Bringing Carrion Crown into a Steampunk / Cyberpunk setting.

[palindromicsquare]

Before I ran The Haunting of Harrowstone, I came up with an extremely rough outline for possibly turning it into a sort of steampunk or cyberpunk campaign instead. In my defense I was heavily into the TRON: Legacy Soundtrack. I'm looking to see if anyone here has any critiques on how I can make it better or what kind of system would be a good one to run it.

So it'd be like a steampunk/cyberpunk kind of world, where people wore clockwork clothing and monocles that held more than just clearer sight. The prevalent color was blue, and although everything looked at felt so futuristic, they didn’t have automobiles. They had carriages. Carriages drawn by jet black organic horses if you were rich, and automaton clockwork horses if you were poor. True organic bred animals would be hard to find, and mages and folks of a magical nature with familiars were hard to come by, at least those who you felt were doing their job correctly. An automated cat or raven just didn’t seem to hold the right kind of feeling.

The horses and automated animals would also have monocles.

The feel of Ravengro would be a poor Steampunk town, with run down gears and shops and carriages. Merchants came rarely, but when they did they would bring the finest metals and gears and clockworks from Lepidstadt or wherever they had come from. But, even as rarely as they came—their visits kept getting shorter and shorter. There was rumor coming from Ravengro. And not just rumors, but uncomfortable feelings.

The mill house at the top of the hill. It holds the source of power for Ravengro—the electricity and sense of security. But something’s wrong with the mill house, and the people of Ravengro can tell. Their monocles are breaking. The problem with the monocles is that in this world, you’re born with it. So when it breaks, a part of you breaks. The people of Ravengro are slowly going insane.

Professor Lorrimor takes it upon himself to go to Harrowstone, the mill house, to figure out what’s going on.

& that’s when the player characters come in, after his untimely demise.

Long story short, The Whispering Way had implanted a series of viruses in the main computer of Harrowstone, and it had spread throughout the levels of the mill house, reaching the supply that held the information for the Warden Program, that held back the numerous problems that the mill house could cause Ravengro and the monocles if a virus were to penetrate the system. But the virus presented by The Whispering Way was incredibly powerful and didn’t take long to infiltrate. It released the programs being held back by the Warden Program—viruses placed as a failsafe incase something were to happen and the information regarding the people of Ravengro needed to be destroyed. Of course, these 5 programs are only supposed to be released if the entire city of Ravengro has been destroyed—the programs target the systems relaying to the monocles, the systems that record the lives and the powers and the history of the city and its people.

Your mission is to enter the millhouse and discover the codes to disable all 5 programs: Splatter, Charlatan, Axe, Mosswater, and Piper.

That’s really all I was able to come up with. What do you guys think? I know it's a rough sketch with a bunch of loopholes. I know it goes through being steampunk and then cyberpunk--it's really just a jumble in my brain.

[mjb235]

I really like this setting! I may just have to steal it! Hehehe.

But I think a great system to mine would be Shadowrun. (I've played 4e, but I hear a lot of people swear by the 3rd edition) It will have a much more futuristic vibe than what you seem to be getting at (Steampunk with some computers?) so you would have to adjust a few things. I would suggest using a more "magic" vibe with the computers and removing the hackers from the system. That way the "technomancers" would be the only ones capable of interfacing with the machines.

Now if that system doesn't work for you, you might also consider adjusting the pathfinder rules to work for you. A lot of the basic rules are in place with guns (Maybe go up to "Guns are everywhere" rules) and some clockworky things. Privateer Press had a rules supplement for 3.5 called "Iron Kingdoms" (Recently rereleased as its own rules system) that gave off a very distinct Steampunk feel. I'm not sure how you might have characters "hack" the "computers" though. Maybe work with some people on the forums here to design a new base class (Or prestige class). Or you could treat all the computers as a type of mage construct that anyone can interact with. I'm not sure.

Either way, hope you end up running it! This version sounds very creepy. And could fit the theme of the AP really well.

[palindromicsquare]

Hm. I haven't taken a look at Shadowrun, but I hear it's a pretty neat system. Iron Kingdoms is definitely something to look at as well. I'm definitely feeling more Steampunk than Cyberpunk, however I'm not really sure how to convey the ghosts in a Steampunk way. I really like the idea of adding more magic to it.

But these are very good ideas, and I'm going to keep them in mind if I decide to run it. Thank you so much!

[blindiebyrd]

I'm running Rise right now, but I'm doing Crown next and I'm thinking Steampunk is the way to go with it. Zeitgeist has some neat stuff in it that may help with the setting. I'm very interested to see how your game goes. Please keep us updated. :)

[Pendagast]

So ghosts can still be ghosts in steampunk, everything doesn't HAVE to be mechanical.

You can use Hellboy movies as a good example of mixture of steampunk and swords and sorcery.

I dunno if "Guns are every where" theme is good, you will detract too much from people who want to play non gun types. But anyone who wants to play a gun type should be able to, and get/buy guns and ammo.

I did this a bit with Serpent's skull (under the idea that lost azlanti technology was guns, alchemical golems, clock work stuff etc.... ie ancient lost technology)

[Victor Zajic]

I'd don't think pathfinder is the right system to run the type of game you are describing. I also don't think what you are describing is steampunk. An important part of steam punk is the victorian setting and sensibilities; it's not just gears and monocles everywhere. What you are describing is more science fiction, not really steampunk. While you idea sounds silly and fun, the Carrion Crow AP has a pretty serious story to tell, and nothing defuses fear and horror faster than humor.

However, converting Carrion Crown to steampunk wouldn't be especially difficult. A lot of the adventure path takes place in major cities with universities, which easily could be the centers of high science, ingenuity, and invention.

What you would want to emphasis, though, is the difference between the urban steampunk centers, and the small rural villages. Ravengrow would not be a center of steampunk inovation, and people from the more urban population centers could either scoff at the ignorant, backwards yokels, or be entralled with the idealized pastoral charm of country life, away from the smoke and noise of the big cities.

Beyond using advanced gun rules, I would suggest having a good deal of wonderous items for sale that mimic spells and magical abilities. A lightning gun could be a modified wand of scorching ray, that does lightning damage and doesn't require spell trigger to active. But such things wouldn't be available until the party got to lepidstahd, or if the part has a steampunk scientist in it.

[palindromicsquare]

Such great ideas guys, thank you so much for reading my idea! I'm going to have to do a lot more research if I'm going to try running something like this.

I do have one player specifically who is into the whole gun-toting thing, so I would have guns available, but not at an excess. Clockworks and alchemical things have always been a fascination of mine.

I do however want to make a few things clear: I do realize that Pathfinder isn't the best system to run the game I was thinking about. But I was told to come here and suggest it because the people on here are much more versed in not just Pathfinder, but other roleplaying systems and would be able to help me find one better suited for me. Thank you for putting it into a better definition, science fiction I think would be better suited. I am however very familiar with Victorian ideals and the Steampunk world, I just couldn't come up with a better suited term to get my idea across. I apologize if I offended.

Having played through The Haunting of Harrowstone verbatim and now running through Trial of the Beast, one of my favorite aspects about it is that it is horror. I just wanted to play with the main idea of the story. I also have a group of players that, while interested in the horror aspect, tend to disintegrate down into a bit of comedy (which isn't a bad thing...it's just sometimes I feel the horror aspect is lessened, but that's my DM problem, not the AP's).

Great ideas, and I'll definitely be writing them down. I do need to familiarize myself with the world of wondrous items, especially in a world like this. That lightning gun sounds like a marvelous idea.

[Overcast]

I'd like to kind of make an observation, not on the steampunk (which I feel is a wonderful idea) but on the comment that Carrion Crown is horror, with a serious story to tell. Honestly, while this adventure path has been a diverting and entertaining one, as a vehicle to tell a horror adventure, it is a failure. Horror is so much more than providing a gothic setting for an adventure, and there are so many missing elements that I hardly know where to start. From poor rule design and overused plot devices (here's looking at you, haunts), to a disjointed story, to a lack of grey morality (anytime a PC might have to make a morally 'grey' decision, the authors gave them an easy out, such as creating a 'non-evil' werewolf tribe to ally with).

I picked up this path because it reminded me a lot of the Ravenloft setting, but it falls far short of capturing that feeling of personal horror that Ravenloft conveyed so well. Make no mistake, my players and I are enjoying Carrion Crown, but only after I restructured the themes to fit a more heroic, high-fantasy feeling, because it was failing as a horror story. And that's why I think it's a perfect fit for your Steampunk setting, because a bit of humor (and story reconstruction) could go a long way into making this a better adventure path.