New to the forum and not sure if I'm posting this in the right place.
I've found alot of help regarding the campaign here but I still have plenty of questions. I have the new hardcover edition and I've read the first two parts. Let's start withe these questions:
1. It's obvious that it's important to tie the player characters to the city. The crimson throne player's guide seems great but it kinda gives away the Gaedren Lamm hook. Everyone will know this is what ties them together even before we start and then expect him to be the goal. Did you find this a problem?
2. It seems in Edge of Anarchy all the side quests Croft gives the players are just foreshadowing and could easily be skipped. Apart from the Shingles one they don't really add anything. All the meat in the world especially. Eels end is nice and maybe this could be where a runaway Lamm could be found. Perhaps The Dead Warrens is needed for introducing Rolth. Listening to the audio version these weren't even there. Am I missing something here?
3. In Seven days to the grave I'm having a hard time finding what clues are expected to make the players suspect Davaelus and the physicians? The sunken boat gives them the cult name and meeting the sick girl might make them suspect it's the coins that started the disease to spread, but why would they investigate the physicians? In the audio version two characters get sick and are taken to the sick house which is a solution. What's your take on this?
More to come...
1. Yep, it's a problem (particularly if the PC group has nothing in common outside of Lamm, as the following anarchy sort of encourages you to split up and go home - several groups have collapsed under this). You can fix it one of two ways: A) make it clear to the players that the AP is about the party facing a series of threats to Korvosa, not just Lamm, and they should make characters interested in the ongoing stability of Korvosa. B) Remove Lamm from the fishery and put him deeper into the module (replacing Vreeg at the end of the Dead Warrens), with a string of clues and actions elsewhere in the module bringing them closer to Lamm and taking down his organisation. By the time they get to the end of the Book, they should be a more tied together party. There's plenty of good threads on the forum about doing exactly this. (For my game, we moved Lamm into Book 2 instead - there's a lengthy actual play podcast on the forums of it).
2. Mmmm... yes, it is foreshadowing, but that foreshadowing is how you meet all the important NPCs of the city, and invest people enough in the city to continue through the horrors of Book 2. And all these quests are about stabilising the city and establishing a rep, which needs to happen.
1. Yep, it's a problem (particularly if the PC group has nothing in common outside of Lamm, as the following anarchy sort of encourages you to split up and go home - several groups have collapsed under this). You can fix it one of two ways: A) make it clear to the players that the AP is about the party facing a series of threats to Korvosa, not just Lamm, and they should make characters interested in the ongoing stability of Korvosa. B) Remove Lamm from the fishery and put him deeper into the module (replacing Vreeg at the end of the Dead Warrens), with a string of clues and actions elsewhere in the module bringing them closer to Lamm and taking down his organisation. By the time they get to the end of the Book, they should be a more tied together party. There's plenty of good threads on the forum about doing exactly this. (For my game, we moved Lamm into Book 2 instead - there's a lengthy actual play podcast on the forums of it).
2. Mmmm... yes, it is foreshadowing, but that foreshadowing is how you meet all the important NPCs of the city, and invest people enough in the city to continue through the horrors of Book 2. And all these quests are about stabilising the city and establishing a rep, which needs to happen.
1. Thanks for the advice with Lamm in the Dead Warrens. I can see this being a possible solution. Still I don't want to make the campaign longer than it already is. Might be the city guard has a lead that happens to coincide with that certain quest.
Also, did you give the players the guide before play and let them all now about the use of Lamm as a way to tie them together? I really would like to use the guide but it feels a bit revealing with everyone knowing that this is the glue.
2. Ok. I appreciate the foreshadowing but it will probably be hard to motivate the players to do fetch quests like All the meat and Eels end for the city guard. Dead Warrens could be tied to Lamm instead of course. Unless they really care for the city, which helping the guard kinda is. I guess you're right, I just prefer the campaign to not drag too much and be a bit more focused. I really like the way they did this in the audio sessions from Big Finish.
3. Any ideas here to make them suspect Davaulus and the physicians for foul play? A clue or two to make them work for it...
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1. I cut out any revealing parts of the players guide before I gave it to my PC's. Also do not let them see the guide to Korvosa unless you edit also -if i remember correctly there is a secrets section! regarding Lamm, depending on what happens to him in your game; I added him as a Zombie in Rolf's lair... And I have really focused on Rolf as the main antagonist in the first 2 books. Keeping the players interested by having Rolf as the real source of their coming together.
2. Edge is one big foundation laying introduction and foreshadowing exercise; use it as time for your party to get to know the city.
All the world's meat is the party's first introduction with the Arkona family. Eel's end is the party's first experience of Old Korvosa's seedy underbelly. The time going through these encounters will give you lots of NPC's and locations to bring back later in the AP.
3. I too found it hard make Book 2 a mystery to solve. My party are currently half way through it. I have planned it as the Manor encounter is the direct clue to the Doctors - not just with the crazy half elf leaking Rolf's location at the blessed maiden.
But by also having the manor's owner being the man in charge of the new mint of coins for the Queen's reign. ( I have had Amin invite the party to the manor for a VIP party (x amount of days away) at the start of the book as an insurance policy that they will go there.)
I have leaked in clues towards the coins being the source of the plague throughout the book. Rackers alley I had dead plague bodies - untouched by the ghouls- all having purses with newly minted coins in. When the party visited the bank of Abadar, Darb Tuttle mentioned in conversation that they were busy with the new mint. Giving the party opportunities to focus their investigation on the coins and possibly go to the manor earlier - rewarding them in the process by not wasting time with the boat,rats,perfume. The party has of course focused all of their efforts on the boat and rats!
I think the important thing for book 2 is to give your group options - and leads - let them decide where they go. Just don't make it too obvious that the doctors are the cause - as they are expected to experience most of the encounters in the book first.
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1. You're half right - as written, the PCs are drawn together for their mutual hate of Gaedren Lamm, which can definitely mean that there's no reason for them to stick together after he's dead. And, if they left the fishery and things were normal in the city afterwards, they probably would. However, there should be enough weirdness to convince them to stick together. The fact that the whole city is rioting is enough for newly 2nd level PCs to realize there's safety in numbers, and to stick together for at least as long as they can get somewhere safe to plan their next move. Also, every party I've seen that finds The Hatbox wants to investigate that. That usually involves going back to the start and checking out what happened there. I had her straight up tell the party that "their work is not finished."
All that said, the players should at least manufacture some reason why they'd want to work with the rest of the group. Part of playing in an AP is working within the framework of the story. If the group decides that they'd rather leave Korvosa and go somewhere else...well, that's fine, but they've decided to leave the AP entirely.
2. Yeah, Edge of Anarchy is a slow burn. It sets up a lot of dominos that will be knocked over at a later date. All The World's Meat has a tie to Book 3, the Trinia Sabor affair ties directly into the larger plot, and the reworked Dead Warrens sets up both the Shoanti plot later in Book 4, as well as give the party a second chance to kill Gaedren, as well as set up his son as a future antagonist! The one that seems the most disconnected is Eel's End, since it doesn't look like the PCs ever go back that way. It could probably be reused in Escape From Old Kintargo, though.
3. There are really a dearth of clues to suspect the plague doctors, other than plague doctors are creepy. The only real clue I've seen is the one that Jolistinia drops if they crack her, leading the PCs to suspect that Rolth is working with the plague doctors to spread the plague. I haven't run that part yet - that's actually next week! - but I can definitely see some groups either killing her, or being unable to break her in interrogation. In that case, the GM needs to find a way to get the PCs to the next step in the investigation. There's always the time-honored "bad guy has a journal" method - maybe the PCs find some papers that Jolisitinia was composing some really bad love poetry on for Rolth, and she makes allusions to the "black-beaked carriers of infection" or something. Maybe the PCs interrupt some sort of nefarious affair between a pair of plague doctors and their "patients." However you manage it, though, the PCs need to have a good reason to investigate the physicians.
Also, did you give the players the guide before play and let them all now about the use of Lamm as a way to tie them together? I really would like to use the guide but it feels a bit revealing with everyone knowing that this is the glue.
I tend to openly tell the players the broad outline of the AP as a part of their required character creation. Investment in the city is critical, it's only the minorest of spoilers to let the players know that Lamm is the starting plot hook (you'll be telling them that in the very first session, so what does it spoil to tell them before the campaign?), and a party who isn't interested beyond Lamm is going to fall apart.
For my own words, straight out of the edited Guide I sent them:
The PCs have reason to seek out Gaedran Lamm, the crime lord, and see him either dead or bought to justice. You must take one of the Campaign Traits that link you to Gaedran. Multiple PCs can take the same trait. You gain a second trait, which may be from either the Korvosa list or the standard list.
Most importantly, you must live in, and be invested in the city of Korvosa. Around 80% of the campaign takes place in the city itself, and involves the city going downhill, so you need a good reason to not simply leave it to rot.
You need to have an idea of where in the city your character lives and how you earn your living. You must also create 3 currently living NPCs or currently operating locations within the city that relate to your character – people you know, a place you work, that kind of thing. These need to be only a simple couple of sentences description.
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I modified most of the Book 2 quests to make them matter more to the overall plot:
1. Cressida mentioned that the Party could either investigate the plague ship or the rumors of wererats spreading the plague with rat swarms coming up from the sewers.
2. They first went to the plague ship, where they found the dead captain, but with only a tattoo of Urgathoa (no mention of Andaisin). There was suspiciously no cages or containers that might contain rats or the plague.
3. Vencarlo introduced the Party to Eries Yelloweyes, who led them to the wererat lair. They adamantly pursued a diplomatic approach with Griggiz and, with a natural 20 diplomacy role, managed to get him to show a letter of support from Andisain, promising weapons and supplies to the wererats in exchange for using their rat swarms as a diversion.
4. Responding to reports of blood-drained corpses outside Giottori's Toys (whom they happened to have previously visited) they killed the vampire swarm and Giotorri-turned-into-a-wight. In his shop they found a pile of suspicious, newly-minted coins that Giotorri had obviously set aside and been examining.
5. Carowyn Manor was actually an exercise by Rolth, with Jolistina's help, to test a new strain of the plague on the nobles, who served as a convenient test-group. When they captured Jolistina, she went on about how all of Rolth's time was taken up by those weird doctors who just didn't appreciate his talents!
6. I dropped the whole Vendra side quest, it just didn't seem to add anything.
This is actually where we left off, so the Party is now going to talk to Cressida about the doctors and Davaelus (whom they also met), and she will point them towards the Hospice.
Slightly different from the official plot, but not drastically so, and it has furthered their interest in all the intrigue and different players.
Listening to the audio version these weren't even there. Am I missing something here?
Maybe a bit late, but one thing to point out is that the audio drama is an alternative dramatization of the story... it is not meant to be a guide to how it plays out in-game.