A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for 1st- through 4th-level characters.
A recently inducted Pathfinder field agent makes a startling discovery as pleas for assistance flock to the Society’s Grand Lodge from across the Inner Sea. A group of Pathfinders come to assist in parsing the ongoing damage to the Society when a staunch ally requests their assistance. Stepping into a problem close to home, the agents quickly uncover a larger plot set to tear the Society apart and that it’s up to them to raise the alarm!
Intro: Year of Shattered Sanctuaries is the introduction to the ongoing story of the Year of Shattered Sanctuaries. It is also the first scenario in a four-part arc detailing the events taking place in and around the Society's headquarters at the Grand Lodge in Absalom, the City of Lost Omens. Other arcs explore other locations across the Inner Sea. While the arcs can be played in any order, it is recommended that players experience the scenarios within each individual arc in order, and this scenario is a natural starting point for the Year 3 metaplot as a whole.
The story more than does justice to the intro character. You are not confronted with countless new names and that is a good thing, nice for beginners. I was able to take the time to really show the important NPCs, which I like better when leading than having to show several NPCs at the same time. You either come across well-known names or well-known places, nice for veterans.
The opponents in the encounters are varied, so that there is definitely something for everyone. Here and there, the players have to react quickly to the fights, otherwise the encounter and paths that nobody wants will escalate.
What I think is a bit of a shame that you may stumble too obviously from one fight to the next. And then the adventure is already over. Maybe a little more variety would be great.
Still, I can only recommend this intro. A nice start into the third season, because the end definitely makes you want more Metaplot. I ran the scenario four times and I think everyone had fun every time.
The special this year was the pathfinder/starfinder specials affecting each other they mentioned in blog. They apparently don't plan to tie in specials with metaplots anymore
(which is great in my opinion, I STILL don't know what happened to Aram Zey in the end because its "special spoilers" :p Tying the metaplot with convention only stuff kinda sucks when you can't go to every convention)
If possible, can editors avoid using colors like red/green to denote items on maps? As a colorblind person I have a really hard time making out certain red items on page 13.
Is this scenario really repeatable? It's the same creatures in each encounter with no variation. Usually replayables have several creatures to choose from for each encounter so that it is different each time you play it.
The final encounter does not list number of baddies at the base level. I am referring to the number in parenthesis that I expect to tell me how many initial.
