I am starting to think that my players are just really slow. We have been playing Rise of the Runelords for almost two years now and next Tuesday will be our 61st game session. We are almost through the 4th book in the series. I was wondering how many sessions do most people take to play through the different Adventure Paths?
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I’m a player in a Curse of the Crimson Throne campaign (using Pathfinder rules). We’ve just finished book 1, which took 8 sessions (each session approx 4 – 5 hours).
Mind you, our GM is changing things quite a bit. He’s cut things out and added different stuff back in. I assume that means it all evens out in the end.
On the other hand, I have been running Shackled City for a different group since about the start of 2005, and they are at about level 8 … that is with very irregular gaming sessions, a couple of long breaks and several changes in the group’s composition.
I am starting to think that my players are just really slow. We have been playing Rise of the Runelords for almost two years now and next Tuesday will be our 61st game session. We are almost through the 4th book in the series. I was wondering how many sessions do most people take to play through the different Adventure Paths?
Crimson Throne took my group about 32 sessions to finish. We didn't finish Runelords, but I was estimating it was going to take about 40. Sadly, we didn't finish SD either, but that group was probably going to take about 30 sessions.
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I am starting to think that my players are just really slow. We have been playing Rise of the Runelords for almost two years now and next Tuesday will be our 61st game session. We are almost through the 4th book in the series. I was wondering how many sessions do most people take to play through the different Adventure Paths?
It's not not how fast you get there, but the path you take. Enjoy the campaign as it is happening.
WE finished the Runelords campaign in about 2 years, But I condensed Book 5 into about 10% of the written content.
I started SD and started playing CoT in early December.
With 3-4 hour sessions and light roleplaying, in SD, we're at the midpoint of book #4.
With 9 hour sessions with light to medium roleplay in CoT, we're at the beginning of book #5.
So, about eleven weeks in and we're beginning #5 and ending #4. I figure CoT will be done and finished with in another 4-5 weeks and SD will be done and finished with in another 6 weeks.
I don't know how you guys can play through some of these APs and take 70 weeks to do it! You guys must really get into roleplaying a lot more than my current groups. A lot a lot!
My group is at 13 sessions over 6 months (usually every two weeks) and we're just into book three.
Hope to finish it early next year :)
We play weekly for about 4 hours. This week will be the 35th game which will put them at the halfway point.
Back in our Shackled City campaign (using the HC edition), we spent several months at a mostly biweekly sunday schedule from 12-5pm. We only got as far as Demonskar legacy. Took us like 7-8 months or so IIRC.
I think the time that it takes to complete any AP is fairly dynamic. It all depends on the environment. Memorable NPCs can get alot of interactions from players, and sometimes badly-hatched plans can lead into "extra-innings" in a specific module (like getting captured in both Life's Bazaar and Zenith Trajectory).
If they are having fun (my players really loved SC) it doesnt matter how many sessions it takes to get through any given chapter of it. IIRC, it took us almost 2 months (possibly longer, was awhile ago) just going through Life's Bazaar between the NPC interactions, getting captured, the daring escape, etc.
Some crews never reach a 61st session :( . Just think of how much newer stuff you will have to cover many more years of gaming goodness on your shelf. :)
If your whole group is enjoying RotRL thats the main thing. If you are sensing that they may be getting bored at times in the same campaign for so long, then that could be a problem.
I am starting to think that my players are just really slow. We have been playing Rise of the Runelords for almost two years now and next Tuesday will be our 61st game session. We are almost through the 4th book in the series. I was wondering how many sessions do most people take to play through the different Adventure Paths?
My group has been playing about the same amount as you, and we are half way through HMM. It just depends on the dynamics of the group, methinks.
We finished Edge of Anarchy from Curse of the Crimson Throne in one marathon session.
Runelords: ~63 sessions, ~7 hours each, 29 months, and we're about 1/3 into #5. I do have a very chatty group for this one, and there's been a lot of turnover as well (and every last one has been chatty! :)
Second Darkness: ~33 sessions, ~8 hours each, 18 months, and we're 1-2 sessions from completing it. Low turnover (only one slot that has changed twice). Focused group! Also a slightly shorter AP (though we did about half of the sidequests).
Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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We've been playing Rise of the Runelords about every other week since November 2008. Sometimes things have bumped us one week or another, so we're probably 30 to 35 sessions in and have nearly finished Hook Mountain Massacre. We're loving it, though, and so far do not have a problem with taking this long to play out one story. The only one who is antsy about the next path is me, and that's because I've fallen completely in love with Council of Thieves and have so many plans that I want to implement that it's killing me. I figure I have another year left, and that will give me the time to make CoT truly one to remember.
On the side, take your time if your group is enjoying it. Invest a little time in the bad guys to make them truly memorable, and make sure you pick up on what your players want. I'm actually stunned that one poster was able to get through most of a path in a matter of 3 months. I might have been able to do that when I was a kid and could play three times a week, but now that life gets in the way that's just a pipe dream type of accomplishment. Maybe when I retire I can play that much again...
My Runelords group has played 12 sessions so far, are in the final stages of The Skinsaw Murders and will probably finish it in the 13th session, so we're averaging 6.5 sessions per book so far. We've been playing just over a year..our first session was Jan 25, 2009.
My group is starting the 10th week of ROTR and we just finished the Glassworks/ Catacombs of Wrath last week.
But, my players have done a LOT of roleplaying, including romances, side treks, fighting the Sandpoint Devil, Harrow Readings, Gambling, playing at the Festival, etc. They are on the slow XP path and 3 of them just leveled up to L3 last week. (We did a 3 week session of Into the Hauted Woods first, so some of the players were 1/2way to L2 when the Swallowtail raid started.)
All this talk of the Sandpoint Devil has made me decide to start having it make random night appearances. Just to see what the party does.
Classic Horros Revisited also has a nice critter that lives in Magnimar that I'm planning on having meet one or two of my players. Oh yes, they will be messed with.
I am starting to think that my players are just really slow. We have been playing Rise of the Runelords for almost two years now and next Tuesday will be our 61st game session. We are almost through the 4th book in the series. I was wondering how many sessions do most people take to play through the different Adventure Paths?
We just finished the first module after one year (24 sessions). We tend to take things slow... ;-)
It's been 21 months and we're just about at the end of #3. I would estimate we've played 3/4 of the weeks, which would make for about 70 sessions.
We are playing RotR and are in at 15 wekkly (with a few weeks off spread in) sessions and are near the end of Skinsaw. I estimate that we will be done with it in 2 or 3 sessions at most. We play around 3-6 hours average but have had 10 and 12 hour sessions recently that include food breaks and talking that sitetracks us. I estimate those sessions to be around 8 1/2 and 11 hours respectively.
We played almost twice a week in last summer but when schools starded pace changed to once a week. Sessions were about 4 hours sometime longer sometime shorter. One 11 hours session between first and second book. Finished AP in 34 sessions which is ~5.67 sessions per book. Skinsaw Murders was shortest [only four sessions] but HMM was longest, seven sessions. We started June 2009 and finished January 2010, fairly accurately eight months.
Our group's rough time for APs completed. Each session is 4-5 hours.
Age of Worms - 35 sessions
Savage Tide - 38 sessions
The Drow War - 37 sessions
Rise of the Runelords - 30 sessions
Curse of the Crimson Throne - 34 sessions
War of the Burning Sky - 39 sessions
Second Darkness - 31 sessions
Legacy of Fire - 33 sessions
Council of Thieves - 35 sessions
Kingmaker - 4 sessions so far, now starting Rivers Run Red
Yep, that is 9 APs down, one in progress and one still outstanding - Shackled City, which may or may not be the next one after Kingmaker
My GM finished Rise of the Runelords just today. I want to say it's taken us maybe 28 sessions to finish (5 hour sessions each), but he cut a lot of encounters and superfluous stuff in the end in the interest of time (after all, we run our games based around our school schedules).
I find a lot of time is lost in Rise of the Runelords running mass-scale combats and doing dungeon crawls. While fun in theory, the practice of dungeon crawls is time consuming and boils down to a formula of sorts:
-Rogue scouts ahead, Perception to locate traps
-Finds monsters in next room
-Reports back to group
-Party spends 10-30 minutes debating best approach to the encounter
-Run encounter, which takes about 30 minutes to 1 hour because players keep getting distracted/rolling bad/make bad decisions.
Fortress of the Stone Giants kind of serves as my example for all of this. The tremendous dungeon crawl seemed more like a practice in patience rather than a fun endeavor.
All told, we probably spent the MOST time on the first three paths, more specifically Burnt Offerings and Hook Mountain Massacre. This is probably because in those two adventurers we explored the WHOLE dungeon, rather than only getting the essentials. Runeforge was a better implemented dungeon crawl because there were fewer encounters (only 1-2 per wing) and we mostly accomplished the whole thing in 3-1/2 sessions (the longest fight was probably with the champion lady and her "teddy bear," and that ran out to an hour simply because it boiled down to 3-4 summoned shadows wailing on it while it chipped away at us with Unholy Blight, safe in our Magic Circle against Evil).
We'll be starting Curse next year, and I hope we get a chance to finish it because it looks like a lot of fun. I especially dig the numerous mini-games spread throughout the plot (Bloodpig most of all). Plus I really like my character (he's the saddest paladin ever)!
We've been playing for 15 sessions (5 to 6 hours per session) and just finished Hook Mountain Massacre... So, on average, 5 sessions per book so far.
I get the feeling that we're zipping through the story, but that's what I was aiming for, as we only tend to play like once a month because of 'family schedules'. I didn't want to drag my players in pointless side-quests that would take two sessions to complete as I felt that they would forget what they were supposed to do when they got back on track.
Mind you, at the beginning of each session, I read to them a text entitled "...The Story So Far.", which recaps the last session in a few paragraphs. I found this technique very useful so the group would retain a few pieces of obscure information they got in the last game that they might forget at the start of the new one.
Ultradan
I DM's it as a solo, and it took about a year. I don't like roleplaying minutia, just the main moments in the AP. We only played on usually one day out of the weekend, and maybe 2 to 3 weekends out of a month.
We started Rise of the Runelords a year ago, but it's in rotation with another campaign and it's been hard to get our whole group together more than twice a month. We've just had our 16th session of RotR and finished the Skinsaw Murders. I'm hoping we can pick up the pace so it won't take us two more years to finish the AP. We're eager to get on to Kingmaker.