Pathfinder Society Scenario # 9-04: "The Unseen Inclusion" [RPG]

NO SPOILERS

I played in The Unseen Inclusion with my Daggermark Poisoner character, Siegfried, via play-by-post.  I probably didn't bring the best PC for it, but I still found that the scenario was well-written and interesting.  It ties into a major plotline for one of the PFS factions, and has a good mix of combat and role-playing.  I can't say there's anything super memorable about it, but it's a solid adventure.

SPOILERS

The Unseen Inclusion takes place in the city of Merab in the country of Thuvia.  The scenario is a big part of the Scarab Sages' faction storyline in Season 9, as it continues with the plot concept that the sage jewels (ancient Osirion mystical stones that have been collected by a new generation of scholars) were contaminated with the spirit of a vile necromancer named Aryana Tahari.  That spirit is starting to revive and exert influence on the present wearers of the sage jewels.  When the Sapphire Sage, Amenopheus, senses something related to the jewels in ruins recently unearthed in Merab, he sends Pathfinders to investigate.  (Amenopheus can feel an evil influence, but doesn't know anything about Tahari)  The scenario itself starts with a briefing from a cool new Venture-Captain, Diya Akan.  She explains to the PCs that excavation in the city has uncovered an ancient complex, while also setting free some kind of evil spirit.  She asks the PCs to investigate the dig site and canvass the workers to learn more.

Interviewing the dig team provides a good, early opportunity for role-playing.  I especially like how one of the youthful workers makes up a story about having seen the monster emerge, and this story could give the PCs a very different sense of what to expect (a vargouille) than what was really set free.  A scholar named Obahar who is working at the site gives members of the Scarab Sages faction a sort of special mission--to learn what their senses (other than sight) can discern when they explore the complex.  I didn't play a PC from this faction, but I really like how the scenario calls them out for some special importance (and can lead to a special faction boon).

The ancient complex dates back to the Age of Destiny and was a secret outpost for Aryana Tahari, the necromancer whose spirit has corrupted the sage jewels.  Tahari used it as a laboratory to craft curses and diseases, using a trapped doru div named Veshtahz as her test subject.  The encounters in the complex are fairly mundane--skeletons and caryatid columns--but there's a ton of excellent "dungeon dressing" and flavourful lore to uncover.  With some careful investigation, the PCs should learn that the "evil spirit" or "monster" that escaped the complex was Veshtahz--still alive after being buried for millennia.

But finding Veshtahz's current whereabouts isn't easy--the PCs need to assemble several clues from different sites in Merab (a temple to Sarenrae, an alchemist's shop, a necropolis, and a scholar's study) in order to reach the right conclusion.  I found the "clues" pretty obscure and thought they could have been done better.  On the other hand, there is a surprise appearance by Zurnzal--a notorious Aspis Consortium assassin (who I got to play in a Special!)--who is now working for Grandmaster Torch.  Zurnzal is here as an ally, not a foe, but PCs' innate distrust of Torch may be enough that they refuse to work with him to their own detriment.  I love Zurnzal, though I'm not sure how much his appearance here is really necessary to the plot.

One way or another, the PCs likely do discover that Veshtahz is located at the "Dungeons of the Ever-Dying", another ancient outpost of Aryana Tahari.  The site has since been reclaimed by the Usij (cultists who are trying to hasten her re-awakening).  But in a good twist, Veshtahz hasn't come to help the cultists--he's come to murder them all as vengeance for what Tahari did to him!  The flip-mat chosen for this location, Asylum, is simply too large for the actual content in the scenario.  When I played, instead of the PCs getting to the only room where the action was, we spent ages investigating each of the over two dozen side chambers, occasionally finding a minor clue but nothing of any real importance.  The big showdown with Veshtahz (and the cultists he's mentally taken over) is solid, if unspectacular.

After the climax, the PCs will be able to recover the onyx sage jewel which Amenopheus can use to realise that it is Tahari's spirit that is reawakening.  It's an exciting ending that sets up nicely future scenarios in the storyline.

I could quibble that it seems awfully convenient that a construction crew in Merab would accidentally free Veshtahz, who has been trapped for millennia, at exactly the same time that Tahari is awakening.  But on the whole, I thought the scenario was put together pretty well and, if I were invested in the Scarab Sages, would be thrilled by.