I'm curious about how Paizo determines the length of an adventure path, for th whole thing and for each chapter. Is there an official "goal" in terms of game hours for each chapter/the whole series? How long does it take the typical group to get through one, if the DM plays "by the book" with no changes of any kind?
Our group is almost done with chapter 2 of Serpent's Skull. We started it in early January and have only missed a couple of meetings. We game for an average of 3.5 hours at a time. By my rough estimate, it has taken us an average of 3 months per chapter, or 45 hours. Is this about right? It seems awfully slow to me. I feel like the chapters are too long and the dungeons WAY too long.
Creative Director
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There's a physical limit to the length of each adventure—about 50 pages, more or less. That's the hard limit on what one developer can handle on a monthly schedule, so that's what limits us from doing longer adventure installments.
And that page count limit also tends to limit the number of encounters we can cram into each adventure, which itself influences the length of time it might take to play the adventure.
That length of time, though, can vary from group to group.
We don't actually have any goals in mind for how long in real-time it takes for an Adventure Path to be played. The speed at which you play is really up to the GM. If things feel like they're going too slowly, the best bet is to either play more often or play longer sessions, frankly. I suppose you COULD simply shorten the encounter areas, but doing so will remove opportunities for the PCs to gain XP and treasure.
Thanks, James. One great thing about these boards is getting the word directly from the folks at the top!
It wasn't solicited, but I have some feedback/suggestions for adventure paths. I'd love to see a sidebar or front matter section which tells DMs how to run an "accelerated" version of the chapter and/or entire adventure path. That could mean cutting out 25% - 50% of the content of each chapter, or even tips on ending an Adventure Path at a midpoint instead.
A greater focus on plot would also be nice. I enjoy dungeons as much as the next guy, but there are so many of them in APs I groan every time a new one comes up. Sometimes it seems like the plot is merely thin tissue to get the party from one dungeon to the next. Shorter dungeons would also be nice. In Council of Thieves #4, it took our characters nine days (in-game time) to reach the end of the dungeon, and that was one that should have been time-sensitive!
While you're at it, it would be a great idea to put in the occasional sidebar for handling deviations from the AP plot. (One great example has been Racing to Ruin -- I didn't want to team up with a faction, or follow the route provided. I wanted to forge our own. It would have been great if we had been given a map and been tasked with picking a route, then the DM could compare that with the "master" map to determine encounters, including run-ins with enemy factions!)
For what it's worth, we don't use XP -- we just level when it seems right, which is usually every 3 - 4 sessions, or upon reaching plot points. We also tend to run our games a little light on the magic items (my character in particular this time around -- I'm playing a jungle ranger who refuses all money and only uses what gear she can make or find).
Just my $0.02 cents.
Perhaps, but I see adventure paths as toolkits for running a whole campaign with minimal prep for the DM. So advice on alternative ways to use the adventure only make sense. Besides, a lot of adventures have those kinds of sidebars, offering advice on customizing the material from the person who knows it best -- the writer.
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Creative Director
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Perhaps, but I see adventure paths as toolkits for running a whole campaign with minimal prep for the DM. So advice on alternative ways to use the adventure only make sense. Besides, a lot of adventures have those kinds of sidebars, offering advice on customizing the material from the person who knows it best -- the writer.
The problem is that every part of the book we spend telling you how to run an Adventure Path differently makes us have less room to present it in it's baseline form.
Frankly... the kind of advice you're looking for is best handled by these boards, rather than in print.
We also game once a week for about 3 to 3,5 hours and so far APs have come down to a little over a year ( compared to my old homebrewn campaigns, which came down to 1,5 years for a full level 1-20 ride and with considerably longer sessions ).
I'd expect a combat heavy scenario to take quite a bit longer, since an encounter takes a lot of time. The last module in Carrion Crown is something which I'd never run as it is, as it has more than 40 combat encounters and has the group beginning at level 13, which considerably lenghtens the encounters due to option paralysis on the side of the players. I had to cut the thing down to 20 ( buffed up ) encounters.
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This October will mark the second year and about 50th session of my biweekly Kingmaker/Runelords mashup campaign, at probably 5 hours per session. We're currently at 39 sessions and 11th level but I have slowed things down a bit by running Medium advancement, cutting a few encounters that didn't do much and cutting story XP awards (like the Kingdom building and exploration milestone awards from Kingmaker).
This process (significantly lengthening the Rise of the Runelords meta-story by running a second campaign at the same time) has got me thinking about doing the opposite - running a normal AP on the fast progression table and editing back encounters that I didn't think served the main plot well.
I think it could be done fairly easily as there are often encounters that aren't truly needed to tell the story (random road encounters, dungeon fillers that may or may not be needed) - just move a little treasure around, get rid of a third of the fights or so and trim the maps back some.
The problem is that every part of the book we spend telling you how to run an Adventure Path differently makes us have less room to present it in it's baseline form.
Frankly... the kind of advice you're looking for is best handled by these boards, rather than in print.
I can't disagree more. The adventure paths already have plenty of content -- too much, in my opinion. Sometimes less is more. Or put another way, I'd like a little less quantity in favor of more quality. They don't need any more encounters crammed in. Frankly, they could use fewer encounters and more thought put into managing the plot. That could go a long way to avoiding the railroading people often point out in adventure paths.
And as for the message boards, not everyone has the ability or interest to go online looking for help. The adventures should be self-contained and not require the DM to post on the boards, or scour Google or whatever, hoping for help in scaling an adventure. Besides, online those answers most likely don't come from the person who knows the work best -- the writer.
The answer to a slow adventure path isn't to "play more often or play longer sessions." We shouldn't have to change our schedule to fit the material. Our lives are not slave to the adventure. It is a tool that we use as we see fit. What I'm suggesting is to consider making adventure paths a little more adaptable and geared for groups with slightly different needs. I'm not talking about cutting out pages and pages of content here, just a sidebar or two would be most useful.
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Fair enough. I certainly am always looking for feedback on Adventure Paths, and while I do hear complaints now and then that they're too long... for the most part folks want more. People keep asking for an Adventure Path that goes all the way to 20th level, for example.
At this time, I happen to think that the Adventure Paths do pretty good at what they do—they're very successful, and folks seem to mostly be enjoying them, so I'm pretty hesitant to mess with what seems to me to be a successful equation is all.
Personally, I think the decision to go with the medium XP track has negatively impacted AP design. I can point out several modules where the need to cram in the necessary amount of encounters to make XP needs meet ends to get to a certain level has resulted in a mess of absolutely unnecessary mook encounters, which serve no other purpose than to bog down the flow of the story, while posing no challenge to a well-balanced group whatsoever, aside from the damage to the players nerve costumes in having to spend session after session wiping the floor with almost worthless opponents.
Using the fast XP track would go a long way in giving more space for more roleplaying and less but more complex and thus memorable encounters.
I think one way to add more plot managing text (as HawaiianWarrior requests) to the AP and less encounter text is to avoid the massive NPC and adversary stat blocks. I know at one point the stat blocks were seen as a boon to GMs do to their re-usability. Now, I can't imagine a GM having a shortage of stat blocks for any CR. There are just too many APs in print plus books like the GMG and NPC codex for me to me believe there is still a need or demand for complex stat blocks in the APs themselves. I think it may be time to retire the half page+ NPC (friendly or not) stat block in exchange for other content. I don't make this suggestion lightly, I do enjoy the stat blocks and think they are in themselves a kind of work of art, but they have outlived their usefulness and novelty to me as a GM. I'd rather see that page count used for other work in the AP. If this means I have to get more bestiaries or find my own stat blocks from other sources so be it, I'm ready to make that sacrifice at this time.
I would tend to disagree with this, myself. These stat blocks you speak of may not be necessary for you, who has been playing this game for a while, or even GM'ing this "edition" of the game forever, but to newer players who don't have that type of experience with it, removing the stat blocks would be immensely confusing and probably more time-consuming than they'd be willing to accept trying to work with the system. I'd certainly be afraid that if you stopped putting the ease of use stat blocks into the campaigns, there could suddenly be a drop in new, inexperienced gamers for the system, as it would become that much more difficult just to run the AP. Even for those with the experience, it would become a more time-consuming hobby than simply having to get the book, open it, and start running (which is what I did with Serpent Skull back in the day, mind you, and my players have had a blast with that AP); now one would have to either start creating every villain themselves, or use the generic NPCs thrown in other books, which would become incredibly monotonous for the players who would be squaring off against the same enemy time-after-time, only with a different name this time.
Of course, this is coming from someone who truly enjoy the APs as they are currently being written. I personally believe the content is quite top-notch, and part of that is because they give the GM a ton of wiggle room already. You would rather run this AP on the fast track? Simply eliminate a few of those mook encounters that you're not fond of and you're good to go. Everything you need is still there minus about 7 encounters that you already felt unnecessary anyway. As with the NPCs, they've even started to stat the major ones up in their own section behind the adventure, giving them awesome write-ups for exquisite roleplaying flavor if you wanted to do more with them than just throw them into a fray and watch them die, and they don't cut the AP size down any by doing so, thus giving you less stat blocks and more story in the adventure itself. I've loved this concept since they started doing it in Jade Regent. I guess what I'm trying to say is that a lot of what people seem to be criticizing here Paizo has already done a lot to fix, or made it incredibly easy for people to fix themselves with very little effort on their part. I mean, yeah, we all want them to cater to us specifically, of course, but I believe they do that very, very well in what they put out now.
As to more info on adaptability in sidebars and the like . . . I wouldn't necessarily disagree that this could be an interesting concept, but, again, they do some of this already, and the company shouldn't have to be responsible for knowing how your players would tackle any given scenario. Just my personal opinion. The GM still knows his/her group best, and it's up to the GM to be able to adapt to how their players react to the information thrown at them. That's not a writer's job. Heck, I know for a fact that if the Paizo writers through in a dozen possible ways to go at a scenario/storyline problem, my players would find the 13th option not presented, and I'd still be looking at the situation with that "let's roll with the punches here and see how this works out!" approach. That's just what players do. They surprise you! Personally, I think that's part of the greatness of playing this game! So, while the writers have given me input on how the players could go at this part of the story from various different perspectives, mine own would nullify all that anyway, and then I'd be complaining that those numerous sidebars are useless to me, and that if Paizo just gave me more storyline/encounter info I could adapt it myself to fit my individual players (which is what they do now).
Apologies for the wall of text here.
TL;DR version: The established AP that Paizo pushes out right now is easily adaptable, and they've made modifications to it that use less stat blocks in the published adventure without cutting down the length of the adventures themselves. They are pretty much user friendly as they are, and they refrain from issuing major changes that completely destroy their formula, but instead simply make the product more polished. I think they've got it right with how they're handling APs now, personally. Major changes simply wouldn't make the product better.
The difference between 20 and 13 encounters is fairly noticeable as a player, and I'd rather have more encounters at one level, where I get the chance to play my character and find outwhathecando at this particular level before he levels up.
The current layout of the APs does tend to encourage a rapid fire approach to combat encounters that can at times seem "mook like", I do agree. However, in PF on the medium XP track, it takes 20 CR appropriate encounters to advance a party of 4 PCs a level. This keeps the number of encounters, or more precisely the number of CR XP appropriate awards, at a consistent number. It's just the way the math works out. Moving to the fast track would bring this number down to 13, a reduction, but probably not a significant one with regard to playing time.
Are you kidding me? Cutting seven encounters per level would not constitute a "significant" reduction of time? A typical combat encounter takes about 1-2 hours, depending on the group, for set-up, execution, rules discussions, rules referencing and general conversation around the table. That's 7-14 hours ( or 2 1/3 to 4 2/3 entire sessions for my Tuesday group ) which could be spent on, y'know, ROLEPLAYING.
Geeze.
A typical combat encounter takes about 1-2 hours, depending on the group, for set-up, execution, rules discussions, rules referencing and general conversation around the table. That's 7-14 hours ( or 2 1/3 to 4 2/3 entire sessions for my Tuesday group ) which could be spent on, y'know, ROLEPLAYING.
Then cut out the encounters you find unnecessary (about a 10-20 minute endeavor after having read the adventure, which you were going to do anyway) and play with the fast advancement XP track.
Then you can spend more time, y'know, roleplaying.
I'm tending to lean the other way, personally. I like to give my players a lot of encounters, allow them to do a ton of roleplaying (which they love), and I like to use the slow advancement track so I can toss in additional side quests of mine own creation.
Does this mean I should start demanding that they write 96-page adventures for their APs to better suit my needs of more material? Even if I did, I'm pretty sure the answer would be, "No, don't think so." In fact, I'd hope that would be their answer because they shouldn't have to cater to my gaming style! They should do the best they can to find that happy medium for everyone involved . . .
Which is pretty much what they've done. ;)
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Creative Director
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This might not prove to be a popular suggestion but if the problem with having an advice section in the AP volumes (and I favour it, especially when it came to the gunpowder/skull and shackles debate) is space, rather than messing with the adventure design (a very complicated and difficult task) why not drop the fiction?
Not only is that not a popular suggestion... it wouldn't allow us to make longer adventures even if we did it.
We've been doing monthly adventures for 5 years now, and during that time we've tinkered with adventure lengths. At about 45-50 pages (the current size), we can keep the product on its monthly schedule, but we can't go much bigger than that due to the physical limit of how many pages a single adventure developer can do in one month—splitting developers up to do multiple adventures is something we've done before to catch up, but it's not pretty when it happens. It's much better for one developer to handle all six parts of an adventure, and that limits the size of adventures as a result.
Cutting the fiction would end up in us having to replace it with something else that wasn't adventure material, in other words.
SO, all it would do in this case is annoy and disappoint those of us who like the fiction (which includes all of us at Paizo) while not being able to address the desired result (physically longer adventures).
NOW!
I know you proposed something slightly different than that... but that's my boilerplate response to folks who ask us to cut the fiction.
Replacing fiction with 6 pages of "How to adapt the adventure" advice wouldn't be much different though... 'cause guess who the best person to write that article would be? That's right... the person who's most familiar with the adventure in its final form—the developer who's already got his 40+ hour week full developing the maximum sized of a monthly adventure he can develop. Shifting this to another employee or writer would be fantastically inefficient, since that would mean that employee would have to become an expert on every adventure AND would have to be a great adventure developer (something we still have a shortage on at Paizo, frankly)... and he'd have to do so in about half the time the primary developer has to do the whole adventure since the ship date can't really change and he can't START this process until the developer's done with the adventure.
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Then cut out the encounters you find unnecessary (about a 10-20 minute endeavor after having read the adventure, which you were going to do anyway) and play with the fast advancement XP track.
Then you can spend more time, y'know, roleplaying.
I'm tending to lean the other way, personally. I like to give my players a lot of encounters, allow them to do a ton of roleplaying (which they love), and I like to use the slow advancement track so I can toss in additional side quests of mine own creation.
Does this mean I should start demanding that they write 96-page adventures for their APs to better suit my needs of more material? Even if I did, I'm pretty sure the answer would be, "No, don't think so." In fact, I'd hope that would be their answer because they shouldn't have to cater to my gaming style! They should do the best they can to find that happy medium for everyone involved . . .
Which is pretty much what they've done. ;)
When did I demand anything? I have given my opinion on what I think is one part which is going wrong with APs lately, which is that there seems to be a lot more encounter padding than under the 3.5 rules, especially at the latter levels where the XP needed to level increase dramatically ( and the designers still love to throw big groups of CR-2 or CR-3 type mooks at the party, which is just so effing tedious to GM. God, I hate it. At no point do I feel like I am making my players feel like they are in any real danger by those guys who can't even hit most PCs. What's the point of throwing about 5-10 encounters of this type into every AP? I think players get the point that their characters are bad-ass when they turn only two groups of mooks into smush. ).
Obviously my opinion is not shared by everybody or even by the majority, who knows? But it is something which bothers me greatly, so I am giving my feedback.
And FYI, I am cutting out as many of those tedious encounters as I can at this moment in the last module of Carrion Crown, if only to get faster to the next AP which once again features roleplaying.
This might not prove to be a popular suggestion but if the problem with having an advice section in the AP volumes (and I favour it, especially when it came to the gunpowder/skull and shackles debate) is space, rather than messing with the adventure design (a very complicated and difficult task) why not drop the fiction?Not only is that not a popular suggestion... it wouldn't allow us to make longer adventures even if we did it.
We've been doing monthly adventures for 5 years now, and during that time we've tinkered with adventure lengths. At about 45-50 pages (the current size), we can keep the product on its monthly schedule, but we can't go much bigger than that due to the physical limit of how many pages a single adventure developer can do in one month—splitting developers up to do multiple adventures is something we've done before to catch up, but it's not pretty when it happens. It's much better for one developer to handle all six parts of an adventure, and that limits the size of adventures as a result.
Cutting the fiction would end up in us having to replace it with something else that wasn't adventure material, in other words.
SO, all it would do in this case is annoy and disappoint those of us who like the fiction (which includes all of us at Paizo) while not being able to address the desired result (physically longer adventures).
NOW!
I know you proposed something slightly different than that... but that's my boilerplate response to folks who ask us to cut the fiction.
Replacing fiction with 6 pages of "How to adapt the adventure" advice wouldn't be much different though... 'cause guess who the best person to write that article would be? That's right... the person who's most familiar with the adventure in its final form—the developer who's already got his 40+ hour week full developing the maximum sized of a monthly adventure he can develop. Shifting this to another employee or writer would be fantastically inefficient, since that would mean that...
If I may give my own brand of uneducated advice, cut out a few combat encounters per AP, add more roleplaying stuff and maybe cut back on the two-page biographies for the 3-4 major NPCs of the current module ( of which I assume that they are included in the adventure module page count ) to maybe one page. Every GM worth his salt can insert some self-thought up combat encounters and the NPC backgrounds many times include stuff which the players will never ever know anyway. But I think a lot of GMs would appreciate some more little plothooks for sub-plots which are appropiate to the AP module and its location. Hell, you can make one paragraph about ideas which kind of random/semi-random combat encounters would be appropiate and every GM with a Bestiary or the GMG can run with that.
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Creative Director
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...add more roleplaying stuff and maybe cut back on the two-page biographies for the 3-4 major NPCs of the current module...
Some other interesting ideas, but I wanted to hone in on this section.
To me, having a 2 page NPC biography is an invaluable aid in building roleplaying encounters, since knowing that amount of history and personality about the NPCs is key to being able to portray them.
The magic items and the NPCs that we've been providing at the ends of the adventures ARE calculated as part of the adventure footprint—that's absolutely a portion of each volume that, if we got rid of them, would simply translate into more pages for the adventure. My take so far is that the NPCs and magic item appendices for the adventures are quite popular... but I'd really be interested to hear if folks like them more than getting extra pages of adventure instead.
In any event, to get back to my original question... and I'm not trying to be snarky here—I'm honestly curious about the answer...
...But what would you say "roleplaying stuff" is if not more details about NPCs?
First off, I love the magic item two-pager, since the ones which have been introduced so far have a lot of flavor to them ( although I'd like to know if they can be upgraded like "standard" magic armor/weapons/items, because most players tend to disregard cool features for higher bonuses ).
But my point about the NPC biographies is the following: Many of them are antagonists whose background the PCs will never have a chance to learn about. Sure, I could build in some contrivance where the villain ( or an ally/enemy of the same ) gives them a lecture of all the secrets that villain has. But in general a lot of those NPCs are of the "meet once, fight, kill, never see again" type and I find that they don't need to have a super-detailed backstory which essentially is only for the GM to read.
Now, on the other hand, if you got a recurring NPC who will accompany the party for a long time, I'd love to see more backstory and/or personality traits for them.
In essence, NPC write-ups should not be "this NPC needs to have a two-page entry, no matter how much the group will interact with her/him", but each according to her/his role in the campaign.
In essence, NPC write-ups should not be "this NPC needs to have a two-page entry, no matter how much the group will interact with her/him", but each according to her/his role in the campaign.
This. If an NPC is important and recurring, a deeper insight into the history, personality and motivations is very very welcome from my GM point of view.
However, a lengthy backstory on an NPC the group will fight once, and whose only scripted interaction with the party is 'fight to the death - will sucide before being captured' is rather... unnecessary. If I then read the comment that the NPCs behavior text had to be kept that short because of word count (remember the lengthy backstory? You used plenty of words back there), I find it difficult not to facepalm.|
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Fair enough...
...although it's important to remember that the NPC that Group A ends up killing on the spot may be the NPC that Group B manages to cast charm person on and then redeems and recruits to their side.
And I actually think that giving an NPC a lot of backstory even if there's a good chance that they'll never spill all those beans to the PCs themselves is important, because my philosophy is that while it's okay if the game doesn't explain everything to the players... it's not if we don't explain it to the GM.
Furthermore... and I know this might sound like it flies in the face of some of my previous comments about space being a premium in each adventure... but I think that giving the GM something fun and inspiring to read is AS important as putting information in that most games will see in play.
In other words, the PCs might never find out why the big bad end guy decided to build a giant zombie out of stitched-together bears, but if the 1 page history of that NPC's reasons for doing this help the GM to present the adventure in a more interesting way... or even if that 1 page just entertained the GM while he read it... that's important too.
In any event... in the end, the fact that I can't really accurately predict which NPC any one group will decide is worth keeping as a friend and getting to know means that I have to more or less just pick which ones that I think would be the most interesting ones. Or, in the case of an AP that Rob develops... NPCs that HE thinks are interesting, of course...
ALL THAT SAID... If folks really don't like knowing the backstories to why bad guy NPCs do what they do... let me know. I can certainly save a fair amount of space by not explaining why they do what they do if they're ultimately "nothing more than a fight."
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Creative Director
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First off, I love the magic item two-pager, since the ones which have been introduced so far have a lot of flavor to them ( although I'd like to know if they can be upgraded like "standard" magic armor/weapons/items, because most players tend to disregard cool features for higher bonuses ).
All items can be updgraded if the players wish to spend the cash.
A better solution, though, is for the GM to be informed about the players' gear and preferences and plans—if there's a cool magic weapon in an adventure that's got a lower enhancement bonus than the weapon the PC who would be able to use it the best already has... it's not criminal to boost the item's enhancement bonus to match or exceed so you build in to that item a reason for the PC to keep it. Or to change a sword into an axe if your group's fighter uses axes.
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To OP's first question. For my group our average seems to be 4 hour game nights and it takes 5-7 game sessions per AP book.
I might be in the minority here but I like the bio's on major NPC villains. I like it cause it helps me play them different and make them into more than just BBEG number 6 to be killed. Though to be fair it is not uncommon for my group to engage in conversation with bad guys before or even during a fight and they don't always kill them. Also in our group if the PC's do things that give the NPC advance warning they are coming, like really in advance it can help with now the NPC might react or do.
Lastly after a AP we as a group often talk about it for a full game session and the players often ask questions about some of the earlier NPC's or plots and how they was tied in etc. So often the players get to learn at least some or most of that info which they enjoy, but as I said I might be in the minority here.
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I might be in the minority here but I like the bio's on major NPC villains. I like it cause it helps me play them different and make them into more than just BBEG number 6 to be killed.
This. As a DM, it's priceless to have more infos to work on for quirks, plans, strategies, attitude, and so on. A lackey might be fine with "he's cowardly against orcs but almost suicidal against elves", but for a key NPC it's a thousand times better to know why, how, where and when to act in a certain way.
A (slightly) less combat heavy approach to XP balance, would be appreciated nonetheless. Roleplaying rewards, investigation rewards, puzzle solving rewards, resource/NPC management rewards, etc.
And a bit more attention to creature size vs map size: I know that most beasties can squeeze into narrow passages (and getting there/getting out of there is good fun on its own), but handling combat in a small room against one or more large creatures, maybe with a 5+ PCs group... uuugh.
...add more roleplaying stuff and maybe cut back on the two-page biographies for the 3-4 major NPCs of the current module...Some other interesting ideas, but I wanted to hone in on this section.
To me, having a 2 page NPC biography is an invaluable aid in building roleplaying encounters, since knowing that amount of history and personality about the NPCs is key to being able to portray them.
The magic items and the NPCs that we've been providing at the ends of the adventures ARE calculated as part of the adventure footprint—that's absolutely a portion of each volume that, if we got rid of them, would simply translate into more pages for the adventure. My take so far is that the NPCs and magic item appendices for the adventures are quite popular... but I'd really be interested to hear if folks like them more than getting extra pages of adventure instead.
I agree with you that they're popular, so suspect I'm in the minority.
Nonetheless, for my part, they're a little too much (I'd prefer one page for an NPC write-up). I dont have time to memorise it all and when I end up with so much backstory for half a dozen NPCs (like in the first instalment of Jade Regent, for example) I end up skim-reading it which kind of defeats the purpose since it's no different than if I just read a couple of paragraphs.
My preference is for more fully fleshed out locations rather than people.
I'd also be curious as to whether a fast-track AP would ever be considered or what the downsides to that (beyond DM preferences) might be?
Well, I'll fall back on "it depends on what the role of the NPC is". A prime example is Goti Runecaster from Night of Frozen Shadows.
For the vast majority of players he will be "that funky looking troll we killed in a room". He really didn't need one full page of backstory how he moved out of his moms basement.
But, man, would I have loved one more page of backstory and character quirks for Ameiko, Shalelu ( especially Shalelu ), Sandru and Koya.
I agree with Steve that more fleshed-out locations would also be nice, although we get very good write-ups in the non-adventure part of some cities like Kalsgad or Kasai.
Steve, what exactly do you mean with "fast-track"? Fast XP chart or an AP with less total levels? Or something else?
And thanks, James, for the info about the specific magic items. Much appreciated.
ALL THAT SAID... If folks really don't like knowing the backstories to why bad guy NPCs do what they do... let me know. I can certainly save a fair amount of space by not explaining why they do what they do if they're ultimately "nothing more than a fight."
Oh, no, please don't cut the backstories. As you mention, this is what makes reading these adventures interesting, and makes them easier to run them. Not having the motivations of the major NPCs would certainly hurt my sense of verisimilitude, even if the PCs don't necessarily learn about them.
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I wouldn't mind seeing a fast track xp AP either. It would be fewer encounters so could devote to more other things. IF the focus was done well it might be very cool. I haven't really given it a lot of thought on all the implications on how it might effect a AP though.
Magnuskn - I believe they mean the fast track xp chart so you need fewer encounters to level. Least that is how I read it.
If you want to see how it affects an AP, just look at the earlier ones, which were written under 3.5.
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I can't disagree more. The adventure paths already have plenty of content -- too much, in my opinion. Sometimes less is more. Or put another way, I'd like a little less quantity in favor of more quality. They don't need any more encounters crammed in. Frankly, they could use fewer encounters and more thought put into managing the plot. That could go a long way to avoiding the railroading people often point out in adventure paths.The problem is that every part of the book we spend telling you how to run an Adventure Path differently makes us have less room to present it in it's baseline form.
Frankly... the kind of advice you're looking for is best handled by these boards, rather than in print.
HW, I am of the school of thought that GM's are given the creative control to adjust, modify, add to and take away from the AP as needed to fit character story arcs. And I know through years of speaking to folks like James and Sean K on these boards (not to mention the numerous GM;s out there) that Paizo is not in the business of telling GM's HOW to do anything. We get 6 adventures, a 32page companion book, a 64 page chronicles (more gm'ish book), and a player handbook per AP.
If we, as GM's, cant figure out a way to make the AP work for our players, how is James and the others going to know? They dont know our players at all. Even if they decided to add 1 page of GM content that fits your description, where do they begin? What information is most important. To you, you want cde, to me, I want xyz. One of us is still going to be upset when this page is produced.
And as for the message boards, not everyone has the ability or interest to go online looking for help. The adventures should be self-contained and not require the DM to post on the boards, or scour Google or whatever, hoping for help in scaling an adventure. Besides, online those answers most likely don't come from the person who knows the work best -- the writer.
Remember, you are not required to come to the boards for help, but they are provided by paizo for just such an occurance. And scaling the adventure must be done by the GM, who knows the players best, and knows what interests them. I cut out the entire scene in Legacy of Fire, where they put out a fire in the camp and to an investigation into the crime. In place of it, I started them off in Solku where they were hired by alma and added some encounters in the city, which they liked alot more. I did this without ever telling them, and they came up to me after and said they appreciated it. -just an example-
The answer to a slow adventure path isn't to "play more often or play longer sessions." We shouldn't have to change our schedule to fit the material. Our lives are not slave to the adventure. It is a tool that we use as we see fit. What I'm suggesting is to consider making adventure paths a little more adaptable and geared for groups with slightly different needs. I'm not talking about cutting out pages and pages of content here, just a sidebar or two would be most useful.
I have noticed you keep saying the Adventure path is a tool. I agree with you. I also agree with you that you shouldnt have to change your gaming hours to get through an AP faster. However, you, as GM, are the one that must make these cuts/additions to the AP. I know in each AP section of the boards, there are many GMs that have posted their unique changes/additions. I know the boards are the only place you are going to find this kind of information right now. It might not be what you want, but the ideas of each change might inspire you. They have me.
CC
Steve, what exactly do you mean with "fast-track"? Fast XP chart or an AP with less total levels? Or something else?
I meant the fast xp chart. Presumably it's come up, but I don't remember ever reading about the reasons against such an approach (other than dm preference).
If you want to see how it affects an AP, just look at the earlier ones, which were written under 3.5.
Does that mean if I run one of those with PF characters on the fast advancement track,the PCs will stay at about the right level?
If you want to see how it affects an AP, just look at the earlier ones, which were written under 3.5.Does that mean if I run one of those with PF characters on the fast advancement track,the PCs will stay at about the right level?
Yes. The 3.5 assumption is about 13 CR X encounters = enough XP to go from level X to X+1, which is roughly the same as the Fast xp track.
So essentially every Adventure Path has used the Fast xp track up until Kingmaker. (I don't remember if Council of Thieves uses the Fast track or the Medium track, but I thought it was the Fast track.)
I thought I read somewhere that some of the Medium xp adventure paths actually have story-based xp rewards deliberately thrown in so that the actual number of encounters is not that different from the Fast track. Am I misremembering and/or making that up? (Probably!)
What would be nice is for enemies that are primarily combat encounters (or at least are writen as such) are some tips about how that characters personality can come out during combat. Lines they might say, actions they might take, targets they choose, etc.
They better say them fast, given how most encounter last about three rounds. ^^
Yes. The 3.5 assumption is about 13 CR X encounters = enough XP to go from level X to X+1, which is roughly the same as the Fast xp track.
So essentially every Adventure Path has used the Fast xp track up until Kingmaker. (I don't remember if Council of Thieves uses the Fast track or the Medium track, but I thought it was the Fast track.)
I thought I read somewhere that some of the Medium xp adventure paths actually have story-based xp rewards deliberately thrown in so that the actual number of encounters is not that different from the Fast track. Am I misremembering and/or making that up? (Probably!)
No, they are in there, too.
Just a quick 2 cents, since I'm at work right now, but I saw Goti Runecaster brought up as an example of a negative NPC spread. I personally am loving the NPC bios for all of the reasons others have already mentioned. They are incredibly inspirational for me. It was precisely because of his bio that I have really been playing up the role and reputation of Goti in the Frozen Shadows game I am running right now. It is making for some really memorable story points resulting in the players doing some great roleplaying and critical thinking that is outside of the book's assumptions. I plan to share more once they've gotten through it.
I still would have preferred one more page on, say, Ulf Gormundr.
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Creative Director
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I'd also be curious as to whether a fast-track AP would ever be considered or what the downsides to that (beyond DM preferences) might be?
The main downside to a fast-track Adventure Path would be that GMs who prefer to run slow track games would have to do more work, and GMs who have gotten used to us doing the Medium track would have a possibly jarring experience switching over to a new style of play.
That said... the Rise of the Runelords revision does use the fast track.
Of course... in the long run, the difference between slow, medium, and fast tracks is about a level apiece...
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Creative Director
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Well, I'll fall back on "it depends on what the role of the NPC is". A prime example is Goti Runecaster from Night of Frozen Shadows.
For the vast majority of players he will be "that funky looking troll we killed in a room". He really didn't need one full page of backstory how he moved out of his moms basement.
But, man, would I have loved one more page of backstory and character quirks for Ameiko, Shalelu ( especially Shalelu ), Sandru and Koya.
I agree with Steve that more fleshed-out locations would also be nice, although we get very good write-ups in the non-adventure part of some cities like Kalsgad or Kasai.
Steve, what exactly do you mean with "fast-track"? Fast XP chart or an AP with less total levels? Or something else?
And thanks, James, for the info about the specific magic items. Much appreciated.
Probably worth keeping in mind that with Jade Regent, that format was still BRAND new. We were still sorting it out and figuring out how best to use it. And we were already starting Skull & Shackles before we had a significant amount of feedback on the new format, so really... it's not until Shattered Star that what we've learned in that customer feedback category is really starting to flesh out.
And the primary thing I've learned is that 4 NPCs is too much. For Shattered Star, it'll usually be just 2 NPCs, and they'll generally skew toward NPCs whom the PCs have more contact with... but we WILL still feature bad guy NPCs who need a bit more backstory to them.
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Creative Director
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If you want to see how it affects an AP, just look at the earlier ones, which were written under 3.5.
Switching to the Fast Track would pretty much allow us to have adventures that went 1... MAYBE 2 levels higher than they do now by the end... and the first third of the levels you gain would all be gained in the first adventure.
In fact... 3.5 used its own progression rate, which is an even faster one that the Fast Track.
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Creative Director
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If you want to see how it affects an AP, just look at the earlier ones, which were written under 3.5.Does that mean if I run one of those with PF characters on the fast advancement track,the PCs will stay at about the right level?
At the start, yes, but as you get higher level you'll probably lag 1 or 2 levels behind.
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Creative Director
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I thought I read somewhere that some of the Medium xp adventure paths actually have story-based xp rewards deliberately thrown in so that the actual number of encounters is not that different from the Fast track. Am I misremembering and/or making that up? (Probably!)
Actually... the reason story-based XP awards are in our Adventure Paths is because I'm a firm believer in giving out XP for non-combat resolutions to encounters, and for roleplaying, and for other things that happen to advance an adventure's plot without the PCs needing to roll initiative. Doesn't really have anything to do with padding XP totals at all.
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Creative Director
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Also, as this thread pretty well illustrates... no two GMs have the same needs or interests or desires, and that only further encourages me to keep doing things the way we're doing—aim for a middle of the road approach so that we can appeal to as many GM styles as possible, while minimizing the amount of GM adaptations needed for their specific games by adhering to the same baseline we've been adhering to.
That does mean that GMs who prefer games that significantly deviate from the baseline will need to do more work... but that is, to me, a better situation than one where the majority of the GMs have to do more work.
Actually... the reason story-based XP awards are in our Adventure Paths is because I'm a firm believer in giving out XP for non-combat resolutions to encounters, and for roleplaying, and for other things that happen to advance an adventure's plot without the PCs needing to roll initiative. Doesn't really have anything to do with padding XP totals at all.
I also like story awards (if I'm using XP at all, that is).
Nevertheless, I thought I read somewhere that there were more story rewards in the Medium xp track adventure paths compared to the Fast track adventure paths. My brain tends to make up random stuff, though.
And the primary thing I've learned is that 4 NPCs is too much. For Shattered Star, it'll usually be just 2 NPCs, and they'll generally skew toward NPCs whom the PCs have more contact with... but we WILL still feature bad guy NPCs who need a bit more backstory to them.
That's great news and I am happy to hear it. :)
Switching to the Fast Track would pretty much allow us to have adventures that went 1... MAYBE 2 levels higher than they do now by the end... and the first third of the levels you gain would all be gained in the first adventure.
Well, that doesn't exactly correlate with your past APs. Rise of the Runelords, Second Darkness and Curse of the Crimson Throne all had the PCs begin the the seccond module at fourth level, which is only about a fourth of the total levels they would gain throughout the whole AP. Legacy of Fire had them start module two at level five, which is more like what you said.