Experiences running Sailors on the Starless Sea (Spoilers!)

[DM Cojo]

I just finished running Sailors on the Starless Sea for the third time, with three different gaming groups. It is very interesting to see the approach that different groups take.

Spoilers below:

My first group investigated nearly everything in the keep (except the Well of Souls), had a two characters die when the Menhir crazed elf took them out and then snapped out of it, defeated the chaos leviathan with a massive turn unholy with a luck boost, and used mighty deeds to fight their way up the ziggurat to victory.

The second group also investigated everything in the keep except the well, killed the person who was mesmerized by the menhir before he could hurt anyone, defeated the chaos leviathan with three incredibly lucky critical hits in the second round of combat, and used magic to ascend the ziggurat to victory.

The group last night ignored everything in the keep EXCEPT they lost a guy in the well of souls. They made a bee-line to the beast man tower (based on one of the random rumors that said the treasure was there), subdued the person mesmerized by the menhir until she came out of it, got past the chaos leviathan by sacrificing the weakest member of the party (unwillingly...lol), and then using boom-cannon magic missiles to rise up the ziggurat (took out 13 beast men with the first magic missile due to spellburn and luck burn), to achieve victory.

I love how every time I run this module, different things happen. What a great game!

[finarvyn]

Nice story!

I don't often run the same module twice since I mostly play with the same folks, but I did have a similar 5E experience with a game where I play versus one I run. Both were doing WotC's HOARD OF THE DRAGON QUEEN and the two adventures really looked very little like one another since the players did different things and the characters were so different.

HotDQ is a very linear adventure, which leads me to believe that DCC modules would be a lot more fun played by different groups than HotDQ was. Thanks for sharing the experiences!

[Jeff Griffith]

I'm currently in the process of running Sailors with my group. We're going to finish up next week. However, my group has ran very similar to your third groups, as they completely ignored everything in the keep and headed straight for the tower. Amazingly, thus far they have only lost one character ( Hothenfinder The Dwarf) , and that was to the vine horrors outside. Through some insanely lucky rolls on their part and some insanely horrible rolls on my part, they blew right through the beast men in the tower, and are now well on their way to making it to the Starless Sea. I'm concerned that I've done something wrong, as they are simply not dying off like I expected them to....

jeff.

[DM Cojo]

I'm concerned that I've done something wrong, as they are simply not dying off like I expected them to....

jeff.

No, my third group didn't lose too many...although I was running them through the 2nd printing of the module which has the additional "summoning pit" encounter added, which killed a character off. The real death comes from this point on. I let my players all level up one character at the start of the second session this last time, even though they weren't at 10xp. Maybe I am getting soft in my old age...lol. But it was mainly because if you stop to level them up at 10xp, you might have to stop your game to do it, and that kills momentum. And I don't see a party surviving if they are all still zero level at the end.

[Stretch]

I had a similar experience with my current group when I ran them through sailors. I leveled them up right before they reached the beach area. I made sure they and enough encounters by throwing in a few run-ins in the hallways going down. I too was worried that they wouldn't make it through the module if I didn't level them up. My biggest concern being the trip across the sea. I had been playing a campaign with these people for over a year and had a feeling they would fight without looking for alternatives and that by fighting they would die. So I leveled them and they fought it and defeated it from some really good magic missile rolls.

The next time I run it. I am not going to level them. Part of DCC and part of the old school is letting the players decide when to run and when to consider alternatives to fighting. I told them several times before we played that they needed to keep that in mind. And then I reinforced the alternative by leveling them and letting them have more of an advantage in the fight by being leveled. Fighting is the first option they choose.

So the next time zero level all the way to the end. If they wipe then we can start over with another group of villagers going in search for the ones that never returned. And they can think about what happened and what they can differently. This will have them more than likely searching out areas they skipped over the last time and maybe finding something that they could have used the last time. And it will enforce the idea that not all conflicts need a punch to the mouth.

Just some passing thoughts.

[DM Cojo]

If they wipe then we can start over with another group of villagers going in search for the ones that never returned. And they can think about what happened and what they can differently. This will have them more than likely searching out areas they skipped over the last time and maybe finding something that they could have used the last time. And it will enforce the idea that not all conflicts need a punch to the mouth.

That's actually not a bad idea...I can always throw them some more pregens to replace the TPK party...