So I talked with a few of the players recently, and I made a mistake. I let slip that when I had played through modules 1 & 2 of RotRL, there were a couple of "almost mandatory" TPK areas, like totally unbalanced fights.
The players took that almost as a math challenge, and began putting together spreadsheets of the most high-damage PC attacks possible to create in Pathfinder. They love char-op, I guess. I tried to suggest to them that if they optimized for the 10% of the fights that are super-hard, they will then spend 90% of the game in the remaining fights being bored, but this did not matter to them.
However, there are other players signed up for my game who cannot hyper-optimize to be murder hobos, and I need to give them some good times too. I really do NOT want the game to be only about combat, and I want these other players to have a chance to shine at something.
I've already seen the festival games posts, and I'm building up lots of skill challenges for that. I'm aware of the romantic diversions in town and the social challenges with a certain store owner (I actually bought the social combat cards, and I've assembled a small deck to turn that into a mini-game). Oh! And I own the old "Three Dragon Ante" card game for D&D 3.5 (the card game where your character's skills can help your hand in the real world). I recall reading one of the locations in Sandpoint was full of gambling, so I can use that there.
But what else is there? Do you guys have ideas for non-combat stuff? Maybe swap a monster room for a puzzle room? Or maybe during down time in Sandpoint there is a non-combat event? I'd love to hear about non-combat stuff you did in your own games. Please clue me in!
Also, have Tsuto flee and use the chase cards.
Oh! I have those cards already, and Tsuto would love to escape! Thanks for the idea.