Goober4473
2016-05-13, 02:04 PM
My players just finished up with Neverlight Grove, which is the first place they went after Sloobludop, and now they're headed to Gracklstugh to try and find a way out of the Underdark, bring Hemeth home who has promised them quality equipment, and to possibly find answers about the demon lords they've been encountering from some stone giants (they came face to face with Demogorgon and Zuggtmoy, and have seen evidence of both Juiblex and Yeenoghu).
This chapter is a bit of a mess, layout-wise, and there are a lot of teaks to be made, but I like most of the actual content. I think it just needs more focus, instead of a lot of semi-related hooks to toss at the players until one sticks.
The main thing I'll be changing is the overall motivation here. It seems like the book wants the players to either be wandering around doing side quests for no reason, or be arrested and forced into something. I'll be dropping the "look for signs of madness" quest for sure. The weird happenings work fine as flavor and world-building.
Instead, the players will encounter the rampaging stone giant as in the book, the guard will show up and detain them for questioning/possible arrest, but before they can really do that, a representative of the Keepers of the Flame will show up and bring them to Themberchaud (who I will be giving a New Orleans accent, just for fun). From there, he will make his offer, as will the Keepers, giving the players some options about what to do with the egg: keep it, give to to the dragon, or give it to the Keepers. Plus they can go talk to the stone giants before/after grabbing the egg, though I'm likely going to modify how Gravenhollow works, so I might tweak the stonespeaker crystal.
My players have lost the drow for now, due to their stop in Neverlight, but spies will locate them in Gracklstugh. The duergar know some ways to the surface, which the players may want to take, but all are guarded by factions that would rather turn the party over to the drow. If they refuse the mission or take the egg and run, the drow will be on their tail again, but if they hand the egg over, or find some way to cheat the system and pretend to hand it over, they can get safe passage out of the city, plus supplies, probably including some magic items.
I'd ideally like to make the whole situation feel like it was in some way worth it, and not just getting into and then out of trouble. I'll probably have drow scouts locate the party before they get to the city. That way, it won't just feel like going to Gracklstugh got the drow's attention again, and returning the egg will help solve an existing problem. This would have been a bit easier if they had gone here first, but oh well.
In addition, my plan is to have Hemeth smuggle the players in through the tunnels beneath the city, which will be a little more extensive than the given map, ultimately emerging in one of the derro districts, where he'd have some contact that can get them safely out of there and into the Darklake District. In the entry tunnels I can put some content that might not fit in with the main quest, including encounters with the Gray Ghosts and some of the more interesting random encounters, like the two-headed grimlocks. It feels like the Gray Ghosts and the derro cultists sharing the caverns is kind of a mess of plot hooks, and the derro cultists feel like the real big bad here, suffering the influence of Demogorgon, so I want to make sure they're the main enemy for the egg quest.
The Gray Ghosts can then simply be enemies and rivals of Hemeth, and be in the way of entering the city. As far as I can tell, there are only a couple of encounters with them anyways. I'll probably also combine the organization with the Empty-Scabbard Killers, to add some enemy variety and keep the complexity down. Duergar Xarrorn are also really cool, but only ever seem to be guards the players shouldn't be fighting. I'll likely use the statblock for like an assistant to the Gray Ghost alchemist, and let the players keep the lance.
I also want to put more emphasis on the pygmywort/bigwig mushrooms, introducing them here and then using them again when the players go after the egg, since I love that Alice in Wonderland reference. Rather than simply apply the enlarge/reduce spell, I think I'd like to instead have the players face enemies with adjusted stats for their new apparent size, such as a rat the size of a horse or a giant-sized dretch. I might do this only for the smaller size though, and have the bigwigs either reverse a pygmywort or enlarge, as usual. I'll also likely have the mushrooms lose their potency after a few minutes of being picked, keeping the mechanic localized.
And finally, Grackle-lung feels very punishing, and I'm not sure how the whole city isn't dead yet. I might just have it not stack. Make the save each day, and on a failure, you have a level of exhaustion. Fail a second time, you keep the exhaustion. Succeed, and you get rid of it for that day. I like the flavor of it, and I want to keep it relevant, but it shouldn't be a critical thing to worry about.
I'll probably do area-by-area tweaks as I reread the Whorlstone tunnels section and plan out encounters (which will need to be balanced for 5th level characters). I want to make sure each encounter is totally solid and interesting, and tailing Droki should involve some mushroom resizing.
Does anyone have any advice other for Gracklstugh? Encounters you added? Ones you avoided? How did your players react to this location?
This chapter is a bit of a mess, layout-wise, and there are a lot of teaks to be made, but I like most of the actual content. I think it just needs more focus, instead of a lot of semi-related hooks to toss at the players until one sticks.
The main thing I'll be changing is the overall motivation here. It seems like the book wants the players to either be wandering around doing side quests for no reason, or be arrested and forced into something. I'll be dropping the "look for signs of madness" quest for sure. The weird happenings work fine as flavor and world-building.
Instead, the players will encounter the rampaging stone giant as in the book, the guard will show up and detain them for questioning/possible arrest, but before they can really do that, a representative of the Keepers of the Flame will show up and bring them to Themberchaud (who I will be giving a New Orleans accent, just for fun). From there, he will make his offer, as will the Keepers, giving the players some options about what to do with the egg: keep it, give to to the dragon, or give it to the Keepers. Plus they can go talk to the stone giants before/after grabbing the egg, though I'm likely going to modify how Gravenhollow works, so I might tweak the stonespeaker crystal.
My players have lost the drow for now, due to their stop in Neverlight, but spies will locate them in Gracklstugh. The duergar know some ways to the surface, which the players may want to take, but all are guarded by factions that would rather turn the party over to the drow. If they refuse the mission or take the egg and run, the drow will be on their tail again, but if they hand the egg over, or find some way to cheat the system and pretend to hand it over, they can get safe passage out of the city, plus supplies, probably including some magic items.
I'd ideally like to make the whole situation feel like it was in some way worth it, and not just getting into and then out of trouble. I'll probably have drow scouts locate the party before they get to the city. That way, it won't just feel like going to Gracklstugh got the drow's attention again, and returning the egg will help solve an existing problem. This would have been a bit easier if they had gone here first, but oh well.
In addition, my plan is to have Hemeth smuggle the players in through the tunnels beneath the city, which will be a little more extensive than the given map, ultimately emerging in one of the derro districts, where he'd have some contact that can get them safely out of there and into the Darklake District. In the entry tunnels I can put some content that might not fit in with the main quest, including encounters with the Gray Ghosts and some of the more interesting random encounters, like the two-headed grimlocks. It feels like the Gray Ghosts and the derro cultists sharing the caverns is kind of a mess of plot hooks, and the derro cultists feel like the real big bad here, suffering the influence of Demogorgon, so I want to make sure they're the main enemy for the egg quest.
The Gray Ghosts can then simply be enemies and rivals of Hemeth, and be in the way of entering the city. As far as I can tell, there are only a couple of encounters with them anyways. I'll probably also combine the organization with the Empty-Scabbard Killers, to add some enemy variety and keep the complexity down. Duergar Xarrorn are also really cool, but only ever seem to be guards the players shouldn't be fighting. I'll likely use the statblock for like an assistant to the Gray Ghost alchemist, and let the players keep the lance.
I also want to put more emphasis on the pygmywort/bigwig mushrooms, introducing them here and then using them again when the players go after the egg, since I love that Alice in Wonderland reference. Rather than simply apply the enlarge/reduce spell, I think I'd like to instead have the players face enemies with adjusted stats for their new apparent size, such as a rat the size of a horse or a giant-sized dretch. I might do this only for the smaller size though, and have the bigwigs either reverse a pygmywort or enlarge, as usual. I'll also likely have the mushrooms lose their potency after a few minutes of being picked, keeping the mechanic localized.
And finally, Grackle-lung feels very punishing, and I'm not sure how the whole city isn't dead yet. I might just have it not stack. Make the save each day, and on a failure, you have a level of exhaustion. Fail a second time, you keep the exhaustion. Succeed, and you get rid of it for that day. I like the flavor of it, and I want to keep it relevant, but it shouldn't be a critical thing to worry about.
I'll probably do area-by-area tweaks as I reread the Whorlstone tunnels section and plan out encounters (which will need to be balanced for 5th level characters). I want to make sure each encounter is totally solid and interesting, and tailing Droki should involve some mushroom resizing.
Does anyone have any advice other for Gracklstugh? Encounters you added? Ones you avoided? How did your players react to this location?