The 3.5 Age of Worms Handbook for DMs - Major Spoilers! - PEACH!

[Septimus]

However, it is true that the link between Whispering Cairn and the Age of Worm is somewhat thin. To improve the link, I have made the "Greyhawk Champions" aka Auric and co. to extort to the PC their first magic weapon they found in the cairn (using charms and non-lethal force). As this would been invaluable during the rest of the dungeon, my players hated that a lot. When they arrived in Greyhawk for the Champion's Belt, the Auric's band had various reactions: the elf apologized to them and offered them work from the Thief Guild, Auric assumed it was a good joke and tried to hit on a female PC and Khellek just wanted to fight them to death in the Arena. That gave them a good incentive to continue and be powerful enough for the revenge ;)

[earthseawizard]

However, it is true that the link between Whispering Cairn and the Age of Worm is somewhat thin. To improve the link, I have made the "Greyhawk Champions" aka Auric and co. to extort to the PC their first magic weapon they found in the cairn (using charms and non-lethal force).

Could you expand on this? Auric and co. extort the parties first magic weapon from them?

[Septimus]

This is what happened in my game.
Auric's band are in Diamond Lake to find treasures in the various Cairns around. My PCs met them in the tavern before going to the whispering cairn, and Khellek convinced Auric that to follow them was a good way of making money. After the exploration of the underground level of the whispering cairn, when their resources were thin, the PCs went up to rest, and they were ambushed by Auric and co : Tira knocked down the wizard with a non-lethal sneak attack, Khellek successfully cast a suggestion on the fighter and Auric intimidated the rest. Auric then searched their loot and took the +1 short sword they found in the dungeon. Then Auric threatened them to not speak about it "otherwise dot dot dot" and left. For the rest of this chapter, every time a monster had RD x/magic, they remembered that it was Auric's fault they struggled.

Much later, when the group arrived in Greyhawk for chapter 4 and 5, they met again Tira (good-aligned) who apologized and offered her services as Greyhawk guide and quest-giver for secondary errands, including bets for Chapter 5. In Chapter 5, they are opposed with Auric and Khellek but must live with them for a week before the final. Khellek (evil-aligned) still ressent them and would like them to die, but Auric (a bit stupid and neutral-aligned) just take the past as a "good joke" as the bully he is and tried to date the female fighter PC.

Auric's band, in the end, was more impactful and more complex NPCs than described in the book. The players have strong feelings for them. These feelings are quite negative, but less than with Raknian (who tries to kill them since Chapter 3), and provide good RP hooks for the Chapter 5.

[RedMage125]

Spoiler:

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It seems that Manzorian and Balakarde are loose reskinnings of Tenser and Bucknard, both members of the Circle of Eight of wizards from Gygax's campaigns. I should have recognized Magepoint but didn't think about it! The deeper history and name recognition could be very fun to restore to a Greyhawk campaign.

Spoiler

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Manzorian, at least, is not a "reskin". When the Circle of Eight was betrayed, Tenser was killed. He had a Clone on the moon, which then awakened. When he returned to Oerth, he changed his name to be able to stay on the DL.
Balakarde...is a re-skin. For some reason, they didn't want to use the name Bucknard.

[earthseawizard]

Random thought as I'm running this: Isn't the magic item distribution a little insane? +1 weapons at level 1?! I've always used the MIC chart, which doesn't have PCs getting +1 weapons until around level 4. What happened here?

[Tiktakkat]

Random thought as I'm running this: Isn't the magic item distribution a little insane? +1 weapons at level 1?! I've always used the MIC chart, which doesn't have PCs getting +1 weapons until around level 4. What happened here?

Nothing happened. Or rather, time flowed normally, as did corporate production with the left hand of design ignoring what the right hand was doing, probably because they were more focused on 4E which had a completely new Item By Level system.

Age of Worms was a standard cycle adventure, appearing from March 2005 to June 2006. It uses both the Wealth By Level guidelines, which suggests that an item be worth no more than half of the total wealth a PC has for that level, along with the standard treasure tables in the DMG for what treasure is found. That is how all adventures were written.

The MIC was a very late, essentially end cycle reprint, book that appeared in March 2007. It contained so,e stealth errata, including to the Wealth By Level System, in which items gained would be worth approximately half of what was gained to that level rather than half of the total a character should have at that level, which reduced maximum item values about 40% at each level. (The other big change was the "Adding Common Magical Effects" errata to adding effects to magic items.) Even after it came out, the few adventures developed along with the MIC and published after it continued to use the standard core rules, rather than the MIC revisions.

If you have always used the MIC chart, you must have come to 3.5 relatively late and never realized just how different a system it is from the one in the DMG.

[Ozreth]

On page 46, round 4 of the fight with Filge it states:

Filge casts ghoul touch and uses spectral hand to deliver a touch attack charged with the spell.

How is he doing both in the same round?

[RedMage125]

On page 46, round 4 of the fight with Filge it states:

Filge casts ghoul touch and uses spectral hand to deliver a touch attack charged with the spell.

How is he doing both in the same round?

I'm AFB, but doesn't he already have Spectral Hand cast? While that spell duration is in effect (1 min/level) any touch spell up to level 4 can be cast and delivered thru the SH.

He casts SH early in the fight, or as part of his pre-fight spell suite if he's warned of them coming, IIRC.