Cintra Bristol's page

You may want to spend a few minutes browsing in the "Pathfinder Adventure Path General Discussion" forum. It's fairly common to find threads there which rate or compare the adventure paths.

Regarding Kingmaker, I actually skipped buying that one when it first was published - I just wasn't that interested in fey or kingdom building. Then I spent time reading threads on the Kingmaker forum, ended up ordering the whole path, and dropped my plans at the last minutes to run another one (Serpent's Skull) in order to do Kingmaker instead. We're nearing the end of chapter 1, and we love it! On the other hand, because it's a sandbox-style adventure, it does require more work from the DM than a more linear plotline.

I also have to agree with Gorbacz's quick summary. Building on it - If I were you, I'd start by considering the following narrowed list:

RotRL - Particularly if you have time to wait until the compilation. Great NPC stories, and some really innovative individual adventures. Chapters 1 and 2 are amazing; my group loved chapter 5 as well. (Chapters 4 and 6 are "ordinary" rather than excellent - I ended up modifying them heavily.) If you run this path, consider finding ways to connect the PCs' backgrounds to some of the key NPCs.

KM - This path is worth the effort, and there are lots of threads with helpful tools/advice. Players really seem to enjoy the feeling of ownership in the setting. This path has possibly the best 6th chapter of any adventure path. If you do run this path, some advice - get the author's original turnover of chapter 5, and read threads about eliminating the "magic item economy" (you'll easily find threads about both of these in the Kingmaker forums).

CC - Very solid. Includes investigations, putting together clues to solve mysteries and understand NPC motivations, dealing with interesting NPCs... However, this path needs players who are interested in investigating; it would not be recommended for a group that prefers to solve all problems with violence. If you run this path, read the thread(s) about Adivion Adrissant (sp?) to make sure you foreshadow him before the end.

JR - This path actually looks very solid, too. I haven't read the last two chapters yet, but I've been very impressed by what I've seen so far. This path has a good mix of combat, great adventure sites, and truly engaging interactions with NPCs. It also has a prequel adventure ("We Be Goblins!") that lets you introduce the path in a truly unique way.

In my opinion, Kressle is iredeemably evil, and is your excuse to do whatever is cruelest to your PCs - within the limits of what your group can still find "fun."

That night, she might snipe from darkess to keep them from getting any sleep (and pick off individuals she manages to lure away from the camp), or she might lure a wandering monster (or something from a nearby lair) to the camp. She might also make as much distance as possible, disguising her trail, so they have no hope of following her in the morning.

You mentioned the assassination attempt that happened during your campaign's start. Is it possible that Kressle is somehow affiliated with whoever arranged that assassination? If so, she can turn to them for information on the PCs as well as more recruits and weapons to let her go after the PCs in the future. Even if not, you can do something similar if any of the assassins survived and were sent to prison - someone releases them and sends them south to join the bandits, and they end up as Kressle's reinforcements.

Once she has reinforcements (from the assassins or elsewhere), Kressle will probably set up a position to watch Oleg's and observe when the PCs leave. Once she knows they're gone, she can enter the fort, perhaps using subterfuge (send ahead a couple of the new recruits that folks at Oleg's have never seen, or kidnap a kid from southern Brevoy and threaten to slit his throat if Oleg doesn't open his gate). Maybe she kidnaps Svetlana, or maybe she just leaves a scar on Svetlana's face or something.

Or, Kressle could use fire arrows to try to set the fort on fire - this is probably better if the PCs are at the fort. She knows the layout of the place, and if the PCs have captured a bunch of horses from prior bandits, then aiming the first few arrows to arc down onto the stables would cause some lovely chaos. Kressle doesn't even have to make a serious attempt to enter the fort, she could just be harassing the PCs. This goes well with occasional hit-and-run attacks, then leaving tracks that try to lead them directly toward dangerous creature lairs or toward wandering creatures she'd spotted earlier.

The more out-of-whack wealth-by-level gets, the more trouble you'll have as time goes on. As the DM, you'll have to increase the power of the opposition more and more. That's a ton of work for you, and it isn't terribly satisfying (at least in my experience). It also makes the game very "swingy" (more powerful opponents have more powerful abilities that can suddenly drop one or more PCs) which means that in order to challenge them at all, you'll end up with an increasing likelihood of PC death.

I'd strongly recommend removing the option of withdrawing money from the treasury. Just explain to your group that this option is throwing off the game balance and will eventually make the campaign unplayable.

If at all possible, reset the current party wealth to the correct amounts. You may want to have a talk with your players and present these two options - reduce their wealth now (re-equipping their characters to the correct gold-piece value), or get very little treasure for a while until their level catches up with their current wealth.

Of course, this is also the hobby that gave us "illusionary."

Biobeast - Thanks!

For my campaign, I figure there might be a Rogarvian heir or two still out there, although I haven't defined any yet. They need to have been "not at home" when the Vanishing occurred, and not somewhere that she would have discovered their presence to include them - which should be fairly simple to justify for your disowned PC.

Hassy - Regarding your last spoiler tag:

As for background information, a few years ago, I started giving my players one- or two-page questionaires suited to the campaign. Here's the list of questions I used for Kingmaker. They're very wordy, because I've found I get better results if I explain my reason for asking each question. With 10-point Calibri font and limited response space, it fit onto two pages.

That sounds reasonable.

One question - is it feasable for Paizo to add a shipping option of USPS Priority Mail plus Insurance? If I were to have delivery problems again, I'd gladly pay the extra $2 or so for Insurance if this option were available, but I'm not sure if this could even be done with your current shipping system.

I'm considering re-subscribing to the Adventure Paths (as opposed to continuing to buy everything from my FLGS).

In the past, I had to choose UPS Ground to get any sort of guarantee of intact shipments. (Either by USPS or UPS, I was having really bad luck for a while there, with about one book every 6 months damaged in shipping, and as I recall, Paizo had me upgrade my shipping to UPS Ground in order to be able to replace damaged shipments.)

Now I see that UPS Ground costs $15, but there's USPS Priority Mail for only $7-something, and I truly can't recall if that was available in the past. Does USPS Priority Mail carry any guarantees of damaged-book-replacement from Paizo? (If so, I'll almost certainly be re-subscribing, but if not, I can't justify paying $15 shipping.)

Thanks!

I assume you're already incorporating the noble house members listed in the Brevoy article (in the same issue as Stolen Land).

My Kingmaker campaign is nearing the end of Chapter 1 right now, but I'm planning a couple of things that might interest you.

First, I had each player fill out a Background Questionaire which included questions such as "You have a particular patron who suggested you for the exploration of the Greenbelt. Who is it? What is their interest in this project? What is it about your relationship that makes them think you’ll be a particularly good agent for their interests?" (Other questions asked for info on their immediate family, an ally and an enemy "back home in Brevoy," as well as a "troubling mystery for which they don't know the answer.")

I'm using the information from their backgrounds to supplement a guest list for a large gala party in Restov at which they will receive their charter to found their kingdom. For most of the NPCs attending, I'm using random tables from a variety of sources to create secret motivations and plot hooks. The PCs will probably only interact with a limited number of these hooks at the gala - but they might choose to recruit some of these NPCs as members of their ruling council, and they'll certainly have future opportunities to interact with the NPCs. (Some of the NPC plots are things that will just wait until the PCs stumble across them before I develop them further - a few, however, might continue to develop in the background.)

The second thing I'm planning involves the Vanishing. I'm putting this in spoiler, because it necessarily involves many specific plot elements from throughout the adventure path:

They are not evil. The party has been acting strongly lawful neutral. They figure she has the longest legal claim to the lands, and as such, it is rightfully hers.

If they do join with her, who would come against them in the last book?

In this case, I'd assume her plot in book 6 wouldn't be aimed at the PCs' kingdom. So instead, aim it at Pitax, with that nation sending a large team of high level adventurers (Irovetti leading them) against Nyrissa.

Alternately, make the final enemy be Brevoy. This requires more re-writing on your part, but could be a lot more interesting. Assume Nyrissa isn't currently trapped in her realm, just exiled from the Fey Courts. Most of the critters written in book 6 don't work for Nyrissa. Have the events in chapters 4 and 5 proceed as written. Toward the end of book 5, let Have Choral the Conqueror return to Brevoy and be revealed as

and lead the war against the PCs and Nyrissa. Choral can eventually invade Nyrissa's palace, sundering it from the world, and the Blooms are a spontaneous result of that sundering. The PCs have to invade the sundered pocket realm, fight past all the encounters there (which in this version are allied with Choral, not Nyrissa), and rescue their queen from the Conqueror.

CAVEAT: I'm assuming you don't particularly want the PCs to pledge themselves to Nyrissa. My comments here are meant to support that assumption - not as absolutes about how the campaign has to be run. With that stated, here goes...

The PCs may think they want to seek her out, but my question would be, how exactly are they planning to do that? I'm assuming you didn't give them too much detail on her.

For the time being, just don't let them uncover anything too specific. Over time, let them find evidence that she keeps sending attacks against them (like all the NPCs with locks of green hair in their possession).

When you get a chance, land a couple of low blows. For example, if you roll an Assassination event, consider having her send someone to kill one of the PC's family members, perhaps leaving a mocking message behind. Even crueller, have one of her lock-of-hair-carrying minions destroy one or more of their most treasured magic items, saying they will not be able to use it against his "queen." If the PCs ever successfully interrogate any of her minions, keep a few rules in mind - these guys don't personally know how to reach her, and their knowledge of her abilities is quite limited.

By the time they learn where she is, as scripted in book 6, they'll know they have a vested interest in stopping her.

Name: Ekada
Race: Genasi
Classes/levels: Artificer level 3
Adventure: Stolen Land
Location: Random encounter at the Rickety Bridge (location Q)
Catalyst: Epic fail on Perception at the start of the encounter

NOTE: We are using 4E; hence the odd race/class options and random encounter monsters.

Gory Details: The PCs were crossing the Rickety Bridge one at a time. When half the party had made it across, the three previously unnoticed perytons suddenly swooped down and attacked the party members on one side of the bridge.

(Cue Benny Hill music)

The PCs keep trying to gang up on and pin down the perytons, which continually manage to fly around and attack PCs who are separate from the others. One peryton snatches Ekada into the air, dropping her on the next round for near-maximum falling damage. She is bloodied but still fighting, and manages to heal herself back up to a decent HP total. But that doesn't last long; another peryton swoops down on her and attacks, knocking her to -1 hp with a prodigious blow. Papa peryton, seeing a "dying" adventurer, moves away from his current battle (shrugging off the ranger/assassin's opportunity attack) to use its Feed attack on the unconscious girl to rip out and consume her heart.

The warlock used an immediate reaction to shove the peryton 1 square away from Ekada's dead body. Because the peryton's Flyby Snatch Attack hadn't recharged, it therefore wasn't able to do what I wanted to do - snatch her body and fly away with it.

The PCs are now headed to their friendly neighborhood gnome druid for another Reincarnate (2nd in two weeks - see above). Ekada's player has to wait 2 weeks before learning at our next session what she'll be reincarnated as - and the other party members are praying to Erastil that they won't end up with another pixie.

Who says you can't kill PCs in 4E?

I say "go-LAIR-ee-un"

It's a really big darn dungeon crawl. Each region (map) has its own basic plotline going on, but they do tend to be fairly basic. As in, the PCs might be able to uncover the mystery of "what happened here." Some sections have populations you can ally or negotiate with, but if I remember correctly, it's mostly very combat heavy. (After all...it is a dungeon crawl.)

We really liked the section where one early room has gargantuan broken chains and an obvious trail of something immense having escaped...

I'd say a few of the sections are interesting and are worth the time, but there are many sections that just become a drag after a while. So if you can get it at a reasonable discount, go for it...

A couple of the Encounters seasons might qualify. The "Keep on the Borderlands" adventure - where the PCs are suddenly betrayed by their patron - was quite memorable. Some of our players still make b*&%$y comments about Benwick. The current season, Beyond the Crystal Cave, has had some wonderful moments dealing with bizarre fey and complicated NPC interactions.

What interests me the most here is a 4e version of kingdom building and armies.

Any thoughts on how those would be adapted to 4th?

For kingdom building, you have two choices. The easier (but oddly, more problematic) is to set a specific BP value for the magic item slots, rather than rolling items. But this leaves you with the arguably-broken magic item economy, which doesn't really fit 4E. If you want to go this route, I actually ran the average values generated by the original system (assuming a common house rule that items worth less than 4000gp could be saved up and sold for accumulated BPs) and here's what I came up with:

MINOR: 89% are worth 0.1 BP, 11% are worth 2BP. Average value 0.309 BP.
MEDIUM: 29% are worth 0.2 BP, 71% are worth 8 BP. Avg value 6 (5.738).
MAJOR: 15% are worth 0.33 BP, 85% are worth 15 BP. Avg value 13 (12.8).

The more complex solution is to rebalance all the buildings and in the process, completely eliminate the magic item economy. You can either try to increase the Econ values to make up for this, or not (and let your PCs take longer to get their kingdoms to be profitable).

I've actually got a version that I'm reasonably happy with, but it's completely untested - my group is still in the middle of the first book. I think this link will get you to a version I posted a while back. PLEASE simply eliminate the Slave Pen entry from what I wrote there - as was discussed later in that thread, it's a bad, bad idea. :)

As for armies, I'm still looking for a good solution.

Name: Koridan
Race: Eladrin
Classes/levels: Bladesinger level 3
Adventure: Stolen Land
Location: Tuskgutter's Lair
Catalyst: Lack of back-up (aka Never Split the Party)

NOTE: We are using 4E; hence the odd race/class options. Also, to meet 4E encounter standards (where solo monsters are usually unexciting), I added a couple of creatures to the scene.

Gory Details: The PCs found the lair unoccupied, and laid an ambush. Unfortunately, they weren't expecting Tuskgutter to have allies. Most of the group got bogged down dealing with his mates (a were-boar priestess of Gyronna and a were-boar dryad), while Koridan led the charge down-slope to battle a wicked treant. They were well-involved in these separate battles when Tuskgutter arrived and charged Koridan. Before the others could reach him to provide support, the dire boar had gored him to death, and pounded him into the dirt for good measure.

All was not lost, for the PCs had recently made friends with a group of gnomes, and they were quickly able to contact a gnome druid regarding the possibility of a Reincarnation. I quickly built a random table of possible 4E races and the player rolled - a Pixie!

(The embarrassed druid backed away with the comment, "No refunds!" - and was later heard to mutter, "At least it wasn't another kobold...")

I am an enthusiastic DM of 4th edition. (I still have my bookshelves full of 1E/2E/3.0/3.5 stuff, and I continue to collect and run Paizo adventure paths using 4E.)

And as much as I LOVE 4E, I can tell you that I've been excited by many of the comments that have come out in the 4E Design and Development articles this past year, so I'm actually looking forward to seeing what happens with this new edition/iteration/whatever. WotC has been successfully recapturing the 1E feel in a lot of ways with the weekly Encounters program, and with many of their more recent releases.

Not everyone has to take change as a personal affront.

I'm more worried about losing my character builder. :(

I strongly agree with this. On the other hand, since using it requires a paid subscription, hopefully they won't see any need to remove the 4E character builder (or the "4E settings" if this is an "iteration") just because they've moved on to a new iteration/edition/whatever. At the very least, I'd like them to continue to support both for a year or two within DDI, to give us time to wrap up campaigns already in progress.

Just a couple quick questions. Lumber gives a hex a +1 as a resource. Does that mean every forested hex claimed gives a +1 bonus or do you need it to be a road hex as well. Can a hex have multiple resourses, like a mine and forest.

Only "particularly valuable sources" of lumber count as resource hexes, not just any old forest hex. On the DM's hex map in each adventure, specific hexes have the coin symbol denoting resource hexes - those are the ones where it applies, and the adventure text explains exactly what the resource is. (So for the published adventures, there's never more than one such special resource in the same hex.)

You just have to claim the hex to gain the benefit of the resource - you can still develop the hex in any way that is appropriate to the terrain etc.

You can build farms on special hexs, you just can't have a farm and city in the same hex. Try to build so you keep consumption at zero.

+1

You can build farms in any grassland or hills hex - so the hexes with the fangberry thicket, old sycamore etc. are perfectly valid for farms. You gain the bonus for a resource in addition to whatever you do to develop the hex - while some resources have restrictions, most of them are wide open to development how you see fit.

I strongly discourage starting with an expensive structure like a castle. Start with inexpensive buildings, focusing on getting your Economy up to the point where you can reliably make the rolls. In your initial few rounds, add three (or seven) hexes to your initial hex, and immediately develop a road in each, and enought farms as you go to offset all the consumption. Remember:
* You gain +1 economy per four hexes with roads.
* Using the Stag Lord's Fort hex as your capital grants you a +1 bonus on each of Economy, Stability and Loyalty.

Finally, check to be sure that you've filled all ruling positions (no vacancies) and that you've selected Economy for those that have a choice.

If you do all that, by the time you burn through your initial BPs, you should be able to make it work. I also strongly suggest you look at this thread: The Overlords Guide to Kingdom Building and download his Google Docs file (linked right near the beginning of the thread). He does an analysis of the various choices that I found very helpful.

Okay, that explains a lot.

One thought that occurs to me is that a civil war in the PC's fledgeling kingdom really plays into the hands of the adventure path's BBEG. (This assumes you're still building toward the BBEG in the final volume, of course.) She might have some agents currently acting to increase the likelihood of civil war - and the PCs might be able to uncover evidence of this conspiracy.

If the PCs realize some unknown enemy is working so hard to destabilize their nation, it might at least encourage them to find a way to keep the nation intact when they resolve the issues you describe. It might also lead to questions regarding if that same mysterious adversary is encouraging the crisis in Brevoy.

If nothing else, a bloodless coup leading to a new leadership in the PC's nation would be far better (for your campaign's fun factor and for eventually defeating the BBEG)than two separate and grudge-holding nations.

American Signature Furniture carries a few nice tables in your price range.

There's an "unfinished furniture" store here in Nashville that I've never checked out, but I've heard good things. I don't know if they're a larger chain or not.

If you don't care so much about elegance or matching your other furnishings, you can find some nice furniture at Goodwill. Also, check the newspaper and go to estate sales for a few weeks, and you might find a real bargain on something quite nice - but you'll probably have to figure out your own transport for it.

There are also places like Big Lots (or when I was in college in western Massachusetts, the "Railroad Salvage Store" was a favorite) that can have really good bargains on discontinued furniture lines.

I've tried to come up with some advice, but I run into a problem. I'm having trouble picturing any scenario where the PCs divide into two separate kingdoms, but continue traveling together as one adventuring party. Because if they're no longer a single adventuring party, then one of the PCs would be out of the campaign regardless, wouldn't they?

If they're willing to work together as adventurers, then surely there's some way to keep the kingdom intact.

Can you supply a bit more information about what is driving the conflict? Also, it would help to know if the two PCs have groups loyal to their separate interests - are there larger groups that would push for separate kingdoms?

In my campaign I find the foreshadowing and sense of impending dread easy to build: I keep talking about Brevic history, the weak grasp that Surtova has on the throne, the Valley of Fire, how House Rogavaria was the real power before the pretenders, how the heraldry came to be, how the Rostlanders were decimated, how the Vanishing dramatically up-ended the economy, how Mivon was founded, how there's so many dragons in the mountains...

Wait, we're still talking about the same BBEG, right? Choral the Conquerer, right?

Yeah, that sounds right to me.

After all, it's completely obvious that

used the to before she and sent her So by the end of the adventure path, the PCs will need to battle Choral the Conqueror in order to And this gives them two difficult decisions to make: and

. . .

There are many ways to solve this. In 4e they instituted the bloodied condition where certain things only kick into effect once someone is below 50% of their hit points. A 4e solution might be to have a power like the punishing kick feat, where you can knock someone back, but they have to land in a safe spot unless they are bloodied, at which point they can get tossed into whatever place happens to be there.

Actually, in 4E, you can knock someone into damaging terrain or off a cliff of any height by using a bull rush attack (or any attack power which includes a Push or Slide effect), but the target gets a save before he goes over the edge - if he succeeds, he falls prone on the edge of the cliff instead.

In 3.5/Pathfinder, introducing a saving throw for these situations could be a perfectly reasonable house rule.

You could also consider continuing on with Rise of the Runelords. There are a lot of opportunities for roleplay in the rest of the path.

My group found plenty of opportunity for interaction in the third adventure. I recommend you check out Denek's campaign journal for Rise of the Runelords, particularly the part where they visit Turtleback Ferry. I cribbed shamelessly from his journal for my own group. Whether you let your group actually experience the massacre (perhaps with their own PCs, perhaps as a cut scene playing NPCs) or you just use it for background for a handful of "survivors" they can talk to, it will enrich the story.

For the fourth adventure, I'll admit that I did some extensive rewriting. I fleshed out some of the different groups ("armies") and had some of them be much less happy about being there than others, plus a lot of disputes between different groups that the PCs could take advantage of. My PCs spent a lot more time talking and investigating than they did fighting. Some specifics from my version:

When you get to Sins of the Saviors, don't let the big "dungeon" fool you - this adventure can be a huge opportunity for roleplay. Each separate faction is its own mini-community with opportunities to interact, form alliances, or deal with enmities that have been brewing for thousands of years.

The sixth chapter is harder, since by the time you get to high-level play, so much of the word count has to go toward combat stuff. I added:

I'm NOT saying that you should go with this specific storyline - just look at the threads that are coming together from your PCs' backgrounds, keep some recurring enemies in the mix, and see what you can make of it.

All that is to say - there's plenty of opportunity for interaction in this path.

Bear in mind - I've only just started running my Kingmaker campaign, so my answers are based on pre-planning, not experience with running the adventure. With that said...

I think that banning conversion of BPs to GP ("raiding the treasury") is best. If any PC has item creation feats, letting them pull extra BPs from their kingdom is just a recipe for character wealth to spiral out of control.

On the other hand, I don't think that near-automatic success on most kingdom rolls is a problem. They'll still fail on a natural 1, but succeed 95% of the time on the basic kingdom management rolls - in other words, for the most part, their well-managed kingdom runs smoothly.

The PCs shouldn't know what Kingdom Events are possible, and certainly shouldn't know the DCs for those events ahead of time. Where appropriate for specific Events, playing out the events and using appropriate PC skill rolls instead of using set DCs vs. kingdom stats can add in some uncertainty if its needed.

2) The other option, and what I would recommend, would be to do a simple division in the cell (e.g., =A3/$C$2) rather than using the quotient formula.

Small correction: The formula in cell C3 should be:

=$A3/C$2

Then copy and paste-special, Formulas to paste the formula without changing the cell colors.

The dollar signs "lock" the cell reference when you copy - so this version makes it always refer to Column A for the numerator (total miles) and Row 2 for the denominator (speed).

Yes, my suggestions basically amount to telling them they could've gotten something cool if they'd handled things differently. Some of them are harsher than others - some players have harder heads than others, and I don't know how big a stick he needs to get through to them. (Most of my players would get the hint from any one of these - but one or two of my players would probably still not be able to keep the hint in mind even after all of them.)

More to the point, though, these are suggestions that can be implemented now, in this very chapter. Penalizing diplomacy rolls can't happen until the PCs have their own kingdom and are interacting with other nations. Waiting until book 3 (or later) to address behavior that is making the adventure less fun (or eliminating cool possible storylines) during book 1 seems - impractical. Really, what does it accomplish at that late date?

Okay, mea culpa here - I really should've started with "Best thing to do is sit down with your players and explain they're missing cool story options because of this behavior." So, consider that suggestion made. With bold type, and I wish I could put a big flashing star next to it. But one way or another, if it's bothering the DM now, it needs to be addressed now.

You could also consider introducing some negative consequences of their policy, such as:

1) A traveling priest can bring word of a specific religious item - a drum, a special set of bells, a minor holy relic, or the like - that was taken by bandits. This item is needed for a specific religious festival that will be happening in a few weeks. If it can't be found by then, it becomes completely worthless. (If the PCs had interrogated the bandits to learn where such items would be taken, they'd have been able to go after it - as things stand, they won't find it until months from now, when it is worth literally nothing.) NOTE: If you don't like the religious-festival idea, you can go with something perishable, perhaps a large shipment of fine quality wine or alcoholic spirits...

2) A pretty girl seeks out the PCs at Oleg's, looking for their help. Her brother is missing. They're from a wealthy family, and when their father died last year, their uncle claimed the family business for himself and kicked the girl and her brother out, penniless. She went to stay with a female friend, but her brother hinted at turning to banditry. Now uncle has been thrown in prison, and the family business turned over to the girl and her remaining brothers. Unfortunately for the PCs, the brother she's looking for is one of the bandits they already killed, and if she learns this, the PCs will gain the enmity of herself and her other brother(s) back home. (For a slightly more nuanced resolution, she had two brothers turn to banditry - one they've already killed, and one they can find in the Stag Lord's fort.)

3) A traveling bard learns of the PCs' unforgiving ways and creates a song satirizing the PCs as merciless (and not too bright, and unable to solve a problem except by killing it). Merchants bringing goods to restock Oleg's supplies can relate the song to Oleg or Svetlana (who can then express concern to the PCs), and say that they shouldn't be harboring murderers - meaning the PCs.

4) The PCs' patrons in Restov can hear the satirical song (see #3 above) and can send an emissary asking an accounting of their activities. This emissary can make a point of documenting how well they're meeting the terms of their charter. ("Hmm, explored forty percent of the area so far, that's good; hmmm, no useful information from interrogating prisoners, tut tut...") The emissary can hint that the PCs' performance may affect what future opportunities they are granted.

And this is why I don't go to Cons or play at my FLGS's open game nights.

Those players.

Actually, that is why my husband and I always run the games at our FLGS's open game nights. So that we can require responsible behavior (yup, not being "that guy") and everyone who shows up for open gaming can have a chance to have fun.

And with that one exception, I agree with everything that you said.

Regarding the Stag Lord mini made by Reaper...

I picked this mini up at GenCon. It looks fabulous. However, it comes as several separate pieces (both antlers, the cape, and I think at least one hand) that must be detached from the sprue and then glued onto the main body of the mini.

It was completely outside my ability to do all this. Since I was at GenCon at the Reaper booth, I talked to them about it, and the actual sculptor of this mini was there. He was extremely nice about the situation, and he actually offered to assemble it for me, right there.

So he started working on it. I watched. About twenty minutes later, he had it glued. Yup, twenty minutes, and he's the professional who designed the thing.

After watching him carefully trim, glue, re-trim, re-glue, comment that he didn't have his pinning kit with him, re-glue some more, etc., I found myself vindicated in my belief that I would never have been able to assemble this mini myself.

You'll need decent skill, or at least a lot more patience than I have, to get this mini together. (But if you can do it, then like I said - fabulous!)

I never dug into the GSL, but can you share your conversion work online somewhere? Is there a Pathfinder-to-4E group on yahoo or somewhere? I'm sure you and Scott aren't the only two in existance.

Add me to the list of folks that convert Paizo adventures to 4E.

Unfortunately, I don't have much in the way of conversion work, per se. 4E is easy enough to DM that I mostly convert on the fly. Sure, I collect up a bunch of stat blocks that approximate the intended encounters (and with more individual creatures, and usually more discrete creatures per encounter - so not a straight-up conversion), but I have never really needed to create detailed notes.

Actually, the vast majority of my prep time is spent on story development for my particular group of PCs. And that's the stuff I tend to have detailed notes for.

But if we wanted to share tips on how to convert the adventures on-the-fly, that could be a really fun (and separate-from-this-thread) discussion.

Over the years, I've been in several different groups where a single player, using the "I'm just playing my character" defense, has caused an incredible amount of disruption to the group. I'm talking about disruption that grows to the point that members of the group gripe for hours/days about the disruptions that occurred during the last session, and people get so frustrated with the disruptions that they are no longer having fun - or are even dreading each week's game session.

As DM, I now make it clear to members of my group that those words are not a defense - in fact, that they are the first and clearest sign of someone who is playing the game selfishly. My group understands that it is everyone's responsibility to ensure everyone in the group has a chance to have fun. Everyone deserves their moment in the spotlight, and no one is entitled to make someone else miserable.

The thing is, at least in my experience, people who tend to use the "just playing my character" defense are usually not able to change their play style. They aren't having fun if they can't play this way. They may be overly competitive, they may be taking out their frustrations from outside the game, or this may simply be their way of getting the spotlight - correct them and they get defensive, insist they change to a more cooperative character and they find other ways to act out.

My advice - Your group needs to firmly express to this player that his disruptive behavior isn't appropriate. You can give him a chance to change - but if it continues to be an issue (or seems to get better when you nag him about it, but continually reverts back under stress or when it doesn't get mentioned for a couple of weeks), then you also need to make it clear that you are willing to remove a disruptive player for the sake of the rest of the group. Talk about sharing the spotlight, working as a group, etc. Make sure he understands that he shares the responsibility, as does everyone else in the group, of making the game fun for everyone - and that right now he's failing in this responsibility.

And if your group isn't willing/able to remove a disruptive player for some reason, you need to examine why that is. Because if you don't, then you're basically letting yourselves be held hostage to his bad behavior.

I've never had group members try to make a profit off their fellows. If they "take commissions" from their team members, in my groups, it has always meant making the item for the 50% price. Then everything is balanced, and if wealth of the group starts getting out of hand, the DM can adjust by awarding less wealth (since the party is able to make what it needs for that reduced wealth amount).

And by the way, giving less money in this circumstance is NOT penalizing the party for having the item creation feats - those feats still let them make exactly what they want instead of getting only what they can find.

Depending on your group, I would simply forbid profiteering off other party members. Does the cleric charge for healing? Does the fighter charge for keeping a troll from getting through to attack the squishy wizard?

Regarding map paper - I get large easel pads with a 1" grid. I don't recall if I last got them from Staples or Office Depot - whichever it was, they had a recycled paper four-pack (fifty or sixty sheets per pad) for about $60, delivery-only. When I want to keep a map, I just insert the sheet back under all the other blank pages, just above the cardboard, and they're safe until I need them.

I'm starting my Kingmaker campaign in a few weeks, and I picked up a few things at GenCon that I can strongly recommend.

Dark Platypus Studio (http://www.dark-platypus.com/) has some really fun products. Since I can't draw trees worth a darn, and this adventure path is going to have a lot of wilderness scenes, I got a couple sheets of their Dungeon Clings: Trees and Bushes. They also have Boulders and Rubble. (Dungeon Clings are like Colorforms, so they'll stick to a laminated map, but I figure I can set them on a paper map just fine.)

(I'm also using their magnetic Action Stands with Status Flags. The web site refers to their 4th edition-compatible status flags, but at GenCon they also had 3rd edition/Pathfinder status flags available. I did not go with the magnetically-receptive 1" grid, although I kind of wish I had - and the bendy-walls to go with them. If you haven't seen these yet, check out their web site.)

I also want to recommend two books from Engine Publishing - Eureka: 501 Plots to Inspire Game Masters and Masks: 1000 Memorable NPCs. These books are a treasure trove of ideas when you get stuck for plot twists or for interesting NPCs, and in a sandbox campaign, they look to be extremely useful.

I'll admit, I've only looked through part of this...but I'm impressed. I particularly like some of the new hex improvement options. And the reduced building list - I'm going to have to play with this a bit to really wrap my brain around how it works, but I like the smaller-town feel.

With improvements like the mines ("exotic" or "precious"), was the intent that they can roll a % chance to be able to establish such a mine in a given hex, or were you going with the specified resource hexes from the adventures?

Also, can I get the word document?

Here's the thing...

This is a very "sandbox"-style campaign. A whole lot of pieces are there, but it's up the the GM and the players to give them life. There is no (or rather, very little) over-arching story, because the story is supposed to be created by the GM and players.

For a game like this to work, the GM needs to do the stuff that William Bryan listed in his excellent post. But you as the players also need to take some responsibility. You should be developing your characters' stories, and coming up with goals for them. Someone is presumably the Ruler (king, Baron, whatever) - has he/she gotten married and produced an heir? Are the rest of you thinking of political goals you could achieve?

If this sort of campaign sounds fun to you, then you may be able, as a group,to re-tool the campaign and make it work. But if it doesn't, then you probably are just playing the wrong adventure. I'd also like to note that, if your GM thinks this path is "boring," then he's almost certainly not looking at this path in the right way, trying to develop stories around what the PCs do, etc.; and that makes it almost impossible that this path can be salvaged. A sandbox campaign takes a lot more effort on the part of the GM, and his/her imagination really has to be engaged by the pieces that are provided.

So I'd tend to recommend that your group should switch to a more story-based adventure path (pretty much any of them other than Kingmaker and Serpent's Skull). Carrion Crown looks like a lot of fun, with its horror theme. If that doesn't appeal, there are other threads on these boards where folks compare the different adventure paths, although you might recommend that your GM check them out rather than you looking through them, as they're by necessity riddled with spoilers for the adventure paths they're comparing.

If you want a well-researched presentation of the difficulties (but not impossibilities) of taking a galley on the ocean, try David Weber's "Off Armageddon Reef" (and its sequels).

The author is a military history buff, so I trust his presentation to be largely accurate, and in this book, several nations take their galleys on ocean voyages during a major religious war - with varying results.

Has anyone come up with a suitable solution to the Mage's Disjunction trap? It's not really a danger any more, since the chance of it destroying magical items is so low..

I actually replaced the Mage's Disjunction trap - I didn't think it would be enjoyed by my group. Instead, I described the trap similarly, but when it went off, all of the PCs magic items were "taken" (the PCs saw their items go insubstantial and quickly recede into the distance). I then handed each of them a copy I'd pre-made of their character sheet with no magic items.

What followed was a series of challenges the PCs had to pass through in order to get into the Abjurer's Sanctum to get their magic items back. (I figured that Envy would be a desire to take other folks' goodies away, combined with an enjoyment of watching their victims jump through hoops.) The challenges included:
* Jumping across a series of platforms over a spike-filled chasm.
* Crossing a web-like series of bridges over a "bottomless" chasm with different skill checks required for completion (and each bridge collapsed as soon as someone crossed it, so everyone had to take a different path).
* Battling exploding automatons with saw-blades on a web of rope bridges.
* Choosing a final challenge (with each path designed to appeal to a different sin's followers, and designed to be impossible for mages of that sin to complete) - and having the collapsing paths beyond narrow to four, then two, then only one, so the PCs end up racing one another to be "the only survivor."

At the end, the one winning PC gets into the Sanctum of Envy, which is deserted as per the original module. A big shiny lever resets all the bridges and other traps, and locks the bridges in place to let the other PCs join the winner. (Those who fell into the "bottomless" chasm at any of the specific challenges went down a chute and were dropped back at the start of that challenge, so this wasn't as deadly as it may sound.) They find all their magic gear in a pile, waiting for one of the mages of Envy to sort through it. And to add insult to all this injury, they also find the secret door by which the Envy folks bypassed the trap when they came and went - so their payoff for completing this section of the adventure became a "safe house" they could retreat to between exploring the other sections.

The ideas you have are good. Another easy option is to give the monsters Vulnerable 5 All once bloodied. It lets the early part of the fight feel just as challenging as it should, but once the bad guys start to go down, the "grind" of finishing them off is reduced.

I don't have my copy of the adventure with me, so forgive me if I get this wrong - but as I recall, the last two sessions are very good (Nathaire and Vontarin) but run a little long. (NOTE: Because we're going to GenCon, and we're the only GMs for our FLGS, my husband and I had to run both the final sessions this past week - and it took close to 3 hours to get through both.)

The two sessions before that are both actually fairly disposable (unnecessary side-trek to the crypts and then the random mooks fight in the ruins). The only purpose was to bring on night-fall and let the PCs know they needed to find the Library... and you could do that with the skill challenge in Session 10, if I remember right, though you may want to add in a couple of additional skill checks (e.g. History DC 13 to figure out that the Pelorans would probably have stored items taken from Vontarin's manor in the abbey Library; Perception DC 13 to spot tracks that seem to run to a specific section of the ruins, where the library is likely to reappear after nightfall).

So I'd actually recommend cutting both sessions 10 and 11, then running sessions 12 and 13 without cutting them down in difficulty.

So how many other people who *aren't* getting the PDFs would be interested in a collection of all of the interactive maps after we've published all six volumes of an AP?

I would definitely buy such a product.

And if you go back and do some of the recent APs (esp. Kingmaker), I'd be thrilled.

For me, the anti-D&D hysteria wasn't too bad, although there were a few teachers at my school who reacted negatively to it. I grew up in Atlanta (which despite being in the South, is much more Northern/Cosmopolitan in outlook).

For my husband, though, it was very difficult. He grew up in rural Michigan, and some people at the church his family attended were extremely judgemental. Jeff's parents bought him the gaming books and had no problem with him playing, but parents of many of his friends wouldn't let them play (or insisted they - the parents - be present whenever the game was being played so they could intervene if they decided it was necessary).

While things are far better than they were in the '80s, the damage and misinformation still lingers. We currently live in Tennessee, right in the heart of the Bible Belt. Even in the last few years, I've had co-workers react with astonishment when I mention that I play D&D, asking me "Isn't that the Satanic game...?" (On the plus side, they generally do listen when I explain, and seem somewhat open to being corrected.) And every so often, a member of one of the local churches comes into the Friendly Local Game Store where we run our games, looking to see if the store sells particular items, although in recent years they mostly seemed concerned about White Wolf products (Vampire the Masquerade in particular).

For the record, the game store owner does NOT carry in inventory the specific products those folks are checking on, as the church members really would spread the word that his store is "evil" or something, and severely damage his business. It just isn't worth it. (A nearby office supply store got black-listed by the members of one of the local churches for signing up to sell lottery tickets, and went out of business within a few months even though they changed their minds and stopped selling the lottery tickets.)

I know this doesn't quite go along with what you've already proposed, but I'll suggest it anyway...

I like a lot of these and will probably steal some. Definately much better organized than the paizo ones. Alphabetical is frequently not the best method of organization.

Thanks!

However slave pens need a MAJOR edit. First off is that 20% discount for the district or the entire city? Regardless of which it is you need to either make it non-stackable or drop it down. I'd suggest both actually. As it is starting with my second city I'd use 2.5 of my squares to build 5 slave pens. That leaves me with 6.5 squares to build FREEE buildings. That's not counting of course the +15 economy. And by that time I can build houses and other buildings in my first city to cut that unrest to 0. Let's see the first one is 20, second is 16, third is 12, fourth is 8 and last is 4, which comes to a grand total of 60BPs....I can get back 70 free BPs by dropping a Parliament there.

Oops - I abbreviated everything to post it, and I needed to be clearer there. Slave Pens get more text in the long version of my rules.

The discount doesn't stack with other Slave Pens, it stacks with discounts from other buildings. So if you want to build an Herbalist (10BP) and you have two trade roads to foreign lands (which halves cost of Herbalist) AND Slave Pens, the final cost of Slave Pens in the same city is (10 BP halved = 5, then -20% =) 4BP.

The discount applies to the whole city, but I have a note that in order to get the discount from Slave Pens, you have to have at least one Slave Pens in your city per District in that city. Build too many districts without expanding the slave pens area, and no more discount.

Then, I have a note that utilizing Slave Pens adds a number of new Kingdom Events to the list, all bad - Slave Revolt, Andoran Raid, etc., and also increases likelihood/DCs of some exisitng events such as Plague. Some penalties would be cumulative; build a lot of slave pens to keep up with your number of districts, and these events could become truly significant.

I should also note - in the Kingmaker campaign, I consider Slave Pens to be a trap. Since this campaign is set in the northern reaches of the River Kingdoms, where slavery is not acceptable, if the PCs were to institute slavery, they'd probably get wiped out by an alliance of their southern neighbors. I included it because I thought of using these rules in another region entirely - but for Kingmaker, if I thought my players would react to it with anything other than a laugh as they say "Slave Pens? In the River Kingdoms?!? No #@$%ing way!" then I'd certainly cut it from the list.

I created a modified ruleset for kingdom building. I've eliminated the magic item economy (i.e. no buildings produce magic items, and there is no longer a process of generating and selling magic items to generate BPs for the kingdom).

Note that I haven't started my campaign quite yet, so these revised rules are untested.

Special Rules:

Interpreting the Statistics:
Commentary:
Residential Group (no discounts)
Foreign Trade Group
Arena Group
Cathedral Group
Exchange Group
Sawmill Group
Parliament Group
University Group
Waterfront Group

'Free Fangberry Tart Day'

One of the players in my group is going to love this - and be extremely motivated to be crowned "Miss Fangberry Tart"!

Perhaps the Mites might call themselves the "Mighty Rulers of All We Survey" (or "Mights" for short).

And the kobolds could pick up on this, and call them the "Mights" as in "Mighty Annoying." Except they use ruder words for "Annoying." And for "Mighty."

My dad told us a story about having visited the Soviet Union, possibly in the '70s? He said they didn't have any road signs telling you which road led to where - if you didn't know how to get there, you didn't belong there.

Apparently Ustalav takes it a step further and avoids any obvious roads at all. It makes a paranoid kind of sense - why should they make it easy for foreigners to find their cities?

At the beginning of stolen lands it seems as if they are plunked down at olegs and expected to know what to do from there. They have a charter, but It doesn't mention when or if they should ever contact whom gave them the charter, and by what means. Or what reward they will gain from exploring and mapping the land. Have I missed something?

A few things to keep in mind here:

1) The PCs probably are supposed to report on their progress occasionally, but there's probably no specific schedule.
2) This adventure path intentionally avoids deadlines or specific calendar events, so it doesn't matter if the first chapter takes just a month, or two years+, of game time.
3) As long as the folks at Oleg's know what the PCs are up to, it can be assumed that word of their accomplishments spreads via merchants and other travelers. This is a good thing, as in later chapters it explains how people know to come settle in the PC's kingdom.
4) The PCs patron(s) probably don't want too obvious a connection between themselves and the PCs, to avoid triggering civil war between Rostland and Issia. So spelling out their long-term intentions in the initial charter would be inappropriate, but deciding that the patron(s) gave some verbal hints or off-the-record goals would be appropriate, if the PC receiving those hints seems trustworthy. The patron(s) really do want the PCs to be as independent as possible in accomplishing their goals.

So I would say the PCs should report back some of the Quests they complete (e.g. the various Wanted Posters at Oleg's, as shown on the inside covers), as some of those rewards are probably being offered by the PC's patrons anyway. Being public reward offers, there should be no need for subtlety in making these claims.

They should also send a report when they believe they've eliminated the bandit threat in the area (i.e. after defeating the Stag Lord). Since the charter requires them to map the area, you should probably encourage them to send updates on their progress with exploration, as that will help encourage the players to do the exploration and not just bee-line on any plot hooks they happen to discover. These progress reports would probably be assumed to occur by sending a trusted messenger with a sealed missive - the trusted messenger can be someone the PCs choose from Oleg's reinforcements, or you can have the patron(s) send someone once a month. If the patron(s) sends someone, in order to preserve the PCs' independence, I recommend it be a merchant or other traveler they are told they can trust, rather than someone who is obviously an agent of their patron(s).

The fact that the charter doesn't mention specific rewards is probably intentional - although you may want to say that their patron(s) hinted there could be an opportunity to earn a noble title and/or land grant if they do well.

Does that help?

Alright, so I figured out some of the problems:

Kingmaker requires ALOT of extra book keeping, which we lack general organization. Is there a place I can buy like a Kingmaker kit? Something with the hex maps, ways to mark where we've been, where stuff has been placed, etc? I think that would make it a bit easier. I see GM decks, but don't know what they're used for. Maybe an improvement on bookkeeping would help.

Also, about the xp...so they're halfway through level 7 (unless I move the xp bar up) which puts them pretty high to go through KM 3, which is why I was going to do a custom scenario. Should I just cut xp from KM 3 then, or what? They need to be level 10 I think for KM 3, so Ihave to regulate how much xp they get.

The Kingmaker Player's Guide is a free download that includes a hex-map page template, as well as a couple of other forms for use in tracking the kingdom building aspects of the game.

If you're willing to spend a reasonable amount, you might also consider the print version of the Kingmaker Map Folio. It includes big poster maps for the four map areas of the Stolen Lands. Buy four poster sleeves (my Friendly Local Game Store orders Ultrapro poster sleeves of the appropriate size for me) to protect them, or get them laminated, so your players can use wet-erase transparency markers to track their progress and discoveries.

If you search the forums for Kingmaker Spreadsheets, there are a couple of useful ones out there - the one by Berhagen comes to mind. They help track buildings per city, and do all the calculations of kingdom statistics.

Finally, about XPs. Many DMs here on the boards don't award XPs normally - instead, we simply decide when is an appropriate time for the PCs to level up and announce it when the time comes. This eliminates the need to track XPs entirely, lets you have leveling coincide with the recommended levels of the adventure, and helps avoid players making metagame decisions based on how many XPs they need to level up so they can instead make decisions based on what their characters would actually do in a given situation.