Converting Savage Tide (Obvious Spoilers for That Adventure Path) [Archive]

MOLOKH

2014-10-19, 04:46 AM

I'm running it for my current group. It's a party of five with an on- and off-player. So far it's going good and they seems to enjoy it - they finished most of the Parrot Island dungeon yesterday.

I used Bandits and a Thug for the Blue Nixie - the Bandt captain seems way too much for a 1st level party. It was still a pretty hard fight - they waited for nightfall and I had a little boat come signal the ship and lead it away, at which point the party started chasing in another boat, alerting the smugglers. The warlock sniped one from the water, but then the party split - three went after the other boat, the Dragonborn paladin failed miserably to climb the ship and fell in the water and the rogue went after him to help. The bandits started shooting and managed to down the other paladin in the boat even with disadvantage from the darkness. Eventually the dragonborn climbed up, but was alone versus 5-6 enemies. By the time the other characters got back he was on the retreat and a lucky max damage hit downed him. The half-orc barabarian climbed up with an impressive athletics check, raged and went to town finishing off almost everyone with a little help from the rogue who also climbed up. Unfortunately the dragonborn failed 3 death throws in a row and died. He rolled pretty well, too - 20 strength and 17 charisma. I kept the Rhagodessa stats mostly the same, just gave it tentacle attacks that would grapple and give it advantage on its bite against whatever is grappeled. Barabarian downed it in 2 hits. It was a chaotic but fun session with just one PC death. The bandits didn't seem like much, but the ship gave them a big advantage.

The Iron Cobra was also left mostly the same, I just gave it nonmagic damage resistance and a posion that imposed disadvantage on attacks and str/dex skill checks. It actually critted quite a lot and was a surprisingly hard fight.

The trapping under Parrot Island went off without a hitch. They actually managed to save the guide and it was a good thing, too, because the dragonborn player could take him over. I had the bad guy blow up the cliffs above the entrance and bury them just in case (and in the story he's prone to using barrels of alchemist's fire), as I was also sure the Warlock would just blow the metal grate up with eldtritch blast. This unlimited cantrip stuff seems a little imbalanced to me. You can technically use it as a disintegrating ray - nothing is stopping you from just spamming it on a wall. Anyway, they went in the room with the dead body and the crabs. The Barbarian went after the body and the Giant Crabs attacked. Two managed to hit and grapple him so even if he used an action to free himself from one, he still wouldn't be able to retreat. This was again a surprisingly difficult fight, mostly because the crabs were in the water, so I gave them a little bit of extra armor and ranged attacks had disadvantage against them. The party also rolled very poorly the whole way through. Finally the barbarian killed one of the grappling crabs and the rogue threw him a rope and managed to fish him out of the water with and extraordinary atheltics check, along with the other crab clamped on. The warlock then blew it away with e repelling blast, one of its claws ripping off and remaining attached to the barbarian's leg. The other crabs chased on dry land, but were quickly forced to retreat and were finished off by a few big hits.

The party ignored the water caverns and explored the other side of the complex. They found pirate zombies in one room, for which I used the given statistics, just adding an ability similar to the crabs' - if they hit they would start a grapple, and if they win the check they start doing biting damage. One managed to chew on the barbarian, but then he raged and critted it in half. The other zombies were too slow and rolled too poorly to do anything worthwhile. They also failed their constitution saves a lot and couldn't stay on their feet for too long.

In the last chamber I had them fight 4 more zombies and the Huecuva (or however it's spelled), for which I used an unmodified Wight. It seemed like a little bit much at first, but it was against a party of five with pretty good attributes. I added little touches to the wight that the players appreciated - its body was black mist that floated around in the armor and where its face should be it had only fiery red eyes and a little red smile that got larger the more damage it took, until it started laughing maniacally. It also absorbed arrows and thrown weapons into its body. The fight could have gone better - the barbarian busted through the door and the zombies rolled high on the initiative, while the Wight rolled very low. The zombies clumped around the door and started swinging against the party tank, giving the whole party a great choke point. The warock repelling blasted a zombie into the one behind and we pondered if that would push both of them away. I decided to have the second one roll a strength save with DC = damage dealt by eldritch blast - if it succeeded it didn't get pushed and the first would stop in front of it. It failed and both got pushed, raising the question if they would provoke an attack of opportunity. I ruled they wouldn't as this was involuntary movement. I'm pretty sure it was like that in most cases in 3.5 too. By blasting the zombies away, the warlock made room for the wight, who got in a good sword hit, but missed the Life Drain attack. The players were scrambling and weren't sure what to do and after another big sword hit the barb was almost down and they all started retreating. The warlock lagged behind so he could cast Burning hands on the clumped up zombies and Wight, doing some good damage, but the Wight caught after him and got in a max damage Life Drain attack. The warlock failed his save and his life total was reduced to below half his original. Then they really started freaking out. The paladin stayed behind to draw the fire, using Dodge the whole time and taunting the wight. He was backed up by the rogue. The corridor where they were fighting was full of water so the zombies retreated. The wight got a couple more sword hits but miseed all the life drain attacks, while the party got whatever ranged weapons it had and plinked away at it. Between the tanking paladin, the arrows and finally a big sneak attack from the rogue, they downed it, the wight laughed and crumpled into useless amor in the water. Everyone cheered.

I had the treasure stored in this room, behind an artificial wall the rogue found. The warlock eldtrich blasted it away and the barbarian smashed the treasure chest (and the healing potions inside). Currently they are all rested, they haven't explored the sea caverns, and they don't have a way out - I forgot to add the earth elemental gem in the loot.