So what are people thinking of doing as a starting level? If this AP is a challenging as the previous two, then I'm thinking about starting them at at least level 2. I will only have four players and to be honest they are not the best at teamwork. My players are also asking what level they will be startiing at (one player wants a military background so he wants a level of fighter before doing cleric) so I have starting thinking about it. Has anyone else put any thought to it?
I personally don't like the idea of giving away a character level as a "freebie" at the start of a campaign. There is too much fun to be had in discovering your character's abilities for the first time, while at the same time knowing that nearly any monster could kill you on a single lucky hit.
What I would therefore do, if ever I thought the party needed a bit of a boost before starting the AP - is to simply come up with a brief introduction chapter of my own, even if it only consists of a couple of encounters, and a lot of bonus roleplaying XP. At least then the players will have "earned" their level-up, in some way.
Chris, I would not recommend starting your characters any higher than level 1. The beauty of Savage Tide is that Paizo has had a chance to use the experiences (and mistakes) from the first 2 APs to learn from. I've read the first three adventures and found that they were matched up exactly how the level progressions are designed to be.
Your characters should attain 2 levels from each adventure. And there will be opportunities for them to earn xp without ever drawing a weapon. I suggest you be patient and not starting tweaking the adventures before you even have a chance to read them.
Chris, I would not recommend starting your characters any higher than level 1. ... I've read the first three adventures and found that they were matched up exactly how the level progressions are designed to be.
Do the adventures assume four characters?
Your characters should attain 2 levels from each adventure. And there will be opportunities for them to earn xp without ever drawing a weapon. I suggest you be patient and not starting tweaking the adventures before you even have a chance to read them.
Am I reading this right? Are you saying that characters should get 2 levels per adventure?
Does that mean with 12 adventures in the Savage Tide AP they will reach level 24 at it's conclusion?
As an aside, this reminded me of when I played in Shackled City. Since we heard it was tough, and because we were interested in the races anyway, all 4 of the players got a "free" +1 LA. We had 4 genasi - one of each element.
I'm finding that little things like that can be a nice way to get a minor boost without outright being higher levels. As long as everyone in the party gets the same LA, just never mind it.
It also helps that we tend to play some interesting characters that are far from optimized and generally as a group prefer to avoid character deaths.
Chris, I would not recommend starting your characters any higher than level 1. ... I've read the first three adventures and found that they were matched up exactly how the level progressions are designed to be.Do the adventures assume four characters?
Yes
Your characters should attain 2 levels from each adventure. And there will be opportunities for them to earn xp without ever drawing a weapon. I suggest you be patient and not starting tweaking the adventures before you even have a chance to read them.Am I reading this right? Are you saying that characters should get 2 levels per adventure?
Does that mean with 12 adventures in the Savage Tide AP they will reach level 24 at it's conclusion?
Let me ammend that by saying, the adventures that I've read so far and what I've written assume a 2 level advancement. Some of the adventures are going to have only a single level advancement, so, no, I don't think you'll have level 24 characters at the end. It's meant to take characters from level 1 to level 20. Of course, each DM will run it according to his or her own whim. So... maybe some will.
James Jacobs would probably have the best answer for you with the broader scope of character advancement. And perhaps this may have been outlined better in the AP section of Dungeon #138 I've been hearing about?
Perhaps I should just shut up now...
Unfortunately the preview in Dungeon #138 does not include the recommended levels for the adventures. At least I read it twice last night and don't recall seeing that info. It has a (long) paragraph synopsis on each adventure and some concept artwork.
Given how stat blocks take increasing amounts of space at higher levels, I'd figure the earlier adventures would be 2 levels, and the last 4 would be single levels.
Although a few of these adventures, I was really surprised at how much they are planning to fit into some of them!
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Some of the adventures are certainly going to be long, and we'll have to pull some stunts to get them to fit. But that's nothing different from what we had to deal with in Shackled City or Age of Worms.
As for advancement, we'll be following the same plot as Age of Worms, for the most part. Characters will probably gain 2 levels per adventure for the first eight, and then gain one level per adventure for the last four. The high level adventures tend to have more stat blocks (and the stat blocks themselves tend to be longer), so we generally need more room to present them.
By the end of Savage Tide, your PCs will be 20th or perhaps 21st level. Assuming you have a group of 4 PCs.