|
I'm planning to start up a RBT group, but I was wondering if anyone had any advice on two aspects of the module. I will be running it as a non-PFS module, so some of the aspects that are already inside the module become less useful. Namely, why the players are there if not sent by the Society to recover the tapestry. While I could default back to the original Society storyline, I would like to use this opportunity to come up with something more engrossing to non-Society characters. My questions are below, suggestions will be greatly appreciated:
1. How did the players enter the tournament? What heroic deeds did they accomplish to make it there? Were they hired to enter the tournament, or they enter of their own accord?
2. What happens if the players get to the end of the module, and cannot decide on which item to take with them?
|
I actually just finished running this module as a one-shot on these boards (more or less - I need to finish up the epilogue), and I can definitely answer the first one.
I asked each of the players to come up with a reason why their character wanted to be at the Tournament, other than competing for the prize. The opening scene of the adventure has the PCs on a boat from Goka heading to Xielan Island for a martial arts tournament. If that sounds like the opening to Enter the Dragon to you, then good, I'm not alone. I had one party member who was looking for her lost brother, and another who was trying to avenge the murder of his best friend. Those plots got woven into the narrative of the adventure. They weren't a party when they got onto the boat, but they entered as one by the next day.
As for the ending, that's yet to be written. I have a solution to that, though:
I plan on giving them a ring of wishes. That way, they can use it to acquire whatever it is that they're hoping to achieve on the Island.
Now, if you're running this as part of an ongoing campaign, then you'll have to figure your own answers out. It probably works best if some benefactor asks them to compete so they can acquire some artifact of awesomeness from the Vault.
I'm also running this module as a home game, although it is a very modified version of the Ruby Phoenix Tournament.
For the motivation, I asked the players to get involved and bring up their own reasons to enter the Tournament as Misroi did. And about the prize, once you get what the true goals of every PC are, then it's more easy to tailor-custom an item suited to them. After all, who knows for sure what kind of wonders awaits in the Ruby Phoenix's Vault? ;)
I'll be using that for my players as well soon.
Beginning: a battle erupts in Goka, the PCs band together to quell it off and someone enters them in the tournament as a team.
End: A day after they came out victorious, a Pathfinder Chronicler comes in and hire them as bodyguard as he wants to explain Tian Xia for his publications. Why not pick the tournament's champions?