Nix Tharel's page

Now that My friends and I know the basics, I wanted to start an AP with them. But I'm not sure how APs work.

Are they the same as how the black fang campaign was written in the Gamemasters Guide of the Beginner Box? As in, does it tell you what to do, when what events trigger, what to tell the PCs, etc.? Thanks for your help.

Adventure Path's are a series of 6 books. The bulk of the book contains adventure text. There are typically 2 segments on side topics per book (city/village/location description, new (special) rules for the adventure, description of one of the religions related to the campaign), a few pages of fiction, and some new monsters). There is also a free Players Guide which can be downloaded.

The Adventure Path (and modules) doesn't give as much direction, as Black Fang's Dungeon was meant as an introductory encounter with rules interjected into the text. Instead, you'll need to "understand" the rules well enough to have an overview of what should happen, although the trick to good GMing is knowing how to improvise past parts you don't know very well offhand. (Don't stop the game, just make a note to look it up later, and use a dice roll that seems appropriate.)

The APs/Modules use a similar format as Black Fang's Dungeon. There is a section title, "Block Text" (designed to be read aloud), then text describing to you the true details of what is present that you need to interpret/handle, and then Stat Blocks (or page number references to them) for any combats.

Before a session, you'll have to review the encounters, check the bad guys abilities, and look up what the mean. You'll have to read up on the backstory of critical locations and characters, and be ready to act out NPC's. Key NPC interactions are noted in the APs, but you'll presumably have to take some notes.

1) The APs/Modules use more rules than the Beginner Box. The 'Open' part of the Pathfinder Rules are available for free at: http://paizo.com/prd/. Having a physical copy of the Core Rulebook at the table is very nice, and you should ensure that all of your players have quick access to the text of any rules they use.
2) A module might be a better transition piece. Search for Paizo's Free RPG Day modules for a short version, but The Dragon's Demand might be good. However, APs start with brand new characters are meant as a full campaign. When you start an AP, you start with new characters. (Modules are not meant as a full campaign, are more of a "short story".)
3) Also note that a new AP is starting right now. If you want to subscribe through Paizo, now would be the best time for the next 6 months. See Mummy's Mask.
4) These message boards connect your to a wonderful community. If you have questions, need advice, or even want to know how other GMs handled something, this is a good place for all of that.

I would like to suggest (where sensible) a direct PDF download, as opposed to ZIP files, so that one could directly load my PDFs into iBooks on iOS devices. (I recognize that one can use 3rd party utilities to unzip the file, but I find this to be buggy at times, especially with the large hardcovers.)

An alternate suggestion along similar lines would be an App connected to my Paizo Downloads, which could handle the PDF downloads.

Are there really large ratmen living in the sewers of Germany seeking to undermine its government or is that all a myth? If were to take a vacation to said country, what city would most likely harbor such vermin?

It is a well known myth that the baby crocodiles were flushed down into the sewers, grew up, and ate all the ratmen. I cannot say what the crocodile-men are up to.

I am getting married in the next week and then honeymooning in St Lucia. So my posting will be intermediate to say the least until November 6th.

Congratulations. Be sure to take some time to simply look around and build memories. You're going to get pulled in many different directions at once, so you need to make sure you give yourself a chance to stop and absorb the day.

Be sure to leave some directions/motivations for Kalis. For the most part, I just let the group ask the missing player's character to help as out needed.

And when you get back, you can fill us on what's it's like to be on a tropical island. ;)

If you never say what happened to Aroden, or even provide sufficient clues to guess, how is that distinguishable from you not knowing what happened to him?

Have you ever seen a series which has very good subplots, leaving some things unsaid but with hints everywhere? And then one day, a (presumably new) writer interjects something which is completely contrary to the previously provided details?

Upholding the internal consistency of the story is what separates great works from good works. As Mr. Jacobs knows what is going on, he knows what minor details other writers might create that should be rejected from becoming canon.

Edit: Also read Cthulhudrew's post, Mr. Jacob touches upon his purpose there.

As for clues, there are many. It would be a poor mystery without clues.

When my PC's are in town or civilization, I can think of good side-conflicts to build up around the story, but I am having a hard time of thinking of how to find conflict (to be built into plot points) for druids (or possibly fey) which live their day-to-day life in the forest.

Does anyone have any resources they can recommend for ideas? (RPG supplements, fiction, notes, etc.)

Specifically, I am working with the Fangwood Forest in Nirmathas, but I could adapt (or take inspiration from) something else.

Personally, I am pleased that Paizo has included locations which aren't fully expanded, as it gives them room to grow the world with details of places as they go forward. (In the 3.5 main setting book, it was disappointing to look for cities mentioned in modules or adventure paths, only to find they weren't on the map.)

As I said in my review they shouldn't have called it a campaign setting they should have called it an outline of a campaign setting or "The Inner sea fill in the blanks campaign setting"

This (version) of the book doesn't contain "Campaign Setting" in the title, nor does it promise to be a definitive reference. Rather, the text "Campaign Setting" is part of the product line. I can see that this isn't a clear distinction, especially if your did not order through the Paizo web store. It should be noted that there are other books in the Campaign Setting line which do a close detailing of cities/areas.

I would note that an "outline" is essentially what Paizo has advertised the book as. The back-of-the-book text (which is also on the product page) explicitly states that the book contains "gazetteers," thus containing directories or indexes for the geography rather than detailed location backgrounds.

Its a pretty book, I just wish it was more substance.

It would be difficult to add more material without adding more pages, which would increase the price. To that end, there are many other products under the Campaign Setting line which do add more substance, (adding to the total pages you are buying, but also increasing the cost).

Well I appreciate what they are trying to do, but as an adult with a job and a life, I only have limited time to prepare weekly adventures for my group and the reason I bought the campaign setting was so I could work on the adventures, not fill in a world.

I think that perhaps your best course of action would be to ask the boards about what your situation is and what it is you are looking to do. I would guess you are location for a location based adventuring setup, but I'm not sure what kind of plot style (open "sandbox" vs. closed "railroad") you want.

Going to be starting up a Kingmaker game here pretty soon and I've read through this entire thread. One of the things that I really want to do for my players is make the hexagon map and then allow them to glue the hexagons on as they successfully explore. To me, this really emphasizes the exploration and gives the PCs a sense of achievement.

So, my question is, I bought the book from my FLGS and didn't download the PDF. Is there any good way to get a copy of the map short of trying to scan the page out of the book?

Thanks

You might consider the Pathfinder Chronicles: Kingmaker Poster Map Folio. If I recall correctly, this had the "Player Maps," with only major cities marked. The 4 area hex maps are a bit... sparse in comparison to the AP version for the GM, but this might be what you are looking for. (For having 4 maps of empty terrain, I did not fully appreciate this product until I saw the print version.)

The physical version is a 4 page poster map, which means the individual hexes are roughly twice as large in comparison the hexes in the players guide or in the AP itself. It would also be a shame to cut it up into pieces, though I could see covering individual hexes in order to reveal them through exploration process.

The PDF version might offer some other options, if you have some skills with image editing.

--Nix