First off, the Newbie DM in the isn't me. I'm currently running two campaigns and I'm feeling a little burnout, so I posed the idea of letting other people DM for a while- and, I'll get to play. One player said he had some ideas, and would like to try it out, but seemed a little unsure on how to go about it. I suggested a premade adventure- specifically from Paizo, as I have heard nothing other than that they are the best in the business, with my experience with their other products supporting that.
So my question is this: What adventure should he use? No one in the group has read any of them, so thats not a problem, but there are some factors I'd like to know first.(in no real order)
1. Is the adventure not too daunting, with too much fiddling to do?- Kingmaker looks like it's mechanics might be too daunting and the design too open ended for a first timer.
2. How much of the campaign setting will he have to learn? So paizo material looks fairly interchangeable, others... let's just say The setting for the council of thieves is fairly unique.
3. Conversion difficulty: If he needs help converting monsters from 3.5 to pathfinder I can help him- so no big deal there. He wants psionics available- I told him that the only necessary conversion needed was to match the hit die with the BaB, update skill list and to match psionic powers to the equivalent spell has been changed- polmorphing etc...
4. Length- How long does it take to get through a module? How long is an Adventure Path installment? How long is the full path?
Any information would be welcome
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 32
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He doesn't have to start an adventure path if that seems too daunting. There are also plenty of Pathfinder modules. (Follow link for module goodness)
Crown of the Kobold King is great fun and Hollow's Last Hope isn't bad either. The latter has the advantage of being free. That would get him started nicely! They're both 3.5 rather than PFRPG - which makes it even easier.
If he wants to run PFRPG then I recommend Crypt of the Everflame - it's great fun and very well written for beginning GMs by the one and only Jason Bulmahn!
I dm'ed crown of the kobold king a while back. Was great fun and really easy to do, all y'have to do is convert it from 3.5.
I second my vote for bypassing an AP and going for modules. Further, I would also endorse Crypt of the Everflame. It requires a few fixes, but it's a great adventure and is a great way to get exposed to most of the major mechanics involved in DMing. Good luck!
I found the adventure path specific forums to be a great help:
http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/paizoPublishing/pathfinder/adventurePa th
It is one thing to read through it yourself, but when you can read about where others tripped up, and how they handled it, that is a great resource.
I have only DM'd the first couple of Runelords modules, so I can't compare them to others, but they start off built for flavor rather then TPK's, and progress very well. Just watch out for some of the boss monsters, they can be very deadly to an unprepared group.
So my question is this: What adventure should he use? No one in the group has read any of them, so thats not a problem, but there are some factors I'd like to know first.(in no real order)
1. Is the adventure not too daunting, with too much fiddling to do?- Kingmaker looks like it's mechanics might be too daunting and the design too open ended for a first timer.
2. How much of the campaign setting will he have to learn? So paizo material looks fairly interchangeable, others... let's just say The setting for the council of thieves is fairly unique.
3. Conversion difficulty: If he needs help converting monsters from 3.5 to pathfinder I can help him- so no big deal there. He wants psionics available- I told him that the only necessary conversion needed was to match the hit die with the BaB, update skill list and to match psionic powers to the equivalent spell has been changed- polmorphing etc...
4. Length- How long does it take to get through a module? How long is an Adventure Path installment? How long is the full path?
Any information would be welcome
Crypt of the Everflame was a great intro module. It includes a brief write-up of Kassen--the PC's starting villag--and the prominent NPCs in town. However for PCs that are either not from town or not complete newbies, the "coming of age" hook needs a little tweaking. Still it was good fun. It didn't take much modification though.
1) I think it's perfect speed for a new DM or someone trying to get a feel for the new PF mechanics. There are many helpful rules reminders in the module.
2) It's not entirely clear in the module, so I slapped Kassen in-between the north and south Fangwood along the Tourendel river, but knowledge of the surrounding countries and area aren't really necessary.
3) It was made to go with the latest PFRPG rules so little to no conversion needed. While I am currently running and enjoy Crown of the Kobold King, the conversion work has been a slight pain--but that might be because the group leveled and now we have 6 PCs.
4) I think my group made it through the adventure in 3 game sessions of about 6 hours each, but there were a few non-combat role-playing encounters with NPCs in town.
I was going to post something like this myself. I am having great difficulty with making games, either with story or map making. I have GM'ed games and all the games I have GM'ed How hard is it to convert something from 3.5 to PFRPG? Should I start with a module or the adventure paths? What does the Adventure paths entail? Like does it take a charter from one to twenty? Does the module take a charters just to second or to third? What would I do with my second level charters? Would I come up with something? Any and all feed back would be nice. Thanks
In a similar situation here too.
I'm taking a break for the next month or so while a key player is out-of-town on business. In the meantime, her 20-yo little brother has decided to try his hand at DMing.
Initially he was trying to make his own adventure and campaign world since he knows that's what I've done. However, he keeps getting frustrated feeling that his skills can't yet match his ambitions. As a result, the past couple weeks have mostly been combat grinders.
Still, this has actually been helpful in its own wa. Myself and another player have made certain to put him thru his paces adjudicating various combat scenarios, and to familiarize himself with both referencing rules quickly and also knowing when to invoke Rule-0. Additionally, I put together a spreadsheet that allows him to quickly and easily build encounters using the CR/APL calculations in the new rules.
If you, or anyone else, want to DL my encounter calculator to see if it's helpful, you can do so here:
http://home.worldsunknown.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/PfRPG-Encounter-Ca lculator.xlsx
I've included an example encounter to show how to fill things out. For your own purposes, I've found it easiest to input the party on the Encounter Template and then simply make multiple copies of that sheet for individual encounters. If there are any bugs or suggestions, please let me know: http://home.worldsunknown.com/
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At this point, he's pretty well squared away on handling what I'd consider to be the toughest part of being a referee.
With that hurdle passed, I suggested he try running a pre-made adventure. Initially we were thinking about Rise of the Runelords, but after a bit of discussion, we agreed that doing something with a more limited scope would be a better idea.
After helping him to look over Paizo's offerings, this coming weekend, he's going to start us on Masks of the Living God. Were we still 1st-level, we'd do Crypt of the Everflame, but we're about 3rd now and the whole temple infiltration sounds really cool (there's an inquisitor in the party). I can let you know how well he does if you're interested in feedback.
Thanks for the advice- I think Crypt of the Everflame will do nicely, I just wanted to make sure that it was long enough for him to decide whether or not he wanted to continue and four sessions should be enough. I'll hold back on Kobold king though, as I'll soon be doing a Tucker Kobold styled dungeon, and I don't want people to be kobolded-out.
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My feeling is Crypt of the Everflame is best for people who are completely and utterly new to the game. For people who are experienced as players I'd recommend Tower of the Last Baron as their first module.
It's more fun to run as a DM, and good for a newer DM with experienced players since the players have to take a lot of the lead in deciding what to do next rather than riding the rails.
If he does like it and wants to take up a full adventure path I would recommend starting with either Curse of the Crimson Throne or Kingmaker. Kingmaker for the reasons I mentioned above, and CotCT simply because it's the best one they've released ever.
The player is our least experienced one- as far as I can tell. he hasn't been playing with us long, and I'm not sure how much prior exerince he's had, it doesn't seem like a lot, and he certianly isn't an expert on pathfinder (only about half of the players have a pathfinder book- oddly enough one of them that does never own 3.5)and quite frankly he's nervous enough to use a published adventure so I figure that he might want to start out with an easy one.
I should note that, as a rule my group doesn't use published adventures, Our usual DM scoffs at them for being for people who don't have either the time or creativaty to DM properly and I....well I have just had enough ideas as a DM to not need them yet. I should mention that Kingmaker gave me all the best sorts of nerdgasms and I'[m planning on DMing that myself.
So yeah, I'm not sure if a wsandbox is a great way for him to start is all. Maybe after the crypt, if he still want's to DM, he'll give those a go.
The player is our least experienced one- as far as I can tell. he hasn't been playing with us long, and I'm not sure how much prior exerince he's had, it doesn't seem like a lot, and he certianly isn't an expert on pathfinder (only about half of the players have a pathfinder book- oddly enough one of them that does never own 3.5)and quite frankly he's nervous enough to use a published adventure so I figure that he might want to start out with an easy one.
I should note that, as a rule my group doesn't use published adventures, Our usual DM scoffs at them for being for people who don't have either the time or creativaty to DM properly and I....well I have just had enough ideas as a DM to not need them yet. I should mention that Kingmaker gave me all the best sorts of nerdgasms and I'[m planning on DMing that myself.
So yeah, I'm not sure if a wsandbox is a great way for him to start is all. Maybe after the crypt, if he still want's to DM, he'll give those a go.
The thing to remember that when designing modules for your own group, at the least, you will have about 15 or so encounters in 'fast' mode for xp before the players level. Most of the modules break it up nicely and have you go for a CR 2 at first, then a CR 1, then another CR 1. Instead of having a bunch of encounters with two orcs a bunch of times, per se.
If nothing else, the best use of modules would be the pacing and adopt from there. See what was used, when, and how often it lets up on the players.
Make up your own story. A guy in hooded robes at a bar hands you a map and a bag of silver and promises even more silver and possibly electrum should you be a kind enough soul to go to said X on the map and achieve desired result by returning from X on the map and having the good sense of not dying in the process.
Or hell, you could look up the Orc and Pie module and just run that with the following sequel, the Orc and Toilet Paper.