Malorium's page

The problem with the early stages of this AP are that there isn't a huge amount for the party to intereact with.
To give my campaign more of a story feel for the players I've added in a refugee from the Fey whose hiding out from the Fey Queen (forget her name) - this gave the players a much earlier heads up on what the story arc is and helped put some of the encounters into a context.

I've got the Fey incursion happening much earlier - with her agents working much more in the Stolen Lands to keep the area destabilised. The remnants of the Cyclops empire is playing a more up front role.

I've approached this AP as not only a Sandbox for my players but for me as well - take the central story, twist it to my GM style & my players style, drop some encounters, add others.

Nope - I'm in the UK so it takes ages to get here usually but it does feel longer than usual and my FLGS has it in stock already :-(

Trying to judge a whole path (Savage Tide) against one module of Serpents Skull would be unfair.

That said I took one look at Serpents Skull and went 'oh look, another map of an unknown land with pre set encounters for the party to find' - maybe they should have called it 'PirateMaker'? That said I'm looking forward to the path getting stuck into the main story.

Or, the Stag Lord could take a page out of Korben Dallas' book.

1. Shoot one of the PCs in the head.
2. Ask if anyone else wants to negotiate.

>:D

Oooh I like that. The Stag Lord as a crazed psychopath killer.

Having just watched Apocalypse Now maybe take a leaf out of Colonel Kurtz's book?

I'm tempted to run my Stag Lord along those lines

My group have just received the Stag Lord Charter so now know what direction the campaign is taking. Barely 5 minutes had gone by before we had a split in the party along Monarchy v Parliament lines with religion thrown into the mix - I think Paizo missed a trick on not putting in rules for Civil War lol

On a more serious note - I've told my players that their personal actions will dictate the type of Kingdom they end up with - so if they are mean & nasty then they will attract mean and nasty settlers or v.v.

I think Jhod Kavken is going to be an interesting NPC for my party to engage with and might be more of a regular interaction with the party. I'm planning on running a 'defend the temple' from Feywild attack when he needs to consecrate it for the first time as I imagine a formal reintroduction of Erastil might p*** the big baddie fairy thing somewhat.

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I also thought you meant it was hard because the players' choices can gave you flipping pages instead of going from page 1 then 2 then 3, and so on.

I don't use the book 'in play' (I hate running scenarios straight out of books) I just have a copy of the map in front of me and headline notes about each planned/random encounter & then tailor it to how the party is playing that night.

"It is not DM friendly because of its openness. The ones(adventures) that are easiest for most DM's are one layered with railroads."

Sorry but thats a very poor excuse. Case in point:

% chance of random encounters page 13 (after the encounter at Oleg's)
Random encounter table page 75 in the Bestiary section.

It's little things like that I get annoyed at (particularly when I'm prepping the next session at 11pm at night!). The AP itself is great just as a GM it doesn't make my life easy when looking for info at times.

I've found that Kingmaker requires a lot of pre work from the GM to make it work plausibly. Starting the AP cold straight from the book won't work easily. I've had my players spending about 6 weeks of gaming before they got to Oleg's so that they are understanding of the political background to the charter that they've been given. Even then they are querying why they should be entrusted with it - I have to be honest and say (IMHO) that the official reason given for Restov's 'hands off' approach is weak.

I also find that the layout & order of the AP's for Kingmaker are not massively GM friendly. They could be structured slightly differently. I'm not criticising the AP itself which I think is great. It's just not user friendly from a time stretched GM perspective.

I GM a weekly game of 4e & play in a quarterly game. Observations thus far are that it appears well balanced.

As a GM what I will say is that this game is a dream as it allows me to 'play the game' instead of adjudicating/tracking numbers & rules.
With the Adventure Tool creating encounters is a 5 minute job allowing me to concentrate on the story/campaign.

Across a group of 9 gamers with something like 300 years of RP'ing experience between us (yes, we're that old!) and only one WoW player in the group - there is no one who has said they didn't like it - or have found outrageous imbalances (yet - we are working on it lol).

I'll probably change the Mites to Goblins in my game just to keep the 'low level' feel to the initial phases of the campaign. I really want my players to ally with the Kobolds as the role playing opportunities presented by a population of manky kobolds littering their shiny new city is just too much to pass up. (for those of you who live in London I envisage them occupying the same ecological niche as pigeons!)

Of course, if your PCs are good at giving themselves their own direction, you might not even need the quests.

Ha! My players lose direction when presented with a fork in a path!

I think that the wanted poster element is important in a sandbox type adventure. It gives the party a few leads/reasons to step outside the fort, gives them a motivation other than blindly blundering across the countryside and puts some of the control into the players hands.

I can see it raising some interesting role playing amongst the players as they prioritise their activity.

It can only be old squid face himself - the Great Cthulhu!

I'm running my group through an intro session or two before they arrive at Oleg's. Thay way Restov is a 'real place' to them and not just to be treated like a mail order depot for goods that can't be found in the Stolen Lands.
May have them meet the other adventuring groups in Restov - a bit of friendly competion :-)
Also toying with the idea of them being 'sponsored' by a merchant.

I'm still kicking ideas around in my head at the moment though.

When i mentioned prep time it was in relation to converting 3.? scenarios - by stripping out the non IH stuff from them and adjusting challenges & monsters and still making sure the scenario was playable & balanced.

I used 4th Ed monsters as written in my games of IH - they gave the characters a real challenge suitable to their abilities.

Just got my copy of Kingmaker - its ideal for an IH campaign

IH characters move around the field of battle a lot more than 3.? ones do. The Harrier for example gains bonuses on the # of squares moved - so they are always moving. The combat & skill options encourage movement & activity in combat - something a fight in a 10ft wide corridor or 30 x 30 room won't support and quickly becomes frustrating. I always kept dungeons (if used) down to no more than half a dozen rooms/locales or you used natural caverns to create more space.

No, at higher lvls they could more than hold their own & it was coming up with 'sensible' challenges for them. Also got the impression that the rules & feats had been well tested at up to approx 6th lvl or so but after that the options available to characters seemed to be a little less firmer (for want of a better word). It was a game that seriously needed a second Edition to iron out some of the bugs but that said for those who want a half way house between 3.? & 4th I would heartily recommend it - although the lack of magic might not suit some players.

I ran an IH campaign using published 3.? adventures - including ones from Dungeon Magazine. The lessons I learned (IMHO) were:

1. Lots of prep time
2. Change the skill challenge DC's given IH characters better skills
3. Purge the magic - which for some adventures can be difficult as
they may rely on high lvl spells etc as plot devices or
assumptions about PC capabilities.
4 Treasure is fairly meaningless so you have to replace material
rewards with something that matters for your IH characters.
5. I used 4th Ed monsters in my campaign (anyone familiar with IH &
4th ed will recognise some of the system similarities)
6. Anytyhing that relies on dungeon based encounters will frustrate
IH characters so watch out for that.
7. Lots of prep

I've yet to receive my copy of Kingmaker but it does sound like it might be ideal for an IH campaign.
I & my players loved IH and it was a pity it wasn't heavily supported. I do have concerns that at higher levels it was creaking a lot.

Have fun

Thanks for that Jason - I was going to have the invasion possibility rumbling very very quietly in the background and I saw it as a far horizon event which would leave me free to not use it if the players took the campaign off in a different direction or if the 6th episode proved to be too good not to use.

I was going to run the 'Githyanki Invasion' campaign arc as mentioned in an old Dragon magazine - but then I saw this PF and thought 'what a great way for them to become attached to a town & its population just before I dump a Lich Queen army on it' - cue evil GM laughter.

As the final part of this AP is self contained (I've read the spoiler posted elsewhere on the board) does anyone (aka a Designer) know that if running an Invasion will 'ruin' the campaign arc as envisaged within the AP or is it flexible enough to withstand such strains?

I and my two gaming groups will not be upgrading to 4.0.
Will I continue to buy Paizo products if they do convert to 4.0. Of course I will.
Will I continue to buy them if they stay with 3.5? Of course I will.

I buy scenarios/game material because of the ideas and quality of product offered not because of the rule system it is based in. I still have enough imagination and free will to take a scenario/adventure path created in one rule system and convert it to my system of choice.

Paizo will & should do what it requires to remain a viable commercial concern that puts bread on the table for its owners & employees whilst at the same time being able to produce the top quality material we have come to expect from a company that treats its customer base with respect and a sense of social responsibility.

I run Iron Heroes - can't see me changing to 4th edition :-)

When 4th Edition was announced I told my gaming buddies that it would be a card & gizmo friendly system. Why? Because by having all these extra little gizmo's like quest cards for your customers to buy means that you have an extra ongoing revenue income. Don't be surprised if more of these 'optional' gizmos appear in the rules. Hey - you could even construct them for feats (or whatever they are in 4th) - 'I play my power of awesome kung fu chopping card.'