Running for Queen and Empire as a stand-alone

[Sjommieboy]

Hey folks! I've always wanted to run an evil campaign, however due to limited time I cannot run the entirety of Hell's vengeance. I have heard good things about for Queen and Empire, and I was wondering whether I could buy it as a stand-alone? Would I have to significantly change up the story, or are there things that do not make sense? I read there's a betrayal at the end of the previous part, for example.

Any help before I end up committing my (meager) finances to 'for Queen and Empire' would be much appreciated!

[Yakman]

as a stand-alone, WRATH OF THRUNE is probably a better way to go. QUEEN AND EMPIRE is a bit meh imho.

QUEEN AND EMPIRE is pretty well self-contained tho, if you want a higher level adventure.

[Sjommieboy]

What do you like about the one and dislike about the other if I may ask? :)

[Yakman]

I just wasn't a huge fan of FOR QUEEN AND EMPIRE. there's a lot of diplomatic stuff (which was okay, but somewhat disjointed), and the quest at the end kinda seems like the quest in the previous volume.

plus, that final quest doesn't make a ton of sense, but that's beside the point.

WRATH on the other hand is much tighter and simpler - go and take this town back from the good guys. There's a wide variety of enemies and potential enemies, a pretty cool boss fight at the end, and some fun stuff in the middle.

note, I haven't played either (yet). but that's just my two cents from reading them.

[Gratz]

I'd have to disagree with Yakman on the quality of "For Queen and Empire". I think the political intrigue is great and offers great roleplaying opportunities. It's a light on combat though, if you are looking for a more combat-oriented game, it's not the best choice. You'd also have to cut and replace a key encounter, which is tied to previous events.

Honestly, I think you could run any of the Hell's Vengeance books as a stand-alone, as all of them have very different themes, so could hop into any of them with slight modifications.

[Sjommieboy]

Which encounter would that be, Gratz? :)

[Gratz]

Sjommieboy wrote:

Which encounter would that be, Gratz? :)

Spoiler:

The PCs get ordered to Egorian, just after they killed their previous patron, Archbaron Fex, because he betrayed them and wanted to sacrifice their souls to a devil. Archbaron Fex has a cousin, who is a hellknight and is out for revenge for the death of his cousin. He is supposed to show up and challenge the PCs during a ball. If you start start with this book though, that storyline doesn't add up, but you could tweak it, so he was hired or involved with another patron, who wants to get back at the PCs.

[waltero]

Not sure if you ran this or not yet, but my group did not kill Fex and instead remained his ally. (I'll post that explanation somewhere else).

So, I had the Hellknight be the cousin of whichever noble they sided against. For us, they chose to side with Sethic and ended up killing the lady noble's fiance'. I changed the last name of the Hellknight to match the murdered fiance' and had him out to avenge his death.