Recommed me a recent AP

[Lord Snow]

Hey all,
I've been out of the AP business for quite a while, as I was a bit burnt out from Pathfinder after a Curse of the Crimson Throne campaign (plus, I figured I'm never going to run half the APs I own already and money was somewhat tight).

I want to dip my toe back in the water by getting one of the APs that I missed in recent years.

The latest one I own is Iron Gods, so I'm looking for recommendations among all APs starting from Giantslayer and going all the way up to the current one.

My favorite past APs are Curse of the Crimson Throne, Reign of Winter and Shattered Star (I'm not the biggest fan of dungeon crawls, but the ones here are done so exceptionally well). My least favorites are Jade Regent and Kingmaker - I dislike the idea of a sandbox AP and would rather have a solid story with awesome set pieces :)

So, which AP should I get?

[The Purity of Violence]

Hell's Rebels or Strange Aeons (though you need to be a fan of the Cthulhu mythos for the later).

[GeraintElberion]

Giantslayer does good set pieces.

You’ll want to avoid Ruins of Azlant.
Early Ironfang books have a bunch of mini sandboxes but not masses.

[Gorbacz]

Hell's Rebels and Ironfang Invasion are both excellent and very consistent in quality.

[UnArcaneElection]

GeraintElberion wrote:

Giantslayer does good set pieces.

You’ll want to avoid Ruins of Azlant.
Early Ironfang books have a bunch of mini sandboxes but not masses.

What's wrong with Ruins of Azlant?

[Douglas Muir 406]

Wait, "a solid story with awesome set pieces"? No sandboxes?

You want Strange Aeons.

-- Yes, it's the Lovecraft-y one. But (1) solid story, (2) less sandboxing than almost any other recent AP -- not none, much of Book 5 is a bit sandboxy, but very little by Paizo AP standards; and (3) frickin' awesome set pieces, scattered across all the books but especially in the (rightfully) acclaimed Book 3.

The big issue is that, yeah, it's the Lovecraft-y one. It starts off strange and disorienting -- the PCs wake up with no memory in the basement of an insane asylum! -- and it just generally has a different "feel" than your standard Paizo AP. I think it works great, myself, but I have the impression that it's one of those APs that either clicks with a group or doesn't. I will note, though, that no Lovecraft mythos knowledge is required -- the Order of the Amber Die played through it without anyone, even the GM, knowing anything about the mythos whatsoever, and they had an absolute blast.

Doug M.

[Elegos]

If you liked Curse of the Crimson Throne, I cant recommend Hells Rebels enough. Its truly excellent.

[Jurassic Pratt]

Ironfang Invasion, no contest. Genuinely the best AP I've played in to date.

[Lord Snow]

Actually, Lovecraft Mythos is a bonus for me :)

Is Hell's Rebels different in feel from Council of Thieves? I wasn't generally a fan of that one except for the second adventure.

Is Ruins of Azalant very sandboxy? The concept seems really cool...

[Orthos]

Putting my 2cp in for Strange Aeons as well.

[Yakman]

Yeah... based on what you said you enjoyed (diversity of opponents, direct paths to adventure, Lovecraft being a plus), I'm going to say that Strange Aeons might be the best fit.

It's a really solid AP (but then again, they've all been hits (for me) since Hell's Rebels).

[Davor Firetusk]

Strange Aeons is great. Definitely read the whole thing and use the message boards to help spot a couple of things you might want to tweak or at least be aware of early of to get the biggest payoff.

[GeraintElberion]

UnArcaneElection wrote:

GeraintElberion wrote:

Giantslayer does good set pieces.

You’ll want to avoid Ruins of Azlant.
Early Ironfang books have a bunch of mini sandboxes but not masses.

What's wrong with Ruins of Azlant?

Hexploration + community building = pretty sandboxy

[Douglas Muir 406]

What I've seen of RoA looks good, but yeah -- sandboxy.

As Firetusk said above, If you decide to run Strange Aeons, and you don't want to buy the whole thing in advance, hit the message boards -- there's some stuff in later modules that could have minor (but fun!) effects on earlier ones. (Or, just PM me.)

cheers,

Doug M.

[Lord Snow]

thank you all, people :)

I think I'll go for Strange Eons