Hilary Goldstein's page

I must have a special edition of Ultimate Campaign that comes with this super awesome cover. I haven't seen the standard edition with this terrible cover you speak of.

As with any adventure you are GMing:
Prepare
Be Flexible
Be the Angel of Mercy

For S&S, preparation is important. There's underwater combat, severe weather, a ton of NPCs whose allegiances need to be tracked -- all things many GMs will have little prior experience with.

As was said earlier -- adjust the campaign to the playstyle and interests of the players. No one at Paizo is going to be grading you on how closely you followed the source material. Never let the "official" adventure path stand in the way of enjoyment.

In reality, no one actually ever HAS to die in a Pathfinder campaign. The GM can always find a way to spare a life. It might require quick thinking on your part of just an obvious deux ex machina, but you do have the power to adjust the adventure/enemies/NPCs to spare the PCs from digging a grave.

Sometimes you can even turn a near death into a memorable sidequest. Ghoul Fever didn't kill him, it just put him in a deathlike coma. But there's some plant on island X that NPC Y has heard of that is said to cure it but Enemy Z runs that island. Yadda yadda.

A cavlier who rides on a dolphin.

The beginning really depends on the GM. It's a pretty fine line between making the PCs hate their oppressors and making them hate the game.

I think the book actually makes a mistake in how it assumes to lead PCs to hate their overlords. Punishing the PCs too much annoys the players and when you aren't succeeding at level 1, it can be very frustrating. Instead, punish NPCs the players care about. In fact, it makes more sense that Scourge and Plugg would take note of the PCs allies and punish them for aligning with the 'wrong crew.'

Sandra befriends the PCs right away and sneaks them some of their items? Well, guess who should get a lashing that night for doing so.

I had toyed with the idea that Besmara was a more benevolent deity than described in the official books. That her image and intent had basically been perverted and distorted by pirates who just wanted to do whatever they wanted... They removed some of the laws in the pirates code of conduct to suit their needs. You (and Tessa Fairwind) are agents of a Besmara cult determined to clean up the Pirate Council and restore piracy to its intended civility.

Also, the player is being a dick.

Another tactic. What is the alignment of the captain? Because immediately backstabbing a new shipmate and then tossing their body overboard is an evil act. Pirate doesn't mean you ignore your alignment.

I've just finished reading through the six books and making notes as I'm going to be running this campaign starting next month. Without having run it yet, I can offer some observations at least...

I would say that this AP probably depends on how you GM. If you are looking for something where the AP kind of does it all for you and if you just follow it point-by-point it's brilliant, this is probably not for you. There's a lot to work with here and the core elements are great, but this seems like an AP that benefits from a GM who likes to embellish and adapt -- who makes the AP more guidebook than holy book.

My recommendation (and this is for any campaign) is to get your players to invest time on their backgrounds and to create better hooks for why they are at the pirate capital Port Peril to begin with. Maybe one's father was a Pirate Lord betrayed by someone on the Pirate Council, but he doesn't know who. Another could have come searching for an ancient family heirloom lost centuries ago. Etc., etc.

With this little bit of info, you can tie your PCs to specific events, characters, even treasures in the AP. While you still run the same main plot lines, now you have one PC trying to figure out who betrayed his father (and gain revenge). It could be one of the main villains... or it could be their greatest ally and the "betrayal" could have some more noble explanation.

As for the complaints about it being railroady... it's your campaign. You can make it more sandboxy if you want. You can adapt it as you go to how your players play.

Last thing. It's very important that you let your players know in advance what to expect in terms of environments/skills. That is -- be sure they know underwater combat is likely and that social skills will be used probably more than in just about any other AP. I've run campaigns where no one bothers with a professional or craft skill. Here, profession (sailor) is almost a must for every character and craft (siege engine) or (sails) can be very helpful.

These are some good thoughts. It doesn't solve my main issue with book 6 and doesn't (to me) seem to work for a good-ish campaign. And that is, because the Hurricane King is stubborn, the PCs decide to kill him. It's pretty weak motive for what they go through to get to him, and feels disconnected from the rest of the adventure.

I would alter your story slightly to make the Hurricane King more compelling. Bonefist has sensed his power has waned and already knew that he'd been betrayed by Harrigan, who was once his strong ally. He doesn't want that to come to light, because it shows more weakness in his power. Bonefist's inaction/stubbornness throughout the adventure path is actually part of a big gamble he's taking.

He knows his position is tenuous already. He needs to solidify those on his side. So he allows thorn-in-his-side Tessa and her lapdogs (the PCs) to gather those who would dare stand against the Hurricane King's orders. Let them gather in one spot, fight the Cheliax and then when both sides are weakened, Bonefist and his loyal crew come in and wipe them all out. In this way, he removes the Chelish plot, destroys his enemies on the Pirate Council, and solidifies his power once more.

It's easy enough to have Bonefist survive the naval assault (or not even be there personally) and then have the PCs learn of his betrayal and come after him as in the adventure path.

Curious how you guys are handling the ship combat? I've read nothing but complaints and though I haven't run it yet, just from the rules set forth all of the complaints (single-player focused, too slow) seem like they would be accurate.

And let me know how your Skulls and Shackles goes! I love to hear about the exploits of other parties in adventures that I've run before.

I will stop by sometime!

Hey, welcome to Utah!!

Thanks, appreciate that. My PFS experience has been that people don't care about roleplay (sometimes don't even talk to one another) and that's not really my style.

What day are you wanting to play on? Me and a friend are looking for a game. He lives in Sandy and I live in SLC.

BTW welcome to Utah. :)

Not sure yet. Wanted to get the group together and see what works best for people. Friday night might be good (5pm-pass out) or on a Sat/Sunday 10am-6 or something.

Hit me up on email - hilgoldstein [at] gmail.com

Just moved to Utah and need my gaming fix. Looking for gamers near (or able to get to) South Jordan, UT. Going to run Skull & Shackles campaign and need 3-4 more players.