Yakman's page

Any update Yakman? I'm curious if you ended up pivoting away from DA. Or if you came up with something else.

Are your players commonly optimizers?

We ditched DA. Running STOLEN FATE with the same group and having a blast [session 8 is tonite!]

My guys are not optimizers. They build decent, but not min/maxed PCs.

One player's soldier [unintentionally] broke the math on Attack! but he built a 'themed' Witchwarper for D/A who was anything but optimal.

We had run THREEFOLD and ATTACK! w/ some common NPCs and stuff between them with the goal of finishing the grand campaign w/ DA, bringing PCs back and all, so it's kind of a bummer, but looking at the weak encounters in Books 2 and 3 combat was just going to be either a) a time sink as the PCs roll every encounter, or b) a headache as I have to rework encounters to scale them, and then midcombat de-scale them b/c I'd gone overboard.

This seems awfully complicated.

Personally, as I DM, I'm a fan of subsystems.

They give players a chance to drive narrative action, to introduce NPCs, always an opportunity for a joke when the barbarian crushes the library check and the wizard flubs it.

There might be too many in Myth-Speaker and Wardens, but I think they are a critical part of adventure paths. Otherwise, it's just punching and blasting.

I honestly do not understand the influence system [this is after running Book 1 of Sky King's Tomb]. It's a lot of note keeping or otherwise I was doing something wrong.

I would hope that future subsystems not vary dramatically from the GMG. But yes, get the party in a library, get them on the dance floor, get them in the courtroom.

Yakman wrote:

Ptolemaic / Christian Egypt

Come again? The Ptolemies were a couple generations gone by the time Christianity was a thing, never mind a predominant thing, in Egypt.

I'm thinking of when Egypt came permanently under the sway of foreign imperials... macedonians, romans, etc.

there's historical continuity, but also unmistakable foreign influence

ultimately, eh. doesn't really matter too much. make it your own place.

sorta bummed that there isn't going to be an 'evil' AP in this meta-plotline. Alas.

Why Ptolemaic? I would've assumed that's the era that's missing the most, since there's no parallel to Hellenistic conquest in Osirion's lore, but you seem more well-versed in Egyptian history than I am.

(I feel like there's also a bit of modern Egypt in there with the sort of nationalistic reclaiming of its ancient history, but that doesn't contradict anything else)

I always thought that if you were really desperate for Ptolemaic / Christian Egypt, then the influence of the Inner Sea Gods would be a good proxy for these.

But that's really getting in the weeds.

I'm just about to start running this Book. I realized that it repeats the trope of the PCs arriving...by sheer coincidence...just as the town's major annual festival is starting. (This also happened in Book 2.)

This isn't a big deal. But my rule-of-thumb is that a story should really only have a maximum of one coincidence. Any more and I fear it will strain the reader's/viewer's/player's suspension of disbelief.

Allen

there are so many festivals in adventure paths...

Dunno about it being 'new' but my players TPK'd near the end of Book 1 of Sky King's Tomb just last month. To an unnamed monster just 1 CR above their level. They'd been seriously challenged a few times as well earlier on.

The end of Book 4 proves that Radiant Fire can be used to destroy a lich and to sever a lich's link with their phylactery (because that's exactly what Arazni did). So I have chosen to modify Books 5 & 6 so that the goals of the PCs are for them to learn how to do that to Tar-Baphon. I think that is much more internally consistent...and I think the players will find that much more emotionally satisfying.

After this is all over I will confess to the players that in the canonical Golarion 2.0 Tar-Baphon survived.

I'll give many more details on my modifications to this AP after we finish.

Allen

Dracovar wrote:

If I was a PC, right about the end of part 2 of the installment I'd be kinda pissed...

PC prospects going forward into Book 6 look bleak indeed.

So - just so I'm clear - the endgame for the PC's is to sacrifice themselves to create a feedback loop that blows up Tar Baphon and ends his ability to use Radiant Fire. However, given he's a lich (and what we already know about 2E so far...) he is coming back, just without his superweapon. And that's the goal of the AP, in a nutshell?

Effectively, from a metagame perspective admittedly, the PC's get to perma-death themselves in order to set the table for how Golarion 2E is going to look. At least the devs had the foresight to put in a sidebar suggesting the helpful NPC can arrange something for PC resurrection sometime in the future, after they've heroically sacrificed themselves. Gee, thanks for that.

What I eagerly await now is the "what if the PC's fail" outlines that typically show up in Book 6 of the AP's. This kind of 'ultimate sacrifice' might work ok in some groups, but I know groups that would take the boon (having their obols recalibrated to positive energy), and head for the hills.

I had a similar thought when I was running it.

I was pretty unimpressed with the two story beats you mentioned - and altered the outcome so that both Arazni and TB are perma-ded as of the end of TG.

Was running the bit in the archive, and there's a line about the ghostly possession of Ole Krohan, which talks about him having to pass a DC 20 flat check to resist the possession, and also about what happens if he critically succeeds on said check... needless to say, it's impossible to critically succeed at a DC 20 flat check.

It didn't make any sense to me, told my players, and they thought that the author probably meant a Will Save, which I thought made more sense.

Wow! Great stuff. Gonna yoink some of that for sure. We're just doing the penthouse ourselves now. I had to completely rejigger the Hagegraff part too...

We are going to wrap up Book 1 in a session or 2... what did you do to improve Hagregaf?

A consistent concern I've seen of reviews of this AP is how to motivate the party to pursue the story. Have any of you had an issue with this, and do you have any suggestions as to how to make the players feel the importance of seeking out the cards?

I dunno if that's going to be an issue for my party, [we just did Session 1 last week] but I told my guys that 'hey, it's like Pokemon' go get some cards.

I suspect that the novelty and mystery should get through Book 1. The plot picks up pretty dramatically in Book 2, so the 'motivation' problem probably ends there.

Starting STOLEN FATE tonight! I ran SKY KEY SOLUTION as a 3-episode prologue, and our intrepid heroes have returned to Absalom after an 8 year separation, with a card in hand, and the 5th member of their Pathfinder Society party, the Varisian sorceress Raven, is missing... and everyone was brought back by a mysterious Harrow card... and just as everyone lays eyes on each other, they hear a terrible scream from a store...

GM Cthulhu wrote:

The party rogue detected the trap on the door to J7 but totally fluffed his disable device check, so he's now a hand short.

My condolensces to your rogue, I hope they weren't a two-weapon fighter?

On the note of the Graveknights, I am wondering if I should do something with them to flesh out those fights a bit more. My party has been wrecking shop - Paladin and Swashbuckler do so much damage, Cleric is really well kitted out for undead fights, and between the Wizard's summons and buffs they're a force to be reckoned with whenever they have a spellslot free, so it's all added up to some very quick combats. Which, you know, love that for them, but sometimes you want a fight to have some oomph to it.

So while I probably won't go full "army of undead" I'm considering my options - two at once sounds rough but, who knows, maybe they can handle it. Putting Yhalas into a fight with Tycha or Amaretos maybe? Since she doesn't have any mooks. Or having Gustari swoop back in during another fight after rejuvenating (swooping is bad).

Also, unrelated: my party have met Arazni and the Wizard (who was in a cult against his will) is like "wow actually I can totally get behind his whole 'no mercy for your oppressors' thing" which is nice, I'm glad my players are vibing with her, she's great.

ALSO also unrelated (but don't wanna double-post for it): I'm thinking of doing something at the end of the book at Renchurch. Having the Watcher Lord just sort of leave sounds sad - I get it, they'll all totally die if they try anything, but I'd love to have something more dynamic happen. So I'm thinking of having the PCs convince them to instead intercept a force of the Tyrant's soldiers on route to the bulk of the army. Also, part of our canon is that, after the events of the the Carrion Crown AP, the party (which included a powerful hallowed necromancer) spent a good long while destroying Renchurch and exorcising the trapped souls there. There's also some figures left behind...

I gave Yhalas two ubashki lynxes for flanking. It wasn't enough against our bloodrager, swashbuckler, and fighter.

If I were to run it again, I'd either give her a few Daughters of Urgathoa [or something like that] or pair her w/ the graveknight on the surface [can't remember her name]

The Graveknights are REALLY DANGEROUS in pairs. Not so much on their own.

woo boy.

Ran this in 2E at level 10 for my guys as a set up for STOLEN FATE.

It's a lot of fun... a bit of a mess, but that's all good. It's a fun mess and the guys had a good time. They were NOT expecting the setting or the enemies.

My biggest question is... how was this run at a convention in 5 hours???

We spent like... 10-11 hours running this on Foundry. And I cut out most of Part 3.

Did anyone run this in person? How was it? What had to get cut out? Did anyone finish it in the timeframe?

Huang Shixin is my bet. He'll just break the whole system up. He's not going to ask permission.

Yakman wrote:

they don't always come out on time.

not worth worrying about.

Counterpoint: I would like the Player's Guide because I wanna build characters!

You can always build characters... just sometimes they'll be better off riding bench for a bit... ;-)

We're finally at the end of the book! Just got one more sessions of wrap-up and they're onto greener and grassier pas- Oh wait it's Virlych.

The fight against The Haunting Dark went pretty well - Wizard summoned a flying Ankylosaurus for the Paladin to ride into battle, they cast Death Ward on it to make it immune to the nightwing's Channel Energy buuuut it didn't do much for the Cone of Cold right to the face. Still, it survived long enough to make a couple attacks, and when it died to a nasty AoO the Paladin dismounted and managed to mount the nightwing instead. Swashbuckler hit with the Needle. it passed its save but still 50-something hp down is a nasty blow. Also the cleric had a big reveal of a sort of awakened-aasimar state (she's been outwardly a half-elf the whole time but an aasimar on paper, I know this isn't reeeeaally how aasimar heritage works but it was fun! Some stuff about Sarenrae's fury burning through her and such.) She had wings of fire and a Flame Blade (to hit that 12 touch AC instead of dealing with the 29 AC) and used Invoke Deity:Glory Domain (via Deific Essence) to get heroism and add a lil 1d6 positive energy damage each turn but mostly to look really cool.

I'm gonna forego the final fight with the zombie sailors and the mutated turtle - it's a cool setpiece but my party are exhausted and running on fumes and I think it's crossing into the territory of just being frustrating rather than impactful apocalyptic narrative. The death of the Haunting Dark is a good note to finish on, so it'll be a mad dash to get all the survivors to the ship (from both the Tower and the Cathedral), and then setting sail for a much needed rest.

Guess I should start prepping book 4 now....

very fun w/ the flying dinosaur!

I dropped the zombie sailor fight in lieu of a showdown with the escaped gnome thief ... ALL OUT GNOME WARFARE!!! grabbed like 6 gnome NPCs and had them ambush the party as giant skeleton monsters chased them down and crazy living plants started emerging from the sewers.

They were also on fumes... but I felt like I had to wrap up that plotline. They got out to the docks, with nary a draugr in sight, but it was a close thing, just like I intended.

The swashbuckler almost got got by the crocodile in the sewers, but they managed to escape the beast... so instead of a massive turtle, it was a mutant crocodile which emerged [no combat though]. And of course, as the PCs looked back at the burning ruins of Vigil, with the sun setting, the smoke almost seemed to turn into a thousands masked crows descending on the wreck of Vigil...

Here4daFreeSwag wrote:

Prolly still a wee bit too early yet to bring out the Player's Guide for this, methinks. ;)

It comes out on April 2nd, so if anything it's late. They seem to drop the PGs two to three weeks before the street date, and we're just under 2 weeks away now. I know that I was hoping for it this past week.

they don't always come out on time.

not worth worrying about.

Yakman wrote:

Sibelius Eos Owm wrote:

Yes, how will the lore survive without the gameplay canonicity of a biologically superior master race, represented in mechanics that simply don't mean the same thing anymore.

the mechanical bonus was just a straight up bait for an argument between a DM and a player who really wanted the free bonuses.

DM: "Jake, that sure does sound like a fun gnome barbarian... he'll be a great fit in our campaign... Bob, who are you playing..."

Bob: "My guy was frozen in ice for 10,000 years, but he's been thawed out now, and since he's Azlanti, he gets +2 on all ability scores. Says so right here in the World Guide."

DM: Sorry Bob, you can't play Azlanti but you could still play another human ethnicity that was frozen in ice for 10,000.

Is how that conversation should go.

Pretty much.

I think it was just one of those things that had unintended negative consequences. Like, it's kinda cool that a DM might say... well... the PCs encounter Azlanti time travelers or something and they are just... better than they should be. But DMs can do that stuff anyway.

Putting the mechnanic in there was just a cause for friction as certain players try to maximize their PCs.

So, we are starting STOLEN FATE [very pumped, first session is tonight!] and shortly after I told the guys that we are going to start this campaign, I was moseying around on the internet, and I randomly found that there's a Stephen King book which touches on some of the [censored] which are in the AP. When I was preparing to run ATTACK OF THE SWARM, I picked up some sci-fi novels about bug-fighting, namely ARMOR by John Steakley, and the WAR AGAINST THE CHTORR series by David Gerrold [I also bought all of the DAMIA series by Anne McCaffrey, but I haven't read those yet... they are staring at me right now...].

And that got me thinking about the White Wolf / Onyx Path books, almost all of which have 'media guides' for inspiration on themes and backgrounds on whatever book it is, which might help the player / storyteller either get more information on, i dunno, cyborgs or frankensteins, or get a sense of the mood of the book.

I was wondering if Paizo would consider / has considered adding something like this to the Adventure Paths, either in the Player's Guides [in a non-spoilery sense] or in the actual AP volumes [spoiler galore], to help players/GMs get a better sense of the mood and themes of the adventure they are about to play?

My party is slowly working their way to Gallowspire.

Some fights were childishly easy: The Pallis Sunrise had a feeble AC of 20 and lasted about two rounds after the party used the Wand of Communal Protection from Energy (fire). The Tempest Guards were sitting ducks to area effect spells. Otto Canrivash was wiped out after someone used invisibilty purge early on. The various graveknights encountered haven't been much of a challenge either.

By contrast the dybbuk was problematic, and the Dreadwraiths could have easily been a TPK if I hadn't nerfed them a bit by making them play the fight a bit dumb. Their Con damage was downright nasty, and my party suck at fighting incorporeals.

Next week they'll encounter Tycha Ghuzmaar. He could be nasty if he can use his death attack in, but his stealth is such that he will probably be seen before he can get his three rounds of study in. I think I'll give him a potion of invisibility to give him a boost. If I don't, I think that fight will be too easy as well.

The dybbuk is a PC killer, and to be honest, I couldn't make heads or tails of how its key ability actually works.

I nerfed it in play, and when the party encountered another one in the adventure i inserted into Book 5, I swapped it out for a "hellsnail" [that was AWESOME].

Tycha's not going to stand and fight to second death. He's gonna run. I also gave him the same out [invisibility] so that he could show up w/ Amaretos [and negotiated his escape by showing them how to turn off the portal thingys... just to return and betray the party when they finally left the dungeon, along w/ one of the other Council Libertine [the mounted one from the surface] had resurrected [lucky me! I rolled a 2 for the # of days for her to return!]]

One of my players is a big fan of Dragonlance, and I made Tycha seem sorta like Lord Soth when he negotiated his escape, even using the Words "My Honor is My Life."

Well, dude's dead, so sucks to be betrayed, but he told you he had no honor.

One GK is a pushover. But two of them make for a great challenge, w/ the different energy damages and their unique immunities and attacks. We even got to a point w/ the Tycha / Amaretos fight where they were back to back against the party, and got to yell, "Just like the old days!" to give them some characterization.

[was missing your updates! hoped you hadn't dropped your campaign!]

Was just thinking about this, and an AP where the PCs are theives / pirates and the books are built around heists, abductions, banditry, shakedowns, etc.

Maybe just a level 1-10 AP as they rise in the criminal underworld of some major city.

Arkat wrote:

Darth Game Master wrote:

In this case the hypothetical enemy would be Cheliax, which Camilia Drannoch has already supported rebellions against, and is less of a direct risk since Andoran could be a buffer against counter-invasion. I agree it probably wouldn't go over too well, but people make bad decisions sometimes, so it's not entirely out of the question. Either way, I'd certainly be surprised if Galt immediately joined the war on Andoran's side.

There would have to be some sort of provocation or a false flag operation conducted to get the people of Galt to believe Cheliax poses enough of a threat for them to ally with Andoran.

Which brings up the question of why Andoran would even bother. Galt is weak, and unlike other weak powers (e.g., Isger, Ravounel) doesn't even have the advantage of offering a strategic base from which to strike at the enemy. An alliance with Galt would at best offer Andoran a quite small army of militia fighting far from home for a cause not their own--thus an army that is unlikely to be useful on the offense or cohesive on the defense.

The only scenario where Galt involving itself in the war makes any degree of sense is one where Taldor intervenes against Andoran with the express or implied aim of suppressing Common Rule, because such a campaign naturally turns against Galt itself after Andoran is dealt with. But that is a thing which Taldor has no good reason to do. The advantages to Taldor of neutrality have already been hashed out at length. And even if it did, for instance by jumping in opportunistically against an Andoran which has suffered reverses, such a Taldan campaign is not one in which Galt could expect to make much difference (because, again, it is weak).

We have no idea of the political leanings of most important player here: Taldoggis.

I dunno. I read the Well of Night thing or whatever it is as some sort of controlled black hole.

Like, his soul cage exists beyond the event horizon. It cannot be recovered and destroyed.

Your solution is more interesting though.

So... where are we thinking Galt comes in? They are kind of a low-key powerhouse with a big population and what one should assume to be a pretty strong baseline economy, albeit one devastated - but recovering - from a near century of mismanagement.

Yes, how will the lore survive without the gameplay canonicity of a biologically superior master race, represented in mechanics that simply don't mean the same thing anymore.

the mechanical bonus was just a straight up bait for an argument between a DM and a player who really wanted the free bonuses.

DM: "Jake, that sure does sound like a fun gnome barbarian... he'll be a great fit in our campaign... Bob, who are you playing..."

Bob: "My guy was frozen in ice for 10,000 years, but he's been thawed out now, and since he's Azlanti, he gets +2 on all ability scores. Says so right here in the World Guide."

Maybe Drustan might be that Azlanti general, who gets sucked forward in time?

So... let's say I have my guys run SCOURED STARS... would this be a capstone adventure I could run w/ minimal updating?

Currently running SKT weekly. We're in the transition now between chapter 2 and 3 of book 2. And yup, I've added a lot of extra content to make up for some of the shortcomings of the AP as-is.

1: Using the Highhelm book I added an extra "front" to the adventure... the Ashen Engineer who is striking at Highhelm as a proxy/setup for when Narseigus does eventually arrive. Right now we've faced down a couple of his lower level bosses, etc. but each time they come to Highhelm I use agents of the Ash Engineer to create a threat to Highhelm and with some pointers in the right direction from Lady Dux/Clan Tolorr so there's some meat for the transitions and more dwarfiness to the AP overall.

2: I developed a whole bunch of Darklands encounters that flesh out the quest for sky background... monuments, sites that were once great battles, wandering NPCs to tell more of the story (grabbing from the timeline in the start of the adventure) a few microdungeons along the way too. If this is the darklands AP we should experience darklands.

3: I'm still considering what needs to be done to make book three more connective... especially foreshadowing for the last chapter of book three.

Yeah, I'm doing some of all of that. N is going to be at the big party at the end of Book 1, and he'll show up in person in Book 2 as well.

GM Reference Thread.

The Twin, pp28-29, has a power called Help Themselves, which lets The Twin grant itself flanking. The trouble is, it's a three-action power that provides a benefit until the start of The Twin's next turn.

So, should this be a one-action power? A free action? Or does The Twin actually get a double allowance of actions each turn since it has two bodies? (I'm leaning toward Free Action, but I could also see One Action, using that action to move one of its "selves" into flanking position, since it's a single creature that happens to have two spaces. Letting each body have a full set of actions is way too strong.)

You could either say, alright, full round - in which case the Twin basically burns its first turn doing that one thing, OR you could just assume that it's a free action.

OR...

It could be used as an 'out' for a party that's having a rough go of it, and you have its bonus end at some point in the middle of combat... to turn it back on the Twin has to use a whole round.

As for whether it gets two sets of actions? Geeze... i dunno. the description could be read either way. The statblock itself is pretty clear that it doesn't.

So... does the BBEG have the DoD invested? They have it, it's in their statblock and they are doing some kind of ritual with it... can they use its powers?

So... I'm just starting planning to run this...

I was thinking that to reduce MY workload that the player whose PC invests the card will be responsible for RPing the NPC in the Harrow Court?

I can give them the same guidance that the book gives me, and we can have some fun with it.

someone else mentioned that in a discord when I mentioned i was planning to run this campaign. I'm going to tell my players to take 'interesting' options rather than to optimize their PCs.

So... I'm prepping this AP, which I slept on for a long time, but am really excited about.

I'm planning to run Sky Key Solution as a prelude, where the PCs are level 10 Pathfinders who have adventured together for a while... but then are brought together again 10 years later b/c of the cards.

I'm trying to put Drustan in either Sky Key Solution or earlier on in THE CHOOSING [as he just shows up for the fight], and I'm kinda at a loss. Thoughts?

I ran this module as a side-quest / foreshadowing for my Agents of Edgewatch campaign. My notes are very patchy but I thought I'd share them in case they are useful to someone else.

Should be okay for around level 10-11 PCs.

Playing the corresponding card against a storykin applies the weak adjustment to them for the rest of the fight.

Events:
Andera Paldreen as Algon the Ever-Seeking.

Α. Midnight circus
Combine A2 and A3 into one encounter. 2 reskinned Feathered Bears as the unicycle bears (Feathered Charge represents their exceptional ability with the unicycles). Raja Rakshasa as Bernaditi.

B. Briar
A leveled-down Rabbit Prince as the Rabbit Prince. (In foundry use the workbench module to do this automatically; otherwise just reverse-engineer it using the creature building rules).

C. Demon's Fen
Change the owl into a skill challenge without any combat. Xiuh Couatl as the couatl. Leng Ghoul as the Barrow King.

D. Manmolds
Steam Vents as the steam vents. Formian Queen as the ant queen; either level it down to be an appropriate challenge or turn into an threatening RP encounter with occasional attack/ability usage but not a full fight.

E. Prophet's Garden
Confounding Betrayal as the hunter's horn trap. Replace Sonnorae fight with a Flensing Blades hazard to simulate her haunted ghostly outburst.

F. Sanguine Playhouse
Grig as grig. A leveled-down (just...

very cool... i'm looking at running Stolen Fate and maybe running THE HARROWING as a prelude... thanks!

The guys were actually level 14.

I'd forgotten to tell them to level up.

Yakman wrote:

As for Hellbreakers, it might just be that the PCs are involved in one aspect of the war... say... the Conquest of Westcrown [just making something up]. You can tie up one story w/o wrapping up the whole conflict.

If we're prognosticating, Andoran's opening gambit more likely has to do with conquering [large parts of] Sirmium than anything to do with Longmarch beyond coastal raiding. There are Eagle Knights and Firebrands operating clandestinely in Ostenso, and that city is more easily reached both overland from the Arthfell-Sirmium frontier and by sea from Augustana than Westcrown.

That's what they want you to think.

Clearly the PCs are part of the infiltration and sudden offensive to seize Westcrown, depriving Cheliax of its largest city and access to its most important port.

[the sequel AP FREEDOMSMASHERS begins in the Shackles, as Cheliax's agents [the PCs] raise a fleet of mercenary pirates to strike back against Andoran after forcing the straits of Aroden and contesting the Inner Sea.]

keftiu wrote:

Yakman wrote:

willfromamerica wrote:

ANDORAN VS CHELIAX WAR AP IS HAPPENING!

"Battlecry! will tell the story of the wide-ranging conflict known to inhabitants of the world of Golarion as The Inner Sea War. The inspiration comes from World War I — complete with a similar inciting event, specifically the assassination of a foreign dignitary."

Gonna say... we already kinda got this w/ one recent AP and some of us were not overly thrilled with the output.

Which AP do you mean?

Probably Wardens of Wildwood. It is less than a year old, is ranked 42nd out of 44 APs by the hoi polloi who bothered to vote on the question, and opens with a terroristic assassination of assembled dignitaries.

That said, anyone whose takeaway from World War I is limited to its inciting incident (and who makes that inciting incident the assassination of Franz and Sophie rather than the German blank check to Austria and the subsequent Austrian ultimatum to Serbia!) is Doing It Wrong. The exemplar for this AP shouldn't even be World War I, nobody has the military-industrial complex to do total war or the massed fires to do the trench stalemate -- and almost nobody has mass politics or an industrial proletariat liable to conscription either (as opposed to big agrarian populations liable to levy, which is different, even en masse). The exemplar here really ought to be the Thirty Years War, the Wars of the Spanish or Austrian Successions, the Seven Years' War, or at the outside limit the Napoleonic Wars.

I am curious about the timeline. Hellbreakers (sic.) starts at level 1, and probably only goes to level 10 over the course of three months of publishing. This seems quite short for a war AP -- even a level 1 to 20 six-month AP is highly...

Wardens is the AP I was referencing.

As for Hellbreakers, it might just be that the PCs are involved in one aspect of the war... say... the Conquest of Westcrown [just making something up]. You can tie up one story w/o wrapping up the whole conflict.

It seems to me that Paizo wants to play around w/ the metaplot in this bold new post-Gorum era, and I for one am very excited for it.

ANDORAN VS CHELIAX WAR AP IS HAPPENING!

"Battlecry! will tell the story of the wide-ranging conflict known to inhabitants of the world of Golarion as The Inner Sea War. The inspiration comes from World War I — complete with a similar inciting event, specifically the assassination of a foreign dignitary."

Gonna say... we already kinda got this w/ one recent AP and some of us were not overly thrilled with the output.

There's a number of conversions floating around. You can usually find them on an appropriate reddit, or here, if someone did it for free, but there are others for sale at the relevent webstores as well.

It's not the hardest thing in the world. Some monsters don't have correlaries, but that's pretty easy to work in. The real buggaboos [from my understanding] are effects dealing w/ alignment and treasure. Someone's thrown together a handy DC conversion table from 1E to 2E which is probably a good guide.

would this be a good one shot leading up to running STOLEN FATE?

Also... Jirelga and Krohan just... vanish? Like... where do they go? Would there be good places to bring them back into the AP? Jirelga just, like... jets before the Court, and Krohan kinda... evaporates?

I'm thinking that the PCs get

So... I was reading Book 2's back half for the first time, and while I didn't go into detail, I saw that it just... ends?

And then Book 3 starts in a whole other place. There's no guidance for how to get out of the broader situation in the end of Book 2, ramifications, etc.

Any thoughts on how to get the PCs effectively from Book 2 to 3? Particularly on the extrication from the almost certainly LETHAL situation they'll find themselves in at the end of Book 2?

It seems that the Whispering Tyrant's CMD are miscalculated. The CMD would be 10 base, 2 strength, 4 dexterity, 10 base attack, 5 deflection ring for a total of 31, not 19 as it says on the sheet. Did I miss something?

Probably not. There's more than a few errors in AP statblocks.

It sounds like a very heavily ranged group. You might want to encourage them to try and kite people - ranged attack or spell and then stride sort of action economy. If they hit the ooze in the cavern, I think that would have been brutal for them, but that's just a bad matchup. If they try and go in close on things, that could lead to difficulties as none of them can really 'tank'

I failed to level them up to 3 when they went into the Darklands.

Oooooh. Very cool. This is also keeping with the Gallowspire puzzle:

Tar-Baphon>Gods>Undead>Mortals

He fancies himself above the gods, so why would he aspire to become one? Seeking divinity would make his arrogance all bluster when in fact he covets their position. I sort of like him as utterly confident and bought into his self-importance. He actually thinks gods are beneath him.

Y'all have any details on how the Starstone might be weaponized?

It's outside the scope of the AP.

If he succeeds [i.e. kills the party] then it's game over.

If he fails, well, then that's the end of the AP [and the world].

If you want to run some kind of post-TB-victory campaign, then that's something else. You could take some inspiration from the fantastic 'Midnight' campaign setting books if you wanted to run the last campaign in Golarion against the final boss.

What is your party comp? Maybe we can help with ideas for survivability if we know what you're working with.

Thaumaturge [melee... kinda?]

So... I really wanted to like this campaign, but after finishing Book 1, I've told the guys that I'm probably going to end the AP.

There's some of the generic issues [starship combat, not great NPCs] but also, when running the final combats just... the guys whomped 'em really bad.

Looking ahead at Books 2 and 3, there's lots of combats which are really weak. Like... gimmes. My guys at the present level [15] will just ROFL stomp them. And I don't have the bandwidth to update every encounter - which usually is best done through mooks, and that's just padding [adding time to sessions].

I dunno. I ran an experiment at the end of Attack! where the players were told to make level 18 versions of their PCs and they fought the Broodsoul from the back of the book as the "final form" of the BBEG. They struggled 'a little' as I had a bunch of other monsters there, but ultimately when they got to the CR 20 monster, he was a paper tiger. And looking ahead at the boss of DA when the PCs get to him... he's also a CR 20 monster... and they'll be Level 20s! Where's the challenge?

Anyone else run/played this AP and have thoughts on the issue?

Hey folks,

My game world has been running for about 25 years. It's been shaped by previous characters successes and failures (so it doesnt perfectly resemble the AP Golarion). We're nearing the end of Tyrant's Grasp and there are major world shaping implications.

I'm wondering what folks think would happen if Tar-Baphon reaches the Starstone. Does he achieve apotheosis? If so, what's his portfolio as a new god? What kind of conflicts does this create in the pantheon? Does he count Urgathoa as an ally or as enemy competition? What's the in-world impact of him ascending to divinity?

The way I ran it, he was not interested in ascending to divinity. He is immortal anyway.

That takes him off the board. As his simulacrum said to the PCs in Book 4, Norgorber ascended, are thieves no longer hung? Cayden ascended, are hangovers no longer? Iomedae ascended, are all crusades successful? Did godhood save Aroden?

so... what's the point?

Instead, he sought the Starstone to use its power to become the God of the Real. To control the Prime Material Plane.