re-writing Worldwound Incursion to include a time skip

[Diminuendo]

after GMing WofR, I love the book, but really dislike the beginning

I hate telling the players this "is your past"

I think I will start out asking which mythic path each player wants to be, I'll then use the backstory for each in the book to make similar events happen.

I want all of the players to start at age 13-17 (if anyone feels I should scale for other races that human I'd like your critique). There will be a timeskip of five years at the end of book one. I feel a timeskip would help to make the outbreak seem more serious than the slight inconvenience it is presented as in book one. Letting the moral of those fighting as well as their desperation and frustration be much more apparent

all of these events will be triggered by Trendelev's death, some will fall underground, some will be otherwise displaced. all of these storys will be one on one games up until they meet up at Defenders Heart. They would soon after storm the grey garrison as a covert team, after which they gain Mythic.

Horgus, Aneva, and Lann would be peppered throughout these adventures to complement the fighting ability of the players.

For the Riftwarden Orphen backstory Aravashnal will be presented as a much superior wizard to the player (beating the PC in a practice duel before the outbreak) and be taken down a peg by his blindness.

Stolen Fury would be focused mainly on the mongrelmen and the traitors. With the ritual happening underground.

Chance Encounter would focus on an extended section including Faxon

I plan to re-use existing assets when possible.

this will lead to the first book having less content per player, but I think it will still be good. thoughts?

[Victor Zajic]

One on one sessions are time consuming and difficult to balance. And you rob the characters of more than half their opportunity to get to know each other and form into a cohersive group before they get their superpowers. Superheroes tend to have a harder time convincing themselves to play nice with their fellows.

[Galnörag]

It really depends one runs the game, one on one sessions are great for play by post, or if you game really frequently with your group (like more then once a week.) Otherwise it will draw out the first module over months and make you hard put to assemble the group coherently.

[Wildebob]

Cool idea. I could see RP-ing the actual encounter in the backstory for each trait; treat it like a flashback cut scene as the player "tells" his story to the others in the group. I agree that entire one-on-one sessions would be more than I could pull off, personally.

Spoiler:

Myself, I see the very first scene as more a robbery of story than the background traits. The Storm King and his minions, including the indescribably awesome ulkreth demons, attack mid-ceremony, wreck the city, and slaughter Terendelev...and that's "oh, by the way..." information for after they wake up?! When I run this, I plan to play out that invasion, for a few rounds, at least. I've read some other people's ideas for doing that and it sounds pretty unreal.

[ecw1701]

For my group, I had them come to town for Armasse, and fight in the battle. So I had the flavor text happen real time. When they got dropped through he street, I had the cleric's channel energy revive Horgus, Avaniel, and Arvashinial and proceed from there.

But I don't think there's anything wrong with a time jump if it makes the narrative more cohesive to you. I also don't think there's anything wrong with wanting to strike while the iron is hot like it's presented in the module...since you'd have to justify why your characters saved the city and hung up their swords, only to have the Queen personally ask them for help 5 years later.

[Galnörag]

Come to think of it, you could run the PFS Siege of the Diamond Citadel scenario modified, it has a good Tier 1-2, and you fight the results of the fall of the wardstone. You could imply the fight between the Storm King and the dragon lasts much much longer while the players fight the demon waves. Ending in a box text fall into the abyss.

[voska66]

I plan to do the back story via flash backs.