Advancing RHoD out of core.

[Natael]

By virtue of my being generous with stats (average stat of 13 for all characters), as well as allowing ToB and a bit more importantly a nearly full selection of the complete and races series, I figure I should use the same updates in my running of RHoD. I have not started that part of my campaign yet (they're about to finish Forge of Fury at the moment).

I have not done a whole lot of tweaking of characters, much of my previous GMing has been from stock MM and have not ran D&D for a few years, so trying to gauge appropriate power is a bit foreign.

Most importantly, I'd like to know at the very least if there are any major villains that are especially inept as statted in the book, that should not be such push overs, help changing them a little would be nice, but a good direction on what to look at is most important.

For the most part I plan on updating a few of the weaker stock minions (Doom Fist Monk, Hob Bladebearer etc...), to be a bit more powerful, if not just varied. Likely going to build some stock unarmed sword sages in place of monks. Not sure if I want to merely give the fighters good feats (maybe make some of them trippers, some heavy power attackers) or make them stock Warblades with some simple maneuvers.

For the Ghostlord, for my druids, I'm forcing the PH2 shapeshift variant for balance purposes, I'm curious how to mesh it with the Blighter (just slap skeleton template along with the shapeshift stuff?), or if maybe I should just go with druid 11 and not worry about the Blighter class.

I fairly well spice up the dragons a bit with Draconomicon and RotD on my own.

Looking through some of the other Red Hand topics, I didn't quite see specifics on what I'm looking to do, and apologize if I'm making a duplicate topic. If anyone else has experience with modifying some of the monsters/important NPCs, especially ones that are particularly inept, I'd like to know.

Thanks,

[kjones]

It's worth noting that RHoD is not strictly core-only. Bits and pieces are taken from outside core, although they're always cited as such and only core is required to play.

That being said... Where to begin? Many of the major villains are fairly inept as written, even as core-only builds. Koth and Kharn are particularly egregious in this regard - Koth has bad spell selection and no ranks in Concentration, and Kharn has levels in Talon of Tiamat, which is basically worthless for him. Even the well-built villains often suffer from LA (I'm thinking Ulwai here; she'd be better off as a human, but she obviously has to be a hobgoblin.) (Or does she?) or other shortcomings (pretty bad feat selections across the board).

I highly recommend re-statting the Horde rank-and-file - AslanCross did something similar in his Eberron run. The villains could definitely use some work, particularly the ones noted above. The dragons are OK for the most part, though re-selecting feats will help, and you might consider advancing some of them (the module notes this, specifically with Regiarax).

Don't worry about the Ghostlord - restatting him as a Druid 11 is probably fine, but ideally the party should think twice about attacking him in the first place.

But most importantly, you should keep in mind that RHoD was not designed with Tome of Battle in mind. Having martial adepts in your party will make a big difference, especially during the Battle of Brindol - casters will be worn down, but martial adepts will keep on truckin'. If you're including ToB, I recommend re-statting most melee NPCs to deal with this.

Finally, one aspect of RHoD that is almost entirely core is treasure. The Wizards boards used to have some excellent threads about redoing treasure with the MIC, but they seem to have vanished. I'm working on rewriting the guides myself, but you should be prepared to tweak the treasure extensively.

[Darkfire]

You might find it worthwhile looking at Saph's RHoD Campaign Journal. Various tweaks were applied to deal with a party of 5-6 and there were plenty of player character deaths through out with a couple of near TPKs IIRC.

You may be able to track down the treasure thread kjones referred to via this thread over on the Wizards forum. The links may be broken but Google may throw up some results if you search for the specific titles.

[Tehnar]

Hehe I remember changing the encounter in Rhest town hall. Instead of the 6 ogres i put in 4 lizardman barbarians with falchions, and just put silence on the spell list of the bard/mindbender.

The party after defeating the dragon and goblin at the bell tower, rested up and the next day went to the town hall. They decided to enter through the hole the dragon used to exit the building. Which was perfect for me because the lizardman were underwater, and the mindbender and ettin were waiting in the tunnel, invisible.

The mindbender threw a silence in the middle of the room, the lizardfolk came from behind and hilarity ensued.

[Eldariel]

Out of the Wyrmlords, I'd like to emphasize Saarvith. As a your average Archery Ranger, he does...no damage whatsoever (though giving him Spell Compendium feats helps quite a bit) and overall, just plain pales in comparison to his Dragon.

And yeah, the rank-and-file soldiers could be rewritten; especially the Worg Riders, an obvious elite Skirmish unit, should be written to actually perform in Skirmish. And the Bladebearers are obvious Warblades or Warblade 3/Swordsage 2s (even their fluff matches Warblade).


Few journals beyond Saph's one that might interest you:
AslanCross's Eberron RHoD Journal
KJones's RHoD Journal Part 1
KJones's RHoD Journal Part 2

[BooNL]

As mentioned, most of the enemies, both rank-and-file and named ones, have a terrible feat and spell selection. You'd be wise to just review all of them and at least make some common changes to their builds.
After that you can start tweaking them and balancing them to your players. If there's a lof of ToB in there, consider upping the monsters as well, etc.
Most named enemies can switch classes without any trouble. As Kjones proved Kharn can easily be a Ruby Knight Vindicator.

I'm about to start a campaign myself. One of the first things I did was change Koth to a Sorcerer/Dragon Disciple. It's not a lot stronger, but at least those levels give him something besides extra spells.

[ericgrau]

Give monsters a +2 to all stats to match the PCs. Here's a checklist for what that means: +1 AB, +1 damage, +1 AC, +1 save DCs, +1 to all saves, +1 HP per HD, +1 skill points per level, +1 to all skills.

Redoing the races and classes seems like it'd be a pain, but maybe that's what you'll have to do.

OTOH RHoD is already quite difficult as written, so maybe you don't need to boost everything 1 for 1. Just play the monsters smart. It may not seem terribly hard at first, but the difficulty goes up as you get later in the campaign.

[Foryn Gilnith]

Doesn't 4d6 drop lowest 1 average out to 13-ish anyway?

[Natael]

I have not had the chance to browse through the journals yet (working from my cell right now), but many of those suggestions look good.

I'll probably switch over bladebearers, switch some of the sorcs to warlocks (same type of flavor, and are a fun class to work with). Redo feats on at least the main villains, probably even restat them if they are falling short on relative stats.

Current party is thus:

Raptoran archer fighter
Halfling Sorc
Eleven druid
Human Paladin (using that variant with the switchable auras and multiple paths between mount, shield, and offense.)
Dwarven healing/cross-bow (using one of the gameologist hand books to build an archer up) Cleric
? ? (his bard just died)

Told my party I would be using most/all the books I'm allowing them, wont super optimize, but am not allowing retarded choices from the campaign books, so they have proper warning.

I'll be sure to post out any major villain, and maybe some mook rebuilds I do.

[ericgrau]

Doesn't 4d6 drop lowest 1 average out to 13-ish anyway?

O that's something to check. If so, then no stat bonuses to monsters.

[Eldariel]

O that's something to check. If so, then no stat bonuses to monsters.

4d6b3 is average is about 27pb IIRC. The reroll rules push it over the average 25pb that was originally supposed to model it. As such, the standard point buy should be 28pb, but that's besides the point.

[ericgrau]

Rounding 4d6b3 down to the nearest even number drops it back down to 25 pb IIRC. I mean sometimes odd numbers are useful, but most of them are not. This is getting off-topic though.

[Natael]

Specifics on changing minions:

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I'm working doom fist monks into Swordsage, dragonchain a worthwhile weapon to have them work with (or at least reasonable for some strong mooks to be using), or should I try to make a solid unarmed focused swordsage? Perhaps make a couple different ones, one that grapples w/ DC (and maybe even use regular swordsage rather than "monk" variant for that) and one that goes unarmed.

Plan is to make 2 or 3 different bladebearer warblade templates, a tripper, a power attacker, and a sword/boarder, then randomize/plan a variety into battles .

Worg Riders are to become scouts and use skirmish.

Sergeants will be white raven specced fighter 1/WB2 to represent some leadership.

Veterans will become Warrior 2/Fighter 2 (to keep with CR 3/weak 4).

For the Wyrmlords:

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Koth is going to get a +1 cha (to 16), and a change of feats into (but keeping with flavor): Force of Personality, Improved Initiative, Storm Bolt, Persuasive.

Saarvith will multiclass Ranger/Scout, swift hunter build, probably go mostly ranger and get a riding companion.

Ulwai will keep the classes, I really like stormcaller for coolness, will optimize gear for perform, probably keep feats (unless there is a recommendation).

Kharn will just get the talon levels converted back into favored soul, unless there is a decent devotion themed prc someone can suggest.

Ghostlord will wind up with undead toughness and I'll find another good necromantic feat for him. Keep with blighter, just let shapeshift give the skeleton template.

[Tiktakkat]

For the Ghostlord, I would note that a party can rather easily confront him alone. That generally means the Ghostlord is dead undead walking, as despite his template he is still a lone spellcaster without a precast suite of buffs. The best way to improve him would be to give him more minions present. Of course given his high base CR, that will make the encounter automatically lethal, and you may not feel compelled to ensure his survival just because he has a background.

[Eldariel]

I'm working doom fist monks into Swordsage, dragonchain a worthwhile weapon to have them work with (or at least reasonable for some strong mooks to be using), or should I try to make a solid unarmed focused swordsage? Perhaps make a couple different ones, one that grapples w/ DC (and maybe even use regular swordsage rather than "monk" variant for that) and one that goes unarmed.

Suggesting Unarmed Swordsage here. They can still take EWP just fine. You can mix them, really; both function perfectly well. That's the beauty of SS.

Plan is to make 2 or 3 different bladebearer warblade templates, a tripper, a power attacker, and a sword/boarder, then randomize/plan a variety into battles .

The original is a dual wielder; Swordsage/Warblade with Shadowblade & Weapon Finesse makes for an excellent dual wielder. I suggest at least one individual with the original template built into a ToBber.

Worg Riders are to become scouts and use skirmish.

Good option.

Sergeants will be white raven specced fighter 1/WB2 to represent some leadership.

I suggest either Marshal 1/WB 2 or straight WB 3. I don't think Fighter really gives them much.

Veterans will become Warrior 2/Fighter 2 (to keep with CR 3/weak 4).

Mayhap just Fighter 3 - Fighter 4? I don't think it really matters that much, but unnecessary NPC/PC class multiclass is just...inelegant IMHO.

[Natael]

The original is a dual wielder; Swordsage/Warblade with Shadowblade & Weapon Finesse makes for an excellent dual wielder. I suggest at least one individual with the original template built into a ToBber.

Wasn't too familiar with good dual wielding builds through ToB, I'll check that out, thanks.

I suggest either Marshal 1/WB 2 or straight WB 3. I don't think Fighter really gives them much.

I forgot about Marshal, good idea, I'll probably use that.

Mayhap just Fighter 3 - Fighter 4? I don't think it really matters that much, but unnecessary NPC/PC class multiclass is just...inelegant IMHO.

While it is inelegant, it is not much work, and not something going to be shown off to the PCs, so not an issue IMO.

[Eldariel]

Wasn't too familiar with good dual wielding builds through ToB, I'll check that out, thanks.

Tiger Claw in its entirety is incredible for dual wielding. As both schools offer access to it...well, let's just say that the combination of Punishing Stance, variety of maneuvers enabling free use of two weapons (Wolf Fang Strike), for example), Dex SAD, ability to use maneuvers for AC/saves and really solid offense makes for pretty efficient damage dealers. Maybe one-level dip in Barbarian for Pounce and use the White Raven Charge available.

[Natael]

I'll probably just keep with the SS/WB for the dual wielding.

Thinking for the monks, I'll focus on Desert Wind, with some spiced up dragon fire flavor, then some shadow for tactics. Then go with some stone dragon and diamond mostly for the dragon chain ones.

The only ToB I'm really used to using is an AC/save buffed to hell whisper gnome crusader.

[PinkysBrain]

Even the well-built villains often suffer from LA

NPCs don't suffer from LA ... hell for martial characters templates and powerful races with low racial HD will almost always be more dangerous than 1HD races for the same CR.

Even for non martial characters it's not nearly the problem it is for players. Especially since for say a giant you would not count spellcasting levels as associated (well, not in core anyway ... in non core with all it's low level swift buff/boost spells I'd always count them as associated).

I'm thinking Ulwai here; she'd be better off as a human, but she obviously has to be a hobgoblin.

Hobgob has CR equal to a human with class levels, so you trade a bonus feat for +2 Dexterity, +2 Constitution and darkvision (and +4 to move silently, but that's irrelevant here). Which isn't all that bad.