Hi there!
So it looks like I am FINALLY going to get a chance to GM a Pathfinder campaign. This will be my first time, and I had a couple questions, one simple and one not-so-simple, I was hoping some more experienced GMs and players might be able to chime in on.
1) I’m trying to get a sense of how to calculate the CR of a group battle. If it’s multiple creatures with the same CR, you add numbers based on the chart on page 398 of the CRB. So if it’s 4 creatures with CR 16, you add 4 to the 16 and it becomes a CR 20. So far, so good. But what do you do if the encounter has mixed CRs? Let’s say it’s 4 monsters but one is CR 16, two are CR 12, and one is CR 5. My best guess was that you’d average the CRs and add 4, but that would make the hypothetical scenario above a CR 11.25, which sounds low. Is there a rule for this I haven't noticed? I looked through the CRB and the bestiary appendices and didn't see anything.
2) Despite my best efforts, I only got one friend to agree to play the campaign with me. We decided we’d give the solo campaign concept a shot. One possibility we discussed was having me run some party NPCs to balance encounters, but I’m wondering if that would take the focus away from my friend’s PC, which I’d like to avoid. I want his PC to be the hero of the story, or at the very least the leader of the party. Other than stocking him up with magic items for healing/enhancements, are there any ways I might be able to tailor the encounters to fit one character? Is this at all feasible from a balance perspective? I am not certain but it is most likely he’ll be playing a martial class, like fighter, inquisitor, or brawler.
Any thoughts you might have for questions 1 and/or 2 would be greatly appreciated :)
If it's a solo campaign the CR math is honestly fairly irrelevant since the baseline of the system presumes at least a party of 4 so already the results are going to go haywire.
As for a solo campaign itself, really the best thing to do is talk to your player before hand and poll him on what he wants out of the game and what he intends on building. Grog the melee barbarian isn't going to do well against a bunch of wizards flying around invisibly and Weasel the diplo-rogue would probably not prefer a dungeon crawl.
As for the NPC party, you certainly can do it that way although it can eventually become a bit of a hassle to run on your end due to both sides of the engagement and having to keep yourself from metaing on either send. However, a flat lone player against the world can get ugly since he's a single save/suck away from being utterly neutralized which can also not be fun.
Personally, I'd give him a single NPC confidant of the support bend who can supply buffs, terrain traversal, and condition removal that'll minimize the load on your end but keep the player front and center in encounters. This is all fairly broad strokes though, a lot of what goes into a solo campaign largely depends on the what the player brings and wants and I can't stress enough how critical it is to get that before you start planning anything.
You're also likely to do a lot of actual RP, as versus combat, so be ready to timeskip. A lot of players get locked into thinking the GM has something planned.
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Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Adventure, Lost Omens Subscriber
For question 1:
CR16 + 2 x CR12 + CR5
CR5 is too low to mean anything in this situation.
2 x CR12 is CR14 (2 x CR(x) = CR(x+2))
CR14 + CR16 = CR17 (CR(x-2) + CR(x) = CR(x+1))
Try and add lower CRs to get a higher one and use the rules for multiples of the same CR. Start low.
Or just add up the XP values of all the creatures in an encounter and see what CR that equates to.
If you've only got one person, a one-on-one fight with people the same level can go either way.
Lower levels, a fighter will trounce everything. Mid levels, it's a toss up depending on who gets first shot... A rogue that gets stealth will get the SA off, a mage that sees the enemy coming can huck fireballs and lightning bolts at half-dozen or more football fields away, and if the fighter gets into melee with either before they get an attack off, he'll wipe the floors, and at about level 9 or 10, Clerics and Oracles get Heal (BOOM, all health back). High levels, a mage will splatter everything if it's built right, healers come a close second, rogues a middling third (remember that rogues are extreme specialists... given the right gear and stats, a rogue CAN take a wizard if he's got a little luck at high levels, but he has to be built specially for it), and fighters dead last.
A solo campaign is usually a long arc or two, for some specific side thing for the character, rather than a whole start-to-finish thing, to be honest. But there's nothing saying you CAN'T do it, you just have to understand that your player is going to have weaknesses.
If he's a rogue-type, he won't have much healing beyond the odd potion or wand he can afford (you might consider the partial-charge wand purchases) or melee staying power.
If he's a mage, you'll probably want to start him off at fireball/lightning bolt level, or he's going to NEED a meat shield for several levels, and even then he's going to be middling until level 5/6 spells.
If he's a fighter, he'll have no scouting ability or healing beyond JUST potions.
A cleric or the right Oracle mystery would be his best bet for a soloist, though you might consider giving him either a free weapon feat or a free White Pyramid Ioun Stone and give him free reign to swap it out as desired if he goes Oracle, unless he's a Kitsune oracle (their Alternate FC is 4 points = a proficiency feat... but if he goes that route, let him use the custom weapon rules so that he gets something decent for it). Clerics get good weapons out of the box, but oracles are limited to simple ones, but BOTH get acceptable armors. My current oracle has the Bones mystery, and at level 5 I've got a base 27 AC (+1 heavy shield, 20 dex, Armor of Bones, and my GM ruled that the Armored Kilt stacks with the armor of bones, because that's how the Armored Kilt is intended to work). But he still won't have scouting ability on his own.
I mention this because you'll have to compensate, either by allotting him NPCs to do them or by not putting him in situations where he'll NEED it.
The issue with solo campaigns is you lack the HP pool, action pool, saves spread, skill spread, and redundancies of a regular 4+ party.
One crit and the best fighter is downed with no one to prevent a coup de grace. One bad save and the best wizard is shut down without the HP to survive.
Without the action economy advantage no cleric will survive spending every turn healing (damage scales so much faster).
There are no allies to carry skills, roll a second perception, or add aid another, or even offer alternative damages.
So a solo character will need: Decent skill spread, a broad range of melee, ranged and magical damage options (to negate antimagic, DR and SR).
A solo GM will have to tailor his enemies and encounters to the player, limiting options and variety. A fighter would be crushed by a social game, a wizard in a pure battle game, etc. The game setting and type will have to be (Mostly) in the players favour.
I would suggest letting the player run 2 characters, or providing a bonus animal companion played by you for a non-spotlight hogging battle buddy.
Maybe have a quest early on that earns the player the help of fae agents at critical moments, (Charm person, dazzling, cure light wounds, a single attack, aid another skill check, pick a lock, scouting, spying, hints, etc). Nothing powerful enough to feel like GM fiat or deus ex machina, but enough to buy a round or give a second chance.
Giving them gestalt, better saves, or ability to hire temporary underlings should also help with everything but the single party target vulnerability.
Hero tokens are another useful tool, allowing for a second save, auto stabilize (useful if they have die hard and ferocity), or reroll a crit. failure.
I have run solo campaigns several different ways. Save yourself a headache and have the player make a character that can be the "hero"'and another that is a sidekick. Then you make two NPCs who fill in the gaps and whose personalities consist of "whatever you say, boss." You end up with a party of four and the player isn't overwhelmed with too many characters.
After using this method several times, I also suggest the player have the "face", debuffing spell caster (if present), and heavy hitter on their side of the table. You want the NPCs to be filler, not stars. Another thing you can do if using a point buy, is give the PCs 25 points and the NPCs 20 (or 20 and 15 respectively). It's is all about keeping the player in the spot light.
Contact Rules in Ultimate Campaign are pretty fun.
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Here's how my partner and I have been running two-person games for awhile. One of us (the player) plays two characters. The other one GMs and also runs two characters. The GM's characters still interact with the player's characters, but the player's characters are the ones who talk to the NPCs, figure stuff out, etc. For us, it hasn't really taken the spotlight away from the player (one character usually ends up being the party "face," but it's generally fairly balanced in terms of main character/side characters). We've gone through four APs that way and are about to finish our fifth.
It might be a bit much to keep track of if you're a new GM, though. Is your player new to playing?
Meraki wrote: Here's how my partner and I have been running two-person games for awhile. One of us (the player) plays two characters. The other one GMs and also runs two characters. The GM's characters still interact with the player's characters, but the player's characters are the ones who talk to the NPCs, figure stuff out, etc. For us, it hasn't really taken the spotlight away from the player (one character usually ends up being the party "face," but it's generally fairly balanced in terms of main character/side characters). We've gone through four APs that way and are about to finish our fifth.
It might be a bit much to keep track of if you're a new GM, though. Is your player new to playing?
He played some D&D 3.5 back in high school and a Pathfinder game 2-3 years ago, so he knows more than me.
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I've been GM'ing a campaign for a soloist since 2012. Here is some general advice based on my experience.
1) If you need a guideline, use CR -2 as an average encounter. So, for example, in general if you throw a single CR 7 critter at a level 9 PC, they'll probably be okay, especially if they have time to plan and prepare. But there are exceptions. If you throw a CR 7 succubus at a level 9 fighter, the fighter is pretty likely to wind up as a sock puppet for Team Evil in short order. See #2.
2)The CR system is less important than knowing the capabilities of your PC. You must prepare the encounters based on the PC's abilities. For example, if your PC is a Fighter, the PC has no way to deal with traps. So, don't use traps. If your PC is a rogue, they can handle traps, but may be ill-equipped to translate ancient runic inscriptions. If your PC has a terrible Will save, go easy on the enchantment spells. If their fortitude stinks, avoid poison.
Basically, play to the PC's strengths. You CAN use stuff that targets their weaknesses, but do so cautiously. If you need it to advance the story, do it. Otherwise, think twice first.
3) Avoid save-or-die spells and effects. Because if you kill the PC, the game is basically over.
4) Avoid save-or-suck spells and effects. See #3.
5) Avoid spells that reduce the actions that the PC can take. These are absolutely lethal, because a soloist's biggest problem is their severely limited number of actions. Similarly, be aware that adding multiple enemies to an encounter means that the baddies get a more actions than your PC.
6) Consider giving the PC an NPC pal who covers a few of their weak areas. For example, maybe your fighter has rogue buddy who can help out with traps. You could keep this as one special companion -- the PC in my campaign has developed a deep friendship with her cohort, to the point where the player has been talking about getting a tattoo of her cohort (the player, not the PC!).
However, you could also use a rotating cast of NPC allies. Maybe your fighter has a cleric buddy, a wizard buddy, and a rogue buddy, but only gets one of them at any given time. This will let you use different challenges in different adventures.
7) NPC allies must NOT take the spotlight too often. The PC is the hero. They are sidekicks. It's okay to give them moments to shine, but keep the focus on the PC pretty much of the time.
8) Have a plan for death. It's entirely possible to kill your PC by accident. What then? Is the campaign just over? Does an NPC ally find and resurrect their corpse? Do they come back as undead? Does a family member take up their quest? Does a deity send them back to life with a mythic tier and a mission? (Note: mythic tiers are good for added PC durability, but they also make the game a lot more complex. Probably you should avoid them until you've got some solid GM experience under your belt.)
9) Don't be surprised that the PC gears up quickly. If you're giving them loot designed for a party of 4, and the player has just one PC to kit out, then in short order they will have excellent gear for their level. That's okay. They need it.
Finally, be prepared to have fun! I've done a pretty fair bit of GM'ing at this point, and all of my most rewarding experiences as a GM have been for solo players, primarily in one campaign, but I've also run solo one-shots for people from larger groups.
It is much, much easier to maintain a sense of immersion with no opportunity for side-chat. The PC gets all of the face time, which strongly encourages in-character role-play as opposed to third-person descriptions of what the PC does. That will result in much broader and deeper connections to the world and the people in it than one tends to see in larger groups.
It's not impossible to get good immersion in large groups. Matthew Mercer does it all the time with his incredibly well-behaved players on Critical Role. But having a smaller group makes it a lot simpler.
Hope this helps.
@Tinalles Excellent information, very helpful, thank you!
For solo adventures. calculate the APL at -2 so all of your CR should be adjusted down by 2.
Try to avoid "save or suck" spells or else the campaign can end very quickly.
It's useful to have a stable of NPCs that the player can call upon for assistance in matters that are not covered by their own skillset.
FWIW, a level 10 PC is effectively a CR 10 mob. Meaning putting it against a CR 10 mob is about a 50% chance to win (though in all likelihood the PC is better optimized...though the mob might also have some abilities which specifically screw over the PC as mentioned, so watch out for that).
So in most cases you want your most difficult fights to be player level -1 (which is still in the PC's favor) unless there's an outside factor mitigating that.
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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Why not just download some of the 1-On-1 Adventures? There are 16, though only volumes 12-16 are available individually. I bought the compendium that has volumes 1-11 in it. They are designed for several different character types, written in a way that makes it easy for a single character to cover all the bases, with no heavy lifting from the GM. Each of these is at least a few sessions as I recall. At the very least, it could provide you with some insight into balancing a single-player campaign.
My son and I started on the rogue path which has 3 modules (or 4?) that can be done in order as a complete campaign though they are not technically connected in a real way. We made it through the first one (Gambler's Quest) and had a lot of fun.
It sounds like you will both be learning at the same time. My advice would be to find a pre-written game to run - at least for the first time out - That will make it easier for both of you.
Some of these links might be useful.
http://paizo.com/pathfinder/adventureFinder/soloAdventures
http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/64278/One-on-One-Adventures-Compendium
The reason I didn't look into prewritten 1-on-1s is because I didn't know they existed. Thanks! We're going to discuss his interests and expectations beforehand but these look like helpful references if nothing else.
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