Nicholas D.'s page

Our group just started this a few weeks ago.

Borai - Melee Solarion
Skittermander - Vanguard
Entu Colony - Envoy
Human - Mechanic (Experimental weapon)
Android - Operative

----
We are playing as a crazy group of Evangelista of Desna out to spread the good word. Our Android also happens to be our head priest (con man). So far it's been a blast although a very challenging start!

This probably is way too late to help as this question was asked months ago.

The 200 credit tool Broad Spectrum Scanner gives +4 to perception checks to search and would thematically be appropriate for seeing if a transmitter was broadcasting any signals.

The relevant link for the tool is here https://www.aonsrd.com/TechItems.aspx?ItemName=Starfinder%20Armory&Fami ly=Tool%20Kit

Although at GM discretion a tracker might feasibly only broadcast at set intervals to conserve battery power/ be harder to detect if you wanted to make that a harder check for your players.

Small correction for Count Bartelby Lotheed's statblock. It seems like you copied the top lines from Okerra. Strength should read Knowledge Nobility, Sense Motive DC 14 instead of Perception, Sense Motive DC 15; weaknesses should be Arcana / Sense motive DC 14 instead of Heal/Sense motive DC 15

Otherwise this is great I'm going to add the Night Swan to the GM sheet but with my group already starting with Okerra at Friendly I think influencing her might be an uphill battle at best. I can understand why you would omit her especially from the PC sheet to avoid spoilers.

Thank you again for your hard work on this resource.

Thank you for your hard work on these sheets! I'm sure they will prove useful as we should be starting this module next week!

And the bold skills can be revealed to the players? It specifically says so for the weakness/discovery section but not for the bold items in the influence section

Again that's just my interpretation, but yes it seems like the intention is for you to reveal the Bold skills to your PC's. These discovery skills are almost always Sense Motive and a Knowledge skill in this module but I know at least in the next module Songbird, Scion, Saboteur that one of the NPC's has Sense Motive and a profession check in place of Knowledge.

I do believe this system was designed to allow people with a variety of skills to interact with different NPC's and thus it makes the system appealing to a larger group of adventurers as they can all participate.

Diplomacy seems to be a universally usable influence skill as you've noted in the first two modules. In the second module at least some NPC's have higher DC's for diplomacy so using other skills may be more advantageous; that doesn't seem to hold true in Crownfall as all of the influence DC's are set the same regardless of skill used.

I assume it is up to the GM what limit on people talking to one person at a time is. In this scenario one plus aid other is probably the cap to avoid people feeling bullied

I ran this very similarly, it does mention in the princess's stat block that only one PC can influence her at a time but otherwise I let them have up to two others aiding as a maximum but whatever you feel works balance wise.

----------------

If you are running this module or even just adapting the system. I heavily recommend checking out The Rising Pheonix's flash cards. They can be found here:
https://paizo.com/threads/rzs2uytr?Get-your-flash-cards-ready-SPOILERS-GM-O NLY

I made some minor modifactions and had some printouts for my party specifically from the Intrigue rules summary section and the starting missions page. If your just adapting the rules the intrigue rules summary will still be helpful and could save you some time to have it printed out for your players as this system is probably quite different but fun compared to your typical dungeon crawl.

Could someone please advise on how to read the social stat blocks. I am really confused about the influence sections where some skills are in bold and others are not

My reading was that the skills in the discovery section reveal either a weakness or an influence skill

Is it actually that the first set reveal a weakness and grant the +4 and the bold skills under the influence section are actually “discovery” checks as well despite not being in the discovery section of the block

I have clearly misread something somewhere

Lanathar this is just my interpretation but I hope this helps

In Crownfall it states

"...learning an influence skill normally requires a successful Sense Motive or Knowledge (nobility) check with the DC listed in parentheses in the Influence entry of the target NPC’s social stat block."

So for example Baron Okerra needs an Knowledge Nobility or Sense motive check with a DC of 15 to figure out which skills can effectively influence him. This check is the bolded portion of the influence stat block. It is then followed by a listing of skills (Bluff, Diplomacy. and Knowledge [Local] in this case), which you can provide your PC's if they succeed at the influence check.

I Think of it as a pre-check before your PC's can influence someone. Your players will be using their previous knowledge or their intuition and observation of how a person reacts to see what interests a given NPC and how they can use this information to sway their viewpoint. Consider if all you knew about someone was that they love cats you are more likely to engage them in a discussion about cats than politics; given that you already know they have an interest, it's a good talking point to get them to open up and leave a positive impression. So the check is basically to find out what interests a given NPC.

The Discovery section works a little differently.
Again quoting from Crownfall

"Learning a target’s weakness requires a successful skill check using the skills and DCs listed in parentheses in the target’s Weakness entry; the GM can reveal the skills needed to recognize these weaknesses without need for a separate discovery check."

In this case the bolded portion are skills you can provide your PC's to find out someones secrets or doubts. So again using Okerra as an example his weakness checks are Knowledge(nobility) or Linguistics DC 16. If your players make either of these checks you can read or paraphrase the unbolded section that follows it from the NPC stat block. Essentially they are able to infer that Baron Okerra is unsure about the impact Eutropia's bid will have on the stability of Taldoran Law and can exploit this for a +4 on any future influence checks. Maybe they can try and prove that a stable line of succession will help the country or exploit some obscure Taldan precedent in another law.

I hope this helps clarify the stat blocks sorry it was a little verbose.

If you want to get your hands on it early just PM me and I'll send you a copy.

I am unsure how to actually PM you on these forums sadly. I checked the FAQ and there should be some links from your profile to do so but I'm unable to locate them perhaps you have to enable it or maybe I just don't know how to use this feature alas. I'll try and enable them from my side if possible.

Anyways your previous resource was great and I'd really like to steal your work again as this was a lot of help for me during Crownfall's Exaltation Gala (and I greatly appreciate it as did my players!).

There is a thread: "War For The Crown Agent Generator" on this forum that might have what your looking for; A player made tracking sheet for this sub-system as well as a creative group of tables to generate unique agents.

https://paizo.com/threads/rzs2v73c?War-For-The-Crown-Agent-Generator

Lots of work clearly went into this and I appreciate the tracking sheet at the end as I am prepping to DM the second module for my group finding some of the groundwork already laid out for me is extremely helpful. I was previously thinking of abstracting this idea (and still might) after discussing the pros/cons of more book keeping with my group.

I will try and hop on in a couple of months to give proper feedback if we do use this system these tables look like they will add some much needed depth. Thank you for doing all this work!

Is there any chance you have a similar resource for sharing for Songbird, Scion, Saboteur?

Thank you for making this I'm finding it quite helpful in setting up for my first session! Trying to balance this many NPC's with unfamiliar mechanics was daunting but you did half the prep work for me!

Thank you again.

Thanks for the reply! I'm looking forward to this campaign even if we do end up running War for the Crown first.

I just love the idea of tie in's with previous campaigns and characters playing a defined role in an ongoing story. We already tried to do that by replacing/adding ties to minor npc quest givers from the inside covers with retired pc's for our later module's to make the players invested in the sub-quests of our last modules.

I hope the release goes well this week for this campaign. Have a great day!

I'm trying to keep my cool about the player's guide's arrival, but honestly I'm super curious about this "Sihedron Heroes" / past-PCs concept in the AP. I seem to recall reading somewhere that it would be at least partially detailed in the player's guide. My group is trying to decide on what to play next, Return of the Runelords or War for the Crown; we just finished Shattered Star, so this Sihedron Heroes thingy might be the deciding factor between the two! Pretty exciting.

I'm curious too and as a member of your regular gaming group I have a vested interest in this decision! I hope this guide releases this Wednesday before Secret of Roderick's hollow ships!

A question on continuity. As far as this adventure path I'm guessing there will be some spoilers in each book as you do need to set out an overarching plot to keep the world engaging and your players guessing; The question is will each module be able to be run separately, without reading background information from the previous module? Kishmo and I just took turns as DM / player for Shattered Star and not much happened on the plot level that wasn't covered in game (although the Sorshen clone option kept coming up but sadly wasn't relevant for us). Will there be background mechanics that carry over from book to book we need to worry about or will this format continue to work for us in theory?

Thank you for your time and happy gaming.

If you are still looking for ideas I'm going to second the Mesmerist. Just finished shattered Star with a Half-Orc Mesmerist and it was a blast. The last chapter was a little tough with it's construct focus for a psychic class but Psychic Inception helped quite a bit.

Your social skills are quite stellar and with built in condition removal you can help support your oracle and the implanted tricks can be quite helpful for everyone. Our party definitely enjoyed Mesmeric Mirror for pseudo mirror image on our Wild-Shape Druid and our fighter.

Half-Orc is a good pick for Overlooked Mastermind and the FCB of 1/2 damage extra per level on your stare target.

Eventually you will be able to stack two debuffs a round with a high save DC coupled with a base -3 to will saves and other debuffs from your stare. It's a little feat heavy with Manifold stare and Compounded pain + your choice of two stare debuff feats but it's great single target control with a bit of damage as well!

-----
If your still interested in the whip Warpriest going as a Half-elf should qualify you with ancestral arms giving proficiency and weapon focus then being free. As a half-elf you can also use the FCB from human or elf if the bonus to channel isn't your thing.
-----

Also just putting it out there your Kensai build with Bladed Brush and Bodyguard is a pretty genius sounding option for loads of shenanigans if your GM will allow it. You'll lose out on crit fishing with spells but a good reach build will excel at mid-tier content right around the time the Kensai starts to hit it's stride. Fair warning though if your going to level 20 a combat maneuver build often fairs poorly at level 15+ as monster defenses skyrocket as do the number of monsters with straight immunity to trip, disarm etc.