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Pathfinder Adventure Path #183: Field of Maidens (Blood Lords 3 of 6)

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Solid Continuation

BakaReaper — May 18, 2023, 10:28 am

APs played: GM for books 1-6 of Extinction Curse, GM for books 1-3 of Ruby Phoenix, Player for books 1-2 of Edgewatch, Player for books 1-2 of Strength of Thousands

Book 3 introduces the best NPC by far imo and has the players go on a chase after a foe throughout the country. The locations they travel to are interesting and varied and sets up good foreshadowing for the main antagonist.

The section with the 2 armies is probably the most frustrating part of this book. The adventure seems to imply the characters should spend weeks to months here, but they are in the middle of a race against time from their perspective to track down someone they desperately need information from. There is no reason in character for them to spend time talking with or impressing these factions as that would only slow down their investigation.

Overall still a really solid continuation of the AP. I think foreshadowing and leading up to a good villain is vital for a story and this plants the seeds of that very well.

Pathfinder Adventure Path #182: Graveclaw (Blood Lords 2 of 6)

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A Big Problem

BakaReaper — May 18, 2023, 09:24 am

APs played: GM for books 1-6 of Extinction Curse, GM for books 1-3 of Ruby Phoenix, Player for books 1-2 of Edgewatch, Player for books 1-2 of Strength of Thousands

Book 2 is probably the most controversial book IMO of this AP. Overall it's a really good investigative mystery that sets up the players well to show their loyalties to the country as well as introduce fantastic NPCs throughout the chapters. The first enemy the players go after is the best by far. They are extremely well written and capture the sinister vibe of the AP well.

The worst part of this AP is the thing I am the most torn on. At the start the players are offered a ritual to provide them negative healing. This makes sense and gives the players a way to purchase healing items that would be available in the undead country as positive energy is illegal normally. However, this introduces a huge problem for the rest of the AP. I do not know if this ritual being included was not communicated with the rest of the writers of this adventure or what happened, but for the rest of the adventure, each book has a couple encounters where the only damage the enemies can do is negative damage. Which means the players are completely immune to the encounter. I believe if the players are playing undead, this should be a nice unforeseen benefit they get. However, since this was just blanket negative healing given to the party, the rest of the adventure should have accounted for this. Many tense situations end up being treated like a joke since the players can just walk through groups of enemies with no penalties. I recommend keeping some lower stakes negative only encounters as is to let the players feel powerful, but some should be switched to doing cold damage or something else so they aren't complete jokes.

In the end this was still a very enjoyable book but I have to knock this down a star because the ritual above causes so many problems for the rest of the adventure.

Pathfinder Adventure Path #181: Zombie Feast (Blood Lords 1 of 6)

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Great Adventure

BakaReaper — May 18, 2023, 09:14 am

APs played: GM for books 1-6 of Extinction Curse, GM for books 1-3 of Ruby Phoenix, Player for books 1-2 of Edgewatch, Player for books 1-2 of Strength of Thousands

Book 1 of Blood Lords is a fantastic start to a cohesive, well written adventure. As a GM, I greatly appreciate it being written out in plain text at the start of the book who the main antagonist is and what their motivations are. It really helps for planning things in the long run and incorporating my player's backstory.

Book 1 is a solid introduction to one of the major factions of the nation as well as a few reoccurring NPCs. It really sets the stage and allows the GM through the Blood Lord the player meets to provide in character information on the setting and politics for the adventure.

BakaReaper — Nov 30, 2022, 10:33 am

(Edit: I originally posted this review as 5 stars with no comment purely to combat the 1 star no comment reviews a lot of APs receive from trolls. I apologize for doing so as I realize 5 star reviews with no content are just as useless as 1 star reviews with no content.)

APs played: GM for books 1-6 of Extinction Curse, GM for books 1-3 of Ruby Phoenix, Player for books 1-2 of Edgewatch, Player for books 1-2 of Strength of Thousands

Book 5! Getting to the end here. This one unfortunately may have been the least liked by my group. The characters and set up is fun, as well as finally getting hard evidence the party needed, but there are a few problems with it.

First of all, just like the last book, the players have worked hard to get into their position but they receive almost no respect. The book even calls out to impress on the players that they are just like common folk in Yled and the players hated this with a passion. The players don't even feel like they're actual members of government other than doing some downtime in book 4.

Additionally, the investigation that takes up the 1st half of this book is too vague. There isn't enough direction to get the players to check out the temple except for the rumors which are also problematic. The rumors that are listed are way too railroading. Every single one says "Hey, go check out this person". There aren't even any fake rumors or any other information that could be helpful, it's put all on the GM to make up. Extinction Curse did this much better with the rumor tables they had with a variety of different information.

The story and characters were phenomenal but this mechanically felt like the weakest book somehow which was disappointing.

Back on track and going strong!

BakaReaper — Nov 30, 2022, 10:32 am

APs played: GM for books 1-6 of Extinction Curse, GM for books 1-3 of Ruby Phoenix, Player for books 1-2 of Edgewatch, Player for books 1-2 of Strength of Thousands

Finally to Book 4, where the players become Blood Lords. Very solid villian of this book and the characterization of Geb is wonderful. The combat was incorporated very well into this book and the entirety of it flowed very nicely.

My biggest problem with this book and the next are the players aren't afforded really any respect for their status. They become elite members of the government and are treated like the same still for not very justifiable reasons imo. It feels like the players should have earned more respect by now for stopping a treasonous plot. (The first of many, honestly but they get barely any respect until book 6.)

Despite the problems with the attitude of the NPCs, everything else in this book is wonderful. The characters, the locations, the combat, all of it is masterfully written. After some speed bumps it really feels like the AP got back on track here.