Emerald Spire - land rush + property broker

[Tangaroa]

I have... A clever plan!

However, I must check my cleverness, as its probably against the rules.

I'm playing straight through ES with a group.

Land rush boon for the spire is 2 PP/hex - if one of us was a sacrificial lamb, and took property manager (PFS primer), everyone else could buy land for a discount (1 PP/hex). This makes the math for landrush almost as worthwhile as just doing regular purchases. (almost)

So, now I'm waiting for someone to step in and tell me that gaining land via landrush and property vanities are not the same thing.

*tick,tick,tick*

[Nefreet]

They're... Not the same thing?

[Tangaroa]

Well I hope they are :). It doesn't say "vanity" on the landrush chronicle. So I worry people might get antsy about legality.

[UndeadMitch]

The property broker vanity does not work with the Emerald Spire Land Rush boons, since they are boons on chronicles and not vanities. People will get antsy about legality because it is in fact not legal. It is a clever idea, though.

[Tangaroa]

OK. I just needed someone to confirm what I had already concluded.

Oh well :) Landrush sounds cool, but the mechanical advantages are sub-par for the price - which I was hoping there might be someway to counter-act. If Emerald Spire was anything like Thornkeep (i.e. rather hard in some spots, and very light on role-play), I would prefer mechanical advantage (wand or potion in-hand) to flavorful background coloring anyways.

[Serisan]

There is mechanical benefit: Emerald Spire is the only module set currently sanctioned that gives you a way to earn 5 Fame for completing the modules. There are 6 spots that allow you to do this. One of the interceding spaces between these opportunities costs you nothing but the purchase slot (2 PP cost, 2 PP given back). A player completing levels 1 and 2 of ES are able to get to 9 Fame for 2 modules, putting them up a purchase bracket in Fame vs any other pairing of modules.

That's a pretty reasonable mechanical benefit, honestly.

[Nefreet]

Yes. John Compton outlined it somewhere else. Emerald Spire surpasses the Fame you'd achieve by normally playing only modules, and actually earns you more than the average amount of Fame that PCs are expected to earn.

It's maximum possible Fame still falls short of what a PC playing only scenarios could achieve, and that's what people are choosing to focus on when they criticize Emerald Spire.

I'm sure after a couple more seasons of difficult Secondary Success Conditions players will complain less.

[Tangaroa]

So you get more fame, so you can buy your custom whiz-bang at an earlier tier, but it costs you ~33% of your wealth from prestige awards, which are sub-par for being modules. An unpleasant choice.