Okay,thanks to a lot of circumstances coming together (both positives and negatives), I'm going to be getting my 38 year old butt back in school this fall. The downside is that in order to do so, I'm going to have to significantly cut short the Savage Tide campaign I'm running so I'm not ignoring school work for game prep (always an issue with me). As it was, I had to stop reading more than one issue ahead in the adventure path - it was distracting me from prepping for the next session!
So here's my situation: after a year, we're about halfway through Sea Wyvern's Wake (lots of ROLE play, lots of no-wife-no-kids camaraderie, some side quests, every other week game that gets preempted by real life every few months...). What story elements, Here There Be Monsters to Prince Of Demons, are essential for it to truly be a Savage Tide game?
Stopping shadow pearl production is critical.
Discovering Demogorgon's plan as well.
What else needs to be in there?
For example, reading through Here There Be Monsters, I'm really not finding anything that the characters need in the adventure in order to move the plot along, and plan on moving straight from Tamoachan (current point in SWW) to Farshore. (Don't worry - they'll be getting plenty of Isle of Dread time - I've got too much nostalgic feelings for IoD to let this opportunity pass by.)
One approach would be to simply cut it short -- end the campaign after "Tides of Dread", (not quite as natural) "The Lightness Depths", or "City of Broken Idols". You don't get to the BBEG of the as-published campaign, but you still reach a good conclusion, having accomplished something.
You could do it as a series of set pieces or vignettes, just skipping to the major encounters and or end battles, which ever you think your group will get the biggest kick out of. For the in-between stuff, you can just tell them the events, or read them the various synopses, or something.
Give them the levels proper for the upcoming encounter, cash and/or magic items from the STAP, let them level the characters and run the encounter.
Its certainly more hack and slash that way, less focus on roleplay, but if your time is that restricted, then this may be a way to go.
Cheers!
You could do it as a series of set pieces or vignettes, just skipping to the major encounters and or end battles, which ever you think your group will get the biggest kick out of. For the in-between stuff, you can just tell them the events, or read them the various synopses, or something.
Yeah, I think this is more along the lines of the intent of the original question.
Here's what I'd do, off the top of my head. I think it's mostly the climax encounters or set-pieces of each scenario.
* HTBM: Urol's abduction, and the inner sanctum of the shrine
* ToD: the Battle of Farshore
* TLD: all of Golismorga
* CoBI: hm, maybe the entry to the complex and the lowest level
* SoS: the Crimson Fleet's base
* ItM: this one is harder to dissect; maybe a battle with Vanthus over the cauldron, and one other boss of your choice
It's been long enough since I've read the rest that I can't make good recommendations there.
You could do it as a series of set pieces or vignettes, just skipping to the major encounters and or end battles, which ever you think your group will get the biggest kick out of. For the in-between stuff, you can just tell them the events, or read them the various synopses, or something.Yeah, I think this is more along the lines of the intent of the original question.
Here's what I'd do, off the top of my head. I think it's mostly the climax encounters or set-pieces of each scenario.
* HTBM: Urol's abduction, and the inner sanctum of the shrine
* ToD: the Battle of Farshore
* TLD: all of Golismorga
* CoBI: hm, maybe the entry to the complex and the lowest level
* SoS: the Crimson Fleet's base
* ItM: this one is harder to dissect; maybe a battle with Vanthus over the cauldron, and one other boss of your choiceIt's been long enough since I've read the rest that I can't make good recommendations there.
ItM is definitely a big@$$ dungeon crawl that would normally take several sessions to complete. I might consider making the area for the VV end-game battle larger and adding a few more of the DI's denizens to the fight. After all, the party should be spending resources prior to meeting VV. This section may take quite a bit of rework and planning ahead of time, but would be well worth it IMO.
WoD: the Rescue of Shami-Amourae and the encounter with Ahazu are the big ticket items on this list. I think I'd go with Ahazu and flavor text the S-A rescue if I could only choose one. Although, the rescue does preface the next adventure well...
EomE: the Arena Battle with Big O's Champion(s). Yeah definitely that. Maybe the Court of Stars for a change of pace as there shouldn't be much in the way of combat, but thats a bit out of step with this overall plan.
PoD: I would do all the big battles here, since it is the finale to the AP, but the obvious choice if you can only do one, is the battle with ol' Dubble Monkey Face, Hisself. I'd certainly include the battle outside Wat Dagon in that, just to make sure they aren't completely fresh when the enter WD.
Cheers!