Emirikol: review of session 2, planning for session 3

 Taking things in order of occurrence from the second session 

1) The 3E encounter design rules worked really well for what I wanted here. The mass of kobolds vs. the already battered PCs worked exactly as planned. This comes in part form the players inside the line character creation. I know from experience that playing an 18 Str Barbarian with Cleave just let you rip through encounters like this, throwing off the challenge rating math by maximizing your ability. 

2) Also, the lack of specificity let us provide the detail where we needed. This is one of my important rules for game mastering, which is that when people miss, they miss for a reason. It’s not that the PCs were inept, it’s that circumstances got in their way; it’s not that the villains are inept, it’s that the heroes are just that good. 

3) I was very curious as to how the players would react to the scene with the non-combatants, but the rules of the game universe (chaos beasts vessels for captured souls of this realm, being tortured and twisted by alien forces) meant that the future Paladin was right to do as he did. This is one of those cases where knowing the world also helps with Gygaxian Naturalism. I could have done the “these things just bubble out of the ground) but I wanted to emphasize the almost Lovecraftian horror of the chaos cults and that the chaos beasts are unequivocal bad guys. 

4) More Spiders Trying To Kill Melas! This is one of the perils of a limited number of classic lower level monsters being recycled in these old adventures

5) I love how the players immediately grasped the idiom of politics and connections, urging their host to take political action to prevent a recurrence of the chaos infestation on Vulture Point

6) I did get the chance for Ambleer’s staff to mess with Hiram’s head re the Ghost. This is one of those cases where 3E gave the PC a chance to see through this, but didn’t. What I had not expected with Dave’s fervent, absolute desire on Hiram’s part to not take part in a ghost story. Nope Nope Nope Nope! So they partied all night rather than risking another encounter with Lorell Ambleer. It didn’t matter to me one way or the other, we could come back to this later, or not. We never got back to it. It was a great character moment.

7) The magnificently evocative treasures from the Vulture Point module did exactly what I wanted in piquing the PCs interest, and I was even able to stat out the value of the Wand of Petrification with 1 charge level for the Cockatrice Feather; the detail level of 3E helped a lot there. 

8) The descriptive introduction to the city worked well, and while Dave continued to joke around with things like the Petros the Pugilist Sextet as a stand in for Rocky, it all worked. Likewise, the introduction of Dietrich’s house hit just the right Phoenix Guards note. 

9) Of course the PCs immediately let themselves get insult-goaded into a duel! Again, this is where having the players all on board with the genre conventions. There was a long talk in and around the game as to what “first blood” should mean in a duel after Hiram’s first round hit for 1 point of damage on a Figther 2/Aristocrat 2, but I ceded at the time because his using Sunder as his first round attack to shatter Hiram’s sword made for a great long term rivalry. More on this later. 

Going into session 3, I had asked the players what they wanted to accomplish, and then I tossed in what I wanted to accomplish. 

Player Agenda: 

• Drink/Dine with Florian and Donato de la Ballesteros in Scornbul

• Visit with the Paladins and possibly the Cardinals of the Endless Ocean over the remains. 

• Explore the city as gawking rube; Visit a local theater. 

• Visit Raul's solicitor concerning Hiram's broken sword. 

• Visit the Ferrantino Library as per the invitation by the Loremistress d'Ferrantino

GM Additional Agenda

• Learn that there are tales of someone going into Hightower Tor

• Witness actions of 'East Cardinal Sebastian d'Ferrantino' (actually his double Reme Collbras) 

• Have Cybele get isolated and braced by her halfling mobsters.

Everything on the player end is immediately following up on subplots from the plot elements dropped in the last two sessions, which is fine because my prep work already has answers and NPCs for most of these cribbed from other modules. On my end I want to set up for the events of the Last of the Iron House, which is being placed straight in the city rather than being some strange roadside event placed outside the city whose events it’s supposed to be influencing, irritate Rebecca’s PC with the halfling mobsters, and generally keep their first session adventure in motion. 

So far my lightly modified 3E was doing everything I wanted it to in terms of how adventures played out, how skills worked in the system, and the adventure long attrition aspect of hit points. Would I have preferred something like 13th Age where your HP swing a lot more over the course of an adventure? I don’t know. It might have worked better, but it might also have had too much detail on each fight. Making the combats last longer.