg riders (Fighter/4 Dragoon Arch. with Mounted archery build) heard something and got up to check out it out. There was enough noise from the ensuing fight that the manticore got woken up and the Hobgoblin Veterans (Fighter/ 4 Phalanx Soldier Arch with longspear, shield, and shield wall feat) They proved a good counter to the reach that the Oracle had with enlarge person, but the ranger did substantial damage to them from distance. The bard was their bane however: despite the ironwill feat, glitterdust with a rod of persist spell blinded the entire group, leaving them fumbling to get back inside the barracks and away from the archery fire.
Karlikan didn't disappoint. A single level of Barbarian adds one to the CR of a minotaur, but probably is worth a CR+2. He brought the Oracle down near death with a savage cut before the combined blows of the party brought him down.
This is when wyrmlord Koth stepped in. He'd buffed himself up when he heard battle outside the door, and was ready for a fight, though was taken aback that his Lieutenant was dead. I decided to have fun when building him and made him a magus/7, which brought his CR to 7, since the Bugbear HD and magus levels stack poorly. At lvl 7 he could get off 3 attacks a round (which didn't help much against the half-dragon monk's ridiculous AC) and a fireball, which caught most of the party in the blast. The fireball killed Flower the Oracle:smallfrown:Shortly thereafter Koth made good his escape by downing a potion of invisibility and using a scroll of fly to go up and out the tower.:smalltongue:
At this point the party was lvl 7 and went back to Drellin's Ferry and was joined by a wizard that liked to spam fireballs. At the same time the Oracle's character was replaced with a druid (he did not want to be raised for Roleplaying reasons). They also discussed Koth's map (which they did capture) with the town council, who they were able to convince to evacuate the town.
Skull Gorge Bridge
This fight should have been really tough, but it turned out to be a cakewalk for the PCs. I had 2 Hobgoblin regulars outfitted as archers on each of the towers and 8 veterans and 2 sergeants (Fighter 5 tactician Archetype) in the camp on the far side. Plus 2 dire wolves. And Ozy. The Half-Dragon monk lured Ozy away from the bridge and cleverly got him to following him down along the road, where the party was waiting in ambush.
The druid's lion got him in a grapple and he never got out alive.
From there the ranger and the flying monk took out the regulars on the tops of the towers and the wizard pretty much wiped out the hobgoblins at the camp with a couple fireballs.
After speaking to the town council, the party was divided on whether or not they should destroy the bridge. In the end they destroyed it. The party split thereafter for a time, with part going to secure an alliance with the Twisktusks and the Ranger going to scout the army gathering at cinder hill.