What aspects of Game of Thrones are you trying to emulate? The characters? The politics? Family rivalry? The rarity of magic and monsters?
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Kingmaker.
The political situation in Brevoy sets up the adventure path, and those politics, I believe, were inspired by Game of Thrones. I'm sure I read that somewhere, probably in the Kingmaker forums. The AP doesn't really touch on the alliances and disagreements of the prominent families of Brevoy, but when I ran it for my players I really ramped up the political machinations of the Surtovas (who I used as the de facto Lannisters).
Building your own kingdom, dealing with threats to your growing realm, and eventually fighting massed battles and deposing a king all sound pretty Game of Thrones to me.
During the campaign, some of my players starting getting involved 'off-screen' with the politics back in Brevoy, even marrying off their relatives to strengthen connections with powerful families who opposed the Surtovas. Essentially, the Game of Thrones style background manipulations and betrayals can be catered for away from the table since not everyone might enjoy spending a long time on that kind of stuff.
I introduced an NPC who was the rightful heir to the throne of Brevoy who was sent with the PCs to take charge of 'their' kingdom. In fact he was just a spoilt kid who came to realise he knew nothing, was pretty useless at ruling, and had probably been sent into the boonies by his relatives in the hopes that he'd get killed. The players hated (HATED) him at first, but as the campaign went on and they grew to understand him and why he had been sent with them, they came to feel sorry for him. Then I had him killed on a hunting trip - sound familiar? Heheh.
So, yeah, Kingmaker is set up perfectly for a Game of Thrones style game, and there's plenty of scope for you as GM to make it even more Game of Thrones-y than it already is.
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See thread. Hope this helps you! It would have helped me a lot if I had the heart to do it! I would rather play it, myself!
Echoing kingmaker on this though I'd posit that any adventure can take on a political aspect if you wish. Personally I think pathfinder society scenarios do a good job with politics
As I am currently playing in a KM game, run by our very talented and eloquent GM_solspiral, I would say yes. I strongly suspect the most work is on the GM's part. Think the trick here is get them invested in politics and kingdom building early on, a good story hook makes getting new players into the game much easier. You were right to do your own players guide as well, I think with enough planning and some quality sitdown and discuss time with your players about their backgrounds and motivations that things should go quite well.
Kingmaker actually is the wrong AP (if taken as written (<-emphasis mine)), contrary to what people say here. While it starts in Brevoy, it has absolutely nothing to do with that nations politics.
Of course nothing stops you from disregarding the later parts of the AP and start to get involved heavily in Brevoy politics with your new nation. But the closest as RAW Kingmaker gets to serious politics is the tournament of King Irovetti.
There are many very good KM enhancements and mods that have been made by many good GM, and they are available for free. Mag has a point that as written it leaves a bit to be desired. However as I said earlier, playing in a heavily mod'd KM game with expanded kingdom building an political scope. Would still stay such a game could easily be very much turned into a Game of Thrones style adventure.
I would pose that if you to run KM, book one seems to be the hardest to integrate as written. Another GM started the AP for us, and bailed out after book one as GM because there was to much for him to handle, so he said. Thus my good bud GM_solspiral took over the KM AP and made it his own, and it has been a KILLER game since the beginning of book 2. He has also posted some great info on the boards, under the rivers run redder thread (a chronicle of many of his personal changes, and of the parties doings, funny threat that) and expanded kingdom building rules and politics. These threads do have allot of great stuff to help your thinking David. I will admit that book one felt very pelmel. We just sort of ran around the local sandbox and things happened as we triggered them. It was not unlikable, but if a Game of Thrones vibe is the desired flavor, then perhaps narrowing the scope of book one might be helpful. If it were me, I would pick out the parts of book one that I liked or that fit the flavor, and expand them, while cutting down on some of the encounters and themes that didn't seem to fit what I was going for. Hope that helps, good luck and enjoy!
Well, maybe you should homebrew something in Brevoy, then, instead of running Kingmaker. The first module of Kingmaker has the Brevoy gazeteer. House Surtova are taking more or less the place of the Lannisters in the setting.
Well, maybe you should homebrew something in Brevoy, then, instead of running Kingmaker. The first module of Kingmaker has the Brevoy gazeteer. House Surtova are taking more or less the place of the Lannisters in the setting.
This is probably the best option.
Your best bet is to sit down, homebrew up additional houses in Brevoy, decide where each stands in the politics of the country, decide which of the power players are clever, ambitious, or backstabbing, and finally make a story unfold where the PCs simply can not ride directly up and try to defeat their 'enemy'.
Make sure they are never sure who is pulling who's strings, and that there are social repercussions for accusing people of things you can not prove. Make the 'intrigue' a tangible part of each story line.
I'll point out a few things...
1) Kingmaker is close enough to Brevoy for the politics to spill over.
2) Pcs get their own kingdom and there's kingdom building rules and a leadership council built in.
3) Mass combat rules
4) Kingmaker forums are frakin' stuffed with DMs that do useful mods many of who are politically minded when making the mods and there are thousands of posts to steal from.
If not running the Kingmaker AP I'd still pick up KM 1 for the political stuff in Brevoy, KM 2 for the kingdom building rules (again though mods and expansions on this all over KM forums), and KM 5 for mass combat rules that involve raising an army compatable with rules from book 2.
That's already basically buying 1/2 the AP why not just run it and mod it.
that's my 2 pennies.
What about Curse of the Crimson Throne? Granted, it's 3.5 so some conversion is needed (and probably available). It includes some dirty politics in a city with a more and more tyrannical ruler. If the book 4 and 5 detours outside of the city don't appeal, I'm sure that some GM in the CotCT forum has some alternative suggestions.
I will mention there is a GoT RPG, it seemed decent, but differs greatly from PF or 3.5. Could always use some of its material, but home brew/cut and paste in out what you want. That would be allot of work I suspect, but may pay off in the end. Also, if its monsters you want to avoid, to keep the GoT vibe strong, if you used KM then I would just play up the Stag Lord, the Sword Lords, and other important human NPC in the game, and sub out monsters with humans.