Pathfinder Society Scenario # 9-09: "Beyond the Halflight Path" [RPG]

 

NO SPOILERS

I played Beyond the Halflight Path via play-by-post with my disgusting dwarf oracle, Makras Vekker.  My thoughts at the time were that it was fine, but sort of loosely-plotted.  After having read the scenario, I have a better understanding of why that was: the scenario is a repeatable because it has *nine* different main stories that can be told with it (the scenario weighs in at 92 pages!).  Although the stories will have some common elements (including a shared flip-mat), there's enough differences between them that replays should still be fairly fun and fresh.  I can't give it a perfect score, but I admire what it's trying to accomplish and can see how it's a real boon to the PFS community.

SPOILERS!

Beyond the Halflight Path takes place in (and below) the city of Kaer Maga, perhaps the most original (and probably my favorite) setting in Golarion.  The scenario has a clever structure to foster replayability.  First, there are three major problems going on, and the GM gets to choose which he wants the PCs to address.  Each of these problems is linked to a different subterranean vault under the city, and the briefing for the PCs is delivered in a different district of the city by a different NPC.  The PCs really get exposed to the flavour of the city, and are encouraged to do things like hiring guides (with some fun random variations on who they end up with), talking to troll augurs, collecting rumors, getting help from the Duskwardens, etc.  Although some of this is consistent across the scenario's variations, there's enough differences that even the first quarter of the scenario, where the PCs are trying to figure out the location they need to head to in order to solve the problem, won't be completely repetitive for replays.

Once the PCs know which vault they need to go to, play shifts entirely over to the Bigger Cavern flip-mat (two of the story groups share one side, while the third uses the other side).  Each of the three main "problems" contains its own list of room descriptions for the different vaults: the Scintillating Halls (a caulborn storehouse for items from the Dark Tapestry), the Shining Deep (a poorly constructed vault of unclear purpose, with lots of natural dangers), and Sparklegrim Passage (a caulborn vault meant to lure and trap thieves, filled with magical dangers).  If anything, I think exploring the same flip-mat is the part of the scenario that could feel a bit "been there, done that" across multiple replays.

The clever part of the scenario's design is that although there are only three different problems (and thus three different briefings, etc.), each of those problems could have three different causes.  When the GM preps to run Beyond the Halflight Path, they have to choose the precise cause of the problem in the scenario, and that then provides them with a list of monsters and treasures that they use to populate the chambers.  So with nine different possibilities in total, every group will end up running around the same flip-mat but what they encounter should be very different.

This can sound a bit abstract, so I'll give the example of the variation I played.  The GM must have selected the second problem group (property damage) which is linked to the Shining Deep.  The briefing was delivered by a cleric of Urgathoa in the heavily-undead part of Kaer Maga called Ankar-Te.  The GM then had three options for who was responsible, and selected the "Recovering Implements" explanation: two dwarf brothers exploring the vault found a device capable of tunnelling into worked stone, but their use of it has been causing minor earthquakes on the surface.  By selecting this option, the GM was given the major NPCs to use for the climactic encounter, a linked danger, and then a free choice of several unconnected dangers.  And at the end, the briefer has some custom text for the PCs.  Finally, there's even a full set of three different Chronicle sheets so that players don't get spoiled on what the other options are!

I've read through several PFS & SFS repeatable scenarios, and I've never seen one go to so much effort as Beyond the Halflight Path.  It's genuinely impressive both in its flavour for Kaer Maga and in the different vaults under the city.  I like how the GM is given a lot of advice on how to plan their adventure, and some extra sidebars on making different parts of the scenario really come alive. (It is definitely a scenario that a GM shouldn't try to tackle on the fly--a lot of preparation is required.)  If I had a critique, it would be that some of the nine individual stories are under-developed; in the variation I played, my group never really got a sense of what the heck was going on beyond the fact that there were some bad guys in some caves and we won.  Still, that was just one experience, and I'd happy replay the scenario to see what happened the next time.