I’ve just finished running chapter 2 of the first book, and it feels like the adventure path is flying by so quickly. I expect chapter 3 to only take 2 sessions max, and then we’ll be leaving Oppara without the PCs having had a chance to get to know the city barely at all. Does anyone have any ideas/suggestions for further missions the PCs can complete in Oppara after rescuing Martella and before moving on?
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Oppara is rife with chaos and intrigue in the wake of the Exaltation Massacre. Martella is likely not the only noble who was kidnapped or lost in the chaos. This could be a good moment to bring in any of the "Faces of the Senate" if you used them in your campaign, have them run into some trouble that the PCs can save them from. Maybe have some of them try to recruit the PCs as their own agents after hearing about their actions at the Exaltation Gala, paying them for missions around the city.
You could also use the upcoming Persona Phases at the start of book 2 (if you're using the system) encourage the PCs to describe how they develop their persona, and integrate it into Opparan locations. A PC who's organizing a protest might head to The Narrows to talk to the city's downtrodden, another might organize a secret meeting with the corsairs in the Gray Market, another might perform acts of charity with the Sarenite priests at the House of Dawn's Redemption. Even if you don't plan to use the system, it might be a good idea to keep some of the roleplay elements, give the PCs the sense that they're building their own networks and reputations among the elites.
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My own approach to acquainting the players with Oppara was to run a prelude adventure before Crownfall that took them to various parts of the city and gave a sense of its overall society and culture (and created a reason for them to be recruited as agents). That said, the events of Crownfall provide plenty of juicy material for missions in Oppara during the weeks in the wake of the Exaltation Massacre.
The flavor here depends on how much civil strife you want there to be. Canonical WftC keeps things relatively cozy for the most part, leaving it open for problems to be solved as much through social sparring as with the sword.
You could mix it up here, depending on your party. If there are social luminaries among them, they could head off problems in high society "at the pass," as it were, before they develop into street violence. OTOH, maybe sometimes it's like Paris during the Fronde (or certain American states during the Floyd Protests of 2020), where the violence is already in the post and the party is stuck with trying to mitigate it.
The book provides a lot of NPC hooks you can use. Check out Notable Locations starting on p. 67. There are a number of prompts here that provide immediate mission ideas for me:
The Basilica of the Last Man: The character of Cyr Amestin, who has fallen somewhat under the spell of a holy longsword with a vestige of the Starstone's power, might be in peril in a landscape of contending factions that would be curious about that development. Perhaps she'll need to be evacuated to someplace safer and more obscure.
The Cathedral of Coins: The Tare and their leader Veneranda Cain might draw hostility from Imperialists, for her departure from tradition, and attract the support of the Loyalist faction for the opposite reason. Coping with an Imperialist attempt to infiltrate the Cathedral and perhaps kidnap Cain herself would be solid mission material.
Grandbridge Vagabond Camp: There's an enigmatic Human cavalier here named Samrag Nezres who abandoned her career for mysterious reasons five years ago. Did she have some presentiment of the Exaltation Massacre and the coming succession struggle? Was there another reason tied to a plot point of your choice?
Gray Market: A pro-Eutropia smuggler, Captain Seferi, is operating here. She could gain some heat from Imperialist factions in the city, or could be tasked with smuggling people or goods out of Oppara derived from missions elsewhere. A colorful hive-of-scum-and-villainy environment.
The House of Dawn's Redemption: If your group wants to lean into Battling Bigotry, Dawnmother Zenaida Tandleos and her Sarenite temple could be the ticket. She's always been considered suspect as someone who "redeems" genuine villains and might draw direct attack from mobs of bigots or corrupt operations within the city guard from White Hall.
That's a scattering of examples: there are many more. You can use them as pretexts for everything from dungeon crawls to tense social encounters to RP or combat encounters in the streets.
I like Mothman's idea for using this as an opportunity to introduce the Persona system, too, but you don't need to. There's plenty of time provided in Book Two to work into that.
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I really wanted to get to book two and so I pushed into that. I had already run a prelude.
Of course, my guys saved Lord Kalbio at the last moment so that person started his Herosim persona with a bang