Suicide Squad for Pathfinder. Which AP


Pathfinder Adventure Path General Discussion


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So, this thread has a few purposes.

1) As someone that hasn't read many comic books, and none on the last twenty years, I don't really know much about Suicide Squad. Beyond it has The Joker and Harley Quinn. So if anyone would like to enlighten me or correct me, please feel free to do so. :-)

2) I'm not looking to recreate the Suicide Squad exactly, but if you have particular build advice or character concepts, feel free to share. You can never have too many ideas or opinions.

3) help me decide which AP to use, right now personally, I'm leaning towards either Hell's Vengeance or Wrath of the Righteous (please, no mythic rants, I get it) but again, all ideas or opinions welcome.

And last but most importantly

4) Be excellent to each other.


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Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber

As far as mind-set compatibility, Hell's Vengeance (evil characters working for an oppressive government) or Skull and Shackles (pirates) are probably your best options, with Serpent's Skull (the PCs can choose to represent an evil faction) as a possible third option.

Most of the rest of the Adventure Paths assume a neutral to good party and require more work to adapt. Serpent's Skull might require less work than some others, however.


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I'm not a huge Suicide Squad fan or junkie, so I can't claim to know a whole lot about it, but if the basis is just to capture that concept, then I think I can follow and help out enough. The basic premise is that you're taking a group of criminals and dangerous folks--the kind who really ought to be kept in maximum security and never let out until the next time a plot demands it--and forcing them to work for a higher authority, toward the greater good, despite perhaps their own awful motives and methods.

So for PCs, you're looking at a chance to play more out there, morally ambiguous, or downright despicable concepts. I won't try and rebuild the Suicide Squad's actual roster in Pathfinder, because I'm not sure it could be done very easily, but you're looking at probably a lot of the more cunning and backstabby classes, as well as some brute force. And if anyone in the group has been waiting to play an antipaladin or a true blue assassin, here's the chance.

As far as AP, Wrath of the Righteous was the first one that sprang to mind. A group of dangerous criminals, being emblazoned with marks of justice by the Mendevian Crusade, and unleashed as a special team to fight the demon horde (one of the few groups that even EVIL folks would absolutely want to get rid of)? Hell, that basically already exists in Golarion: you're a bunch of Low Templars (well, maybe without the actual class).

Hell's Vengeance probably wouldn't work great, actually, since they're working for bad guys. Suicide Squad, as I understand it, is all about bad people doing bad things for the greater good. In the end, they usually end up doing "the right thing," but only in the big picture, and for all the wrong reasons. Hell's Vengeance wouldn't really capture that. I'm not sure Hell's Rebels would, either.


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I gotta second Skull and Shackles, if only because:

1. You start off kidnapped and FORCED to work together, otherwise the pirates capturing you will beat the crap out of you and torture you, so, you know, there's that.

2. The entire rest of the AP is more or less centered around being greedy bastards.

3. It closes with working, sort of, for the greater good, by defending the Shackles against Cheliax (though it's pretty stupid you can't just be like "Eh, f#@~ it, I don't care about these people. Let Thrune take over for all I care." - and also, don't get me started on Thrune not just sailing around the damn hurricane that is entirely stationary).

4. Finally, one of them ends up the pirate king - so you COULD end up with an every-man-for-himself-I-wanna-be-the-pirate-king royal rumble free for all


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Those are all great points.

We have been playing two separate Skull and Shackles campaigns off and on for the last three or four years. Well, technically Animal Farm and Shackles ended last summer when it lost steam. But we still have the other one.

I may or may not (I do!) have a weakness for pirates.


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It occurs to me, Shattered Star could also work, if I don't want to mess around with mythic.


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Carrion Crown would be an interesting twist if you have honorable villains who don't want to die. When the outcome of you losing is "all life on the planet dies" that can motivate even villains to help


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Wrath of the Righteous has a lot of things going for it in terms of a quest a group of people could get forced into , book 1 may play a bit odd but if the criminals are the ones who end up mythic they would be necessary for the rest of the path. 2 Issues are how do you force high level (never ind mythic ) pcs to do anything , second issues (rants about mythic for several pages)

Giant Slayer may work as the players being the expendable suicide squad sent by a civilised nation to help out with the giant problem


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Giantslayer is one AP I don't have, actually. Second Darkness and Legacy of Fire being the other two.

I see your point.

Honestly, Galfrey reminds me of the lady in charge of the Suicide Squad, what with her speech at the beginning of book two, and then admitting the mission in book four very well could be a suicide mission (insert Magnuskn's most sarcastic laugh here) that strikes me the most similar.

And yes, I'm well aware of what Mythic Adventures is.


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I would love to do wrath of the righteous with suicide squad. evil characters forced to fight for a just cause.


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You can hypothetically do this with most APs, I'd guess, but, looking at the concept of "people required by a <higher authority> for <greater good> by <compulsion>"-style concept, you've got some solid ideas.

Those that come to me are:

- Wrath of the Righteous (bound by a disciplinarian Queen Galifray/Iomedae/etc., the group are compelled to stop the forces of evil and anarchy from destroying them and everyone else)

- Council of Thieves (stuck under one oppressive government/compelled by a good force - or maybe somehow Arael or Jannivan somehow get a hold of criminals and have a binding placed on them, or something - and are forced to assist a city against criminals on the rise and the city falling into chaos)

- Skull and Shackles (kidnapped and forced to work under the force of a ship, but then become local "heroes" in spite of themselves)

- Curse of the Crimson Throne (can actually work this way surprisingly well, akin to CoT, but you'll have to heavily change the opening part to get it all to work/put the characters on-track)

- Second Darkness (as criminals put to work by the government, this one might work for the sleezy-but-necessary vibe)

- Legacy of Fire (as dangerous criminal/slaves slowly becoming heroes, this might work well)

- Shattered Star (much like CoT, CotCT, or SD, this is more or less about a group undertaking dangerous missions under the guidance of a powerful female authority figure in an attempt to save a city from chaos; making them criminals who are threatened with re-incarceration or death - by someone other than their direct authority figure - might just work well)

- Hell's Vengeance (like CoT, CotCT, SD, or SS, above, a powerful governmental authority figure could easily press-gang a bunch of ne'er-do-wells into unwilling service to thwart a greater threat. You might want to re-fluff the glorious reclamation; or not.)

... and that's about what I got. Hope that helps!


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Suppose I do Wrath of the Righteous, considering it's built assuming a certain level of Goody-two-shoesness would I be better off not castrating mythic adventures.


Dunno. I haven't run it. I'd guess, though, a combination of geas and lesser geas would keep the criminals in line, until they're invested enough that they're just going to keep going under their own momentum. After all, this entire process has 'em hanging out with gods, killing demons, gaining unfathomable power, and generally being too hard core. Sounds like something some criminals could want to do. I'd recommend talking to your potential players first, though, and getting them on-board with the idea.


Addendum: also a mark of justice (from the paladin list).

You could always have it be a kind of cursed item - something like a purposefully cursed, but invisible tattoo or something, that applied all of those effects to the bearer, but might give them something else, too, like the ability to empathy with each other, or something. I don't know.


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I don't think I'll need all that, the players are the ones (my wife, and some old friends) that suggested the Suicide Squad angle. Besides, they'll have the most metal Paladin goddess keeping them in line with Galfrey playing Bass. :-)


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I'm already thinking of ways to flip parts of Swords of Valor around, but I don't want to go into spoiler territory here. :-)


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captain yesterday wrote:
I don't think I'll need all that, the players are the ones (my wife, and some old friends) that suggested the Suicide Squad angle. Besides, they'll have the most metal Paladin goddess keeping them in line with Galfrey playing Bass. :-)

Oh! I wasn't actually suggesting it to keep the players in line. I was suggesting it for the characters.

The entire concept of the suicide squad is that they have this thing that'll kill them if they don't do it or they try to get it out - so they do it and don't try to get it out.

That's the basis of the suggestion. I actually figured that your players would be good to go on this in the first place! (Hence talking to them about the other stuff - just so you all could kind of brainstorm, "What keeps these jerks working together at first?")

Basically, I just mean it as a method of in-character yield to conformity for the purposes of having a manner of bringing them all together and keeping them in-line, even if (for some reason) no one in particular is there to press "the button" - but by the time the stuff wears off, they'll be invested in curb-stomping the guys (and you can just let the things wear off normally, or them grow immune by becoming super heroes via Mythic rules or whatever).

But yeah, do what's best for your group. :D

I know my post didn't answer your question, exactly - it was more of a tangential, "If you start here, with your players' buy-in, the characters can grow and find they start to like doing this, so that by the time they're too big for the doofy little "keep 'em line" spells and effects, they're on-board for good. So it should be fine to leave as-is, on that track." kind of thing. :)

And thanks for not going into spoilers! :D


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I see! Yes, that makes sense, I'll keep those in mind as I figure out the nuts and bolts.


Kingmaker: Claim the lands or come back on your shield...


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Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

First thing that comes to mind is Reign of Winter, since they basically have you on that anyway. Hopping from place to place also allows for you to create a lot of collateral damage without too much worry.


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As I see it, for the premise to work the AP needs several components #
- First, the patron of the party must be powerful and ruthless enough to think of such a group
- The premise of the AP must not rely on the PCs trusting or liking the patron, but they should not be able to jump ship (at least not easily).
- The patron must have a clear task for them from the start to justify the PCs being called into service.

The obvious first choice is Way of the Wicked, if you do not mind it being a 3rd party campaign and specifically geared towards evil parties. Heck, it starts with the PCs being in prison and having to get out.

Reign of Winter sounds great for me too. I mean, at some point you are essentially sworn into serving as a replacement for one of the Three Horsemen, iirc with a geas. Instead of the standard hook, the Horseman could instead swear in some condemned criminals instead. A few other APs work as well - I can see a somewhat modified premise working for CoCT, Legacy of Fire, Shattered Star, Hell´s´Vengeance...


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Ignore the New 52 Suicide squad, it's crap.

The one from the 80's that they tried to redo has the themes you're looking for. For example, in the 80's Suicide squad the boss of the whole thing was Amanda Waller. A 50ish black woman, so solidly built she lived up to her nickname. 'The Wall'

She had clawed her way up from nothing to being high in the govt power structure. While hard and ruthless she still looked after her squad, and even gained respect from some of them.

The new 52 Amanda waller was young, hot and fond of screwing the squad over and breaking her word constantly,while telling them how badass she was.

What made the Squad work as a comic was the differences in the Squads regular members, not just dangerous criminals, but heroes who needed something from the govt. Heroes who has stepped over the line and thought the squad was the only way to redeem themselves.

You always had the tensions between the Heroes running the squad, and the dangerous criminals working for them.

To set it in Pathfinder it works best with a mixed party, one with a common goal, where they have to work together, even as their differences come between them.

Skull & Shackles: have the party be a group split between criminals and guards, shipwrecked and picked up by the Wormwood. The guards want to get out, the criminals might like being pirates, but not under the current command. Have them from somewhere opposed to Cheliax, so the gradual reveal of the Cheliaxian plot forces them to work together as pirates.

Kingmaker: Set magically bound criminals, with some guards or a Overseer to clear the Stolen lands. Set a thief to catch a thief. As they grow in power do the criminals escape their bindings, or do they stay and fight for the land they've built?

Hope that is helpful.

Silver Crusade

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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Kingmaker Outcasts Origin could work well.

Serpent's Skull (could work, players are all prisoners bound for the colonies).


What you need is short episodes, or at least ones where you can set a harsh time limit and succeed anyway. This means, as stated, that the objectives need to be entirely clear from the get go. There should also not be too much contact with society, unless the commanders are ok with serious collateral damage. This structure cuts out anything that relies on mystery and research. If you want to do it anyway, extensive reworking with division into sub-objectives and a trip for each might do it, letting someone else deal with clues found. Also, of course, the squad is meant to struggle life and death against their commanders.

So, the only one I can really see is Shattered Star.

Shadow Lodge

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Loup Blanc wrote:
So for PCs, you're looking at a chance to play more out there, morally ambiguous, or downright despicable concepts. I won't try and rebuild the Suicide Squad's actual roster in Pathfinder, because I'm not sure it could be done very easily, but you're looking at probably a lot of the more cunning and backstabby classes, as well as some brute force. And if anyone in the group has been waiting to play an antipaladin or a true blue assassin, here's the chance.

This sounds like a pretty solid setup for Kingmaker to me.


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Already done in a PbP Council of Thieves years ago here. *This pbp was better than alot of home games, I miss it and the players of the group.
My character, Meraxilar, is akin to Captain Boomerang I guess, calculating yet not entirely predictable. Caldazar is very close to Deadshot, Pollux is a mix of Harley Quinn and Enchantress (Unpredictable and Mystically weird). Tok is maybe close to Bronze Tiger or Katana. Scivian... maybe El Diablo as he was hesitant on entering any melee.

I'm drawing from more than one roster of Suicide Squad of course.

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