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It’s been quite a while since I posted an article on this series! There are several reasons for this, both real-world and blog-related. One of the latter ones was that these adventures were getting bigger. The detailed approach I took on Adventure 02 was meant to kinda be a stealth GURPS adaptation, but it probably wasn’t as helpful as I thought and it left me kinda burned out on Hell’s Rebels.

I’m going to take a more condensed approach on Adventure 03, Dance of the Damned, and leave the detailed conversion bits for their own post. This one feels even bigger than Adventure 02, as it has three “dungeons” and a number of social encounters as well. I’ll try to cover them all with one post.

One of the things that happened over the hiatus is that I ran the first adventure and most of the second for a group of my friends, over roll20 and using GURPS. So you can expect real conversion notes in the future!

Introduction

By the end of the previous adventure, the PCs had secured a permanent headquarters under the ruins of the Lucky Bones casino and completed several high profile missions that increased their fame and notoriety within the city of Kintargo. Even Barzilai Thrune, ruler of Kintargo and the campaign’s Big Bad, was forced to congratulate them on their “civic-mindedness” after they get rid of a dangerous serial killer.

Thrune unwittingly helps them further by increasing the Bleakbridge toll to 2gp per crossing (or 10 for a day pass). This a trivial amount for the PCs by this point, but it’s prohibitive for a lot of the civilian population. You see, Kintargo is split into northern and southern halves by a river, and this bridge is the only crossing. Plus D&D sets the daily wage of a common laborer at about 1gp. So yeah, dick move on Barzilai’s part.

Some people set up illegal ferry operations in response to this, at first charging just a few coppers and then doing it for free just to stick it to the Man. It’s quite possible the Silver Raven PCs themselves have already done this after the first couple of increases in previous adventures (like my group did). If they did that, they’re sure to gain a massive reputation boost. Even if they didn’t anti-Thrune sentiment should still help them gather supporters.

With the rebellion poised to grow so much, it’s time to begin thinking bigger, and this is what Adventure 03 is about.

Ah, yes, the book also mentions that the PCs might want to begin thinking about improving the Lucky Bones’ defenses. It doesn’t get attacked during this adventure, but there’s a high chance that will happen in the future.

Chapter 1: The Silver Council

If the PCs aren’t yet regularly meeting with the key NPC allies they’ve been making along the way, then one of these allies will suggest they begin doing so now. The book calls this group the Silver Council. It will at the very least be composed of Laria Longroad and Rexus from Adventure 01 plus Hetamon Haace from Adventure 02, and will also contain any other such allies the group makes in your game.

The Silver Council’s first order of business in this adventure is an alliance proposal by Lady Mialari Docur, one of Haace’s good friends. She runs Lady Docur’s School for Girls, which is a real school but also a front for the closest thing Kintargo has to a functioning thieves’ guild. The offer is genuine, the numeric and political benefits are great, and the alliance is more or less automatic unless the PCs go out of their way to be assholes.

After these pleasantries are concluded it’s time to discuss the next big steps in the rebellion’s progression. They have plenty of citizen support, but they should still secure official alliances with Kintargo’s noble houses. And even beyond that, they should gather regional support and prevent Thrune from doing the same. Kintargo is not the only city in the duchy of Ravounel, after all.

Noble Alliances

Kintargo’s eight remaining noble houses are a bit more similar to Renaissance families than to feudal ones. Their fortunes come from varied commercial interests in the duchy. We get a list of houses, a short stat line for their leaders, their political allegiance, the requirement for an alliance, and its mechanical benefits to the rebellion.

Political allegiance can be either to Kintargo or to Thrune. Houses whose allegiance lies with Kintargo can be persuaded to support the rebellion if the PCs can impress their leaders and convince them the city would be better off if it declares independence from Cheliax. Failure to do so results in them staying neutral. Thrune-aligned houses can’t be convinced to ally with the Ravens. They’re also a bunch of evil slave traders, so we don’t want then on our side anyway.

Four of the houses are Kintargo-aligned, three are Thrune-aligned, and one is undecided. This last one is House Aulorian, which will only ally with the Ravens if the PCs undo their good deed from Adventure 02 and return Marquel to them. I don’t imagine many groups will go for this, but the option is there. Unless this happens, they flip to Thrune when the chips are down.

Regional Hot Spots

Kintargo is the capital of the duchy of Ravounel, but it’s not its only city. The duchy is cut off from central Cheliax by an imposing mountain chain with a single pass through it. Most trade comes via sea.

There are three important places related to the goal of gathering regional support in Ravounel:

  • The aquatic elf village of Acisazi, whose inhabitants can do a lot to defend Kintargo from Chelish naval actions. The PCs rescued scouts from this community in the previous adventure, which should give them an “in” with the local rulers.

  • The city of Vyre, a mostly independent “vice city” that’s a preferred vacation spot for the country’s nobility. The Chelish government wants to keep good relations to them because it loves its vacations; they want to keep good relations to Kintargo because they don’t have a decent sea port. Securing an alliance with Vyre would help with keeping Cheliax away.

  • The Menador Gap, that one mountain pass to Central Cheliax. If the pass is closed, it will prevent Chelish troops from marching directly into the province. They’d have to take the long way around and march through neighboring nations, which will be at the very least much harder.

Each of these is its own chapter (or “Part”) in the book.

Rumors

We close with a round of rumors where the GM can insert the ones they like. The book notes two important ones: a reminder that the former Mayor of Kintargo is still missing, and the news that Barzilai Thrune is organizing a grand gala to assure the city everything is fine.

The gala, named the Ruby Masquerade, will be the adventure’s climax.

Notes and Impressions

I think this is where the Adventure Path format hurt the actual adventure a bit. Both Lady Docur and the noble houses feel like things that could have been introduced way back in Aventure 01.

An early introduction to Lady Docur give the PCs a good starting bonus on the “strategic layer” of the campaign, and allows her to act as the “face” of Kintargo’s black market when the PCs need to buy gear. I did that when I GMed Adventure 01 and had a lot of fun inserting Little Witch Academia characters as students / guild members.

The noble houses also benefit from an early introduction. Securing alliances with them requires a lot of personal interactions with their leaders, so PCs who like the tradecraft and roleplaying aspects could have a good time researching their habits, arranging meetings, and negotiating with them. It also gives a little more weight to the decision of whether to rescue Marquel in the first place or not. Rescuing him still the right thing to do, IMHO, but it feels more organic to have it be inserted in a political context from the beginning.

Chapter 2: Dead In the Deep

Ravounel has a northern coast that’s mostly dominated by a huge tangle of reefs known as the Dismal Nitch. There are charted routes through this, but Kintargo is pretty much the only decent sea port in the region. The Acisazi village is located in the Nitch, and its sea elf inhabitants can easily swim all through it. They can do wonders to block those sea routes if they don’t like the people trying to sail through. The PCs should make sure they dislike Thrune.

If the PCs saved the sea elf scouts from Adventure 02, they’re going to have a much easier time here.

The Situation

The Acisazi village has a submerged district and a coastal one, where its half-elf inhabitants live. It’s located near an underwater shaft called The Drowned Eye, a cursed place whose evil was contained by Acisazi wards. Back around the start of Adventure 01, though, these wards failed, and a strange malady began affecting the village’s inhabitants.

Here’s the spoilerific truth: the wards failed because they were destroyed by Menotheguro, an aboleth necromancer who moved in around the time Adventure 01 was getting started. He’s working on focusing the Drowned Eye’s cursed energy into the creation of an epic undead creature called a “sea bonze” (i.e, an Umibozu).

To protect himself, he’s raized an entire sunken ship’s crew as draugr, and a huge great white shark as a zombie. He also secretly placed Nerrenn, the village’s main protector, under long-term mental domination.

Menotheguro’s draugr have been raiding the village and taking prisoners below the waves to serve as sacrifices in his magical workings. The elf scouts came to Kintargo to ask for Shensen’s help - she was a long-time friend of theirs. With her missing, though, the PCs are their only hope. If the scouts survive Adventure 02, their leader Aava can tell the PCs about the malady, the draugr raids, and that they serve someone named “Menotheguro”. She doesn’t know the rest.

Negotiation

Getting into the village is going to be hard even if the PCs bring the sea elf scouts with them. Nerrenn will receive them at the head of a crowd of hesitant half-elves. Acting as the village’s interim leader, he will deny then entry citing all sorts of paranoid reasons.

PCs good at Diplomacy or Intimidation might convince him to allow an audience with the village’s Speaker. Otherwise there’s going to be a fight. Whether he’s browbeaten or just plain beaten up, Nerrenn will rush to his master’s side after this encounter. Perceptive PCs might realize he’s dominated, and might think to restrain him and try to dispel or suppress the effect. If they succeed at it, Nerrenn will spill the whole truth outlined above.

Next is an audience with the village’s true leader, Speaker Athannah. This aged half-elf druid is close to death due to the curse. She will be an instant friend of the PCs if they brought the scouts back or revealed Nerrenn’s domination. Otherwise winning her over will require some more diplomacy on the PCs’ part. In either case, her condition for a formal alliance is the same: break the curse of the Drowned Eye and save the village.

Dungeon: The Drowned Eye

The Drowned Eye is a deep pit in the ocean floor near a particularly treacherous set of reefs. Its “curse” comes from the fact that a lot of ships sunk and fell into it over the years, saturating the place with a death aura. Menotheguro is at the bottom, protected by his guardians.

This is a “dungeon” only in the sense that it’s a location with monsters. The layout is entirely linear, and the PCs will run through every encounter in the order listed. The biggest environmental complication is that it’s all underwater. By this point the PCs should have some experience with underwater combat, since it was a good bit of Adventure 02’s final dungeon. Acisazi Village should have more than enough water-breathing magic available even if they didn’t come prepared for this.

When the PCs approach the vincinity of the hole, they’re going to be attacked by half of Menotheguro’s draugr contingent. If they haven’t yet dropped underwater, they’re going to have a surprise because the undead will surely try to sink their boat and/or drag then under.

Dropping down into the Eye itself, the PCs are going to fight the zombie white shark on the way down. There is no ground, and their opponent is aquatic, making this fight extra-tricky even though the shark’s numbers aren’t particularly scary against the whole party.

The bottom has the other half of the draugr, including their captain, and an entrance to Menotheguro’s cave.

It’s almost guaranteed that the aboleth will notice the fight just outside his door. If that happens he’ll try to trick the PCs with an illusion after they deal with the draugr, claiming to be the ghost of a druid named “Menotha” who needs a cleansing ritual performed by a living druid so she can finally rest.

If the PCs don’t fall for the illusion, the aboleth fights them immediately. If they do, he will wait for them to bring Athannah down here, dominate her and then fight the PCs.

Menotheguro himself only has 3 levels of Necromancer, but those are stacked on top of an aboleth stat block so he’s certainly boss material. If Nerrenn escaped the surface he will be here at full health ready to fight alongside his master. He’s considerably more dangerous here because he has terrain advantage and has his shark animal companion with him.

After the fight the PCs can destroy the runes etched in the cave’s wall to ruin Menotheguro’s ritual and cleanse the Eye. Then they can loot the pile of treasure in the corner.

With the aboleth destroyed and the curse lifted, the PCs secure an alliance from Acisazi.

Notes and Impressions

This is by far the most “side-trekky” part of the adventure. It does have a connection to the overall campaign and its story is kinda interesting, which is good. On the other hand, its ends in an underwater “dungeon” featuring exactly a day’s worth of combat encounters placed in a straight line one after the other.

I think this is enough to make skipping this chapter altogether a reasonable decision. In that case you can say Acisazi is actually fine, that Aava was a relative of the Speaker, and that rescuing her back in Adventure 02 is enough to secure the alliance. Escorting her back home is something one of the rebellion’s NPC teams might do, freeing the PCs up for the other scenes.

Next up: a feast and a fort.