So I am starting Way of Wicked today with a party of 7 players and I was wondering if anyone that has run the full adventure path encountered any pitfalls or hiccups. Since it is a larger party I figured I would see what challenges other GM's ran into or if anyone had recommendation as far as adjusting Encounters given the size of my party.
Thanks!
This campaign path is fairly brutal in my experience. I had a party of 5 and we had 10-15 deaths in book one alone. Expect death, though a party of 7 might be able to survive. If your players don't like having to reroll it could become a problem. My group fell apart in early book 2.
So I am starting Way of Wicked today with a party of 7 players and I was wondering if anyone that has run the full adventure path encountered any pitfalls or hiccups. Since it is a larger party I figured I would see what challenges other GM's ran into or if anyone had recommendation as far as adjusting Encounters given the size of my party.
Thanks!
FWIW, we had a fairly strong group of four run through it with 0 deaths though there was definitely some close calls. They were well built and played smart though, and as GM I didn't go out of my way to kill characters (since the players put a lot of work into their characters and character death/re-roll is fun for no one).
I guess experiences will vary with play style from both sides of the GM screen.
As far as a party of seven (ugh), its been my experience that maxing out the hit points of 'bosses' and always keeping a second and third wave of kooks in your pocket is a good way to increase encounter DC on the fly without making things overly difficult on the players or yourself.
Tell your players to play smartly. Being able to kill things will likely not be enough. They could find themselves taking on more than one minboss/boss if they try to murder their way through the game.
The greatest one is, in my opinion, to de-legitimaze any player vs player situation that could arise since is an evil campaign.
I also reccomande, for book 1, to:
1) have the Cardinal do not text any asmodean character, but to give them a sidequest to cover up their traces at brandescar (so they may meet future npc's.
2)get rid (or allow players to solve them through skill checks) of many of the encounters (ice mephit and seal hunt) along the way on the frostmar to focus on the fireaxe camp and create few errands sakkaroth my ask them to do.
3) Allow your players maximum freedom at Balentyre, and to free pillaging it after the deed is done. In Way of the Wicked book 7 there is a gazeteer of the town, for any need.
Thanks for all the great feedback gang!
My group effectively TPKed themselves right away, so my advice is just a caution that the adventure path has a very different style than those Paizo puts out. Paizo's APs, being fairly heroic in nature, tend to also be reactive in nature. "Here's your PCs; something bad's going to happen, you need to stop it." If the PCs get stuck, sooner or later, the GM can always just have a bad guy kick in the door to get things rolling again.
WotK, being villainous, is designed for PCs (and players) who need to be far more proactive. "Here's a seemingly stable scenario; your PCs must figure out a way to ruin it." Particularly early on, if the PCs wander around aimlessly, the world just keeps on keepin' on, and if they flub something, there's no help coming.
My players tend to handle the former scenario well; the latter, not so well.
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You need players who are indeed proactive and patients at the same time. Some players really like to jump into the action asap...this kind of game may not be for them. Preferably people who enjoys roleplaying. A lot of roleplaying experience is available, while you can indeed solve some issues with an axe swing, some social/roleplaying would often yield the same results.