Advice for somebody thinking about running Curse of the Crimson Throne

[Skeletal Steve]

Hi there! I've been combing over the forums for this AP for a week or so, and was just wondering if anybody had any tips or tricks or things they wish they had known/seen before running CotCT. Pitfalls to look out for, story bits to play up, etc. Still got a couple of weeks before I am in line to run it, so just seeing if there were any ideas or thoughts I may of missed!

Thanks in advance.

[MrVergee]

Hi Steve

First of all, congrats on starting this wonderful AP. You've made an excellent choice.

The biggest tip I can give you is to read these boards very carefully. Many DM's have given their ideas, compliments or doubts about certain aspects of the adventure. There are also tons of suggestions to adapt the game. Keep in mind that the game should suit your group, so whatever changes you want to make, be sure your players like them. It really is a question of personal taste.

It is also very important to read the complete AP in advance and try to make Korvosa your own. This way it will be easier to 'wing it' when circumstances demand it or to foreshadow certain NPC's or events.

The fourth and fifth installment of the AP have been 'criticized' the most, because these adventures are not to everyone's taste. Adventure 4 is a huge railroad, which some players don't like, but maybe yours don't mind at all. Adventure 5 is a huge dungeon crawl (actually a 'castle' crawl). It is superbly written, but again big dungeon crawls might not be up your players' alley. Adventure 4 and 5 also take the PCs away from the city of Korvosa for quite a long time. Again this is an aspect that some DMs or players haven't liked in the past, but then again, there are tons of people who loved it. Anyway, if you like these adventures, there's absolutely no need to change anything. If you'd like to make changes though, these boards offer tons of excellent suggestions.

I hope you have fun playing Curse of the Crimson Throne.

[IcedMik]

When helping your players make up backstories for the PCs, the player's guide talks a lot about Gaedren, when he's actually wiped out in the first session. If your players like weaving their characters into the story, try to downplay Gaedren for more ties to the city of Korvosa. The campaign is about their home city being ruined by the new queen, so make sure they have ties to the city and reasons not to abandon it.

[Aberrant Templar]

IcedMik wrote:

When helping your players make up backstories for the PCs, the player's guide talks a lot about Gaedren, when he's actually wiped out in the first session. If your players like weaving their characters into the story, try to downplay Gaedren for more ties to the city of Korvosa. The campaign is about their home city being ruined by the new queen, so make sure they have ties to the city and reasons not to abandon it.

I totally agree that the characters need a strong connection to the city. Gaedren is a plot device for why the characters get together in the first adventure and form a party, but you'll want to make sure there's a reason for them to stay together after he dies.

[Aeshuura]

Like everyone else said, try to find a way to get your players to actually find something that they like about the city.

When I played through, basically the biggest complaint that I kept hearing from players was, "Gah, I hate this city! Why are we saving it anyway?"

It was only because it was my character's home that I was the driving force behind it all.

[Dread]

one of the things Ive done is have each player create information on three npc's they have as contacts- name, relationship, job, and then I gave them 2 more from the Korovsa city guide,

that gave them 5 people they knew...I let them use these people as sources of information and resources.

then when things start happening to them.....

it makes it personal

[Luz]

Don't be afraid to change things up if they are not to your liking. For instance:

Spoiler:

I was not a fan of the Blackjack subplot at all, so I scrapped it entirely and went ahead with the execution. This had way more dramatic impact on my group than the contrived cutscene.

On the other hand, I really liked the turf war potential between the Arkonas and the Emperor of Old Korvosa. This wasn't really fleshed out enough for me so I modified some city encounters to build up some tension between the two. So far it has worked out really well.

Just some examples of what worked in my campaign. Its an excellent AP and flexible enough to accommodate changes without interfering with the overall plot.

[Tels]

Also, some things that should have been included in each chapter is tie-ins to the next chapter. I only managed to get each book one at a time (ordering problems) so somethings came as to me out of the blue.

For instance, try foreshadowing the events in Seven Days, and Escape from Old Korvosa. If PCS attempt to gather information in Edge of Anarchy, drop little hints like, 'There's a fever going around' or 'You heard there's been a surge of visits to Abadar for a fever' etc. etc.

For Escape, the tidbit of the Grey Maidens destroying the access to Old Korvosa should have been in Seven Days, so I had to backtrack a little for my players.

There have been a lot of really good alternatives to the 6th Book, make sure to read them and determine what it is you want to do. Try and work out any potential story plots a head of time, even if it's just notes on a card that you can use to wing-it later.

Curse of the Crimson Throne, as a 3.5 AP, has less Experience Rewards than the Pathfinder modules, so you'll have to do some sidequests to make up for it. Try to come up with some good ones to do for this. Things like an upsurge in undead in the Grey District during the Seven Days arc, or Orc Marauders in History of Ashes. I included a turf war between Blink Dogs and Phase Spiders during my HoA that the players really liked.

I also used the 3.5 Meat Grinder dungeon, the Seven Swords of Sin as a side quest for my group. It coincided with the party needing a diamond and a True Ressurection for a fallen player during the Flameford camp assault, and the Abdarians sent the party on a quest to reclaim the swords. I warn you, the dungeon is pretty tough, even for 10th level characters, but the reason I really wanted to do it, was as a glimpse for things to come in Scarwall. I didn't want my party going in there and having to face Scarwall since few of them had any dungeon crawl experience, as most of them were brand new players.

For reference, my Scarwall blocks access to Extradimensional spaces thanks to the amplified Dimensional Lock on the place. I did it so they would get the hint that things like Teleport, Dimension Door etc. wouldn't work in there, so they wouldn't get cocky. When my Players first tried to get into Scarwall, they encountered the skeletons on the bridge (my own version) and they took such a beating that they never even made it inside the gate, before having to retreat.

So to sum it up:
1) Foreshadow events.
2) Determine additional XP ahead of time.
3) Decide on the story you want to tell.

[Wyrd_Wik]

All very good advice. CocT was I think the best campaign I've ran, and the best of the APs I've read.

1. Be upfront with the players, the characters need to have a stake in the city. A motivation to want to save it. If they build this into their background they'll have much more enjoyment plus they'll also create some backstories that you'll be able to weave into the events of the AP.

2. Books 4 and 5 are good but I would suggest cutting it down a bit to keep the plot going forward. My group actually really liked History of Ashes (again it helped that we had two Shoanti characters who had a connection to 1000 Bones) Scarwall is a kick-ass dungeon but it is huge so it can be a bit of a slog.

3. I made the re-taking of the city a bit more epic as the party had worked hard to forge alliances with the Shoanti and Magnimar. Nothing like leading an army on the field to say hey we're high level.

[Shadar Aman]

Tels wrote:

Also, some things that should have been included in each chapter is tie-ins to the next chapter. I only managed to get each book one at a time (ordering problems) so somethings came as to me out of the blue.

For instance, try foreshadowing the events in Seven Days, and Escape from Old Korvosa. If PCS attempt to gather information in Edge of Anarchy, drop little hints like, 'There's a fever going around' or 'You heard there's been a surge of visits to Abadar for a fever' etc. etc.

For Escape, the tidbit of the Grey Maidens destroying the access to Old Korvosa should have been in Seven Days, so I had to backtrack a little for my players....

Some good advice in general, but I have a couple comments in response to your foreshadowing advice.

Seven Days to the Grave spoilers:

One of the first events in 7DttG is the sinking of the Direption, which is one of the ways the plague is introduced to Korvosa. The other tainted coins are introduced in a similar time frame. As written, there should be no hint of the plague during the events of Edge of Anarchy. One of the things that makes the plague so scary is that it basically comes out of nowhere and spreads like wildfire.

If you think this would be too jarring for your players (or for you), then foreshadowing it would work fine. If I were going to do that, I would probably start with rumors about a strange ship being sunk in the Jeggare, then follow that with rumors about a fever going around. Basically move part of 7DttG into the last parts of EoA.

The quarantine of Old Korvosa actually is in 7DttG (the sidebar on page 44), but it's really easy to miss if you don't know what's coming. For the players, it's even easier to miss, so I would definitely encourage playing that up a bit more. Just don't actually let your players stop it from happening....

Another thing that can be worth foreshadowing is the Cinderlander (from History of Ashes).

For the experience issue, the other option is to use the Fast XP track instead of Medium. This brings Pathfinder advancement more in line with 3.5 expectations. If you play frequently enough that getting through an AP takes a reasonable amount of time, then adding in extra content is a really great thing to do, and I encourage it. For me, it would stretch the time required into the realm of the truly absurd.

Definitely try to read through the whole AP if you can, and if there are changes you want to make, note them now so you can adjust for them.

[Tels]

Shadar Aman wrote:

Tels wrote:

Also, some things that should have been included in each chapter is tie-ins to the next chapter. I only managed to get each book one at a time (ordering problems) so somethings came as to me out of the blue.

For instance, try foreshadowing the events in Seven Days, and Escape from Old Korvosa. If PCS attempt to gather information in Edge of Anarchy, drop little hints like, 'There's a fever going around' or 'You heard there's been a surge of visits to Abadar for a fever' etc. etc.

For Escape, the tidbit of the Grey Maidens destroying the access to Old Korvosa should have been in Seven Days, so I had to backtrack a little for my players....

Some good advice in general, but I have a couple comments in response to your foreshadowing advice.

** spoiler omitted **

Another thing that can be worth foreshadowing is the Cinderlander (from History of Ashes).

For the experience issue, the other option is to use the Fast XP...

Seven Days to the Grave:

Keep in mind, the sinking of the Direption served two purposes, infection and distraction. While a large amount of people were infected due to the Death's Hand Coffers, there were other methods employed by the Urgathoans. The only one specifically mentioned was using the Bank of Abadar to infect people on Page 9 under 'Part One: Infection'.

[Shadar Aman]

Tels wrote:

Shadar Aman wrote:

Tels wrote:

Also, some things that should have been included in each chapter is tie-ins to the next chapter. I only managed to get each book one at a time (ordering problems) so somethings came as to me out of the blue.

For instance, try foreshadowing the events in Seven Days, and Escape from Old Korvosa. If PCS attempt to gather information in Edge of Anarchy, drop little hints like, 'There's a fever going around' or 'You heard there's been a surge of visits to Abadar for a fever' etc. etc.

For Escape, the tidbit of the Grey Maidens destroying the access to Old Korvosa should have been in Seven Days, so I had to backtrack a little for my players....

Some good advice in general, but I have a couple comments in response to your foreshadowing advice.

** spoiler omitted **

Another thing that can be worth foreshadowing is the Cinderlander (from History of Ashes).

For the experience issue, the other option is to use the Fast XP...

** spoiler omitted **

Seven Graves to the Day?:

That's true. You could certainly say that the other coins were introduced earlier. I read it as suggesting they all occurred around the same time (so the Direption could distract from the other events), but there's nothing stopping you from handling it differently. I guess I just like the unexpectedness of the plague without foreshadowing.

[Skeletal Steve]

First of all, I'd like to thank everybody for their input and tips. I'm definitely going to be using the fast XP track for this adventure. Especially because it is going to be 6 players with some of them new, but in reading I am really excited about this adventure. Some of the later stuff does worry me, but if it gets to that I can always change stuff around and run by the seat of my pants.

Got some new roleplayers in the group, so they idea to having a connection to Korvosa is a good one. I probably played up Lamm a bit too much in my intro bit, so maybe pushing my players to have a connection to the city would be a good one.

I was thinking about instituting something like the "contacts" system from Shadowrun. Where there might be a couple of people in the city they might know/care about to give some hooks and such.

One of the upsides is that this is an every other weekend game, so I have some time to plot and prepare.

Thanks again!

[Shadar Aman]

Skeletal Steve wrote:

First of all, I'd like to thank everybody for their input and tips. I'm definitely going to be using the fast XP track for this adventure. Especially because it is going to be 6 players with some of them new, but in reading I am really excited about this adventure. Some of the later stuff does worry me, but if it gets to that I can always change stuff around and run by the seat of my pants.

Got some new roleplayers in the group, so they idea to having a connection to Korvosa is a good one. I probably played up Lamm a bit too much in my intro bit, so maybe pushing my players to have a connection to the city would be a good one.

I was thinking about instituting something like the "contacts" system from Shadowrun. Where there might be a couple of people in the city they might know/care about to give some hooks and such.

One of the upsides is that this is an every other weekend game, so I have some time to plot and prepare.

Thanks again!

Contacts are a very good idea for this campaign. And once you're actually using a system for them, it's easy to add important NPCs as contacts when the players meet them. I think there's a contact system in Ultimate Campaign. I would give you a link to the rules on the PRD, but the site is running too slowly at the moment.

[Aeshuura]

Good luck man! I would consider running this one sometime down the road. I think it would be fun, but as it is, I have a pretty full plate.

I would be interested in hearing how things turn out!

[EvilMinion]

Thoughts from someone who's playing it.

Spoilers Ahoy:

Don't let Lamm be their main focus... he seemed little more then a speed bump, so they need something more to keep them focused once he's out of the picture. The dead gypsy lady's head in the box was totally creepy! I didn't see that coming at all, and then having her in the card deck as an intelligent item was cool, and made for an interesting NPC from that point on.

The Black Jack stuff, to me, seemed a bit goofy. Didn't much care for it, but others feel different.

Definitely build up personal connections for the PC's inside the city. There's so much bad stuff dropped on that city in short succession, even we the players were feeling a little overwhelmed and desperate for a while.

Some of the crossover from 7Days to Escape were a bit jarring in that, after the plague breaks out, and they cordon off Old Korvosa, how exactly did those people get cured? Escape starts basically under the assumption that the plague is over, yet Old Korvosa is still quarantined. I'd suggest having the cure apply only to the other parts of the town, and still have stuff going on in Old Korvosa (perhaps toned down some). If the players were involved with the cure, they can help to fix that situation while they're there... which could lead to some great relations with that part of town in chapter 6 when it might matter.

Our final assault on the Urgathoa temple was a hastily concocted well-planned precision strike we wanted them dead so badly... Rolth especially... (we ran into him much earlier when we made a tactical error and he showed up to kick our asses briefly and destroy some evidence we'd collected but not yet been able to turn in) Hell, don't be afraid to have Rolth show up a time or two earlier in person... we hated him sooooo much! He made a great recurring villain for a short period. Although I don't know if it was in the regular module, when we did catch up to him in the temple, he was just finishing upgrading the plague to a plague zombie version... there was a collective sigh of relief when we stopped that.

Chapter 3 was interesting... the stuff with Pilts was ok, though we bypassed the whole Blood Pig thing which might have been fun to try =). The Arkona mansion was a challenge and though we capped everyone cause we were all long-time paranoid RPG players and didn't fall for all that fancy talk, I could easily see the far reaching ramifications of allowing some of them to continue on. Quite the power vaccuum there, however it goes.

Chapter 4 was quite railroady... the PC's reasons for going out there were fine and made sense to me, but all the frickin' hoops the Shoanti have them jump through? Bleh. (Though we did have the most deaths in that chapter!)

Scarwall was awesome, don't cut it down! Though its level of awsome might depend on your PC's backgrounds. (Gods will your players hate non-corporeal stuff long before its done) And the encounter with the Devil will be good practice for the mass teleport assault that will hit them in Chapter 6. We lost one person here too, though it was not to anything that you'd expect to have caused a death really.

Final Chapter still in progress, but holy crap can alot of trouble decend on you in short order inside the castle with all those teleporting devils in there.

[Skeletal Steve]

EvilMinion wrote:

Thoughts from someone who's playing it.

** spoiler omitted **...

Thanks for the input of a player! That really helps me look at things from a new direction and consider how some things play out. I've got several new players in my group, so seeing how they react to some of these situations will be important and being able to build on the fly to them.

Responding to said spoiler:

Part of me is starting to agree on Blackjack. But another part of me worries that if the execution goes through I'm not sure how some of the new players may react. It's already kind of a shock the things they are going to get thrown at them that are vastly different from the usual MMO fare. I guess I will have to play it by ear when I get there.

Also, somebody already did a complete pathfinderized monsters for each book of Cotct on the PFSRD. So I can easily print out the monster's sheet and have it available. Mwahaha!

[Korbem]

I am currently running Cotct as well and so far everything is running relatively smoothly, I did read the boards in advance as well and demanded upon character creation that all PC's had strong ties to the city woven into their background.

I guess one of the main things is knowing your players, mine like solving and figuring things out, this drive is so strong that is sometimes interferes with their otherwise solid roleplaying :

SPOILER

Who is blackjack ? Well, I don't know... there is a fencing master with a spanish/italian sounding name : Vencarlo Orisini, he might as well have been called Don diego de la vega.

These types of transparant ruses won't work, Glorio/Bahor the Rakshasa will be unmasked within seconds if I play it as written, my advice : don't, adjust it to your players as you know them best, regardless how well written the AP might be.

I also plan to change the end fight a little bit, as they strike Illeosa down the true might of The ancient blue dragon will come crashing down !

The final fight will also take place in the pyramid underneath Castle Korvosa.

[Tels]

Korbem wrote:

I am currently running Cotct as well and so far everything is running relatively smoothly, I did read the boards in advance as well and demanded upon character creation that all PC's had strong ties to the city woven into their background.

I guess one of the main things is knowing your players, mine like solving and figuring things out, this drive is so strong that is sometimes interferes with their otherwise solid roleplaying :

SPOILER

Who is blackjack ? Well, I don't know... there is a fencing master with a spanish/italian sounding name : Vencarlo Orisini, he might as well have been called Don diego de la vega.

These types of transparant ruses won't work, Glorio/Bahor the Rakshasa will be unmasked within seconds if I play it as written, my advice : don't, adjust it to your players as you know them best, regardless how well written the AP might be.

I also plan to change the end fight a little bit, as they strike Illeosa down the true might of The ancient blue dragon will come crashing down !

The final fight will also take place in the pyramid underneath Castle Korvosa.

Grand Mastaba:

Keep in mind, that Pyramid is the lair of the Runelord Sorshen. She sleeps in the Mastaba, awaiting to be woken up. Not sure if you were aware, but it's something to keep in mind.

[Knick]

The best tip already came from MrVergee, but I will stress one other tidbit. I have run this adventure path to completion for two groups now, and there is one thing that I learned the first time around. The adventure as written goes: the characters assemble, go raid the fishery, Korvosa is in flames.

My first group never got to know what Korvosa was like before the anarchy. The sense of attachment was bad. A few of them weren't really sure why their characters would want to save the city. So the next time I ran it, I expanded Lamm's organization and had the PCs taking it down piece by piece, focusing a lot on the shiver dealing the book suggests he's involved in. This gave the party almost two weeks of game time to "meet" Korvosa and allowed me to casually introduce lots of NPCs and locations. The Old Fishery was a bit anti-climactic after a fight against alchemists in a shiver lab with only thin glass separating everyone from hundreds of dream spiders, but Gaedren is out of his prime anyway.

I also invented some NPCs (neighbors, shopkeepers, etc.) so that there were a multitude of storytelling outlets. A few sentences can say a lot:

--A barmaid proudly telling the party it's her last night before she joins the Grey Maidens (late book one or early book 2)

--The keeper of a shop the party frequents bemoaning the loss of his wife to plague (book 2).

--A baker showering thanks and muffins on the characters for saving his children from the plague. (early book 3)

--A child, scared and alone, because his parents were taken away for resisting the Blooding (book 6).

--A mother, heartbroken since her daughter was "conscripted" for the Grey Maidens (book 6).

You get the idea. These incidents can still help drive home the evil of Ileosa in a vacuum, but if they come from NPCs that the characters are familiar with, it will build attachment and motivation (beyond XP and loot).

Hope that helps!

[tonyz]

Excellent background ideas.

[Skeletal Steve]

Thanks for the tips. Part of it was I was going to do a little vignette with each player. Each has done a page background with connections to Korvosa, and I fully intend to play upon them for good and ill. Many of them also have attachments to religious institutions in the city (Paladin of Sarenrae, Inquisitor of Pharasma, Cleric of Sarenrae ) a Wizard graduate of the Theumenuexes College, A thief who may be in with the Ceruleans and a Kobold Detective who has roots in the town.

So hopefully that will be some strong ties to the city. I hope it's enough to keep their interest. Has anybody found any particularly good theme music for Korvosa, with it's Chelish/Varisian/Shoanti mix thing going on?

[Puna'chong]

I have a D&D playlist that I've been slowly updating over the years. Great background stuff that's never intrusive but helps keep the feeling going. I love the Midnight Syndicate Official D&D Soundtrack (love is an understatement; I nerd out over it). I'm actually listening to my playlist on Spotify right now while I'm getting ready for a new group to run CotCT.If you have access to Spotify I highly recommend it.

My playlist has most of Midnight Syndicate's stuff because I've found they're pretty good at establishing tones, though they also use a lot of voices/sound effects on some tracks. Those ones were cut. The Dante's Inferno soundtrack is pretty good, too, same with the Warcraft 3 soundtrack. Videogames usually have pretty good background music: Tomb Raider (the new one), Dead Space 1-3, Dragon Age: Origins, whatever suits you. The 300 soundtrack is also really good for your epic moments, especially the track "Returns a King." I used that to start off an epic Last War campaign for Eberron and my players practically frothed at the mouth when I turned it on full-blast =P

Also, if I can suggest it, Ultimate Campaign is fantastic. I'm absolutely loving it, as it's helped some of my players who are a little weaker on the creative backstory side to get inspiration for characters with little to no trouble at all. Before they would make their "rogue who likes money," now it's a Halfling Archaeologist Bard who thinks his crime syndicate family are all fools for not seeing that the real treasure is in finding and exploiting tombs, dungeons, and less mundane sources of wealth. If you don't have time to use it on this AP, I super ridiculously crazy-highly recommend it for your next one.