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Oct 16, 2012 -- 11:23AM, darrell_uk wrote:

Wizards have confirmed in Twitter that Season 12 is NOT the final season.

Proof.

MetallicPharoah:

I've talked to WotC personnel about the importance of expanding Encounters to gaming clubs, and despite the lip service they gave me, their current mindset is that there is no chance of gaming clubs being served. As a result, many people will never get access to Encounters. It seems contrary to their own interests, but they at least have a point about focusing on larger metro areas that have a larger, concentrated audience. Ultimately, though, I think they're being short-sighted. Eventually, the internet will all but kill FLGSs, and even mid-sized metro areas will have no organized gaming sites outside of gaming clubs. They should get ahead of the curve and start developing them.

@diversionArchitect:

Who's to say they won't? Seriously, there have been only a handful of seasons, and the current season, along with the last two, is the first that have a theme connecting them. Maybe they will do it once they have enough seasons under their belt ... and yes, that could mean soon.

Just some speculation. I have no inside information. Haven't even heard rumors.

I've DM'd the first session already, and made some major changes. I'm planning the same for the second session tonight. Although I understand Mearls' goals as far as "playtesting the new edition feel," I think that Encounters is the wrong venue for that. Still, going by the idea of "a mini adventure every week," I think the changes I made went a long way towards that.

In the first session, I did the following: First, I changed the encounter from a single stirge to 5 stirges, but gave all of them the quality "Starving: This creature's starting hit points are equal to its bloodied value +1." The second encounter became 1 orc berserker, 1 orc raider, and 6 orc savages (half from each different tribe), with the standard monsters given the quality "Fatigued: This creatue has a -2 penalty to all attack rolls, damage rolls, and defenses, and its hit points are equal to its bloodied value +1." The encounter with the NPC adventurers was unchanged. The final encounter was changed to an imp, a spined devil, and two tar devil guards who would all appear if either riddle was answered incorrectly. All had the quality "Bound:  This creatue has a -2 penalty to all attack rolls, damage rolls, and defenses, and its hit points are equal to its bloodied value +1." Okay, you all see where I went with this...

The result was...good! The encounters were 2-3 rounds each, every player got a turn or two, and the whole thing took about 20 to 30 minutes. We ran a little long, but got through six or so memorable roleplaying encounters, plenty of exploration of the woods and the dungeon, and three combat encounters in 2 hours and 15 minutes. Everyone left the table having had a blast!

Tonight, the first encounter is going to be with 6 orc savages, 2 orc berserkers (fatigued) and 1 orc rampager (fatigued). The second encounter will be a combat with two or three characters (depending on a few Bluff, Diplomacy, or Intimidate rolls) directly fighting the king's champion, an orc mauler (the type with the maul) and a cockatrice, while the rest do sneaky stuff on the sidelines. I plan to describe the king's throne room has having the heads of "stone statues of defiant dwarves, elves, and humans, all cracked or worn, placed in niches along the wall behind the throne." Should give them a clue as to what they face. I've also made the cockatrice's touch a little more deadly. It's secondary attack immobilizes and does ongoing 10 damage (save ends both), with failure resulting in petrification (save ends) and the aftereffect being slowed and ongoing 5 damage. The tirck is, its a "save continuum." Fail the aftereffect save, and you are immobilized and taking ongoing 10 again. Fail that and you are petrified. Save against petrified, and you are immobilized and taking ongoing 10 again, etc. Anyone killed by ongoing damage is permanently petrified, as is anyone who fails 3 consecutive saves against petrification. I think that may be my new standard for petrification from now on, BTW. 

Anyway, I figure I will post any further tinkering I do. Hope some of you like my ideas. The players last week certainly did!  

Even when Encounters has seemed like it won't be particularly fun (like last season's Drowfest), at the very least I've DMed it to get the free maps.

Clansmansix, that sounds like a really interesting way to fix the combat-lightness issue.  The other DMs at our FLGS and I have been talking about doing something similar, though we wanted to see how the first adventure played out "by the book" before making changes.  I like the cockatrice idea... it's a definite threat without being ridiculous insta-kill.  Great way to handle petrification.  I'm also thinking of having the entire party end up in the fight against the "champion," though I had thought to make it a wyvern.  But I think I like your cockatrice idea enough to steal it (though out of respect for you, since my orc minis are numbered on the bases, I'll be sure to use orc raider 6 as the cockatrice's handler).  

Great ideas.