Sunday, May 3, 2009

Rannick Reclaimed

With the ogre force driven from the fort, the party can now lay claim to its own substantial plot of defensible land. While you should feel free to make use of as much or as little material from the Keeping the Keep article presented in the original adventure, this conversion will continue with a short side trek into a set of long-forgotten chambers uncovered by a rare earthquake shortly after the party gains stewardship of Fort Rannick. This possibility is touched upon in the "Secret Chamber" entry in the article, but it will here be made substantially more significant. The side trek will contain three encounters, and will both help the party reach the appropriate level of experience for their next adventure and increase their investment in their new holding.

Because this section of the conversion is not tied directly into the plot of the adventure path, you can run it at any point in The Hook Mountain Massacre that feels appropriate. It is assumed that at this point in the adventure path conversion the party has hit level 10. If this is not the case, consider running the side trek before continuing with the main plot. When you want to move forward with the storyline of the adventure, continue with Part Three: Down Comes the Rain.

Update: The information presented here is no longer accurate. See the Keeping the Keep chapter conversion for details on how the side trek events play out.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

I have to ask you. How do you format the NPC and monsters? What soft do you use?

Scott said...

I create my stat blocks in a word processor (OpenOffice Writer, specifically), using columns to size the blocks. Getting the indentation and formatting right took some fiddling, and save the templates so that it stays consistent across multiple stat blocks.

I originally posted a short walkthrough of how I make them at http://rustydragon.blogspot.com/2009/02/tangent-how-i-make-stat-blocks.html but that has since been made obsolete by the changes I outlined at http://rustydragon.blogspot.com/2009/02/tangent-fiddling-around-with-stat.html

tadkil said...

Hey Scott,

I am adding more detail to the encounter with Myriana. I'm planning layering 3 Fey themed swamp encounters in before encountering her and using a Delve style format.

At this point I see Myriana as a skill challenge. Failure means you fight her and a couple of minions. If defeated, she is still accessible to the PCs. I plan on having her disembodied voice challenge the PCs and talk to them if she is defeated in combat.

Structurally I saw this as a means to inject more XP into the players level climb.

As for a secret chamber encounter, I think the Level 10 encounter, from Dungeon delve might work with a little modification in the first room. The human minions could be traded out for a Skull Lord and a Skeletal Tomb Guardian and maybe some Vampire bloodhunters.

Continues to be great work.

Scott said...

I agree completely with the swamp encounters. Not only does it help pad an otherwise combat-lacking area of the adventure with experience-giving encounters, but it gives the players an immediate use for their recently acquired Boots of the Mire. It would really be a shame to include that item and not provide significant opportunities to get use out of it.

I'm going to base the number of encounters present in the swamp/secret chamber on my level target for this adventure. I should have an idea of how that will break down very soon.

Scott said...

I have significantly altered my plans for the secret chamber and where it falls in the course of the conversion. It is now set up to be uncovered after the events of The Hook Mountain Massacre end, as part of the Keeping the Keep article conversion.