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I am getting ready to run this AP after playing it as a player. A few things I have noticed.
#1 Oleg is intended to be the primary guy the players buy ordinary gear from, but his selection is very weak at the start (he pretty much has nothing the players would want), and if he wants better stuff, he has to go to Restov to get it, which counting the return trip would take Oleg out of the trading post for about two weeks. That really doesn't work. And yet as a GM you probably don't want the characters constantly leaving the adventure area to go shopping in Restov.
So:
This means that though Oleg might not have something in stock right now, he can "order" things through Wassily and it will take 3 weeks after Wassily next visits for such items to arrive. Wassily is also willing to take messages and mail to Restov for a small fee.
Wassily travels with an armed guard large enough to discourage bandits and/or evil players from hitting his wagon, including one Paladin of Abadar who is his second-in-command.
While at Oleg's he will not sell directly with the player-characters. He and Oleg are both part of the Merchant's guild and he won't go behind Oleg's back or infringe on Oleg's franchise. If the party encounters him on the road more than 12 miles from Oleg's though, then bets are off and he will deal with the players, though he won't give them anything wholesale (unless someone in the party manages to join the Merchant's guild as more than an apprentice).
Wassily is a canny businessman and is a much better merchant than Oleg. He has a low opinion of those who live out in the Stolen lands but is careful not to show this to prospective customers. He is also impatient and tightfisted, but is smooth and polite as long as he is not angered. He is not generous except that when negotiating he is happy to provide strong drink to prospective customers in the hopes of making them drunk enough to have poor judgement. Wassily is good at seeming to drink a lot without actually drinking very much.
#2: Taking Prisoners becomes a real moral dilemma for some parties. Oleg's isn't really a good place for putting prisoners (though the only reason I could think of for having the midden pits inside the compound was that they could be then used to throw prisoners in), and Oleg and Svetlana won't want them around after what they've been through at the hands of the bandits. If the party decides to turn prisoners over to the "authorities" in Restov, then once again they are leaving the adventure area.
So:
If prisoners are turned over to Szemyan then they will be tied behind the horses and taken away. It will be clear from Szemyan's attitude that they will not be treated well and will be executed publicly once in Restov. Szemyan will take statements from the players and the Levetons before leaving, but since Brevoy has a status-based justice system, and the players are agents of the crown, anything contradictory to the players' testimony said by captive bandits will be ignored. Anyone actually living in the Stolen Lands is automatically considered to be nearly an outlaw to begin with so they have no legal chance.
Szemyan considers the people of the Stolen Lands to be worthless drifters and neer-do-wells living in exile. As far as he is concerned, if they had any worth they would live in Brevoy proper (though he won't admit that the Stolen Lands are not part of Brevoy). While Oleg is a guildsman and thus has more status, Szemyan thinks Oleg is a fool for setting up shop out here.
Szemyan is handsome, charming, and entertaining, and will be friendly and boisterous among those he considers to be of his station, but will not tolerate any disrespect from someone he considers beneath him, nor will he fraternize with them or allow any familiarity. He has a low opinion of Sir Kesten and the feeling is mutual. He also believes that anyone who avoids a stand-up fight, even to pursue a tactical advantage over an enemy, is a coward and deserves no mercy.
Szemyan's family is a junior branch of House Rogarvia and his elderly grandfather is a baron. After three to six months of campaign time, Szemyan's patrol will be reassigned to within Brevoy as priorities in the country change, and the party won't see him again... unless the GM wishes to bring him back for some other purpose later.
That definitely works. I'm currently running Kingmaker and we are almost done with Stolen Lands (likely to finish on Saturday). The way I interpreted the adventure was simply that Oleg had the ability to send messages/requests to Restov. The adventure mentions that there are trappers that come through Oleg's and we know that Restov is in communication with him (see Garess and his retinue). Add to that the fact that Restov is now sponsoring the exploration of the area and they are even more inclined to keep in contact. I basically just had a caravan come through every week that could both take messages to Restov and take any prisoners that repented.
On top of that I introduced messenger crows as well. I had Varn send a message to the PCs early on and gave them the ability to send a reply. The implication was that there were plenty of means by which to communicate if they wanted.
Basically the way I see it, Restov and the Swordlords are pretty heavily invested in seeing the Stolen Lands get developed and as such, they are going to help out while they can. Honestly, my players didn't think too much of it and never questioned it. The fact that they had to wait awhile to get certain items, and the fact that Oleg had a very limited set of funds actually helped to create the frontier feel of the setting. I also think its not a bad idea to keep the available gear relatively tight early on (keeping the guidelines set forth in the adventure in mind) as much of the first book (and campaign for that matter) consists of 5 minute work days so having a tighter set of item availability early on actually helps make things a bit more challenging.
That definitely works. I'm currently running Kingmaker and we are almost done with Stolen Lands (likely to finish on Saturday). The way I interpreted the adventure was simply that Oleg had the ability to send messages/requests to Restov....
Sure. Might as well put a face to the game effect though.
Basically the way I see it, Restov and the Swordlords are pretty heavily invested in seeing the Stolen Lands get developed...
I wouldn't get too carried away there though. They only sent a party of first-level adventurers. That's not much of a commitment.
... so having a tighter set of item availability early on actually helps make things a bit more challenging.
I can tell you as a player in a KM game that having a bunch of treasure and having nothing to spend it on is really frustrating. Having a system where players can at least "order" things through Oleg would alleviate that quite a bit.
Sure. Might as well put a face to the game effect though.
True, nothing at all wrong with that.
I wouldn't get too carried away there though. They only sent a party of first-level adventurers. That's not much of a commitment.
Eh, yes and no. They also sent three other (presumably higher powered) groups out to the more dangerous parts of the Stolen Lands. On top of that, even 1st level adventurers are pretty unique in the world. My point was more though that they are encouraging caravans, merchants, etc. Not that they were just giving the stuff to the party. Restov wants the Stolen Lands secured and stable so that when the inevitable civil war comes they don't have to worry about their southern border.
I can tell you as a player in a KM game that having a bunch of treasure and having nothing to spend it on is really frustrating. Having a system where players can at least "order" things through Oleg would alleviate that quite a bit.
Perhaps I should clarify. I absolutely let them order stuff from Restov. It just takes a couple of weeks to arrive is all. I entirely agree that giving the players treasure doesn't mean anything if they can never spend it. My point was more of a "Oh, you know there are werewolves out there now and you want silvered weapons? Well, you can order some, but what are you going to do for the next two weeks?" For my group, knowing that there wasn't the equivalent of an Amazon warehouse sitting at Oleg's helped reinforce that they were out in the wilderness and that it was a dangerous place where they needed to be careful. There was also then that "nervousness" when they would go back out to explore knowing that they wouldn't have their newest orders for a couple of weeks and hoping that they didn't encounter another werewolf, or fey, etc.
I will agree though that every group is different, so you need to tailor things to your group. More to the point, I apologize if my initial response seemed dismissive of your work, that really wasn't my intent. I think it is a good idea, just one that I didn't need/use for my game because I just used the regular travelers going through Oleg's to send the messages, etc. rather than Oleg himself.
When I was running Stolen Lands, I played with the idea of ordering things from Restov a bit by making Svetlana Leveton have a bit of a psychic gift. As long as the players wanted to buy things under the Trading Post's spending limit that weren't too obscure, the Levetons would have just happened to have ordered in what they wanted in advance, and Svetlana would make comments like "I just knew you'd want that". I felt it gave her a bit more presence in the setting, rather than just being Oleg's wife.
If the PCs wanted expensive or custom things though, they had to send off to Restov.
I made the ex-hunter Vekkel Benzen (the quest giver for the Tuskgutter quest) one of the traders driving a cart between Restov and Oleg's. As it stands, there's no mention in the module of where the players can find him, so it worked well for him to roll up into Oleg's once every few weeks and take special orders. I made it that he'd lost his hand to Tuskgutter, rather than a leg, which is why he can no longer use his masterwork longbow. He defends himself on the road with several loaded crossbows in his wagon which he can fire one handed, as well as some hunting dogs (from the litter of his beloved Fang who gave her life so he could escape from Tuskgutter after losing his hand).
I took a somewhat different approach. As a frontier tradesman, Oleg just didn't have that much in stock. If my players did things to make the Stolen Lands safer from bandits, Oleg would have more and better gear for them.
That's sort of what I'm getting at with mine. He's had plenty of opportunity to order things for them, but as the kingdom grows, he (and other merchants) won't need to order as much as they'll have more stuff in stock normally.