In another thread, 137ben asked a question and here is my answer. I figured it might be something others would have different opinions on:
Back in 2e/3.0/3.5 there were a lot of setting specific books with both fluff and crunch that could be adapted fairly easily to other settings, so I ended up buying and using a lot of setting-specific books for settings I never played in. So far, I haven't bought any of the Golarion books, though, but I am considering it, and pantheon books were always something I found useful.
How much has/will adaptability been/be incorporated in this book? Should I even be paying attention to PFCS releases?
(I'd love to here responses to my questions based on previous PFCS books, even if the devs haven't released enough information about this particular book to make an accurate assessment on).
I think a number of the previous campaign setting releases may well be of interest. What constitutes 'usable' is obviously a pretty subjective thing – I have no interest in and cant really comment on the mechanical value of the following, but (fwiw) the following are the campaign setting books I'd find most useful for inspiration/flavour material even if I weren't running a game in Golarion:
The books of the damned:
Volume 1 - Princes of Darkness
Volume 2 - Lords of Chaos
Volume 3 - Horsemen of the Apocalypse
These are tied very heavily to Golarion's cosmology, but I think there is a huge amount of material here to adapt to another setting. They are amongst the best 'in character' sourcebooks Paizo has produced, in my opinion. I really enjoyed just sitting and reading them cover to cover.
The various "Monsters Revisited" books:
Classic Monsters Revisited
Dragons Revisited (Although this is the weakest of the line, in my view)
Dungeon Denizens Revisited
Classic Horrors Revisited
Misfit Monsters Redeemed (Another that didn’t really do it for me – there were a number of people who seemed to like it though, so I include it for completeness).
Undead Revisited
Mythical Monsters Revisited
Giants Revisited
Mystery Monsters Revisited (Not really my cup of tea – I like more vanilla, western European, tolkienesque fantasy monsters. Nonetheless, I think this was done quite well if I were into more ‘out there’ monsters).
Fey Revisited
Demons Revisited
These are amongst my favourite of Paizo's sourcebooks. It's rare that I read one of these monster entries without getting immediately inspired to create an adventure/opponent/scene featuring the creature in question. They inevitably have some which you'll like and some which just wont sit well with you, but I think they are great for ensuring you don't get stuck in a rut and that there's more difference between a goblin, a bugbear and an ogre than just the CR.
Various of the City Guides/Etcetera:
Guide to Korvosa (This was my all-time favourite paizo sourcebook for quite a long time).
Cities of Golarion
Heart of the Jungle
Magnimar City of Monuments
City of Strangers (The Kaer Maga sourcebook).
This last batch are probably the most heavily tied to Golarion. I’ve listed them in order of decreasing ‘adaptability’ (in my opinion, anyhow). The Guide to Korvosa is one of the best written city sourcebooks I’ve ever seen and I think could easily be transplanted as a standalone city state/vassal of some ‘evil empire’ without too much trouble. Similarly with the others – Kaer Maga and some of the Cities in Cities of Golarion are perhaps too closely tied to Golarion (both of those sourcebooks are excellent though and well worth a read).
Other sundry books from the campaign line:
Classic Treasures Revisited
Artifacts and Legends
These would possibly depend on running a ‘magic items are special’ campaign. However, if you are looking at something like that, I think these would give great material for legends/backstory/etcetera that would be easy enough to adapt.
Rasputin Must Die!
I think that'd work pretty well outside of Golarion.
Rasputin Must Die!
I think that'd work pretty well outside of Golarion.
Ha.
You've a typo in your thread title, Steve. Can you fix it within the edit window?
Thanks Joana. That would have annoyed me. :)
Ha.Rasputin Must Die!
I think that'd work pretty well outside of Golarion.
No, seriously. Well, also half seriously. It could be pretty easily adapted.
Most of their one shot modules too, I'd wager.
Yeah, I'm sure you're right. Although I think people are more used to adapting adventures to different settings or rule systems. In my view there are a lot of the campaign setting books which could also be useful to somebody creating their own world.
Chronicles of the Righteous should also be listed up there with the Damned volumes...Probably the best treatment out there of good outsiders.
I would rank Heart of Darkness higher on the list...there is plenty of specific info on the Mwangi expanse, but a good chunk of it could be used for any jungle region. For similar reasons I would also list Land of the Linnorm Kings if you have a "viking" area and the Dragon Empires Gazeteer if you have a "East Asia" area
Brilliant thread, I love doing my own world building but love some aspects of Golarion. I have been wondering which books I could use for inspiration/blatant stealing :D
Here's some adventures I think would do particularly well in any campaign setting.
Pathfinder Modules
Crypt of the Everflame: Very generic undead dungeon crawl.
City of Golden Death: Very generic city of gold dungeon crawl that was really well done.
Shore to Sea: Great module set in a small coastal town with abberation horrors.
Broken Moon: Part of an adventure path, this works great as a stand-alone adventure. It's a whose done it in the middle of a werewolf infested forest.
Wake of the Watcher: In the same adventure path as Broken Moon. Change the initial plothook and you get another coastal town filled with abberrations module with cosmic mi-go and Shub-Niggurath.
Souls for Smugglers Shiv: A great opening where the PCs are washed ashore after a shipwreck. A very brutal survive or die module where PCs are forced to decide whether to hunt or move their camp so that they can eventually get off the island.
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All good modules that can easily be transplanted into any campaign setting of your choice.