Hi everyone! I'm relatively new to the forum and Pathfinder, but not to RPGs or gaming.
A few months ago, I had an itch to do a dungeon crawl for my 40th birthday. So, I got a bunch of friends together, found a simple dungeon crawl online, had them roll up 1st level characters, and then had at.
It ended up reawakening my desire to do a good fantasy RPG, so we kept going. And I've run them through a few sessions, leveling them up to Level 4, in a town of my own creation that they are now ready to get far, far away from.
I've just started reading Rise of the Runelords, and I love it. I want to bring my PCs into it - but I don't know how best to do that.
My thoughts were that I could:
Option 1 - Let them deal with the first few scenarios more or less as-written, knowing that the encounters will be a cakewalk.
Option 2 - Scale up the encounters for each adventure, continuing to scale them up through the entire adventure path. More work for me (potentially a *lot* more, but doable.
Option 3 - Drop them into the adventure path at the Skinshaw Murders and do my best to impart any background information that they would have gotten in Burnt Offerings so that, as we go further, they have all the required information for the later scenarios.
-This one seems the hardest to do effectively in terms of making them care about Sandpoint, and having the relationship with Aldren.-
Option 4 - Like 3, but instead of me just trying to find new ways to impart the information from those earlier adventures they didn't play in, do a brief time-jump out-of-game, writing up the events that occurred since leaving the previous city, arriving at Sandpoint, and giving them a narrative recap of the events of Burn Offerings (so that it all actually occurred for their characters, and they have a reputation in the town, etc.)
Any thoughts on what I should do? I outlined the ideas to my PCs, and they all seem to be ok with any option other than 1 (because cakewalk adventures worth negligible XP are no fun for anyone).
I think your party should meet Shalelu a few days afar from Sandpoint, using her as hook and then start at Thistletop, probably finding Aldern Foxglove locked in a cell so they can save him, doesn't really matter these or those goblins. Let Nualia drop her journal (you can find one nicely done around) so the party can then go to Sandpoint knowing everything they need to finish the chapter once they clean the Catacombs of Wrath
Two ideas:
I'd either have them play through the non-combat part of Burnt Offerings before the Swallowtail festival, and alter the festival itself to go off without a hitch, but with the first body from Skinsaw showing up the morning after. I'd also add the fan-made festival games found elsewhere on this board, because they're awesome. Have Aldern make his appearance during the festival and maybe be awed by their performance in a game.
OR
I would write up a blurb about their trip and befriending the other people on their journey to the point that those people announce the party to Sandpoint as the heroes the are, and have them play through the Local Heroes portion of Burnt Offerings, omitting the goblin raid and any aftermath therein. Use that to establish relationships in the town and then plunge into Skinsaw when they're ready.
I'll second Mousmous' second idea. Omit Burnt Offerings. If you really like it and want to run it, persuade them to start over at 1st level - perhaps with new characters.
Getting the pc's and by extension the players attached to Sandpoint is generic advice that gets a lot of publicity here (rightly so) but it's primary purpose is to help keep players on the rails. The AP takes the players away and back again to Sandpoint multiple times and if they aren't somewhat committed to helping it, they may run off on some damn fool crusade and leave the GM (not to mention the town!) high and dry. If your players are more likely to stay on task, then they may not need backgrounds tied to Sandpoint or connections with the NPC's of the town, etc. Though it should be observed, Skinsaw can provide those as well, perhaps with slight alterations.
The Nualia plotline is not really tied to Karzoug rising. Sure, she was setup in Sandpoint by Xanesha but that connection is very, very hard if not impossible for the players to discover (as written in the AP) - the only hint is her possession of a Sihedron medallion.
Burnt Offerings introduces the idea of Runelords even providing images of Karzoug and Araznist. But your players can learn about them via other methods, even some of the same ones available in BO - such as Brodert. The core purpose of Burnt Offerings is to get the pc's grounded in Sandpoint (which they need to repeatedly save) and level them up so they can confront Karzoug's minions in earnest. Your pc's have already accomplished the latter.
As suggested by Khrom, you could have the pc's rescue Aldern from Goblin raiders (from Thistletop if you wish) on their way to Sandpoint. How keen are you on the Aldern obsession thing? You could easily have him ignorant of the pc's and instead angered at the leaders of Sandpoint. Perhaps he tries to frame the Sheriff, and he or the Mayor turn to the newcomers as "neutral" 3rd parties to investigate. You could increase the number of killings in Sandpoint and make them harder to solve before sending the group out to the farms and on to Misgivings. This would give them a chance to become hero's in the town and build connections with NPC's. Notably, your pc's can still umm... tangle with Shayliss. Her encounter isn't really tied to CR :)
So, having them roll up new characters to start at Level 1 isn't an option. Everyone is pretty attached to their characters at this point.
I think I'm going to run with having them save Aldern from Goblin raiders on their way in to Sandpoint, to establish that goblins have been a problem. Let them get into Sandpoint and wrap up some business from their previous location (messages they were asked to deliver, and at least one case of a "thing you wanted to buy wasn't here, but I know a merchant in Sandpoint who specializes in X," to let them get settled. The group had a Bard who had to leave last session, so I'll say that he passed through Sandpoint ahead of them, and sang their praises, meaning that even without having saved the Swallowtail Festival, they're known as (and expected to be) heroes.
I'll run the Sheylnn encounter, and one or two other small encounters in town to keep them interested, and then have them sent off to Thistletop to stop the actual invasion. They aren't quite murder hobos, but they're fairly mercenary, so if there's some sort of reward from the town, they should be more than willing to take care of a massing goblin invasion.
If I let Tsuto be with Nualia and company (and maybe give all of the named characters another level or so), they shouldn't find that encounter too much of a cakewalk. That will expose them to the Sihedron medallion, introduce them to Karzoug, and give the murderer from Skinshaw Murders time to get his actions underway.
They can always deal with the Cave of Wrath later - or even while the murders are taking place.
Thanks for the suggestions, everyone!