Rise of the Runelords in Hellfrost setting using Savage Worlds

[Ron Hay]

So I started by "Rise of the Runelords" AP set in Hellfrost using Savage Worlds on Sunday evening and it was a good start. I've been trying out all kinds of game systems over the past few years, and I have to say it feels good to be back to Savage Worlds. To me it actually feels like AD&D2 done right ... or something ;) What I mean by that is in hindsight, AD&D2 was the system my group had most fun with. I'd say five out of the top ten campaigns we've played were in AD&D2. However, looking back over the rules, there are things now available in "modern" games that I enjoy that are absent. Savage Worlds seems to catch a lot of the flavor and fun we had in AD&D2, but adds to it.

As for our first game on Sunday, it was rather short for various reasons, but we still got through about 3x as much stuff as other games I've run recently. My wife glared at me when I started a combat with only 15 minutes left before the game was supposed to end - 10 minutes later we were done, and it was a fun combat! 6 monsters (furies) vs 4 PCs and 7 NPCs.

As for Hellfrost itself, all the players really took to the setting. It's the first "vanilla" fantasy setting I've run in many, many years. Besides a very small campaign 6 years ago, I don't think I've run vanilla fantasy since the late 90s.

The group is:
- Human (Saxa) man Road Warden swordsman with a ghost following him around.
- Human (Saxa/Tuomi) man Grey Legionnaire priest of Rigr - (think "Rooster" Cogburn from True Grit)
- Human (Saxa/Finnar) woman Ertha Elementalist of the Reliquary.
- Frost Dwarf crossbowman/Rune Mage (arrow rune, of course!)

I ran a prelude adventure from the Hellfrost Encounter Book 1 ("The Price of Sin") as an opportunity to get the characters together before getting to Sandpoint, and to introduce an NPC capable of magical healing. That worked out great, and next session will have them getting to Sandpoint.

As for Rise of the Runelords, well I haven't really gotten them into it yet, but it is really nice having a well developed campaign "at my back" so I don't worry about what the campaign is about, and instead can just add customization for the group and figure out how to make things more fun.

All-in-all a great start!

[Patrik Ström]

I haven't yet had an opportunity to try Savage Worlds and i've only glanced at the Hellfrost setting but i have to say: this sounds awsome!

[Citizen Arcane]

How's this going? Any updates?

I've been thinking about doing pretty much the exact same thing (although setting it in Golarion).

I'm mainly wondering how this will work further along in the AP. It seems that Pathfinder (and D&D 3.5) have an assumption that characters will have access to certain spells and abilities at higher levels (scry, teleport, planeshift, etc).

Since Savage Worlds is a bit more down to earth, I can see this becoming a bigger and bigger issue as things progress.

Yea? Nay?

[Ron Hay]

Things have been going well - although I ended up changing things greatly to fit the setting and the characters more. RotRL basically became a toolbox to plunder for things I need.

Savage Worlds has been working very well, overall. The group largely enjoys it and it moves along smoothly. A big thing difference, however, is that Savage Worlds does not do Big Bad Guys well. Savage Worlds is more about lots of opponents, so you need to "layer" your Big Bad Guy because if 4 adventurers step up to that BBG, the BBG will die *fast*. At best the BBG has 3 Wounds and 3 bennies, and not a big ole pool of HP to wade through. So I have to change encounters for this - basically once the group engages a single foe, that foe's time is done.

I'm thinking of switching to Fantasy Craft because I miss the 1-20 progression. Savage Worlds has a Novice to Legendary progression, but it doesn't feel the same as d20. Overall I really wish I would have set it in Golarion instead, because switching systems proved relatively easy, but switching settings was really annoying - you constantly have to fiddle with locations and distances, names often feel "wrong" (my group still find Shalelu to be a funny name in a Nordic setting - they call her "Shanaynay"!), and just all kinds of things are off.

[Pop'N'Fresh]

You really should have renamed the locations and NPC's in that case. Nothing will suck the flavour out of a game faster than a silly name. It's something I always watch for in my games as my players can become a little bit immature at times.

I'm in the process of converting the Kingmaker adventure path over to Hellfrost and placing it in the Unclaimed Lands. Some examples of that conversion are:

- Highmoor replaces Restov
- Chalcis replaces Brevoy
- Otto replaces Oleg
- Swethyna replaces Svetlana

and so on.