Does anyone feel that any other pre-existing Paizo material could slot into this AP at the level of an NPC / Encounter / Side quests
So I don’t mean adding in No Response from Deepmar . I like that Deepmar can be really relevant to the plot as it is a prison. However I don’t really like the Derro / villains
Potential sources seem to be Crimson Throne and Council of Thieves as both are Chellish / pseudo chellish cities.
As an example :
- the fishery encounter map seems like it could be in kintargo (changed encounters of course)
- there are manors in book 2 of both the APs mentioned that could be used as nobles manors in Kintargo (just the manors and not the encounters within)
- Eels end could potentially be ported in . Devargo seems quite interesting
Can anyone else think of options ? Perhaps to act as replacements for some random encounters...
Count Lowls might make for a fine party guest in Book 3, either in Vyre or at the opera house.
Where does he appear? And why specifically?
From Council of Thieves, the Mayor's Cornucopeia manor and the Six Trials play both worked well for me when the party visited the Sarini estate. Note: the play is actually written by an ancestor of theirs. And the dinner from that scene uses mint, a nice little faux pas of class privilege.
If you want to expand the aboleth elements, From Shore to Sea can work nicely. Might fit when the party needs to round up regional support in Book 3.
Out of Anarchy, the 6-22 Pathfinder Society Scenario, was previously mentioned by zimmerwald1915 as a good plug-in for RP during the 3rd or 5th book. That would require A LOT of fixing on the Dm's part though: it's for levels 1-5 and the PCs' mission would have to be completely redone. And you'd have to move it to be within the borders of the Ravounel duchy. But unifying a town split into four factions by revolution might be very interesting.
You could try Tower of the Last Baron, which is a solid infiltration adventure. Change the hook to be helping the Iomedaen paladins secure your flank by taking out this outpost, reduce the leader in rank. Needs to be updated from 3.5 and would probably either replace the Menador Keep encounter or you'd have to upgrade it and place it somewhere strategic on the border with Nidal.
If you're looking for another seaside adventure, there's Treasure of Chimera Cove which has a hook from Last Baron, but stands alone pretty well. Needs updating from prior edition and needs water setting.
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I used the fishery from Crimson Throne as the headquarters of a honey trap rebellious organisation set up by two Thrune agents.
I used the Mayor's manor from Council of Thieves as Sarini's estate.
I incorporated parts of The Midnight Mirror in book 3. I added a major arc in this book where Kintargo's food supply was threatened (in part because Barzillai has called in most of the countryside guards to the city), and the Silver Ravens could now prove themselves to be real saviours of the people, not just enemies of the state. (I also felt they needed to do some large scale heroics, since they had been really low key up to that point.) One part of the food crisis was the fishing, which was disturbed be the Acizasi problems (which I expanded with From Shore to Sea), the other part was the grain trade, which was where The Midnight Mirror came in.
The village was in the domain of Delronge and the region and the town served as the main producer of grains for Kintargo. This gave me a chance to introduce Melodia earlier. The villain Nicasor and the Kuthite priestess in Kintrago, Aluceda Zhol, had cooked up a plan were they would create problems in the region, hampering the food supply to Kintargo, and then offer to solve the disturbances for the price of replacing Karpad's Asmodean temple with a Kuthite one, and placing a permanent garrison of Nidalese soldiers in the town.
I changed the mirror itself from a prison to a shadow portal that the agent Nicasor could use to get between Nidal and the village.
The main treasure was a letter the PC found among Nicasor's belongings which indicates that High Priest Grivenner is influenced by Zhol.
As mentioned, I used From Shore to Sea with the Acizasi parts, but all the changesI did there would take a long post to go through. The short of it is that it worked out well, both the Midnight Mirror and the Shore to Sea inclusions, and the players thought it was fun, not least to take their city-built characters out into the great unknown, a.k.a. the WILDERNESS :-)
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Count Lowls might make for a fine party guest in Book 3, either in Vyre or at the opera house.Where does he appear? And why specifically?
Lowls is a BIG character in Strange Aeons. He's a VERY WEIRD dude, who is researching lovecraftian secrets of tremendous import and insanity. He's got a massive beard and wears sunglasses. Think of someone who is trying to find Secrets Man Was Not Meant To Know, and combine that with a superficial brilliance.
and a huge beard.
But he's also the sort of guy, who in his traipsing around (and beyond) the Inner Sea, might make a short stop in Vyre or Kintargo. He and Barzillai would be instant BFFs.
he's on the cover of one of the AP issues:
https://static1.paizo.com/image/product/catalog/PZO/PZO90112_500.jpeg
[Count Lowls]'s also the sort of guy, who in his traipsing around (and beyond) the Inner Sea, might make a short stop in Vyre...
I love this idea!
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Also, and this is a thought, is some of the NPCs from BURNT OFFERINGS (Rise of the Runelords 1) fame might well end up in Kintargo after their run-ins with the PCs who would go on to such fame and murder.
Looking at you Tetsuo and Mr. Vankercassin (sp.?). Either would make for a really interesting ally as a potential Silver Raven.
The professor whose death kicks off Carrion Crown as another fella who, were he in Kintargo at the time, would get invited to the Ruby Masquerade in Book 3, or may well have information about our critical villain in Book 5. The BBEG in Carrion Crown could be used for either role as well... at least before he goes all BBEG. He'd probably get a kick out of Vyre as well.
I can easily see the final bad guy in Book 3 of War for the Crown being in Kintargo during books 1 & 2. He'd make for a great NPC (not necessarily as an antagonist) who knows the PCs or Rexus or the Rose of Kintargo. He's also the sort of fella who'd make a beeline for the door when things start getting out of hand.
In book five the group has another underwater encounter with a drowning devil, a charibdis and Skum.
This thread seems extremely rehashed and a bit vanilla. I haven’t entirely worked it out yet. Tentatively, I plan to have the drowning devil have mastery over a beast of legend known as The Black Maga (which was ignorantly freed and set into the ocean by our PCs last campaign when we played RoTRL)
One of my characters in CoT was turned into a vampire and after we failed that campaign, he broke into the groups safe house and murdered the Children of Westcrown. Rumors of his return have surfaced as Barzillai has hired him as a Rebellion-Ending Specialist.
This thread seems extremely rehashed and a bit vanilla
Thanks. I'll be sure to provide derivative, boring help to your future requests.
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Thanks. I'll be sure to provide derivative, boring help to your future requests.
This thread seems extremely rehashed and a bit vanilla
After re-reading I took the quoted line to be about the book 5 story thread with skum and drowning devil and not this thread. Because aren’t both in book 2
I read it like you first though so who knows ...
I would hope so. I went diggin' through the crates for this thread.
Thanks. I'll be sure to provide derivative, boring help to your future requests.
This thread seems extremely rehashed and a bit vanilla
Dude. Not your Thread here on the boards!
The PLOT THREAD. Skum and Aboleth are used in book 2 and in book 5 but are unrelated.
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Thanks. I'll be sure to provide derivative, boring help to your future requests.
This thread seems extremely rehashed and a bit vanillaDude. Not your Thread here on the boards!
The PLOT THREAD. Skum and Aboleth are used in book 2 and in book 5 but are unrelated.
i don't like any of the underwater stuff.
it seems like book 5 would be better served with a piratical combat... heck, bring up the Cheliax bad girls from book 6 of Skull and Shackles. You could team up with the captain fella from book 2 and take them on!
that could be pretty fun!
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i don't like any of the underwater stuff.
it seems like book 5 would be better served with a piratical combat... heck, bring up the Cheliax bad girls from book 6 of Skull and Shackles. You could team up with the captain fella from book 2 and take them on!
that could be pretty fun!
Great Idea! (Aka: Neither re-hashed nor a bit vanilla plot thread)
You've seriously made me realize that I need to drop Ship Combat in here and probably completely ignore my Black Magga idea altogether!
A battle against a few Chelish Warships would be a great kick off!
BUT, after they succeed in defending against the Warships, Pirates would totally seek to capitalize on the unguarded waters and loot and plunder Kintargo in their infancy.
One of my players has taken a serious liking to Elia Nones and having Captain Sargaeta and Elia act as captains of separate ships sieging the pirate ships plaguing the Seas around the cities is awesome. Damn... you've given me a lot to think about.
(Maybe the ships will eventually be attacked by the Black Magga too ;)
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i don't like any of the underwater stuff.
it seems like book 5 would be better served with a piratical combat... heck, bring up the Cheliax bad girls from book 6 of Skull and Shackles. You could team up with the captain fella from book 2 and take them on!
that could be pretty fun!
Great Idea! (Aka: Neither re-hashed nor a bit vanilla plot thread)
You've seriously made me realize that I need to drop Ship Combat in here and probably completely ignore my Black Magga idea altogether!
A battle against a few Chelish Warships would be a great kick off!
BUT, after they succeed in defending against the Warships, Pirates would totally seek to capitalize on the unguarded waters and loot and plunder Kintargo in their infancy.
One of my players has taken a serious liking to Elia Nones and having Captain Sargaeta and Elia act as captains of separate ships sieging the pirate ships plaguing the Seas around the cities is awesome. Damn... you've given me a lot to think about.
(Maybe the ships will eventually be attacked by the Black Magga too ;)
if you want to do something about it, swap out one of the nobles in book 5 with the pirate captain dude's boyfriend in book 2.
after all, he's like supposed to be important. you ditch one useless NPC for a useful one which you actually have a connection to. and fought a pirate battle with his pirate boyfriend.
Dude. Not your Thread here on the boards!The PLOT THREAD. Skum and Aboleth are used in book 2 and in book 5 but are unrelated.
Sorry--sometimes I get tetchy.
Did anyone drop the underwater stuff from book 2? To me it seems like it could be an anticlimax
I didn't--playing it now. There were a couple of reasons. First, the lower level adds two exits to the secret base, one inside the walls to the sewers, D9, and one outside the walls to the ocean/river, D13. You'll want to keep the level, at least, to prevent the impression that the base is a death trap with only the front exit. (What thieves guild has just one exit?)
Second, the battle with the skum and its leader ended up being awesome--as the party engaged with the mooks in the front room, it gave the leader time to get their spells up. I did, however, boost the numbers of skum, and add a cordulegaster from the bestiary to D8. So I ended up with 3 nice waves of attackers, each with different abilities. This AP doesn't have so many dungeon crawls, so I wanted to keep the ones that are there. The shell guardian(s) and the drowning devil encounters look interesting as well. I have at least one player who loves the tactical elements of Pathfinder.
Third, I don't think it's supposed to be. I would bet that the Thrune response to the capture of the cultists and the serial killer will be the highlight. My players did a trial and execution of the serial killer, and left off some of the cultists for Tayocet Tiora to claim credit for arresting. (She's demoted to a beat cop walking the streets under the Thrune administration.) So, how they'll handle the notoriety of being called out will be interesting.
And my players skipped Lorelu's room for some reason, so it's looking like that room will be the climax of the exploration, although I'll have to figure out answers to questions about the past that they'll ask rather than the Lucky Bones, which they've already explored.
Oh, digging through the crates, I found another usable module, from 3.5 Paizo. Gallery of Evil has some really good set piece encounters featuring animated art. It would be pretty easy to include it as a mini-module in the context of nobles' decadence and rivalry.
You could also have the Shelynites ask the party to put on a revolutionary play for their congregation to recruit them to the cause. That would be a hugely interesting skill challenge.
Did anyone drop the underwater stuff from book 2? To me it seems like it could be an anticlimax
I left it in and it was fantastic!
The players enjoyed trying to figure out the best ways for their characters to attack underwater and really liked that it was different.The skum were all easy fights for them and only the leader gave them a little bit of a problem.
I was worried that they weren't going to be able to kill the shell sentinels but that was mostly because of party composition (rogue, bard, shaman, & monk) but it ended up being a nice challenge for them.
They left the drowning devil, devilfish, and globster until they could go back up and get some healing. They were terrified of the drowning devil but it wasn't too difficult of a fight. The devilfish used the evil tactic of attack, grab, savage bite, cleave for attack on another PC with the attack, grab, savage bite again. (But it was still an easy fight.)
The globster however.... What a fight! I honestly thought I was going to have a TPK (as did the party) so that was pretty intense.
As for if it felt anti-climatic for the end of the book, it was (sort of) the last thing they did in book 2 but it flowed directly into book 3 with the aquatic elves to the point of I don't think my players even noticed the change-over.
When they got back from Acizasi Thrune was trying to give them some gifts and that felt like a really good conclusion to book 2. (See this post for details on how that worked out.)
Did anyone drop the underwater stuff from book 2? To me it seems like it could be an anticlimax
Haven't got there yet but I plan to run it - though roguerouge's idea about adding a cordulegaster is a good one (and I'm stealing it.) Besides the good reasons roguerouge listed, it is also a foreshadowing for the troubles of Acisazi.
I do plan on changing Acisazi into a mash up with From Shore to Sea which seems a more interesting challenge. Though I'm probably going to eliminate the racial change features of the module including the creepy wedding night ritual. There will still be transformation from human to skum but it'll be the outcome of forced magical processes not some call to ancestral genetics. I'm looking for more of an ominous/perilous feel and less weird/disturbing. Acisazi will be a human and aquatic elf village with its fair share of half-elves.
I'm also adding Deepmar though I'm changing it to more of a Vyre penal colony historically run by the King/Queen of Delights as an alternative to Dunrock prison (as in one where you might come back from.) Deepmar as described in the module does not seem very "Imperial." I'm adding it as a mission the pc's take on for the Queen of Delights as part of her ongoing rivalry with the cult of Norgorber factions in the city. There will be Norgorber elements working with the Derro (working to get access to Darkland poisons etc.) Also more conflict with the Norgorber forces helps explain their ever increasing levels of animosity toward the Silver Ravens as the AP progresses.
So I am interested in trying to add in some NPCs from some of my groups previous Pathfinder games. Sadly that only extends to PFS modules and Midnight Mirror
(Spoilers for season 5 if anyone is ever going to play any)
Midnight Mirror: My players loved the ZK priest and would probably enjoy seeing him again. I would be tempted to put him in the church if they decide to go there. Or create an option for them to cross the border for support of some kind
PFS:
There is a bratty noble called Lander in one of season 5 who I could make a distant relative of one of the noble families
There are some irritating merchants who could easily be in a market or shop somewhere
My big challenge is fitting in the priest of Urgathoa who TPKd my group to give them some meta catharsis. I can’t think how such a priest would fit in Kintargo . Or whether a cult would make sense at any point. I don’t think it makes sense to replace the book 2 cult but would still like to get her in
Does anyone have any ideas ?
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So I am interested in trying to add in some NPCs from some of my groups previous Pathfinder games. Sadly that only extends to PFS modules and Midnight Mirror
(Spoilers for season 5 if anyone is ever going to play any)
Midnight Mirror: My players loved the ZK priest and would probably enjoy seeing him again. I would be tempted to put him in the church if they decide to go there. Or create an option for them to cross the border for support of some kind
PFS:
There is a bratty noble called Lander in one of season 5 who I could make a distant relative of one of the noble families
There are some irritating merchants who could easily be in a market or shop somewhere
My big challenge is fitting in the priest of Urgathoa who TPKd my group to give them some meta catharsis. I can’t think how such a priest would fit in Kintargo . Or whether a cult would make sense at any point. I don’t think it makes sense to replace the book 2 cult but would still like to get her in
Does anyone have any ideas ?
heck yeah.
Book 5. Make her big and mean and nasty and waiting for the apotheosis of Thrune. Or have her in the dungeon of book 6.
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I adapted the first part of Gallows of Madness, setting it in the Redroof district of Kintargo. I threw out the possibility that the missing apprentices may have been caught out after curfew or otherwise run afoul of Thrune's goons in some way.
I believe the BBEG (a dead gravedigger reborn as a vermlek demon) in Gallows retained memories of his old life...consistent with the effects of the soul anchor beneath the city. I had the vermlek inhabit the corpse of a dead Chelish Citizens Group patrolman, and he made his lair beneath the Fair Fortune Livery (which the PCs had cleaned out earlier). The vermlek tried to piggyback on Blosodriette's attempt at creating a portal to bring more of his kind into the city. I restocked the livery with buffed grimples and other vermin infected by demon's bile and had the slimy cistern in the place filled with a covering of the purple slime.
Also, the set piece from AP #13 Shadow in the Sky ("St. Casperian's Salvation") can be imported fairly easily (though it needs updating to the PFRPG rules).