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The Renovation and Siege of Fort Agate
The best laid plans last as long as there is first contact with the enemy. With a much-enhanced table – how did It go?
The layout really helped the players to immerse themselves into the details of the Fort Renovation. They were able to individually choose NPCs. They could keep track of the gold. They could update the daily progress. They could follow the progress making friends.
While all of this sounds fantastic in principle – the reality was – this was overoptimized. The group managed to get the Fort Agate 100% renovated by day 11 with zero gold left and several days to spare.
Unfortunately, this was achieved through losing pace. We went into micro-managing. Discussions about individual NPCs, check of a few gp.
I was applauded as GM for my effort – but it felt empty as several players (GMs) voiced they will never GM this specific scenario.
Actually, despite all my improvements I felt everyone felt happier after game. So how do I plan to run this my third and fourth time? Yes – I signed up for it twice during PaizoCon.
- Assign one player responsible for the money.
- Only do one or two tasks a day – don’t let the players go for 6 different tasks
- Check each task for rolls, let one player update.
- Let one player count the NPCs used once a day and update the money left
Improvements for the GM
I used the empty Excel column to add DCs and Battle Preparation points
These only appear on the GM layer – so players won’t see these. A single (very tall) image.
The SIEGE
That leads to the last encounter. Players will pester you that they want to use the map as it is and go for high positions. Run it as written. Don’t let them try to build defensive positions / choke points. This can lead to drawn out fights.
I did the Maths. A group of farmers lvl 3, Str. 16 with fists (against the skeletons) and daggers (versatile S) against the zombies swarming them in the middle of the keep (flanking) would have finished the fights considerably quicker as my group of experienced and optimized Pathfinders.
The group gets 10 healing potions. This is meant to be a quick slaughter fest with healing up at the end – not an avoidance of damage. Electric arc has an average damage of 2 !! for wave 3 (assuming a spellcasting stat of 18 and level 3). Do what you can to discourage the group to electric arc the enemy to death from high ground.
The whole flipmap used is unfortunate. Players will use what they see. I’m contemplating to rebuild everything in DwarvenForge – make a picture – and overlay it.
This would allow replace the current tower with a ruined tower and a removal of the walkways.