Just a bump to the top, and saying THANK ALL OF YOU for these games! Stole just about all of them, and I will put them to good use! I really, REALLY thank the creativity of these forums.
Matt, that's almost what I think will happen with my first session, but it's going to be a few hours, so I'm sure that it's not ALL going to be festival games, especially with six players.
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Here's one that I came up with. I know it needs to be fixed, so feedback would be helpful.
Man o’ War Tug of War
The Valdemar Family has set up a tug-of-war contest near the shipyard. Do you and four other landlubbers think they can overcome five of the biggest and strongest of the shipwrights of Sandpoint? Test your strength and mettle with four others and see if you can.
A 50 ft length of thick rope, like that used on ships, is lies stretched out down Water Street, near the shipyard. Each player pays one copper piece to try his or her luck against the shipwrights. To succeed, a team must win three out of five strength checks. The strongest member of both teams rolls the strength check for his/her team, while the teammates roll to Aid Another.
Victory against the shipwrights earns the team bragging rights for the day. The losing team falls into a large puddle of muddy water and walks away with wet clothes and wounded pride.
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To make it more like a tug-o'-war, it should probably be a certain number of successes that determines victory. Say you start with three stones in the center. The side that wins moves a stone from the center to their side. If that team wins again, then they get to move another stone onto their side. Otherwise, a stone is replaced back into the pool. First side to get all three stones is the victor.
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simply awesome work by all, my PbP players will love it. thanks for sharing!
Really good ideas everyone!!
I'm going to be starting a run for the AE AP next week, and I've been gathering and tinkering with some of the excellent fan material on these boards. One thing I noticed is that between Delthos' initial work and DracoDruid's Pixie's Kiss, that's five really good events. Interestingly, the five can be tied to the sins with remarkably little effort (The Devil Hunt for Pride, Goblin Toss for Wrath, Lighthouse Smash for Envy, Dragon Races for Greed, Pixie's Kiss for Lust)! Once I saw that, I knew I had to help round this out. I don't intend to make any of this count as sin points, but it ties the festival events to the overarching theme of the AP.
Ahaha! I was skimming the thread and I saw the Pie eating contest(I didn't really read the post properly) and thought "hey, you know what I bet I an tie the games to sins, that'll be a good place to get started!" (As in, basically, the first character to step up to a game gets a mark down, seeing as I've got to start somewhere right? If for no other reason that that's better than random if the PCs remarkably manage to not commit any sins (or they all commit the same sins...!))
Anyhow, imagine my hilariy when I got down to your post again to copy the contest to my document file and realised that is *exactly what you'd thought.* (And hilariously, we'd even thought the same way on assigning the sins for the previous games.) Great minds and all that...!
A brilliant idea all round, folks.
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Now that is funny! I'm glad someone else found the Pie Run as entertaining as I did. You might want to look at reducing the DCs, as none of my PCs actually got to the end without hurling.
As I said in my original post, I didn't actually assign sin points to the games - they just happen to correspond to the sins, and I don't see several of them as actually being sinful. "Smash the Old Light" is a fairly innocent game, as is "Hunt the Sandpoint Devil," after all. You can assign sin points if you want, but I think there's plenty of other things that the PCs will do over the course of four books that will let you know which sins are their favorites. Besides, if your PCs do what mine did, they'll just all start at the first one and visit all of them in turn.
Also, keep in mind the super secret seventh sin - if they don't choose to participate in any of the games, then they chose sloth! (As an aside, that's the sin the inquisitor in my game has inadvertently assigned himself, as he keeps sleeping in whenever he gets the chance!)
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This thread is great. Thank guys!
I'm new to pathfinder and D&D in general, but I bought the "Core Rulebook" and "Rise of the Runelords" and I am really eager to start playing.
Because I'm new, I don't feel confident enough to create my own games (and speeches). So I felt a little bit overwhelmed when I saw that the book did not present them to me. Fortunately I found this thread.
I really enjoy reading your ideas. I am definitely going to incorporate them in my adventure.
Thanks again.
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Great to hear, Steel-Rose! The message boards are a great resource for you - if you've got any questions about things that arise, don't hesitate to post.
If I might offer a piece of advice, it's this - don't rush your way through Local Heroes! Give your players some time to settle into their roles as the new heroes in town. If you do it right, Sandpoint should feel like home to them by the time they leave it. That way, when you threaten it with stone giants later, it's personal.
Welcome to the boards!
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You can't steal what's freely given, WG. The penance for using what the GMs before you have done is to come back and tell us what happened!
And welcome to the boards!
Well, the games took pretty much the whole of today's session for the PCs to work through (details in this campaign-ish log sort of thread here, for any interested in more of the specifics); but long and th short of it is they spend pretty mcuh the whole session on it. And this brings us to two whole weeks of campaign to which we have literally got as far as reading the introductory paragraph to Initial Assault...!
Thanks again, people who have contributed, we're off to a flying start and I just hope I can hold the momentum to match this part!
If I might offer a piece of advice, it's this - don't rush your way through Local Heroes! Give your players some time to settle into their roles as the new heroes in town. If you do it right, Sandpoint should feel like home to them by the time they leave it. That way, when you threaten it with stone giants later, it's personal.Welcome to the boards!
Thank you! That's a good advice.
I'm not a very creative person and improvisation is not my strenght. That's why I feel short on confidence in creating content for the campaign, and that's why I was happy to see that the community had already prepared some things that I could use. However I've been wanting to GM a campaign for years! I'm really, really, really enjoying the process, and I can't wait for the campaign to start. I'm hoping creativity will come with experience.
Still, for the time being, I don't know how to involve more the players with the locals. I would have to create some backstories for the NPCs, maybe? Or some mini-encounters related with an NPC? Is this the way, right?
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Well, the first thing I'd do is look at the traits they chose. In my game, I've got a guy who is playing a Shoanti raised by the Varisians, a cleric who worships Ragathiel (but has a strong belief in redemption, unusual amongst that faith), an elven warrior-woman descended from rich merchants who is trying to prove to her parents that she can be in charge of more than just caravan guarding, a gnome who is desperate to go seeking adventure to help his uncle's floundering locksmithy, and a human wizard who is Mayor Deverin's cousin, orphaned at an early age. They gave me the generalities of their backgrounds, and I helped them fill in the details based upon what I knew about the campaign, the world, and so on.
I'm also not the greatest improvisational GM. There are some people who can run stuff right out of thin air, and I have the greatest of respect for them, but I don't have that ability. I need to at least sit down and type up some notes on what those PCs encounter. From there, I set these things up for them to play around with, and let things happen from there. For instance, let's take the Shoanti. He's playing an inquisitor of Abadar, and took the Family Ties background. He's calling himself a bounty hunter, and ended up stuck in Sandpoint while his mentor disappeared, looking into something or another.
Well, right after the events of the Swallowtail Festival, I looked at what's going on with that background. He'd been raised by the Sczarni, and his player agreed that prior to his conversion to Abadar's faith, he did some pretty bad things for the crime lord. So here's the part where I start coming up with the plot. It's all about thinking about what this particular NPC would do. Jubrayl hears that that Shoanti he adopted is back in town, and has saved the city from goblins. They're calling him and these other four heroes. Jubrayl is skeptical. He used to know where the Shoanti stood on things, but now he's gone and found religion. That always screws a man up, so he needs to know where his loyalties truly lie. He has a talk with the Shoanti, and the Shoanti tells him that there are things he won't be able to tolerate any longer. This doesn't make Jubrayl happy, naturally, so I figure he needs to find out just how far the Shoanti's new priorities go. I write up a pair of encounters in the marketplace that are little more than entrapment shows for the inquisitor - one where a young Varisian girl cuts the purse of a rude merchant, and another where two men are shaking down a third in an alleyway. Everyone in these scenes - the girl, the merchant, all three men - are Sczarni, and the Shoanti's reactions to these scenes will tell Jubrayl where that moral limit exists.
Another one: the elven fighter took Giant Slayer as a trait. Great choice later down the line, but by the AP, rather useless right now. So I decide to write up an additional encounter while they're hunting boars in the Tickwood. They come across a shepherd whose flock has been attacked, and they agree to find out what killed the sheep. Turns out it was a pair of ogrekin.
The traits are your friend, and so are your character's backgrounds. This is just how I write and create my stories - as you play, you'll find tips and tricks as well. I like to look at writing these "off-the-rails" bits as pulling from two different sides. On one hand you have the characters and their backgrounds. On the other side, you have the NPCs and theirs. The key is to pull the bits of both together that fit, as well as showing off pieces of the town that you really want to showcase that week. Got a hankering to do something with the Theater? Then have Cyrdak take an interest in them. Care to show how scummy the Scarnettis are? I had the elf walk into the Consortium office while the Scarnetti and the paladin of Abadar were arguing, led in by the paladin's sister. The PCs should be made aware as much as possible that there's all these competing things going on in Sandpoint, so much so that there's no way they'd be able to find out about everything. That way, once they find out that an attack upon that city is imminent, they'll drop whatever they're doing and get back as fast as possible.
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A rather fun twist I came up with had to deal with a spontaneous whim concerning a player having the Merchant Family Trait. I decided the family he was associated with? The Scarnettis. He's the bastard son of Alamon, and Titus' half-brother (though a bit younger at 27 years of age). They hate each other. The Scarnettis talk down their nose at him and call him a "minor businessman" and he uses everything he knows from both his whore mother's business dealings and what he learned from the Scarnettis to get the best deals... and at the same time work toward screwing over the Scarnettis.
Likewise, due to the background of another character I ended up including an orcish woman living in town, married to a human; they're happily married. Lucian is a little uncomfortable with the rage that builds in him (Barbarian) and loves to read - in fact, he's a Thassilonian scholar and is fairly bright (the player rolled well with stats and used Intelligence as her second-highest stat).
So have fun with these traits. Also, feel free to use the Ultimate Campaign character generation charts (available on the PRD) as well to help you out in case you're unsure of where to go.
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I made a few games to get my players used to using different parts of their character sheets and understanding the use of different die. Additionally it was a good chance to introduce members of the town to them.
Church: Father Zantus
Improve Acting
Players need to tell jokes/act out a scene and roll to see how well it plays out with the audience. Players only game.
First stage: Need to get a d20 + either CHA, WIS or INT mod roll of 10 or higher.
Second stage: Another d20 but needs a 15 or higher to reach next stage.
Third stage: The two players with the highest cumulative rolls so far have to act out a short scene (real life) and the eliminated players vote on the best.
1st Prize: Moderate healing potion
2nd Prize: Light cure potion
3rd Prize: Holy water
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Red Dog Smithy: Das Korvutt
Dummy Smash!
Include npc players to up the odds, in my case I included an npc who would be giving the players multiple side quests later.
11 monster cutouts are placed around an arena and players must destroy as many as possible using melee/ranged attacks to earn prizes. 10 low level monsters (AC10 5hp) are worth 5 points but the single giant ogre (AC15 20hp) is worth 20 points!
Vouchers redeemable at the Red Dog Smithy and even include +1 items in the future.
1st Prize: 50% off voucher
2nd Prize: 25% off voucher
3rd Prize: 10% off voucher
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Rusty Dragon: Amieko Kaijistu
Spicy food eating contest
Include npc contestants
Waiters will quickly bring out plates of Amieko's famous spicy curry and remove them all at regular intervals. Players have to roll 3d6 and add either their will save or fort saves to the totals. For every 6 points they get, is one bowl of curry they manage to finish in total, the player with the most bowls of curry finished by round three wins!
Also at the end make them all roll a DC14 fort save or throw up.
1st prize: Custom masterwork weapon made for player in 2 days time.
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Vinder's General Store: Venn Vinder
Junk stacking contest
Include npc contestants
Players have to stack random junk as high as they can and attempt to make the highest tower possible. The player to build a tower 50 inches high wins.
Players play one at a time and roll 2d6 with each 1 point representing 1 inch of height gained. Players have to push their luck or lock in their progress because if they get a 1 roll on a single dice, their current amount of work crashes down and is lost, if they roll two 1 results, their whole tower collapses and they start again.
The trick is for players to roll their 2d6, gather points and knowing when to stop to "balance their tower" locking in their progress. Trying to be too greedy can result in their work being wasted unless they know when to lock in their progress.
1st Prize: Ioun torch
2nd Prize: Healing kit
3rd Prize: 4 rations
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Pixie's Kitten: Madame Kaye Tesarani
Word making
Randomly grab letters from your scrabble or upwords box and place them in front of the players, give them 5 minutes to make as many words as possible
1st Prize: 1 month of freebies at the brothel
2nd Prize: Disguise Kit
3rd Prize: Manacles
Deadalready, I love these!
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Since almost every game I'm using is from this thread, I thought I'd share the one I created in my head for use when I start Burnt Offerings this weekend.
Uses an original NPC, not sure how you feel about that. My characters (and players) actually contain more females than males, so I needed an extra male NPC to... cause complications.
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Topple the Hammer!
Feldon Ut, Das Korvut's apprentice at Red Dog smithy, is a 6'4" tall manboy, presumably of Ulfen descent, of about 19 years of age. Feldon is not the brightest, but quite gifted physically (str 18). Das boasts that Feldon is the strongest man in Sandpoint (which may be true), and that's the primary reason he keeps him on, because sometimes he needs large piles of metal moved around. Feldon is a better smith than Das gives him credit for, but Das figures it's good for the boy to be humble. Das hosts this event outside the smithy. The fee is 2sp to arm-wrestle Feldon. Das is curt to customers, but generally polite, unless they gloat about winning or give him any lip, at which point he unleashes his trademark rage. Das is constantly insulting Feldon, especially on the rare occasions that Feldon loses.
Feldon is polite, if somewhat vain (and dumb). He thinks very highly of himself, aside from believing (as Das constantly tells him) he is lackluster at smithing. If asked why he puts up with Das, Feldon says there is no greater smith master to learn from, and his body was obviously made for the smithing profession... and the ladies.
The game is named as such because Feldon has a crude tattoo of a smithing hammer on the inside of his right forearm, his smithing (and arm-wrestling) arm.
Feldon Ut
Str 18, Dex 11, Con 14, Int 9, Wis 8, Cha 14
The arm wrestling match starts at neutral. Contestants roll oppossed strength checks, the winner moves to "advantage." Contestants roll oppossed strength checks again. if the person with the advantage wins the check, they win the match. if they lose the check, the contestants go back to neutral. rolls continue until somebody wins. Winning one match will get you 5sp and bragging rights. winning best 2-out-of-3 matches with Feldon will get you a free armor repair at the smithy.
Feldon is distractable, especially by a lady, be it an opponent or a spectator who is trying to distract him. DC 15 (female) diplomacy, DC 20 (male) diplomacy, or dc 20 (either) intimidate. Other methods of distractions (prestidigitation, illusions, etc) at DM's discretion. distraction causes loss of +4 str bonus on his roll that round.
If a Lady pays to compete, Feldon will politely decline. If she insists, he will "take it easy" on her, foregoing his +4 str bonus on his rolls. If she beats him, he will congratulate her and ask for a rematch, which he will pay for. he will not take it easy on her in the rematch.
If a PC makes a large wager with Das (more than 2gp) on the result an arm-wrestling match, there is a 50% chance Feldon will throw the match, foregoing his +4 str advantage like above. Das is of course angered by this, but does not suspect Feldon is doing it purposefully.
Dot
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@IrishRenegade: Short answer: depends on your PCs.
Longer answer: my guess would be that the dockworkers have either Str 13 or 14, with their anchor having Str 16. Each round would have both the PCs and the NPCs assisting the anchor's Strength check. That would range for a +3 to a +11, with a +7 being average for the dockworkers. The PCs probably have someone similarly strong in their party (if not moreso), and will probably top out with a +4 to a +12, with +8 being average. I'd give the party an edge, though - if they're mostly finesse fighters, then they're up against actual shipwrights, rather than dockworkers, and adjust the numbers downwards. If they're all beatsticks, then adjust them upwards. In short, whatever is most fun for them!
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Dunk The Kitty Booth
An adult themed Festival game put on by Kaye Tesarani and the girls at the Pixie's Kitten.
This is a fair standard Dunk Booth are popular at carnivals, made possible here by the fine glassworks in town.
The Dunk the kitty booth consists of a large tank of water, over which a seat is suspended. To the right of the tank is a target. By striking a target with a bean bag, the seat will tip or fall into the tank of water, thus "dunking" whoever is sitting on the seat. The target is AC 16, hitting the target hard enough to dunk the person sitting in the chair is a DC: 5 Strength check.
During the day, one of the girls from the Kitten with basic cat makeup, wire cat ears and a black shirt and skirt will work shifts sitting in the chair. Alternately other town folk, such as Sheriff Hemlock (or whoever else may amuse your players) will take a turn on the dunk booth. Typically players get three bean bags (with painted faeries on them) to throw at the target for 2cp. If player hits the target on the first try, they will be offered the chance to "help the kitty out of the water" which the grateful "kitty" usually rewards their helper out with a peck on the cheek.
After dark, feel free to make this a bit more "adult" weather its Jass wearing a thin white shirt, or a mystery dunk a curtain conceals the seat and the player cannot see who he is dunking until they drop naked into the tank.
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I made up a handout for the festival's vendors and games for a game I run, using a combination of the suggestions posted here and the info provided in the entries for Sandpoint. Figured this would be a good place to share it in case others would like to use it. Enjoy~
http://pastebin.com/bu948iNd
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I made up a handout for the festival's vendors and games for a game I run, using a combination of the suggestions posted here and the info provided in the entries for Sandpoint. Figured this would be a good place to share it in case others would like to use it. Enjoy~
> LINKIFIED
Seeing this has risen out of the grave (thread necromancers!) I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who contributed to this. I'm going to be running a second RotRL campaign with a fairly new player and these games provide a neat and enjoyable way to get into the swing of the game mechanics. And to be introduced to Sandpoint and this world. :)
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Running my first Pathfinder Campaign next weekend, RotRLs! This was very helpful, thanks! Also, there is a Youtube video, some players recorded the whole campaign. Lookup Rise of The Runelords on Youtube, you'll see it. Pretty amusing in parts.
I've run the Swallowtail festival 4 times now, and these games are usually a hit. My most recent group literally spent the whole first session on them and are still going strong. There's no indication they will lose interest anytime soon. ^_^
Wow I don't get around to the forums much anymore, but I'm happy to see so many people still using these and coming up with more events. I've run the AP twice now. One time to the end. In the first running, that only made it half way through book 2, my son and his friend had lots of fun with them. In my second run through, my group wasn't interested in them in the slightest. Much to my frustration, they actually decided to make some money on their own and give guided tours of Sandpoint, telling the stories of the Late Unpleasantness and pointing out where the various murders occured.