@Walkerp: Thanks for your support…

For the record, I told you at the restaurant a few days before I wrote this post and you had time to recover…

I saw your reflexive facial expression when I told you the adventure’s punch… it was priceless but it was not, initially, an expression of awe.

I’m also noticing less resistance as people get used to the idea. I just have to be careful in guiding DMs who read the adventure without following this project to achieve the desired effect (Foreshadowing, Explain it in the adventure’s Background and such)….

Hence I’m going to stick with a dual ending.

@Dr. Checkmate, I’m the one who “claimed” Savage Worlds. But feel free to take it from me, or do your own thing or we could even work together. I don’t think there is very much work to do, actually, except the skill challenges (more on that later). I mean really, Chatty is doing all the work here , we just have to stat it out in SW, which as everyone knows takes barely any time. That’s assuming we won’t rework the adventure in any major way.

However, there is no systemic equivalent in Savage Worlds to Skill Challenges. They serve a really neat function in the way Philippe has structured the adventure, allowing the characters to non-combat there way through some interesting confrontations which will have ramifications for later parts of the adventure. Very cool. So how do we do something like that in SW? Just simplify the crap out of it and make it a simple test of skills, with each raise neutralizing an opponent? Or maybe using the mass combat rules, but make it a giant debate instead of a fight?

@Tomcat: I know how you feel. But I’m convinced that what is a tired cliché in a medium can actually be a surprising trope in another.

The alternate endings will certainly feature some sort of 1/2 Oedipus Complex finish and another more ‘classic’ finish. The shapeshifting Quest giver ‘test’ calls to me now.

Or something.

And they said half-orcs were morally wrong. Ha! What little they knew. There so much potential in a good outcast backstory.

greywulfs last blog post..Then They Came

If you have the Old Crone sighing over a portrait in the back of her lair as the PCs enter – which she hastily covers up – this might help.

Just a thought. I have them sometimes.

greywulfs last blog post..The Joust

What if your regular PCs received a quest from the Quest Giver to rid the local dungeon of the *terrible* monsters? Perhaps the Quest Giver has this cool magic amulet – he says he killed a dragon in the same dungeon, and promises that even better treasure awaits our fearless heroes.

When the PCs reach the dungeon, they are greeted by the kobold crone. She casts a curse on them, transforming them all into kobolds (I would say keep them small sized and let them shift – your players will be sooooo happy to turn the tables). She then tells them that the Quest Giver is an evil jerk who killed her dear hubby and stole his magic amulet. *If* the PCs kill/capture the Quest Giver and retrieve the amulet, then she will lift the curse.

To spice it up, you could mix up the classes – the fighter gets transformed into the kobold wyrmpriest, etc. They could even keep all of their equipment, and then be forced to trade each other for the correct weapons.

You would also want the Quest Giver to really be a jerk, so that the paladin-type players don’t feel any remorse.

Thoughts?

Plus some cool abilities…

I’ll post them as an Interlude early next week.

BTW, i REALLY like the “Chosen Ones” idea from Greywulf.

Reverend Mikes last blog post..Flash Friday: Belgian and Potato, All Kinds Taste Great-o

Also, there has to be some opportunities for baby eating in there. After all, King Torg (ALL HAIL KING TORG!) says that babies are rather tasty.

The potential for Silly is built in but I don’t think I want to impose it, hence my proposal to spilt ending in two ways.

As for GMing the Pathfinder version at Gen Con… Dude that would be so cool. Let’s see how this goes.

Here’s my Summary of things so far.

Overall the adventure piques interest with some scenes appreciated (3 and 4) and one ill received (5).

Note that people hacking this adventure are free to veer off the script and do whatever they feel like.

What I plan to do is:

Scene 1: Explore not doing a reverse incremental combat encounter.I agree with Plotter and I’ll will take his opinion under serious advisement. Possibly use his suggestion as is or I set up a ‘Very Hard’ combat and then embed the skill challenge in the combat and cause a faction to hesitate during combat while PCs fight off (and try to reason with) the remainder.

Scene 3: The Embedded dungeon option will be outlined in a Sidebar (i.e. I’m not going to do it in the scope of this adventure).

Scene 5: Since it was so ill received by some but not by others I’m going to provide alternate endings. I’ll put my original one as the ‘Evil DM ending’ and I’ll provide another one. The best proposed alternatives will feature in another Sidebar.

I thought about un-grossing my ending by saying that the half-Kobold were magically created by the Quest giver (A wizard) as an experiment in the “‘perfect mix of Kobold Cunning and Human Guile”. He then sent the Infant hybrids in the dungeon to see how they fared (and were ‘saved by the Crone’ ). Since then he heard rumours of their exploits so he sent adventurers to find them and give them a scroll.

The Second Scroll would basically be the same trope (I’m your creator) and I could up the Sith Lord Recruitment Speech (You have proven yourself above my wildest expectations, Come rule the world with me!)

So Quest Giver would be an Evil Overlord trying to recover his lost Death Ray…

Is that an easier to DM ending?

This brings an interesting question: What would that make the Crone if she knows about all this?

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