Help: Top-ten PDFs for a non-gamer Pathfinder fan

[Boathar Kaay]

I want to purchase about $200 in Pathfinder products, now that Paizo announced the 35% discount on PDF files. The problem is that almost all of the books and adventures have four or five stars, so it´s realy hard to decide which ones to buy.

I can rarely play (once a month if I´m lucky) so I don´t want to be disapointed purchasing a book with tons of statistics or new spells or PrCs (I´m looking at you WotC). I love the Adventure Paths (already own RotRL and CotCT), but mostly because I´ve read them like novels.

So, any sugestions (like a top-ten) on which modules/chronicles/companions/scenarios are THE MOST FUN, FROM A READER'S PERSPECTIVE?

Thanks for your help

[Dark_Mistress]

Other than the map packs, the Chronicles and Companions are the most fluff heavy. So i would start with them and buy the ones that most interest you. i would start with the Campaign book and go from their. All of them are fluff heavy and well written IMHO.

If you plan to spend 200 that should let you buy all those and then start on the next AP path. So you should be able to net just about everything other than the adventures if you want to.

[flash_cxxi]

1) Chronicles: Campaign Setting
Definately no questions asked number one thing you need.

The rest in no particular order:
Chronicles: Gods & Magic (Detailed Info on all the Gods)
Chronicles: Classic Monsters Revisited (Excellent resource for a Golarion take on some familiar faces)
Chronicles: Dragons Revisited (See above)
Chronicles: Into the Darklands (Golarion's answer to the Underdark is a scary place. Grab this and be prepared!)
Companion: Guide to Elves (Nice background info on Golarion's Elves)
Companion: Osirion, Land of the Pharaohs (I'm a sucker for Egyptian themed stuff, but it's a brilliant resource)
Companion: Second Darkness Player's Guide (Lots of Extra Info not necasarrily about the AP)
Companion: Legacy of Fire Player's Guide (See above)
(Not quite a top 10, but if I had to go 1 more I'd probably go with Chronicles: Guide to Absalom)

Other than that, any of the Second Darkness and/or Legacy of Fire APs are also a good pick as thay contain lots of Setting info as well as the Adventures.

[Disenchanter]

Flash_cxxi has a good list there.

I'd suggest the Guide to Korvosa as well.
And I'd lean more towards Legacy of Fire over Second Darkness... But since it isn't fully available yet...

[flash_cxxi]

Disenchanter wrote:

flash_cxxi has a good list there.

=D Thanx!

Disenchanter wrote:

I'd suggest the Guide to Korvosa as well.

I was thinking this as well as the Guide to Darkmoon Vale, but the Guides are pretty specific and so I went with Absalom 'cause it's "THE" City of Golarion.

Disenchanter wrote:

And I'd lean more towards Legacy of Fire over Second Darkness... But since it isn't fully available yet...

I totally agree.

Addendum:
And GOD! How bad was my spelling! I can't believe I didn't do a read through before posting that. :(

[Wolf Munroe]

I had a fairly lengthy post written up about modules I liked but I clicked "preview" and it went away.

Anyway, in short:

I recommend U2: Hangman's Noose and E2: Blood of Dragonscar, as well as D4: Hungry Are the Dead. All three have to do with undead. Hangman's Noose is a ghost story set in an abandoned court house and the players have to solve the ghost's riddle if they hope to escape alive. Blood of Dragonscar is a high-level adventure in Taldor where the party has to deal with both undead and a red dragon, and Hungry are the Dead is about zombies attacking Falcon's Hollow (or at least that's the set-up).

I haven't read the modules that precede Hungry Are The Dead but I've bought them and just haven't gotten to it yet. Hungry Are The Dead is preceded by D0: Hollow's Last Hope (A free download!), D1: Crown of the Kobold King, and D1.5: Revenge of the Kobold King (another free download!). I'd say considering that two of those PDFs are free, they're worth picking up and reading as s set for the price.

In the Chronicles line, I'd recommend the Pathfinder Campaign Setting and Classic Monsters Revisited first, followed by Gods & Magic and Dragons Revisited. I'm not a big fan of dragons but I found myself reading most of Dragons Revisited when I first took it out of the box.

I think of the three published adventure paths, my favorite to read was Curse of the Crimson Throne. I liked the beginning and end of RotRL, but the part in the middle with giants dragged a little for me. I didn't get into Second Darkness as much as the other two, but maybe that's because it was the first one I actually got as part of a subscription and I couldn't read through it the same way, or it may just be because I'm not a big fan of drow.

[klofft]

This is a useful thread. I do get to play, but I get to read a lot more than I'll ever get to play, so this is very helpful. Thanks!

[Gamer Girrl]

I'd start with any and all that intrigue you with the Chronicles line, then move into the Companions for a good round out of fluff and crunch on the world. All of the APs have some really good stuff to read at the end of the adventure, and I know from personal experience that I just like reading Crimson Throne and Legacy of Fire for fun, as well as being the GM for them :)

If in your purchasing you can afford a swath of the APs, I'd actually recommend starting with Runelords, and getting as many as you can, for the background world information, as well as the Pathfinder Journals -- good fiction that also brings you into the world in glorious snapshots of information.

[Mikaze]

Repeating many of the suggestions made already, though I would personally put Curse of the Crimson Throne AP volumes in place of Second Darkness, but that's just my tastes bleeding through.

If you only get one AP volume though, and if you enjoy reading "sandboxes", the first volume of Rise of the Runelords and its detailing of the town of Sandpoint would be a great read. It also has an article on the old Thassilonian Empire, IIRC.

[KaeYoss]

About crunch/fluff ratio and product line:

Pathfinder Modules: Well, those are adventure modules, and as far as I know, they don't contain much (if anything) beyond the adventure itself, so it's probably the least useful if you won't play it. (Unless you want to follow the story)

Pathfinder Adventure Paths: The first half of the book are probably a lot like the Modules above (with the possible exception that you'll get a better story out of it, since they're linked and all that), but the other half is extra articles about the Pathfinder Chronicles campaign world, usually something useful to those who run the module (regional information about the region the adventure plays in, a detailed write-up of one of the deities involved, a closer look at a race). And there's even serialised, short fiction. Not much, but what is there is usually quite good.

Pathfinder Companions: They're a mix of setting information and extra rules content. Probably something like 50/50. You'll get a bunch of feats that fit the them, maybe some spells, usually a PrC, as well as character traits. Still, it's not just rules - you do get to read about the matter at hand.

The Campaign Setting: Though this is a Pathfinder Chronicles Product, It's unique in that it has more rules content than other Chronicles stuff. But even the amount that's there isn't that much. Something like 10%, if you ask me. Most of it really is setting information. Good read for those wanting to learn more about the campaign world.

Pathfinder Chronicles: Those are your best bet for getting fluff! Very little rules content - I'd say no more than 5%. The X Revisited books (Classic Monsters Revisited, Dragons Revisited) do have a sample stat block for each of the critters in there, and there are a handfull of new feats and the like, but other than that it's flavour, flavour, flavour.

[Wolf Munroe]

He mentioned he already has RotRL and CotCT. I only mentioned my views on them since we had both read them and I thought it might give some insight into my other opinions I had posted above.

As for the Pathfinder Modules, they are primarily the adventure itself. They usually have a two-page spread at the back for a new monster introduced in the story as well.

I actually like to read the modules a bit more than the APs because they're more self-contained. When I get to looking at the APs, the first place I turn is the bestiary to see what new monsters I get, then I kind of read backwards to the main AP story. With Legacy of Fire, I'm actually reading the journal entries or what they're called, the story by Elaine Cunningham. I didn't read the ones that ran through AP 1-18 because I started in the middle and bought the books out of order but I may come back to that.

[Boathar Kaay]

Thanks a lot!
I see that the prefered product lines are the AP and the Chronicles. I´m going to buy SD , LoF, Gods and Magic, Elves of Golarion and the two Revisited books.

I have still one more question for all of you?

Does anyone has read/played the Society Scenarios? Nobody talked about them.

Are they like mini-modules or what?

[Gamer Girrl]

Jared Bobadilla wrote:

Thanks a lot!

I see that the prefered product lines are the AP and the Chronicles. I´m going to buy SD , LoF, Gods and Magic, Elves of Golarion and the two Revisited books.

I have still one more question for all of you?

Does anyone has read/played the Society Scenarios? Nobody talked about them.

Are they like mini-modules or what?

I haven't gotten into them, don't have the time with my gaming group. However, from what I have read, these are designed for convention style play, usually 4 hours, like any tourny or the old RPGA (been last Strategicon I went to was back in 2000, so not sure what all has changed).

[flash_cxxi]

Jared Bobadilla wrote:

Does anyone has read/played the Society Scenarios? Nobody talked about them.

Are they like mini-modules or what?

Yep, that's pretty much exactly what they are.

Probably not worth it from a fluff perspective and they definately contain no new crunch.

[Epic Meepo]

Jared Bobadilla wrote:

Are they like mini-modules or what?

I grabbed a few of those. Each one is a short module. Useful if you want something quick to run for your friends, but probably not worth it if you are only interested in reading about the campaign setting and the epic plots that take place there.

[Mairkurion {tm}]

Your decision may already be made, but here's my two cp, just in case. Though I like all the adventures paths, CotCT and LoF (even unfinished) are my favorites so far. But how can you go wrong?