vikingson's page

You do realise that "goals of societal changes" are triggers for many, and even as much as listing a sidebar would cause any discussion about this AP quickly descend into "why Paizo is shoving their political agenda down my throat?".

You do realize that variable goals of societal change does not mean "forced SJW messages" or "hardcore conservative dogma" ?

Especially for people who are actually from another continent ?

let me see :

- taxation of the middleclass versus noble classes
- land ownership for small landholders/peasants
- Dilution/concentration of noble houses by abolishing titles/creating new ones
- enfranchisement for regional rule with local parliaments/councils Y/N
- rework of Taldorian bureaucracy - say based on merit, seniority or purchase of title
- privatization of tax-enforcement Y/N/specific model
- peace/war with neighbouring states
- tradepacts, opening of trade negotiations
- changes of the legislative system, authorities involved or legal punishment Y/N/specific model
- permission of specific religions/cults/faiths or their exclusion from the borders of Taldor
- regulation of the working week. Y/N/specific model
- legality of bloodsports Y/N/specific model
- structure of the military / navy
all of 10 minutes work
edited : spelling

Actually? I'd be willing to go one further. And this works whether or not the Ravens are secretive.

Have a group of Thrunites waiting in the wings. If the PCs do not show at the end of Book 2? Barzillai has his team of lackeys step forward and accept the honor and claim full responsibility. Have them then be visible several times in "keeping the peace" and the like while declaring they are doing it in Asmodeous' name.

Now the PCs have a dilemma. If they remain in the shadows, Thrune will be claiming their actions for himself. It will damage the rebellion. If they come out of hiding? It plays into Thrune's hands once more as now he has a target.

Please note, I freely admit to being evil. ;)

Sound's like ... ahem.... hogwash. The commoners claiming to be the Silver Ravens to "get some free loot(ahem reward)" are lying about their identity in public,and hence end up possibly dead for their trickery. Unless the PCs intentionally use some people as decoys.

Unless you can plausibly reason that taking gifts from local rulers commonly leads to sudden unexpected death through assassination you are willfully penalizing the players for being careful and not playing the scene as "intended". Not my idea of a fair and fun game.

Wow, it was actually pretty easy destroy it, we got the Alchemist into the powder stores and he blew it up, i'm guessing that was not supposed to happen and the Dominator was not played correctly.

No, not really played as written - methinks, the Dominator is not originally armed with Guns at all....no powder magazine.

Gunpowder-magazines are - just btw - usually well guarded (and well-locked outside battle) and to see 4-6 players overwhelming a full ship's crew to gain access to the magazine ?

Also - did the Alchemist (and everyone else) escape the explosion ? A ship blowing up will deposit its timbers anywhere and everywhere within a few hundred yards... the masttop of L'Orient which blew up at Aboukir was found on a British man-o- war 1500' down the line

selfless *bump* ^^

Maybe take a look at the Legacy of Fire AP (And some NPCs of RotR, part 1) , where there actually are some lamshtuan worshippers and some hints as to kust how the proceed (regarding fleshwarping) in their cultish ways.

Generally : if they can get away with it, the Grindylows will attempt to create new monstrous mothers, by impregnating females with more revulsive bloodlines (which might make the payers fidget or revolted, depending upon temper. It should certainly affect female NPCs ). Or even wish for the party's females to participate in the "act of creation". Tripanation for gaining the Third Eye i also is a fun staple of the cult (and I had wondered why it was not practised on the Grindylow Queen, as a priest)

Also, if the players sail into smaller harbours or coastal places, the Grindylows might see this as wonderful opportunity to raise some hell, capture more viable females and cause general chaos (and demonstrate how the players as their mighty guardians support them !).

Overall : many females on board (Rosie, Sandara etc.) should be more than spooked (or as in the case of Besmara, even antagonized) , since the Lamashtuans will basically regard them as breeeding mares or whatever term you use. This may very well lead to mutiny or sailing of with the unlucky ship while the characters are onshore . Hopefully on some unsettled and dangerous island.

Lamashtu's cults are pretty proactive, and will try to enact their ways of seeing the world on others. Which might not be to many females liking. Unless they are utterly and raving mad. Nevermind that many people do not really like strange religions intruding on their life.

I think to often weird exceptionalism is used as a crutch. It it intended to show how "creative" someone is, when in fact I think it demonstrates the opposite.

Wanting to play something strange right out of the gate with no context is a big red flag to me.

@trying to keep this on the original track (yeah, probably hopeless !)

Besides breaking possible campaign parameters, has anyone ever considered that other players actually have to play alongside your character (and supposedly have fun too ) ?
Their concept of "adequate" "reasonable" or "cute" might arguably vary.

Nevermind that non-powergaming exotics commonly are a cheap grasp for the social limelight e.g. "see how cute I am" or watch me, deeply awed, looking awesome !" (or totally avoiding all roleplaying scenes, by creeping in the shadows for being "unaccepted" by faux-medieval society), but not necessarily for an overall enjoyment at the table.

personally : i'd like to see the awakenend sentient mud-geyser in a scene involving the local powers court^^ (once)

Depends on the orc village? Its not impossible there's an odd family out or an adopted member. Heck, its a trait. Its not that unreasonable. In any game I run its unreasonable that anything is 100%. The evil society is 100% NE, and the orc village isn't 100% orc(they might have a goblin!).

There doesn't have to be sweeping changes unless the orcs have a 'we eat all elves' policy or something.

Oh yeah let's play stochastics. Nothing is 100%. But the extremely minuscule chance that there may be life in the corona of a star, does not mean it has to be permitted in a campaign. There is a point where stochastic improbabilty is not deemed relevant anymore even in hard science..

Because Creativity and long-term viability are two entirely different concepts.

And what is fine for the player to argue - is much more work for the GM to implement.
Nevermind it setting a precedent for the next utterly absurd character concept someone wants to implement ("yeah, you allowed the half-drider, now please allow me my orca-lycanthrope Half-giant Oread... *pretty please") .
Friend of mine build an entire subcontinent's racial structure and realms, invented a sub-race and re-worked several dieties to implement such a character. Say, around 30 man hours of work
Yes, he was pretty smitten with the player.

Yet, as he admits, nowadays, the character was the same typecast, skillset, powers qnd personality she has always been playing, so basically she could have cloned her old character(s), repainted, restoried, re-explained. Neither the player nor the world profited.

The player just needed something "special", e.g. fancy racial clothing, for vanity's sake.

The GM spend 30 hours to rework his world for it.

Besides :
For myself IMHO, what makes a character interesting is how it is played, not what a board thinks makes it more powerful or "flavour of the moment", how much of an odd-ball menagerie it is and how positively broken the rules for it are. Just my take.

35a Wake me up : something is following the ship, its darker shadow being visible mostly at night in the luminiescence of the ship's wake.... Was that glance at tentcle or barbed fins ? Are those perhaps huge and luminscient eyes reflecting the light from the taffrail lanterns ?
Unfortunately...now something has happened to the lower pintel/pinnion of the rudder. So who is going to volunteer and check from below the surface ?

Basically it is : Join the gang or fight the gang. The Shackles being their turf and looking at the power level of Harrigan, one might assume the other pirate lords having a similar staff of competent retainers.

Which makes the whole thing a very onesided affair

some "unnatural" stuff from our campaign

Flatbottom Fish :
Any archipelagoe with a sandy lagoon. Crew had heard of "stinger" island, and also heard of some ships stranded - presumably with cargo. Island was reportedly a "ship sinker", and wrecks could be observed from outside the encircling reef.
Sandy bottom of the bay contained dozens of Stingrays though (up to "huge" size) which made swimming or paddling through the shallow waterway very dangerous indeed, with huge stingers rammed straight through the dinghy's bottom when they disturbed the ever-shifting rays who objected at the disturbance.

Ship of Worms :
Taking some inspiration from Age of Worms, this ship was both pretty rotten, sitting in the lee of an unnamed island. Decks had plenty of opportunity of dropping people to the hold below... which was filled with rot grubs and the remains of several previous pirates and the load of metal the ship had carried. Basically a one trick pony, though, but having the PCs drop through the deck into a hold filled with squirming maggots... priceless.

"Nominal Island"....
remainders of a smaller volcanoe since sunk beneath the waves, close to Drakhar Island. Posing a significant risk since only the reef remained, offering a good chance to rip out the keel and planking, depending upon time and tide. Sunken temple spotted in the deths, as yet unexplored (once a shrine to Drakhar, now populated by Deep Ones ?)
Position got noted down with the express idea of drawing any overwhelming force towards the reef and use it as a shipsinker.

Dinosaur cliffs :
Cavalier (Half Orc) in Group wanted a Pteranodon as a mount, mut got wary at some reports about Raptor Island. Player looked for any pinnacles or cliffs nearby where Ptenarodons might lair. Having dive-boming Petaronods shredding through their rigging and plunging onto deck to pick up crew... another priceless moment. very popular mount came off this though, as "Spotty" the mount has become one of the keenest eyes on the crew and is considered the RGDS (Rapid Gnome-Deployment System )

As someone who ran this AP all the way through with three humans and a half-elf, I want to express my appreciation for avoiding the 'exotic race mania' that seems to have infected pretty much everyone else. I can't even imagine some of these menageries/floating zoo's on the high seas...

What's exotic in some place like the Shackles ?

And having played through this AP with a night-blind Halfling, I can only state that frequent fights in the dark (say in AP#2 and AP#4) are a real bother, and I understand people don't like that disadvantage at all- picking half-whatevers.

I always wondered if anyone ever saw the odd connection to Dragon Age (I + II )

isabela...

Captain of a pirate ship ? General looks ? right..... Her early abductor's vessel named "Dragon's Dishonour" ?

Besides she is already a dig on "Cutthroat Island" with the tattoed-to-skin map.

I agree. GM's become better by being forced to improvise... It's why I always recommend taking whatever the players throw at you... If they're all in agreement about what they want to play and you want to be a gm.... GM what they want to play... Even if it's not what you want to play... Like Kirth says. Take it as a chance to stretch your limits, step out of your comfort zone and see if you can...

hmm, seems to me like a limited (and possibly self-serving - pardon me for being a cynic ?) view. I have played in some "free-forming" campaigns, which usually turned into straight chaos after a couple of sessions, because there was neither a straight or consistent plot and every player was chasing their individually different but incompatible goals. Yes as a player I got some inspiration that way, but usually the whole thing turned mostly to an individualistic " I trump you !" slugfest.

As for "GM's get better"... yeah only within a limited scope. GMs usually are better at improvisiing within a scene, but not through fiddling with the basic (and sensible) superstructure of the world.

One might also try to tae into account that there ARE players who actually prefer a structured setting. Sometimes they even have a long term story setup for their character, and really mind whether someone wrecks the game for them because the GM is "forcefully demanded" to change his tune and allow another player more elbow space and breaking of ingame fundamentals

They might even be sitting right beside you. Or in the next group you join.

Last but not least, as a player, you usually do have less insights in why some stuff in a campaign runs "this" way, and not in another.

Famous example from an old friends group : Player watched an NPC do something incredible and immediately started to protest "that said action" was impossible.
GM just smiled and repeated what they had seen.
Player wanted, nigh insisted, to do the same, GM refused and claimed that it was impossible by the rules as set for the campaign. Player quoted "rules apply to everyone"... Big row developed, broke the until then quite legendary campaign. The group never played again.
GM told me "the impossibility of said action basically was THE clue for the players that they were watching an illusion".... *shrug*

So, at times, trust your GM that his concept for the campaign (which might include NO ELVES or NO KITSUNE ) has some merit, and that forbidding you your inspired whims may have some long-lasting benefits ?

Anyone comes seeking revenge they will have a hard time of it if you are holed up within (its the stairs inside that give the advantage, 2 ways in through the frontdoor and up a small ladder or through the roof, once you play out the assault you relise how effctive it is, The buccaneers in my game just ended up as piles of bodeis at the base of the ladder).

Well someone might just decide to

the whole "the tower is hard to crack" scenario is just nonsense from a more realistic point of view *shrug*

I need a way to keep the adventure on track and am having some issues. Can anyone help? I don't really know what to do here. I think I might have screwed myself.

Yes, you might very well have. Killing the initial premise, before the AP even stated is a bad thing.

You may also have noted that Harrigan dotes on Master Plugg and regards him as something like a son... so I find it hard to believe that Plugg gets demoted, and the players raised in his stead. After the PCs have killed 5 more pirates (which Harrigan can ill affod to lose atthat moment ).....

Why Harrigan actually "likes" them for it... well your call. IMHO : Harrigan goes into *chop chop* mode, settles the affair, recruits some other people in Port Peril and picks up two new PCs from a drifting raft a few days later ?

Owlbear will easily be beaten by most main-line warrior oriented opponents, due to his miserable AC. Our dwarfish Barbarian beat him within an inch of his life on round 3 grabbing a windlass spar and battering him with that two handed weapon (and power attack).
The point to me was : he should be beaten, but spared. teaching them that some mercy will get them allies.

I've been working on this.

Military ships solve the fireball problem by having hoardings they throw up along the entire length of both decks. The front facing is covered in cloth or some such and soaked through with sea water prior to combat. Thus the crew is in cover during most of the approach, firing arabalest and hand gonnes through covered ports.

Right.... Let me offer some criticism or pointed questions :

Now, how does anyone cover up the exposed rigging (sails, hempen-ropes covered with tar or oils for conservation, dried out wood )? Burning cordage, sails and spars dropping onto the deck will readily turn stuff into buring stuff (especially if the crew is carrying rockets etc^^). And without rigging.. not much movement anymore ?

Also putting up a (wet !) tent on deck will
a) make sailing like actually trimming the sails, shifting the sheets and other "need to see the rigging" work nigh impossible. Where is our topsail at ? Why are we drifting to leeward ?
b) will massively affect the trim and sailing ability of any ship. Try setting a bimini sail in any kind of wind beyond Beaufort 3 ?
c) not really helpful if anyone is smart enough to "bomb" the bowsprite with its sails and rigging, and has the flames racing backwards through the ship. Which again, is likely a massive pyre with dry wood, lots of tar and oakum caulkings, lacquered wood.... Same goes for masttops.

Wooden ships will burn, if you keep angling that way.....

Catapults and siege engines are used to make high angle attacks and are fitted out with all kinds of exotic munitions - fire, explosive, bolts that summon critters. Other kinds of torsion weapons are used. A Polybolos is a variation on a ballista that uses a chain drive attached to a windlass to create a semi automatic ballista. The windlass is operated constantly by several men and bolts are fed in while the weapon recharges. The rate of fire is considerable. ...

uhh, Mythbusters ? A Polybolos is difficult to maintain, difficult to build (accuracy issues for the chainlink, mechanism; Modern cutting tools and metalworking is a 18th-19th century invention : required and made possible by steam engines) , and keep a huge supply of ballista bolts ready (many of those fired will drop in the sea, others will be bend and splintered ). 10gp each, 10 pounds each. Stocking up on those will seriously carve into one's plunder. If anyone actually takes stock of the ammunition.... It is also doubtful if an actual Polybolos was build befor ethe 19th century.

As a hint for "swarm-missiles" try hurling rotgrubs in slabs of meat^^ Aquatic snakes suspended in Saltwater (funneled in just before firing) should also work well. But an amphora filled with wax or strong alcohol with a fuse is far more efficient (even if the ship is fireproof, usually the crew is not !). And there we are, back at burning things btw, how much does special catapult ammunition cost ? In comparison to scrolls....

Rockets are also used. IRL military rockets have been in use continually for more than a thousand years. In Golarion various sizes are utlized and many ships that can...

You are hopefully aware that "Military rockets" have neither been accurate enough, nevermind sufficiently destructive , for any kind of - other than morale - battlefield use until WW II ? Since you are quoting RL.

Also : rockets' firetrails (aka "backblast") is a fantastically efficient way to set fire to your own vessel.

And I just don't see what all of these stuff will do, that a couple of cheaply produced Fireball scrolls cannot top ? In an emergency substitute Acid for Fire. Cover you ship with Silent Images or better Illusions

Skull and Shackles : Player character ship and enemy merchant vessel utterly becalmed on the morning after a long "through the night" chase. No wind, no nothing. Both ships keep hurling stones until my PCs' group runs out of stones and start with rowing their cutter. The merchant, keeps on firing, hoping to cripple the pirate vessel, finally resorting to hurling wine-filled amphora with their onager, (heavy pottery, an amphora is^^). They start hitting the pirates with a couple of them, spilling "fluid red stuff" everywhere.

1st player : "What the He*l are they hurling at us ?"
2nd player (deadpan) . "Grapeshot !"

When plundering the selfsame merchant
3rd player :"There is no more wine aboard ?"
2nd player : "Oh Gods, we were beaten to the punch...."

Dealing with their fence, a longlegged, rabbit-eared tiefling (DON'T ask )
1st player : "Ahhh, there's the plunder bunny !"

Final battle (changed finale) against an avatar of Dagon

2nd player (uses Harrow, draws "the Fiend") : "Oh, this appears to be a Call from Cthulhu !"
3rd player : "We do NOT accept Calls from Cthulhu !"
2nd player : "F'taghn ?"

Skulls and Shackles, spoilerish,

I was always under the impression that under most circumstances that sails were not reliable enough to generate sufficient speed to ram other ships. There speed was better over the distance against galleys because the wind does not tire but in battle under short periods galleys could get up enough speed to do some real damage provided they have a ram. This method would be likely obsolete considering that the historical analog of the AP is age of sail not ancient Greece.

Sailing speed actually is higher than rowing speed. No galey I heard off could go to speeds of 12+ knots, which a good man-o-war could do. Both both types of vessel are limited through hydrodanamics according to the length of waterline anyways - no gliding/surfing effects on either.

Nevermind the Mediterranean Sea being (perhaps the ultimate stomping ground of galleys) very calm and low-wind in the summer months so rowing was a good alternative in an emergency.

Plus, ramming with raised masts, an extended bowsprite and all the rigging up being very dangerous for the rigging (which if the vessel was brought to a dead stop could/would simply topple forward ). Soooo real danger there for the ramming ship as well.

If feels like the Caribbean but it functions like Madagascar. A far a way pirate port that forces foreign navies to spend the cash to sail around the horn of Africa before getting close.

Don't work at home ? that might prove more difficult for smaller ships ( will they carry enough foodstuff for the crew ? ).... I'd differentiate between small scale local brigands robbing the coastal trade, and larger crew sailing afar and around half a continent on bigger ships.

Although even the later might attack small coasters simply to stock up on provisions. The man problem with the Shackles is, that the region is too small to not simply avoid by sailing around it. No real enforced gaps like north of Cuba along the Floridan coast, the narrow straits in the Windward Isles or between Cuba and Hispaniola whereone could reasonably lurk to catch the merchant trait forced through this gaps.

With the Shackles : sail west for 300 miles (easily done) and be far out in open offshore waters... where even a slow merchant will be hard to catch. The geography is just suboptimal.

But still, it begs the question whether any player will actually wonder about the traderoutes or simply immerse oneself in being piratish....

As they hid in the shadows, they realized that the Dominator had been put on full alert and had begin off-loading marines on the shore. They deduced (correctly) that the marines had mistaken them for DewClaw pirates who had escaped the previous battle and were now out looking for revenge. The marines had not yet spotted the PC's ship ("The Moist Wench") and had begun searching the nearby woods for the pirates who murdered their commander.

After healing themselves and preparing for the battle ahead (though they did consider escaping, briefly), they rowed back to the shore where the marines had off-loaded. They kept their distance, hiding in the shadows. The PC's captain took out a wand of summon nature's ally II and summoned a pair of air elementals. He then commanded the elementals to ambush the sixteen marines who had been left to guard the four landing boats. The air elementals easily whisked up all the heavily armored marines and plopped them into the river where they all drowned. By the time the other 42 marines and 4 officers got back to investigate the screams, their longboats had been sunk, leaving them stranded on the shore.

Meanwhile, the PCs turned their wand against the Dominator, ordering air elementals to drown everyone in armor. During the chaos, they themselves boarded the ship and traded blows with the remaining Chelish navymen and their officers.

Even with the air elementals, it was a long drawn out battle. Part way through, the Dominator's captain jumped down from the crow's nest, using her dagger to tear the sail and soften her fall onto a cross-beam high above the deck, just above the PC Boatswain's head (which she nearly removed with a swipe of her rapier). The Boatswain dropped from the rigging a few feet, hooking her legs in the ropes to hang upside down and give herself some distance from the new adversary (essentially a 5-foot step with her racial climb speed) before taking a shot with her pistol, grazing the enemy captain's left breast. Much to her surprise, the swordswoman stepped off the cross beam and kicked upwards to connect to the bottom, essentially standing upside down on the crossbeam in defianc

wand of summon monster II : summons small air elementals. Which last for 3-5 rounds (conceivably, or is that an atypically high-leveled wand ?). Small air elementals (2HD) can do a whirlwind for one round each, which can only pick up tiny objects (one step smaller than the air-elemental ).

Frankly I have no feasible idea how two small air elementals can defeat 16 chelish marines in the few rounds they last. I am not even talking about the lamentably misinformed "toss". Or 16 Chelish marines not hearing them (close range for the wand) captain using his wand and reacting to it.. say with a nice charge, be it even to grapple. Or not spotting them.

Really ?

As for the crew of the Dominator : have you had a look at what a Chelish man-o-war commonly has aboard in the way of firepower, magical and otherwise, say like the fury in AP#6 ? Because one only attacks those ships then and so lately in the AP, because they are MAJOR obstacles to pirate survival. A "normal" Chelish officer around that is an 8th level fighter, and I guess the Dominator has at least three lieutenants, plus a master etc etc etc.... some couple of boatswains, perhaps a commander of marines never even talk about someone handling the guns (guncaptain) or a capable commander/captain (it looks like high level ranks in the Chelish navy are filled with Asmodian inquisitor/clerics or possibly other hellknights ?). No healer (cleric?) aboard or a bard (drummer)? Nevermind some access to devils, perhaps ?

Or simply : salvoes by muskets and crossbows... dozens of projectiles all at once, especially nice once everyone is flatfooted according to the standard naval combat rules when boarding or climbing the Dominator's sides.... or paddling away, seated in a rowboat ? Cannonball (salvo or even worse grapeshot ) to the longboat = a number of swimming pirates.

Against the full force of that, I see very little chance of a mid-level group around 6th level surviving.
*shrug* I take that story with a large pinch of salt

Last : Fact from real life : mastheads will easily be spotted over the treetops near a coast (usually very much foreshortened treetops due to winds and gales). Sight/visibility is possible for miles. So... noone spotted the PCs ship ?

I look forward to the Nmeria AP but definitely as a "season to taste", instead of going the world-changing route.

So true. Although my main hope for "Iron Gods" will be that it does not turn too cyberpunkish, but keeps a japano-fantasy touch ( perhaps a light one, where it comes to the world in general ), and satisfies the itch of many of the forumregulars,.

PS I shall hide my yithian lightning gun/staff of lightning

Laithoron...thanks. Most likely the players will think in the line of making the rudder not operational at all :)

Classic trick (European pirates) was to disable the rudder by soldering the pivots/hinges with hot lead/tin (pretty silent). Or ram/batter metal wedges into the gap between the rudder and the sternpost (muc louder, but faster.

Best way - sonic attack spell with an AoE-effect (much harder to find without resorting to the 3.5E "Spell Compendium")

So why is "Desert adventure with dungeon crawls" so much more appealing to you than "Pirate adventure with dungeon crawls"?

Dungeons and Tombs in the desert ? Fits the genre ! Desert - Pyramids - nefarious traps and curses ! Dark caves, buried treasures and secret doors ! The lost palaces of the once mighty genies ? there goes "the Mummy", "Thousand and One Night" and a myriad of desert+ doom stories !

Well if they did only pirate APs, some dungeoncrawling might be welcome, but half of the only existing one ?

@J.Price Noted, the rest of the non-mummy stuff got spoilerised.

Capcom seems to be getting ready to make a game about it.

Help ! We are now all officially doomed....

Friend downplayed the swarms deadliness (group only had a Wind oracle as healer, so neither positive channels, nor particularly strong healing power ), by reducing the "bleed" damage to bleed-1. which made them less "instant killers" (3rd level chars, with a bleed-6 or even bleed-4 on them.... ouch !!!! )

He also added a distinct hum to the swarms (Perception DC12-15 I believe, he mused about a low number so, distance would not totally eat up the chance of the PCs being forewarned) , which usually scared the players' off very effectively.

A wand of Burning Hands should be slightly higher level, otherwise a meagre 1D4 (1st level spell, 1st level caster level) might be more of an insult then a real help^^

@vikingson,

Having a cohesive story and aliens aren't mutually exclusive. You can have a well-done story that involves more "gonzo" things. Reign of Winter is a good example of this, especially looking at the ratings so far of the two off-planet adventures. Both have great plotlines and the adventures are well made. As for the classic nature of dungeon delving, that's YOUR opinion on dungeon delving being lazy. There are many people that love going through dungeons and find Tomb of Horrors and Rappan Athuk to be well-made classics that they enjoy playing. Not to mention that Shattered Star has very positive reviews and is much more than just simple dungeon delving.

They are "lazy" in the sense of nothing much really needs to be done around them and they do regularly resolve in a pretty linear fashion. As opposed to an open-Sandbox, which is far harder to design access-wise to keep the players in level-appropriate areas. Dungeons are places where monsters for hacking can almost always be found.

To be honest, considering how many people speak highly of those adventures and the ratings they get, I'd reckon to bet that you and your group are in the minority of hating them.

Lol, there is a proverb that millions of flies speak highly of fecal matter, which does NOT it make more appealing. Millions of people listen to weird types of music... you see my point ? Quantity - even if there allegedly is any, does not mean better. And even being in the minority has it's appeal... the world-wide minority can well be a local majority ?

There are hundreds of people who enjoy "Dungeonquest" "Heroquest" and/or "Descent" (and the many games akin to them)... but none of them are long- or mid-term roleplayers. But they will speak highly of the boardgame. There is IMHO no depth of story or ongoing plot to a dungeon, there is the tactical choice of killing, but very little interaction, no playing of a role and long-term investment into anything but a more optimized character ?
My experience I take from visiting half a dozen conventions a year, hanging around friendly local game stores for the last twenty years and partaking in games there, or sharing a quick drink. Maybe its a local thing. I don't consider that as a viable transregional scientific study.
But what exactly are you basing your assumptions on ?
Simply put, players playing Pathfinder and Co in a purely tactical way, commonly get kicked/turned away from groups I know, hear off, debate about in forums or run by more or less distant friends of mine after a short while. *shrug* "How was the game?" "Quite good, since our 'boardgamer'alchemist did not show up.". Duh....

And I daresay that people get an adventure not because they are classic, but because they want a good story that the players and GM can enjoy. I'd dare say that is how you actually get a classic.

Players consider adventures classic because they recall them. Nobody I ever met finished Tomb of Horrors, but everyone remembers it. It has become a trope - and be it from other people's stories.

Basically, what I'm getting from you is that you have an opinion about how adventures should be and any adventure that deviates from that, no matter how well written, is of poor quality to you and any person that wants to see something different is just a jaded, immature player.

I could say the same about you. Differing points of view. the problem being.. paizo's publishing schedule has lately diverged more to your interest of published adventure. While in "the beginning" they might have appealed far more to my take

And "jaded + immature" - sort of contradictory. Make up your mind ?

I get the feeling that you've never actually read these adventure paths (Shattered Star and Reign of Winter) and are simply making assumptions based on what you've heard and your own misconceptions. I'd suggest actually reading the adventures before judging them and belittling those that want something different from the standard.

Sorry, I read them intensely but without much joy, partially because I had a bad accident in winter and was happy to have the PDF's on my tablet... although, since I cancelled my subscription on issue 3 of Reign of Winter, I have only had access to a friend's printed copies to read about it. "Rasputin must Die"... omg, yes I do have it on my desk at home.

Anyone believes one will be talking about those dungeons twenty-five years from now like... say about the Sphere of Annihilation in Tomb of Horrors ? the demi-Lich ? Or the "negative Elves" (ahem Drows)in the final ìnstallment of "Against the Giants" AP ?
I don't think so.

No one here is saying that weird is superior. In fact, if anything, you are the one that is putting down anything that deviates from the standard of fantasy.

Oh right - Cthuluesque crossover's are staple fantasy^^ Same goes for pirates-fantasy mixture. Nevermind Edgar Rice Burrough taking us to different planets ? Epic Fantasy in the Tolkien or Greek Myth's style ? Usually the crossovers are done in some subtle way, keeping the world as is in balance through making the cross an extraordinary occurence (which also adds much to the entertainment and sense of the unknown).

What I don't like are cheap/crude mixture of stuff like "more xenomorphs vs. gunslinger/alchemists" in the japanese manga style, or crawling around a mega-sized dungeon just for the sake of it. That's kindergarten style. Yes some people enjoyed kindergarten^^ Just add something cool, from a totally different take of the world and intermix. Godzilla vs. Superman... blah.. Let's add some stats to compare....
Kaiju vs. Giant Mecha, with some Wormhole dynamics thrown in...ok, that works as a movie (and keeping the logic of disbelief in the OFF position^^), but as an ongoing campaign ? And stuff like "Rasputin must Die"... creates major problems in this vein (witness the threads about gun-proliferation in Golarion) . So does the entire "Let's Change the World's climate" of the Reign AP. Or creating a gateway to a different planet.

Basically, failing such an AP means either reworking the world or reseting the players' experiences with said world. I'd rather have a First World invasion aka Kingmaker... weird enough for most, fantastic, with a world running by entirely different means and laws

And I don't like people claiming I fight from a corner which fits their view of the world and particular interests while actually I come froma totally different angle. One of the cheapest rhetorical tricks ever. Almost insulting.

group enters the lair of a pack of fire breathing wyverns, with the "parents" off hunting, and baby Wyvern happily munching on some unidentifiable goblin

Bard (who is a pretty hardcore player most other times, gets gleaming eyes ): "Kawaii !!!" (japanese for very cute..yeah, she has been struck by too many animes)

and starts to stroke the little (dog sized) wyvern. Overly fond of cute reptiles, someone is....

Baby Wyvern sigh's contently (cute sound effect by the GM ) and breathes a searing gout of flame at the bard, setting her very much on fire.

Rest of the group (synchronously) : "KAWAIIII !!!"

"Kawaii !" has since entered our permanent repertoire of assessing something that does look "too cute" to be harmless^^

Considering that in the history of APs, we've only had two adventures on aliens planets (one of which is Earth), I think we could use some more Distant Worlds love in adventure paths. Hell, there was only one alien in Shattered Star and he wasn't even real...

hmm, we had the slightly weird First World Fey Realm in "Kingmaker", two trips to outside planes with specific planar rules in "Legacy", a quick visit to hmmm, what-do-we-call Plateau of Leng in "Shattered Star" (less so in "Runelords"), some odd visits to off-beat worlds in "Reign of Winter" ( just extrapolating from reading over the stuff published for that path, I don't actually have the issues), one could guess that "Wrath of the Righteous" might takes the PCs to the Abyss.

What would actually be fun if several installemnts of an AP would transfer the players... say to the Red Planet. Or the Green One. John Carter of Mars

Nevermind Golarion has so many continents as yet unexplored and not even roughly charted - lots of weirdness to be placed there.

I feel with Osirion's roots in the Dominion of Black, the countdown clocks, and Aucturn, this was a missed chance at having a really cool dark alien cult themed adventure. There is (and always has been) plenty of classic adventures for everyone out there to play.

No, actually there hasn't been for about 18 months of APs (Star, Reign and Righteous - yes, no-one I know really wishes for the mythic rules... strange world.). Nevermind that several APs before that were/are of a more lacklustre quality and some needed much rework.

And yes, a weirdly alien cult might really have worked - nevermind that whole team harkening back to the great old days of Cthulhu and the old Egyptian campaigns from that era - Cairo Sourcebook etc...! But that does not have to include "other worlds", plane-hopping for the sake of it, or introducing 20th century weaponry.

I like the idea of "sands and ancient evil", especially since A.Scott, R.Pett and very-gobliny-Frasier are on board. Let's see how much strangeness they are goingt to wring from the desert.

The most any of us have out right now is Doom Comes to Dustpawn. Beyond that (with the new change to modules) there isn't much else for us. And whenever we finally get an adventure, you get people like Sincubus that can't stand that others are having fun with "lazers" and "aliens". So yeah, it's pretty disheartening to again have to wait another six months for something even close to this.

I am not so sure whether too many players' and GM's outside these board's regulars do actually agree with you. Or would even participate in a suryey, so numbers would invariably skewed towards those posting most frequently on the forum... And even if you have one player saying "guns would be cool", several others on those groups will renege on such a plan or playstyle. My brother is currently "re-running" Skulls and Shackles-- now with gunpowder weapons added in, and all but one of his six players loath the whole idea... It's not yet splitting the group's cohesion, but the whole "gun thing" is a constant irritating nudge.

Nevermind, there is hardly anything "really alien" racewise in a world, were two of the main races are refugees from the First World. Where Fox-spirits and frog-offspring are possible player races. Were the half-undead and reincarnated are probably choices for players.... Luckily, not too many things are hexamorphic, serpentine or tentacular yet^^

If I would ask for something "exotic".... let's hit the Azlanti archipelagoe, where basically every island could be magic-morphed into something special, otherworldly and unique, Landscapes shifted and transformed by magic or the far-off reaches of southern Avistan (let's live among the Gripplis) or even some exploration of the Western continent. Jade Regent hid some nice ideas for the Northern Reaches of the World, why not do something more exotic someplace else ? Undersea campaign anyone ?

I know almost nothing about historical naval warfare but to me it would be hard to see ballista and catapults ever doing the type of damage that canons can do. Of course they had Greek Fire which was much more deadly than alchemist fire!

Catapults and ballistae did do terrible damage in their times they were actually used, since they were used against structurally weak(er) galleys in a different age. Nevermind that damage from a catapulted rock seems way low... just envision what will happen if one of those actually hits a car, nevermind a shed.

Unfortunately, there is no plunging fire in Pathfinder.

Sailing ships of the late medieval and renaissance times, nevermind in the age of sails were built with far stronger sides (several inches thick, about 8" and up for warships, usually planked in several layers with something like oak or teak, if available) and structure with dozens of additional reinforcing spars giving lateral and structural strength and elasticity. Pretty resilient.

Just remember that 12-pounder cannonballs (which were in regular use on english frigates ) bounced off (!) the sides of the US frigates in the war of 1812 at greater than point blank range, with much stronger 18-pounders hardly penetrating. That's telling something about the strength of tarred and layered hardwood. Wooden sips only became obsolete with the advent of rifled gunbarrels and shaped projectiles. and even "Monitor" and "Merrimac" stood hardly any chance to penetrate oaken planking reinforced with iron/steel plates in the civil war.

If interested, have a look at "USS Constitution" in the Boston Naval Yard. Or the tripple decker "HMS Victory" in Portsmouth or the Dutch East Indiaman rebuilt near Amsterdam . Those sides are NOT made from plywood.

I'd like another Sandbox, almost regardless of where it is placed. It allows the players to shape the story (if they are into roleplaying) instead of being forced along by outside events or being outgloried by the spectacular surroundings like strange planes or planethopping. Even better if it allows one to explore a new region of Golarion, be it Casmaron, Garund or Arcadia

and yes, another real "urban" Adventure path in the vein of Crimson Throne would be a winner, too. Absalom ? Sounds good. Although I'd settle for a less civilized, more evil or cruel city. Say Katapesh ? Kaer Maga ? Or something in Thuvia or Ossirion.....

for me :

positive : (would make me re-establish my subscription)
Sandbox
Urban campaign ( CotCT IIˆˆ )
Exploration journey
something Dwarf-centric

Say how about an Urban dwarven campaignˆˆ

negative :
Numeria ( if I wanted to play Sci-fi Fantasy I could pull out my old Palladium books)
plane-/planethopping
Underdark (never liked the concept anyway )

vikingson wrote:

First-off, there is and never was "squibbing". There just was not, so taking an irreal process as the base for calculations is ... futile.

I kindly disagree. American did it.

To carry out this mission, the Continental Congress began to build up, through purchase, conversion, and new construction, a cruiser navy of small ships--frigates, brigs, sloops, and schooners.

The simple act of changing the name or paint (or adding weapons) could be considered Squibbing even though it probably wasn't referred to that way. Changing the design/decor is extravagant, but probably wasn't beyond the wealthy of the times either.

The rest of your points are great though.

we could call the painted on or canvas shrouding for a short period of time "squibbing". have a look at "master and Commander" - both the movie and the factual book. though - who would reallly purchase some canvas for 2000gp ?

BUT : a ship is a composite of its hull shape and size, the placement and size of masts, the location of holds and superstructure. affecting its performance. the IRL Admiral Alexander Cochrane, the man after whom fictitious Jack Aubrey was shaped, just as an example found out that placing two larger cannons on his foredeck both cost him 20% speed, and their actual firing through recoil tore his foreship apart. He never tried how the ship would handle in heavier seas... he went back to the much lighter original cannons.

pirates steal cargo... what precisely is keeping them from stealing the actual ships the cargo is on to hide their tracks ? taking a look at the "Whyddah" "Queen Anne's Revenge" or "Royal Fortune" here...

don't squib... steal !

An if you have 120 tons of capacity for the cargo hold... you ccan't put 120 tons of gun on deck, which would make the craft topple over. One may add hammocks and additional provision spaces below deck good or raiding, bad for endurance.
One may.... and that would be very hard, add some smugggling compartments... since the walls have no insulation, and are usually build to be detached for combat ( a classic place would be hatchway covers or smaller loads).
A heavier hull.....would mean major inhibiton to sailing through additionl wettened space (slowing) less freeboard, and of course slow wallowing in the sea further breaking things down.
A larger rudder... could under very specific circumstances be an idea but again here the pressure point (which would mean an alteration of the entire keel ) and massively reinforced pintels and rudder chains. Nevermind a much increased watch on the wheel which is still moved without hydraulics or dampeners.

Aft castle/stern castle. Nice for fighting but major hassles in a storm and affecting drift.

Higher/lower masts, changed sail......will wreck either the speed, maneuverability, trim ( chance to move windwards or speed on most courses ) and probably make the ship top-heavy.

Best choices : get a better plan for a faster ship, find some way to increase material strength while maintaining stability.... or stealˆˆ Enchant the ship versus fire ( a besmaran Hallowing might be a good idea) . Protect the helmsman at all costs ( wall of force, glasssteel cylinder etc.). Enchant the ship with a silencing field. In an emergency... use illusions.

yes, my ex-GF (10 years) was running a small wharf/repair yardˆˆ I know my boats and sailcraft *grin*

methinks : you are

you seem to have gone far too easy on that android player,attempting murder ( i am not even consideing what would have happened in a IRL navy if someone attempted it ) and never really established where the cruelty aboard comes from.

And playing Scourge and Plugg as some sort of comical buffoons ? this is not a Gilbert and Sullivan play.

your campaign... and your chance to wreck it - looks like you have some heavy housekeeping to do.

some examples (and it seems a tad late for that)... our Harrigan casually stepped on sailors hands (crushing thmem on purpose) while scraping the decks or nailed a carpenters helper to the mast when a "1" was rolled for the skilll check. he chained the dead blasted corpse of our gnome thief to the foremast when that guy blew himself up stealing.

Harrigan is the BBEG and he is hardly to be seen for three issues so you really need to rampup the hatred

But I will say Skull & Shackles was my least favorite AP, possibly because I went into it wanting so much to enjoy it. I've a lot of small little problems with the volumes I have (I confess I stopped buying halfway thru), but I think the biggest handicap is that the Pathfinder RPG concepts (wizards and trolls and plate armor) don't map too well on a campaign trying very hard to look like a 17th century high-seas adventure.

I would then cordially invite you to grab a copy of Scott Lynch's "Red Sea under Red Skies" or Tim Powers original "On Stranger Tides" to have blast in (almost) cannon-free fantasy settings with brilliant pirate plots.

ok, no trolls in either, though

another of the things I found rather mystifying about the whole "Wormwood" ploy was the supposed lack of "armament". At low levels, without many resistances, it is the damage bonus that mostly counts for effect

Prefered and specialised arms, yes. Thse might be hard to get, but overall weapons ?

Some GM's might (?) want to take note, if they intend to keep the players from weaponry, since there those groups that think " we can do the mutiny right away, if we get some weapons"

- Belaying Pins (all over the deck), any number of well balanced clubs, nice for throwing, nice for two-handed clubbery.
- Windlass arms (usually stowed apart from the windlass) - 6'long oaken or tropical wood staffs ?
- Rope end's as saps.. If its is good enough for Scourge and Plugg..... Especially given the rules about killings aboard
- the kitchen knives... or does anyone think Kroop has any idea how many knives he owns ? Or hatchetts' and cleavers' ?
- gambling for weapons. While gambling/card-sharking for money might not be permitted, gambling for a dagger/marlinspike or whatever seeems reasonable enough.
- stuff from the carpenter's chest... axes, small hammers, adzes...
- short chains securing barrels and other boxes...

- dangerous stuff from the kitchen : lamp oil (try using it on someone in the masttops), cooking oil (grease), pepper, flour (in small bags), and I know of at least one player (with an alchemist ) who brewed up poison from potatoes (decent enough char with about +11 in Alchemy ?)... - look it up - hallucination and nausea in the masttops. Same char made an improvised shield from a hunted turtle-back. before you ask, guy IRL is a decent workman, not a specialist in any scientific field. Went to a pretty normal school down in Bavaria w. some practically minded chemistry teacher. So it seemed good enough for Alchemy.

- combination of grease, tar (deckwork) oakum (deckwork) and some hot coals made for nice smokebombs.

We (as players) actually laughed finding the mace in the bilge... noone ever wondered how soaked and broken that stuff down there would be ?

oe thing that went terribly wrong for the group who tried it, was serving the piglet laced with shards of pottery, guessing that Caulky would only laddle stuff from the top.... after that.... they needed a new AP.

nightwatch : a ship is in motion. even if all sails are taken down, there are currents and winddrift. drift oneor two miles an hour ? thatś like 12-24 miles of uncontrolled movement

anchoring : basic rule - you need 5-7 times the depth of water you are anchoring in as hawser... about 3"+ thick stiff rope..... at 50 fathoms ( 100 meters ) we are talking 2100´ of stiff drenched rope, with a 3+ ton weight of the anchor the crew would have to pull up every morning.
and good luck finding someplace shallow enough with only 50 fathomsˆˆ

And that is just about as unrealistically kind and easygoing as it gets. Ships sail at night, simply for safety reasons. nevermind the miles made good, even with reefed down sails.

also... so many nice roleplaying opportunities on deck. Slipping an enemy from the yardarms into the sea to.... say greasing the head (ship's toilets on the ropes besides the bowspirit ). exchanging goods and stuff in the darkness of the night. ... listening in on the officers

sorry and late to chime in... some Easter holidays. Nevermind some de-motivating heart-breaking.

ship actions : first off many of the activities invcluded are either tedious waiting or actions spread out over hours. the rolls determine the moments' of crisis or final decisive action. Andyes, we had a shortlist for "events not potted in time" say by the lookout
We also use(d) them for determining who was actually around the characters to be influenced. Sandara is working the tops ? yeah hard to diplomacy her if you are pumping the bilges. Scourge had one watch under supervision Plugg the other

watches : we immediately went for a watch system of two watches, making some NPCs more or less accessible "at work" or for "helping them out of some trouble". Which made the " I can basically go anywere cook's mate a really atttractive job. A friends group actually got the bard into that position on day eight, after realizing the value and by "infecting" the current character with somecoice TBC lookalike.... *bah* )
Setting no watches at any time ? WTF, this is deep water sailing ! lookouts, maintenance of headway or even checking on the upcoming weather ? sure thing or does anyone actively intend to sink ? Even at anchor... a sudden swing of wind direction and an admirality anchor will give way rather easily. Or have a meeting with some local fauna. OK, I have no idea what Nicolas Logue was thinking, but.... yeah... some more research would have been fun

Lighting at night : two lamps one at the mainmast, one shaded at the binnacle. And as for spotting stuff - phosphorent wake, lighter sails and regular shadow can even be spotted on most tropical nights, even without low-light vision. Nevermind the stuff actually swimming up to the surface in the wake, drawn in by the light of the stern cabin. Which put a a quick stop to people considering swimming off. Or too feel some Deep Water monstrosity scrape against the hull.... then have the characters check on the "damage" the next day.... Care to swim ?

the swarms... beyond deadly. in my run as a player, we encountered one swarm near the beach ( which ended in some hours of determined snorkeling and the lifeboat as a safety turtle shell ). After that, we looked for the late afternoon rains as a deterrent, had a lot of oily smokers ready in clay pots ( mosquitoes and smoke ) but in the end were just lucky. Especially in the maize field.

in my own run as GM I tuned them down, also made them undead which will give the life oracle and elemental sorcerer some opportunity to shine. the undead swarms will also rise only at night.

Caves: our most deadly witch ( sleep at DC 18) and coup de grace combo....saved our sweet asXXes. But.... by the rules, another group jumped down the shaft and had two charactes die from AoOs and Con damage on their down falling by the Stirges..... no comment on that ruling.

as an afterthought (only re-reading it now, to prepare for GMing ) : have a good and hard look at Tim Powers original "on Stranger Tides" and Scott Lynch's "Red Seas under Red Skies".... I think little can be added to the foot-slogging, fantasy induced piracy theme beyond those two titles in the way of mood and "The Strangest Seas" fiction.....

Afterthought : Having heard of three groups who play the AP, having played it myself (we eliminated everyone who was even semi-suspect in four rounds), and now looking at my own group..... I HAVE NOT SEEN ANY GROUP WHO DID NOT IMMEDIATELY MUTINY BEFORE THE ISLAND. In one group, the GM had purposefully included Kipper and Patch as extras aboard the "promise" to prevent this... and even that battle was over in six rounds. To me, the assumption that the players will not go for the first reasonable chance at freedom, with a massive degree of surprise is probably the weakest part of the whole adventure design, since it does take lot of pressure out of the island. Thankfully, in a way.

Great idea, and very nicely written. I definitely will be using this when my crew reaches Bonewrack.

I like the idea of Ivy as a Haunt rather than just another undead ghoul, but can the PCs deal with a Haunt at their current level? I presume in this case Ivy's suicide would have succeeded, so what would you have as the method of finally laying him to rest? Getting word of his fate back to his mother in Cheliax? That could generate some interesting suspicions towards the PCs, if it was thought they were corresponding with Chelaxians.... Hmmm.

I meant the "haunt" more as a figure of speech, but... yeah, why not bring his bones/remains home to Cheliax ? Until then, he will haunt the ship, spooking the crew with "dire portents" about the chelian fleet. But anyways, the whole "stockade encounter is pretty deadly with the combination of swarm, creepers and the ghast in itself, so some reshaping feels necessary.

As a player (when we played the path), we actually visited Correntyn (yeah, to find out more about Harrigan ) and I could see some memorable moments with the PCs sneaking into that fortress harbour with the remains of Ivy, attempting to lay him to rest in his parish's temple ?

Guards : "tell us strangers, what do you carry in that urn"
Not-so-wily PC "just the remains of a sailor cursed by Asmodeus to eternal damnation, lest he returns home to rest with his mother !"

Then again, simply for reasons of sympathy, I would/will not paint him as a devil worshipper, but a follower of Gozreh or similar - a sailor who served on the wrong ship at the wrong time. Perhaps under the wrong oath, as well.

Told to just go about there lives and return in 2 weeks or less. Not really sure where this will go. The anti pally whom resisted twice is big on anti slavery. He will be looking for a cure for them. mean while I think I have an aboleth turning pirate and seeking more slaves. That and a new home.

Drop the Anti-Paladin a hint about the virtues of "Protection from Evil" vs. Dominate Monster... and have a couple of scrolls of Dispel Magic ready ? Hopefully for the Cleric or Sorcerer to use and free as many as possible from the effect^^... then grab some more protection from evil/good and head for the tentacle fish^^

deathbydice wrote:

- Knifemaster : personally I don't think close combat rogues are a huge success in this AP. Daggers.. might work.
<snip>
Some stuff about Kitsune

I'd have to disagree. There's a knifemaster in the group I'm running through it and she is killing EVERYTHING. d8 sneak is nice and the large selection of rogue skills make her good at social/stealth/swim/profession and all that other nice stuff. She stalks enemy crew through their own rigging and drops down to slaughter them when they're surprised or flanked before sneaking off again.

Interestingly there's also a Kitsune (Sea Singer Bard/Cloistered cleric) in our group who
** spoiler omitted ** and has done very well at masquerading as a pirate while seeking out knowledge and ancient relics. We don't play in Golarion so the race isn't a problem, but I can't see it being too much trouble in Golarion either.

If I were to play in the AP though I'd go Rogue, Gunslinger or Bard to fit in with the theme of the campaign (though not necessarily from a combat-optimised point of view). Take DEX and CHA and their related skills and you should do fine.

hmmm, knifemaster : To be honest, we tended to devaste ships both with ranged attacks and cleaving melees. Or simply by eliminating key personell aka the "steering crew" and/or officers with "sudden death" appearances on the afterdeck. The problem I see with knifemasters is that you usually will try to have and use two daggers, which... on ships... leads to falls... onto deck or into the water (and your ship will be moving - quite possibly away from you at some signficant speed ).

Oh, and nevermind that Rogue saves suck in so many major ways....

As for Kitsune. Yeah, the problem is the ARG and most other stuff never really "tell" you about races and how they are integrated into and integral to a world. But, I personally do see a massive problem with a fox spirits thousands of miles away from its home turf "randomly" appearing in a group just because it is convenient. I'd say the same thing for a pygmy juju shaman witch doctor in Irrisen^^
You get told a race or class exists - noone ever considers the implication and habitat. Point in case, a group (with my an ex-GF of mine, who actually plays the character), just started Jade Regent. Nobody as of yet has considered (yet) that her Grippli Alchemist, trekking both out from Sandpoint and out over the Northern Ice cap.... will turn utterly absurd. I personally envision a cold-blooded Kermit in the icepack, and that really sends shivers down my spine.

Next thing "cute orks" (and human - racial adepted - orcish witch doctors )... fluffy ogres ? Much like everybody and his half-brother playing "good" drows after the Drizzt books hit the market. Absurd, absolutely against the concept of the world, but right, it looked so cool and nobody else did it, right ?

Gunslingers : fine idea, but Caws did not mention those. Bard... having lived through to level 15 on a halfling bard (stuck with a fiddle), I do agree !

Some takes on Fitzwalrus' speculations :

Our campaign - the oracle introduced itself as "one blessed by the powers" (he, ironically, served Nogorber), and faced some supervision. We have a cheap homebrew item in our camapign which registers that magic has been used by its carrier for some hours, and the rough type. Sort of a diplomatic "check and balance"

The witch never said anything (introduced herself as the cook ), same for the bard ( a refurbished Rosie).

Friend's group: everybody insisted on being a rogue and then played it to the hilt, wizard had his spellbook set up in some ... creative manner (and also had some nasty SLA Tiefling casting) , knowing from the AP description he would be kidnapped. They were casting magic only out of sight, with sleight of hand etc. Provided some nasty surprises. Oracle was small-sized (very ) and Life-type.

my brother's new group : Besmaran priests are "allowed on board" but face some harassment and are usually the first to be blamed. They have a "keeping mum" witch, and a sorcerer who wears a distracting spiked collar, massively increasing his concentration checks. The bard... yeah, just showed his colours and landed himself in the sweatbox for lying to the captain.

It seems that the AP's are only easy if you know what is comming.

(skull & shackles) swarms in book 1.

Yeppers. Nevermind, that especially item placement in the recent APs is very.... problematic, and will in several paths require an enchanter. Be it for specific weaponry ( Still laughing hard at the proposed weapons in Skulls and Shackles, or the utter lack of any caster items except for CHA until the middle/end of part 3... ahem, Yeah, sensible planning, all around ).

sailing speeds.... *sigh*

First, I'd either relocate the island if you WANT a longer trip. The Shackles map is horrifically small, too small by far for much of the stuff that is meant to occur there.... the"ilsand of Empty Eyes" is supposed to be slightly remote, inaccessible and hence ful of unknown dangers. Not the island you can easily reach with a short weeks sail.

otherwise... 48 miles a day is problematic as a speed, since we are looking at sails here. And their inability to sail straight into the direction of the wind, instead resuming to zig-zag tacking.... no-one is taking into account currents (should be strong in the narrow confines between the islands, growth on one's ships (algae, barnacles) slowing things down, reefs and sandbars and..... the vast difficulty of navigating betweeen the islands by sight alone, in the dark. While being able to sail fair and true in open waters.
With ship speeds depending upon size and wind speed. Yes, that would be a very complicated system

On the other hand.. running before the wind or at quarters, 48 miles a day is ridiculously low. If the ship travels at something like 8 or 10 knots (miles/hour), which is easy

I'd recommend using 36 + 3D6 for estimating daily gain (noone uses GPS etc anway^^), and factor in some penalties for bad navigation or being shifted by winds and currents. In an emergency, have a storm blow the off-course

So basically... paizo consciously volunteered in the direction of keeping things simple, but of course, feel free to grab a book on seamanship and make the journey longer and more realistic. Of course, you can always consider the "island" to be wrongfully placed on some maps, prolonging the whole trip even more.. (say... have it lie off in some direction by like 40-100 miles ? But which one ? Do the Pirates know ?)

The real Carribean Sea spans roughly 1100 x 500 miles, and was historically linked to the North with the American Main (and offshore islands like the Bermudas, the Brazillian shores to the South and the coasts of Western Africa... so the whole thing expands even more.

basically : fiction always was the weakest part of any "Pathfinder" issue. Anything actually campaign related (and be it longer articles on the other subjects ) would be welcome.

Because, let's face it, it is not always very good fiction (sometimes it was^^).
And maps of mystery, larger maps (done inhouse, right) or repeated maps from previous issues would do the trick quite fine. Even extend the AP by a few pages of stats or descriptions if you do not mind.

This "master plan" and "overall supervisor" person already exists. It is the AP's lead developer. So if you'd love it, you've not only got it, but you've always had it! =-)

Taking the current Shattered Star AP an an example, the plotline was written and finalized by Paizo long before any freelancer ever got a look at it. Oftentimes, such as the case of Shattered Star, the author of that outline is also the lead developer (in this case James), so you already have a Paizo professional who is not only responsible for tying all of the elements together between books, but is also usually the author of the AP's basic story structure.

hmm. That might well be the plan.

Looking back at the AP's since Kingmaker, one wonders if the plan actually gets executed all that well, though. Intentions versus actual actions

"Serpent's Skull" : Started out seaside, the campaign traits were all seaward-journey bound.... then everything takes place in a lost mountain city.

"Carrion Crown" : no real cohesion between the AP parts. While some are lovely, there is hardly any visible interconnection.

"Jade Regent" : from caravan entrepeneurs to shapers of a Foreign Empire ? Yeah, worked, but as J.jJ noted some things might have been overdone.

"Skulls and Shackles" : hmmmm. I loved it in a way, but... cohesive ? Who was the BBEG again and when precisely did he turn up to become "the ultimate" challenge ? And btw,... the ultra-generic castleruns really chafed on th athmosphere. What again is the relation between PIRATES stumbling through dungeons ? Somehow, I expected ships... silly me. So where again was the leading hand ?

"Shattered Star" : Since the entire concept is such a turn down, I haven't read much of it yet. The only cohesion I see yet is "Varisia revisted". Howdy Ho, I'd like to go someplace else, too.

well, we had the players share the monetary part of the haul between the crew and Hanelius, but the group in general was very active in using the sandbox-approach to robbing ships for provisions and plunder. Hanelius wasn't set for life, but given that the crew received about 55% of all plunder, and he did not really feel like haggling, it worked.
I think he got around 5k according to the notes. Given what people actually earn in Golarion, that seemed fine enough

whatever floats your boat. Then again, somewhere in his description, it is mentioned that he owes his service to Harrigan due to losing in a card-game two years ago.

And in all honesty : I don't think homo-erotic tendencies would carry any slight or social stigma in the Shackles in the first place.

Or among pirate crews (looking at history). Perhaps he was bonking some relation of the Lobster's owner ? Or fondling stuff in an inappropriate way ?

If you care to spin a yarn about the dangers of homo-erotic affection... well check with your players whether you are on the same page. Things might quickly become antagonistic there.

Mostly I have added island trade-regions to the Shackles themselves.

South of Sargava, there are - in my Golarion - at least three sizable nations

Hydreja : A nation of Mwangi humans and elves ruled by a cabal of "eternal" druids, who feel open to the world, but for religious dogmatics do not think it wise, to have their kin live or even die too far away from their spiritual homeland. Elves are regarded as superior specimen in a cycle of reincarnation, with corresponding privileges. (yes, non-good elves^^). These guys are very good at pottery and glazing or exceptional beauty, as well as traders for major inland spices and competent sailors as well, even if they stick to coastal and shallow water craft which take them to Segoth and Sargava, but not much further. They are said to have "enslaved" rocs and various tribes of Strix to serve as airborne assailants armed with alchemy, and many pirates are... loath to haunt their coasts. Oddly enough Ships from hermia have been repeatedly sighted in their seas

The Purple Coral Bight: a federation of islands and sub-surface kingdoms stretching down the otherwise barren south western coast of Garund. Rich in Corals, all sorty of treasure from the depths of the Sea. Great trading partners, but their territory is riddled with all sorts of tabboos and tribal laws on passage through, so trade with them only exits around the outer rim of their territory. Passing through the Purple Coral Bight is risky, both navigational (few if any maps exist and orient themselves on strange phenomena) for the reefs jutting up unexpectetdly, and socially since tribal laws require frequent stops, reversal of courses after having viited certain territories and hard to judge (from the surface) zones of exclusion. Going by them out west is... adding another thousand miles or so to your cruise, IF you have a clear idea how far their rule actually stretches.
There are only a few nomadic tribal ares inland from the Bight, and Gnolls and Orcs roam (and rule) wide parts of these Hinterlands. About their leadership and organisation almost nothing is known

The Cape : Ruled by a less-than-friendly kingdom of dwarves who are (or feel ) under constant attacks by southern Gnolls and Orks. Who incidentally view the Cape as their holy ground. The dwarves speak an odd and disticntive dialect, an offspring of traditional dwarven speech thousands of years off, and have an utterly self-reliant attitude
The Cape is very rich in minerals and gems, with highland plateaus providing rich farming grounds and while its coasts are rocky and steep a few safe harbours ( and many craggy reefs ) exist, where trade could flourish and provisions be bought. There arerumours of slavery or indenture, but none have ever been confirmed.
The dwarves are notoriously suspicious and organized along stringend lines, making them inflexible if not outright hostile, claiming mostly anyone to be either a spy, or an infiltrator or a shapechanged entity. If a ship makes it into their waters, it is usually forbidden to land, and if provisioned, this is only done from barges. Only a few accounts exist of the land itself, secretly written down by mages teleporting inland and sneaking around teh countryside for days and weeks.
There is also wild talk of dwarven ships without sails who "thud" through the night and sink foreign vessels by simply barging through them with steel rams, but this is probably old sailors' yarn. Right ?
Climatically, in southern-sphere winters, the climate of the oceans around the Cape becomes pretty hostile, too, as storms wreck around the half of the globe, unimpeded by land,, and whip up tremendous swells going straight east, making traversing the Cape to the west a daunting task. In summer, the Dwarves have been reported to harvest seals on islands South of the Cape, and at least once, one of their ships has been reported in the icy waters far down south.

So basically I heavily channeled from real life Africa into my Southern Garund (about which so little is actually told in the books), but "the Cape" is actually the most significant block for any traders going south and west around Garund.
There is also the archealogical trade from the Atzlanti island to consider.

And... I don't know how dangerous Nex and Geb are in your campaign (they are definitely dangerous and utterly ruthless in our Golarion ), so sailing past their coast is... possibly just not really recommended

Also, realistically speaking take into account that high seas longtitudal navigation cannot be accomplished without a very (!) precise and fine tuned timekeeping device to establish your longtitude. nevermind being dependant upon spotting the sun at midday. This should make "high seas" and off-coast navigation very difficult without either powerful magic or the latest devices from Numeria. Making navigation off-coast... just stupidly dangerous

There ARE, after all dragons in the oceans. Nevermind the Kraken

I have loved dungeons ever since reading about Khazad-dûm / Moria in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Did Tolkein justify this dungeon or was it just part of a great story? Not sure but I still love dungeon adventures.

Sooo... to be frank, the group passes through Khazad-Dum, from west to East. Much like the passage through Rohan. Nothing dungeon-oriented in it, except for being underground. One "blockhouse" battle at Balin's tomb.

And taking a long and hard look at most publication aimed at DnD/Pathfinder, where exactly do we, the readers get an extended delving through dungeons and dark tunnels ?

Rarely if ever, because frankly, it is boring stuff to read about.