What is required material?

[kbowen0188]

Outside of the actual adventure path and the Core Rulebook, what material is suggested to have on hand? I am having a hard time finding if Bestiary 1 is referenced, for example.

This will be a group of 4-5 players, all new to the system, and I am new to DMing Pathfinder. I have experience with other systems, just not this one, so I wanted to make sure I had everything required within arms reach. :)

Thank you in advance!

[Lakesidefantasy]

Bestiary 1 will not be referenced as the Curse of the Crimson Throne was written for Dungeons and Dragons 3.5. But, being that Pathfinder is compatible with Dungeons and Dragons, everything is pretty much good to go as is, although you may find you will need to bump up the power of the combatants a bit.

With that said, you will need the Bestiary 1, and it is also good to have the Inner Sea World Guide.

Many of the monster entries in the adventure path simply refer the Dungeon Master to the Monster Manual, which in Pathfinder is equivalent to the Bestiary.

[kbowen0188]

When you mention bumping up the power of the combatants... are you referring to the party members themselves, or the villains in the AP?

[Lakesidefantasy]

Player Character Classes in Pathfinder are more powerful than their Dungeons and Dragons counterparts, so you may need to bump up the power of the Non-Player Characters.

[Knick]

The Guide to Korvosa is a pretty fantastic book. I can't recommend it enough.

As Lakesidefantasy said, this AP is not written for Pathfinder, so a little conversion is necessary, and a lot is encouraged. Knowing ahead of time which PFRPG skill checks are going to replace 3.5 skill checks as written, for example, is very important. I know if you poke around these forums, there are some excellent conversions that are ready to go. You still may want to convert a few bad guys yourself to get a feel for the new system. I don't know what kind of prep time you have between sessions, of course.

P.S. My one best piece of advice for this AP is to expand the intro. Give the characters a chance to "meet" Korvosa before everything goes to hell. It gives you great storytelling and foreshadowing opportunities, and it give the characters a glimpse of what they are fighting for.

[Lakesidefantasy]

Oh yeah, you will want the Guide to Korvosa for sure. It is one of the best books out there.

[Knick]

Optional resources include the legitimate Harrow Deck from Paizo. Adds a little extra awesome to your harrow readings.

[Cpt_kirstov]

Yup,
I would recommend:

*Guide to Korvosa (lots of info and a larger map of the city)

*Harrow Deck

*Either the bestiaries or The PRD Things like the reefclaw have updated PFRPG in bestiary 3.

*Pass out the players guide before character creation, either a hardcopy or a link to the product on the site. also a link to The web fiction set in Korvosa might be good to give them a feel of the city as well

*If you are not comfortable making encounters harder for PFRPG characters, search this board - there are at least 2 different people who have done conversions and posted links to them.

[kbowen0188]

I have gotten the Guide to Korvosa, as it came highly recommended. I am also biting the bullet and buying a Harrow Deck, as that seemed like an excellent product as well.

Would anyone here happen to have experience with the paper minis that they've released for the product? I have a wet-erase graph mat that I usually just draw on for maps and mark for creatures and such... but those minis look pretty. I want to make sure I am not getting too horribly swept up in a buyer's frenzy, though.

When I am looking through the Guide, are there any encounters or locations that really stand out? One thing I plan on changing in the module is where the characters come out of the fishery and the town is in chaos. The level of rioting and the general chaotic atmosphere seems to really come out of nowhere (considering that the fishery doesn't actually take that long).

I was going to try to give them a bit more time to bond with the city and explore other adventures within the area while the town slowly grows worse, and THEN all hell breaks loose.

[GM Wulfson]

you can try to foreshadow the growing unrest in the city before the party enters the fishery. The death of the king is the spark the ignites the powderkeg but the fuse has been sizzling for a long time.

[Cardz5000]

That is a pretty common change, and one that would be welcomed.

Spoiler:

My character saw the riots and heard that the king was dead and literally just went home to pack his belongings, where he found a man in his house rummaging through his things (that man is now dead.) DM had to reign Mikael back in and give him a reason to stay

One thing that our group has that helped one of our players really connect to one of the NPCs was the Harrow Handbook, he's playing a Card Caster which uses cards from harrow decks as darts, but can also cast touch spells through them.

[Cpt_kirstov]

One thing that I did: Its sometimes hard to get a group to join up. if you get a backstory for the characters you might want to try something like I did in my first post of my play by post here and lead that into the meeting with Zellara. It gives Zellara a more mystical feeling which foreshadows her history for the parties second meeting with her a bit.

It also gives them a reason to tell that Zellara is someone who knows a lot of the city to pull them out of various parts of the city and bring them together. Meaning when she tells them of the issues happening throughout in the city they may feel the 'sting of betrayal' but still want to investigate... This also helps because it gets them to keep the deck on them until its needed