aiglos's page

aiglos wrote:

DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

I was inspired by the Player's Guide to expand one of the prologue adventures into a full adventure.

So here's A Night At Valdemar Manor a prologue adventure for Seven Dooms for Sandpoint.

Nice adventure!

I was wondering if you could do the same for the voyage to Sandpoint for a party that have never been to Sandpoint. It would be great if it was for a 4th Level party who have just completed Rusthenge!

Event based adventures need a little more work than dungeon crawls, but I'll see what I can do.

Thanks!

Sorry, just found it!

I was inspired by the Player's Guide to expand one of the prologue adventures into a full adventure.

So here's A Night At Valdemar Manor a prologue adventure for Seven Dooms for Sandpoint.

Nice adventure!

I was wondering if you could do the same for the voyage to Sandpoint for a party that have never been to Sandpoint. It would be great if it was for a 4th Level party who have just completed Rusthenge!

As in the title!

To be quite honest, if an attempt to get the Kobolds of the Silver Mine to join the PC's nascent kingdom goes badly wrong, a guerilla war by the Kobolds could be distinct possibility!

They learnt to use a shield in basic fighter training. Others must pay a feat for that.

The Bastard sword is a nice weapon, if it would have the same features than longsword and greatsword, costing the same, who then would use any other?
Is a weapon that let's you have a free hand when required (like grabbing), and change to greater damage die with a single action. There must be some tradeoff.

I am not talking about the mechanics of Shield Block, which are fine IF you want to use a Shield. I am talking about the fact that the Feat is USELESS fOR some 80% of Fighters, yes, USELESS!

There was a similar thread to this awhile back, and I may be echoing the sentiments from there, but I believe it boiled down to this: "You can't expect PF2 to play like PF1."

What I mean is, PF2 looks to reward "wide" play - giving players a plethora of options that can be very situationally useful. This means that you won't always get the "most efficent" use out of your choices. You may have feats that don't get used as often as others or have class features that you never touch.

In PF1, it was common to trade away everything that didn't contribute to the one thing you did to the best of your ability. We had alternate racial traits to winnow away the "useless" skill feats, favored classes, and fairly set feat progression. That's not to say that these were bad, but just that you shouldn't expect that same mentality in PF2.

I am not asking PF2 to play like PF1, because it doesn't at all. However I DO ASK IT TO MAKE SOME SENSE! Shield Block will probably NEVER be used by 80% of Fighter Builds, not rarely like other choices of other classes.

I have just bought the Remastered Core Rules & GM's guide and am severely disappointed!

I was hoping for a couple of changes but of course was disappointed!

Why is Shield Block still a starting Feat for a Fighter, when it is only useful if you are not using two handed weapons, two weapons or single handed weapon and free hand?

Likewise Bastard Sword is still the only straight bladed sword or knife that doesn't have Versatile. Also the cost makes no sense either, four times the cost of a long sword or twice the cost of a Great Sword!

Ultimate cities available now on PDF!

Thanks for the comments, James, and if I have seemed to be too critical, I apologise. I really want to run this and it to be a success, as I have played and loved the 1st Edition version.

One final question, If the Kingdom levels up at the same time as the PC's level up, then presumably the Kingdom starts at 4th Level, which is where the PC's will be at the beginning of Book 4?

That other thread is useful for way to make the Kingdom level faster but isn't helpful at all to anyone who actually wants to try and use Events for XP as written.

James Jacob's post basically said just don't worry about Kingdom XP and have the Kingdom match the Party's level.

You are not wrong, so you have a choice:

1. Wait for an official errata to come out, and hope the Kingdom XP are better explained and shown.

2. Use the ideas in the other Thread and try and mitigate the problems in the Kingdom Building rules until your Kingdom gets to 3rd or 4th Level. This may make the Event XP not being properly shown less of a problem.

3. Make up your own Kingdom XP for each event!

Not a great choice, I know!

You might also want to take a look at the thread started prior to your threads, where James Jacombs, the Paizo Creative Director, and a major contributor to the Kingmaker project said the following

James Jacobs wrote:

Perhaps the easiest solution is to simply have the kingdom auto level up to the party's level—this puts the pacing of the game squarely back on the PCs' progression and doesn't "force" a GM to take in-game years off to have the players play through several kingdom turns. Unless, of course, that's something your group is into! :)

That thread already has a lot of discussion about this very issue.

I am not sure what James Jacobs was saying here! To me it seems to be saying that the Kingdom in the Background option is the best one for most people? Completely ignoring Kingdom XP in favour of PC XP doesn't solve the problems in the Kingdom Building rules themselves, and takes PC's back to the Empire in an Afternoon scenario.

I am hoping this answer was just James Jacobs answering Forum posts at the end of a long and difficult week!

Having read and digested the Adventure over the weekend, several things have become clear:

1. By the time the Kingdom gets to the Kundal (Werewolf) encounter, the Kingdom needs to be at least 3rd level, if not 4th. The assumptions in the rest of chapter 4 mean the Kingdom must be 4th level. In fact the assumption throughout the book seems to be that the Kingdom should never drop below one level below the PC's, and should in fact be equal.

2. To get to a 4th level Kingdom will probably need to take at least 5 or more Kingdom years, with the Kingdom XP awards as written, although the Kingdom XP awards from Events are not clear as others have pointed out.

3. The Influence section for Farmland, makes no sense in any shape at all. It effectively makes Farmland and the Agriculture skill, largely useless before the Kingdom gets to 3rd Level!

There are a few solutions I would recommend:

1. Until the Kingdom gets to 4th Level, leftover RP gain 10 Kingdom XP, not 1.

2. Villages have 0 Consumption as the one square mile cleared for them will provide more than enough land to feed them, until the Village turns into a Town.

or

3. The Capital settlement can expand into a town before 3rd Level, but it is the only settlement that can, and must follow the rules for creating towns. This only applies to it becoming a town. It becomes a City or better at its normal Level.

1 and 3 are my recommended solutions, as they speed up the play of the game, will keep players interested in Kingdom and Settlement building, and make Farmland and the Agriculture skill relevant before 3rd Level.

As far as I can make out the 5D4 RP that you get at the beginning of each Kingdom turn are the equivalent of the 50 BP from 1st Edition, representing Labour and Colonists, My problem is that there is no way with the RAW that you start with the other half of the equation, which are the Commodities (Lumber, Ore, Stone, Food and Luxuries) and with no way to purchase any prior to the Command phase of the 1st Kingdom turn (Purchase Commodities). Also, if the PC's start their village at the Stag Lords Fort, the nearest source of Lumber is in an unexplored hex, and Lumber and Food are the two most important commodities at the start.

Next we come to Agriculture, which seems to be a largely useless skill until you get to 3rd Level. Creating Farmland is pointless before 3rd Level when your villages can become towns and benefit from having nearby Farmland. As both Wilderness and Boating can both be used to gather Food , Agriculture is largely useless before 3rd Level.

In terms of starting skills, Trade, Industry, Engineering & Wilderness are imperative. Both Trade and Industry should be Invested which unfortunately means that precludes having the Feudalism or Oligarchy government types. Yeomanry is also precluded because you get Agriculture as a starting skill, which effectively wastes one of your six skill slots. Republic has Politics which is nowhere near as good a skill as Intrigue. This my problem with the Government types as hopefully the players will agree on the form of government that they want their state to be, but the government types may leave them with skills and feats that do not help their preferred government type.

With the RAW, and having run a first year minus events, I estimate it would take 5 campaign years to get to 4th Level, doing nothing but Kingdom turns. In all likelihood the Kingdom will still be 1st level at the end of year 1. After 5 such years the only person still doing the Kingdom building will be the spread sheet fanatic!

Iirc the 1e AP did give you BP, so I'm surprised to hear 2e gives nothing. Seems like an oversight?

Not just an oversight. Without the adventure itself it is difficult to get a full picture, however two things come to mind:

1. There seems to be NOTHING that would seem to make the PC's want to support Restov, apart from one or two of the Backgrounds. Aroden help Restov if the majority of the party are Surtovan Bastards or from an Issian background. No support from Restov except a limp charter, of dubious or spurious legality, which the Surtovans, Ludovkans, Pitax and Mivon are never going to recognise anyway!

2. The Kingdom rules in the PC supplement may scare an awful lot of people off, from using the Kingdom Building rules at all. Playing a full year of Kingdom development may have most groups screaming for an outside trip after about three months of Kingdom building. I estimate that most groups will take about 3-4 three hour sessions to do the first years Kingdom building, assuming there are not major arguments about the direction of the Kingdom. Personally my starting idea for the best mechanical Charter and Government are Conquest and Despotism and that is bound to lead to arguments! The first edition could be time consuming, particularly at later levels, but these rules are far more complicated, and the wrong starting choices could have players quickly going to Kingdom in the background or multiple resets! It is crying out for a Kingdom Building computer program. A simple spread sheet will probably not cut it!

The value in getting the charter from Restov is useful in that it lets you boost two Kingdom abilities, at the cost of a flaw to one. If that doesn't seem valuable enough for you and your players, I would them bonus resource dice or commodities before creating a new government type.

Given the flexibility provided by River Kingdom government is far greater than any other government, I would rein it in a bit. Stick with Loyalty and Two Free boosts, but define the second skill and the Bonus Feat. Governments are basically like Backgrounds in character creation - they should give clearly defined skills and skill feats. Maybe make the second skill proficiency Trade, and the feat Skill Training. That still provides more flexibility, but it's more in line with other Governments.

Apart from the Open Charter, the only one I would use is the Conquest Charter, which unfortunately foreshadows Pitax too much! As far as I can see Culture and its associated skills is largely wasted on a beginning kingdom. Maybe Events will make them important, I do not know!

The reason I made the River Kingdom government so flexible is the River Kingdoms themselves. Rereading the River Kingdoms supplement, I realised that most if not all the existing government types had the wrong ability boosts, skills etc to describe nearly all the River Kingdoms. Only Loyalty and Intrigue seemed to be needed for all of them. I would accept that Defence could be the second skill perhaps. The Bonus feat particularly would vary from River Kingdom to River Kingdom, even if they all had the same government type. Take Pitax and Touvette for instance. Both are Despotisms but neither is remotely well covered by the Despotism government type and are very dissimilar

How about this for another type of government, but only if you choose the OPEN CHARTER:

RIVER KINGDOM

Ability Boosts: Loyalty and two Free Boosts

Skill Proficiencies: Intrigue and one other

Bonus Feat: Any first level one

4th Level. As for getting any resources, there is nothing at either the end of Chapter 3 or the beginning of Chapter 4 about the PCs getting any resources besides the charter. There is also nothing in the appendix with the Kingdom Building rules, either. It looks like the only benefit to having Restov's support is the Charter itself, save for the Open charter.

It would not be unreasonable for you to rule that Restov provides some limited material support, such as 1 of each commodity or one or two bonus resource dice for the first couple of kingdom turns.

So, in all honesty, getting the charter from Restov, is no more use than getting a degree in "Underwater Basket Weaving" by post? Looks like Restov just created another Bandit Kingdom!

Let's hope that Dudemeister is already rewriting the VENTURE CAPITAL rules from the 1st edition Kingmaker.

Out of interest, can somebody who has actually got the PDF of the adventure, tell me if the PC's get anything from the Swordlords of Restov, apart from the Charter to found their kingdom? Also will they be 4th or 5th level by then?

The Rot Grub "The Rules Lawyer" wrote:

So long as I might have the team's ear, did the team have a chance to playtest these rules and see how long it would take to reach 3rd level? And the adventure says to let the players get more kingdom turns to get the kingdom level to at least 2 levels below the party's level (preferably closer even). I was surprised that Farmlands are closed off at the beginning, as that runs counter to my years of playing Civilization-type games.

If you find that it's taking too long to level up the kingdom, feel free to increase the XP rewards—one good way to do so might be to increase the XP granted for leftover RP to be 10 XP per 1 RP. You can also just award large story XP for the PCs as they go, or even just abandon the Kingdom XP system and have it auto level up to match the party's level. That last method is the best solution if you find that your players are frustrated with the rate the kingdom is growing XP.

As for a playtest... not really, alas. I did the best I could with a bit of help here and there, but the development of the entire project was mostly just me.

I can understand the reason for this, but agree with the writer of the post. One twelve mile hex in theory has 124.7 square miles of territory. Even if only 10% was usable for agriculture, that would be the equivalent to 7980 acres, enough for 7980 families in theory to feed themselves! Personally I think the one mile square area of a city grid would be more than enough land to feed a village. Personally I would say that villages should not have a consumption cost as they are generally small enough to feed themselves!

Secondly, the Consumables cost for buildings mean that unless you start in a forest hex, or purchase commodities, even one block of houses is off limits, I must admit that without the full game in front of me, the kingdom building rules in the players guide leave me not hopeful that this will be playable, without a separate computer program for kingdom building. I am hoping the game has some way for the kingdom to start off with at least some commodities?

Orc Butchering Axe!

Any more of this, have really been really enjoying it?!

If it was me as GM, I would say to anybody who wants to dual class, fine, but you dice for your stats not point buy!

Ultimate Campaign changed matters considerably.

Hex improvements, such as mines, sawmills, and quarries are all musts, as they each provide a BP per turn. Sawmills are incredibly cheap at 3BP each, but you can't have them with a farm.

Ultimate Rulership is also useful, because it has further useful variant rules and buildings.

Trade Edicts are also a must. We gained one in the first year and after that BP were never really a problem.

In the end our kingdom took over not only Pitax, but also Mivon, Brevoy and the Sellen Hills of Numeria.

I would be interested to see the play test rules anyway to see how they work! We may be able to make suggestions or even play test them before you actually get to it yourself.

I have played in this campaign twice and GMed it once, and this new edition needs to right a number of wrongs that were done to the original edition.

1/ To reduce page count, significant amounts of useful material / information was left out in favour of stuff that was better covered by Gods of the Inner Sea etc. This material needs to be put back in!

2/ Book 6 never worked properly in any of the games I played in and I left it out of my campaign, in favour of the Brevic civil war. Personally, adding in Realm of the Fellnight Queen and Courts of the Shadow Fey, added much better FEY elements than Nyrissa ever did. Book 6 is crying out for the Brevic civil war to spill over into the Stolen Lands, particularly if the players have taken over Pitax. That makes the PC kingdom, a must have new ally for any side in the Brevic civil war.

3/ Personally this new edition is crying out for not only a new rewrite of the campaign, but a further campaign guide, dealing not only with the kingdom building rules, and suitable downtime activities for the campaign, but also a GM's overview of how the new Bandit Kingdom may affect the River Kingdoms, the Brevic Civil War, Numeria etc. The potential here for good writing is potentially endless.

Further to my earlier post, a few more ideas:

The encounters from the first three books should mostly be about the denizens of the stolen lands being more proactive about internal and external threats.

In the case of book four it should be a full scale invasion of the Tiger Lords into the Hooktongue area, coupled with an expansion of the Boggards in the Slough under Nyrissa's influence. This will pusgh many of the monster encounters from the Slough into the path of the PC's. Lady Quintessa Maray should be Irrovetti's agent in Fort Drelev, and it was her idea to hire mercenaries from Pitaz to "protect" Drelev from the Tiger Lords. Thus Irrovetti's takeover looks much more benign, if it is obvious at all. That way the betrayal at the tournament in Book 5 should be a complete surprise to the PC's. This way the encounters make a lot more sense and are a lot more powerful for PC's who may be riding with small or even large armies.

The Tiger Lords should be and be seen to be a serious threat to both the PC's and Irrovettis kingdoms.

As usual Pennywit has the right ideas:

Encounters should either show how wild the Stolen Lands are OR show how the Stag Lord and Hargulka have taken over like a 10th Century Robber Barons. This would also give a new dimension to the Sword Lords pushing into the Stolen Lands, because there southern border is actually threatened. Personally I would remove the debilitating conditions from the Stag Lord to make him tougher. The Bandits should all be tougher, particularly the Lieutenants, with Akiros being the weak link still. Perhaps there should be prior hints that one of Staggies henchmen is looking to go solo or defect?

Also the friendly fey should probably point out the unusuallness of things to do with Nyrissa, like the Dead Unicorn, even though they do not know who is doing it.

Likewise Hargulka is the Robber Baron in Book 2. Dudemeister covered this best. It will then show the Stolen Lands is not a vacuum but useful real estate that others value. Not one monster per encounter but multiple monsters. Three or four trolls with hobgoblin archer and shaman support will worry PC's and give them an idea of the trouble that Hargulka is. A real monster kingdom!

Similarly Vordakai in Book 3 should be played the same way, with encounters being more along the lines of multiple undead. In some cases enough to really worry even powerful PC's. Fifty or sixty skeletons with Undead Cyclops and an undead mage.

All this will mean bringing in the Army rules in at least three books earlier. Perhaps scaling them for each part of the AP.

I would actually take out the tournament altogether for the reasons Pennywit has said, and instead move it to the Outlaw council in Daggernmark. By that stage the PCs kingdom should certainly been invited and Irrovettis sudden disappearance or non appearance should give a taste of what is to come. Also by then most PC groups will have an east way to get back home quickly, at 13th level.

I agree with ... pretty much all of aiglos's statements, but more importantly, I wanted to point out the one I was slightly less in favor of

aiglos wrote:

16. This might be heresy but make this anniversary edition of Kingmaker for Pathfinder 2nd edition.

Aiglos, you will be happy to hear, this IS a 2nd ed product.

Personally, I will not be switching any games mid stream, so I'd MUCH prefer, a 1st ed copy be made available along side the 2nd ed product, even if it's just a pdf copy.

Actually I only said it because it would make the most commercial sense. Personally I agree with you about having a 1st edition PDF, as I have not been won over by the 2nd edition PC creation!

1. First of all, anything by Dudemeister, Pennywit or Red Kelt!
2. Venture capital is a must!The more Deals with the Devil the better.
3. Anything from the Ultimate series of supplements.
4. Get rid of most of the optional encounters from Book 3 onwards unless they can be better tied into the game.
5. More detail on Brevoy (perhaps whole appendix!) and its reaction to the fledgling kingdoms in the Stolen Lands, and what would happen if the Brevoy and the PC's go to war or the PC's get involved in a civil war in Brevoy.
6. Detail on Mivon and its reaction to the PC's kingdom reaching Mivons northern border.
7. Detail on incorporating Pitax, Mivon and perhaps Brevoy into the PC's kingdom, including BP, unrest etc.
8. Reaction of other River Kingdoms to the PC's kingdom. When do the PC's kingdom (size etc) get invited to the Outlaw council in Daggermark?
9. More on Candlemere Island!
10. Possible tie ins to other Paizo products that could / should be incorporated into Kingmaker (see 9 above!).
11. Much better foreshadowing of the BBEG and greater Fey involvement in the campaign.
12. Much better hex map showing Stolen Lands, Brevoy, Pitax and Mivon, Touvette etc.
13. As the PC's kingdom gets bigger, possible diplomatic approaches, offers of marriage etc from neighbouring states, kingdoms etc. Doubly so if Venture Capital is used.
14. Update Varnhold so that it is actually able to survive as a Kingdom, and give details on Drelev's domain possibly before and after the attack by the Tiger Lords and Pitax.
15. Update the Campaign Traits.
16. This might be heresy but make this anniversary edition of Kingmaker for Pathfinder 2nd edition.

I wish people would use the correct terminology! What you have in Taldor, according to Crystal Fraser, is strict SALIC LAW, whereby a woman can never inherit lands or titles in any form at any time. Considering that the First Prince is a paranoid Misogynist it seems highly unlikely that there would be so many women in Taldor in positions of power if strict Salic Law was applied. What the Senate was debating in the first part of the AP, was in fact the move from strict Salic Law to Primogeniture!

If you don't mind a bit of work, use Ultimate Campaign's rooms from the Downtime section to give you an idea. Give them a discount for it being haunted and perhaps in bad repair.

If the writers are doing the Players Guides in their own free time, then that has to stop! It is always a bad mistake for all concerned as I know from my own business. Give anybody a freebie and they will expect it every time and will want more inevitably. I would rather pay for the Players Guide, knowing that the writer is being properly paid for their contributions and that the product will arrive on time as a result. The mistake is referencing the Guide so heavily at the start of the AP. If it isn't essential then you don't reference it, if it is then you produce it on time, free or not. That is simply good marketing!

But five weeks, Mr Jacobs, even allowing for a couple of weeks for flu, shows nothing more than incompetence by those in charge of this AP.

It strikes me that Paizo are horribly overstretched at the moment, and not just because of the flu. I am giving up on War for the Crown and any other new AP until the new 2nd Edition is published. Hopefully by then Paizo will have got everything sorted out, including the website. If 2nd Edition doesn't turn out very well, there are still plenty of AP's published already. Hopefully the play testing of 2nd edition will limit the problems evident from Starfinder.

Considering that the first scene explicitly mentions the campaign traits as part of the scene, then if they are not sorted by now, then something has been badly mis-planned. Unfortunately it seems that everybody at Paizo seems to be concentrating on the 2nd edition and meanwhile the 1st edition stuff is being mishandled, including this website. They shouldn't have released the first installment if the Players Guide wasn't ready, particularly if the traits are explicitly referenced in the first part. That is bad product management! A delay until the Players Guide was sorted out would have been more acceptable.

When is the PDF available, it doesn't say on the listing, as I really want this one! Very slack.

A couple of us used downtime a lot in one of the non-Kingmaker adventure paths. It was great fun, but on a Kingmaker scale, would make even a Kingdom building fanatic wince! If the players were to "OWN" a town the size of Sandpoint, the daily return would cripple the money per level of any adventure path. Also the farmland part of downtime is absurdly small for the return it brings. Covering just one Kingmaker hex in farmland lots of max size would result in (rough calculation) over 11,000 farmland lots or over 11,000 GP per day! Admittedly that would mean forking out between 3,300,000 and 6,600,000 GP for that hex.

I would actually move the Sootscale complex from the Silver Mine hex and put it under the Sycamore, instead of the Mites. The Silver Mine can be the Droskar Mine complex, including Merlokrep's Kobolds, from the Crown of the Kobold King scenario. The silver mine used to be the Sootscales home until they were kicked out by the other Kobolds.

1. You might want to look at the Kobolds from the Falcons Hollow scenarios as they are very much more interesting than the Sootscales and also potentially that much tougher, although still rated for 2nd level PC's.

2. Personally I would lose the Mites altogether, except as possible encounters, and have two warring Kobold tribes. with the Sootscales getting the worst of it.

This sounds brilliant! I really wish I was part of your gaming group, Pennywit. A few things come to mind however.

1. As Olegs draws in "settlers" it seems to me that enterprising players are going to want to set up establishments (read taverns, inns and shops in Downtime terms) to cater for said "settlers". How are you going to sort that out when the players take over Olegs in Book 2 in Kingdom Building terms?

2. Are you going to go down the "Venture Capital" route between Books 1 & 2 and are you going to change the BP on offer as the players will already have the beginnings of a ready made kingdom? And how are you going to incorporate that in terms of Kingdom building rules?

3. I would make Staggy the "Bloody Huntsman"

4. The Mites will have to be very much stronger, as they are comparatively weak compared with the Kobolds. That way they become a power in the Greenbelt rather than just cannon fodder for the PC's

I have recently bought both Horror Adventures and the Villain Codex on a whim. However both seem to be perfect for Kingmaker.

From the Horror Adventures, I would use a mixture of Dark Fantasy and Gothic Horror to spice up Kingmaker. If you include Carnival of Tears, Realm of the Fellnight Queen, and Courts of the Shadow Fey, and play them for Gothic Horror, it will only add to the fun. Whether you want to make the Stolen Lands cursed by Nyrissa may be a step too far but would be interesting. Perhaps the PC's have to find some cursed items in Book 1 culminating in the Stag Lords Fort to free their part of the Stolen Lands from the Curse. Each part of the Stolen Lands has it's own part of the curse, although Varnhold was already cursed by the presence of Vordacai. Book 3 is perfect for horror as is Book 4 if you make the Tiger Lords particularly vicious and gruesome.

As an example of what you could do, the opening scene at Olegs could actually start as the players arrive at the gates. The bandits are already there and are tasking Svetlana as a slave, because business has been slow and Oleg does not have the money for a few days. The Stag Lord could be a slaver as well as a bandit. I would replace Nugrah the Discrepit with the Experimenter from the Villain Codex to make the Fort even more horrific.

I would also use the Syndicate idea from the Villain codex to show how desperate things have got in Rostland. It would make the start of Book 2 much more interesting! The Regal Court could also be used for Nolski Surtova and his court, with his ambitious sister as the Queen. This would give a whole new political element to the game if you want to include some Brevoy politics.

Glad you like them!

One thing to remember is that those 12 mile hexes are enormous. You could fit the whole of Paris into Oleg's hex with room to spare! The whole of London inside the M25 would fit into five hexes roughly.

I would actually place Falcons Hollow one hex to the west, closer to the Narlmarches, with a road joining the South Rostland Road at Olegs. If you give Falcons Hollow a Lumberyard (Ultimate Rulership, Legendary Games) and control over the nearest three forested Narlmarches hexes, that puts a small power to the north of the PC's kingdom at the start of Books 2. The PC's will know it is evil, but I would suggest that the Lumber Consortium will not expand any further until the PC's kingdom looks like a threat, ie they look like they are going to gobble up the rest of the Narlmarches or get too close to the Lumbar Consortium area.If you use Venture Capital, I would suggest using the offer of large amounts of BP from the Lumbar Consortium so that the PC's kingdom avoids the Narlmarches. Having the Lumbar Consortium be a Surtova affiliate brings the Brevoy problems closer to home, particularly if the PC's kingdom threatens Falcons Hollow. Of course the Lumbar Consortium hates Olegs, because it brings travellers and adventurers into an area it wants to dominate and effectively destroy. Having the bandits putting pressure on Oleg or even trying to destroy his place would all be part of a Consortium plan for the area. You could even have vague references to this found in the Stag Lords Fort.

It has always struck me that the Stolen Lands is supposed to be a dangerous area and yet not much in Book 1 looks that dangerous for four 20 point buy PC's. Having two Kobold tribes would actually make the Kobold threat that much more real, particularly if you forshadow it well. Have the PC's find, on one of their first forays out of Olegs, the results of small skirmish between the two Kobold tribes, a few corpses, except that the Sootscales have come off worst. You could even have the Radish Patch be the site of another skirmish between the two tribes. This makes the Kobolds a real problem. It will also make how the PC's deal with the Sootscales an iinteresting roleplaying problem.

If you integrate all the Falcons Hollow stuff and Down the Blighted Path into the AP, it will not only make the Stolen Lands that much more dangerous but also bring home that it has significant past history and that it hasn't always been so uncivilised. It also brings the Dwarf presence significantly into the area. I could never understand what the Dwarves were doing really at Hargulkas stronghold!

I would make Hargulkas stronghold the entrance to the Darklands, otherwise there seems to be no good reason for the trading post being there otherwise. The rest of the dwarves could have gone to Area G because it is the only other significant landmark and source of shelter in the area.

Hope this gives you further ideas, Sunderstone!

If you are going to go Slow XP for parts 2 & 3, why not use slow XP for part 1 as well, and substitute Falcons Hollow for Oleg's Trading Post. This will make the campaign far more political, as the Lumbar Consortium can be a Surtova or Garess affiliate, and so the PC's kingdom will be stuck between Hargulka and the Lumbar Consortium.

I would place the Droskar Mine in the same hex as the potential gold mine, and the tomb of the Azlanti noble can be on Candlemere. All the encounters in the forest of Dark Moon can be in the Narlmarches. The only change to Falcons Hollow would be to remove the river, and perhaps place Olegs in the south east corner, as a small piece of good independance in the Hollow. You could even have the Lumbar Consortium sponsoring the Stag Lords bandits as a way of keeping other loggers and settlers away from their expansion into the Narlmarches.

Somebody further up mentioned Brevoy and Choral the Conqueror. I would second that!

1. Choral, an ancient wyrm, could take human form for most of the AP. Start as an advisor to Surtova, to properly unite Brevoy and to rescue the Rogarvias from whatever hell, demiplane, they have been sent to.
2. The PC's could be involved in court intrigue, exploration of the mountains between Brevoy and Iobaria, investigating Skywatch to gain aid against Choral etc.
3. Imagine the ending of Book 5 with Choral sitting on the throne of Brevoy, and then morphing into his true dragon self as the PC's arrive to kill him.
4. If the PC's have been clever and neutered many of his plans, then Book 6 could have another invasion from Iobaria, including Cyclops, Giants, Orcs, Centaurs and more Red Dragons.

This would be a great AP to go up all the way to level 20. Particularly if the PC.s start out as the squires, apprentices, lackeys of higher level NPC's in Restov, wishing to stop Surtova from consolidating his hold on Brevoy. What better way to introduce beginning PC's to the corridors of power, without having the power themselves to influence anything but the fringes.

I have got some questions on the Acquired Mutant Template in the Numeria Campaign Guide:

1. Celerity Mutation. The d4 roll, does that mean that you have to roll a d4 after every round of Haste to see when you can use it next, or do you roll d4 when you get the mutation and if you roll a 1 you can use the Haste every round as a swift action etc?

2. Multiple Arms mutation. If a Bloodrager has three or more arms can they wield a shield and not have the penalty on casting spells with somatic components?

3. Vulnerability Deformity. Can a mutant have this multiple times, so they are vulnerable to more than one type of energy? Also do creatures with innate energy resistance or immunity lose that ability AND gain the vulnerability or do they just lose the resistance or immunity to that energy?

Personally, Book 6 is a waste of time unless you heavily forshadow it with more Fey stuff. War with Brevoy would be far more in keeping for the Book 6. Perhaps Choral (Dragon or otherwise) comes back with the rest of House Rogarvia to lay claim to everything. Multiple red dragons should cause PC's an inordinate amount of trouble and destruction.

However, by the end of Book 4, the PC's kingdom should be well over a 100 hexs in size, bigger than Pitax, Mivon and most of the Brevoy Houses. They should be going to the Outlaw Council in Daggermark every year by now, and not just as an observer, and so be exposed to the politics of the River Kingdoms. They should already have met Irrovetti by now, possibly several time before Book 5 gets started.

Once the PC's have taken Pitax more possibilities arise. All of this can be surmised from Paizo publications.

The Blood Gars from Numeria take over the Protectorate of the Black Marquis and piracy on the rivers of the River Kingdoms reaches epidemic proportions, and perhaps Mormouth in Pitax gets sacked by the barbarians. Possible war with Numeria? Hajoth Hakaidos joins the PC kingdom? The PC's perhaps annex the Protectorate?

Razmiran attacks Tymon, Lambreth etc in a mass invasion of conquest. The PC kingdom gets drawn in to a large war in the River Kingdoms, perhaps just as Choral is retaking Brevoy and eyeing up the Stolen Lands.

Perhaps raids from Gralton piss off Galt one too many times, or perhaps the misrulers of Galt cannot stave off famine from ravaging it. Again ravening armies, bigger than Razmirans, invade the River Kingdoms looking for revenge on Gralton and /or regular sources of food. If the latter the PC's kingdom should be a major target.

Basically power politics on a major scale!

On a more PC scale, dead towns like Heibarr, Mosswater or Nystra could provide really interesting problems for PC's where armies would be of little or any use at all. At least two of them have valuable resources as well, Nystra particularly!

How about a Mythic Campaign in which the players have to stop the "Whispering Tyrant" from coming back. Based in Ustalev, Lastwall and the Hold Of Belkzen

It could also be done as a Mythic Kingmaker campaign as above, starting off in the politics of Ustalev, building a nascent kingdom in one of those three states, before a finale of a massive attack from the Orcs of Belkzen at the command of the Whispering Tyrant, with the players only hope to confront him in Gallowspire, to save both their own state, Ustalev and Last Wall.

I see Falcons Hollow growing up around Olegs but the Lumbar Consortium now do not like Olegs independence. So they decide to use Kressles band to put pressure on Oleg, with Kressle doing a bit of moonlighting independently from the Stag Lords business. This where the PC's arrive.

After the PC's have dealt with both Kressle and the Stag Lord and have been given their charter by the Sword Lords, I can see the Lumbar Consortium reacting badly to the PC's new kingdom. Particularly if the PC's have not agreed to allow the Lumbar Consortium all logging rights in the Narlmarches in exchange for extra starting Build Points (Read Bribe!). With the PC's based out of the Stag Lords old fort as recommended in the game, the Lumbar Consortium may set up their own rival 'kingdom' based out of Falcon's Hollow, similar to Dudemeisters 'Monster Kingdom'.

This might be particularly interesting for GMs who want to challenge experienced PCs. With Cold War between the Lumbar Consortium advancing into the Narlmarches and the PCs advancing from the Kamelands. Even more interesting if you have a 'Hargulka Monster Kingdom' further to the south. A really political game from the start, especially if the Lumbar Consortium call in their Surtova allies, if the PC Kingdom becomes too successful!