Probably running this in a few months--advice?

[Ian G]

I'm planning to run this for some friends in a few months. Confirmed characters so far are an ex-Chelish paladin and single mom who lives and works in Andoran, and a Hidden Priest of an Infernal Duke, both dispatched to Taldor as double agents for their real factions with the mission of monitoring the situation and ensuring that an "appropriate" candidate gets the throne.

So far I've made the following changes:
--Fluff change to the problem at the root of the succession crisis, the crisis is now over whether or not the national succession (currently run by agnatic primogeniture) should be brought in line with the normal standard of agnatic-cognatic (aka male-preference) primogeniture (which would allow Eutropia to inherit in the absence of a son).
--Pythareus is now a patrilineal descendant of a bastard of an earlier Stavian, giving him a distant claim to the throne.

Does anyone here have any suggestions for running this path or any suggestions for edits that may need to be made to refine the story?

[Berrik Belmorn]

The crisis is at the heart of the path. That is a huge change

[Ian G]

Storywise it changes nothing, it just makes sure that my cynical leftist buddies and my history major buddy don't complain about primogeniture apparently meaning sexism now when it historically just meant "first offspring inherits", and also apparently More Female Monarchs = Good. (It also gives Pythareus a bit of legitimacy and justifies his release of the bastard letter in part 5, he nukes Eutropia's claim and thereby makes them both equal claimants in terms of legitimacy even to her supporters) Basically I want to edit the fluff a bit to make sure my snarky nerd buddies don't get grouchy.

[Terminalmancer]

The change to the Senate vote, to move to agnatic-cognatic primogeniture, is the bigger potential change here. As a result, Carrius's resurrection would invalidate the legitimacy of Eutropia's claim even if you assume the Senate vote was held as legitimate. It also makes some of Eutropia's motivations more irrational, and opens up potential questions about who would be next in line instead of Eutropia if Pythareus's adoption didn't happen. My understanding of traditional agnatic-cognatic primogeniture is that close-enough male relatives would be preferred over Eutropia, a difference that would make both the rules and the family tree more central to the plot. (For my part, I ended up clarifying the vote to be moving Taldor from male-only primogeniture to absolute primogeniture to simplify things, and it made enough sense for the historians in my group.)

Even so, Pythareus's adoption--if you keep it--would render irrelevant your change to make him a distant heir. He (and half of the Taldan nobility) probably already are distant cousins, given the models on which the Taldan noble class seems to have been built on, and it just wasn't worth mentioning.

Assuming agnatic-cognatic primogeniture, Eutropia's claim becomes invalid as of the beginning of book 3. You might find the tone changing more significantly than you think--there are a lot of motivations that you'll want to rework, however slightly, as a result. As written, Eutropia can only verify Pythareus's adoption sometime after defeating him, with the discovery of the reborn but insane Stavian--and after that the PCs gallivant off in favor of some deus ex machina anyway. Your change makes Carrius the primary heir as soon as he enters, barring other rewrites--it doesn't necessarily invalidate everything about the plot, but it makes books 3 and 4 far more cynical. (Which might already be a good fit for your group, but it's hard to tell at this remove.) It also forces the PCs to live with a potentially illegitimate sponsor for two books before they go try to resolve that in book 5. I don't know that it's a problem for your group, but it might be--I've had parties go off the rails to resolve some long-simmering tension before, and I wouldn't count it out here.

You may also want to consider possible PC defections in that scenario, either to Pythareus (whom may have been ruled out by the invisible hand of Cheliax, it sounds like?) or to Carrius later on.

Overall, I don't think any of those changes are individually huge, but you might have more small changes to deal with than you anticipate.

[Ian G]

Thanks for the advice!

So the Hidden Priest is going to be trying to not cause party strife, hence Hidden Priest. Another player is probably going to be doing a Julie d'Aubigny-expy duelist/bard type, so we're probably going into the knights and chivalry and romance tropes here. Also, this is going to take place *after* my other group's Hell's Rebels campaign, which is so far in book 5 (they just finished book 4 by killing Barzillai and renaming New Barzillai back to Kintargo) and will probably result in Cheliax collapsing completely.

I'll definitely change my plans for the succession crisis details. I get the feeling I'm going to need to do some writeups and have character notes for major NPCs ready.

[Terminalmancer]

Ooh. If your group does indeed lean heavily into some of the romantic tropes, I think they'll find book 2 a great fit.

Cheliax collapsing sounds like one heck of a twist! That could make War for the Crown even more interesting.

There are so many variables that it's hard to give good advice. I hope it helps, but it could easily just all be irrelevant! I can say that I'm easily up to a couple hundred handouts in roll20 already, and we've just entered book 3... so yeah, you'll probably want to make a LOT of notes.

[Ian G]

Yeah, I think that book 2 will be the highlight!

Oh yeah the Hidden Priest's motivation is probably going to be "welp, Cheliax is f@%$ed and most of it's run by paladins and a good chunk of the rest declared independence and is now a socialist republic with a dim view on devils and fascism, so our church is going to need a new home and make sure nobody goes on a conquering spree without our backing".

Thank you! I'll get a notebook for this, I think.

[seenar]

So in book two, which is what we are on, one of my players is a half-elf. He took a version of disgraced noble and really wants nothing more in life but to study magic. Still, his mother, a Kyonian ambassador has thrust him into intrigue.

Unsure of what to do, he decided to dance with Dame Carrod (one of Titus cronies). I am a "go for it" sort of GM, so I asked him what he wanted to roll, and instead of Diplomacy, he decided to wow her with his arcane knowledge and pegged it. She is a magic user herself, and so I said with that roll she is interested. I tweaked her to be a half-elf as well, and raised her CHA because this could go somewhere. He did not make it back to his room that night. He was late to breakfast day two as well.

Now, he is moving her away from Titus. It is a hoot!

Another character, who is one of the two Tribunes of the party is a brawler and in no way good at the social stuff. He spent the Jubliee working on Sepsimia, while a more adept character worked on Dame Crabbe. I added a Fencing and Wrestling events to the Joust and he won the Wrestling, and gave his laurel to Sepsimia. Now they have cured her, that courting is going on.

One of two of the female characters may well end up with the Barron as well.

[Ian G]

I will definitely see how people are with romance. I'm getting a notebook on my next trip to Target just to be ready.