Yakman wrote:
Oh, a race around the globe! Getting to pick a track with a bunch of set encounters set around and some "roaming encounters". Could be set up sandbox style similar to Kingmaker but with much larger "hexes" to which encounters would be encountered. As they gain levels, they get magic or better traveling technology. Including perhaps steampunky zeppelins (airships) and things like that. This could be super fun.
thejeff wrote:
At some point though, you have to put the onus on how this plays out on the GMs and Players. Regardless how many unique sub-systems they create or campaign rules they choose to use for this AP, if players and GM's see certain problematic behaviors as "no big deal", that's what they are going to do. And even if they choose to use the most restrictive rule in the sidebar, you are going to have players making characters designed to do massive amounts of non-lethal damage that (at least in 1st edition) are still capable of killing fairly easily.
Rysky wrote: And yes I do assume, or rather hope a 21st century mindset and morals is the default. I don't want to play with any more "that's just how it was back then". And therein lies the social contract you make with the groups you choose to associate with. You get to choose what sort of people you want to game with. But first, I do want to apologize when I speak of 21st century morality, I was not referring to horrible treatment of women, LGBTQIA+, or various ethnicities. I was quite glad to see the 2nd edition Lost Omens go more towards slavery just being evil to be defeated rather than something that exists in polite company. What I meant by 21st century morality, is more the argument about trying to apply due process and 21st century law and order to what is essentially a collection of feudal societies in various states of authoritarianism, plutocracy, and fledgling democracy. And that may not be what you meant when you say 21st century morality. I prefer though, to say that the fantasy dressing of the 18th Century France/French Revolution Galt, Pulp/Steampunk/Monster Ustalav, etc. overcomes much of the subjugation and punching down morality in our real history. In a fantasy world, women get to be heroes, leaders, etc. Much like what we see in Once Upon A Time (Regina, Snow, Emma, etc.), Red Sonja, Star Wars (Leia, Rey), etc. I don't consider that 21st century morality. I consider that one of the positive fantasy tropes that gets overlayed on the period and genre settings. Sorry for the confusion.
thejeff wrote:
Players may not know exactly what those moralities were. But they certainly know the world was not 21st century morality. That's the main takeaway. Trying to pidgeonhole 21st century morality into period settings tends to cause more argument than not at the table, in my experience. YMMV.
Rysky wrote:
Golarion most certainly is a period-specific setting. Or rather, various different regions are different period-specific areas. This is not like its an analog of 21st century earth with fantasy trope dressing. The fact that Galt is the analog for the French Revolution, then it reasonably follows both the 18th Century France morality and French Revolution sub-genre morality along with fantasy trope dressings genre morality and Galt-specific sub-genre morality would be the default. Not 21st century morality. Andoran would be more akin to post-Revolution through Antebellum period US. Ustalav would be akin to pulp-style, 1930's-1950's monster genre, and maybe some steampunk (Verne-esque, Gas Light England/Victorian period, Dr Frankenstein/Dr. Jekyll-Mr. Hide style) tropes. Which is certainly not 21st century morality. I'd be hard put to find the 21st century morality analog anywhere within the varying different genres that Golarion presents. Dangerous to the verisimilitude of the game you are playing. Anytime I'm playing in a game and the GM or players demand that I apply 21st century morals to the fantasy, period-specific setting, I usually end up opting out of the group. Because If I wanted to roleplay with 1st century morality, I'd play a game which was set in the late 20th to early 21st century and in an earth or near-earth setting. When you start overlaying an inanalogous morality onto a game that is set in the analog of a time period or genre, you threaten to bring your players out of that setting and offer chances for there to be more arguments about alignment and morality than just everyone agreeing on the setting you are playing in. If your play group defaults to 21st century, great. But please don't assume this should be, or is the default for what I'm assuming will be a vast majority of roleplayers.
Rysky wrote:
I know you and I agree on a lot, but this is not one of those things. I do recall in years past we've had quite a few arguments on this specific topic. I think its dangerous to overlay 21st century morality on a period-specific genre-specific setting. Morality germane to the setting should be more akin to the period-specific and genre-specific settings as you correlate them to a similar time-period in the real world. In this case, somewhere between 2,000 B.C. and the Renaissance. As always, in your personal circle of friends and/or gaming group, you all tacitly sign a social contract to adhere to a common morality, and if that group wants to overlay 21st century morality over Golarion, then you are not wrong to do so. But claiming that is the demonstrable default is kinda a disingenuous supposition.
On the non-lethal rules. As a GM, I like for things to make sense. And just changing all damage to non-lethal doesn't make sense. However, I do like the idea that the police would be required to use non-lethal force. So the idea is, that all character training and backgrounds leading up to being in the city watch, would come from police academy training. I'm not up on 2nd edition, so not sure if these are things (yet?) But options could be strongly encouraging choosing weapons that don't take penalties to do non-lethal (blunt weapons) or offering a feat or trait that allows them to do non-lethal without penalty. Or perhaps non-lethal is the default and they take a -2 to do lethal damage. Because its all about how they are being trained. You could even switch up the weapon categories, where any weapon that traditionally does lethal damage becomes exotic and requires an exotic weapon proficiency feat to use. Its all about the training and how the character was trained. Furthermore, all spells are modified to do non-lethal damage. That's how the spells are created and work. And you can even come up with different names for them. Like heat ball instead of fireball. And if they find a badguy wizard's spellbook, they might be able to learn fireball, with the understanding that using it could get the fired from the watch and executed for breaking the code. Perhaps because its nonlethal, the reason why heatball is still a 3rd level spell is because it does 1d8/cl instead of 1d6 or whatever. Sure, that causes a fair amount of extra work by the GM, but it allows the non-lethal damage from the PCs to make sense within both the verisimilitude of the story, and the meta of the game rules themselves. Finally, badguys don't have this restriction, because this isn't about the rules simply saying, "everything is non-lethal" but rather, "all watch are specifically trained as non-lethal combatants, so that's the default player characters start with."
thejeff wrote:
Its quite simple really. As the GM you tell the players that you will be playing the most restrictive version of this based on player request, where the minority (even one) gets to choose. Frankly, that's how gaming groups who actually give two figs about their friends should be playing their games anyways, instead of making the one or two people with more sensitivities to play uncomfortably. My opinion, is just like its difficult for parents to cook two meals based on child food wants (no, NUGGETS!), its nearly impossible to run two different campaigns based on different player sensitivities, and when you try to allow for all attitudes to play in the same game, that's when you wind up with inter-player conflict when players get made at one another because the Paladin won't allow the Rogue to torture a hobgoblin for information.
YawarFiesta wrote:
That's not actually what centrism is. Wikipedia wrote: In politics, centrism is a political outlook or specific position that involves acceptance or support of a balance of a degree of social equality and a degree of social hierarchy, while opposing political changes which would result in a significant shift of society strongly to either the left or the right. That sounds a lot like me to, "keep things as they are." And when discussing centrism in regards to the spectrum of left/right, you are talking about the median of voters, policies, and politicians. In other words, today's centrism is roughly Reagan-level conservatism and policy, where centrism during Reagan's time was more along Elizabeth Warren's actual policies (not what she tried to sign onto with all the socialist democracy stuff). The point is, calling yourself a centrist doesn't mean, in common political parlance, what you are saying it means. Its literally sitting in the exact median of the Far Left and Far Right, and that line shifts over the years and decades. Right now, the Centrist seat sits rather closer to GOP conservatism of Reagan than it did during the Reagan years. Because the GOP and conservative politics has really, drastically, gone far right, where many of the current GOP ideals and platform would have been considered freakishly right-wing in the 1980's.
YawarFiesta wrote:
Have you actually been paying attention? And not just to Fox News? There was a violin vigil done in a park that the police used pepper spray on. That's hardly rioting. People were getting arrested for not moving away from certain areas fast enough when they were marching or protesting. The charge was disorderly conduct. So they weren't technically arrested for protesting, as you say, that isn't a thing. But they weren't doing anything else but protesting, peacefully, and got arrested under some trumped up charge, simply because they were protesting the police.
Catulle wrote:
Not to mention, actually doing some research into what "defunding the police" actually means and the programs that will replace it. If all you are doing is hearing, "defund the police," and immediately assume, "that means there will be vast swaths of anarchy and lawlessness," then you are doing yourself and everyone you communicate with a vast disservice.
CorvusMask wrote:
My group has famously used the Pythagorean Theorem to figure distances when doing 3D combat. And you treat Up/Down movement the same as lateral movement as far as squares go as long as you figure every small/medium creature takes up a 5' cube and large takes up 10' cube, etc.
keftiu wrote:
I apologize for misgendering.
Obligation? No. But when you admit to a particular, problematic style of mistake that leads to problematic content decisions, then it obviously leads to the question. How are you planning to deal with that concern in the future? They don't need to lay out an entire itinerary and such. But at least some sort of reaction or response ensuring they are working on steps to help would be nice.
Gorbacz wrote: I guess this essay by one of few black people in the gaming industry, Mike Pondsmith from R Talsorian game, the author of worryingly current Cyberpunk RPG, could open a white eyelid or two. I've been reading a lot of accounts like this from BIPOC people, some of whom I know personally and are friends of mine. Maybe an account like this from a well-respected gamer community icon will enlighten gamers who are still clinging to the "old way." I've also read the account he linked to before; the one from the ex-corrupt cop.
Steve Geddes wrote:
Let us also consider that guilt by association is a valid thing in the eye of perception. It might not get you landed behind bars, or legally be wrong (unless its directly assisting a crime), unless of course your association is with a demographic that is systemically policed against. In this case, there is a solidarity among most police officers, that they remain silent. Its a culture of "no snitching". So if you see an associate doing something wrong, or even dangerous, and you don't speak up or stop it, aren't you complicit in that action? In this case, the idea that there are only a few bad cops and the majority are good... If the "good" cops aren't ousting the bad cops from their ranks (or at least doing their best to rehabilitate), then aren't they tacitly approving of the poor actions? And if they are tacitly approving of the bad cops, doesn't that in turn make them bad cops? To bring us back to the conversation about why this seems to be such a hot-button topic: Anything that through our common modern media has been romanticized, tends not to be a hot button topic. Pirates, medieval, sword & sorcery, etc. has been romanticized in literature and film for far longer than the Pirates of the Caribbean have been a thing. Its why those movies have been able to be popular. Sure, pirates were, by-and-large, horrible people. And medieval times were pretty awful to live in as far as quality of life (at least as far as we consider what is comfortable living.) The reason why a police-centric theme is a hot-button topic, and a hard one to swallow, is because of how demonized police are in our society right now. Because its happening RIGHT NOW. Its also a situation in which our society hasn't figured out how exactly to deal with it yet. We are all kinda on this edge of a precipice wondering what our police force is going to look like in 10 years and whether its going to get cleaned up in how it treats BIPOC. And its affecting everyone, so its not something we can easily ignore and stick to the romanticized buddy cop and cop drama tropes we are all so familiar with from film and TV shows. If we were in a world where piracy was a primary concern, playing a pirate centered game might not be real appealing. So yes, a large reason why this particular AP's theme is unappealing to many, is because its a right now social issue with man, many nuanced variables that most of us are not equipped to parse, let alone do justice to portray positively without in some way being offensive.
Unicore wrote:
There are also some tropes that could be built into the adventure at strategic points that allows players to build toward unique iconic characters. Who hasn't read the Riftwar Saga and wanted to be Tomas wearing his Dragon Armor? If the return of sacred artifacts in turn allowed the organization receiving the returned artifacts to reward the PCs with stuff. Or in the process of seeking out the secret, hidden Tomb of Branthenal to return his Gauntlets of Blasting to his corpse to stop a curse from sweeping over the countryside, the PCs save a mysterious nature spirit disguised as a merchant in distress, who rewards them with things. Or they manage to stumble across another ancient tomb and repository of power and after showing due deference to that tomb the ancience spirit of Bahamut's spokesperson grants each character an item from the hord. These are ways where you can grant players "kits" of gear that turn them into the Dragon Paladin/Cavalier that Tomas became or the White Gold Ring that turned Thomas Covenant into the White Gold Wielder. A truly epic adventure that allows players to mold their characters into and around and become the story, rather than just being a conglomeration of the best stats and items that disjointedly shoehorns into the adventure. I'd gobble this up like Mint Chocolate Chip!
TwilightKnight wrote:
Sure, but as I don't play PFS anymore (haven't really since the end of 2016), it would be home groups that I'd come across. And it sounded a lot like several posters were promoting the right of groups of players to play in whatever style they want to play. I know that we try our best to be inclusive and not say "badwrongfun". But I'm gonna say it. Just like tabletop RPGs can help socially awkward people, shy, and people on the spectrum or with high levels of anxiety incorporate into a group of people in a positive manner, so to can such groups perpetuate hatred, bigotry, and negativity. If a group of people get together to roleplay in an echo chamber of misogyny, hatred, etc., how is that really any different than a club of people who think like that getting together to think like that?
TheFinish wrote:
Wow, I honestly hope I never run into a group that's okay with acting out a rape fantasy. That really breaths life into the whole neckbeard negative stereotype of gamer dudes.
keftiu wrote:
Certainly I do. But if you are going to proselytize being better, then it becomes hollow sentiment if you don't practice what you preach.
keftiu wrote:
Sure, however the comment, "Can we gloat now?" Is extremely tone deaf from someone who stands on their soapbox quite often in regards these issues. Like they cared more about winning the argument, than the issues the argument was over. That's called performative allyship, and isn't a good look.
TwilightKnight wrote:
But you did engage, in a dismissive way, by responding at all. If you truly find the comment that repulsive and don't want to engage, then don't. But posting up dismissive comments without any followup language does not help all the rest of us who are following the conversation. If you have a different viewpoint, then state it, so the rest of us can make an informed decision on who we feel best represents what's real and true. But when you just say, "No." You aren't just shutting down conversation with that person, you are making it exceedingly difficult for anyone else to engage and have a meaningful conversation. Honestly, we know what sort of conversation to expect from different people when we've engaged with them long enough. You and I are no exception. And if we choose not to engage with that person, that's fine. That's an incredibly valid choice. We have to take care of our own mental health before we start worrying about what some nitwit on the internet said. But engaging in a negative and dismissive way is not helpful.
TwilightKnight wrote:
While I typically haven't agreed with zimmerwald1915's narrative lately, and the rhetoric is quite inflammatory, outright dismissing what they are saying, instead of engaging with what the reasons might be for why they feel that way, certainly does not help the general positive forwarding discourse on why #Blacklivesmatter needs to be a thing.
Shisumo wrote:
Going in with the intent to bring a law-breaker and heinous mass-murderer, alive, but given the right to defend yourself, lethally if need be, is the exact opposite of justifying premeditated killing. The nuance here, though, is whether the group of players use that as an excuse to just kill. Which, frankly, is often the case from my experience. That is not the fault of the AP though, that is the fault of players who choose to be bloodthirsty hooligans instead of the upstanding citizens the AP assumes they are.
Windjammer wrote:
Again, I think you are misrepresenting, for some reason, what's actually written in the text of the AP. And you just actively ignored the part where the Sheriff wants this person brought in alive.
CorvusMask wrote:
I don't know if you are of the BIPOC community or not, so please take what I'm about to say in that context. What you are saying is exactly what most white privileged people say, who are from predominantly white privileged neighborhoods. White people don't often view police in the same way as BIPOC people do, because our experiences are drastically and fundamentally different. This is food for thought.
I imagine the Heist AP could be written a couple ways: 1) Robin Hood-esque: Where the PCs are stealing from the rich to give to the poor. Probably starting in a small city district or hamlet (or fiefdom where they are doing mostly heists of transport carriages and perhaps the Lord Knight's Mott and Bailey keep. And eventually merge into needing to do the heists of the BBEG's domain to steal the powerful artifact he's going to use to own the world. 2) Morally Ambiguous: Where they are a group of morally questionable people doing heists for their own ambitions, and during one heist happen across something really nefarious and evil. Probably after shrugging about it, they keep heisting, but the evil knowing the PCs are a loose end, the BBEG commands his henchmen to take out the meddling rogues. So for self-preservation, the PCs have to continue conning and heisting their way to learning where, who, and what the BBEG really is, and then figuring out how to take him out in a really cool, well-staged heist/con.
Paradozen wrote: For a First World AP, I think it would be pretty fun if the PCs flitted between the First World and the parts of Golarion where fey are prominent, taking the party across the inner sea. The Verduran Forest, various parts of the River Kingdoms, Axan Wood, IIRC there are a couple mountain ranges, etc. The Fangwood in Nirmithas as well. It could certainly be a way to revisit several locations already visited in other APs as well.
Sporkedup wrote:
Previously, various different creators, designers, developers, and publishers "owned" various countries or regions of Golarion. And that area of the planet was usually left alone, unless there was consultation with that person, so that any "plans" or "canon" would not get stepped upon. Which is why you didn't really see anything in Geb, Nex and not much in the Mana Wastes. But as Publisher, Erik Mona didn't have much time to actually write material, and so nothing got done in that region. Other areas had similar fates. My understanding, as PF2 was getting off the ground, that regions were going to be detached from specific people, so that developers could work on any region. Although, this might have changed, and out of respect, many developers might still choose to stay away from Erik's region.
Davor Firetusk wrote: I understand the relevance of European colonization, but focusing only on that interaction to the exclusion of others is it's own form of white bias. After all most of us posting learned an Indo-European language as our first tongue and the shared cultural elements from the Yamnaya (or its close cousins from the Eurasian steppe) is very arguably way more of an impactful homogenizing event. Even less widespread conflicts are significant parts of local history. Assuming that modern European influence is the only trauma and issue needed to understand them really strips local ethnicities of agency and the importance of their own history prior to the Age of Discovery. You could say that Genghis Khan also colonized a huge portion of the world, stretching from the China Sea, to parts of India, across Asia, and deep into Eastern Europe. While it wasn't necessarily the exact same type of colonization (in that it wasn't a rich, white man, exploiting the foreign lands for more wealth at the horrid expense of indigenous lives), it was still a conquering nation--so much so that 0.5% of the world's population (roughly 17 million) can trace their DNA to him.
Lanathar wrote: Where is the best space for the discussion on paizo content being too white European focused that the OP and Zimmerwald seem to want to have ? At this point its probably best moved to another thread. Almost everything that can be said has been said. It would be nice to see people respond with ideas for what the OP asked instead of sidetracking the conversation past the suggestion for what Zimmerwald wants to see. That's been done. No need to now hijack this thread for purposes of discussing the merits, ethics, and politics of his suggestion or what Paizo already does.
Sporkedup wrote: Depends. Some of the early and other side plots in APs feel very small. Especially if the players have characters tailored for the adventure, where sometimes they feel really disconnected while it's fetch quests and things. Sure, if all the GM does is present them as fetch quests and unnecessary side things just to get folks experience or to fill out an adventure, its no wonder why players might feel disconnected. While I would prefer the authors/developers/editors to ensure that these side quests are tied more closely to the story either as a red herring or a foreshadowing of things to come, that's not always realistic to expect. And a GM who makes the NPCs behind these quests interesting and even recurring characters (even if they are just throw-away shop keepers within the AP), then the players can feel engaged and have fun regardless of how closely tied they are to the adventure itself. Why? Because you are directly creating fun character relationships that the players get to explore and have fun with throughout the story. I'm not going to say that all APs are flawless. They clearly aren't. But even a bad adventure can be made fun if the GM puts in the effort to do so. If the GM just runs the script, then even the most engaging and fun adventure can be a slog though.
Steve Geddes wrote:
And part of appealing to a wider audience is offering that wider audience more representation within the story. As a Gen X, Cis-Het White Dude, I don't know what it feels like to never read a book, comic book, see a movie, or TV show without seeing someone that looks or feels like me. But I do know that I've heard many folks who are either POC or don't identify the same as me gender or sexuality-wise saying that they had a hard time getting into sci-fi/fantasy or comic books because they didn't see someone that represented them (side note: Its why spiderman became so ubiquitous and popular amongst the nerd culture.) So I have no issue with Paizo choosing to show a wider representation within their published works so as to include more people who are different than me in their fandom and this hobby. One way to get sales is to also find a wider market for those sales. What really chaps me, is the comment using "representation" as a pejorative and using "verisimilitude" as a way to justify this view. What I garner from that, is the reviewer wants to only adventure in a world that represents them. They can't conceive of a fictional world that doesn't look like the history of the real world or don't find it enjoyable to play in that fictional world. They like the idea of being misogynistic, racist, and/or homophobic, even if on a subtle, inferred, or undercurrent level, within their game. Because somehow, without the Patriarchy of heterosexuals, the world doesn't seem realistic to them. My take, is that Paizo is trying to have a world where anyone, regardless of race, creed, ethnicity, sexuality, gender identity, or anything else, can be a leader of people. And that's awesome!
W E Ray wrote:
I've only run* Kingmaker and Ironfang Invasion, and played* Reign of Winter and Skulls and Shackles. *I've done bits and pieces, mostly of book 5 and 6 for PFS, of Rise of the Runelords, Shattered Star, Jade Regent, Iron Gods, & Giantslayer and I played through book 2 of Carrion Crown as an AP. So none of these are really APs I can speak to in regards to transition. Kingmaker: The transition between book 1 and 2 was the most seamless. Book 2 and 3 was maybe a little jarring, since the entire book more or less had nothing to do with the overall metaplot except for I think a couple kingdom events (which were like secondary and tertiary side encounters). Book 3 to 4 also had some issues in transition and book 4 to 5 kinda did, but it actually made sense. Book 6 tied it all together so its transition was fine. But what tied it all together was doing the Kingdom Building, and as long as exploration and expansion was the focus of the adventure, then the jarring transitions were mitigated almost entirely. I can imagine if you played without that aspect and just played the story, with the kingdom stuff in the background, the GM would have had to work hard on the transitions. I did not have to work hard on them. Skulls & Shackles: I've only played the first 3 books, and the transitions are pretty good as it follows the natural progression of shanghai'd slaves to pirate lords without missing much of a beat (at least through book 3, no idea if this trend continues.) The only issues I had were the sub-games in book 1 and 2 became monotonous. Book 3 rocked. Reign of Winter: I've played through book 5, and the central conceit of the entire AP makes the transitions fine. They would be jarring if the players don't buy into this central conceit. But with buy-in to the central conceit, the transitions make perfect sense and work very well. Each book is entirely and incredibly different from the last (with the exception of book 1 & 2), and without the central conceit, they would literally be 6 separate adventures barely stitched together with any cohesion. But it actually works really well, because of the reason why they are so drastically different. I feel like, perhaps (and I'm kinda speaking out of turn, because I'm assuming) the reason some transitions are seen as faulty, is because the developer did not devise a cool tool by which to help the GM transition from story to story smoothly.
Rysky wrote:
Agreed. I'm not going to waste my time listening to someone who is full-on bigotry. Even if some of their points are valid, I tune them out entirely.
Oliver von Spreckelsen wrote:
I think we are really starting to narrow down the specific issues in transition between books that W E Ray initially spoke about, when they are written by different authors. In many cases, an author of an earlier book might make unintentional promises that never get realized because it wasn't in the outline/adventure skeleton assignments handed to the authors by the developer. This is why more comprehensive collaboration is important, in my opinion.
CorvusMask wrote: I mean, I agree that GM advice of "If players make a really long deduction that they are proud of, you can change things so its true so that players feel happy about being right" can be good idea, but it can also be good idea to let players sometimes just be wrong about their assumption. I think its a long-time trope/inside joke, "Hey, don't say that, you'll give the GM ideas!" I do, though, enjoy with player assumptions in creating encounters or side adventures that were never intended.
Davor Firetusk wrote:
Exactly! This is exactly my point. There is one scenario I point to specifically, that while PFS was going, came out as the Season 3 special "Cyphermage Dilemma". The previous Season 2 special was pretty good, and the Season 4 special rocked. But this was just a really odd choice to make the special. It was not a very well written scenario. And yet, as a Venture-Officer at the time (the only ones allowed to run them for 1 year), I ran this one 5 or 6 times (a couple of which were at conventions.) I've had players tell me that they stuck around PFS because of that scenario. I've had brand new players signed up to play after running it for them. Why? Because I did what I could to make it fun for the players. I didn't have to rewrite or change anything. I just approached it with a good attitude and really allowed the players to succeed with nifty plans and roleplayed the badguys in a keystone cop way and it turned out to just be a ball of laughs and fun. It can be the worst thing in the world, and if you want your players to have fun, don't tell them that during or before play.
Mathmuse wrote:
Trail of the Hunted: I just got done running that one last October or so. and I didn't mind it at all. The emotional impact of live flaying and torture would be enough to raise the skeletons. And since the bloody skeletons keep coming back to life until their skins at Scarvinious's camp are destroyed, its easy enough to assume this is some sort of "ghost" or haunt.
Matthew Downie wrote:
As a GM and published adventure author who does just all of that, I don't expect my GMs to do any more than I do myself. But if they aren't prepared to run an adventure to such a degree that issues within it catch them so off guard that they take valuable play time to complain and moan about the terribleness of the adventure, then that's not a GM I want to play with. You don't need to be a published or experienced adventure writer to figure out how you are going to handle such a poor writing situation while you run it for your players. Because presumably you spent more than 5 minutes reading that and know what the issues are, and can easily figure out what you are going to do so your players will enjoy it. An example would be a horse stable that has several 5' x 10' stalls and the monsters inside are all large without actually enough room to all fit in that building let alone fight in the building. So as a GM you just either make the stables larger or the creatures medium-sized instead. Another example would be if there is a huge plot hole that doesn't make much sense, and as a GM you don't have time to write the filler bit. Just don't talk about it during play. Likely the players aren't going to even catch that there is a plot hole, because there are tons of things players aren't privy to that the GM is when playing the game. So you even bringing up that there is this gaping hole is only going to bring it to the player's attention and help them not enjoy the adventure. Almost zero effort. Actually, more effort would go into complaining during play than just doing nothing about the plot hole. Not sure why you acted all offended by that comment.
James Jacobs wrote:
THIS! I think one of the reasons my players enjoy my running of Kingmaker as much as they do, is because I've done my best to adapt the story to not just the characters, but also the players. It also doesn't help that they love resource management (which surprised me). So much so, that one player who's a coder created a pretty complicated online app (with a hex map and everything) to track all the kingdom building stuff. Also, I wanted to comment one one of W E Ray's comments about Kingmaker. Spoiler:
That the BBEG isn't even known to the players until the end of book 5 or book 6. There are nuggets from book 2 on that give a taste of what Nyrissa is up to. I'd actually say that Book 3 is probably the only one that doesn't have any of Nyrissa's interference directly written into it (other than Book 1). And once the players find out about Nyrissa and presumably have befriended Evindra, you can actually reveal all of these nuggets to them! My players really loved the fact that I was able to keep that plot point secret from them until the big reveal. That lots of the obstacles and rabble rousers were because of Nyrissa. I think one thing that would be helpful (and probably happened more to a certain extent on the APs that have the best transitions), is to ensure that your authors collaborate with one another. I seem to recall Thursty holding court at Paizo Con many times talking about collaborating with other authors and making sure something he wanted to do would fit with what the other author was doing (or seeing if that other author could add a paragraph or two) so his thing would make more cohesive sense. When writing in a shared world, writing in isolation is likely to ensure the most difficult of transitions from one adventure to another. I imagine though, different authors, with the infinite number of writing methodology they use, it may be more or less difficult to quickly and comprehensively collaborate with one another. But if I had one bit of advice for Paizo, it would be to ensure that their authors do more collaboration on a distinctly comprehensive level to ensure that the story threads remain cohesive.
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