Jacen's page

I think the spending limits are mostly for tasks that take far more resources than time, like teams that cost 0 days to recruit or crafting magic items. If you can work on multiple projects at once, you can ignore the limitations of building individual rooms/hiring individual teams. Sum up the total capital the project would consume and divide it by the spending cap; compare the result to the number of days it requires and take the higher number.

It specifically states on page 80 that spending limits apply to goods, labour and influence, not magic. Therefor they cannot apply to the creation of magic items. You would also need to undertake truly massive projects in order to even come close to the small town spending limit of 15 per day overtaking the construction time.

Does it state anywhere in the rules you can undertake multiple construction projects at once?

To expand upon my example of crafters being overpowered in the downtime system, let me give a specific example:

We have two characters, one an alchemist who owns an alchemists lab room, the other a fighter who owns a Bar room (I am using single rooms to keep things nice and simple)

The fighter runs his bar to earn GP for +20 a day (+10 for running it himself) and takes 10 on the check so he makes 3gp a day. The alchemist can make the exact same amount of money if her were to run his lab. The problem comes in when the alchemist uses his day to accumulate Magic.

If the alchemist takes 10 on his check he can earn 3 points of magic capital for 150gp, that same three points are worth 300gp towards crafting magic items. He has just netted 150gp of profit for the day rather than 3gp. You could argue that this profit only applies to magic items so its not quite got the utility of the 3gp the innkeeper makes, however adventurers will always spend the majority of their funds on magic items, even with this system in place, and I would rather have 150gp of magic item credit than 3 generic GP.

But the barteneder can use his day to earn influence I hear you say! Well that is correct yes, but influence cannot be used to make me a flaming sword of death, so its not quite the same.

If I am doing something wrong here please let me know.

Although I have to say I very much like Ultimate Campaign overall, I do have a few glaring questions with the downtown system that I hope someone can clarify.

First off the rules state that a magic item crafter can spend points of Magic Capital towards magic items creation. Is magical capital worth 100gp per point towards the creation of magic items? If so I could earn it for 50gp and a skill check, thus cutting the construction costs of magic items in half. Granted it would take longer to craft the item. Could I then sell said item for double the cost it took me to craft it?

Next up is town spending limits. Do you need to pay for the entire costs (good, capital, labour and magic) before the construction of a building or recruitment of an organisation can begin? Otherwise spending limits for town size seem fairly moot.

Take the construction of an inn for example. It requires 33 points of Goods, 3 points of Influence, 32 points of Labor, and 90 days to build an inn. Now if I am paying the capital as the Inn is being built, even in the smallest throp I can use 180 points of capital over 90 days, much higher than the 68 points needed for the inn. On the other hand, if I need to pay the capital up front it will take 34 days to pay the capital then 90 days for construction meaning 124 days for my inn, which makes sense as this time would be reduced in a large city with better resources and a higher spending limit.

My last query is to do with the "Run a business" downtime activity. Now the description of this activity says the you can spend the day inspiring your workers by personally running your business, and this means you can make a check to earn capital at +10. So in the inn example my inn has a +41 bonus to earn capital and if I run it personaly this increases to a total of +51 correct?

Why then would I not just abandon this activity to earn capital for the inn by itself as soon as I have a skill modifier of more than +10 (which does not take long in pathfinder) Say I have craft(blacksmith) at +18 I could have myself earn capital at +18, and the inn earn capital at +41 for a total of +59 per day.

Perhaps I am reading things wrong here, any clarification would be much appreciated before I use this system in my home game.

Your list more or less is the same as the collection I bought to run the path. The face cards and item cards are a real plus,they are far from essential but add a nice reward to the players when meeting a new NPC or finding a new piece of loot.

If you can afford it I would add Giants and classic mosters revisited to this list. RotRL redefines many staple dungeons and dragons type monsters and having these books will give you a deeper understanding of these creatures and help really bring those encounters to life.

All of these are just accessories though that while helpful will not guarantee a good or fun game. That responsibility resides with you as GM :)

I like Scarlet Johansen as seoni. I would have throw Tom Hardy out there for Valeros.

Damned iPad with its automatic words. It's meant to say absolute. I would have thought that it would have seemed like an obvious mistake, rather than representing an inane lack of proficency with the English language.

Perhaps manners are obsolete.

Was giving some thought to what actors I would like to play characters in a Rise of the Runelords movie( I can dream can't I?)

It also helps me role-play as I like to imitate the traits of famous actors.

So let me know your thoughts on who you would like to see if ever a movie was adapted from this brilliant adventure path.

I would like to see Hugo Weaving as Justice Ironbriar. He just personifies the cold, calculated intelligence I think Ironbriar would have and he plays great villains.

Fantastic ideas Halandir, I am going to steal many if those ideas for use in my own game.

All very good suggestions. I particularly like Tsuto being Ironbriars son, genius! I'm surprised that's not cannon.

The party wiped out Tsuto in thistletop but seeing as our last session finished just as they defeated Malfeshnekor, I may make him grown and indicate he's still alive as they leave while I remind them that Amikio asked them if they could keep her brother alive for fair trial if possible. Fingers crossed they don't just stab him in the face to finish him off.

Me and my players have just finished Burnt Offerings and found it an obsolete joy to play, Paizo have did a magnificent job with the RotRL AE.

That said, after having read next adventure I feel somewhat underwhelmed by the second half of the chapter. The first section with the haunted house and Murder mystery seems like it will be a treat to play but after the players reach Magnimar it all feels a little... rushed. As read it does not appear that they will even know who Justice Ironbriar is when they face him, let alone the motivations of the Skinsaw Cult.

I intend to rectify this redesigning the second half of the adventure path with additional encounters. I'm thinking that I will have Sandponts sheriff ask the party to transport a prisoner on their way to Magnimar and stand in on the trial. That way they will at least have context to who Ironbriar is. I'm also thinking of making foxglove manor something of a dead end, the players will have to do a little more digging to find the Sawmill.

Does anyone else have any additional ideas to insert more of the plot into the second half of is adventure?

Brilliant, thank you both very much :)

My players have all chosen pawns for their PC's from the BB pawn set for our RotRL campaign and I was wondering if anyone knows which publications the art on the PC pawns came from originally, specifically the male elf cleric, the male human rogue and the male human wizard?

I have fixed all the spelling and grammar mistakes mentioned by JohnF, link is here

I created the document on iPad so I am not sure how I would go about formatting it to US paper size, I shall look into it though.

I have fixed a few spelling mistakes on the document. Link is here

I shall look into adding the reference numbers for the Sandpoint map when I get a chance.

I am in something of a unique position given the nature of my work I am away from home for 4 weeks and then home for 4. During my time away I have plenty of time to prepare for our upcoming games, and was wondering how other prepare the adventure paths.

I am running rise of the runelords and so far I have spent my time analysing the encounters and taking a few notes of information I think critical, as well as meaning out how I'm going to play some of the NPC'S at the table.

What preparations do you make for running one of the adventure paths?

Created a handout of locations and important information for Sandpoint for my players:

Sandpoint Player Handout

I created this handout for my players in our game. It just provides a list of all the locations they can visit in Sandpoint as well as a brief description of the areas function. Locations are organised by type.

Sandpoint Player Handout

Interesting subject.

For the record however there is no "Scottish" language, both scots and Irish speak variations of Gaelic, natively anyways.

I for one can't speak a word of it but it's quite a pleasant sounding language, very akin to welsh and I would imagine its closer to an elven or sylvan tounge. The original elven tounge created by Tolkien was based on welsh, a language he had a great love for.

About the prim and proper English thing, the way English people are portrayed talking in american media is a carefully chosen accent that actors are taught in acting school, that accent does not exist in reality.

Being a "prim and proper" Scotsman myself I can say I have never heard a genuine Scottish accent in any American media, even Ewan McGreggor and Keven Mckidd change the way they talk when doing international films. I suppose it's probably he same with any accent.

Here's my choices for voices, if I have to give certain NPCs thick accents.

Azlanti / Thassilonian = Greek (or slightly Far-East sounding tone, more of that on Thassilonians)

Andoren = Mixed British or American (depends on region)

Chelaxian = Italian (because Ancient Rome analogy)

Taldan = Posh British or Spanish (depends on region) / Russian (Brevoy only)

Garundi = Middle-Eastern (though never a strong accent)

Keleshite = Middle-Eastern (usually a strong accent)

Kellid = East European? (they remind me of the ancient slavic people)

Mwangi = African (rather obvious, some variance in ethnic groups)

Shoanti = Greek? (their native language is a mix of Thassilonian, Hallit and Varisian, so rather highlight the Thassilonian part)

Tian = Asian (depends on region, no silly racist stereotype voice acting)

Ulfen = Scandinavian (or just the voice actors from Skyrim)

Varisian = East European (highlighting the Romanian accent)

Vudrani = Indian (kind of obvious)

I'll add others later if any come to mind. Azlant (and Thassilon to a rather limited extent) is an analogy to Atlantis, so it makes sense for them to have the Greek accent. Iblydos is not on the list, but they have a similar accent (it's the Ancient Greece of Golarion, after all), but probably should differ in some way to avoid confusion.

I like all of your choices very much, especially Russian for Brevoy.

Okay I have not read that far ahead but I will keep that in mind. This is designed to be used upon initial meeting with the NPC's and is just for GM reference.

I was wondering if anyone had any ideas for what regional accents certain characters in the campaign world would have. Obviously certain cultures are rooted in real world elements such as the Linnorm Kings being close to Nordic culture or Imperial Cheliax resembling a decadent roman empire. You could therefor inmate italian for cheliax or Norwegian/Scandinavian for people of the North.

For some reason I imagine the people of Ustalav to have a thick cockney English accent, I think this would work well for the Carrion Crown horror themes. Taldor would be another old English accent for me.

This topic does not necessarily imply what voice you use for NPC's at your table as I know that doing accents is not everyone's thing, just in theory what sort of accents you think characters from particular parts of the continent would have.

Thanks :) Here is another one.

I would love to see an adventure path set in ancient azlant that deals with the events that lead up to earthfall, and pitches the players as epic heroes in the vien of Hercules and Achilies. Obviously this type of campign would use mythicl rules and be epic on a timeline changing scale! haha

Another good one would be a wild west style game set in the Mana Wastes where magic takes a backseat to firearms and steal punk elements.

Thanks, I am going to go with the first pronunciation as well. It just sounds more organic.

I am not sure what you mean by "Virtual Reality Gaming" as it seems to me you are describing something completely different from a tabletop RPG experience.

By your logic should pen and paper games not have been replaced by MMORPG's and video games already?

If you propose that we are 22 years from walking into a machine that takes us into a fantatical world that can be anything we can imagine, alongside our friends and it allows us become an avatar of our own design then I am somewhat excited.

I also don't think thats anything like sitting round a table and playing pathfinder...

My take on Shalelu

Oh and another for good measure :)

Thanks for the clarification on the naming, I was saying both of them wrong haha

Here is another NPC, will post more in time as I prepare them. I want to have all Sandpoints major NPC's and any others featured in burnt offerings done by the time we start playing mid September.

Hey I have been something of a longtime lurker on these boards but decided its about time I posted something.

Just got gifted the Rise of the runelords anniversary edition for my birthday and hugely anticipating running this campaign.

As part of my preparation I am focusing on how I am going to roleplaying specific NPC's. I have adopted the following formulae for the major characters in my notes:

Would anyone be interested in a consolidated list like this for all the main NPC's? These notes are made to be used in conjunction with the RotrlAE as they are just bare bones info you need at a glance when the PC's meet the NPC in question.

I was also wondering to how people pronounce Amikio and Shalelu names, they don't sound right when I say them aloud, perhaps I'm pronouncing them wrong...