I'm going to try and keep this post short, but in my opinion what we really need out of an Adventure Path is a series of small towns. First, I'd like to reference without any real spoilers Sandpoint from the RotRL AP where the players become small town heroes and probably even get to know two dozen locals by name. Essentially the players come in and clear out all the local dangers. Now without going all Buffy the Vampire Slayer "Hellmouth" where everything centers around one place eventually the players move on to the next area, but I've noticed they usually aren't as NPC rich as the first one, maybe because of the inherent danger of higher levels, maybe not. I'm reading another AP for mid levels, the Slumbering Tsar, and its got another really cool small town that adventures are based around. What I'm getting at is that I think a really good adventure could be designed where players don't really stay in the big cities, kind of clearing out local dangers as they go, might make a good adventure. Small towns usually have their own dynamics, a constant influx of new folklore, and alot of NPCs that the players will need to get in contact with, but they aren't big enough that nameless commoner 105 becomes the norm.
I hope someone can make sense of my post and knows what I'm talking about. I think it would be a great backdrop for a larger story, either that or I just like tons of flavorful npcs.
I think the assumption that players will want to live in small towns like Sandpoint is wrong.
I don't have much experience as A GM, but I ran RotRL many years ago. The players couldn't wait to leave Sandpoint forever, and only went along with defending it from giants because they understood it was part of the story.
When I'm a player I basically will only want to live somewhere away from a big city if I have easy access to teleport.
I've been DMing for about 15 years and the various groups I've run for, one of which is the same group I started with, really enjoys the small town feel. They have alot of fun getting to know the locals and rolling for local rumors (knowledge local). Oftentimes adventures fall into the trap of only including major npcs who carry plot hooks, which while it works to keep the adventure flowing sometimes disconnects the players from the rest of the living world. What I was suggesting is that it would make a good Adventure Path to have a group of adventurers going from town to town as a backdrop. Much like a pirate game has Pirates or an open exploration adventure has unexplored frontier. Its a flavor thing and I wouldn't expect a DM to pick it up if they wanted to have an adventure about Holy Crusades around the Worldwound.
My players typically don't have access to teleport unless they travel to a large city where someone can be paid to cast it for them or they are of sufficient level to cast it.
Unfortunately, I have to agree with Morain. Whenever my Runelords PCs get back to Sandpoint, they can't wait to run off to Magnimar... and its much bigger market for magic items! I tried and tried and tried to make the NPCs at Sandpoint likeable and important to the PCs (and, more importantly, to the players), to no avail.
Seriously-- next time I run a campaign, I'm going to say that magic items have such a high price and low demand, that there is no market for them. Any purchased item will have to be custom-ordered (or crafted by the PCs).
@Haladir
Well rather than changing the demand for magic items, what about adjusting the wealth of the local economies? At higher level typically players are bouncing around with magic, but at low and mid levels most of their shopping can be handled by local markets.
There are tons of benefits from large cities mostly access to spells, healing, and markets. I just don't like the "hey lets run down to walmart and buy a +5 sword" feel that you can get in a big city. Theoretically with the item charts we as DM's can roll up what is available, but that's kind of a pain. And generally the response is "well if its not here this week I wait until it is." The adventure I'm running right now has the player's isolated basically in a desert town and it has some interesting effects on the RP, like no access to raise dead or reincarnate and no market to really sell equipment. Of course they are making plans for an eventual treck back to the city to sell their goods, but they are planning it for the winter when the bad weather sets in. I don't know it just has a more organic feel to it.
One appeal of small towns I can think of is the players can basically take it over and run the town themselves. But Yeah, I had the same experience as Haladir with Sandpoint VS Magnimar.
I don't mind the magic item shop though, like you two seem to. As long as it's within reason and the gp limits.
A small towns AP could work maybe if it was about the PC's bringing the towns under their control to forge a small nation. Maybe one town they could take by force, and in the next town it might be best to help the locals and gain influence that way. It could be a different take on something like Kingmaker.
I was mulling some ideas about having factions, mostly non-evil who were looking to take over this town or the other. Like two disputable claims for land where the player's would have to choose a side and go with it socially and maybe militarily. Even small towns could have reasonable encounters with townguards and clerics with groups of adventurers and mercenaries jumping in for one reason or another.
I was over in the alignment threads and some people were going back and forth about "the goodguys always unite", well I don't see that as true. A lawful good and a Chaotic Good can fight to the death over ideology.
Well for instance if this adventure happened in Varissia, maybe there was a rebel movement among the Shoanti to cast off their foreign oppressors, they lost the war a long time ago, but its not like things are completely settled. A Shoanti warrior might rise up and demand that the towns stop paying taxes to Magnimar and send him warriors to fend off Magnimar or something. Some players might really get into that kind of story. Not that Magnimar is evil or anything, but for the cause of further independance. You don't have to be evil to hold a grudge.