Hello All,
I hope someone will take a look at this. I know Kingmaker is not the most popular AP out there but I running it for the second time with a new party.
This party has played before but is by no means, experienced players. I have let them choose their own classes and races. Altogether they have made some great characters. The problem is they all wanted to be casters. I have a wizard, a sorcerer, a witch, and a summoner. Taking some pity on them I plan to add an NPC Paladin/Oracle. Though even that is mere bandaid, not a fix.
Do you think it is possible for this party to survive?
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Absolutely. A lot will depend on how they build their characters, etc. but as you know, most of the AP revolves around the 5 minute work day, and by the time they get to the tougher, longer drawn out dungeons, they should be able to summon in help, have followers that can help, etc.
At most, you may want to monitor how the combats go and potentially alter some fights in order to make them more suited, but honestly, I'd say its more up to them to figure out how to survive in the wilderness.
Well, I was waiting for some more replies. I am happy I got at least one. Thank you Gargs454 for giving me some support and feedback. I'm not familiar with the term 5-minute workday. I am assuming it is a reference to one combat and rest.
I hope the party will be able to figure out how to survive. Like I said they are not new but I would not call them experienced players. For three of them, this is the first time they've played a caster so there will be a learning curve to deal with. I think I may run as a one-shot to get them to familiarize themselves with the new playstyle needed for a caster. Each of them did a nice job on the character background so they have some investment in keeping them alive.
Thanks again
No problem, happy to help.
"Five Minute Workday" refers to exactly what you said, more or less. Essentially having only 1 encounter in a day, after which you rest. Much of the AP, especially as written (i.e. not adding additional content) has them exploring large tracts of land where they may be only a single encounter in a given hex. They'll then be able to rest afterward. Some of the dungeons or other locations might get a bit dicey in some places without a beefy melee fighter, but the players might come up with some clever solutions.
Since two of your PCs are charisma based, they do have an out in terms of the Leadership feat at 7th level. If they decide that they need more muscle in the party, the cohort received from that feat would be one way to take care of it.
It has been quite some time but I do have an update for those who are interested. The first week of our planned session did not go well for a lack of attendance with only 2 of my 4 players present.
I took it as an opportunity to let them playtest their new spell casters. It had some interesting results.
Short set up I had the Sorcerer, the Witch and included the NPC Paladin versus a few goblins.
The battle was rather interesting and educational or the new spellcasters.
The Witch won initiative and immediately went looking for a weapon. On the sorcerer's turn, he too went looking for his weapon. The Paladin made a charge and fumbled. He then took some damage from good rolls by the goblins.
Round 2 got even more fun. I let the players know they were spellcasters and could look at what they could do to control the combat.
The Witch had Slumber and put one goblin to sleep. The Sorcerer thing this was a great idea laid out his sleep spell. What he did not take into account was the area effect. He centered the spell on the goblin in front of the Paladin and of course, the Paladin failed his save, but the goblin made his. He did get two other but the Paladin was now vulnerable. The next round the Witch tried another spell the goblins saved against and the Sorcerer doubled down on getting the Paladin killed by casting color spray with the Paladin in the cone of effect again.
As I said it was a learning experience. We got everyone together the following week and they performed much better ambushing Hap and the bandits at Oleg's sleeping Hap and 2 of the bandits and incapacitating 2 others within the first 2 rounds.
The group is in the process of taking on the bandit camp. They are doing rather well and starting to work as a team more. I'll keep updating as we play more.
Kevin
Another way to help alleviate some of the problems that comes from having no melee character in a group of spellcasters is to utilize summoning/calling spells.
The Leadership feat is also a valid choice but you got to survive long enough to get it.
Hiring NPC experts (hunters) and warriors (bodyguards) can work as well. While exploring, the hirelings can also work on skinning captured game and you could sell the pelts/components in order to help offset the costs of hirelings.
I highly recommend the Ultimate Charisma pdf because it provides a great way to "draw aggro" in the Pathfinder system. The spellcasters can have their meat shields/hirelings utilize the antagonize maneuver to minimize the risk of enemies going after the spellcasters right away. The Ultimate Charisma book also provides support for the Leadership feat, influence, building contacts, and so forth (perfect for a kingdom-building campaign).
If you are not too shy about using 3rd Party Products, for your Kingmaker game, I also recommend just about ALL of the Ultimate books from Legendary Games. They cover a lot, from better (in my opinion) kingdom building rules that expand upon the kingdom building rules established in Paizo's Ultimate Campaigns core book, to hosting tournaments and festivals, to building armies, factions, and more.
And since your players are playing as spellcasters, I strongly recommend the Creature Components pdf. This will add more flavour and incentives for the spellcasters to skin and harvest animals, magical beats, dragons, and even fey.
Granted, getting all those pdfs might get a bit pricey but most of those books I mentioned are available as part of bundles or heavily discounted right now at DriveThruRPG. ;)
Finally, as pennywit said, working as a team is the best way to survive in Kingmaker. You might want to consider, as a campaign bonus, for the players to select 1 teamwork feat for free at 1st level, 8th, and 16th level (or at whatever level(s) you prefer).
I hope your players continue to have a blast playing Kingmaker! :)
CB
I have to say it is heartening to still get responses to what is now an old post.
I had a few moments where I wanted to fudge a few roles in the parties favor. But I held off. (I blame Troy from the glass cannon podcast. If you have not listened to it do yourself as favor and get it.) A few bandits made their saves and I was sure I was going to kill the witch. She survived, even though she went to 0 hp. In retrospect I'm glad I did since I feel they truly earned their victory.
Kevin
PS it will be a few weeks before we play again but I will keep updating.