SoT Book 5 Chapter 1A - Pranksters and Preparations

By Tobey Nguyen

Hey folks!

This post outlines my plans for the first half of Book 5, Chapter 1 of Strength of Thousands, largely related to adjudicating timing but also regarding handling the individual listed events. Most of them will be relatively unchanged.

I'll be saving the Iobane and the Cathedral of Nothingness for next time!

Graduation!

In addition to the research and events already listed in the book, I want to add in some more actual teaching, this time with a focus on helping their cohort of students (introduced in Book 3) graduate!

The Timeline So Far

Our heroes arrived at the Magaambya in the Spring of 4721, eventually graduating about two and a half years later at the end of Summer, 4723. They started teaching their new cohort in Spring of 4724, went through Book 3 that year, and their fellow students graduated over the next year or so (Esi was first, obviously, but the others all graduated that year), as did Jumimo, who finished his 50 years of scholarship and joined his brother in alchemical medicine. Our heroes spent some time teaching their students, but soon were off to Mzali for book 4, and only taught 2 or 3 semesters each (some went home for some chunks instead) over the next two years. They will finish Book 4 towards the end of 4726.

So, our heroes took about 2.5 years to graduate. The other students in book 1 took around 4 years (starting about 6 months prior and ending around a year later), with some variation. The cohort the PCs are teaching will have been students for 3 years by the start of book 5, but their main teachers have been otherwise occupied for a lot of that!

Downtime, Preparation, Graduation

The PCs can spend any amount of time they want! The longer they spend, the harder the Iobane will be to negotiate with, but they can get a head start at the end of Book 4 if they decide to return early instead of helping to fix up Osibu (the downside being that Dimari Diji won't come to Nantambu until the beginning of Book 6, but he will still make sure to tell them about Jatembe before they leave).

The PCs can spend 1, 2, or even 3 semesters (of 3 months each, so almost a whole year) teaching and researching if they want! Or more if they really want, but letters from the Iobane will get increasingly frequent. They will get 2 downtime actions per month (each representing about 2 weeks).

The main additional downtime option (in addition to research/retraining/etc.) will be individual coaching to prepare the students to graduate! There are 4 students in the cohort: Onyiji the magus, Fardrik the the storyteller, Selozè the writer, and I’boko the raincaller. Each requires 5 Graduation Points (+/- 1 based on party size if you don't have 4 PCs), and automatically gains 1 at the end of each semester.

In total, here are their (core) downtime options (they can always come up with their own):

• Graduation Prep. Standard DC 32, +/- 2 (or 5!) for tactics that would work better/worse for that specific student, using any skill applicable to the method. Crit: +2 Grad Points. Success: +1 Grad Point. Crit Fail: -1 Grad Point.
• If Dimari Diji comes to the Magaambya (the PCs must first spend 3 months helping to fix up Osibu), all the students get +1 Graduation Point as they listen to his tales!
• Preparatory Research. Into the Doorway, the Iobane, and the King of Biting Ants (see p6-7). The PCs might also come up with their own options, e.g. analyzing wtf happened in Mzali to cause them to attack Osibu, and what that political situation is like now!
• Practical Research (increasing Branch Levels). There are no opportunities in this first half, but the PCs might decide to bring the party back to one of the other sites they've already researched, possibly bringing their students along and teaching them there! The travel time will likely eat up Downtime Actions, but it might also make Graduation Prep checks easier.
• Retraining. Most things (such as retraining a lore to Driving/Piloting Lore for E7) will take 1 downtime action.
• Crafting. This is now one of the best options for getting high-level items, since the PCs have out-levelled Nantambu! It's also a better way to save money than earning income (see below, plus the DCs will be based on item level).
• Earn Income. The absolute max is the city's level, level 10, outside of specific one-off opportunities (spellcasting services up to level 13) that the PCs would have to go find a buyer for (DC 36 Society check).
• Side Projects. Whatever they want! Somehow smuggle aid to the Bright Lions, or otherwise deal with that contract stuff? Continue managing city projects started in Book 2? Sending letters to the Terwa Lords to establish or maintain diplomatic relations?

Downtime Events

At the start of the semester, before any months go by, several teachers come talk to the PCs to help give them a sense of how things will go.

• High Sun Mage Oyamba will debrief with them about their experience in Osibu (and Dimari Diji's report on Jatembe), as well as share with them a letter from the Iobane asking for the Magaambya to please remove their errant teacher at once. Sendings are blocked by the Egg. (They'll send an additional letter at the end of each semester, sharing more and more details, but to start they expect that their history with the Magaambya will mean that they don't need to elaborate.)
• Ahassanu will walk them through the research prep options.
• Teacher Ot will talk through the situation with their students (including a conflict with the pranksters in E8).
• Tahenkot will try to enlist them in helping with her later project (letting them know that Haibrim is helping!). She tells them it'll be a few months, and is happy to answer any questions (telling them about potential checks, emphasizing Piloting/Driving lore but also throwing out the other options).

I'm going to use 1 event each month, in the following order! [TBD] means that that slot will be filled based on who the PCs have the best relationships with, and who they interact with. I'll also include some notes on what broader trends will likely happen that month.

1. E1: A Diplomatic Dilemma. This one gets bigger changes than most (see below).
2. [TBD]
3. E8: Pranksters in Peril. In addition to what's written, they've been doing some light feuding with the PCs students, basically using pranks to one up each other. Failing to reach 3 Lesson Points causes each student to lose 1 Graduation Point, and if the PCs can reach 5 Lesson Points their students instead gain 1 Graduation Point!
4. [TBD]
5. E7: First Flight. 
6. E5: Nantambu Noodles.  This starts about halfway through the month! PCs can make 1 check to find the carts for free, or can spend their second downtime action to make an additional check with advantage fortune. I put this after E8 because I like the idea that the PCs know about the prank shit ahead of time, and that this might be a moment of "but we tAlKeD about this!" before they realize that, in fact, it wasn't them.
7. [TBD]
8. [TBD]
9. If you're not using Event 9, I don't think you need an event here, and can instead just have them prepare to set out!

Here is my best guess at the order my PCs will likely take with the rest:

• E4: Assistant Summoner Duty. Lesedi is the Aunt of 2 of my PCs, so they tend to check in with her fairly frequently. The only "change" I'm making here is actually a house-rule to rituals overall! Instead of the listed bonuses, a Crit is +4, a Success if +2, a Failure is -2, and a Crit Fail is -4. Keep in mind that the bonuses don't stack with each other (nor do penalties), but they do cancel each other out (so a Crit, some Successes, and a Fail would net to +2, only success/fails would be +0, etc.).
• E6: Pollen for Paintings. This can happen whenever, but I think it's really sweet and so want it to happen at some point! 
• E3: An Impromptu Field Trip. In my game, Koride is already up north by the Iobane, so this will be a cohort-driven project instead. Basically, whenever there's no other obvious TBD choice. Feel free to give PCs a free Graduation Prep check with 1 student of their choice if they can come up with a good way to incorporate it!
• E2: Disruptive Admirers. You probably don't need dice for this! I put this close to last because my players didn't vibe with Izem that much.
• E9: Runelord Rainbow. I honestly don't like this one. Partially because neither me nor my players care about Zuma, partially because it seems really unwieldy to deal with New Thassilon (none of us played 1e so Runelords mean nothing to us), and partially because the "she might save their ass" feels really random. YMMV though, if you do include this event make sure it comes back in the diplomacy stuff at the start of Book 6!

Also feel free to come up with your own Events, or honor PC ideas! Maybe an event for a month is them throwing a party or trying some weird ritual of their own, for example. Reward clever ideas as always.

Event 1: A Diplomatic Dilemma

... Back at it again with the negotiation. This time featuring some revised framing (only Patrons can see that or the later full draft) for Motivations and Pitfalls from MCDM, aimed at making them more generalized and therefore easier for the PCs to guess! Because they are less hyper-specific to the NPC, they also don't auto/succeed or fail, but instead introduce a pretty hefty bonus or penalty to the roll (in the MCDM rpg, this is basically +1 degree of success, in PF2 I am tentatively changing that to a hefty reduction in the DC).

I have mixed feelings about this change! As I talked about here, I liked motivations auto-succeeding, but maybe it's better to have a more general approach that just gives a bonus (like Influence does). It's possible that making it +1 degree of success in PF2 will be better, though DCs should maybe start relatively high in that case. I definitely like the full version better than my imagined changes to that draft.

Here's how I'll be adapting this. Appealing to a motivation in a broad, general way reduces the DC by 2. Appealing to it in a major or very specific way reduces it by 5. Tripping over a Pitfall immediately results in a Failure, or a Critical Failure for particularly egregious examples (see the degrees of success below). 

• Critical Success. Increase Influence by 1!
• Success. Increase Influence by 1, but decrease Patience by 1.
• Failure. Decrease Patience by 1.
• Critical Failure. Decrease both Patience and Influence by 1.

Before, a Success did not decrease Patience, and a Critical Success jumped you up two levels - I think I like this better, but it will mean either setting slightly lower DCs or increasing patience further to compensate. As always, charisma-based skills (especially Diplomacy) will be pretty broadly applicable, but other skills can absolutely be used when relevant (as per Influence).

PCs can ask questions (e.g. “What do you want out of this?”) to learn motivations or pitfalls! Some NPCs will answer openly. In other cases, PCs can sense motive to read their response, using Perception or a skill that could be used to recall knowledge. On a success, the PCs can learn either one Motivation or one Pitfall (or both on a critical success). On a critical failure, this process takes too long or annoys the NPCs and their Patience is reduced by 1.

Raido-Kan the Sovereign Dragon

A sovereign dragon claims that the Magaambya holds a stolen artifact, a fragment of the Soulkeeping Scepter - and he is correct! Not only did the adventurers steal the item from the dragon's horde, but the Magaambya put them up to it in order to keep the artifact secret! Will the heroes convince the dragon to give up its claim and allow them to keep the artifact safe? Will they come up with an alternative that satisfies both sides? Or will it be battle between them?

Starting Interest: 1

Patience: 2

Standard DC: 36

Motivations: (Make sure to foreshadow these!)

• Greed. Any offer of treasure or wealth decreases the DC by 2. Offers of 1,000+ GP decrease it by 5 instead.
• Higher Authority. Raido-Kan believes strongly in destiny (believing it brought the shard to him) and in the Imperial Mandate of himself and the other Sovereign Dragons. Appealing to either decreases the DC by 2, or 5 for a particularly sound or compelling argument.
• Legacy. Raido-Kan is proud. Protecting the scepter is his sacred duty, and he wishes to be known as a powerful and effective guardian. Offering him a direct role in its care reduces the DC by 5, and offering indirect gestures towards that reduces it by 2.

Pitfalls: (Insults count as Critical Failures, as does Deception of discovered)

• Intimidation. Not easily frightened (automatic Failure).
• Insults and catching PCs in Deception counts as an automatic critical failure. In addition to the obvious, the following both count as insults:
• Revealing that the Magaambya was responsible for its initial theft.
• Flat out refusing to ever return the fragment (being like "idk about that, how about this instead?" doesn't count, only "no, never, fuck off").

Influence: (I might not write things out as specifically in future)

• 0 - Attacks! If driven off, will hunt the PCs specifically throughout their later adventures (in addition to smearing the Magaambya).
• 1 - Demands the scepter one last time, and attacks if refused. If driven off, will publicly smear the Magaambya.
• 2 - Will demand the scepter, but will allow the Magaambya to help him shore up its defenses.
• 3 - Will allow them to keep the scepter, but will demand that he be allowed to help guard it, which will make keeping it secret much harder.
• 4 - Will allow them to keep the scepter.
• 5 - Will allow them to keep the scepter, and spreads tales of the heroes' wisdom, making Diplomacy with the Iobane and in Book 6 easier.

Remember - the PCs might also make more specific deals with Raido-Kan, potentially changing these tiers! Take these as the Maximum possible with a given Influence. If they make an offer, they will be expected to uphold their end, though such offers will likely make getting any good result more likely.

I'll say as well that #2 might actually be the best result! If the PCs can think up good enough safeguards that it will legitimately be secure, then respecting this dragon's claim is frankly a moral boon and well worth pursuing. If they offer this actively, Raido-Kan will boost their reputation as per #5 and possibly give them some cool treasure as well!

Any result that affects the PCs/schools reputation should come back both with the Iobane and in the Influence section in Book 6, as well as affecting social aspects throughout the rest of the campaign.

Reframing

Another way to frame this is with Offers and Responses. This is largely redundant with the above, but as a thought experiment since this is how the most recent draft frames things, what might the dragon offer, and what might they ask for?

Offers:

• As a compromise, might offer to either let Magaambya help secure it in his lair, or even let them keep it if he is allowed to participate in its defense.
• Widely praise the Magaambya (and the PCs) - the word of Sovereign Dragons in such matters goes a long way (as does their disgust...)
• Treasure from his horde! A level 16 magic item. Fun options might include armor of the holy warrior, a moonstone crystal ball, or a greater staff of arcane might.

Responses:

• It is his duty to watch over the scepter, and he wants a role in its defense.
• He might demand recompense for the loss of the artifact, likely in the form of treasure to add to his horde.
• He might threaten to smear the PCs and the Magaambya, lessening their diplomatic influence.

I'm not sure which of these two frameworks I like better! Leaning towards the former if you know what the PCs are after, but the latter is more flexible if the PCs don't argue for what you expect - I will have to play around with it more.

I think that's all for now! Next time, I'll be taking a closer look at the Iobane as well, because that whole section 1. feels a bit weird as written, and 2. needs some soft rewrites for the Koride changes. I think Chapter 2 will mostly work as written, though I'll likely be opening up Chapter 3 (specifically the approach to the airship) at some point as well. See you then!