Starfinder Society Faction Pin: "Exo-Guardians" [RPG]

 My Steward skittermander, Officer Swizzers, rocks this cool Exo-Guardians faction pin.  I'm not 100% sure what the creepy eye-blasting helmet is supposed to represent (it could easily be the holy symbol of a daemonic cult), but that's okay.  It intimidates our foes!  The pin itself is the usual solid metal with a clasp on the back.  It comes pinned in a custom card, that on the back indicates the Exo-Guardians are "The Sword that Seeks the Darkness."  

Angel: "Close to the Ground" (2000) [BUFFY]

 Close to the Ground

By Jeff Mariotte (Pocket Books, 2000)

RATING: 2/5 Stakes

SETTING: Early Angel Season 1

TV/MOVIE CHARACTER APPEARANCES: Angel, Cordelia, Kate, Doyle, Trevor Lockley

MAJOR ORIGINAL CHARACTERS: Mordractus (sorcerer); P'wrll, Hench, and Currie (henchmen); Jack Willits (studio head); Karinna Willits (Jack's daughter/shapeshifter); Tirbol (vampire); Mr. Crook (demon); Special Agent Newberry (FBI); Orias (demon)

BACK OF THE BOOK SUMMARY: "Greed. Fear. Anger. All, technically, human emotions.  But Angel's a demon, not a saint, and he's not immune to human emotions.  So when big-shot Hollywood studio head Jack Willitts offers him huge sums of cash in exchange for guarding his overprivileged daughter, Karinna, the Dark Avenger takes the gig.  After all, as Cordy and Doyle point out eagerly--there's rent to pay.  And Willits can certainly foot the bill.  After accompanying Karinna to several trendy nightspots, Angel writes her off as a spoiled brat.  Cordy thinks Angel's too personally involved in the case, but the situation is worse than they suspect.  Karinna's in trouble and suddenly Angel and company are being pursued by an unidentifiable creature, bent on destroying everything between it and what it wants most in the world.  Before long, Angel finds himself trapped within a supernatural struggle for power, fame . . . and immortality."

REVIEW

Close to the Ground is a real hodgepodge.  It's one-third pulp detective novel, as Angel is hired as the bodyguard to the spoiled teenage daughter of a powerful Hollywood movie studio executive.  It's one-third action cop movie, as Kate investigates a spate of bank robberies only to find herself kidnapped by the robbers.  And it's one-third really bad fantasy as a super-cliched Irish sorcerer named Mordractus plans The Summoning (hey, that was pretty much the title of the last Angel novel I reviewed--but there's no connection), which is intended to draw "Balor" from the netherworld to Earth to grant him eternal life.  The three storylines do intersect, as it turns out (through an *extremely* convoluted and nonsensical way) that the move studio executive was working for Mordractus to distract Angel for  . . . some reason I don't know . . . and that his daughter had really died years ago and was now being impersonated by a shapechanger!  Only, the daughter's real spirit was also in the shapechanger's body?  And meanwhile, Kate's off doing an entirely separate storyline until the last couple of chapters when Angel arrives to rescue her.  Methinks the Kate storyline was padding added later, because it really has nothing to do with anything else but it gets way to much space to be labelled a subplot.  There's also a very dubious flashback to just after Angelus was cursed to become Angel.  All in all, it's a pretty crappy novel.  But, I give it two stakes instead of one because I really enjoyed the scenes of Cordelia getting a job giving tours at a movie studio and being just terrible at it.  Still, that's not nearly enough for me to recommend this one.

Starfinder Adventure Path: "Dead Suns, Chapter Six: Empire of Bones" [RPG]

 NO SPOILERS

Yes, I did save the galaxy.  You're welcome.  Empire of Bones is the sixth and final installment of the Dead Suns adventure path, designed to take characters from Level 11 to Level 13 or so.  If you've read my review of the previous instalments, you'll know I'm not a big fan of the AP overall.  It has a pretty cliched plot and a very heavy-handed approach to ensuring PCs stick to the rails no matter what.  Of course, that doesn't mean there aren't bits and pieces that are salvageable, or that a GM couldn't take the (pardon the cover art pun) skeleton of the AP and make something better out of it.  But Chapter 6 has pretty much the same flaws as the earlier chapters.  Now that a lot of other APs have been released, I'd suggest shopping around for something better.

As usual, I'll start with the non-spoilery back matter.

* The inside front- and back- covers feature the stats, interior layout, and some background on a truly massive Tier 20 Corpse Fleet ship class called the Blackwind Annihilator.  Categorised as "supercolossal ultranoughts", there only a handful of these vessels in existence. They're best thought of as the equivalent of Imperial Super Star Destroyers. I can't speak to the stats, etc., but I like the little description of the status/fate of each individually-named one of these (adds a bit of fun lore to the game).

* The first back matter proper is "Ships of the Line" (4 pages).  This section introduces the  supercolossal base frame, a category that allows for unlimited expansion bays and designed for a crew of over 100,000!  Lots of new starship systems are added here to support such a large ship.  The new "spinal-mount weapons" category is pretty cool.  "Take 6d12x10 damage from my vortex devourer, fools!"  I should note that this all came out before Starships of the Galaxy, and I don't know how that book treats the material here.

* Next, we get "Ships of the Corpse Fleet" (6 pages).  This section has a ton of cool stuff for ships crewed by undead, like a "ghost drive" (allows a ship to become briefly insubstantial) and a "corpse recycler" (turns bodies into necrograft UPBs).  Several new Corpse Fleets ships are introduced, ranging from a tiny Tier 1/3 "Barrow Boneshard" to the hefty Tier 16 "Barrow Cenotaph."  Starfinder starship combat has never appealed to me, but I know it does to some folks, so hopefully they get something out of this section.

* This issue's "Alien Archives" (8 pages) is 85.7% undead.  Many of the creatures will be familiar to long-time gamers.  We get 1) baykoks (soul-devouring undead); 2) corpsefolk (formerly known as "zombie masters"); 3) gatecrashers (these guys are neat, as they wield multiple massively oversized unwieldy weapons with ease); 4) kuobozus (also known as "black monks"; they have pretty much the CREEPIEST artwork ever); 5) mohrgs (paralysing skeletal undead); 6) pale strangers (very cool undead gunslingers); and 7) shimreen (the only non-undead entry, this is a playable race of crystalline undead with an incredibly wussy special power--occasionally add 3d4 damage to an attack once you get to Level 16!).

* For the "Codex of Worlds" (1 page) we get Shimrinsara, the home planet of the crystalline shimreen introduced above.  The place is a "storm-torn world of master artisans".  If you were *really* a fan of "The Saga of Crystar, the Crystal Warrior" in the 1980s, now's your chance to live out your childhood dreams.

SPOILERS!

Previously on Dead Suns/Star Wars: A ruthless master of eldritch forces (with a huge military fleet) sought a superweapon capable of dominating the galaxy by sending entire planets to their dooms!  Fortunately, a rag-tag bunch of heroes stepped up to save the day.

Part 1 ("Close to the Bone") of Chapter 6 starts with the PCs seeing a massive armada of Corpse Fleet ships arrive to claim the Gate of Twelve Suns, intent on taking the Stellar Degenerator for their own nefarious purposes.  The flagship of the Corpse Fleet armada is the Empire of Bones, one of the "supercolossal ultranoughts" mentioned above.  As the Corpse Fleet ships begin engaging the automated defense batteries protecting the Gate, the PCs realise there's only one thing to do: destroy the Gate before it's too late! No.  Such a plan would be "beyond the scope of this adventure." The one and only, completely obvious and viable plan is to sneak aboard the Empire of Bones, navigate its miles-long corridors without getting caught, storm the bridge, kill the admiral and bridge crew, and set the ship on a suicide course to ram the Stellar Degenerator.  Like, duh!  Sarcasm aside, I do really like the variety of new crew actions ("Fly Casual", "Dampen Life Signs", "Garbled Communication", etc.) to support pretending to be a Corpse Fleet vessel in order to land in the Empire of Bones.  It's an idea that could be easily abstracted to other Starfinder starship encounters.

Part 2 ("Mass Graves") has the PCs landing in "hangar country" aboard the flagship, trying to figure out exactly where they are and where the bridge is.  There's a cool battle in the hangar here, as one of the Corpse Fleet starfighters turns its guns on against the PCs when they're on foot! (honestly, it should have been tougher) and a crane that can be used to pick up and smash opponents.  But after this, the PCs are then expected to do a room-by-room search (as if dungeon crawling) which really slows down the excitement of what should be a crazy bold plan.  My main criticism of this entire section is that there's hardly any feeling whatsoever that a massive space battle is going on outside.  The ship never rocks from being hit, there aren't constant emergency crew orders being given over the intercoms, damaged vessels and injured crew being attended to, etc.  Essentially, there's no timeline whatsoever for the PCs, and no hurry--the adventure even contemplates them taking multiple overnight rests!  It's just a really weird way to dampen suspense, like if Luke was depicted having a brief cockpit snooze in the middle of the trench run.  Anyway, the PCs learn they need to take a grav-train to the bridge.

Part 3 ("In the Marrow") provides a cool map of the grav-train station (though it's a big one!).  But securing the grav-train is one thing, fending off a security train that gives chase is another.  Unlike some gamers, I actually enjoy Chase sub-systems, and the author certainly provided a lot of detail for this one. 

Part 4 ("Dead to Rights") has the big bridge battle against Admiral Serovox and his minions.  It's a genuinely tough battle, as Serovox uses greater invisibility and displacement to make himself hard to hit and uses wall of force to separate the PCs from one another.  I think our GM let us win.  There's some good dialogue and really interesting relics in trophy cases here.  Assuming the PCs win, their final task is to steer the Empire of Bones toward the Stellar Degenerator and then get away *quick* (actually, *slow* is just fine; there's no time limit on how long it takes them to escape, as long as they don't take anymore overnight rests).

I've jumped over some interesting bits in the summaries above: for example, the PCs can find a computer virus to mask their movements from security cameras, there are security keys scattered about that provide bonuses on hacking attempts, there's a battle against some ginormous ellicoths, and there's a cool pale undead planning a mutiny that the PCs can interact with.  Again, I really did find the lack of a timeline for how long the Corpse Fleet will take to overcome the automated security batteries made it impossible to tell how much of a hurry the PCs should be in.

Assuming the PCs succeed, they get praise from the Starfinder Society and (if they reveal what they've done publicly) become famous in the Pact Worlds.  The artwork of the PCs receiving medals from Luwazi Elsebo just like at the end of A New Hope is cute.  Many, if only there was a Star Wars role-playing game out there!

A "Continuing the Campaign" section (6 pages) offers some alternatives for GMs, including ideas of what happens if the PCs fail.  Two two-page write-ups offer further storyline ideas. One involves an "apocalypse atrocite" getting the Cult of the Devourer to use the Gate of Twelve Suns itself for nefarious purposes; it looked interesting but perhaps a bit too "samey" to the previous stories.  The other was really clever, involving a stowaway invasive species aboard the PCs' ship spreading plague everywhere they go.

Pathfinder Society Scenario # 5-10: "Where Mammoths Fear to Tread" [RPG]

 NO SPOILERS

I played Where Mammoths Fear to Tread recently via play-by-post.  It's not really a spoiler to say that the scenario is set in the Realm of the Mammoth Lords, so I was super stoked to play my "caveman shaman" (Gurkagh, my favourite PFS character) finally returning home.  I don't think the GM was excited by the idea as I was, but that's okay!  I had a decent time.  Anyway, reading the scenario for the purposes of this review, it strikes me as a pretty standard PFS experience: a good mix of combat and role-playing, some connection to the season storyline, and no glaring faults.  I wouldn't necessary put it high on the "to play" list, but I imagine most groups will walk away satisfied with the experience.

SPOILERS!

Season Five of PFS is the "Year of the Demon", with a storyline involving the search for a legendary dwarven Sky Citadel that must be located somewhere near the demon-infested Worldwound.  As Marcos Farabellus and Aram Zey explain in the briefing, the Pathfinder Society has decided it needs to move its base camp for this major expedition to a new site in the so-called Realm of the Mammoth Lords.  The PCs are to act as scouts to locate the best location for this new base camp.  Knowing that negotiation with the native Kellids may be important, the PCs are given several trade goods that can serve as gifts to sweeten diplomatic efforts.  (The trade goods have different mechanical effects depending on when and how wisely the PCs deploy them, and I liked this little touch.)  Aram Zey teleports the whole group from Absalom to a spot just outside the Kellid settlement of Tolguth (a long trip!) and then leaves them to their own devices after giving them a magical signalling device to use when they've found a suitable location for the new base camp.

The first encounter occurs as the PCs are making the short walk to Tolguth.  They see a vrock demon being chased by a dinosaur!  It's either really fun or a bit too on-the-nose, depending on your tastes.  The PCs can just watch how it all plays out, or intervene, taking the risk that both combatants will turn on them.  My minor quibble is the use of the Forest flip-mat for this, which is both overused and doesn't really fit the "prehistoric jungle" vibe we're to understand this area of the region has.  In any event, what's important here is whether the PCs impress several Kellid hunters hiding in the area and observing the scene.  If the PCs prove themselves to be mighty combatants, they'll have an easier time persuading the Kellids to take them to Tolguth as guests instead of threats.

Tolguth is given just a little bit of description.  I would have liked to have seen more to flesh out the settlement even further.  The PCs' job here is to convince the tribal elders to give suggestions on plausible campsites.  There's no way to fail here (the only question is how many of the trade goods will have to be used).  The elders suggest three options (n sheltered cave network, a natural spring, and an abandoned border town).  The main obstacle, the elders explain, is that all three areas are in lands claimed by the Red Winters, a small Kellid tribe that is known to be hostile to strangers.

After the PCs have explored a couple of the potential camp sites, Red Winter scouts will find them.  There's a fair chance this encounter can be resolved peacefully, but arrogant PCs may find themselves in for a fight.  If it is handled diplomatically, the scouts will lead the PCs to the nomadic Red Winter caravan to talk to their leaders.  The gist here is that the Red Winters will only give permission for the Pathfinder Society to occupy one of the locations if the PCs prove they are worthy warriors--and this requires the slaying of one of two different types of demons in the Worldwound!  (the scenario does allow for PCs to just try and wipe out the Red Winters--surely an evil act--and bypass the whole demon-slaying part)

The journey into the Worldwound may be interrupted by an (optional) encounter with undead skeletal mammoths and their ghostly riders.  Tracking down one of the needed demons to slay is pretty straightforward.  To my recollection, the combats were fairly challenging and enjoyable.  Once proof of success is returned, the Red Winter tribe gives permission and the PCs can select which campsite they think would be best (their choice is one of the reporting conditions, so perhaps it influenced what happened in later scenarios).

As I mentioned at the beginning of this review, I don't really have anything bad to say about Where Mammoths Fear to Tread.  On the other hand, there's nothing that really jumps out to me as super original, clever, or exciting when I think about or read through the adventure.  Perhaps my melancholia is simply channeling Gurkagh's realisation that you can never really go home again.

Curse of the Crimson Throne Recap # 19 [RPG]

[16 Desnus, 4708 A.R. continued]

Yvicca the Sea Hag

Immersed in eight feet of the murky waters of the Jeggare River, the Harrowed Heroes continue their exploration of the Nidalese merchant ship Direption.  The Reckoner moves the unconscious jigsaw shark out of the way and then pushes open the swollen door it was guarding.  Crew quarters lay on the other side, hammocks drifting in the water amidst a haze of gore, fish heads, and half-eaten eels.  A terrible sight drifts near the back of the chamber—an ancient-looking woman whose hair is like rotting seaweed, skin like algae, and face like weathered rock.  A sea hag!  She moves suddenly, raising a shortspear, and the very sight of her makes Goldcape feel weak in the knees.  The Reckoner cleverly braces himself in the doorframe to find purchase with his legs as the hag advances to kill him.  He stabs her multiple times with his short swords, but the hag curses him in turn, filling his mind with horrifying phantasms that send him drifting off into a motionless fugue state!  With Goldcape weakened and The Reckoner virtually comatose, the situation seems dire indeed—but Rocky darts through the doorway and catches the hag by the neck, shaking her until she dies unceremoniously.

Yraelzin and Goldcape realise just how serious the curse affecting The Reckoner is—if it’s not broken, he could slide from a coma to death in just a day!  They rush him to the surface and find the fishing boat still waiting for them.  But as they clamber aboard with their helpless ally, they notice the gnome fisherman isn’t paying them any attention—he’s standing astride the bow, staring off toward Old Korvosa.  All of the wooden bridges connecting it to the rest of the city are in flames!  Goldcape leaps atop Rocky’s back to fly to the Burnt Honey Inn to gather some coins from Ralph Blackfeather’s secret stash, while Yraelzin forces the gnome to start rowing again and help transport The Reckoner to the nearby Temple of Abadar.  There, after forcing their way through a crowd, they meet with Ishani Dhatri and he arranges for a more experienced priest to break the curse affecting The Reckoner.  With a gasp, the vigilante awakens.  Before they leave, Ishani explains about the burning bridges—Old Korvosa has been quarantined!  The Grey Maidens have set fire to all of the wooden bridges, and have set up guards around the only stone bridge.  Ishani says it’s a sign of how terrible the plague has become and that he hopes the new hospice set up by Doctor Davaulus, the Royal Physician, will be able to help some of those affected.

Concerned that in their hasty exit they may have left vital clues behind, the group hire the same fisherman to take them out again.  Yraelzin is able to magically conjure bubbles of air for the dive, but explains they’ll only last a few minutes.  Fortunately, The Reckoner still has the bottle of air recovered from a previous adventure and is able to supplement the group’s ability to breathe in an emergency.  But, apart from some silt eels, a thorough search of the wreckage turns up nothing of value—indeed, the ship is oddly empty of any crew or cargo.  The Harrowed Heroes return to the surface, disappointed and sure that they must have missed something.

Once everyone is seated on the boat again, The Reckoner suggests rowing across the river to Trail’s End to see how young Brienna Soldado is faring—especially now that Yraelzin has proclaimed, in his usual grandiose manner, that Razmir has given him the power to cure blood veil.  But they’re too late, explains the girl’s mother, Tayce.  Brienna passed away yesterday morning, and her body has already been transported to the Grey.  She doesn’t blame the group, and says they at least gave her a few extra days with her daughter.  She does ask them for a favour, however: to check in on Grau.  The Korvosan Guardsman was about to sell his mithral blade for the money to pay for Brienna to be cured, but was persuaded that elixirs from the perfumery Lavender would cure the disease.  Obviously, they didn’t, and his niece’s death has hit Grau hard—he’s taken up drinking again.  The group agree to help, and give Tayce a now-rare magical potion that may cure blood veil if she or her other children contract it.

Outside, Goldcape, Yraelzin, and Ralph Blackfeather discuss what to do next.  Yraelzin is upset that Old Korvosa has been quarantined, as his newly-established Temple of Razmir is there!  Ralph is intent on finding something that once belonged to Rolth Lamm to see if a diviner could use it to discern the purported necromancer’s location.  Goldcape, however, is keen to help Grau.  The trio decide that Yraelzin and Ralph will return to the Grey and the derro warrens below to see if they can find anything Rolth left behind, while Goldcape will see if she can find and help the despondent Guardsman.

Sergeant Clenkins

Goldcape leaves the other two behind and flies on the ever-growing Rocky across the river to Citadel Volshyanek.  As usual, the friendly and moustachioed Sergeant Clenkins is on duty.  He confirms that Grau hasn’t shown up for work and has been spotted making the rounds of some local taverns.  He gives Goldcape some leads, and the two discuss recent events in the city.  Clenkins says that the Longacre Building, the government building where the arbiters (magistrates) do their work and pass sentence on accused criminals, was taken over by the Grey Maidens and that Zenobia Zenderholm, the most famous arbiter in the city, is missing!  Goldcape wonders aloud why Clenkins is always on gate duty and never in the field, and hears how he suffered a leg injury some years ago while on a raid that never quite healed properly.

Meanwhile, Yraelzin and Ralph cross back into the city via the North Bridge and stop by the Burnt Honey Inn to change into some drier (and cleaner) clothes.  While chatting with the innkeeper, Yraelzin hears a rumor that the palace tried to have the king resurrected, but that it backfired!  Yraelzin laments that a Priest of Razmir like himself hadn’t conducted the ritual, as it surely would have come off perfectly.  Ralph and Yraelzin then make the trek on foot to the Grey District and take up a surveillance position high up on the wall around the cemetery.  They see the distressing sight of mass graves dug for the numerous victims of blood veil. 

At the same time, Goldcape has managed to track down Grau—he’s sitting despondently in the corner of an ironically upbeat inn called the Bard’s End in South Shore, just a block from the Kendall Amphitheater.  Grau is so drunk as to be barely conscious and coherent.  Goldcape tries to cheer him up, but can’t get through to him.  In a show of solidarity, Goldcape decides to have a couple of drinks with him, but the alcohol rushes to the vanara’s head quickly!  Still, she has the wherewithal to send a message via Rocky to Ralph, saying that she’s found Grau.  When Ralph receives it, he sends a message back stating that he and Yraelzin are ready to go into the derro warrens, and that Goldcape should come too, as it could be dangerous.  But Goldcape is quite drunk by this time, and sends back a message saying they can go tomorrow.  Feeling let down by a teammate, Ralph sends back an angry note saying they’ll go in without her.  The derro warrens look to have been stripped of anything valuable—the alchemical equipment, library, and all signs of criminal or necromantic activity are gone.  But Ralph remembers from a conversation with Yraelzin that something like fingernail clippings or a lock of hair could be vital to a successful scrying spell.  He searches the bedroom where they once found the broken key-shaped blade, and turns up several brown human hairs!

The two hurry out of the warrens and pass from the Grey to South Shore.  Inside the Bard’s End, they find Grau has completely passed out and Goldcape is too intoxicated to be of any assistance.  Annoyed, Ralph leads Yraelzin to the Heights, knowing that’s where Mercival Jeggare’s luxury townhouse will be found.  Yraelzin, however, manages to talk his ally out of a plan to break in, kidnap the learned aristocrat, and interrogate him for information on Rolth Lamm, by arguing that the risk of being caught and punished by the city’s constabulary is too high.

[17 Desnus, 4708 A.R.]

The next morning, a hungover Goldcape meets the others at the Burnt Honey Inn.  They decide their best chance of finding a diviner is at Theumanexis College in East Shore, since the far more prestigious Acadamae has barred its gates ever since the unrest began with King Eodred II’s death.  Theumanexus College has a small campus of three buildings, and in Geezlebottle Hall (bizarrely sized halfway for humans and halfway for gnomes) they persuade (with hundreds of gold pieces) a high-pitched gnome wizard to cast the necessary spell.  It takes him hours of work, but eventually he pinpoints the location of the owner of the brown hairs: somewhere underneath the Hospice of the Blessed Maiden!

Through hard work and the diligent assemblage of clues, the proactive Harrowed Heroes may be ready to take the battle to their enemy.  But if the hairs do belong to Rolth Lamm, what is he doing at the city’s newest effort to combat blood veil?  And could the Queen’s Physicians somehow be involved

GM's Commentary

Yay Rocky!  Goldcape's animal companion has been amazingly useful in the campaign, with its ability to fly especially important.  Without Rocky, that battle against the sea hag could have turned out very differently indeed.  

I didn't really realise before running this session just how nasty the "evil eye" effect of a sea hag could be.  Coma then death, in a matter of days.  It's a good thing the group was near civilisation and could get it removed.

I really liked the spectacle of the burning bridges just as the PCs emerged from exploring the wreckage.  Once in a while, GM Jhaeman is inspired!

The death of Brienna Soldado was sad.

I was privately relieved that the PCs gave up (and eventually forgot about) the lead with Mercival Jeggare.  I had hinted at the party that maybe he knew something about Ileosa purchasing dark magics and something about Rolth Lamm, but I hadn't really prepared anything, much less a map and stats for a kidnapping attempt!

I really appreciate how proactive the PCs are in this campaign.  It's so much more fun and interesting than groups who just sit back and wait for stuff to happen to them.

Pathfinder Society Scenario # 4-08: "The Cultist's Kiss" [RPG]

 NO SPOILERS

The Cultist’s Kiss

is an interesting, well-written scenario that significantly advances the Season Four (“Year of the Risen Rune”) storyline.  I played through it with my half-orc Paladin of Sarenrae, Trokkus, which led to some moral quandaries! (but in a good way)  The scenario also adds a wealth of detail about a particular town in the setting that hadn’t receive much lore to date.  It’s worth mentioning that, like most Season Four scenarios, this one features some genuinely tough combats.  Overall, it provides an excellent experience—just make sure enough time is set aside to run it properly.

SPOILERS!

Across Varisia, the scattered cults of Lissala (ancient Thassilonian goddess of rune magic) have become more active and visible.  It’s clear they’re planning something big, and in The Cultist’s Kiss, we find out what it is: they want to bring back the Runelord of Sloth!  One particular cult called the Feasters of the Heart, located in Palin’s Cove (a town near Korvosa), is secretly run by vampires that use domination spells to maintain control of its members. 

In the briefing, Venture-Captain Sheila Heidmarch tells the PCs that she sent an experienced agent to spy on the Palin’s Cove cult but that that individual hasn’t reported back for weeks and has to be presumed dead.  Importantly, Heidmarch tells the likely murder-hobos in the group that she doesn’t want a bunch of bodies—she wants information, so the mission is to infiltrate, not to just wipe it out.  She has a cover story prepared for the PCs so it won’t be obvious who they are in the town.  The subsequent journey from Magnimar to Palin’s Cove is handwaved.

The next part of the scenario, where the PCs try to gather information in the town about the cult and how to contact it, is very opened ended—something I always appreciate.  Unusual for a scenario like this, the writer provided a full (and excellent) overview of residents and locations within Palin’s Cove, all tied into a really nice map.  It’s great when PFS scenarios add to the setting like this, as there’s an enduring contribution to the game even after the scenario has been played.  For the information gathering bit, this scenario provides several different rumours and clues (and NPCs to deliver them), rewarding a more in-depth investigation instead of just “everybody make a check, here’s what you get” that many scenarios go with.  I especially like that failed checks result in wannabe-cultists starting to hang around the PCs (and they become important later).  Another thing I like is that the town has a retired (“put out to pasture”) Pathfinder agent who is secretly a member of the Shadow Lodge!

Chances are, the PCs will eventually find information leading them to the town asylum where they can interview a dhampir patient who has been held there (involuntarily) for pretty much his entire life.  He’ll talk if the PCs break him out (which requires getting past some super-creepy-looking totenmaskes), and provide some more information on the cult and its leadership.  From either this guy or other leads, the PCs will learn that they need to show up at a particular place outside town at midnight wearing black robes if they want to be inducted into the cult.  I love how the scenario features an “Off the Rails” sidebar to help the GM with enabling the various approaches different groups might take (I’ve been writing Dead Suns reviews recently where every sidebar is seemingly about how the GM has to firmly shut down any attempt to get off the rails).

Assuming the PCs stick to the infiltration plan, they’ll find themselves in the town foundry (the cult headquarters) along with several other inductees from among the townsfolk.  This part is really interesting, as the leaders of the cult have several tests they put initiates through to test their desire and loyalty.  The first one is being branded with a Sihedron—something my paladin wasn’t going to go for! (It’s actually a magical tattoo that is very useful.)  Another test was to step into a furnace, with those proclaiming allegiance to Lissala magically protected from the flames and those who don’t taking some burn damage.  Fortunately, not every member of the group has to agree to each and every condition.  The final test involves selecting the weakest member of the group (NPCs included) and killing them!  Here, as the scenario advises, the GM should remind the players that PvP is not allowed and that killing an NPC under these conditions would count as an evil act (still, I imagine some PCs would choose the second option anyway). 

What’s most likely to happen is that at some point during these trials, the PCs will have had enough and combat will break out.  The exact order and composition of the foes will change depending on what’s happened, but the long and short of it is  . . . vampires!  Regular vampire spawn, vampire rogues (like the missing PFS agent, who has been turned), vampire clerics, vampire sorcerers, etc.  (all the cult leaders are well-detailed with pictures and backgrounds) If the PCs happen to have prepared for undead, they’ll certainly have an advantage here, otherwise they could be in for a tough battle.  I remember things getting pretty dicey before we pulled out a victory.  After the carnage, the PCs can investigate the headquarters thoroughly, and that’s when they’ll discover what the whole season has been leading to: the return of a Runelord!

One thing I did find a bit odd is that the mission is styled as an infiltration one, but there aren’t really any consequences for the PCs being terrible at it.  A group of all-bards who are masterful at Disguise and Bluff would have pretty much the same experience as a group of all-fighters skilled at Swim or Climb.  Indeed, the scenario assumes the cult leaders may very well know that some of their initiates are “secretly” Pathfinder agents, but the plot plays out the same.  So it’s a bit of false advertising, which is too bad since sneaky characters often don’t get a chance to really shine in PFS.  That’s my only real criticism.  Apart from that, as I discussed above, there’s a lot to really like about The Cultist’s Kiss, and I certainly recommend it.

PaizoCon 2013 Pin [RPG]

 Imagine if King Kong were a giant-sized goblin, and instead of climbing the Empire State Building he climbed the Seattle Space Needle, and instead of holding onto to Fay Wray he had a massive dogslicer!?!  You need imagine no more thanks to the PaizoCon 2013 Pin.  This is your classic round metal badge with a sharp pin to poke holes in your shirt or draw blood from your chest.  These days, 99 cents won't buy you much, but it will buy you this.

Curse of the Crimson Throne Recap # 18 [RPG]

 [15 Desnus, 4708 A.R.]

Rain clouds fill the skies above the troubled city of Korvosa as Ralph, Yraelzin, and Goldcape spend the day running errands and preparing for the evening’s fancy masquerade party at Carowyn Manor.  Goldcape checks on Rodolfo and is heartened to see that the old toymaker is recuperating.  Yraelzin’s faith in Razmir and efforts to attract converts seem to be rewarded when he adds a new spell to his repertoire—remove disease.  Ralph visits the pentagram-shaped Temple of Asmodeus in search of a wand of infernal healing, but discovers the plague has caused a run on everything related to magical healing—even those requiring devil blood!  But a contact leads him to one of the city’s many black market entrepreneurs: a student of the Acadamae who has taken the dreadful risk of stealing from the school’s storerooms and selling the fruits of his criminal labor.  The prices are high, but Ralph ends up finding what he’s looking for.

At dusk, the scattered members of the group assemble.  Ralph helps everyone with their costumes, taking extra effort to fine-tune everyone’s garb so they appear to be of upper-class status.  Goldcape will go as The Harrower (completely disguising her vanaran heritage), The Reckoner is going as himself, Yraelzin insists on going as a pirate bandit from Osirion, and even Rocky gets to join in the fun.  Goldcape planned to leave her roc companion behind, but Ralph expects trouble, and wants the team to be fully prepared. 

Carowyn Manor proves to be a stately, gabled estate along Shoreline Way that includes a limestone manor house, a servant’s residence, and a meticulously manicured garden—complete with a gazebo and pond.  Every element is as fine as the nouveau riche can afford, and the party’s guests have come similarly well-dressed to match in garish outfits and elaborate masks of all shapes and sizes.  The proffered invitation obtained from Jolistina’s bolt hole and Ralph’s skilled costuming is enough to get the group in the front door. 

Mercival Jeggare is an ancestor of the famed Montlarion Jeggare,
and is also related to noted Pathfinder Society agent Count Varian Jeggare.

The wealthy, aristrocratic, and/or famous guests enjoy the party in grand style, with little thought to the disease they believe only affects those living in squalor.  Splitting up to look for anything suspicious or any word of Rolth Lamm, members of the group make idle chit-chat with a variety of partygoers.  Goldcape realises Maximos Flavicos, leader of Longtail’s performing troupe, is at the party, but her disguise holds up and Maximos has no idea he’s speaking to the city’s only vanaran.  Ralph speaks to Ausio Carowyn (host of the party), and also notices that Amin Jalento—the bearded youth he helped save from a mob in the early days of the unrest—is present as well.  Mercival Jeggare, the learned curator of the Jeggare Museum and chief consultant for the University of Korvosa’s Jeggare Library, is overhead speaking about a new order of books on arcane and esoteric subjects requested directly by Queen Ileosa herself.  Ralph subtly makes a reference to Rolth Lamm, and it seems like Mercival knows something—but he immediately changes the subject.

It seems like the night will slide into the tedious mingling favoured by the idle rich, but at least one guest has a hunch that the group does not really belong at the party.  Darvayne Gios Amprei, Korvosa’s snooty ambassador from Cheliax, loves nothing more than to prove his wit and status by embarrassing those of a perceived lower station.  He rounds on the group, loudly mocking everything from their accents to their footwear to the way they eat hors d’ouvres.  Sniggering can be heard from the crowd, as all ears and eyes turn to the ensuing confrontation that promises someone being laughed out of the party.  But although a verbal duel isn’t what they were expecting, and they no longer possess the letters obtained from Eel’s End implicating the ambassador in immorality, the Harrowed Heroes rise to the challenge.  Ralph makes cutting remarks about the ambassador’s devil-worshipping heritage, Goldcape has Rocky do charming stunts, and Yraelzin is unmatchable when it comes to pompous oratory.  Amprei fights back with every tool of his manipulative trade, but eventually finds himself outmatched and forced to stride away, humiliated.

The rest of the party is uneventful, though Ralph gathers more background on Mercival Jeggare and learns that an entertainer named Ruan Mirukova (a Varisian prodigy) never showed up as planned.  Having obtained some interesting new leads, members of the group agree that the next day they’ll follow up on an earlier one by investigating the submerged wreckage of the purported plague ship!

[16 Desnus, 4708 A.R.]

The next day, Goldcape visits Sgt. Clenkins at Citadel Volshyanek and receives a warm welcome.  When asked, Clenkins says all he knows about the sunken ship was that it went down somewhere near North Bridge.  He’s able to direct Goldcape to one of the trebuchet crews stationed on the Wall of Eodred, and a helpful member of the Korvosan Guard is able to narrow the area further.  The guard says that efforts to send a salvage team below have been hampered by the river’s depth in that area (80 feet), the difficulty in suitably outfitting a dive team with water breathing and anti-plague magic, and the presence of a jigsaw shark.  By flying on Rocky’s back, Goldcape is able to skim right over the surface of the Jeggare River and she sees, despite its muddy currents, the wreckage of a ship.  It looks to be a merchant ship from Nidal and is very similar to the one that brought her and Longtail over from Casmaron.  But the vessel has hit the river’s bottom on its side and cracked in two from a rocky outcropping.

After Ralph and Yraelzin are notified, the group prepare for a dangerous dive.  Ralph purchases short swords that will be much easier to wield underwater than his battle maul, special weighted harnesses are obtained, and a gnome fisherman is persuaded to (for a reasonable fee) take the unusual trio out on the river in his small boat.  After securing the harness chains to the boat and swallowing the magical potions obtained from the Temple of Abadar, the Harrowed Heroes dive into the river.  The waters are tolerably warm and visibility, aided by magical light spell, isn’t bad.  The wondrous ability to breathe water lessens the group’s anxiety as they descend deeper and deeper.  Goldcape’s inherent talent for natural magic allows her to see trails of multiple aquatic creatures in the area—small eels, a shark, and some sort of humanoid.

The group aim their descent to the aft portion of the fire- and trebuchet- damaged vessel, landing near the captain’s cabin.  The door is swollen shut, forcing The Reckoner to laboriously hack it open.  Inside, amidst the tattered sheets of a canopied bed, the body of a drowned man can be seen floating in the murky water.  The corpse is dressed in simple black robes and wears an amulet depicting a skull shaped like a housefly.  The Reckoner notices a wound on the man’s head that matches a patch of skin and hair on the edge of a nearby footlocker.  When Goldcape opens the footlocker, she sees that its seals have remained intact, and the contents—coins, a robe with the same housefly-skull symbol, and a heavy book bound in darkwood—are unharmed.  The Reckoner motions for Goldcape to open the book, but she shakes her head, suspecting its pages would be ruined.

Swimming out of the cabin, the group move amidships and open one of the hatches in the now-canted deck. Wooden boxes and crates—all surprisingly completely empty—float in the water, but it’s the small jigsaw shark that catches the intrepid explorers’ attention!  Curiously, instead of attacking, the shark swims over to a door in the wall and butts its head against it multiple times!  The Reckoner and Goldcape swim over and, in their first taste of the awkwardness of underwater combat, manage to subdue the shark.

Now, eighty feet underwater in the rotting hulk of a suspected plague ship, questions abound.  Where’s the crew and passengers?  Why is there no cargo? And who—or what—was the shark trying to signal?

GM's Commentary

I was glad to see the PCs make use of Korvosa's black market.  Before the campaign, I had developed a rules sub-system (drawn from one of the hardcover books or Player Companions) about the risks and opportunities of engaging with it.  The black market only matters, of course, because the settlement rules limit what PCs can purchase.  I really like how these limits contract and expand in the AP (even down to the availability of healing items here in Chapter 2), which really adds to the flavour of the campaign instead of a "anyone can buy anything they can afford at anytime" thing.

The players were expecting a big fight at Carowyn Manor, but what they didn't know was that by killing Jolistina early, they stopped the "zombie apocalypse" that would have happened during the party.  I mostly improvised the party, drawing on the rich collection of NPCs the campaign makes available, and I used the Social Combat card deck for the confrontation with Amprei.  It was fun and worked really well to bring out some good role-playing.

The PCs prepared extensively for the exploration of the sunken ship, not knowing that there's really only a couple of battles down there.  I had also prepped cheat sheets to explain underwater combat, and I think it went relatively smoothly (3D combat will also be a bit tricky), with the fact that they could fight on the bottom of the river making it easier.

Curse of the Crimson Throne Recap # 17 [RPG]

 [14 Desnus, 4708 A.R. continued]

Having fought their way through a wererat pack and other dangerous denizens of Korvosa’s sewer system, the Harrowed Heroes finally find an exit.  But they jump from the frying pan and into the fryer, as a group of wererat-hunting locals have staked out the sewer grate and launch an ambush!  The Reckoner dodges a hurled net and shouts for them to stand down while holding his battle-maul threateningly.  Goldcape emerges and persuades the aggressors that they’ve made a mistake.  She even gets them to release a very real wererat they had previous caught.  The wererat, Eries, explains that she had come to the surface to find help because Girrigz was planning a war in response to all the recent murders of rats and wererats due to suspicion they were spreading blood veil.  She’s grateful for the rescue and returns to safety underground.

After their exhausting day, the members of the group split up.  The Reckoner changes back to Ralph Blackfeather and visits the shops at Eodred’s Walk.  While chatting with Phaeton Skoda, Ralph learns the man flunked out of Theumanexus College—a worrisome sign for a proprietor of a magic shop.  Yraelzin makes it back to his “Temple of Razmir” in Old Korvosa and promptly lays down to rest, as he’s battered and beaten from the time in the sewers.  Goldcape goes to the house of Rodolfo and Wynda Giotorri, the friends of Old Lady Cloggins who have provided them shelter since the arson made their own homes temporarily uninhabitable.  Wynda is pacing back and forth, as Rodolfo is late for supper, something she says never happens.  When more time passes and she speculates that maybe he’s had to stay in the toy shop he runs because the streets are too dangerous due to rioting and the plague, Goldcape kindly offers to take some food over there to check on him.

Goldcape first stops at the Burnt Honey Inn to find Ralph.  As she waits, she chats with Potter Minehan.  The mild-mannered innkeeper is glad to hear that there won’t be any further thefts from his storeroom.  He expresses confidence that this plague that has affected his business will soon be over, as the Queen’s Physicians are very good at their jobs and are setting up a new hospital to help the victims.  When Ralph arrives, Goldcape shares what she knows about Rodolfo not coming home; the mention that Rodolfo had been complaining in recent days about a terrible smell near his shop seems ominous to Ralph, and he agrees to join Goldcape.  When they cross one of the many bridges to Old Korvosa, they see the neighbourhood is in even worse shape than usual: garbage isn’t being collected, fires have reduced some tenements to smouldering cinders, and some homeless persons have died from the plague and been left to rot on the streets!  The pair, along with Rocky (who has been growing steadily), stop to collect Yraelzin.  The priest complains stridently at being awakened, but pride makes him refuse the offer of being left behind.  He grumbles that a “disreputable street preacher” outside a nearby tavern has been “stealing” his “flock” with tales of a miracle cure for blood veil.

When the group reaches Giotorri’s Toys, a peak through the front window shows nothing amiss inside.  Although Rodolfo clearly isn’t a talented toymaker, there’s no sign of him or a disturbance, and the front door is locked.  The terrible stench from an alley adjacent to the shop is almost overwhelming though.  Goldcape climbs with monkey-like skill up the front of the building and across the roof to peer into the alley from above, but completely fails to realise she’s not alone up there!  Fanged teeth, pale skin, clawed hands, and red eyes mark the figures who ambush her as vampires!  Fortunately, the vampires are newly-spawned and awkward in their movements, and they push and shove each other to get at their prey, giving Goldcape a chance to escape and call Rocky for help.

The Reckoner tries to climb up but finds the brick walls too difficult, so he advances into the alley itself—only to stumble upon a gruesome sight.  Heaped against a bent wooden wall rises a pile of more than three dozen plague victims, their faces blistered and flushed, eyes open and staring.  Obviously, one of the plague cart drivers has been saving himself a trip to the Gray District by unloading his collections here!  More vampires, who must have been using the corpses to help disguise the bodies of their own victims, emerge from the darkness.  But although he’s hampered by fighting only in the moon’s dim light, The Reckoner once again puts his silver-tempered battle maul to good use!  One after another, the freshly-made vampires are crushed and assume a mist-like form to escape. 

Although Goldcape is badly hurt in the fighting, the group chase the fleeing bloodsuckers into a workshop that exits onto the alleyway.  There, they find Rodolfo—the victim of repeated feeding--unconscious but still alive.  A rickety trap door is opened to reveal a crawlspace under the workshop containing six coffins!  One by one, the helpless vampires are staked and destroyed.  Interestingly, coins found hidden in the coffin soil are all Ustalavic in origin.

As they carry Rodolfo home, the group speculate where the vampires came from, and who their master is.  Ralph says the various tragedies taking place in Korvosa could be connected in a web of conspiracy.  Goldcape says the city is cursed!  Yraelzin just wants a good night’s rest.  The Harrowed Heroes make plans to meet up the next day at sunset, because they have a masquerade to attend!

GM's Commentary

The passing reference to Rocky "getting big" denotes that he's now Large-sized at this point.  Alas, animal companions never get any bigger than that, but after the campaign's over we can imagine Rocky growing into a full-sized Gargantuan roc.

This session was a nicely self-contained story.  I really like how the AP provides several of these that can be run in any order and easily customised by the GM.  Coming across the vampire on the rooftop was a twist the AP probably didn't expect.  The Reckoner did well, as good rolls kept the miss chance from dim light from becoming a problem.

Pathfinder (GameMastery) Compleat Encounters: "Grove of the Mad Druid" [RPG]

SPOILERS!

Grove of the Mad Druid is another product in Paizo's short-lived "Compleat Encounters" line.  Combining a short adventure, gridded encounter tiles, and metal miniatures, the line was an interesting and innovative idea that ultimately didn't succeed.  I ran Grove of the Mad Druid as part of a homebrew "Roots of Golarion" ("The Magic Mirror") campaign, and for whatever reason, I liked it better than some of the others in the series I've played.  As the name indicates, the adventure involves a druid (named Gaskar) whose devotion to the natural concept of rot has started causing problems in the area.  There's not really much of an adventure hook (the PCs can either just stumble into his grove or be "hired by someone" to investigate).  The encounter involves Gaskar himself, his condor animal companion, a "carrion golem" he's constructed, several traps, and a cool new spell called spiritual menhir (it allows a caster to hide while casting spells that emanate from a mobile menhir).  Unlike some of the flip-cards of other products in the line, I found the ones with this set intuitive and actually pretty neat--the hollow tree and the collapsed compost heap were fun to reveal.  The artwork of the carrion golem is awesome (I love the equivalent of "roadkill" integrated into its body) and the drawing of the menhir is fine (a bit generic, but that's understandable), though the art for Gasker needs work.  The set I have didn't include the miniatures (either by design or because I purchased it second-hand), but from photos, the pattern from the artwork continues (carrion golem and menhir are cool, druid not so much).

Anyway, this is a "Compleat Encounter" that does live up to its name.  It'd be easy for a GM to spice up a long overland trek through the forest with gradual but ominously increasing signs of decay that lead to the mad druid's grove.  I've now played all but one of the products in the line, and Grove of the Mad Druid may be the best.

Curse of the Crimson Throne Recap # 16 [RPG]

 

[14 Desnus, 4708 A.R. continued]

Having stumbled onto the trail of thieves operating from the sewers below the city, the Harrowed Heroes find themselves in the middle of subterranean wererat den!  Although the pack’s outer guards have been subdued, sounds indicate more are on the way.  The Reckoner and Goldcape take up defensive positions alongside one tunnel, only to be blindsided by a veritable swarm of rats that squeeze through a crack in another wall!  Yraelzin hurls a flask of alchemist’s fire to slow the squeaking horde, and The Reckoner manages to disperse the rest with mighty blows from his war maul.  Wererat reinforcements also fall to the mighty weapon, its silvered head sizzling on impact.  Goldcape expresses frustration that she and Rocky’s attacks can’t seem to hurt the monsters.

The group advance to another chamber full of oversized rats’ nests.  When several dog-sized dire rats pour through from the north, with another from a small tunnel to the east, The Reckoner orders Yraelzin to take care of the lone one.  But the priest of Razmir is in for a surprise when that dire rat’s body begins to somehow shift and expand with a sickening crunch of bone and flesh, to reveal the leader of the wererat pack!  The burly wererat shouts about a war for revenge on the surface world for what they’ve done to his kin.  Yraelzin is stabbed and bitten by the foe, but manages to retreat as Goldcape and Rocky rush to his aid.  Once the dire rats to the north are dispatched, The Reckoner arrives as well, forcing the angry foe to shift back to rat form and escape through a crack in the wall.  But they give chase through another tunnel, and The Reckoner is able to put him down for good.  A search of the chambers reveals a stockpile of supplies and a small armory of weapons—it sounds like the wererats’ shouts about a planned war wasn’t just rhetoric!  But what drove them to such desperate measures?

Heavily wounded in the fighting, Goldcape suggests the group backtrack the way they came and exit the sewers as quickly as possible.  But The Reckoner presses for an exploration of the sewer tunnels around the wererats’ den.  They come across a sewer beast trapped between two gates, and despite its protests, attack it with a volley of arrows.  The aberration is easily defeated, though Goldcape shows mercy and uses magic to keep it from dying.

The group continue on through the tunnels and are nearing an exit when they turn a corner and find themselves only a few dozen feet away from an equally-surprised cytillipede.  The ten-foot-long segmented creature with a chitinous body and venomous mandibles looks like a giant centipede, but displays an unusual ability: it begins to glow brightly to stun its prey.  Goldcape jumps on Rocky’s back and charges forward with her new rapier, only to be bitten by the cytillipede!  Goldcape is badly hurt and near death, but Yraelzin rushes forward and saves her life.  With Goldcape out of the fight, Rocky flying around frantically to defend her master, and Yraelzin almost out of spells, the situation looks dire indeed!  But although he bleeds from multiple wounds, The Reckoner perseveres and finally succeeds in breaking through to a vital part in the cytillipede’s anatomy and killing it.

They’ve been victorious in every battle, but the sewers and its denizens are clearly draining the strength of Goldcape, Yraelzin, and The Reckoner.  Can they escape before their endurance gives out?

GM's Commentary

A short recap here, because sessions that are mostly combat don't take nearly as long to recount as ones with lots of role-playing.  We definitely start to see the dynamic of Goldcape urging caution while The Reckoner tends to want to push on further.  The battle against the cytillipede was a random encounter--sometimes those are cakewalks, but this one sure wasn't!