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<blockquote data-quote="Tolamaker" data-source="post: 9341419" data-attributes="member: 7031495"><p><strong>86, 87, 88 - Agony's End</strong></p><p></p><p>Oh man, I'm further behind than I thought. The party descends into the prison due to Kreven's very convincing argument of thousands of gallons of water washing them down. They are met by a mad druid by the name of X, who starts to give them a tour of the prison. They meet the X, the X, and the Mad Dinner. During the tour, they come across a fight between two gangs, where Mishka sees her father among the hostages taken. She beheads the orc bringing them back and rescues her father. He tells them that only one prisoner has descended into the Oubliette, Guthwulf the inquisitor.</p><p></p><p>The party brute-forces their way through the hallway, crossing a bridge that shows the glow of the Obelisk above. Guthwulf meets them, nonchalantly revealing himself to be formerly in charge of Ragesia's diabolical recruitment wing. He is interested in the party in a detached way, calmly telling them that their successes led to his fall from grace. He tells them that they must kill agony to stop the waves of pain that power the obelisk, corroborating what they learned from their dealings with Vellisk.</p><p></p><p>Guthwulf stoneshapes the door so they may pass into the Oubliette, where they find a ring of fire, and a singing seela named Etinifi singing the Song of Forms. Eluriah takes up the song so they can talk to him, where they learn that he has been imprisoned in this way for 40 years, and he begs them to kill Agony to end his pain. They destroy the runes around Agony's prison, revealing a horrifically wounded and pained trillith in the form of a woman. They talk to her, and convinced that she will not turn on them, let her go. Eluriah attempts to heal her, but the pained nature of Agony doesn't allow it to take hold. Still, she gives Eluriah her boon in thanks before descending into the crevice.</p><p></p><p>With the power source for the Obelisk gone, Corban feels the limitation on teleportation lift. They decide to send Corban and the torch to take the prisoners back to Seaquen, while the rest of the party goes up to deal with the Obelisk. Kreven is waiting for them, with a wall of force protecting him and the obelisk.</p><p></p><p>The fight goes awry when Aripos is targeted, and Gruz is heavily wounded attempting to rescue him. However, when Corban returns, the party is able to turn the tide and destroy the runes that enable the Obelisk's powers. Kreven is the last enemy defeated in the midst of a silence spell, cursing their names. They destroy the obelisk, and take the torch to the beseiging Lyceum forces, teleporting everyone back to Seaquen. A wounded yet elated Simeon grabs hold of them and cries out "We can beat them! We can take back Gate Pass!</p><p></p><p><strong>Post Session Thoughts</strong></p><p>86 - I felt a little strange in the prison. The book even calls out that players are going to expect a fight, but there isn't really one to be found unless they really botch talking with Agony, or fully trust Guthwulf's aims. As such, I felt like I had to kind of play up the detailed factions that really don't matter beyond flavor. The protections leading to the oubliette also felt rather weak, with a single glyph of warding and a block that could be brute-forced. Not a bad session, but it felt a little empty to me. I'm not sure how I would change it if I could go back.</p><p>87, 88 - The reveal of Agony and Etinifi went well, with some more learning of trillith lore. I didn't feel the need to reveal Etinifi's role quite yet. The fight with Kreven was a fun one, with enough moving pieces coupled with some bad rolls at the beginning really keeping the players on their toes. If I were to make one change, I would probably either shrink the room down, or add a few more inquisitors, because the spellcasters were able to fan out enough to avoid the worst of the counterspelling.</p><p></p><p><strong>Changes to the module-</strong> The two changes I made was that I added an Obelisk Elemental (the same stat block as the blizzard elementals that attacked Seaquen), when Corban's player returned for the second session for CR purposes (he missed the beginning of the fight), and I also changed how the runes worked so that destroying them would have a greater effect on the battle. No one really touched them at first, and when Corban's player destroyed one, I figured that it was late enough in the battle, and it was mostly decided anyway, that it would cut off Kreven's access to those spells completely, rather than simply ending the ability to cast them for free through the Obelisk.</p><p></p><p><strong>Post Module Thoughts -</strong></p><p>I enjoyed this module more than I expected for such a combat-focused adventure, and I think it's because nearly every battle felt interesting enough to keep me and the players on their toes. The one day time limit across two levels and a dungeon is a fun restriction, and really made them think about what they had to do. Mishka's barbarian took the most damage against lowly zombies, simply because she decided she needed to save her rages for later. The Kreven, Eye, and Antimagic room fights were all really well designed, so kudos to the original creators, and to [USER=6776887]@Tormyr[/USER] for the 5e conversion.</p><p></p><p>The other thing that helped is that I didn't pull my punches. I have a tendency that I've been trying to shake where I make a million little changes and adjustments to make the game perfect, and this time I just ran with it. Having three characters go down (one of them twice) has started to help me get a little less precious with their lives. While it helps that they're high level enough that even death is going to be more of a roadbump, I feel like this adventure might help me kick that habit for good, because those near-death experiences led to better gameplay overall.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tolamaker, post: 9341419, member: 7031495"] [B]86, 87, 88 - Agony's End[/B] Oh man, I'm further behind than I thought. The party descends into the prison due to Kreven's very convincing argument of thousands of gallons of water washing them down. They are met by a mad druid by the name of X, who starts to give them a tour of the prison. They meet the X, the X, and the Mad Dinner. During the tour, they come across a fight between two gangs, where Mishka sees her father among the hostages taken. She beheads the orc bringing them back and rescues her father. He tells them that only one prisoner has descended into the Oubliette, Guthwulf the inquisitor. The party brute-forces their way through the hallway, crossing a bridge that shows the glow of the Obelisk above. Guthwulf meets them, nonchalantly revealing himself to be formerly in charge of Ragesia's diabolical recruitment wing. He is interested in the party in a detached way, calmly telling them that their successes led to his fall from grace. He tells them that they must kill agony to stop the waves of pain that power the obelisk, corroborating what they learned from their dealings with Vellisk. Guthwulf stoneshapes the door so they may pass into the Oubliette, where they find a ring of fire, and a singing seela named Etinifi singing the Song of Forms. Eluriah takes up the song so they can talk to him, where they learn that he has been imprisoned in this way for 40 years, and he begs them to kill Agony to end his pain. They destroy the runes around Agony's prison, revealing a horrifically wounded and pained trillith in the form of a woman. They talk to her, and convinced that she will not turn on them, let her go. Eluriah attempts to heal her, but the pained nature of Agony doesn't allow it to take hold. Still, she gives Eluriah her boon in thanks before descending into the crevice. With the power source for the Obelisk gone, Corban feels the limitation on teleportation lift. They decide to send Corban and the torch to take the prisoners back to Seaquen, while the rest of the party goes up to deal with the Obelisk. Kreven is waiting for them, with a wall of force protecting him and the obelisk. The fight goes awry when Aripos is targeted, and Gruz is heavily wounded attempting to rescue him. However, when Corban returns, the party is able to turn the tide and destroy the runes that enable the Obelisk's powers. Kreven is the last enemy defeated in the midst of a silence spell, cursing their names. They destroy the obelisk, and take the torch to the beseiging Lyceum forces, teleporting everyone back to Seaquen. A wounded yet elated Simeon grabs hold of them and cries out "We can beat them! We can take back Gate Pass! [B]Post Session Thoughts[/B] 86 - I felt a little strange in the prison. The book even calls out that players are going to expect a fight, but there isn't really one to be found unless they really botch talking with Agony, or fully trust Guthwulf's aims. As such, I felt like I had to kind of play up the detailed factions that really don't matter beyond flavor. The protections leading to the oubliette also felt rather weak, with a single glyph of warding and a block that could be brute-forced. Not a bad session, but it felt a little empty to me. I'm not sure how I would change it if I could go back. 87, 88 - The reveal of Agony and Etinifi went well, with some more learning of trillith lore. I didn't feel the need to reveal Etinifi's role quite yet. The fight with Kreven was a fun one, with enough moving pieces coupled with some bad rolls at the beginning really keeping the players on their toes. If I were to make one change, I would probably either shrink the room down, or add a few more inquisitors, because the spellcasters were able to fan out enough to avoid the worst of the counterspelling. [B]Changes to the module-[/B] The two changes I made was that I added an Obelisk Elemental (the same stat block as the blizzard elementals that attacked Seaquen), when Corban's player returned for the second session for CR purposes (he missed the beginning of the fight), and I also changed how the runes worked so that destroying them would have a greater effect on the battle. No one really touched them at first, and when Corban's player destroyed one, I figured that it was late enough in the battle, and it was mostly decided anyway, that it would cut off Kreven's access to those spells completely, rather than simply ending the ability to cast them for free through the Obelisk. [B]Post Module Thoughts -[/B] I enjoyed this module more than I expected for such a combat-focused adventure, and I think it's because nearly every battle felt interesting enough to keep me and the players on their toes. The one day time limit across two levels and a dungeon is a fun restriction, and really made them think about what they had to do. Mishka's barbarian took the most damage against lowly zombies, simply because she decided she needed to save her rages for later. The Kreven, Eye, and Antimagic room fights were all really well designed, so kudos to the original creators, and to [USER=6776887]@Tormyr[/USER] for the 5e conversion. The other thing that helped is that I didn't pull my punches. I have a tendency that I've been trying to shake where I make a million little changes and adjustments to make the game perfect, and this time I just ran with it. Having three characters go down (one of them twice) has started to help me get a little less precious with their lives. While it helps that they're high level enough that even death is going to be more of a roadbump, I feel like this adventure might help me kick that habit for good, because those near-death experiences led to better gameplay overall. [/QUOTE]
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