Festival of Halina: Adventurers Gone Wild! (Orsal Judging)

[Bront]

XP up, and added a 4th question
Responce to RA:

1) Thanks I will try to work on pacing a bit more, though this was somewhat openended as well, so it was a struggle on players as well as the GM I'm sure.

As far as the anti-climax, amazingly, you got lucky and stumbled on a few clues. If you hadn't, her leaving may have been a bit more of a supprise. I think I made the festival a bit too long though, and if the timeline had been compressed 2-3 days, it would have made for a bit more tension.

3) Yeah, I saw that. You and Oirhandir had some... interesting chemistry, but it wasn't good. And unfortunately, Lasair's nature prevented her from enjoying time with Carsis as much, though I hope she at least finds him an interesting character.

And the loss of people did hurt party unity. If Sunny had been around, and been able to RP what happened to him, it may have unified the party and polarized it a bit more.

Great feedback You sure you don't have questions?

[sblock=RA]If you can, hold off. My next adventure may have an extra hook for you, though it's nothing earthshattering if you choose to downplay it.[/sblock]

 

[Rystil Arden]

1) Thanks I will try to work on pacing a bit more, though this was somewhat openended as well, so it was a struggle on players as well as the GM I'm sure.

Yup, Time Matrix adventures where pacing is too fast or slow can be the toughest, since they were prepaced for event triggers based on time and it may not make sense to change the parameters of the Time Matrix to help with pacing. I think you did a good job adding threads to fill in the gap to help with this (I'm assuming that certain tangential threads were added for this purpose).

As far as the anti-climax, amazingly, you got lucky and stumbled on a few clues. If you hadn't, her leaving may have been a bit more of a supprise. I think I made the festival a bit too long though, and if the timeline had been compressed 2-3 days, it would have made for a bit more tension.

Yup, 2-3 days may have been perfect. That gives enough time to explore each area if you do one or two a day without too much extra time that might be spent hanging. As for our luck, it was skill! Well, not really. But we did have Troi's nose I still say nothing can compare to the time I created a completely paranoid character who wound up on an adventure to determine the cause of mysterious disappearances in a small town. She walked up to the temple of the fire god, claimed that the fire priest was feeding the villagers to a red dragon with absolutely no evidence, convinced the party to tie up the priest, and searched the premises. On close inspection, we found a red dragon

3) Yeah, I saw that. You and Oirhandir had some... interesting chemistry, but it wasn't good. And unfortunately, Lasair's nature prevented her from enjoying time with Carsis as much, though I hope she at least finds him an interesting character.

Heh, it was interesting to see them clash and to see why they clashed. I think that Oirhandir's relative inability to read social situations combined with Lasair's naivete about western culture led to them alternatingly thinking the other was completely misunderstanding what was going on.

And the loss of people did hurt party unity. If Sunny had been around, and been able to RP what happened to him, it may have unified the party and polarized it a bit more.

I completely agree with that. It was *much* easier for us to just 'not tell Sunny' when there wasn't a player around to complain and snoop on Sunny's behalf.

You sure you don't have questions?

Should I? What sorts of questions might I have? Maybe I'm just not realising the type of question I should be asking.

#4) I think that if your goal was to handle them in a way that would be least disruptive, you succeeded completely. This is exactly what I would have done if my goal was to keep them in the lowest profile. Sometimes when I NPC characters, I try to pick up from the player's vision and keep the character engaged (I might have done that more for Sunny and/or Elise as GM and treated Fang the same way you did), but that's more a matter of style in dealing with these situations.

[SBLOCK=Lasair]Sure. Keep in mind that Lasair automatically accepts any adventure if it seems to have a good chance that she will somehow be able to cheat fate and catch Zaeryl.[/SBLOCK]

 

[Bront]

Well, I'm open to "Who was X?" "Was X connected to plot Y?" "Did we miss anyting?" questions, or whatever

4) Yeah, I was more worried about them coming back, so it was to avoid potential problems.

Got it

 

[Rystil Arden]

How about: Were those people who attacked Scarlet just petty thieves as I suspected, or did we miss a larger plot?"

 

[Bront]

No, they were just an extra, though if Oirhandir had charged instead of slowly approached, they might have been a fight, or at least a better chance of catching them. They had a fairly large head start otherwise.

 

[Rystil Arden]

Yes, that is what I thought too. I think I pretty much understood everything correctly then.

 

[GnomeWorks]

GW, I know you missed December, I think another month (I said February, not excatuly sure which one though), but I wasn't sure. let me know if you disagree.

I do not disagree with your evaluation of what happened. I know I missed a good deal, and two months is probably about right.

#1) I want some player feedback. How was I as a GM? How was the Adventure? Was there something I could have improved? Keep in mind, I warned you there would be very little combat involved ahead of time.

You were an excellent GM, Bront, and I hope to learn from your lesson of interesting NPCs.

The adventure itself was not quite up my alley - as I think was evident from Troi's demeanor, he is not the type to enjoy a festival of any sort, and is more of a loner. However, he was presented several opportunities to remain relevant while remaining true to his personality, and I am glad for those. I'll admit that I fully expected this to be a get-there-and-get-back thing, and that was most certainly not what it turned out to be - which is alright. Even in a fantasy world, things characters do don't always turn out to be what they expected. I appreciate that versimilitude.

I think the adventure was perhaps a little too cloak-and-dagger; some things were not very clear and some were downright confusing. However, I suppose that was the point.

If Troi seemed hesitant to show interest in Melinda, that is due to his background. I realize that almost all the PCs had an NPC interested in them in some fashion, but Troi - again - is not that sort of person.

#2) Any questions about the adventure, the characters or such? I'll answer most of them (There's a few I won't).

None at this time... and since this is the end, I suppose that means I have none.

#3) Did you enjoy it? What was your favorite part? What was your least favorite?

Dealing with the thieving gnomes was entertaining. It was nice to have an effect on events despite Troi not having an interest in the main going-ons.

Also, the fortune teller was an interesting touch - I especially liked the bit about Troi finding what he sought. Something of a foreshadowing of the approval of the Learner, I suppose.

I did not enjoy the extensively long chase sequences, though. They seemed to take far too much time than necessary - hunting down Scarlet's abductors, for instance, seemed to take a long time, as did hunting down the figure Troi spotted at the Mayor's house.

#4) Did I do a good job handling the droped characters in a way that was the least disruptive? Input is again appreciated.

While I found Troi joining up with the sheriff for an extended period of time most definitely not lining up with his personality, I saw it as the best way for you to deal with him at the time and have no complaints.

As for the others - you did what you could. When players drop, there is extra stress on you to explain them away, and I think you managed it well. There may have been a better way, but what you did was effective and believable, and I'm sure there were many worse ways you could have handled it.

Overall, I agree that it was a touch long - I had extreme difficulty keeping track of our time spent at the Festival, though that was partially due to me being gone for long periods of time.

 

[Bront]

1) Melinda was sort of a throw in, wasn't ment to "woo" you thought. I'm glad you enjoyed it even though it wasn't what you were looking for.

2) I'll answer them anyway in other sections.

3) Fortunes are always hard, but being vague is a good way to do it.

On the Chase scenes, here's an explanation:
The Shadowy Figure: It was not only Rinaldo, Rinaldo is a Shadowdancer, which lead to breaks in the scent, as well as other problems. You got lucky twice I think durring that chase with nat 20s to find out as much as you did. You would have identified him immediately if you had bothered to smell the area when you met him. That's why the lingering scent of him appeared when he danced witht he girls as well (another nat 20, otherwise you wouldn't have noticed) (BTW, I expected you to ask about him)

The Abducters: Too much time had passed, you were tired, it was dark, and others had ruined the trail. I didn't think you would have stuck with it as long as you did, which is why it lasted so long.

4) The sheriff thing was actualy a way to not only get you involved in the town a bit more, but earn some extra money, given you were the high level character involved.

Good to know it wasn't disruptive. It was certaintly frustrating on my end

 

[GnomeWorks]

1) Melinda was sort of a throw in, wasn't ment to "woo" you thought. I'm glad you enjoyed it even though it wasn't what you were looking for.

Well, my initial guess towards the oddity of each of us having an NPC showing an interest in us was some sort of crazy plot or something - ie, we were being lured into some sort of trap by letting our guard down.

That - along with Troi's background - definitely cautioned me in how much Troi dealt with Melinda.

2) I'll answer them anyway in other sections.

I honestly can't think of any.

3) Fortunes are always hard, but being vague is a good way to do it.

Fair enough.

On the Chase scenes, here's an explanation:
The Shadowy Figure: It was not only Rinaldo, Rinaldo is a Shadowdancer, which lead to breaks in the scent, as well as other problems. You got lucky twice I think durring that chase with nat 20s to find out as much as you did. You would have identified him immediately if you had bothered to smell the area when you met him. That's why the lingering scent of him appeared when he danced witht he girls as well (another nat 20, otherwise you wouldn't have noticed) (BTW, I expected you to ask about him)

Ah... that's pretty sneaky. I myself am not a fan of prestige classes, so I don't really consider them when thinking of what a PC or NPC is capable of. Though his being a shadowdancer now makes a lot of things make sense...

I didn't ask about him directly because I didn't want to arouse suspicion. Again, my theory of there being some crazy plot going on behind the scenes...

The Abducters: Too much time had passed, you were tired, it was dark, and others had ruined the trail. I didn't think you would have stuck with it as long as you did, which is why it lasted so long.

Well, I suppose that's our fault, then, for following what was pretty much a dead-end.

4) The sheriff thing was actualy a way to not only get you involved in the town a bit more, but earn some extra money, given you were the high level character involved.

I honestly didn't mind the low pay - again, it is demonstrative of the versimilitude of the world. Just because he's more experienced doesn't necessarily mean he's going to get paid more.

And as I said, while I don't think it fit his personality, you had to do something with him while I was gone. It worked, and wasn't all that awkward.

Good to know it wasn't disruptive. It was certaintly frustrating on my end

Most definitely understandable.

 

[El Jefe]

"You did well for me, and I'm glad I had little use of your services. I hope you enjoyed the festival, and perhaps I'll have the pleasure of employing you some other time."

Oirhandir shook the dwarf's hand vigorously (by elven standards, although perhaps not so vigorously for a dwarf), and replied in the other's native tongue, "

Spoiler

It was a priviledge to work for you, Master

Ingus

Spoiler

, and I am at your service should another opportunity arise.

"

"Be safe, and Helina bless your journies."

Oirhandir murmured in response, barely audible, "And may the Searcher watch over your journies as well." With that, he bade his companions a good day, promised that he'd see them soon in the Red Dragon, and ventured forth to the Street of Merchants.