DCC#2 The Lost Vault of Tsathzar Rho (warning: DMs only!)

[Angulimala]

I'd like to hear DMs' experiences with running this adventure.

I've prepped to run it by creating about 24 visual aides and by buying a load of miniatures (I've even got some Derro minis!).

Also, I created dialogue for Logbrag the ogre and Slazzik. I've got lots of crazed mutterings ready for the kobolds to exclaim ...

I plan to place an adventure journal in the Derro's room (area 2-11) in order to deepen the player's knowledge of the plot.

What extras did you prepare? Also, what areas were most deadly for your players? Any cool tweaks you'd suggest? Did the players complain or rave about certain aspects of the module?

Thanks for your comments!

[jugger]

I just starting running it and my wife got dive bombed by the stirges near the entrance and died.

I forgot she only had a 10 Constitution....

[Save Vs. Death Ray]

I just starting running it and my wife got dive bombed by the stirges near the entrance and died.

I forgot she only had a 10 Constitution....

Bummer.....hope this wasn't her first experience gaming.

Lost Vault of Whoop Ass.

[jugger]

Luckily no, although there are several people in the party that are pretty new players. They're scared to death of stirges now I can tell you that!

I'll keep yall updated on the module progress as we play each week.

[Harley Stroh]

Luckily no, although there are several people in the party that are pretty new players. They're scared to death of stirges now I can tell you that!

Heh. That sort of thing will scar you for life. Twenty years from now they'll still remember stirges.

I wonder if there is a D&D mock-up of the "Sturgis Rally" t-shirt, yet.

Stirges: Swarm to Live, Live to Swarm.

[bobrunnicles]

How did everyones group get on with the ogre? I'm worried this will turn into a TPK or a walkover if I play him too sappy. Problem is his club does something like 2d8+7 damage, enough to take out most of the group in one hit.

I'm debating kicking off with this or DCC1 for a new campaign with three experienced players and one newbie; perhaps after checking out the poll somewhere further up I should go with Idylls?

[Renshai]

I'd set up the fight so that they can see how strong the ogre is. Perhaps they encounter him when he is quite mad and is having a tantrum, breaking rocks (or kobold skulls) with his club, having the explode into fine powder upon contact. Smart players will make sure they stay away from him during the fight. Rash players will most likely have their heads turned into a fine mist.

Ahhhh... DCCs...

[Ogma]

My FLGS got a copy of this in yesterday (which I promptly purchased having missed the opportunity when it was originally released) and I noticed that the back cover maps appear to be mislabelled (d'oh!) Is this a mistake that appeared in the first printing and was never corrected or something new to this more recent printing?

~Ogma

[goodmangames]

My FLGS got a copy of this in yesterday (which I promptly purchased having missed the opportunity when it was originally released) and I noticed that the back cover maps appear to be mislabelled (d'oh!) Is this a mistake that appeared in the first printing and was never corrected or something new to this more recent printing?

~Ogma

D'oh! Nope, that's brand new errata for the 2nd printing. Guess we'll have to do a 3rd printing to fix that.

It's funny, that book's been out for a year and you're the first person to mention it.

[Ogma]

Pages 30&31 (the big climax to the adventure, of course) were STUCK together at the edge, as well. I was able to razor the pages apart (with a bit of tearing), but it was a tad frustrating. I guess I picked the most flawed copy in the bunch, eh???

Oh, well. Seems like a fun adventure and I'm sure my newbie players will enjoy it.

~Ogma

[Ogrepuppy]

Personally, I get tired of kobolds as 1st level monsters. So I intended to swap them out.

I always imagined a Lovecraft-inspired monster would be good given the Background info for this module. But what kind? Most of them are too powerful! So I created a new monster type in my head, called them the Hideously Deformed, and imagined them to be large, slug/maggot type creatures with the faces of townspeople and travellers that the ogre had kidnapped. These people had been....altered...into the Hideously Deformed by the reality warping effect of the Vault. They'd wriggle and crawl to the adventurers, trying to bite & paralyze them and be horrible and terrifying and very appropriate to an adventure with Old Ones in it.

Strangely enough, Harley Stroh's Well of the Worm adventure (from The Adventure Begins, DCC #29) features monsters that seem to be nearly identical to the creatures I just described--I won't say more for spoiler's sake. It's almost as if he read the post I put up on ENW's boards about my Hideously Deformed and just yoinked the idea.... (conspiracy theories fly) ...although, to be honest, I couldn't figure out how to create the Hideously Deformed so I'd given up on them. And I'm kinda flattered in an off-hand way that he thought up a cool creature that's so much like my own cool creature...

So I intend to exchange the kobolds with maggoty, hideous creatures. Logbrag will become a "mountain man" (a lâ Grizzly Adams) and thus 1) will be slightly less deadly and 2) be able to speak fluently...err, as fluently as a madman can speak.

Aside from that, I can't see why the adventure couldn't be run basically as written. Maybe give the Hideously Deformed some nubby, grotesque arms so that they can set traps and whatnot.

[Takeyabue]

Just posting a note that I am preparing to run this later today as the first installment in the Saga of the Dragon Cult compilation. I have a party of five (two couples and my wife) primed to experience DCC for the first time.

I do wish to compliment the Goodman Games staff involved in the production of this module as this is one of the cleanest and best edited modules I have read in a long time. With the exception of the switched titles mentioned above, nothing at all jumped out at me on the first two readings. The purchase of Saga of the Dragon Cult PDF along with the four modules in PDF has made me a believer in the DCC line. I will probably be buying the print version as well as it becomes available.

[Ogrepuppy]

Problem is his club does something like 2d8+7 damage, enough to take out most of the group in one hit.

So he "lost" his club, and can only punch. A lot less damage that way....

[bobrunnicles]

Problem is his club does something like 2d8+7 damage, enough to take out most of the group in one hit.

So he "lost" his club, and can only punch. A lot less damage that way....

Wow....I made that comment over a year ago

In the end we went with Idylls and had a blast. Might be starting a new campaign in the very near future though so will be looking at this again (although my money is on Into The Wilds or something from The Adventure Begins....).

[Ogrepuppy]

Heck, I'd do all three, and just give less XP to slow the PC's progress.

Maybe chose an adventure from Adventure Begins that will lead the PCs to the Wildsgate area. (The first adventure, Black Pearl, is a personal fave, but it doesn't really lend itself to travelling to Wildsgate.) One of these shorter adventures should get the PCs enough XP for about halfway to level 2 or so.

Then you can do Vault: by the end, the PCs will be solidly into 2nd level which is a perfect segue to Into the Wilds, which has some slightly tougher combats that a 2nd level party would be well-suited for. At the end of Wilds, they'll likely be 3rd or even 4th level.

Heck, you could even have the Vault cave be a few miles east or west of Wildsgate.

Maybe someone in Wildsgate needs to have you investigate the ogre located "up the road a stretch"....multiple plot threads at once can be fun.



SPOILER:




Just be aware that both Wilds and Idylls contain a vampire that may or may not give the players some headaches (or, should I say, neck-aches), so you might not want to run both of those two particular adventures due to redundancy.

Alternately, you could change some background elements and have both vamps be part of a coven that's in the area. Lady Aborn (Wildsgate's antagonist) could even be a vamp too--or striving to be one. Ooooh, I love conspiracies.

[stripes]

The party was a little short on players (3) so I added one NPC who happened to have been one of the level zero charactor who took down an ogre. His contribution to planning was relating the half assed plan his group used & the causalty count (3 of the 4) so the players went in with a plan & no qualms about using all their resources. Now I expect they will be a bit light on spells for the kobolds...

But that didn't for into the 1st play session.

[Rath]

I just got through reading this one and... "wow"

What a cool adventure, it definitely has that Lovecraftian Cthulhu kind of feel to it. I like how the ogre is the first encounter too... I doubt I would expect that as a player. I'd probably be thinking that the ogre would show up at the end of the module after a lot of searching as part of a final battle.

Great maps, great encounters, great feel to the module. I honestly think this adventure is better than many of the old 1E modules which it tries to emulate... like many DCC's, it holds together very well and actually makes sense (as much as a fantasy setting with magic and evil monsters can).

Anyway, just wanted to share...