I saw Nullpunkt's post detailing how he ran the City and it gave some great insight for me, and helped me formulate my campaign, so I figured I'd do the same:
So first, The players:
Davos: Male Human Fighter, who's wielding Scarlet Bane, a greatsword of some historical significance, which they haven't delved into yet.
Xelana: Female Halfling Bard/Rogue who describes herself as "Neutral Greedy"
Imani: Female Mwangi Oracle: Fled an undead child-god thinking that this was not as the spirits intended (will incorporate more of that story as time goes on.)
Aileanna: Female Elven Magus: Scimitar wielding, quick to anger that has a penchant for making things fry using electricity
Trianna: Female Elven Sorceress: Celestial blood Sorceress who isn't fully sure of her background, who throws fireballs around like candy
Twitch Tinkerfoot: Male Halfling Inquisitor/Ranger: A halfling that likes to instigate. His bow has gotten the group out of many a sticky situation
Next, some prep work:
I created a random number generator in excel and rolled out all of the defense, exploration and supply rolls for the month that the PCs are in for the Golarion calendar, so it's easy to check to see what camps are damaged, how many disc points etc they have. I also did the same for all the wandering encounter rolls the pcs will have for the same span. It was easy for me at that point to start piecing together encounters and having them make sense. I also marked the weather for each day to make that easy on myself as well.
Further, I created an encounter mini/dungeon for Savith's Crypt.
I also created a much larger list of discoveries for the PCs to find, and tailored them for each district. That way I could have the PCs find items, journals, etc that would deliver the broader information that the book gives. (ie journals that are diaries describing the days that led to the downfall of Saventh-Yhi, or frescoes that depicted Savith killing Ydersius. Ledger books showing what was stored or transactions in the mercantile district, etc.)
The party met the week before this and figured out the campsite information, which I told them if they could do it in character, I would give them an RP bonus. They managed to discuss it in character, only breaking character to apply actual numbers to the stats.
Now for the adventure:
The PCs started, unlike so many other GMS are saying, by heading directly for the military district. So I played up the spartan nature of the buildings, describing them as very Aztec in nature (never understood why people would have them be greco roman in the jungle). With frescoes and paintings along the doors and walls. The PCs then wanted a better look. The fighter, Davos, specifically wanted to find a map, and maybe some kind of military deployment schedule. I used that for the first discovery roll for the party, and they rolled high. So I gave them a very old map, that they had to be careful with due to its age (I determined that the preservation magic worked best on buildings, not so much on material items, or remains). By describing the rooms as almost dormitories, and describing oddly shaped armor (form still remaining, but useless), the PCs started to put together some history. I embellished some, and they started trying to figure out ranks from the different armor. I rolled with it and ad libbed some, but it made the discoveries more interesting for the PCs. They did this for about an hour and a half real time before it started to lose some steam.
The whole time that they were searching the ruins, I kept rolling perception checks at a high DC, to see if any patrols, or some of the 100-200 Charau-ka living there would notice, adding a +1 to the roll for every in game hour they spent still searching. Eventually, after the party had taken a break for the heat in the middle of the day, the party decided to investigate the "fort on top of the hill", but ran into a patrol along the way. The Charau-ka (who my party has grown to HATE) started their shrieking frenzy, and as the fight went on, I had the fort come alive with watchers. The fight actually took some time, and Davos took a goodly bit of damage, but having 105 hp already (high con, + toughness, and taking the hp instead of the sp), made it so he really wasn't worried. When the Charau-ka dropped, I described the fort as having a LOT of watchers, trying to discourage them from going after Olujimi right away, since I though he might be a bit for them to handle. The sorceress, Trianna, decided to lob a few fireballs into the place, "just to see". Out came Olujimi, his dire apes, and a decent retinue of Charau-Ka. The sorceress thought this was great, and cast another fireball at Olujimi, who resisted the whole thing.
The party came up with a different tactic...RUN!!! Away they went, but rather than running back the way they came, they decided to run for the plaza..... So, out come the Girallons from the plaza, and a screeching halt by the PCs, who made a turn and are now heading due south. At that point, I called it a night, since it was already past our quit time, and I knew that a battle with that many combatants was going to take time.
So, next week, I'm going to begin with a skill challenge for the pursuit. I figure I'll add in some damage from the buildings, since they're going to run right through the area the book says most of the Charau-ka are housed. So they'll get pelted with paving stones, roof tiles etc as they run. I figure acrobatics, climb, or CMB will be some of the skills (dodge, jump over, climb to roof, or simply bull through obstacles), and if the PCs manage 6 successes vs 3 failures, they'll elude the pursuit. Unless they veer towards another encounter area, at which point it'll start all over again. Either way, the military district is now on alert.
IN the meantime:
The other factions will start arriving in three days, which was the lead they had coming out of Tazion.
I set up the skill challenge and modified it a bit as I went. Essentially though, the party sent their rogue up ahead to scout out the area and signal back to the party the best route to take. The sorcerer used message to they could communicate and the chase was on. About two rounds in, the Oracle, Imani, cast silence on a rock and carried it with her, so the group made no sound. The Inquisitor cast invisibility on both himself and Imani, and then split off on his own. I granted bonuses to rolls then, because they were making no noise at all. So, with Olumimi and several dire apes in tow, they started to run north towards the river. Apes don't swim, so they felt safe in running to this area.
In the meantime, Twitch started casting spells that would create a lot of noise and distractions, starting with create water about 10 ft above the roofs of the shanties that the Charau-ka had set up. (On the map, it looks like there's a shanty town just west of the main plaza). A lot of noise, and water from nowhere, but not an offensive action, so it didn't break his invisibility.
Eventually, Twitch distracted Olujimi, (who can see invis), and Olujimi came after him. Twitch made a dash for an area where he could try to hide (a halfling with the stealthy feat, plus some levels in hide) and was able to hide himself away from Olujimi.
The party eventually made their way back to camp, a bit wet, bedraggled, and now thoroughly cautious about just barging into the different sections of the city.
They set out again, this time for the mercantile district, where they made some important discoveries, and uncovered a few mysteries as well. They discovered that the banks here redistributed wealth, and from that, inferred that it was a communist society ;). They found a few minor treasures, and started to make a straight line for the ziggurat, only shying away from it when they found the sunken corner, that was filled with bat guano tainted water. They spent a few more hours scouting out the area, taking note of the lifeless, muted area where the shadows are, and the island building that houses the Chimeras. They chose to investigate the bank first and encountered the shadows.
Imani was able to do a nice bit of damage with channeling positive energy, and Trianna also was effective with fireballs, but the Greater Shadow was giving them a hard time, and actually reduced Davos' strength to 4 with a number of attacks before the tide of battle swayed in the PCs favor. Imani had a scroll of restoration from earlier in the path and used it to restore Davos to his usual self.
At that point the group was trying to decide on whether or not to go back to camp, or try to go to the island dwelling before dark. Either way, I think I'll have the giant Mwangi bat make a fly over late in the evening to start the "dragon" sightings
Quite a bit happened since the last post. The group decided to sleep in an abandoned building, and in the middle of the night, the bat took to the air, and Davos saw the bat silhouetted against the moon, and woke up a few of the party, who all thought "dragon". Soon enough the bat flew beyond the moon, and they lost sight of it, but were wary of the sky from that point forward.
Upon waking the next day, they crossed over to the island that held the Chimera. Twitch noticed them shortly before they arrived, but much to their chagrin, the Chimera also noticed the group, and 3 of them took to the air. The first swooped in towards the party and used its breath weapon, to devastating effect. Everyone in the group received burns from the acid, with Trianna coming perilously close to dropping where she stood. The group immediately split, in order to make less of a grouped target. Davos used his intimidating shout to get the attention of the Chimera, who all turned on him. Davos took an amazing amount of damage from bites, and claws, but stood his ground, and counter attacked. Scarlet Bane bit through three of the Chimera, with a critical hit on one of the beasts, which all but killed it outright. Trianna used a well placed fireball, which injured all of the Chimera, and dropped the one that had been cleaved by Scarlet Bane. The fight ranged back and forth for a few rounds, but the party, battered and burned carried the day, and made off with the Chimera's loot. They headed back to the camp to stow the goods they'd found, and then made their way across the broken bridge towards the government district.
After a comedy of errors that saw Imani and Twitch falling several times into the lake, and having to either climb or be fished out. Eventually they made their way to the promenade, and saw a curious sight. Pillars that marked the laws of Saventh-Yhi lined the street, all of which were completely clean of any kind of dirt. The group investigated these carvings, and began to understand that many of the laws were designed to help keep Saventh-Yhi hidden, and also to keep something underground at bay. As they were looking at the pillars, they found out why the pillars were so clean. Twitch (an unbelievably observant halfling, dammit), spotted a Boggard, controlling 8 zombies, that were clearing the pillars of dirt and debris. The Boggard spotted the party as well, and the zombies moved to attack. Imani made insanely short work of the zombies with a burst of life energy that fried them where they stood (max damage channel positive energy). After that, the party devastated the Boggard Olujimi.