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Hi GMs,
I've got some questions - forgive if these are simple:
> I read through the player's guide, and it seems a TON of advance information. How much of that stuff are you revealing to players? I'm thinking to not use the players guide due to all the stuff in there. Also I'm concerned that since I own (but haven't read) all six parts yet, that the players guide would introduce stuff I'm not as familiar with.
> Has anyone adapted Kingmaker to their own world? I think doing so for Part 1/6 would be easy, but I'm concerned that all the many many references to different provinces, house names, countries etc. might be just too much to convert on the fly with the other modules. Thoughts?
> Would you recommend that the GM read all 6 parts first before running the first one? I can see how I could run the first one without reading the rest... but I'm wondering if I would lose the richness of all the forshadowing, or find myself unable to answer all the questions. Thanks.
I would always read an AP first if I had a chance. I used Kingmaker in Eberron.
There is not a lot of other counties, and so on that you have to deal with.
The players guide gives hints about most of the advanced stuff coming down the line, not all the rules around them.
The kingdom rules are presented in Kingmaker 2
Mass Combat rules are presented in Kingmaker 4 or 5
You can alter the Kingmaker setting with some work, but it'll depend on how much your going to change it.
As for the other rules (like kingdom) let the players do the book work on it (just audit it every now and then)
Reading as much of the AP before running it.
Like a trailer for a movie, some amount of limited spoilers is a good thing. You want your players to be excited about the concept, looking forward to the campaign, and otherwise on-board with the premise. It would be weird to start playing an exploration game and... surprise! you rule a kingdom now!
Adapting KM to their own world shouldn't be too hard. There are very few references to things external to the Stolen Lands. You'd have to change whomever it is giving the charter/supplies in books 1&2, and you'd have to find a replacement for Pitax in book 5. Everything else is self-contained.
I would definately look over the exploration parts of book 2,3,&4 before starting, just so you know where your PCs might wander off to. Plot-wise, though, you don't need to know too much about what is supposed to "happen", other than very broad strokes.
The game itself doesn't have much foreshadowing, and if you want to build that in, then make sure to read the final two rooms of Whiterose Abbey in book 5, as well as the intro section of book 6. All of the events of books 3,4,&5 work best as un-foreshadowed surprises anyway.
The only real exception being that I would read up on the personalities of Meager Varn and Hannis Drelev from books 3 and 4 respectively, in-case your party makes diplomatic contact with them early.
Pax- I'd read the descriptions of the books on paizo and skim some of the threads; it's less necessary to read the books to set up foreshadowing.
I'd also recommend writing your own plans for adding foreshadowing b/c the foreshadowing in the game is very minimal.
I added an extensive rewrite of the 'end game' scenario that I've been leading up to by dropping hints here and there. My group after nearly 2 years of play is just starting Book IV. With luck by December we'll be done with the series :). A grand adventure has been had by all.
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As far as adapting to your own world; it is difficult to do with all the names. I sort of adapted it to my world. I picked out the chunk of River Kingdoms, Iobaria, Stolen Lands, and Taldor and dropped them into a corner of my setting. I would have liked to make it fit more fluidly, but that would have been a *lot* of on the fly remembering of substitutions.
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I really recommend adding in a lot of the side quests and systems that are available in this forum section; they add a lot of flavour to the early parts of the game.
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Good to know.
I'm just finishing up a homebrew campaign that's run since February of 2008. PCs will just obtain 14th level.
I'm looking to switch gears now that their "home country" is well established. Do you think it work well if I adapted Kingmaker's Greenbelt to an untamed 'Stolen Land' just east of the country the players have been playing in for years?
I'm still open to using Golarion, but I have my own gods/pantheon and homeworld feel/maps etc. From what I'm reading in the responses of this thread it should be easily adaptable...?
So long as "untamed" also means "unexplored" and "uncharted", then you're good to go. There has to be an air of mystery and "what's in there" to keep players motivated and excited. Otherwise it's "why are we spending time walking back and forth through our back yard? let's go to the cartographer shop and be done with it."
Otherwise, sure, go for it. For all of the gods that show up prominently (Erastil, Gorum) you can swap them out for one of your own dieties. The only question is Gyronna. She works better as a "I've never heard of her before" regional diety, thus making her "clergy" more like "cultists". -my 2 cents
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Not only am I okay with players having some idea what they're in for, I've generally come to think that keeping "big secrets" from the players is more effort than it's worth. Most GMs go through a period of being obsessed with the big reveal, but in my experience it doesn't really help to surprise people in a role-playing game. People usually have cooler contributions if they see it coming — from general trope-savvy guesses to outright spoilers.
If a GM secret reveal works without a hitch, fine, awesome, I love it. But the days where I'll bend over backwards to control PC info are over. Instead I focus on cultivating an attitude against metagaming at the table (with rewards) and try to just improvise as GM about half the time.
So my advice to you is let them read the KMPG. Let them build characters knowing what kinds of things the story holds for them. The devil's in the details, and the subsequent books contain a ton of details that even the best player in the world couldn't extrapolate from the KMPG.
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Not only am I okay with players having some idea what they're in for, I've generally come to think that keeping "big secrets" from the players is more effort than it's worth. Most GMs go through a period of being obsessed with the big reveal, but in my experience it doesn't really help to surprise people in a role-playing game. People usually have cooler contributions if they see it coming — from general trope-savvy guesses to outright spoilers.
If a GM secret reveal works without a hitch, fine, awesome, I love it. But the days where I'll bend over backwards to control PC info are over. Instead I focus on cultivating an attitude against metagaming at the table (with rewards) and try to just improvise as GM about half the time.
So my advice to you is let them read the KMPG. Let them build characters knowing what kinds of things the story holds for them. The devil's in the details, and the subsequent books contain a ton of details that even the best player in the world couldn't extrapolate from the KMPG.
Ditto!
I'm still open to using Golarion, but I have my own gods/pantheon and homeworld feel/maps etc. From what I'm reading in the responses of this thread it should be easily adaptable...?
My "Brevoy" is about 40% published material, deities are altered, the Old Margreve has been dropped into Brevoy, over three times the size of the Gronzi -- and hosts of other changes. But it's been working perfectly after six sessions. Reading ahead, making notes so I know what to change, and can track those changes -- honestly it wasn't that much work.
As long as you have a "northern region" with stretches of lawless wilderness to the south, I rate Kingmaker as *very adaptable.*
Doug.