1 - Devil at the Dreaming Palace (GM Reference)

YES!

Naurgul wrote:

Hey guys. My players seem keen to investigate the missing persons (they asked Ollo specifically to relieve them of their patrol duties and assign them the cases) so I would really like to expand on the missing persons list and allow them to investigate each missing person individually instead of being pressured to go to the pagoda immediately. Does anyone out there have any mini-investigations (one or two sentences per missing person describing who they were, what they were doing, when they went missing and who reported their disappearance) I could use?

Sure! Its a bit tricky because a lot of the trails run cold pretty fast, but that's kinda the point because eventually the PC's realize the Dreaming Palace is a tie between all of them which triggers the final act of the book.

Special thanks to OmegaZ and Naurgul for this bit of detail-filling-in; after the International House of Planecakes the Kobolds (and Qonn) wanted to see if they could tie any of the other missing persons on the list to the DPH, and the stuff these guys put together, mixed with a bit of my own revisions and improvisations, made for a great "chasing down leads" session.

Sounds awesome. Glad my notes helped.

OK, my party has now wasted two entire sessions trying to get evidence on the Murder Hotel without actually going into what they are convinced (but cannot prove) is a Murder Hotel, for some reason having to do with it being a Murder Hotel. Pratchett and Ralso now suspect that they are close to being made, but the team has been so wary that I've been unable to get them into a trappable position, as of yet. Any suggestions on how to push them over the edge?

Are they aware that there are currently people staying at the Murder Hotel?

That could give them some urgency to head inside.

They have actually managed to get a look at the public-facing ledger, so they know exactly how many people are staying there. Thanks to a well-played Pointed Question and some s@&% deception rolls from Ralso, they even have reason to believe there's another ledger.

They have pretty much everything they can get without going in, but that is all circumstantial, and not enough for a warrant.

What kind of evidence is it your players specifically want, before they want to go in? Direct evidence that the murder hotel IS in fact a murder hotel? Or enough evidence that the hotel is the latest lead for the missing people, so maybe it should be looked into?

Because the "reason to enter the hotel" and difficulty in creating/gaining enough evidence necessary for a warrant differs a lot between those two options.

Yeah, I had figured that the various "last sighted checking into the Dreaming Palace" clues would be enough to get a warrant for checking the place out, searching the premises for any of the missing persons or clues to the disappearances.

I think a warrant for the arrest of anyone specific would be premature, but not for a search warrant.

Also note that Ralso is supposed to be at least somewhat twitchy. If they ask too many nosy questions she might grow impatient and lead them to one of the trap rooms for disposal instead of keeping up the charade. After they survive the trap they have every ground to keep searching the place and make some arrests.

When I ran it, my players sent one of their own pretending to be a journalist that would blow the cover of the murder hotel story (they had no solid evidence, it was a bluff). Ralso reacted to that by telling him to "please wait in this room, I'll go fetch Mr. Pratchett to speak with you" and of course it was the room with the smoke rats.

Have an interesting session coming up tonight. My party had cleared out the entire second floor and explored the final room, which dumped them down a chute to the basement. The other members of the party climbed down.

Now they are badly hurt, tapped out of spells for the most part and have 3 doors to choose from, 2 of which almost certainly lead to their death.

The craziest part is they heavily barricaded the door to the basement from above so that no one would sneak up to surprise them.

How is this not going to be a TPK? If nothing else Pratchett will set fire to the place and then he and the entire party will find themselves trapped while the building burns down around them.

Should be an interesting session!

Yikes, indeed it seems pretty hopeless. I think if they have a chance it is due to this:

they heavily barricaded the door to the basement from above so that no one would sneak up to surprise them.

How "heavily barricaded" are we talking about? Depending on the type of barricade, maybe you can prepare some scenarios, skill checks or other possibilities for them to somehow get past it. Alternatively, they might survive by holing up somewhere in the basement and stealthily resting.

They have actually managed to get a look at the public-facing ledger, so they know exactly how many people are staying there. Thanks to a well-played Pointed Question and some s@@$ deception rolls from Ralso, they even have reason to believe there's another ledger.

They have pretty much everything they can get without going in, but that is all circumstantial, and not enough for a warrant.

If it is seeming like your players are playing too much by the letter of the law (waiting for warrants before searching, etc), you could always use the real-life workaround--probable cause.

While in the real world this workaround has (and will likely continue to be) abused, this is your fantasy world.

If the players continue scoping out the place and suddenly see a missing person break free of their room, bloodied and abused, the agents will have ample reason to immediately try to arrest Ralso and Hendrid.

If the players do a stakeout and watch from afar, perhaps the furnace that the two use to burn excess bodies breaks down/gets clogged up and Ralso is forced to discreetly get rid of the evidence at night, allowing the agents to catch her red-handed.

When the session stalls, you can always have a badguy walk in the door with a gun drawn to kick the pacing back up.

Yikes, indeed it seems pretty hopeless. I think if they have a chance it is due to this:

The ShadowShackleton wrote:

they heavily barricaded the door to the basement from above so that no one would sneak up to surprise them.

How "heavily barricaded" are we talking about? Depending on the type of barricade, maybe you can prepare some scenarios, skill checks or other possibilities for them to somehow get past it. Alternatively, they might survive by holing up somewhere in the basement and stealthily resting.

The words they gave me was they were going to spend an hour to "barricade the s2#t out of that door".

The issue was that the whole place would be on fire AND they would still be fighting creatures on their way out, including the BBG who was now trapped along with them.

In the end they randomly picked the least two of the three deadly doors and all was well.

They have pretty much everything they can get without going in, but that is all circumstantial, and not enough for a warrant.

Obviously it's your Absalom, not mine, but I would suggest that circumstantial evidence is more than enough for a search warrant. The purpose of a search warrant is to FIND evidence, so you will generally have minimal or no evidence prior to one. You just need a good reason to suspect the likelyhood of evidence.

Likewise in terms of an arrest warrant. Even now, police don't need a warrant to arrest someone where there is clear and present danger to the public. In historical times, they certainly didn't.

(Of course it depends a lot on class. The Watch wouldn't be able to arrest Hoff or Olansa Terrimor without a warrant, in the same way that you can't arrest a US Senator without a warrant, even if you get close enough. They would just say no, their lawyer files a complaint, and you might get fired. But arresting a "commoner" without a warrant is easy. Pratchett is somewhere in between - he's a middle class gentleman who owns property and runs a business, the two key marks of a "gentleman" in Absalom. But beyond that he isn't very well connected.)

My PCs are finally heading to "check out" this hotel they keep hearing about in their investigations. Could be messy.

For the DMs, did your players make it through the whole hotel in one dungeon delve? It seems you need at least one long rest.

What do Pratchett and Ralso do if the PCs retreat for healing and come back the next day?

My players did make it through in one go, though they did spend several 'short rests' in the building.

If they had retreated to rest, depending on how obvious the PCs had been, I was going to have Pratchett burn the place down and escape--and then figure out a way to fold him back in to the story later.

My players also made it through in one go without any full rests but they did make short rests for treating wounds. They were smart enough to avoid most room traps though, which is the reason this was possible. Basically they skipped the first floor after the cinder rats encounter because they saw Ralso climbing up the stairs. Then on the second floor, they kept opening doors for a quick check and mostly not walking into rooms, which meant they only had to deal with the redcap, the statues (which they actually ran from) and Ralso. In the basement they had to deal with mostly everything because it's linear.

If your players want to be thorough, then any daily resources will almost definitely be depleted long before they make it to Pratchett.

My players approached the hotel with a "this is a dungeon" mentality at first and explored every room in order. After discovering the pit trap, triggering the cinder rats, fighting a mimic, and threatening to beat senseless innocent lodgers unless they proved that they weren't shapeshifters or something... well, they took the hotel a bit more seriously. Suddenly it became "Open a door, are there more doors in there? No? Don't go in."

Which is good, but I guess is one of the frustrations I had with the chapter. I love the murder hotel and it oozes theme and horror, but once the players catch on to its schtick, it's a bit easy to say "we're not going in any rooms unless necessary." I did prod them along with having had Ollo ask them for as many clues as possible to make a conviction stick, but they got one or two and called it quits.

So yes, my players also made it through with only the occasional 10 minute break, but I feel like there was a lot they missed out on. Nevertheless, I still love the murder hotel and the showdown with Pratchett was fantastic and amazingly exciting. Without a doubt my favorite PF2 encounter to date.

@Evil Paul: My players went full completionist with the Dreaming Palace, exploring every room for evidence to use against Pratchett. This ate up the majority of their resources, so they took a long rest in some of the comfier rooms they had cleared. I kept Pratchett in the basement (he wasn't aware of any threats) for simplicity. It took about 3 sessions total for them to check into the hotel and out again.

@Benchank, @naurgul, @ruzza, @OmegaZ, thanks for the replies.

For those that made it through without going back to base, how did you handle levelling?

The hotel seems tuned for the first two floors at level 3, and the basement at level 4. There is more than a level's worth of encounters (if you do everything). And there isn't enough XP in the rest of the module to start the hotel at level 4 (unless you do side-quests, which I have been doing, but I imagine others didn't).

So did your players start the hotel at level 3 or level 4?

If level 3, did you have them level up before Pratchett? How did you manage that if they didn't go home... did they just "ding" mid dungeon?

If they started the hotel at level 4, was that because you did off-script side-quests, or because you just did an early story-point leveling before going to the hotel?

My PCs are 100 XP off 4th, have a warrant for the hotel and are thinking about raiding it. I'm trying to decide if I should give them a very short 100XP detour + level-up before they go there (in which case they could conceivably do it without a long rest), or just send them to the hotel at 3rd, in which case it could be messy.

I've seen quite a few people frustrated with the menagerie. I was pretty worried about it myself when I started running it... I only have 2 PC's and and NPC, and none of them are strictly combat heavy (dwarf monk, gnome bard, human investigator).

They pulled some good ideas out though, and I thought I'd share if it helps anyone.

- For the cocatrice, they used their environment pretty well. The bard tore down a tent for the poles and canvas, the monk tried trapping it in one of the rugs in the market and the investigator ended up throwing a large crate over it before dropping the merchant statue on the crate.

- The owlbear was rough, but again, a lot of environment use. Our monk climbed up on the shop with the canvas from the tent and jumped down on the owlbear trying to wrap it up. I ruled that based on the average party damage it would take 5 hits to bring the beast down, so if the PC's could make 5 successful skill checks vs it's AC, they could hog tie it. Between the canvas, rope around the legs Empire / Hoth-style and the occasional smack on the head, they were able to subdue it. Rusty the Rust Monster was the same / similar.

-The hyena's ended up getting closed up in the concession stand - I ruled the PC's were able to slam closed the awning, and the back door was already closed. They beat the hyena's in initiative and completed a successful skill set to succeed.

-The ankrav (sp?) just sucks. That thing is a beast and the PC's went full 'real damage' on it due to it's ferocity and viciousness. Having avoided a ton of damage by quick thinking on the other encounters they still had a hard time, but were able to succeed if barely.

Anyway, just wanted to toss that out there if it helps anyone. Encourage players to think out of the box for these. It'll help make it a little more palatable.

@Benchank, @naurgul, @ruzza, @OmegaZ, thanks for the replies.

For those that made it through without going back to base, how did you handle levelling?

The hotel seems tuned for the first two floors at level 3, and the basement at level 4. There is more than a level's worth of encounters (if you do everything). And there isn't enough XP in the rest of the module to start the hotel at level 4 (unless you do side-quests, which I have been doing, but I imagine others didn't).

So did your players start the hotel at level 3 or level 4?

If level 3, did you have them level up before Pratchett? How did you manage that if they didn't go home... did they just "ding" mid dungeon?

If they started the hotel at level 4, was that because you did off-script side-quests, or because you just did an early story-point leveling before going to the hotel?

My PCs are 100 XP off 4th, have a warrant for the hotel and are thinking about raiding it. I'm trying to decide if I should give them a very short 100XP detour + level-up before they go there (in which case they could conceivably do it without a long rest), or just send them to the hotel at 3rd, in which case it could be messy.

I did have them level up mid-hotel.

I don't track xp, and will generally just have the PCs level up between sessions when they get close to the adventure milestones, and then increase/decrease the difficulty as needed to make it work.

So for the hotel, we ended a session with one of the players falling down one of the pit traps into the ooze room. Since they'd already explored the second floor, and were potentially heading into the basement next, I had them level up. But, on the off chance they decided to keep exploring the first floor and hit the few encounters they'd missed, I bumped up those encounters to match the difficulty.

IIRC, they ended up rescuing their friend from the ooze pit, and then found their way downstairs the normal way.

@Benchank, @naurgul, @ruzza, @OmegaZ, thanks for the replies.

For those that made it through without going back to base, how did you handle levelling?

Like Benchak, I use milestone leveling and was somewhat fortunate in that my players had handled a few problems on the first and second floor before confronting Ralso. After that fight took a bit out of them, they had a 10 minute rest while interrogating the half-orc, so it seemed an appropriate time to level them up. They had discovered their method for evading the traps by this point, so it was just about time for them to go to the basement anyway.

Did anyone figure out how the stairs work in the top left corner of the Dreaming Palace?

Did anyone figure out how the stairs work in the top left corner of the Dreaming Palace?

Not sure what you mean. You can take them from the second floor and they go all the way down to the basement. You can see the staircase on the map on the first floor but you cannot access it unless you tear down some walls.

Vortalas wrote:

Did anyone figure out how the stairs work in the top left corner of the Dreaming Palace?

Not sure what you mean. You can take them from the second floor and they go all the way down to the basement. You can see the staircase on the map on the first floor but you cannot access it unless you tear down some walls.

Ah, ok, thanks. Now it's clear.

I have reworked the Eyes On Absalom front page to tie into my campaign, with the conceit that it's published the morning after the Dreaming Palace raid, and so just covers pre-Chapter 4 events. My intent is to use it in Lavarsus's debrief, that he's furious they apparently leaked details of ongoing investigations to Vancaskerkin and made themselves out to be heroes in the process (something that is entirely Reginald's doing, not that it matters). Should be fun, and wanted to share before my session this Saturday (constructive criticism encouraged!):
Eyes On Absalom, Desnus 20, 4720

Very nice! The layout is absolutely perfect. My only criticism is that some of the articles weren't sensationalist enough!

On a separate note, I found it a bit weird that Eyes on Absalom has been a thing for nearly 20 years in your world; in my campaign it's only 3-5 years. I checked Vancaskerkin's biography and while it's listed last as far as life events go, it's vague enough that almost any amount of years up to a few decades could fit.

I have reworked the Eyes On Absalom front page to tie into my campaign, with the conceit that it's published the morning after the Dreaming Palace raid, and so just covers pre-Chapter 4 events. My intent is to use it in Lavarsus's debrief, that he's furious they apparently leaked details of ongoing investigations to Vancaskerkin and made themselves out to be heroes in the process (something that is entirely Reginald's doing, not that it matters). Should be fun, and wanted to share before my session this Saturday (constructive criticism encouraged!):

Eyes On Absalom, Desnus 20, 4720

How are you making these look so cool?

Very nice! The layout is absolutely perfect. My only criticism is that some of the articles weren't sensationalist enough!

I might try and punch them up a bit more; my day job is mostly business documentation, so a dry style is easier for me to slip into.

On a separate note, I found it a bit weird that Eyes on Absalom has been a thing for nearly 20 years in your world; in my campaign it's only 3-5 years. I checked Vancaskerkin's biography and while it's listed last as far as life events go, it's vague enough that almost any amount of years up to a few decades could fit.

My conception is that Vancaskerkin took over an existing publication, turning it to his own ends. That's sort of the pattern of his life, if you think about it. When exactly that happened I haven't quite decided.

How are you making these look so cool?

>>shia_labeouf_magic.gif

Thanks, though, to both of you!

My conception is that Vancaskerkin took over an existing publication, turning it to his own ends. That's sort of the pattern of his life, if you think about it. When exactly that happened I haven't quite decided.

Interesting take. Opens up the possibility for some great foreshadowing, for example the players might learn about how much smaller the publication was before Vancaskerkin took over and how unbelievably ambitious and technologically impossible his initial promises about production and circulation sounded. So any observant player when they finally enter his secret underground lab/lair they get their "aha moment".

Here's the relevant bit from his biography from book 5:

After much experimentation in his private workshop, he devised clever new methods to improve Absalom’s printing press technology, after which he founded a popular tabloid called Eyes on Absalom.

Inspired by Naurgul's post, I thought to dump my own work-up of the "case files" for missing persons in Book 1:

Name/s, Age: Anastatia Corvis (27)
Description: Human Irriseni merchant; came to Absalom to sell ice wine
Circumstances: Did not show up for dinner-date, 24 Desnus
Reported: 25 Desnus, Absalom citizen Lyra Woodsmith

Name/s, Age: Archibald Knight (37), Minera Frum (32)
Description: A halfling menagerie owner (Knight) and his human veterinarian employee (Frum)
Circumstances: Departed for sexual congress, 29/30 Desnus
Reported: 04 Sarenith, Edgewatch Agents [Party's names] o/b/o Knight's Marvelous Menagerie staff

Name/s, Age: Roji Aozo (22), Asao Iruya (19), Nakura To (25), Shuno Danoma (27), and Takeko Lon (22)
Description: Minkaian human stonemasons, working on Dragonfly Pagoda exhibit
Circumstances: Last known to be going to talk to labor broker/criminal figure Jeremin Hoff
Reported: 02 Sarenith, Ama Uomi, Chief Architect, Dragonfly Pagoda, Minkai Delegation

Name/s, Age: Elama Mohaso (48)
Description: Dwarven scholar from Rahadoum who came to the city to study at the Forae Logos.
Circumstances: Did not return from a day of errands, 20 Gozran
Reported: 21 Gozran, Illian Swin, Deputy-Under-Sub-Director, Inner-Sea Scholar Outreach for Garund, Forae Logos

Name/s, Age: Kemeneles (53)
Description: Human wizard originally from Taldor; trained at the Arcanamirium decades ago.
Circumstances: Did not return to minor charge (Eunice) after errands, 28 Desnus
Reported: 04 Sarenith, Edgewatch Agents Sulla/Brighton/Nathraak/Shep o/b/o Eunice

Name/s, Age: Lyrma Swampwalker (27)
Description: Vidrian gnome ranger; came to Absalom to see the fair.
Circumstances: Unknown
Reported: 10 Desnus, Vidrian diplomatic delegation

Name/s, Age: Vindi Sachta (32), Sudhar Sachta (34), Bashar Sachta (8), Nita Sachta (8)
Description: Family of Jalmeri tourists.
Circumstances: missed multiple appointments
Reported: 08 Desnus, Remendi Melipdra, /Melipdra Adventures and Logistics/, owner of the outfit that organized the family's trip to Absalom

First time posting (*^▽^*)
Inspired by GreatGraySkwid and the great art of narchy I'm changing the skeleton encounter including "Hendrik and The Risen Dead", which made me think about where would that take place. The book indicates that the Dreaming Palace is

"situated at the junction of quiet Osprey Lane and the busier Sabaton Road".

which doesn't help much.

Image credit to narchy, you can find his maps in the community thread.

Interesting fact I came across today: it seems Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio are making a big-budget TV show from Erik Larson's book "The Devil in the White City" for Hulu, starring Keanu Reeves. In case you didn't know yet, that's the book that inspired this adventure's Murder Hotel, as well as its title.

Hello, everyone. I decided to give this AP a go and enjoy it so far. Thanks for everyone's ideas here. It is my group's first time in Pathfinder 2e - for me as Game Master and for the rest as players. I especially enjoyed encouraging them to think outside of the box to solve the challenges in ways different than a fight, unless they had no choice. For some of them, it was a steep learning curve but they are getting hang of it. They have became the most troublesome of agents, and they have earned an alias on the precinct already: "Divas of Edgewatch". "Queens of Drama" would do to :D Anyhow, I have just shared with them a quick set of handouts I prepared for the Missing Persons part of the game. A lot of the text comes from or is inspired by the Naurgul's post. Maybe some of you would like to use it, then have fun! Here are 9 missing persons notes/reports.

Hello, everyone. I decided to give this AP a go and enjoy it so far. Thanks for everyone's ideas here. It is my group's first time in Pathfinder 2e - for me as Game Master and for the rest as players. I especially enjoyed encouraging them to think outside of the box to solve the challenges in ways different than a fight, unless they had no choice. For some of them, it was a steep learning curve but they are getting hang of it. They have became the most troublesome of agents, and they have earned an alias on the precinct already: "Divas of Edgewatch". "Queens of Drama" would do to :D Anyhow, I have just shared with them a quick set of handouts I prepared for the Missing Persons part of the game. A lot of the text comes from or is inspired by the Naurgul's post. Maybe some of you would like to use it, then have fun! Here are 9 missing persons notes/reports.

Wow your handouts are absolutely amazing! :D

Glad your players are having fun making trouble for the watch, especially for that stuck-up Lavarsus I would hope!

Thank you!

They are driving him crazy, yes. :D I did not expect them to end up behaving like that - I thought we will have quite epic but funny game, but it went full kindergarten, which makes it even more hilarious and an interesting contrast to how dire and gore things will get soon, at least looking at the last part of both book 1 and 2.

My players enjoy handouts and because we play across the sea, I try to make as many as I can for them to compensate for not sitting at the same table. I wrote the Ralso's journal for them, as I thought it would be a major find at the Dreaming Palace and also because I found Ralso to be exciting as a character but taking in consideration that the players would be unable to find out details about her past felt like a great secret you have but can't really enjoy with others.

After they caught Ralso, half of the squad barely staving their desire to send her off to Pharasma, they found her journal and one party member decided to give it a full read, while hunkering down in her bedroom. I love what had come out of that - the reader decided that Ralso was not so far gone as to not be able to rehabilitate for her deeds and tried to appeal to her. With great roleplaying and a few rolls to gauge if the words land on the fertile ground, their uneasy and uncertain alliance led to Ralso giving them a hand with Hendird, although, she first hoped she might escape while they try to complete her part of the deal - getting rid off the 'thing' in the attic for her.

I suppose, not too many people are playing this AP anymore, but if you happen to be one of them and would like a bit more flavour in your game, here's the link to the journal: Ralso's Journal

Hey All,

Just had session 1 for this AP and enjoying it. Been using the resources here, so thanks for all that!

One of my players learned about Esker's Camp and really wants to help the homeless. Did anyone do anything with that quest hook, and if so, how did you go about possible resolutions?

I also only bought and looked through book 1 so far, so I don't know if Esker herself is used later in the AP or not. Am I free to do whatever with Esker's story without messing something up later in the AP?