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I want to preface this by saying two things.
1: This is my first time running a pre-written AP (I've always just run homebrew setting/campaigns)
2: My PLAYERS want to continue the story, they are simply having trouble finding reasons for their CHARACTERS to be interested. Our group has a blast playing together, it honestly might just be the writing of this AP.... This all may come off as a lot of complaining, but as a GM I am genuinely frustrated and stymied for a way to continue the story as written without significant changes.
So, I'm currently running Age of Ashes, and we just finished Book 3 and nobody seems to understand WHY they need to continue. More specifically, they believe that as long as they hold several of the portal Keys (currently they have the arrowhead, Eclipse, and now the Eye of the Wise) that the Scarlet Triad can't do whatever it is they have planned for the portal.
The problem is, obviously I as the GM know that there is ALOT going on behind the scenes. The dwarf 2nd in command in Book 4 is causing problems in Five Kings Mountains, Uri Zandivar is being a baddy over in Katapesh, and ultimately their schemes will bring them close to their ultimate goal of completing the Orb of Gold Dragonkind and controlling Mengkare, and then Mengkare has his own plans... And absolutely NONE OF THIS INFORMATION comes to light for the players until really late Book 5, or even Book 6.
Am I missing something? The characters all receive individual character drives from their AP specific backgrounds... and those gave almost NO reason to even go into book 2, let alone an interest in stopping the Scarlet Triad beyond "we're the heroes".
Or are the PCs really expected to be interested in being proactive with stopping the activities of the Scarlet Triad, despite having absolutely no idea what they are actually up to? Its like a world spanning game of whack-a-mole... Ive read over the first 3 books several times now, and it honestly seems like the only info the players know is:
Book 1: Voz is being funded by some organization called the Scarlet Triad to look into Alseta's Ring. Cultists show up through the portal, and a spider-lady gets cut off from her home. (If it wasn't for the spider-lady, my PCs wouldnt have even had a reason to investigate the portal into Book 2, they would have sealed off the basement and went about their lives)
Book 2: The PCs go through the portal "for reasons" and are immediately conscripted into a war between the Ekujae elves and the Cinderclaw cultists. They find out that the cultists are mining gold for the Scarlet Triad. When they ask about why they are mining the gold, THE AP LITERALLY TELLS YOU that the cultist leader responds with "Do you not like gold? Everybody likes gold!" and says that they genuinely have no idea, and dont care, why they are mining the gold beyond doing it in exchange for services from the Scarlet Triad.
Book 3: Laslunn sends several agents to check in on Voz, those agents take it upon themselves to capture a villager (I had them capture Pid and Zarf instead of the woodworker guy, because my PCs couldnt care less about some random NPC who's only purpose is to repair the citadel... again, having to change the narrative to engage the characters). As PCs they took this attack personally, so thankfully that drove them through Dreamgate and into Book 3. When they get there... oh no pirates/slavers, and the longest chain of combats Ive ever seen in a book... They rescue the town and head to Kintargo to look into the warehouse they learned about, setting off the rest of the book... again another game of whack-a-mole. The tower on campus has no purpose to the story, the Triad could just take people offsight like theyve done all the other prisoners in the quarrey... The Bellflower Network does essentially nothing... the Rahkshasa's summoning fake ghosts only makes sense to any players that have played through previous 1e APs... Finally, they track down Laslunn in the quarrey, defeat all the enemies there (including the Lich who has no bearing on the story and literally just happens to be there with the Scarlet Triad, in a "you stay away from me Ill stay away from you" stalemate)... and they find the letter saying that the newly found key, Eye of the Wise, leads to a place in the Five Kings Mountains where they Scarlet Triad once again already is, and again, No reason why available to the players.
So... going into Book 4, obviously I know that the Dwarf lady is trying to broker a deal with the Magma Dragon in the area, mostly the get access to the Shard of the Orb of Gold Dragonkind it has in its possession, but also to bolster her own position and power. But before you even get to Chapter 1 of the Book, there is a sidebar that says "Veshumirix has already agreed to part with the shard in exchange for Kovlar, and Illssrah has sent the shard on to Katapesh—but the PCs shouldn’t learn about this until the next adventure." So even if they find a reason to combat the Scarlet Triad AGAIN without reason beyond "we're the heroes", they still wont find out WHY anything is happening.
Is this normal? Are PCs honestly expected to go through FIVE BOOKS before finding out the main plot of an AP? I haven't even covered the Mengkare plot line... Starting the Scarlet Triad himself, planning to sacrifice an entire city... aren't these things my players should know?
Please hive-mind... I need your help...
You might get more help with this over in the Age of Ashes subforum, especially the Book 4 thread. (Would link, but phone posting)
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I want to preface this by saying two things...
You are right. One of the main problems of AoA is that's little to no reason to non-heroic players to continue. Unless they want to use the Alseta gates to earn money (want to re-establish the gate network for trade reasons) or are afraid of some invasion in their fortress, especially by Scarlet Triad interests in the gatenetwork (where the players can simply choose to implode the entire gates room to avoid this risk at all).
So you probably need to create extra reason to they travel to next gate or anticipate some Scarlet Triad plans to players and/or crescent Dahak risks behind their actions to make your players to act!
That's the main problem in AoE IMO, there's weak reasons to characters to keep going between most books, unless you force them to do in someway.
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To this day I still do not understand the "Yes there are doors in our basement through which evil cultists have come, but no, we're not interested in securing these infiltration points or investigating further" attitude some characters have. I suppose if the party isn't interested in running the citadel that's reason enough to ignore the portals, but then I'd ask why the group is playing this AP in the first place when such is clearly outlined in the player's guide.
When concepting and creating your character, work with the other players and your GM to ensure you’re building a character that’ll work well with the other PCs and the overall plotline of Age of Ashes.
Are groups just skipping these recommendations or something? I ask because in my session 0 we discussed all of this, and more, before characters were created.
Maybe this comes across as bemused, but I think GMs can nip this problem in the bud before the campaign even starts if they secure the buy-in of their players.
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That may seem more harsh than I intended, so here is some help for your specific situation.
If you want the story to continue, and the players want the story to continue, is there really a problem? Is verisimilitude that important? Can you just handwave it?
If not, then perhaps have someone in town with whom they have a connection ask about it, and perhaps that person can go through by themselves. Maybe they stole the key, opened the portal and then left the key behind. They could be in trouble inside Jewelgate Way Station and need help from the PCs.
Or perhaps hint or flat out tell the PCs that there is more than one key per gate, that should motivate them to secure the gates themselves.
As far as revealing the story to them, maybe have some NPCs not die in combat but instead be captured. Ilssrah would be perfect for this. If they do kill her and you don't see an easy way to just have her surrender, have them find some notes on her that reveal more of the story. Or perhaps after she dies they find an NPC she had captured who can relate the info to them.
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Another angle for specifically the "we have three keys, so we can't imagine that the Scarlet Triad can actually enact their plans for Alseta's Ring" point is this:
The Scarlet Triad has already gotten access to two keys in the past before the PC's got them. They gave the Cinderclaws the means to steal the Hunter's Arrowhead from the Ekujae and Laslunn had managed to get the Eye of the Wise through her own machinations.
Considering that they've also come through on their own at least once from the other side, it's really not much of a leap to imagine that it could happen again. Not to mention they've already come into town and kidnapped an NPC once(Fadelby Vusker in the adventure as-written, Alak Stagram in my own campaign because he was a PC's boyfriend), and Laslunn has been pushing for a more active stance on taking the Citadel for the Triad.
They know that the Citadel exists, they've used keys to invade before, they've snuck into town and endangered people before, and by this point the PC's are definitely on their radar considering their very visible actions against the Triad in Kintargo.
The PC's have made a very bad enemy who could conceivably come after them at any time, and their only lead at stopping them is to go into Jewelgate where they know another high-ranking member is making nefarious movements. They could stay at home and just ignore the machinations elsewhere in the world, but they've really only got half of the total keys(counting Lotusgate's, which obviously isn't relevant), and the last one they found was in Triad hands.
I feel like it's easy enough to assume the Triad is holding onto the rest for their own purposes and that's a scary sword of Damocles hanging over Breachill.