Gonna be wrapping up ROTL soon. I think I'd like the next one to be a different direction than ROTL (outside of Varisia perhaps, away from the same type of monsters in ROTL). What's a good AP to move onto?
I was thinking Mummies Mask? I'm not sure how highly rated it is, but I like the setting. I also just got Shattered Star in the humble bundle, but seems too samey unless someone is able to explain otherwise. Thanks ahead of time!
Actually, if you are really into the Egyptian setting, then Mummy's Mask would be a great way to go.
If you are Truly looking for something different then Rise of the Runelords then I would suggest (in order of preference)
* - The extremely popular Hell's Rebels.
* - Skull & Shackles, which is actually better for "dark" characters then Hell's Vengeance.
* - Finally, the Technology Rules make Iron Gods play very differently from any other Adventure Path.
Shattered Star is the sequel (and middle part of the trilogy) to Return of the Runelords. It is heavy on dungeons, but has a good smattering of diplomacy (if your players choose so) in-between. I'm running it right now, it is good. Although the constant dungeons get a bit tedious, with weeks of sessions on end where you mostly are fighting from room to room.
Hell's Rebels is really good. A city based AP in Cheliax with lots of roleplaying opportunities and an interesting story. I'll be running that next.
If you want to get away from Varisia, but still start in Varisia, then I'd recommend Jade Regent, where your party travels to Tian Xia to help Ameiko from RotR to find her destiny. I've run it twice, aside from the weak final encounter it was really fun. Having four permenent NPC's with you can be great for roleplaying, although you have to come up with storylines for them after the first module, since the writers sure did not.
Curse of the Crimson Throne is another city based AP in Varisia, and also is very good. It stays in the city for three modules, then you go on a field trip for two modules and come back in the sixth, where you spend most of the last module in two mid-sized dungeons. Still, an excellent AP in terms of encounters and roleplaying.
Carrion Crown is placed in Ustalav and features five modules of 50% investigations and 50% combat encounters and then, sadly, finishes with a module of 95% combat encounters. But the journey to that last module is pretty good, since it features a lot of horror themes, including a first stab at lovecraftian horror. Also, you probably should rework the last encounter completely and introduce the final villain much earlier in the campaign.
Those are the ones I'd recommend at first glance. War for the Crown, a roleplaying-heavy AP in Taldor, should also be good, but I've heard already that it very intense on the GM preparation, so beware of that.
I'm preparing to start Mummy's Mask for my group and it looks to be like a lot of fun (reading it was quite enjoyable and the story is connected fairly well from book to book) so if you're thinking of going with that one I'd suggest it.
As for it not getting much attention/traffic on the boards, I think that's mostly because there doesn't seem to be much to talk about with it... It's laid out well enough that GMs don't need to ask others for clarifications, it's all connected so people don't need to try to figure out how to get from one book to the next, it has many different types of things (dungeons, cities, hexploration, etc) and, as I said, the books are well connected, so it's not an AP that feels like you should be adding more content to.
All in all, Mummy's Mask looks like a lot of fun. My only concern is that there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of social role-playing involved (but the previous two APs I ran were Kingmaker and Hell's Rebels, both of which are VERY socially driven campaigns.)
Our Shattered Star game was a lot of fun, but if you want something drastically different than ROTRL and outside of Varisia, I'd look elsewhere for the time being.
I really enjoyed running Mummy's Mask and the party seemed to as well. It's sort of Indiana-Jones-esque in feel (at least at the beginning) and although Warped Savant is right that there aren't too many opportunities for role-playing explicitly marked out in the AP, there are plenty of places to add more social encounters if your players like a more roleplay-heavy experience. In the first book, for example, there are a bunch of rival adventuring parties exploring the same area; the book only gives a few details on most of them, but my PCs interacted with...literally all of them--some more than others, as the campaign went on--so we worked in a lot of RP that way.
It's definitely different in feel than ROTRL in terms of the setting, so if exploring and undead in pseudo-ancient-Egypt appeal to you and your players, I'd say go for it.
My other favorite of the ones mentioned in the thread is Hell's Rebels (less dungeon-crawl and more viva la revolution).
Reign of Winter also might be a good one; I haven't run it yet (played up to book 5 in a campaign that unfortunately stalled out for various schedule reasons), but it's got a very fairy-tale/folktale vibe from it that's pretty different than ROTRL.
(I don't know how much of a spoiler that is; it's in the title of the fifth book, but I spoilered it just to be safe.)
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I'm preparing to start Mummy's Mask for my group and it looks to be like a lot of fun (reading it was quite enjoyable and the story is connected fairly well from book to book) so if you're thinking of going with that one I'd suggest it.
As for it not getting much attention/traffic on the boards, I think that's mostly because there doesn't seem to be much to talk about with it... It's laid out well enough that GMs don't need to ask others for clarifications, it's all connected so people don't need to try to figure out how to get from one book to the next, it has many different types of things (dungeons, cities, hexploration, etc) and, as I said, the books are well connected, so it's not an AP that feels like you should be adding more content to.All in all, Mummy's Mask looks like a lot of fun. My only concern is that there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of social role-playing involved (but the previous two APs I ran were Kingmaker and Hell's Rebels, both of which are VERY socially driven campaigns.)
if you are prepping Mummy's Mask, I would recommend the podcast FIND THE PATH, which is wrapping up Book 2 I think.
The DM has done a fantastic job of making the AP extremely social, since he takes advantage of all the local color and the wide variety of adventuring parties which are in town.
Meraki -- You're right, there is a good chance of RP between the group and the other parties. I haven't been able to figure out a way to further the AP with those possible encounters though.
Yakman -- Thanks! I'll look into that one! **looks into it** 46 episodes about an hour long each and they're only near the end of book 2?!?
Ack! (But yes, definitely going to look into it.)
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Meraki -- You're right, there is a good chance of RP between the group and the other parties. I haven't been able to figure out a way to further the AP with those possible encounters though.
Yakman -- Thanks! I'll look into that one! **looks into it** 46 episodes about an hour long each and they're only near the end of book 2?!?
Ack! (But yes, definitely going to look into it.)
well... there's a couple of pure role play episodes in there.
like i said, the DM really gets into using the background characters to develop the party. and really, i don't think there's a better AP (at least in issue 1) with more fun and diverse NPCs presented. You are literally starting in Adventure Party City.