Hello, fellow Paizlings. I've recently gotten a request to run Pathfinder for some folks in a PbP format, and I'm suffering some terrible indecision.
First off, I'm currently engaged in Carrion Crown, Iron Gods, and Kingmaker games, so those are out.
What I'm looking for is...
• More story than just hackin' and slashin'. As much as I like the concept, this takes Emerald Spire put of the running, since it's basically "While you're here, why not go into this dungeon?"
• Needs to be accessible for "weird" races. I've been rather stingy with the racial makeup of the last few games I've run, and now I'm kind of wanting to just open the floodgates on this. If I end up with a party made of a kobold, strix, two elves and a hobgoblin, I don't want them in a situation where only the elves can talk to anyone without torches and pitchforks in their faces.
• Functional in PbP format. I'm worried that subsystems and daily tracking mechanics (like the work schedules from Skull and Shackles) might end up bogging the game down and causing player interest to wane.
• Similarly, I'd like it to have an early "catch" to bring the player characters on board into the adventure. When I did a Mummy's mask game a while back, the relatively slow start appeared to make people fall asleep at their keyboards.
• Alternately, if people have ideas to pep up either of those last two points, I'd be happy to hear 'em!
Weird races is a show-stopper for pretty much everything, I'm afraid--or at least a tough one to balance against the "more story" requirement. IME, getting away from hackin' and slashin' is generally done via social interaction, and there are very very few places in Golarion where kobolds, strix, elves, and hobgoblins all get along. Essentially, you need a combination of a hook to get the party together and an AP that's restricted to places where some fraction of a group like that wouldn't get TWEPed on sight. Skull & Shackles is probably your best bet, I'm afraid--maybe you can see what other folks have done with the work schedules, or just handwave past that part of it and start the party over first level. Maybe Serpent's Skull, if you also gloss over most of the shipwreck part in backstory as well.
you kind of bring up the obvious choices for "weird races". I might also throw in for consideration simply finding out what races people want to play, and simply retconning the system so that "weird race x" fill the spot of a common or uncommon race that you then cut out.
So if folks want kobolds, but not dwarves, simply have kobolds fill the dwarf role etc, and have dwarves non-existent in the setting.
Actually, if you're looking for a module, something like Godsmouth Heresy (or anything else set in Kaer Maga) would work, even without taking MMCJawa's suggestion re racial reskinning. There aren't many comprehensively cosmopolitan cities in Golarion as she is written, though.
Skull and Shackles: There's lots of social interaction and the nature of the AP allows any non-standard race to easily join into the pirate crew. Its first module is pretty brutal by all accounts, but having access to any race (including aquatic ones) offsets this slightly.
Edit: Saw the quip about running it, but like so many of the sub-systems in APS, can be dropped, edited, or enhanced depending on your preference.