Midnight Anarch's page

However what you are talking about here is a continuous ability. The drakes ability reads:

each time you Strike while riding the drake and hit a creature in the drake's reach, the creature takes 1d4 fire damage from the drake

We don't have clear guidance here.
Sometimes you will see the words additional damage or extra damage used. But these aren't defined either.

I think maybe the only way to take it is exactly as it reads -- the drake is a secondary source of fire damage that would trigger the troll's weakness again. That makes the riding drake dangerously effective in those circumstances and the added damage would really compound against such a foe. I now also suppose that might be why the riding drake is an uncommon companion.

The troll gets one reaction per turn.

So that fire damage from the sword would be the first opportunity for it to trigger.

I'm sorry, I think I wasn't clear enough. I'm not referring to the troll's opportunity attack. Rather, I'm wondering if its Weakness to fire triggers a second time as the drake's support damage is applied, or if it only applies once per attack by the champion + drake combined.

Let's assume that we have a champion player character who wields a flaming sword. The champion has a riding drake animal companion which has the support feature that reads as follows:

>Your drake snorts fire in your foes' faces. Until the start of your next turn, each time you Strike while riding the drake and hit a creature in the drake's reach, the creature takes 1d4 fire damage from the drake.

The champion enters combat with a troll (or any other creature with fire vulnerability). On his turn, he commands his drake to move and support, and then he attacks with his flaming sword. His attack succeeds. Does the troll's vulnerability to fire trigger twice -- once when the flaming sword strikes and again when the drake provides its support fire damage? Or only once as part of a whole attack resolution?

To be clear, I'm not suggesting the players get to forgo the hexploration rules. Quite the opposite. I'm suggesting that familiars shouldn't be able to do this independently, and instead merely provide circumstance bonuses to PCs performing the relevant activities. The...

I misunderstood the direction you were taking. I have been anticipating that the PCs would use familiar like this from various settlements in the kingdom, or perhaps at outposts/towers/forts that they have for themselves or the kingdom alike. This would provide various centers for them to use familiar from, with respect to scouting. My goal was to create a tether that limits just how far and how often this could be useful, or risk having a party of four familiars that fling themselves into the furthest reaches of the Stolen Lands before their masters reach level 6.

That said, I'm on board with the idea that this strategy is impractical at lower levels, if for no other reason than that low level characters might simply lack the power or skill to use a familiar like this. You hit onto a great note with the latter part of your comment, though.

All that said, the Familiar's Eyes feat would change the equation considerable. Constant telepathic contact and information transfer potential would eliminate many of these proximity concerns. And by 12th level, your players already have magic that can trviliaze hexploration, like heightened marvelous mount, shadow walk, or teleport. Seems perfectly fitting for the familiar to discover more at that point.

This is fantastic, and I agree with you that by 12th level, hexploration starts to become somewhat trivialized by players anyhow. I'm thinking that the solution here may be to create a higher level feat that is specifically hexploration related, one that enables a "remote hexploration" with a familiar.

Then it might be a matter of making a simple check to ensure the familiar survives each day, and allow the Master to make hexploration checks using the familiar as a surrogate, otherwise. The opportunity cost here is the loss of time that could be spent crafting or whatever else, and the chance of briefly losing the familiar to some calamity in the outlands.

As for spells: I'd probably let the use of a non-trivial spell or resource expenditure to abstractly grant a circumstance bonus to a Reconnoiter or Map the Area check or count as an automatic success in some cases. It's not strictly necessary to say the spell is doing all the work and most spells are written with encounter mode or exploration mode (not hexploration) in mind. It could be that as your player is Reconnoitering, they see something in the distance and use the spell to help get a better look...

I'm pondering the idea of allowing some scrying spells to have utility in hexploration when heightened to some degree or another.

There is the spell Scouting Eye, for example, which describes something akin to what we're considering. It is a sustained spell, which doesn't quite reach the "repeat a spell" exploration activity, and might hypothetically be easier to maintain for longer periods of time. Enough to hexplore? Hmm, I'm not sure how to rule on that.

Consider next the powerful Proliferating Eyes and its use within a Kingdom context. Maybe this powerful witch, using such a spell, sends nearly 3 dozen normal ravens to sprout these eyes, releasing them as unexpected explorers into a hex. This really seems to reach the "flock of crobains" by Saruman type of casting that concepts this whole discussion.

...

It's a vastly simplified form of the Kingmaker Hexploration and weather rules. I don't want the players to be able to forgo all of that, more or less risk free, by just using familiars to scout.

I fully expect my ratfolk ranger player to get a rat familiar to scout with next, if this is too beneficial. He wouldn't be as impacted by losing it for a bit as the witch, but the witch's familiar also has additional abilities and can therefore be a more useful Hexploration scout.

Using those as examples, I anticipate that the witch player will defer to using this during downtime, minimizing the cost and risk of personal combat encounters. As you say, that could be damaging to the witch player. To the ranger with a familiar, the risk is pretty small. He could use the familiar for that on a daily basis and wouldn't be terribly harmed by its temporary loss.

I did consider the idea of the familiar's death being more beneficial than it's straight return, but this isn't entirely true. For the ranger, the familiar would take a week to replace, during which time it would forget all of its exploration. To the witch, who could use this most potently, it would still incur a day's loss at minimum.

It then begs the question of whether the familiar would have a mind to suicide itself for that purpose. The rules say that they (mostly) were real animals mystically bonded, so we must presume they wouldn't inherently have suicidal behavior outside of their master's control. Even then, it's doubtful. The Independent ability states that the GM can decide to have the familiar act different than the Master would expect or demand, and I'd rule that this is definitely a case of that.

Here's what I'm contemplating so far:

The raven familiar would need the Independent ability to function as a solo hexploration explorer. It would get 1 Hexploration Activity per day, or more if the Master can increase its speed appropriately.

It can explore for a maximum number of days equal to the Master's Intelligence modifier. If it is delayed in returning, it forgets what it uncovered earliest, on a day-for-day basis. (i.e., if delayed for one day, it forgets what it explored on the first day.)

For each day of exploration, two things happen:

* A DC 17 flat check determines the presence of harsh weather. I don't care what the event is, only that it's harsh.
* The raven makes a survival check against the hex's Zone DC. If harsh weather is present, the DC increases by 4.

If the raven fails, it loses 1 Hexploration Action for the following day. If it critically fails, it dies due to mishap.

It can reconnoiter at the same rate as normal based on the terrain. It can automatically find any special feature that doesn't require a check. It can find any special feature that requires a check if it is trained in the skill. It also has to meet any other criteria for discovery that might be expected.

I'm not planning to include random encounters and just consider that part of the survival check mechanism, and it's own survival.

The familiar only pays attention to hex features and won't report that it saw 4 bears, a dozen boar and a party of orcs. However, I'm inclined to allow the Hexploration Activity cost be doubled for it to spend time searching for creatures instead of hex features. I'd require that it be skilled (or better) in Survival, and have to make trained track checks for each day, for that.

This would require some play time to see if it's too onerous or not, but I think it's about right thematically.

Thoughts?

I'm running 2E's Kingmaker for a party of evil characters using the full hexploration rules as well.

One player character, a witch with a raven familiar, wants to use the raven to reconnoiter a hex to obtain knowledge of the standard features that a party would uncover if they spent the time to reconnoiter themselves. This also leads to the possibility of him making the raven skilled and able to use that skill to uncover a hidden or secret landmark that would require use of that skill to detect it.

I'm inclined toward allowing *something* like this, though not necessarily via the familiar. Maybe some spells could manufacture an appropriate capability. In all, the concept is very much like Sarumon using crebain to seek out Frodo and scout an area for him while he tended to other affairs. Given the Kingdom element to this, maybe a PC should be able to simulate something like it as they do their kingly duties.

This leads to another question of, if not the familiar, what? Can some scrying spells be capable of hexploration and info-gathering? It feels like magical hexploration could be an appropriate downtime activity that presents an opportunity cost, but also provides for hexploration at greatly reduced risk. Quite wizardly or witchery, if you will.

There is the possibility that important features are overlooked and missed through this method, however, since it's just one individual scouting through the use of magic or surrogates like a familiar.

Have any of you handled things like this before? What suggestions or ideas might you have?

So I was talking with one of my friends who works in international relations recently about fantasy government.

Her comment: "wow, fantasy RPG settings are pretty corrupt."

How true do people think this is for Golarion? A lot of Pathfinder quests do seem to revolve around blatant cronyism and quid pro quo arrangements with authority figures... but on the other hand, it's semi medieval, when EVERYONE was corrupt.

I think your friend is pretty naïve about the amount of real-world corruption.

Haven't had a chance to read it yet but wanted to remark on the magnificent art throughout this Chapter. I've not been the biggest fan of AoA's previous chapters but the art in this one, beat-after-beat, is unparalleled. Tremendous drama captured in its bigger pieces!

I'm trying to understand what's out there (or will be) with materials specifically lining up for PF2E before I'm able to start a longer campaign next year. I'm not familiar with the breadth of 3pp options these days but someone mentioned Kobold Press maybe doing Midgard stuff for PF2E. Maybe that's inevitable? I don't really know. What sort of settings should I be investigating or keeping an eye on?

What is the CR value of ignorance anyway? How much challenge does it add to an encounter?

The answer is ... zero. Ignorance is already built into a CR value, and players may "attack" the creature by way understanding its strengths and weaknesses. Or not. Even dumb barbarians might be tough enough to survive their ignorance.

Any system that relies on ignorance for its difficulty isn't actually difficult. Its just obtuse.

Ignorance is a pointed threat. It isn't obtuse unless the value of research and knowledge is hand-waved as arbitrary.

I don't see it specifically in the CRB either, but the PFS 2e guide online stipulates 7 days for retraining a spell in your repertoire. @Kyrone's rule seems reasonable too.

Thanks, that's a helpful answer beyond just the spell retraining.

It's mentioned several times that spells can be retrained, such as when swapping a signature spell to another or swapping a spell in your repertoire more generally.

What I can't find is mention of how long retraining a spell takes or what's required. Feats, Skills and Class Features have at least a little blurb explaining the process, but spells are entirely absent unless I'm missing something. For example, does a cantrip take as long as a 3rd or 10th level spell to retrain?

That's the point. Ogres SHOULD be too ugly and horrible to look at. They're SUPPOSED to be that way.

The sort of face only a necromancer ogre mama could love. Amirite?

As to the main topic, I get the logic behind the new Hobber art but the result--to my eyes--is not that they're goblinoids but that they're aberrant and stretched out goblins. I don't see "hobgoblin" at all. This is honestly Paizo's fault (in part at least) for having already made distinguishing hobgoblin and bugbear art in Ironfang that conveys their respective racial traits/cultures better than the new stuff.

I just wanted to say the Hellknight Hill bugbear design is TERRIFYING. It feels like a boogeyman out of a nightmare, which seems pretty fitting for Pathfinder serial killer bugbears.

Couldn't disagree more. It's not even the slightest bit terrifying! If that's a bugbear, it must've been the litter's runt! It's basically a furry, skimpy goblin doing its best to look menacing and only manages to look mostly cute and silly instead. From the art, it's hard to tell that it's supposed to be medium-sized (or even an actual bugbear). Bregga Dreamstalker is a more terrifying example. Literally nightmarish! The imposing tear-your-limbs-off menace of Scarvinious is also far more alarming than the runty joke of Yoletcha.

Also, for so many reasons, this (also from Ironfang) says "Hobgoblin soldier" better than the new hob-soldier art, which as I've said elsewhere, looks more like a hobgoblin got his head stuffed inside his armor and had a goblin shoved down to fill the space instead. Again, I get the logic but the end result still manages to come across as bizarre and unfitting to the race.

Disclaimer: All IMHO, 2019.

It's a bit early for PF2 to have a policy ...

I hope the eventual policy leans to providing the unmodified stats of a creature/character. That begs the question -- isn't this an example of it being their policy for 2E, rather than it being too early to say?

To be honest, I don't see why people are so bothered by the idea of playing as a heroic member of a culture that is traditionally considered "evil".

They're not. They're bothered that the tradition of goblins being evil maniacs is over. And further, because that's true, there is no tension involved with playing a "heroic" goblin and they are not more heroic because of it.

I'd prefer it used for something related to that AP's final chapter.

Looking around, it appears that most of the "Continuing" sections are about 5 pages, which is 2.5 more NPCs in the NPC Gallery, as one example.

If used for direct adventure content expansion, it could have a notable impact. For example, Part 1: Siege of Citadel Rivad in Hell's Vengeance is 7 pages, so another 5 pages here is 70% extra content for that part! Even for something like "Entering the Vault" in Ironfang's last chapter, 5 pages would be more than 30% extra content to flesh out NPCs and background info, detail tactics/environments/hazards, or throw in another map and some art.

If not so directly, 5 pages as an extra side adventure or helpful additions to the main content would be fantastic, and serve sort of the same purpose that the "Continuing" section did in the first place. Something like the "Sellen River Encounters" and "Sellen River Vessels" additions did for Dreams of the Yellow King.

An order of the leaf druid that specializes in tree law.

Later, a politician running on the Green Old Deal platform.

Dying 4 is usually the worst, but you've made a good argument for Fatigued!

In PF1, it was the case that the party level might be considered higher or lower according to the party's total wealth. However, it seems that PF2 might prefer a different approach based on how it suggests adjusting encounters for disparate party member levels (pg 508).

For example, if a 1st level party begins with 300 gp total wealth (in addition to starting assets), should they be treated as 2nd level? As 3rd? Or should party size instead be considered as having some number of extra members and encounters continue to be designed for level 1 characters?

What's the right approach for this?

So to clarify:

* You can retrieve a 2-handed weapon with 1 interact action + 2 hands to immediately wield it.
* You cannot retrieve a longsword and a steel shield with 1 interact action + 2 hands; a character must use 2 interact actions to separately retrieve each item instead.

Correct?

What if, for example, a squire simultaneously hands a sword and shield to you? Also 2 interact actions? (Seems correct to me but I'm curious if others view it that way.)

I wouldn’t find much fun in the “gotcha” moment of letting a player die because the party thought they had an extra round to get to him.

Barring a Wounded X or a critical hit that everyone would know about already, players in this new system have at least 1 round (barring persistent damage or a truly vicious enemy!) to act before someone's dead, even if the first recovery roll is a critical failure.

That said, it does feel like dying might be a little too fast of a process. I'm tempted to house rule that Dying 5 is the default "death value", especially if dying states aren't explicit. That should give a little more breathing time, literally.

I'd make it a perception or medicine check rather than recall knowledge, unless you think your character is recalling a book of prophecy that discussed this future injury of the PC.

No, I imagine it would be a Medicine (Recall Knowledge) check to remember medical training or experience to estimate how severe a wound appears and so on. It can be done untrained so anyone can make a guess. No prophecy required!

As a very basic solution, to the dismembered character in question I think I'd add a permanent Wounded 1 along with an appropriate penalty such as -10 speed for a leg, -4 to Perception checks that rely on vision for an eye, and so on.

Using Recall Knowledge for this has important (and some would say interesting) tactical implications, though it's more gritty and dangerous all around if for no other reason than Recall Knowledge eating an action. (An action also made in secret that could give the wrong estimate!)

I'm curious if those of you who make it open regarding PCs also do the same thing for PC knowledge of NPC states?

Will it be open information in Society games? Do we know?

Should the dying condition for PCs or NPCs be secret until others make a Recall Knowledge check or use some form of magic that informs them? Or is it expected that a character's dying condition is obvious enough to others, even if not the exact numeric state? Should recovery rolls be made semi-secret (between the GM and PC in question)?

How about for the wounded condition? Can PCs look at another character and simply recognize that someone has the wounded condition, even if they don't know whether it's wounded 1 or 2 or whatever?

Uncommon is what we use to indicate that a particular ancestry is not necessarily found (or appropriate as PCs) in all areas of the Inner Sea region.

Shame this approach wasn't used for goblins as they meet the same criteria for inclusion/exclusion to campaigns as hobgoblins or other typically hostile or deviant races. At least it would've put control back into GMs' hands which otherwise seems to be the rule Paizo aimed at in these new 2E scenarios. Fantastic idea though, uncommon ancestries, even if a missed opportunity to smooth dissent and table-issues about goblins.

Also, the football headed art makes these hobs seem creepily and less distinctly hobgoblin, almost as though a goblin is standing on an actual hobgoblin's head stuffed inside the armor. Weird. I wonder when we'll see more, and if it'll start to feel more convincing as a "Pathfinder Hobgoblin," which they'd already done a good job making distinct from other systems before now. Maybe a case of trying a bit too hard to be unique for 2E? Not sure what to think on that one.

By the rules you quoted, Hardness isn't Resistance to all damage. It's Hardness. Which reduces the damage an object takes any time it takes damage. No reference to the Resistance rules. (similarly, effects that ignore or reduce resistance don't apply, it seems)

Sure, but does it reduce damage in the same way that resistance to all damage does (i.e., to each type separately)? It seems an awful lot like Hardness is just a type of "resistance to all" and might reasonably be treated the same for determining how damage is reduced.

It should be noted that shield block's trigger requires a "physical attack" but that would seem satisfied by a wolf doing slash and acid damage with its bite. Would you argue that hardness should only apply to the slash damage, in that case?

This brings up a question raised (but not answered) elsewhere: is an object's hardness "resistance to all damage"? If so, the example given in the CRB means that energy damage can be reduced by shield block, based on the shield's hardness value.

"It's possible to have resistance to all damage. When an effect deals damage of multiple types and you have resistance to all damage, apply the resistance to each type of damage separately. If an attack would deal 7 slashing damage and 4 fire damage, resistance 5 to all damage would reduce the slashing damage to 2 and negate the fire damage entirely."

An item can be broken or destroyed if it takes enough damage. Every item has a Hardness value. Each time an item takes damage, reduce any damage the item takes by its hardness."

But if it behaves like Resistance to all damage does, that's a serious boon to shields and construct armor.

That makes this an important question to have answered, as it could have dramatic effects on combat for shield users or other critter types, as you mention.

Note also that Shield Block's trigger states "damage from a physical attack" which doesn't presumably correspond to an attack that just does "physical damage" as described on page 452. It begs questions like:

"Does positive/negative/force energy damage count as a physical attack?"
"Does alignment damage count as physical?"
"Can Shield Block reduce poison damage?"
"Is mental damage the only type that is non-physical for purposes of hardness/resistance and not triggering Shield Block as a reaction?"

This is like asking if centaurs can climb just the same as a player character. The rules are meant for humanoids. Commonsense applies.

Well duh, centaurs have hands. :-P

So don't take it literally. The "free hand" language is intended for humanoid combattants with 2 hands. Non-humanoid combattants should still be able to attempt those actions with a free paw, muzzle or pseudopod.

I have a mind not to, but I'm wondering if it was intentional for some sort of balance reason and how it will work out in official contexts like Society play.

For example, Dire Wolves can grab but standard wolves only knockdown. It's not clear if the "free hand" wording is intentional to limit those athletic actions by critters like the standard wolf, or if it's an oversight that will be ignored.

If taken literally, a standard wolf or dog can't grapple, a Nightmare can't use its hooves to shove, and an animated broom can't trip a target.

Intentional?

The 2:1 bulk ratio probably occurs for similar reasons, as it seems unlikely that a halfling is actually half the weight of a human.

Based on what logic? The CRB states that halflings "rarely grow to be more than 3 feet in height" which is half that of a typical human. Why wouldn't they weigh/bulk half as much, too?

(Real world data shows they would weigh even less than half, though that doesn't account for second breakfasts.)

Those being observed/hidden/undetected/unnoticed and you seem to be reading in that hidden can’t also apply to a creature that is concealed.

That's not accurate. Page 465 reads:

There are three conditions that measure the degree to which you can sense a creature: observed, hidden, and undetected. However, the concealed and invisible conditions can partially mask a creature, and the unnoticed condition indicates you have no idea a creature is around.

The real question in your situation is whether the target is observed or not observed. The same creature cannot both observe and not observe another creature or object.

You calculate it based on the XP budget you start with, ignoring adjustments you make based on party size. The starting budget listed in 10-1: Encounter Budget is the value for 4 PCs.

So, if you adjust the budget because of fewer or more PCs, you still award the starting value instead. For example, a party of 6 facing a moderate encounter will begin with an 80XP budget that is increased to 120XP (+20 * 2 additional PCs). Despite the adjustment to the starting budget, you still only award 80XP after the dust settles.

Persistent damage worsens the dying state and can effectively counteract a successful recovery check. Persistent damage is *very* dangerous to a dying character!

Concealed and hidden are mutually exclusive.

You observe a concealed creature, you do not observe a hidden one. A concealed creature is difficult to observe, and therefore receives a DC 5 flat check against being targeted. A hidden creature is not observed but its space is known, and the targeting check has a flat DC 11.

"Functions as one monster" is with respect to how the swarm itself functions, not how others function on it. That is to say, its actions in the game are treated as if a single monster, not as 100s of separate entities.

If you attempt a grapple against a swarm, you'll grab one of the constituent creatures and not the swarm itself.

Spirit Link has a range of 30 feet, but there doesn't appear to be any limit to the link's range after established.

Am I missing something and the caster and target have to remain within 30 feet for the link to have an effect during any round? For example, can the caster or target travel to another plane or teleport some vast distance away and still maintain the link?

The attack roll is part of the casting.

Things like the Magic Fang spell make it seem as though that may be intentional, rather than an oversight or poor wording.

Iomedae never really had much of a tie to the sun. She mostly had that domain 'cause it has a lot of spells that are very good against undead, and that fit very well into the lore of her association with the Shining Crusade

I could be mistaken, but I don't think there's a single Iomedean in the entire Hell's Vengeance AP that has the sun domain. Easy to understand why it might get dropped for 2E. That said, it's useful to sprinkle some around if one of that AP's villain PCs is a necromancer!

Actually, I expect the person with Count Lowl's portrait to enumerate the divergent fluctuations expressed by each tradition as demonstrated by the ephemeral metaphysics of dynamic magical essences to the rest of us.

But seriously, the central thematic difference is that arcane magic relies on intense research and intellectual effort to create its formulaic magical effects, while occult magic uses unusual methods to tap into poorly understood spiritual and soul/psychic phenomena, thereby mucking with topics that divine casters otherwise tend to stake a claim.

The result is that arcane magic manipulates matter and energy in ways that occult magic never can, such as through a Grease or Wall of Fire spell. Occult magic manipulates spirits and souls the way arcane casters never can, such as by the Bind Soul, Possession or Wail of the Banshee spells. Crossover appears where powerful mental and illusory magic is involved, such as various prismatic spells and things like Crushing Despair, Dominate and Nightmare.

This is good stuff.

For those using corruptions: Did the characters acquire the corruption prior to the campaign start or at some point during the campaign?

For each chapter, I assign one or two appropriate corruptions along with criteria describing how it might be inflicted. Then I turn the players loose and let things play out until someone ends up corrupted by something along the way. A few examples:

With In Search of Sanity ...

With the Thrushmoor Terror ...

In book one, after my players developed their characters, I secretly gave each of them a corruption.

You ARE evil! I've found that even a single corrupted PC occupies a lot of attention and resources. I can't imagine inflicting them all! Not at once, in any case. All other things considered, I think that might dilute the horror and tragedy of it some, too, but I could totally imagine doing it the way you did for this AP.

Good times.

First, I use the corruption and horror rules. I'd recommend others use them for this AP as well. They dramatically increase tension and sense of theme, and I would not run Strange Aeons without them. Definite thumbs up from me on that part.

I would also suggest that only a single character be corrupted during the campaign, that they face extreme difficulty in removing it, and that the abasement should more likely corrupt the hapless character than they be saved from it. I use a deepening corruption to tempt a player with its increasing power (while less notably pointing out their decreasing likelihood of surviving it).

Remember that corruptions don't act fast, so a corrupted PC presents an ongoing threat to the others; they become a wholly evil NPC should it reach the final stage. This adds a layer of delicious paranoia and strain to the party, even as they face the myriad other lethal problems in the AP.

Second, I disagree with Dasrak's estimation of PCs being fantasy heroes "in the wake" of horror. Instead, they are deeply central to its horror from the very first second of the adventure. I insist on starting PCs without knowing their backstories or relationships to the key players, and let them explore and investigate bits through the first two chapters to uncover it. The resulting intrigue and mystery is like none other.

In all, the AP's arc sees PCs transform *from* direct casualties of their role in its cosmic horror into Dasrak's fantastical heroes who reside above it -- at least enough to stop ultimate doom happening for now.

It's my understanding that this might be the first in a series of connected "intro" modules akin to PF1E's "Price of Immortality" trilogy. If so, this is the "Crypt" module and characters finishing it may have a future still.

That or I'm completely wrong/mis-remembering something I heard or read about Plaguestone.

There seems to be scant info about this upcoming adventure. Too scant! Has there been any preview or teaser, maybe something coming out of one of the 'cons? Has a monster preview slipped out or a hint about cool feats or mechanics that players might encounter?

Other than it being the firstest and bestest stand-alone adventure for 2E, what's its draw for GMs and players alike?

There are none because we don't have additional resources at the time of this Adventure Path's publication, just the Core Rulebook and the Bestiary. And we don't list pawns and map packs and the like as "Additional Resources" anyway.

That's not strictly true. For example, Hell's Vengeance's The Hellfire Compact (pg 91) states:

"Additional Resources To enhance the Adventure Path, GMs can pick up the following resources: Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Cheliax, The Infernal Empire, Pathfinder Player Companion: Agents of Evil, Pathfinder Pawns: Hell’s Vengeance Pawn Collection , Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Hell’s Vengeance Map Folio , and Pathfinder Map Pack: Urban Sites. The Hell’s Vengeance Player’s Guide is also available as a free PDF download at paizo.com."

Having seen that, and "Want More?" style recommendations in other AP guides, is what prompted me to ask. I'd have to look at other APs to see but maybe that one is just an outlier.