I just have these campaign concepts in my head, and I can't seem to get them out of my head, and I'm not sure which I'd prefer to run, though I'm leaning to the Artisan one. So, consider this an interest check for two very different games, and which one I should do.
The first one is a reletively simple one: Everyone is a member of the Artisan guild- Their duty is to discover more things to create, and to create a wonderful world for the people who live in it. To do this, they go out on quests and adventures to gather materials needed to make their home city the best it can be! Mechanically, it's a Gestalt with the third party class Artisan, an item crafter. It'll be a high-gold game.
The alternative one is a odd one- You were once a man, but awoke one day in a city, little more than a shadow. You stumble across someone, strugling to walk, seemingly blind, bearly able to hear, but they seemed like they shouldn't suffer from that. You learn that they are what are reffered to as "Shells," people who were once whole who had their history drained from them, and used as armor for those who took their minds. The officers helped them back on their feet, but they are like this now. They want to become whole again, but they can't adventure safely. They need someone to guide them- And you are that someone. You are an "Echo," a being that is more a memory than man. You enter her mind, as she guides you into the multiverse in search of her memories. Mechanically, it'll be a Gestalt variant where I choose your other class.
I can only choose to run one of these, which one seems funner to play? Both will be run in the Pathfinder rule system, since that's the one I'm most familiar with.
Either looks good. She Shell one looks very interesting. Dunno how I'd feel about having a class picked for me, but I'd be willing to give it a shot.
I like the Artisan myself. Interesting to go delving for rare materials. Would Kingdom Building be involved for the city?
The artisan game seems like a clearer idea.
Definitely two cool campaign ideas. I like the Artisan campaign a lot, though, and would prefer it
the first idea is definitely more of a kingdom builder type thing so you'd have to have that in mind when developing the campaign further.
In my opinion the Second one seems like it needs a bit of work but could be a fund different type of adventure.
Final sum up, either could be fun the Artisan thing seems much clearer
Keeping Kingdom Building within the confines of a city and requiring adventures to build most things would be fun. Of course that's up the GM.
Looks like the Artisan concept is the winner here, folks!
As for Kingdom building, that wasn't the origional idea, and if I included anything, I probably would have gone with the Downtime rules. But if you are okay with Kingdom Building, that's fine.
To keep things from being unablanced, I'm probably going to replace Gold for magic items with some sort of new substance, like "Arcane Powder" or something.
Alright, that looks good- Now the question is, where to set it. I have three ideas for that:
1- Regular golarion. This is probably the least favorable one, since I don't know if there's any sort of engineering country around, and my familiarity with the setting itself is somewhat minor.
2- Homebrew Setting, not particularly fleshed out, but consisting of six cities, connected via teleportation circles, with dangerous creatures lurking outside the walls of the megacities. You are head of the Artisans Guild, designated to enter the wild in search of new materials to make stuff out of.
3- Post-Apocalyptic Golarion, a merger of the above two settings. Something happened, nobody remembers it, everyone lives in cities, and now they search through the ruins of Golarion for new magic items to rebuild the world within the city walls.
lurking, and i would vote for 2 or 3 personally :)
I vote ... 3
I like the Artisan idea with option #3.
As a sidenote; I'm a 15 year veteran of D&D->Pathfinder, but entirely new to play-by-post games. I realize dealing with a noob is not everyone's cup of tea. Let me know if you're interested in having me as a player, no hard feelings if not.
The artisan campaign would work well set in Alkenstar and the Mana Wastes
Option 3 is pretty nice as long as it's been so long since the apocalypse that things have recovered a decent amount. Very early Fallout type settings are a bit hardscrabble and I think Artisans need at least some level of civilization established to be able to operate effectively.
I've got a gunslinger character from a dead game with engineering skills that I'd love to resurrect.
Considering you have the artisan campaign here, I do hope that the one over in Gitp see's more interest in doing no. 2.
Either way, I won't mind playing this game, it looks like its going to be very interest, and I hope you do as JoshB suggests and use the Mana Wastes!
The artisan campaign would work well set in Alkenstar and the Mana Wastes
Read through the Mana Wastes. I would definitely play that!