My group are running the first three APs, with three of us taking turns in the GM chair and finishing a book before moving on to the next AP :) So far, we've finished RL1 and CT1, and nearly finished SD1.
For Runelords, our GM asked that we cover the four bases (main melee, healer, caster and rogue) but made no limits on race choices or how we covered those bases. The fighter/cleric started with a half-level in each of her classes, and finished them to both first at the first leveling. This was done to allow the player to meet the image she had of the character.
In Crimson Throne, where I am the GM, I again wanted to be sure the bases were covered, and did limit race choice a bit, since I wanted the characters to be of the city and have the need/desire to protect their home. I was surprised that the players came up with three half-elves, but each character the fact that a parent wasn't human was integral to how they either wound up in Lamm's clutches or was important to another facet of their background.
In Second Darkness, two of the humans were gimmes from their backgrounds (one is the Garundi fighter, the other the Linnorm Kingdom Viking Bard <G>). The gnome and half-orc were integral to the story/background the players devised. The last human was originally going to be a tiefling, until we found the bloodlines in UA, the GM approved the use of it, and it allowed the player to have the character she was trying to create with much less shoe-horning. (And the player was then surprised when she realized she gained the human extra feats and other things by the change!)
All three GMs have had to do some tweaking of the APs, but not too much, and haven't had many difficulties with the class/race mixes chosen.
Here are our three parties:
Runelords
Human Male (Shoanti) Fighter 1/Ranger 4
Dwarven Female Fighter 1/Cleric of Sarenrae 4
Half-Elf Female Rogue 5
Half-Elf Female Sorceress 5
and joining us for the next book Human Female (Shoanti) Barbarian 5
Crimson Throne
Human Male Wizard 4
Half-Elf Female Cleric of Shelyn 4
Half-Elf Male Ranger 4 (Sable Company Marine)
Half-Elf Female Rogue 4
and joining us for the next book Human Female Paladin
Second Darkness (still in this one)
Human Female Fighter 3
Human Female Cleric of Desna 1/Druid 1/Bloodline (from UA) 1
Human Male Bard 3
Half-Orc Male Rogue 3
Gnome Male Sorcerer 3
I've been running a campaign using parts of RotRL and Conquest of Bloodsworn Vale for about a year and a half now. I use my own setting, which has some non-traditional races, although demographically, my setting is about 65% Humans, with 15% Dwarves, 15% Elves, and 5% everything else. The available races are Human, Giant (From Monte Cook's Arcana Evolved), and homebrew versions of Elves, Dwarves, Gnomes, and Orcs, as well as a new race, the Tanu.
Of the seven player characters in the campaign, we have had one human PC, and he left after the first adventure. Although several PCs have left for short periods, the stable configuration of the party has been 1 Elf, 1 Orc, 1 Gnome, 2 Giants, and 1 Tanu. Virtually every NPC they have interacted with has been a Human or Dwarf, but there are none in the party. When running Conquest of Bloodsworn Vale, I made a point to emphasize the fact that the party were almost the only non-humans living in the town, which lead to the party jokingly deciding their group was "The Fort Thorn Minority Association".
Although the racial make-up is pretty non-traditional, their classes stick pretty close to the four basic classes, although since I am using the Arcana Evolved classes, they have odd names. Essentially though, the party consists of two melee fighters, a dedicated healer, a mage, a skill monkey, and the classic elven fighter/mage.
-C. Robert Brown
|
As a DM I HATE players playing humans... if I wanted human players I would LARP or play D20 modern (I know this is an unfair stereotype of these games, but it's how I feel) . I find that it makes many role players, especially beginners, use more OOC knowledge and goof off more than non-human parties, and there are less roleplaying opportunities when the lvl 20 PCs are able to blend in with the lvl 1 commoners. I went as far as to ban humans in college for anyone having less than 2 years experience roleplaying.
just my 2cp
My players always vote on whether or not to play a theme party. One option that's always available is that they make whatever they want, but so far that hasn't shown its face in a Paizo AP.
In RotRL they're playing giantkin goblins, which meant that the first chapter was almost completely reversed.
In CotCT they're playing human nobles of Korvosa. They're not just part of the primary demographic group, they're sitting on top of it. :)
We haven't started Second Darkness yet. (I'm guessing that's a month or two away.) The two options getting the most noise right now are the "elf secret agent" option and the all-Shoanti party.
In LoF they're playing undead humans. I went with Gamer Girrl's suggestion and they're all from Onyx Hall.
ETA: The iconics all show up as mercenaries in my Curse of the Crimson Throne game. The nobles don't always like getting their hands dirty, so they can hire NPCs to do the jobs for them. I hand the players the character sheets for the iconics and they carry on playing.
The kinds of undead I allowed in LoF were: dread skeleton (from the Advanced Bestiary), dread zombie (AB), festrog (from Hungry Are the Dead), huecuva (from Tome of Horrors Revised), Osirion mummy (from Entombed with the Pharaohs), and wight. I changed them into templates, ditched the level adjustment (because my players are getting sick of that), and assigned racial hit dice. (They're starting without any class levels.)
The reason I didn't include vampires is two-fold: 1) when some people can fly and others can't then some people just get left behind a lot, and 2) when some people can go out in daylight and others can't them some people just get left behind a lot. This is why I omitted all the flying and incorporeal undead.
|
I for one love all of the iconics and opened them up to my players for use for out upcoming Runelords game. One was interested in them enough that he's playing a 1st level Valeros.
It's the second time I've let a player run a pre-gen iconic for a Paizo game. Generally, I give them a rough outline of the character's personality as described by Paizo, and let them run with it. The part I like is that my players don't follow the level progression as set out by Paizo, but make their own decisions and really make their version of the iconic their own creation. For example, this version of Valeros grew up in Galduria and is planning on taking the Giant-Killer prestige class (from Silver Marches) later on. I hinted that their would be giants.
As for racial demographics, my group usually end up with an even mix of humans and non-humans. The group getting ready for Runelords consists of:
Male human Fighter (Valeros)
Male half-orc Cleric of Desna
Female human Rogue
and one undecided. Probably an arcane caster. Toying between a dwarf wizard and an elf sorcerer heading for arcane archer.
Robert, you have been given a non-human party through circumstance and I like how he hasn't let that affect the AP and side adventures as written. Please don't think me racist (or classist) by any stretch but I sometimes find that by having a non-human party tends to have me change certain aspects of a campaign (much like the multiple intros from the Temple of Elemental Evil CRPG), so I find I am relating the game to suit the player's class and race selection in an effort to make them care about the plot. This can be sometimes a bit of a task.
To be entirely honest, I ended up changing a lot anyway because I didn't intend originally to run RotRL for this campaign. My PCs started off at 4th level. Two of them had worked out a backstory involving the tanu character being an amnesiac who was taken in by an orc tribe, and the orc cleric being his "blood brother". The other three were a Giant with a fascination for clockworks and technology, an urbane human wizard, and a deccadent thrillseeking elf. My solution was to put the civilized people on an airship, and have the goblins of Thistletop shoot it down in the forest, which drew the attention of the "tribal" characters. Finding a common enemy in the goblins, they headed to Thistletop to bust some heads.
So originally, I just wanted to use Thistletop and Paizo's take on Goblins in this homebrew campaign,but then the PCs decided to jump onto the RotRL railroad...
Beware RotRL spoilers!
Despite this, I have continued to run the campaign I originally intended to. The PCs are up to their necks in divine shenanigans, trying to resurrect the dead god of nature (which the orc worships, and the tanu is a reincarnation of) and trying to prevent various other evil gods from coming back, or new evil people ascending. Taking a page from the editorials detailing Karzoug's origins in IIRC, James Jacobs' campaign, my version of Karzoug is aiming to obtain godhood himself, powered by the sinful souls of others and the fealty of a conquered population. As it happens, the tanu PC has amnesia because he, as a 20th level monk, fought Karzoug one-on-one and had his divine essence blasted out of his soul, level draining him in the process. Now the divine essence has taken on the form of a heron, and the amnesiac tanu has taken him as his totem animal companion, not realizing the connection he feels with the bird is much more personal.
Anyways, I've rambled enough about this game, and I fear I have drifted off topic.
-C. Robert Brown
|
Contributor
|
I'm running three Pathfinder play-by-post games on RoleplayMarket.com.
There wasn't any discussion about the iconics when the group gathered, since most of the group members had never played or seen any Pathfinder stuff before.
For the first two campaigns, I'm allowing players to use any published book, which has already resulted in some interesting combinations.
Things changed a bit earlier on, but they've settled finally settled into the following:
Rise of the Runelords AP: (3.5E d20 rules)
Male Half-elf (Chelaxian) Druid 1
Male Human (Varisian) Rogue 1
Male Human (Chelaxian) Hexblade 1
Male Human (Chelaxian) Cleric (Cayden Cailean) 1
Male Half-elf (Varisian) Scout 1
Male Human (Shoanti) Spirit Shaman 1
Male Elf Wizard (Conjurer) 1 (an albino elf and aspiring Warmage)
Scions of Golarion: (Darkmoon Vale Module series, using 3.5E d20 rules)
Male Elf racial paragon 1/wizard 1
Male Human duskblade 2
Male Elf ranger 2
Male Azurin cleric (philosophy venerating both Sarenrae and Desna) 2
Male Deep Halfling Rogue 2
Female Elf Wizard (Enchanter) 2 (not currently with the group, due to player absence)
Pathfinder: Epoch Rising (home-brew campaign using Pathfinder RPG Rules, initially set in Andoran)
Male Human Rogue 1
Male Elf Ranger 1
Male Elf Wizard 1
Male Dwarf cleric (Torag) 1 - NPC
Male Halfling Wizard 1
Male Human Fighter 1
|
The Iconics are great for new players to pick up and play with just a brief description of the rules. My RotRL AP groups consists of my regular home group, they've been playing D&D for years, and create their own characters. However my second group consists of work colleagues, all new to the game, and they're each playing one of the Iconics in CotCT.
Someone on the boards here also converted the Iconics to Pathfinder Society organised play rules, and I've printed those out and bring them along to conventions whenever I'm running games. There are always players who turn up on the day who have never played Pathfinder before, and having the Iconics to hand out has been very useful. Some play them as written, others change the name (the Pathfinder campaign setting hardcover is a great place to look up character names) and swap out a weapon or feat. Once you've past first level, it's no-longer a pre-gen, as you make your own choices beyond that.
I'm planning on starting RotRL when summer break rolls around, and there have been a few discussions about race/class setups, though nothing solid yet. So some of this is an extrapolation from non-AP stuff, if that matters.
One player prefers human just in general. Out of five characters, I think, one was an elf. Rest were human. I have no doubt that it'll be similar for RotRL. Interestingly, he's also almost always the cleric and usually volunteers up front. Probably comes from our illustrious history of online gaming and the fact he's just used to being shoehorned into it.
With another player, it's always either human or half-elf - generally possessing a dispassionate and sarcastic demeanor for one reason or another. Why I'm not sure. It's strange because previously I thought he shared my distaste for elves. He trends towards offensive or support arcane spellcasters.
The other two players are generally all over the place, selecting races on a whim (which is how I roll as well on the occasions I get to play). One in particular likes to be outside the box - he's played a centaur, an 'artificially create life-form' who was sort of an uber-familiar for the wizard player (the stats were as human, but the flavor was different), and has plans for a kenku and another human-in-stats only who's actually a polymorphed/power-stripped dragon. These are also the guys who fill the non-caster roles, generally. I think they've been all the 'martial' classes excepting the paladin, probably because all my players trend towards chaotic or neutral on that axis.
As far as what's likely to get in RotRL;
A female human monk who actually has backstory written
One character is thinking about bard; probably human as well.
Aforementioned kenku player as a cleric (god undecided; I need to get around to beating him upside the head with the campaign setting)
And finally a dragon-blooded sorcerer/fighter/dragon disciple for a guy who wants to run that build.
Definitely a non-standard party, but I think I'm up to it for the most part. And if they wind up needing a pure arcane spellcaster, that finally gives me a chance to play a wizard, even if it is a DMPC.
tl;dr version:
My demographics seem to be skewed slightly in favor of humans, with the healer routinely being the first character called, oddly enough.
|
For RotRL, my party consisted of Humans, Elves, a Dwarf, a Half-Elf, Halflings, Gnomes, and a Half-Orc; and thru the reincarnation spell, a Tiefling, Gnolls, and a Goblin.
So far in SD we have:
Male Human Paladin
Female Human Cleric
Female Human Sorcerer
Male Elf Cleric - RIP
Male Elf Ranger
Male Halfling Druid
Female Dwarf Rogue
Male Human Monk - Replaced the Elf Cleric
Well I'm running Second Darkness whenever we can get the group together, and the party mix has been vastly varied, but one thing they seem to refuse to do is play healers. So finally in Armeggedon Echo we got a Druid, but before that it was a rogue with a cure light wand and use magic device. My overall spread so far was:
Elf Rogue, Human Monk, Human Fighter, Human Barbarian, Human Wizard
following that group they added a Human Bard who was replaced by a half-orc fighter, who was replaced by a half-orc fighter/druid, who was replaced by a human dragon shaman, who is being replaced by his new character a paladin/warpriest, the Wizard was replaced by a dwarf druid named Borgo the Bear (known as such for his constant use of bear form... he has the class varients from PH2, shapechanging druid and the fast healing one both and is a very strong character). The elf rogue and human monk have yet to make new characters, although the rogue's player is talking necromancer :P
Oh and we had a human fighter added halfway through and a elf warmage who was in the same session he joined replaced with a human barbarian/frenzied berserker for the session...
|
Currently I am running my own homebrew campaign which I have just transitioned from 3.5 to PF. I do incorporate a lot of PF material other than just the rules:
For my desert region I have adapted Legion of Fire (and once I get my hands on it, most likely Osirion).
I'm using the traits rules and have adapted the traits from all the products I have so far into my own world.
And I'm looking over the rest of the material to see what I want to incorporate.
[Edit] I include material from a wide range of sources in my campaign world:
AD&D (1st and 2nd editions, yup, I adapt a lot modules, lol),Pathfinder, Forgotten Realms, 4E, Mythic Vistas, Arduin Grimoire, Greyhawk, Eberron, Al-Qadim, most of the WotC books, no psionics (even with the 3.5 rules I still don't like psionics) Legend of the Five Rings, 2nd Edition Historic Series (Vikings, Celts, Rome), Midnight Campaign Setting - pretty much if I see something I like, it goes in.
Due to world history there are two Elf subraces: Dragon Elves and Shadow Elves. Dragon Elves actually being the campaign bad guys with the help of gnolls after having turned to Tiamat and having started the 'Dragon Wars.' Humans do make up the majority of the people in the campaign world, something to do with breeding like rabbits compared to the other races, but due displacement becasue of the wars, in the campaign starting area the other races are represented in uncommonly high numbers. [/Edit]
As far as the Iconics, they rock =) I think they are really useful for a group just starting or learning the rules, however (as with some other folks that have posted) my gaming group consists of individuals who have all played quite some time (over twenty years for a couple of us) and they've all made their own characters.
So far we have (and have had, since I don't reward idiocy on the player's part, lol)
Original party:
Half-Elf Swashbuckler
Elf (Shadow) Druid
Dwarf Rogue
Human Sorcerer
Human Cleric
Since then the party make-up has change quite a bit:
When the rogue died (due to not checking for traps when he should have), he was replaced by a Goliath Barbarian who sacrificed himself so that the rest of the party could escape a horde of gnolls, who in turn was replaced by a Human Ranger - who in turn was replaced by a Human Swordsage after he decided to avenge the death of the Cleric who died at the hands of an 8th level commoner with a 19 Str, proficieny in the scythe and who critted both the Cleric and the Ranger (this d20 has since been semi-retired as I've been getting way too many crits with it, lol). The Cleric was replaced by an Elven Ranger.
And the Sorcerer has been replaced by another Human Sorcerer after an unfortunate encounter with a displacer beast and not running from it.
So the current Party make-up is:
Half-Elf Swashbuckler
Elf (Shadow) Druid
Elf (Shadow) Ranger
Human Swordsage
Human Sorcerer
Edited for Spelling andadding more stuff =)
Hrmm... lets see... here is what my group has played since I have been with them.
Shackled City AP
----------------
Human Paladin/Grey Guard - St. Cuthbert
Human Rogue/Fighter
Elf Wizard
Elf Sorcerer
Human Cleric - St. Cuthbert
Thieves World / Paizo Modules (I was a player)
(Anything other than human was discouraged... then they were all over in the modules... go figure)
-----------------------------
Human Bard
Human Psionicist (summoner thing)
Human Cleric
Human Rogue
Rise of the Runelords
---------------------
Human (Varisian) Druid
Human (Azlanti) Soulblade
Human (Shoanti) Barbarian/Ranger
Halfling Kineticist
So I would say that we are pretty heavily human for the most part.
Sean Mahoney