My tip is to read the AP a lot. Read ahead, review stuff that has happened, work out the timeline on scrap paper, and read some more. Get as much of the AP as you can afford, and immerse yourself in it.
Maybe your players are sheep, but in my experience people always want to explore beyond the boundaries, and the more comfortable you are with the material the easier it will be to go with the flow.
In the same general vein, make sure to read the 'Troubleshooting' sidebars and think about how the situations described might be resolved by your group.
Also, if you're into REALLY planning ahead ...
also make sure to make a note on the errata/typos/omissions in the modules. Pay particular attention to the map, stats and encounter errors. Read the forum posts concerning these errors in the AP.
In a few weeks, I'll be running the Second Darkness adventure path for Pathfinder. Can anyone offer any tips or pitfalls I should watch out for? Thanks!
Yay Beth! Well, first of all, good luck! Undertaking a whole campaign can be a big job (if you want it to be), but fortunately most of the work is done for ya! I have three main suggestions for you:
- Pre-Read: Although the campaign outline gives you an idea of what's coming down the line, it's always helpful to know whats coming and how a character you encounter at point A might develop by point Z. If you can, try to read the adventure you're running all the way through and skim the next adventure in the series. In Second Darkness's early ones, pretty much the only characters you need to keep an eye on are Samaritha and Kwava, but by the third one they're pretty much in your hands. Still, always a good idea to know what's coming up.
- Familiarize Yourself with the Settings: We could write for months on Riddleport alone and still not cover all the possibilities. When your group turns left instead of right, a familiarity with the locations, characters, or even just the vibe of a place can be super helpful. While things like the Riddleport primer or the Zirnakaynin gazetteer give you a ton locations, the most helpful thing they offer is an idea of what goes on and what is expected in these places. Get familiar with these main locales, that way when your PCs duck off the street unexpectedly and ask where they are you can bounce back with details on whether they're in a seedy dock-side bar, a questionable bakery, or a hazy pesh den.
- Don't be Afraid to Ad-Lib: Okay, so there's a ton of stuff written for Second Darkness and Golarion already but whether by intention or oversight there will always be holes. That's where it's fun to be a GM. This is your campaign and Golarion is your world, run with it. It's more important for you and your players to have fun than to get hung up on this particular or that detail. If it's helpful, great, I hope we've given you all the names and side quests and neat little locales that you need, but never be afraid to add a character, change a motivation, drop in your own places, or alter things so it's more fun for your party. This is where it helps to read ahead. As long as you know your destination you can take any course you want to get there. Same goes with the rules: if a fight seems like too much, a monster proves too hard, or a DC is simply too high, fudge it. It's always more fun to see your players succeed than to slavishly adhere to a generalized rule. I'm not saying don't challenge your party, but the APs are written to be applicable to a large audience, so don't be afraid to refine them to you and your party's tastes. As James frequently says, running a Pathfinder Adventure Path is a team effort between the designers, the editors, and the GM, so remember that you have just as much sway on how things turn out as we do - and really, at the end of the day, it's most important that you're happy with the way things run, so tinker all you want!
Okay, wow, kind of went on a tirade, but there it is. Aside from all that, I personally suggest bringing background music to your game and having a few thematic tracks to jump between - it can really add a lot to creating a mood and really immersing the players. I'm sure you can find more details on adding music to your game on these boards. This is just a mood thing, though, so if you're already overwhelmed with running your game, let the ambiance wait until later when you're more comfortable.
Best of luck Beth! I hope you have a great time and remember, if you ever get into any trouble or have any questions at all, just give us a yell!
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I'd like to put emphasis on the "add your own stuff" recommendation. Using an AP gives you breathing room as a DM to add texture to your world. Since all the big, megaplot-y stuff has been done for you (the hardest bit, in my opinion), you are free to stretch your creative legs. Toss in a hilarious merchant NPC. yoink encounters from other sources. come up with cool little side-treks and encounters. take the NPCs and really flesh them out.
And yes, you should know the setting locations inside and out. Or, I should say, be passably familiar with it so that, when the party goes to a location, you can take 30 seconds to read the text entry and make something up on the fly ;)
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Wow, I bookmarked this for replying to later, but really, what Wes said!
I tend to read each chapter through 4 times (though I have a lot of free reading time due to two hours of train commuting every day). Once skimming through, to spot any problem areas I'll need to really prep for or ask on these boards about, once reading through from cover to cover, mostly for pleasure, but also thinking about what bits you want to add personal touches to (new NPCs, sidequests, slightly different ways of framing the scene, whatever) and any stat blocks you want to jazz up with some splat. About two weeks before I run it I read it through again as I do any necessary prep like handouts etc. (at this point I know who my PCs are, so I can think about what I expect them to do and any allowances I need to make for their unique characters and situation).
Finally I read through the relevant section the night before the session so hopefully if my players blindside me and do or ask something I don't expect, all the material will be fresh in my head so I'll know whether thr adventure covers it or if I have to improvise. If there are some big chunks of box text, such as extended speeches from NPCs, I try to find a quiet room and actually practice it out loud, I'm a bit of a nervous speaker when I know I have to get specific information across, so this really helps me.
Speaking of box text, don't just read it out verbatim; even if you've memorised it, your players will know from the change of speech patterns that they're being read to, and it really breaks immersion. Read the box text, imagine you're in the place described, and describe it as you imagine it, remember to include all the sensory information, tell your players about the sounds and smells (and tastes and sensations if they're relevant) of a place as well as the sights, it really helps with conveying the right atmosphere. The same goes for long NPC speeches, try to get into their heads and say what you imagine they would say. It often helps to break the speech down into bullet-points and then just work from them (this also helps if your players interrupt and turn a speech into a conversation).
Agh, Wes said most of what I wanted to say and I ended up ranting anyway. Sorry if that was all really obvious stuff :).
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Congratulations... I am running Second Darkness and it is the first AP i have run for my group... It is turning into a fun one. Just a couple of things that have helped me a lot. Many of these reflect the fact that i'm not really quick at making stuff up on the fly
1) Get a list of names - i use baby name lists off the internet. For this setting eastern european names seem to fit nicely. Have 20 male and female names at your fingertips, so when you need to make any situation real, you don't have to invent a name.
2) I keep a binder section for locations with bare bones info (name of business, proprietor). You'll probably want to have some bars, inns and shops prenamed and scattered throughout town. This makes it much less obvious which direction a party should go and lets them spend more time exploring the city.
3) Someone posted a timeline. It is awesome. I adapted it, moved a few events around and added some "non events" so it wasn't always a meta game clue when the PC's were asked to run an errand, or when someone came into the Gold Goblin (it is also a great way to foreshadow minor characters that will appear later or in the AP). The fact is that weeks go by as the story unfolds, so it really helps to know when it is and when payday is so you can keep the flow and trickle out clues and details appropriately. This has been the hardest part for me/my group we are all used to the sort of "time is of the essence, hurry up" type of campaign where there is no room to stray from the tracks. In this it is all about straying from the tracks and figuring out bit by bit how things fit.
4) Riddleport IS random encounters. Many of them (con men, drug dealers, fences, prostitutes) are the flavor of the town. Be ready for them so they feel genuine to the players. This is a fun city to GM, lots of great potential for characters with interesting motives. My players are writing an entirely different story even as the adventure is unfolding, which is great fun.
Most importantly... ENJOY IT! The really nice thing about the beginning of this adventure is things evolve slowly. You have all the time in the world to set the scene and make it believable. The burden of pacing, at least at the start, is on the players. The trick is to keep the days moving at a steady pace. We have gone whole sessions without combat encounters, and yet there are enough odd and interesting things happening that my players are enjoying it.
Have fun and let us know how it goes!
Arnold