I am sure this has been covered a hundred time but my searches are yielding anything. Perhaps I am just not reading the right lines in the module but does it state what advancement path the AP assumes. I don't really want to tell my group "lets go fast!" and then have to either nerf their exp later or have to scale up the encounters at the end.
Thanks for the feedback.
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Most of the adventure paths have guidelines for when the PCs level based on what encounters they've completed. I would just go with that, or if your group likes combat, provide enough random encounters so they go up in level when the adventure path recommends it based on whatever leveling rate you want.
Very first page of the adventure says that it assumes the medium advancement path.
Your party should be second level by they start of part 6 (next paragraph).
Well I feel dumb. I just flipped to the first page and apparently I didn't read the little header that answered my question.
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I can’t speak for ‘6 Trials’ (I haven’t received it yet), but if you remove the story awards, Bastards of Erebus is essentially a fast progression module, with little further modification required (about 30 to 35% of the XP rewarded in Bastards is in the form of story bonuses).
Since I run using slow progression, this is somewhat disconcerting. While I’m not opposed to story awards, the number and quantity of them in Bastards are counter to what I want to achieve in a slow progression game – more of an old school experience where players savour the development of their characters over a longer period of time.
This is a bit of an aside, but to make Bastards work for my slow progression style, I would need to more than double (perhaps triple) the content of the module – which dramatically reduces its utility to me. It has me wondering about the value of Adventure Paths from a slow progression perspective (although in another thread, I’ve heard that future APs are likely to add more meat to the modules, so I’m willing to see how that plays out).
One idea that would mitigate my concern, and be of possible interest to slow progression DMs/those who want sandbox elements in their AP, is an ‘Expanding the Adventure’ sidebar. It wouldn’t need to be a lot of copy – perhaps one column for each character level covered within a module (i.e. if the module covers levels one and two, a column at level one, and another column at level two) providing two or three top line story seeds that expand on the world of the AP, or a couple encounter ideas to expand a dungeon, possibly with unstated suggestions for villains/foes.
For me, such a springboard would create a nice balance between having a great prepared adventure to run, and sandbox elements I can use to personalize the campaign for my PCs – and expand the AP world.
This concept could also work for non-AP Pathfinder modules intended to cover more than one level. For example, Crypt of the Everflame (which BTW, is brilliant) also requires additional content if PCs are to reach 2nd level for the final encounter at slow progression. Since the premise of the module assumes a closed environment, a sidebar with suggestions on expanding the module would be valuable.
While me & my players probably don’t represent a large segment of the gaming population, I thought I’d throw this out there in case there are others who like their adventures slow-roasted.
This is a bit of an aside, but to make Bastards work for my slow progression style, I would need to more than double (perhaps triple) the content of the module – which dramatically reduces its utility to me. It has me wondering about the value of Adventure Paths from a slow progression perspective (although in another thread, I’ve heard that future APs are likely to add more meat to the modules, so I’m willing to see how that plays out).
Doesn't that kinda go without saying? I mean, it's intrinsically obvious that if you buy a preset adventure and then give out fewer XP than the adventure is designed to give out, your PCs will advance at a slower rate than the adventure expects them to.
Therefore, the only way you'll be able to achieve your play style is to pad the adventure with additional encounters, or tweak the later stuff to be weaker than written so your less-advanced PCs can handle it.
One idea that would mitigate my concern, and be of possible interest to slow progression DMs/those who want sandbox elements in their AP, is an ‘Expanding the Adventure’ sidebar. It wouldn’t need to be a lot of copy – perhaps one column for each character level covered within a module (i.e. if the module covers levels one and two, a column at level one, and another column at level two) providing two or three top line story seeds that expand on the world of the AP, or a couple encounter ideas to expand a dungeon, possibly with unstated suggestions for villains/foes.
I totally agree. Not just for those groups on a slower path, but also for those groups who just want a little more.
For me, such a springboard would create a nice balance between having a great prepared adventure to run, and sandbox elements I can use to personalize the campaign for my PCs – and expand the AP world.
This concept could also work for non-AP Pathfinder modules intended to cover more than one level. For example, Crypt of the Everflame (which BTW, is brilliant) also requires additional content if PCs are to reach 2nd level for the final encounter at slow progression. Since the premise of the module assumes a closed environment, a sidebar with suggestions on expanding the module would be valuable.
This is a great idea.
It seems to me that, since Pathfinder provides 3 progressions for XP, they probably should tailor their published adventres, all of them, to cover all three progressions, even if the Fast and Slow progressions only get nominal mention in a sidebar or two.
While me & my players probably don’t represent a large segment of the gaming population, I thought I’d throw this out there in case there are others who like their adventures slow-roasted.
Large or not, it's still representative of some segment. And it's a segment that Paizo created by giving three XP progressions.
I hope they plan to step up to the challenge; it would be really cool.
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so if you are running slow advancement, you'll have to add additional encounters or side quests to keep with the adventure path.
That allows some change in the story line awards as well. If they do additional work (more encounters) shouldn't they get more story award as well? Just wondering as I see the story line awards as a place the DM can fudge a bit to keep the party 'on track' with the story.
My table tends to run full (6 players) so I'm usually amping the encounter numbers a bit: 2 becomes 3, 1 alone generally gains a level, etc.
After dividing by 6, this leaves them about where they should be.