Hi,
It's been some times since any of my players have played, and not under PF at any point. I played through and AP and decided to give my old buddies a campaign to play. So far we look like this:
Half orc Barbarian
Human Cleric, melee oriented
Human Paladin, melee
Human Witch
Human or Elf Rogue, DW focused
I already stated they could use 25 point buy (perhaps my error). Everyone but the rogue is an old gamer (rogue player is brand new). I've read the APs are all designed for 4 players 15 point buy, so I was thinking I might roughly be able to bump up each encounter by around double to compensate for the stellar stat spreads and party size. I'm pretty good at winging that sort of thing.
I am curious how other DMs approach the issue of running the module. I was thinking these APs would be a canned adventure that I merely needed to read and make dice rolls for, but instead I see that the outline of events is there but it is missing a lot of what I should be reading to the party. Instead it appears I'm left on my own for how to relay the events to the party, and this may take some time to write up. How much prep time do you put into these APs as you run them? Is there a DM narrative somewhere I could rob from?
I am very good at doing things on the wing and improv, so I tend to just run with it as is. Most of the time, a read through is all I need to identify the intent of a encounter or room description and I roll with it from there.
Of course, not everyone is so gifted, so some suggestions.
Read through and take notes. Some APs do alot of name dropping or providing information that at first blush, doesn't appear relevant but has significance later on. You will want to take note of these to make sure the relevant info has a chance to be passed onto the characters. It is easy to overlook that some object or some name or tibit of info that suddenly becomes very important later get missed in running the encounter. There is a lot of name dropping and such in Carrion Crown.
If a encounter or description doesn't make sense or doesn't fit with the group's play style, anticipate the likely sticking points and modify so it makes sense.
You can develop your own narrative. Most of the time in Carrion Crown, a encounter serves two purposes - providing XP for advancement; and providing foreshadowing of events later or to acquire some info or some object that will have signficance later. You don't have to do pages of your own dialogue but understand the intent of the encounter and make sure the characters have a chance to gain the object or info the encounter is to provide and use your own roleplaying talents and commentary to allow the players to 'make the connection'.
Most APs flow quite organically but because each AP is done by six different authors, sometimes the flow can be a erratic from behind the DM seat. Your job is to tune it up so the flow is better and the players are not stuck going 'WTF'.
Carrion Crown is full of story and colorful characters. If your players are story driven, use that to your advantage and build upon it if necessary. If they are not so driven by story, you can downplay that aspect but you will need to ensure the info/object to advance the storyline doesn't get overlooked.
Overall, the best suggestion is to understand the story unfolding and you decide how best to 'tell' that story to your group.
I decided that a 15 point buy for this path rather than my usual 20... The lower stats has made the players more cautious and feel more vulnerable although in actuality the point buy hasn't made a huge difference to the actual stats.
To me the path has a grittier feel to it and the lower point buy helps reflect this.
I would suggest that you are up front and straight with your players and stick to a 15 point buy rather than make a whole lot of work for yourself. After all if you are going to boost the encounters to take into account a 25 point buy what is the point in having it in the first place :D
EDIT: Check the size of beasties against the size of the area they appear in...Doubling the area size is appropriate for some places as someone forgot two trolls have a hard time fitting into a 15x15 room...
Hey what are these trolls doing in this closet... ewwwww!
EDIT: Check the size of beasties against the size of the area they appear in...Doubling the area size is appropriate for some places as someone forgot two trolls have a hard time fitting into a 15x15 room...
Hide the goblin...
Hey what are these trolls doing in this closet... ewwwww!
EDIT: Check the size of beasties against the size of the area they appear in...Doubling the area size is appropriate for some places as someone forgot two trolls have a hard time fitting into a 15x15 room...
you gotta play it like a clown car (how many trolls can you stuff in a 15'x15' room) :)
Hey what are these trolls doing in this closet... ewwwww!
They're... ah... squeezing.
Ok the rules officially fail to make it sound any less dirty.