 April 18, 2011 - 3:35pm | Chapters: 1. Pirates on the Serrena Dawn 2. Wandering in the desert upto meet the Ulmor 4. Caves of linear dungeon crawl 5. Meet the quickdeath Chapters: 1. Shard Grass and its beasties (toilet paper roll nose elephant plus acid spitter) leading upto the fight in the trees and meeting the kurabunga 2. Parlay with the kurabunga and the hunt 3. on to the pirate outpost and infiltrating it 4. the edestakai and the pirate town 5. on to the ruins of Volkos and meeting the eorna 6. investigating the sathar obelisk Chapters: 1. Recruiting the Mechanons to help fight the sathar 2. Recruiting the Ul-mor to help fight the sathar 3. Recruiting the Kurabunga to help fight the sathar 4. Recruiting the Edestakai to help fight the sathar Battle of Volturnus Section 5. Attack on the Mechanon forces 6. The Edestakai meet their gods 7. Cybo death for the eorna 8. Charge of the Ul-mor 9. Aftermath section- possible encounters depending how the battle shakes out So what are the essential encounters to the series? What could stand to be changed? What could stand to be dropped? What would you add? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 18, 2011 - 4:05pm | With Crash on Volturnus, my opinion is: 1. the pirates, desert and ul mor and quickdeath encounters are essential but the caves seems like a waste of time that doesn't add anything to the story (other than the possible forshadowing of the eorna that can occur in one cave room). 2. there is not really much opertunity for people to use tech skills once they leave the serena dawn upto 1/2 way thru the 2nd module. This is a weakness IMO (ok ok there was 1 malfunctioning robot in the caves). I originally created a wrecked ship encounter for the desert to add in some tech skills but now I'm thinking to replace the caves with the wrecked exploration ship of the 1st expedition with some graves and clues to whats going on with the pirates and even a bit of foreshadowing about the sathar obelisk. Volturnus Planet of Mystery: I believe everything in this module is essential to the story. However, the linear dungeon crawl beneath the ruins of Volkos could be re-written IMO. I just never liked it. RE: The Star Spawn of Volturnus: I've not really been so down with the ABC quest to win the various races over and secure the help against the sathar 1. the Mechanon mounds are very linear and dont make a lot of practical sense 2. With the Great Game of the Ul-mor I think that the tomar's horses should be deleted and the PCs be mounted on the lopers of the Ul-mor 3. the kurabanga quest involves some skill checks for climbing and a fight with the bird and thats it so I always felt it was lame 4. the edestakai quest- capture a live quickdeath- not much to this but it sets up the encounter, "The edestakai Meet their gods" 5-8 all the battle encounters are different from each other and were an interesting way of covering a battle involving 1000's on a scale suitable for rpg rules. The issue with the ABC quests is that they impact the Battle of Volkos so you really can't delete them. If the Ul-mor dont agree to show up for the battle, the PCs dont get the ul-mor calvry reserve that they can call on to assist them if they need help during battle and you dont fight the battle of "the Charge of the Ul-mor" not getting the Ul-mor to come to the battle means a loss of 20% chance that the PCs will win the battle. So I guess while there are elements of the ABC quests I dont like they just cant be dumped. I probably would change 2= the mechanon mounds and the kurabanga quest. What I'd do with the kurabanga quest is that the hunt of the toilet paper roll nose elephants would not happen in module 2, instead the kurabanga chief would be greatful for the PCs having fought the cursed Sky Demons and just cut to the chase with that chapter, latter the quest the PCs need to do is the hang glider hunt of the toilet paper nose elephants Also I'd take a hard look at many of the animals/monsters in the module and out right delete some and change others. intelligent magma monster- gone; toilet paper nose elephants- changed. Air whale changed or deleted, land whale changed maybe. tomar's horses- not needed EDIT: oh yeah the original serena dawn map stinks and needs to be a KHs style deck plan I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
