Hi all,
I will be running our first PFRPG campaign beginning next month and I can't decide which adventure path to use. I have the first book of both adventure paths but I was hoping to get advice from people that have played Rise of the Runelords and the beginning of Council of Thieves.
Any insight you can provide to support your opinion would be greatly appreciated.
My group is comprised of 8 adult players who all have extensive experience playing 3.5. Half the group first played PFRPG at Gen Con 09 and have since purchased the core book and begun to integrate the PFRPG ruleset into our current 3.5 Ptolus campaign.
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For ease of use, CoT may be the way to go since it's already in the PRPG rules system and you don't need to convert anything. Both are great AP's from what I can gather. I played the first bit of RotRL and was blown away by it, and CoT is engaging and exciting too (we're just about through module 2).
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Rise of the Runelords. Convert all the baddies to PFRPG rules (not too hard, and damn good practice for whomever's DM'ing) and prepare for blood baths.
With that many players, I would really recommend breaking into 2 smaller groups, possibly alternating DM's (my preference, since it means I get to play every other week) as 8 PC's will trounce the AP as written.
Also a bonus, all of RotRL is out, so you can prepare the endgame from day 1.
Pros for Runelords:
Fantastic use of classic monsters. PF Goblins right off the bat, and it just keeps getting better and better.
Evil wizard intent on world doom-ination. Call it a personal preference, but I really like this archetype as the BBEG. Smart, calculating, powerful and thoroughly evil; this is an efficient villain.
Lots of giants, and huge (potential) fights. 'nuff said, from where I sit.
Wide variety of challenges, from straight dungeon crawls to wilderness to building/town management.
Plenty of built in downtime, for crafting, socializing, business building, and whatnot. Mostly the crafting, as it seems our group is never without one, if not two item crafters. The queue gets a little crazy with all the trade-offs from future loot shares.
Council of Thieves is fantastic. I think it'll be my 2nd favorite AP (after Savage Tide), and has the huge plus of being in the PF ruleset.
I recommend you wait, play the RotRL game, learn the system nice nice, and come next year (if you play at a similar pace to us), you can use the Summoner, Witch, et al in your shiny new CoT campaign. And you'll have all the books by then, which is a HUGE plus in my eyes.
Of course, if you haven't run Savage Tide, and want to pad some XP's into either adventure, several of those slot NICELY into Varisia.
-t
I have to agree with psionichamster about making your group smaller. From experience we play with 7 players in RotR and it puts ALOT of work on the DM's shoulders. He has pretty much re-written every baddy in the modules to make them harder. 2 groups of 4 would make it a challenge. As for which one you should run, i would talk to your group(s). If you split into 2 groups you could do both ;) I saw rise as being "Classic" D&D. Where are Council looks heavy RP, with some combat. I am about to run council in about a month or so and i picked my party based on there RP ability's. (we have about 20 or so Pathfinder players in our store). I made them stick to a 4 person party though ;)