How do they get to Salvator if not steered there by Laori, though?
The adventure suggests it's "through conversation with Laori, magical
divination, or DC 20 Gather Information checks."
If they don't make a deal with Laori, they're more likely to be really at a loss. I can try and suggest creative thinking, and they might have some solutions I'm not thinking of, but as written, if they don't like Laori, the investigation is at a dead end.
Preface: I'm using the old adventure path issues, not the revised Anniversary Edition, but if there are relevant changes in the Anniversary Edition that could help me, I'd appreciate hearing about it.
Also I'm a DM looking for advice from other DMs, so the following includes **SPOILERS** for players of Curse of the Crimson Throne. I'm also running the AP in D&D 5e.
I'm a bit at a loss regarding how to run Laori Vaus in Escape from Old Korvosa. She's an intriguing NPC and though I haven't read past Chapter 3 I know she comes up later in the AP. I gather she's pretty popular here, but it just seems likely that my players will completely distrust her and write her off. In fact, I'm worried that my players will not want to deal with her at all, may fight her, and if the encounter devolves into combat, the party may have a hard time following leads to continue to the following step in the investigation.
Here's what I see when I look at her intro in Chapter 3: she probably aids the players in the Otyugh encounter outside Salvator Scream's house, which probably earns some trust. But when they talk to her, she's probably open about the fact that she's a devotee of Zon-Kuthon, and it's probably apparent to players who make the right knowledge checks. Laori isn't hiding that. The notes say she won't mention her cult, but on the other hand my players (who are mostly good) will be confronted with a woman devoted to an evil god talking to a bunch of skulls who says she "just wants to talk" to Salvator.
How did this initial encounter go in your games?
Do you have advice on playing Laori that 1) gives good-aligned parties reasons to deal with her and 2) gives Laori a solid chance to return later in the campaign?
The stakes for the encounter, as I see them, are this: Laori wants the players to bring Salvator back to talk with her. If the party agrees, she will guide them to where Salvator is being held, and will give them the clue about the Seneschal.
The problem: The players will probably see a chirpy cleric of a clearly evil god and presume that it is a bad bet to turn Salvator over to her, especially given the collection of skulls she's got. If they totally distrust Laori, as I suspect they will if I play her mostly as written, how to get them that information? How to retain her as a recurring character?
If the players just want to keep their XP and loot, just have the ones who want to keep their characters do so, and have players who want to make new characters create them at level 2.
If the issue is more that they like their character fluff and backgrounds, let them create new characters with the classes they like, and retcon the history so they're the ones that went through the beginner box adventure.
Here's how I might handle it, if my players just really wanted the XP and loot they scored in the beginner box:
Let those who want to recreate their characters do so, and retcon it so that's how the party always was. Everyone starts at 2nd level. Like people pointed out, a jump to 2nd level isn't incredibly unbalancing, and might increase survival with a small party.
Use a plot device to get rid of most of their loot. You could use the "we were robbed!" trope, or ask your players to come up with one, if they're mature enough to work with you and come up with an idea that involves nerfing their characters. Personally, I would leave them the healing wands and take all the other big items (half plate, dragon slaying sword, acid gem).
I know most players don't like DM fiat that penalizes them, but depending on how mature your players are, I think since you are working with them and giving them an early XP boost, they won't feel too badly about losing their items.
If you want, you could make the robbery into an ongoing plot thread. There are plenty of unsavory characters in Sandpoint who could be culprits, and if you string this out a little bit, you can even give them back their items at a more appropriate level. If you do this, I might give a necessary clue to an NPC who happens to be far away from town and hard to track down (the ranger Shalelu might be a good candidate). That way you can prevent your players from just abandoning the main plot thread and focusing all their energy on getting their stuff back.
There's a lot of good advice here. These are some of the toughest situations at a gaming table, since it's all about interpersonal relationships, group dynamics, and the specific play culture of your group. I sympathize with your Alpha in part, since I am also usually a DM and even though I love being a player, sometimes it's hard to turn off the DM brain that's constantly saying, "Is this how I would do it?"
For me, I try to remember that part of my job as a fellow player is pretty similar to an important DM task - making sure everybody has fun. I'm pretty social and gregarious, so I often tend to jump in and talk immediately, which can sometimes shove the rest of the players into secondary positions. I try to remember that everybody needs a chance in the spotlight and create situations for that as a player as well as a DM.
I think everyone else on this thread is right, there's no other way to deal with this than have a talk with Alpha in a calm, friendly way. He still might take it the wrong way though. Hopefully his better nature will win out and he'll see his way to moderating his Alpha behavior when he's a player.
Trying some new venues, like others have suggested, sounds like a great idea. First of all, it minimizes the risk of Alpha taking his toys - his gamespace - and going home to punish everyone. Secondly, playing at someone else's home or a neutral place like a gameshop might help send a subtle message that it's not Alpha's group - it's everybody's group.
I'm not sure if this is the right forum for this, so if not, please move this thread to a more suitable location.
I'm thinking of running an online message board Kingmaker campaign, but I'm worried about how to use maps in the game. Maps are pretty fundamental to Kingmaker, but I'm fairly certain that I can't post images of the hex maps or area maps in the adventure path, even with proper attribution and warnings about usage.
Is there a proper way to do this? I figured drawing my own hex maps, as long as they look nothing like Paizo's work, might work.
Is there any (legal, proper) way to use Paizo maps in message board play?
...it's a play on words from Zelazny's short story "A Rose for Ecclesiastes". Brust is a major Zelazny fan.
And presumably Zelazny was a Faulkner fan. I'm guessing "A Rose for Ecclesiastes" is a play on Faulkner's short story, "A Rose for Emily." I've never read the Zelazny story, so I can't say for sure, but since it was written second, I'm guessing it was a conscious decision.
This is a great letter and I may steal it...but do you think it reveals too much of the big picture at this point in the story?
Unlikely. If anything, one of the complaints I have (admittedly a minor one) with the Adventure Path is that the early adventures need a bit more tie-in with the main plot.
I noticed this, too...what I decided was to encourage the PCs to do research from the very beginning. I gave them a guide to Sandpoint handout, divided into categories like Taverns, Goods...including a category for Information, so the sage, seer, bookstore, library, etc. are listed.
Spoiler:
I plan to encourage them to research things they might be intrigued about, like the Old Light and the giant head under Thistletop. They won't learn much, but they might get thinking about a connection to fallen Thassilon. That plus the reoccurence of the Sihedron will probably be enough for the first three adventures.
the first part of Rise of the Runelords #2 is a murder investigation, so running one as a sidetrek in Burnt Offerings and then getting to another one in the next adventure might seem like overkill, just in terms of pacing.
I guess it depends on how often you guys play - if it takes you long enough, it might not matter.
I'm running through Burnt Offerings with 2 players, one a newbie, and we used the Pathfinder Beta to generate PCs. Since my party is so under strength, I haven't really made any changes to the adventure as written. The extra hitpoints definitely made things survivable for them, since I haven't scaled any of the encounters down.
Spoiler:
I ran them through a short little bandit attack and then through the goblin raid, but haven't gotten any further. They did pretty decently, but the goblins weren't the most coordinated attackers...things might get worse later on.
I just posted regarding this in the Skinsaw Murders GM Reference section.
Spoiler:
I came to pretty much the same conclusion, but I envisioned the roof more or less intact (with large holes to see the angel perched above, and a large breach on the side with the scaffolding). I thought that maybe enterprising players could arrange to drop the angel on Xanesha if they could maneuver her into position.
I have looked at the S. Clock maps and read the descriptions, but I cannot quite figure out how gets to the Angel's roost. Is the idea that you have to climb outside and climb up to the roof? Is there a trapdoor to the roof?
Also, is the statue above her roost, or is its foundation in the middle of the roost?
Thank you.
I know this is a GM reference thread, but - spoilered for the indepth discussion.
Spoiler:
There seem to be quite a few discrepancies between the descriptions, the map, and the picture of the tower. The easiest thing to do would be to work out a logical solution for yourself and go with that. Here's what I came up with:
The stairs from the E2 areas (the main body of the clock tower) emerge in E3, at which point the description says the stairs end at an opening, and then continue on the exterior of the tower to a room above - E4. The exterior stairs seem to be part of the "tangle of scaffolding" alluded to in the initial description of the tower. There's no description in E4 about how to get to E6, but the map makes it look like the scaffolding reaches from E4 to E6.
I would say that PCs can clamber up the scaffolding outside E4 to reach E6. The layout of E6, though...I don't know. The map makes it look like the top of the conical roof has been shorn off, though this could just be a cutaway view. This is what I decided: it is a cutaway view, and the conical roof is mostly intact, with holes in the rafters enough to see the angel perched above. The scaffolding outside gives entry through a breach in the side of the roof to this "attic." You can visualize this if you look at the map.
As for the statue...if the foundation reaches down to the floor of E6, the supporting pillar might make a neat tactical obstacle/piece of cover. The battle there promises to be so difficult that breaking up the battleground might be helpful.
I decided that there is no foundation and that the statue is precariously perched on the decaying roof of the tower. If I drop enough hints, my players might think to use it as a weapon: one or more players could engage Xanesha in melee combat while another player clambers up on the roof or into the rafters and tries to break up the roof enough to drop it on her, for a few D6s worth of damage. Could make a murderous combat encounter a bit easier.
I think from a story point of view your almost-TPK turned out mighty well - you certainly turned it to dramatic advantage. Your recap was a lot of fun to read.
I'm running through Burnt Offerings right now with 2(!) players, but I've been paging through your notes - they're very helpful, despite my party being miserably understrength rather than overpowered. I particularly loved your idea about Aldern being more concerned about the death of his horse rather than his manservant.
I ran them through an intro session (a bandit ambush) just to get the newbie acclimated to gameplay, then moved on to the Swallowtail raid. They coped pretty well with the encounters as written despite bad dice mojo for the half-orc barbarian that had him whiffing his swings almost the whole way through. I did have the goblins do non-sensible things like attacking with torches instead of dogslicers, taking a turn to raid merchant carts for food, etc., which made the combat more chaotic but less difficult.
They picked up one of the bandits from the initial encounter as an NPC, and I plan to have Shalelu join them as well, so they'll have a bare minimum party of 4 (but no casters).
That's great. My players used the raid as an opportunity for a little judicious robbery as well (they pillaged the rooms at the White Deer), they just happened to get away with it.
I'm interested in joining - the campaign world sounds pretty fantastic. Since I'm not familiar with Gamma World etc., I don't know how much of it is prefab, but it all sounds damn entertaining.
If you've still got an opening, let me know. I was considering a young (19-ish) pure strain human who's rediscovered Communism and roams about seeking support to build some kind of socialist utopian society. He's naive and intellectual, kind of a babe in the woods.
