Orthos |
Paladin: Any idea who s/he'll worship? Erastil gets a lot of attention early on in the AP, if s/he goes with that you can play it up a little more.
Cavalier: Yes, lots of mounted combat opportunities early on and pretty steadily throughout (there's even at least one dungeon that's big enough for horses to enter, in Book 3 Varnhold Vanishing).
Ranger Elf: There's a lot of opportunity to bring in new communities, but unless he waits until after the kingdom is built up and puts them in a sheltered zone there's just as much potential for outside effects or influence to screw with things. It's very luck-of-the-dice sometimes, unless the players plan well in advance.
Magus: KM, except in a few of the dungeons, is very prone to 15-min-day syndrome, doubly so in Book 1. Unless your dice are hot and you roll encounters constantly, players can go with one or two (or sometimes zero) interactions a day while they explore the hexes. Spellcasters can generally burn through their tricks with little fear of trouble unless the GM gets lucky with encounter rolls. I have a magus in my game, but he's new to the game and far from optimized, nor does he use his tactics to the most effective measure. He's still managed to carry his own; the Oracle and Barbarian just outpace him pretty strongly due to good rolls on the former and brutal stats on the latter.
Caineach |
The Paladin and Cavalier will be fine. Bards work great in Kingmaker and there are some good senarios for them, especially after book 1 (Grigori is a great enemy bard). Ranger/Bard is will do fine.
Dealing with PC magic is where Kingmaker kind of falls flat. Will saves are actually the weakness of most enemies - so that sorc will be powerful. But if he is a good player for it, he can make it memorable and fun.
Be glad the Magus is not a full caster, given the description of the player. Magus has high burst damage, and Kingmaker suffers from having too few rounds of combat per day, so expect him to shine even brighter than normal. Make sure you keep his spell book in check - there is not an easy way early in the game for them to get new spells and you should keep it that way. Don't let them treat it like there is a magic market with everything they need, cause those higher level spell scrolls should not be easy to find on the frontier. Also, if the player is trying to do some of the rediculous things like get extra attacks through quickened spells or light (since it is technically touch attack), reign him in. Magus is ballanced when played normally, but is easy to twink to dumb levels.
One thing you probably want to do is roll encounters ahead of time and then combine multiple combat ones into 1 day, as opposed to the <~1/day that you will get with how it works. It will make for more uneventful days, but will reduce the high power of the magus.
As for the elven kingdom, you should read up on the elves in the campaign world and decide if you want to modify them. Go with what feels like it will e the most fun for your players, not what fits the established world. Let your player drive his creation of an elven nation. Let them build everything in the trees if they want. Let them drive the kingdom building. Perhaps you can add a small elven comunity in the area, or the hotspring town (forget the name, its attack starts book 4) is founded by an elf instead. You could even seed the idea in the player's head and have one of his contacts recomend the spot as a good city location.
Irnk, Dead-Eye's Prodigal |
Kingmaker has a very low encounter-per-day ratio as written. If your Magus Player has a tendency to nova that is something you will need to account for. I strongly second Caineach's suggestion about pre-rolling encounters.
Also, While the later chapters do have some significant outside encounters, they don't really show up significantly until seventh level plus & most of the key combats even at those levels are indoors, the only 'dungeon' that you are likely to have the mount be able to maneuver in effectively is Vordakai's as Orthos pointed out. You might consider encouraging the Cavalier to look into archetypes that either switch the Mount feature out for something else, or bring the Mount in later. On the other hand, Cavalier is a class that works well as a team-player, Tactician & a number of other class abilities do a lot to help the party out, not just the Cavalier.
Kingmaker is very outdoor heavy (I realize I just recommended against a Mount-centric focus on the Cavalier but a lot of the outdoors in the first two chapters is forest & trying to charge a mount in forested terrain just screams bad idea to me), so a ranged combatant, of any stripe, will shine. As to the Elf angle, in the second chapter map there are the remains of a pre-Earthfall elven community, so that idea should work just fine. Pathfinder Elves don't really have the Fey connection that elves do in other RPG's, that would be Gnomes & even they don't really have an issue, unless you decide to make one.
Regarding the Fey in
On the other hand, depending on your comfort level with your own abilities, it's been pointed out that Chapter's 1 through 5 make a pretty solid AP on their own, you might swap out 'Sound of a Thousand Screams' for a more political/straight-up border war between the PC's kingdom & either Brevoy to the North or Mivon to the South (not both, at least not at the same time). The 'after the AP is over' article in 'Sound of a Thousand Screams' can give you some pointers there.
Orthos |
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Also, read the ideas Orthos has come up with in some of his Kingmaker threads.
Heh, I'm flattered. Thanks Irnk.
Here's some links for reference: (Warning, obviously spoileriffic)
Some revamped backstory on Nyrissa
The Rings of the Jabberwock - an item that in my campaign each of Nyrissa's "pawns" - The Stag Lord, Hargulka, Irovetti, etc. - will be wearing. A minor hint as to her involvement as early as book 1.
Nyrissa's Nobility stolen along with her Love - why she wants the Stolen Lands so badly, and what benefit it could provide to the Eldest (or, in my campaign, Queen Titania) as more than just a mere pretty bauble in a bottle
Rivers Run Red revamp: Hargulka's Monster Kingdom by Dudemeister - an awesome reflavoring of RRR that gives Hargulka some more activity, more personality, and ties him closer to Nyrissa.
Sound of a Thousand Screams GM thread - lots of ideas in here that can help foreshadow Nyrissa a little.
If you follow the other option and ditch the fey involvement, the "Return of the Conqueror" section of continuing the adventure is probably one of the best ways to end it. Great Wyrm dragon fight makes an awesome campaign capstone.
Crysknife |
Sorry for the first post missing: I was posting from one of my players' pc with his account. When I noticed, I tried to delete the thread and start a new one but it didn't really work.
Anyway, thank you for your answers!
I'm reading your links Orthos, great stuff! I'll also look ahead and see what to do with the elves. There is plenty of time, I don't think we will start before December.
It would seem that I'm right in fearing the magus: I talked with the player but I will not veto the class, I'll see how things will go. The suggestion about the black blade is nice, I think I'll push him in that direction.
Thanks again guys!