I'd like the characters in my RotRL campaign to be able to read some of Eando Kline's journals, mostly just because they are too much fun to read to be just for the DM's eyes. Does anyone know of a good opportunity where the character's might come into possession of one of the journals somehow? Has anyone done something like that yet?
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I'd like the characters in my RotRL campaign to be able to read some of Eando Kline's journals, mostly just because they are too much fun to read to be just for the DM's eyes. Does anyone know of a good opportunity where the character's might come into possession of one of the journals somehow? Has anyone done something like that yet?
I seem to remember JJ or someone similar saying some of the PF Journals were widely printed and sold to people. So, it would make sense that you could go to a marketplace and pick up a page of it, or a small collection. Sold right there next to "The Adventures of Blackjack: Attack of the Fish Monster from Beyond!". If this is the case, you can probably bet on the theater owner, whose name I forget right now, would have an edition or two just for story ideas.
If you needed to give out some of the hidden ones, then those could easily be from captured pathfinders who died in captivity (4 ogres catch a pathfinder and put his book in the corner), or maybe from a player who has joined the pathfinder org and gained access to the library.
Don't the dates in the journal make that unlikely? It seems there hasn't really been time for these to be distributed.
I just gave the PDF to my players and assumed that the stories were simply circulating as rumor and tales told 'round the campfire.
They really do go a long way toward immersing the players in the world.
O
Do they possible give away too much? Just a concern of mine of revealing too much of this new adventure world that is so much fun to play and explore in. any one else with this concern. Or the reverse could there be other peoples Pathfinder Journals "unofficial" ones that maybe we all could share?
While it's true that the Pathfinder's Journal is set up as Eando's current journal, rather than a widely-read volume of the Pathfinder Chronicles, it's obvious that he one day hopes to see his notes published in that venue. So while you're probably not likely to be able to buy his adventures at the average bookseller, I'm all in favor of characters finding them in the street somewhere. We've taken care to make sure there isn't anything in there that spoils the APs, and there are actually a number of Easter-egg tie-ins that should increase players' enjoyment. So spread 'em around, says I!
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I thought about those Journals as well and came to the conclusion, that I will use the short storys of the first pathfinder issue (where some of the volumes are described) to give to my players, and Eando's Journal from RotRL will fall into the hands of my players when they've finished RotRL and start Edge of Anarchy. The EoA journal will be available in the Second Darkness PF and so on... This will fix the date-issue as well.
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Does anyone know of a good opportunity where the character's might come into possession of one of the journals somehow? Has anyone done something like that yet?
Copies of it could be sitting on the counter of the Sandpoint General Store. The sage could have a copy or two. Someone in the town market could be a book vendor selling them to the towns folk that attracts a PC's attention.
Magnimar has a big library. :P
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I actually had the same thought about Eando's journal, though my back story gave me a bit of an in to let it happen. The first scene of the game I did started the characters at the pathfinder charter house in magnimar and each of their backstories had them seeking entrance into the pathfinder group for one reason or another with some of the characters being fairly local and others having come from some distance because the charter houses relatively new establishment means that its more likely to be accepting low level members.
I had figured this would be good for the characters because it gives them all a good reason to be very investigative about everything they come across and to keep track of all that information,We are only two sessions in so far, and our druid has already developed an unhealthy obsession with catching murdermaw and is developing plans to go explore skinners island and maybe go hunting for the sandpoint devil which he is convinced is a half-dragon horse, chronicling it all as he goes.
Now that they are in sandpoint(they were sent here as something of a test, the swallow tail festival being something important that should be chronicled but thought to be too mundane for 'real' pathfinders) I imagine that I'm going to wait until the time seems right and let them happen to meet Eando between one of his journeys. They have not yet decided if they are going to openly show their pathfinder affiliation, in which case he will approach them, or if I'll give them a chance to spot his wayfinder to allow for the introductions. But either way I imagined that he would request their mage to make a copy of his journal and deliver it to the guild in magnimar as his journeys are going to take him further away for a time. He can be mysterious in this way about just where he is going or where he has been since the end of the completed tale he gives them, but still can be a font of information for them about the comings and goings of the rest of the world. And of course his wide range of traveling allows him to be something of a reoccurring character. Even if he doesn't make an appearance again in this AP he can pop in the next one and the players will recognize him and get that feeling of things being linked.
I was planning on using the journals in just this way. My intent was to have a PC get ahold of a copy of one of the books and then use that as an excuse to reveal campaign information.
Fer instance, when the PCs are planning their trip from Magnimar to Turtelback, I'd say something like "this reminds you of an entry from the Journal" and hand out the one from PF2 featuring Eando's trip up the river.
The assumption is that they have all these stories already, but specific circumstances would prompt them to "remember" the applicable ones.
I'm glad to hear there's a promise to keep these player-friendly so I don't have to suddenly start editing them.
I feel silly for not even thinking about that. What a great idea. :)
I am going to collect the various Pathfinder Chronicles notes at the beginning of the Gamemastery, er, Pathfinder modules, and make many of those information known to some characters. There are some nice nuggets in some of them.
Thanks for your input. I thought about the date problem too - the journal would probably be too new to be widely circulated. One way around that would be to set the date back by one year maybe. If it was new it would probably be necessary for the characters to get Eando's original notes somehow.
My characters don't really have contacts to the Pathfinders. The closest thing would be Lyrie (from Thistletop) who used bluff to convince them that she actually was a Pathfinder (and then sex too) and thus that she could prove useful if they let her live. She's now kind of the girlfriend of the group's conjurer (or at least that's what he thinks), and she stayed behind in Sandpoint while the characters are exploring Foxglove Manor. Maybe she could have a journal, or one could even be found in Foxglove Manor if Aldern left it there.
I wonder how accessible these journals really are to the general public. Somehow the first journal from PF #1 seemed to imply that the Pathfinders are some kind of secret operation, or at least secret to the general public. Or did I get that wrong?
I'm glad to hear there's a promise to keep these player-friendly so I don't have to suddenly start editing them.
That's good to hear, yes. I'd have no problem editing them, since I'll be going to translate them anyway if I use them as handouts.
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Well, there's a chapter house of Pathfinders in Magnimar, so the PCs could end up visting it sometime and get to learn what organization they are (Journal in PF1), and they can get very new information from Eando's reports (Journal in PF2&maybe 3). He's sending them to Absalom, but nothing says his notes don't go through the chapter house in Magnimar for a first review/copy, and to insure safer long-distance travel using Pathfinder connections.
While I'm writing this, I'm thinking that my group is going through the last part of PF2 next week, and I'm sure what they have done in the region so far reaches the hears of the PF house. They'll be contacted to visit the chapter house (and maybe stay a day or two) to exchange tales and stories.
After all, even if the PCs don't want to join the organization or are not interrested in it, the Pathfinders will most probably be interrested in the PCs when they hear about their adventuring!
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I don't think that the informations within the journals would spoil something to the players, but I can't believe that the Pathfinder society would publish 'un-edited' journals like that of Eando. Sure, they might include some of the information into the chronicles, but not the majority of the writings in there. Imagine what a bad light Eandos journal would shed on the pathfinders. There are descriptions of criminal activities (even murder!) in there!
If I wanted to include these journals into my campaign, I would let the PCs find these somewhere. It may be a really cool tool to add flavour and spread background informations about Varisia. Maybe Kline shows up some time and demands his writings back, which might be a cool scene too. But I'd refrain from these writings being sold anywhere (maybe only by a fence or some other shady merchant...).