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Is there a mini AP that would play well off of the Abomination Vaults is finished?
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Is there a mini AP that would play well off of the Abomination Vaults is finished?
Not sure what "Mini AP" means, but if that means a 11–20 3 part Adventure Path, then the Stolen Fate Adventure Path, which starts in Absalom, makes an easy transition from Abomination Vaults to a new campaign.
But note that Stolen Fate has no through line with Abomination Vaults' plot and themes.
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Something that could be nice is 11-20 that is "direct sequel" to previous 1-10 to create a sort of "two story arc 1-20" campaign some of APs try to be.
Not sure this would really be a solution to the “later volumes of APs generate lower sales” problem though, unfortunately. It just sounds like a 6-part AP with extra steps.
There are people out there who started Fists of the Ruby Phoenix with brand new 11th-level characters, but I heavily doubt the same would happen with a 3-part AP specifically designed as a sequel to Quest for the Frozen Flame, for example. No one is playing that without also playing through the first three parts.
However, this does raise a point that perhaps low-level 3-parters with the best sales numbers could inspire high-level sequel 3-parters once it’s been proven that the first adventure sells well? But with the time it takes between when these things start getting planned and when they actually hit shelves, it’d likely be 3 or more years between parts, by which point a lot of groups will have already moved on.
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Several of the mid- and high-level 3-part APs for Starfinder feature several possible hooks for PCs who partook in past APs - though Devastation Ark has the most explicit ties to Dead Suns, and likewise Drift Hackers is a bit more linked to Drift Crashers than something like Against the Aeon Throne (but has hooks for both).
PF2 could try a similar approach, where an 11-20 AP has some transitional hooks for some past APs - though currently the only remotely geographically or thematically neighboring 3-parters with a shared followup would be Abomination Vaults and Sky King's Tomb, and even that is a maybe given we only know the premise of book 1 for the latter.
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Something that could be nice is 11-20 that is "direct sequel" to previous 1-10 to create a sort of "two story arc 1-20" campaign some of APs try to be.Not sure this would really be a solution to the “later volumes of APs generate lower sales” problem though, unfortunately. It just sounds like a 6-part AP with extra steps.
There are people out there who started Fists of the Ruby Phoenix with brand new 11th-level characters, but I heavily doubt the same would happen with a 3-part AP specifically designed as a sequel to Quest for the Frozen Flame, for example. No one is playing that without also playing through the first three parts.
However, this does raise a point that perhaps low-level 3-parters with the best sales numbers could inspire high-level sequel 3-parters once it’s been proven that the first adventure sells well? But with the time it takes between when these things start getting planned and when they actually hit shelves, it’d likely be 3 or more years between parts, by which point a lot of groups will have already moved on.
It would probably result in stronger sales for the 11–20 one than if it was just the 2nd half of a 6 part Adventure Path. The perception of there being a starting point" is, I think, a strong attraction. As is the idea that you don't have to all six parts.
In an alternate world, I'd be interested to see, for example, how a version of Hell's Rebels that contains parts 1–4 sells, and then has parts 5–6 as a "sequel." Or alternately, a 3 part Iron Gods presented as a trilogy. Since in those two Adventure Paths' cases, they were sort of built that way to help GMs who want shorter campaigns to have stronger places to tie things up. Not sure how obvious that intent came through in print though, since that information mostly just lived in the forewords.
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It seems to me that the obvious ratio for 3 part AP's is 3 1-10 and 1 11-20 per year based on the format's respective popularity. If you did the 11-20 last each year you could have a page in front giving ideas on how that years 1-10s could plausibly link into it.
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Not sure how obvious that intent came through in print though, since that information mostly just lived in the forewords.
No idea that was the case here at least.
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Something that could be nice is 11-20 that is "direct sequel" to previous 1-10 to create a sort of "two story arc 1-20" campaign some of APs try to be.Not sure this would really be a solution to the “later volumes of APs generate lower sales” problem though, unfortunately. It just sounds like a 6-part AP with extra steps.
There are people out there who started Fists of the Ruby Phoenix with brand new 11th-level characters, but I heavily doubt the same would happen with a 3-part AP specifically designed as a sequel to Quest for the Frozen Flame, for example. No one is playing that without also playing through the first three parts.
However, this does raise a point that perhaps low-level 3-parters with the best sales numbers could inspire high-level sequel 3-parters once it’s been proven that the first adventure sells well? But with the time it takes between when these things start getting planned and when they actually hit shelves, it’d likely be 3 or more years between parts, by which point a lot of groups will have already moved on.
I think it could work yeah, especially if there is year between sequel and first part. I think JJ has it right that its less intimidating to jump to "start of new sequel" than "commit to six books"
I think main benefit of it though is that lot of the aps ARE designed to have two 3 book story arcs, but because they are designed to be single six book story, it usually leads to one of the sixth books feeling less tight than other ones. So framing them as two different aps with time between them makes them possibly flow better (and it helps avoiding people being like "well I don't want to buy this six book ap because if we start playing it, we want to play ALL parts and not end early, but I don't want to commit to playing six book ap yet")
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I stand corrected, those are some pretty good points in favor of companion 3-parters!
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I think main benefit of it though is that lot of the aps ARE designed to have two 3 book story arcs, but because they are designed to be single six book story, it usually leads to one of the sixth books feeling less tight than other ones. So framing them as two different aps with time between them makes them possibly flow better (and it helps avoiding people being like "well I don't want to buy this six book ap because if we start playing it, we want to play ALL parts and not end early, but I don't want to commit to playing six book ap yet")
I think two more significant factor that contributes to a 6-part Adventure Path being percieved to have "one of the six books feeling less tight than the other ones" thatfolks might not be taking into account is developer fatigue and writer skill.
Developer Fatigue: It's tough developing Adventure Paths, and often by the time a developer gets to the later half of the process, they're running out of time to give books the amount of time they deserve during development, since each volume before brings its own chances for being unexpectedly tough to develop into publishable shape—which not only means that a developer has to "borrow" time allocated in the schedule from future adventures in order to take care of a particularly problematic one earlier on, but also faces an increasing frustration and chance of being burnt-out of the whole thing. So that by the time they get to the 5th or 6th book, a developer might have a fraction of the time they would need to properly develop an adventure, and/or might have used up too much of their creative energies struggling with a problematic earlier volume. Which goes hand in hand, alas, with...
Writer Skill: We do our best to hire the best writers for each volume, but sometimes that just doesn't work out. Not every writer is equally good at creating adventures, and sometimes an otherwise great writer ends up working on an adventure that doesn't mesh with their style or interest or skill set. This results in the developer having to work harder on the adventure when it comes in, which leads to Developer Fatigue (see above).
When you switch down to a 3 part Adventure Path, you essentially cut those two factors in half.
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I imagine that the above post goes hand in hand with Player Apathy and GM Burnout. Shorter APs would likely reduce these factors also and result in greater player engagement and more positive reviews.
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I'm thinking it would also allow a bit more mixing and matching. Some people just really like certain themes, and really don't like others. If the 6-book APs really are effectively a set of two 3-book APs with linkages that are solid but not unbreakable, then you could signpost any thematic changes between the first set and the second. If you get any groups who really liked the themes of the first set, but really don't like the themes of the second, it allows a natural breakpoint where those groups can jump tracks. Any time you can meaningfully improve customer enjoyment without changing the price, that's pretty much always a win.
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I imagine that the above post goes hand in hand with Player Apathy and GM Burnout. Shorter APs would likely reduce these factors also and result in greater player engagement and more positive reviews.
I know in my circles a lot more GMs would step forward if it were only for a 3-module arc. Players too, though that's hardly an issue.
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A few times in the AMA, Luis leaned on the very particular phrasing that sailing subsystems might take the place of a new class slot in a given year of design, which feels too specific to be purely a hypothetical...Which of course could lead very naturally into an Aquatic book in the Spring. Or the other way around would work too, depending on what the final quarter AP winds up being.
Kingdoms of the Sea: Aquatic Adventures both above and below the surface! The key difference between this and an underdark or wilderness book would be that the systems and feats that aid exploring those terrains are useful in most settings, while aquatic play is more limited in application (much like planar exploration). The mistweaver idea I kicked around in a different thread would be perfect for this, as would the bloodrager.
It occurs to me that an AP that starts in Katapesh and goes to the sea, both above and below, would be a pretty good way to tackle the veiled master and alghollthu themes they've been hinting at. And starting from a high level you can just give the players magic items that allow for underwater breathing and fighting without worrying about it overly.
Planar shenanigans and Azarketis (whose ancestry abilities echo kineticists) can now be filled out a bit thanks to Rage, so I could see those parts being leaned on as well.
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I’ll take pretty much however Paizo decides to tackle that Golden Road/alghollthu/Shimon-Je plotline, whether it’s on a boat, under the waves, or whatever else.
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IMO, a revised/reimagined Jade Regent campaign would not need to dedicate three books/months of content to the travel, it should start and take place entirely in Minkai, with guidance in the Players Guide for creating characters that suit the setting.
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Same, though I can see it now in retrospect. Each of the two-parters winding up with ** spoiler omitted ** That, actually explains a great deal about the break between books 4 and 5.Not sure how obvious that intent came through in print though, since that information mostly just lived in the forewords.No idea that was the case here at least.
Exactly. Again, I talk about this organization and thematic style IN Iron Gods... in the forewords. Those sections at the start of each volume were a great place for the developer to pull aside the curtain and speak directy to the reader, to reveal some behind the scenes content, additional game content that we didn't have room for in the adventure, or talk about the practice of adventure creation. I miss them, but the perception was that no one read them, and the other adventure developers at the time hated writing them, so they went away.
But yes. Iron Gods was originally concieved as a trilogy, split into a low, medium, and high level story, with each of the two sections telling a different story about how faith and science mix. But also to give GMs flexibility about how long they wanted to run what was, at the time, a huge risk for the Adventure Path, becasue we weren't sure if anyone (besides some of us at Paizo) was willing to spend half a year with an adventure that mixed science fiction and fantasy.
Turns out they were willing, and Starfinder came along as a result of the reception for Iron Gods and the Technology Guide. So in hindsight, I suspect I would have built Iron Gods a bit less like a trilogy and more like a classic Adventure Path that had a single through line. Too late now, though.
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IMO, a revised/reimagined Jade Regent campaign would not need to dedicate three books/months of content to the travel, it should start and take place entirely in Minkai, with guidance in the Players Guide for creating characters that suit the setting.
That would be the second, high-level, AP.
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IMO, a revised/reimagined Jade Regent campaign would not need to dedicate three books/months of content to the travel, it should start and take place entirely in Minkai, with guidance in the Players Guide for creating characters that suit the setting.That would be the second, high-level, AP.
If memory serves, one of the criticisms leveled against Jade Regent was that you were playing the standard array of western-fantasy-style heroes, who traipsed halfway across the world to interfere in a dispute they had no stake in, because of their close affiliation with a Mary-Sue NPC.
Would it not be better to have characters start in Minkai at level one, protecting their village/land from bandits/rogue samurai, then deposing a crooked noble/magistrate (and/or a wicked oni pulling the strings) in a level 1-10 AP. The 'sequel' could have things escalate from there, culminating in an assault on the Jade Regent's palace?
1: Defend village from bandits, dungeon crawl through bandit lair.
2: Head into town to deal with crooked magistrate behind bandit attacks.
3: Head into hostile territory (mountain/swamp) to find/destroy evil oni who was controlling the magistrate.
4: Jade Regent sends soldiers to make example of the group that killed magistrate/defied his rule. Party defend village from siege and drive of general (recurring villain).
5: PCs travel across Minkai, gathering allies to assault capital and overthrow Jade Regent.
6: Assault on capital, rematch with vengeful general, unseat the Jade Regent.
I should add, I would rather see 3 part APs and/or 6 part APs that are distinct from one another. I don't understand the desire for two seperate-but-connected stories to run back-to-back, if that is what is being requested. I would be interested in APs that follow on from the finale of a previous AP, in the sense that Shattered Star and Return of the Runelords were 'sequels' to Rise of the Runelords. However, I imagine they can't be too closely connected, for fear of alienating customers who did not buy the first AP in the chain.
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The reason we started Jade Regent in Varisia and did the overland journy is that, at the time, about 150 volumes of Pathfinder ago, we weren't sure how interested our customers were at the time in an adventure path set beyond the Inner Sea region, so this was a method to start somewhere familiar and then take them to somewhere new.
If we were doing this adventure path today, that would not be a concern.
The "Mary Sue" part was another experiment we wanted to try, with a stronger NPC role in an adventure path or potentailly even having players play those NPCs as their characters, sort of like the expectations back in the day for the Dragonlance modules. In hindsight, one of the big lessons there was that the players prefer to be the focus of the story, not the NPCs, which is sort of what we expected before and for sure what we know after... but still we wanted to try to do a story with important recurring NPCs that stay at the PC's side... ALSO to capture the popular trope in computer games where you travel with well-rounded NPC companions who have their own goals and stories.
(As an aside, it's frustrating to hear folks complain about "Mary Sue" characters, since once the adventure is in the GM and player's hands... it's no longer in ours. There were intended to be a LOT of "safety nets" in Jade Regent should Ameiko not make it to the end, particularly in setting up a PC to take on her role, but we have to have a character to build our own canon off of for future stories, and we don't know your PCs' names, so we have to use our own.)
Furthermore, we were still trying to build up a cast of memorable non-evil non-villian NPCs to populate the world with at the time, and contextualizing them in adventures helped (in theory) to show them off in the world in active roles rather than passive ones just in the Campaign Setting books (which had their own struggles and crisis of identity moments in how to present NPCs).
You'll see us experiment with other variations on this to greater success, for example, with the wide cast of recurring NPC characters in Wrath of the Righteous or Hell's Rebels, and finally it's come full circle with NPCs having full personalities and companion quests in the Kingmaker Companion Guide.
Always eager to hear back from what method of "Including recurring ally NPC companions to adventure with the PCs" works best, though!
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Also, on the subject of a six-parter being split into three arcs, has there been any discussion about making APs into duologies rather than trilogies or hexalogies? I think it'd be an interesting way to take some stories that feel a bit too long for a single Pathfinder Adventure but not quite long enough for an entire Adventure Path ... though I suppose at that point it might make more sense to release both parts as stand-alone adventures that can be played back to back. It's hard to fit a two-parter into a yearly schedule with three-parters.
We're not done experimenting with and exploring the lengths of Adventure Paths. AKA: there's been discussion of different lengths of Adventure Paths in the works for many years... and we're VERY CLOSE to being able to talk to folks in public about the results of those discussions.
So stay tuned, I guess, for more info. I'll chat more about it the instant I can.
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Exactly. Again, I talk about this organization and thematic style IN Iron Gods... in the forewords. Those sections at the start of each volume were a great place for the developer to pull aside the curtain and speak directy to the reader, to reveal some behind the scenes content, additional game content that we didn't have room for in the adventure, or talk about the practice of adventure creation. I miss them, but the perception was that no one read them, and the other adventure developers at the time hated writing them, so they went away.
I always found the forwards a fascinating read, but I am a game designer, so that may play into that.
It would be nice if that sort of info showed up on the website, but the time gap between when the product left development's hands and the release date would probably make those insights harder to remember.
I've long thought that a "Behind the scenes" sort of series of blog articles would be fun to produce... but it's a question of resources and scheduling and priorities and interest. If folks want to see more of these kinds of blog posts or content on the website, by all means let us know via social media or at conventions or in feedback to blogs or the like!
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Always eager to hear back from what method of "Including recurring ally NPC companions to adventure with the PCs" works best, though!
You could include optional NPC allies with ties to the story in the Players Guide for each AP, with suggestions regarding how they should be advanced to keep pace with the party throughout the campaign? The GM could use these characters as they see fit, to bolster a party that is under strength, or allow new/temporary players to join the game without having to roll up a PC, or as replacement characters if someone dies mid-session. If memory serves, you used to do something similar with your Iconics back in the very early days of your AP line (before the jump to PFv1?).
I guess it would be up to individual GMs to ensure these allied characters did not overshadow the players during play.
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Same, though I can see it now in retrospect. Each of the two-parters winding up with ** spoiler omitted ** That, actually explains a great deal about the break between books 4 and 5.Not sure how obvious that intent came through in print though, since that information mostly just lived in the forewords.No idea that was the case here at least.Exactly. Again, I talk about this organization and thematic style IN Iron Gods... in the forewords. Those sections at the start of each volume were a great place for the developer to pull aside the curtain and speak directy to the reader, to reveal some behind the scenes content, additional game content that we didn't have room for in the adventure, or talk about the practice of adventure creation. I miss them, but the perception was that no one read them, and the other adventure developers at the time hated writing them, so they went away.
But yes. Iron Gods was originally concieved as a trilogy, split into a low, medium, and high level story, with each of the two sections telling a different story about how faith and science mix. But also to give GMs flexibility about how long they wanted to run what was, at the time, a huge risk for the Adventure Path, becasue we weren't sure if anyone (besides some of us at Paizo) was willing to spend half a year with an adventure that mixed science fiction and fantasy.
Turns out they were willing, and Starfinder came along as a result of the reception for Iron Gods and the Technology Guide. So in hindsight, I suspect I would have built Iron Gods a bit less like a trilogy and more like a classic Adventure Path that had a single through line. Too late now, though.
My favorite forewords were the ones where writer got into design of the ap :'D
My least favorite one is the one where (at time) marketing director talked about his asian vacations and chinatown experiences.
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The reason we started Jade Regent in Varisia and did the overland journy is that, at the time, about 150 volumes of Pathfinder ago, we weren't sure how interested our customers were at the time in an adventure path set beyond the Inner Sea region, so this was a method to start somewhere familiar and then take them to somewhere new.
If we were doing this adventure path today, that would not be a concern.
The "Mary Sue" part was another experiment we wanted to try, with a stronger NPC role in an adventure path or potentailly even having players play those NPCs as their characters, sort of like the expectations back in the day for the Dragonlance modules. In hindsight, one of the big lessons there was that the players prefer to be the focus of the story, not the NPCs, which is sort of what we expected before and for sure what we know after... but still we wanted to try to do a story with important recurring NPCs that stay at the PC's side... ALSO to capture the popular trope in computer games where you travel with well-rounded NPC companions who have their own goals and stories.
(As an aside, it's frustrating to hear folks complain about "Mary Sue" characters, since once the adventure is in the GM and player's hands... it's no longer in ours. There were intended to be a LOT of "safety nets" in Jade Regent should Ameiko not make it to the end, particularly in setting up a PC to take on her role, but we have to have a character to build our own canon off of for future stories, and we don't know your PCs' names, so we have to use our own.)
Furthermore, we were still trying to build up a cast of memorable non-evil non-villian NPCs to populate the world with at the time, and contextualizing them in adventures helped (in theory) to show them off in the world in active roles rather than passive ones just in the Campaign Setting books (which had their own struggles and crisis of identity moments in how to present NPCs).
You'll see us experiment with other variations on this to greater success, for example,...
If you ask me as someone who is running jade regent and has actually read it through, main issue with jade regent was that its npc cast heavy story that gives zero guidance on how to use npcs, so ap as written feels like npcs do literally nothing but sit at caravan while pcs are dungeon crawling :'D
(its really weird to read people claim npcs are stealing spotlight when as written they do almost nothing during entire ap)
The end result? Caravan feels to be there just for traveling, GM has to do lot of heavy lifting with npcs(like making them actually feeling involved) and ap otherwise as written is mostly just dungeon crawling. I'd probably review jade regent books, but outside of realization that old readers were overly harsh on wrong parts, I doubt I could add new insight devs haven't already learned from it
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Super excited for those upcoming experiments - and I eat up any “behind the scenes” stuff the team feels up to making!
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If you ask me as someone who is running jade regent and has actually read it through, main issue with jade regent was that its npc cast heavy story that gives zero guidance on how to use npcs, so ap as written feels like npcs do literally nothing but sit at caravan while pcs are dungeon crawling :'D
Fair enough. I'm pretty sure that a large part of the issues there were the result of a developer shift; I had to shift away from this project to work on the hardcover of Rise of the Runelords, and I didn't give enough clear communication as to the "still in my head and not written down" goals for the Adventure Path. Something I've learned to do better since then, for sure.
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The flip side issue is... well, GMPCs are tempting, but entirely too easy to do badly. Handing the GM characters in an AP that resemble GMPCs is often going lead to them being treated as GMPCs, which in turn is going to spontaneously generate Mary Sue (and Marty Stu) characters.
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The flip side issue is... well, GMPCs are tempting, but entirely too easy to do badly. Handing the GM characters in an AP that resemble GMPCs is often going lead to them being treated as GMPCs, which in turn is going to spontaneously generate Mary Sue (and Marty Stu) characters.
The flip flip side issue is the GMPCs are a great solution for if you have only one or two players. The very first campaign I ran for my homebrew setting (which would go on to get large chunks imported into Golarion) was for my little sister, and I ran the other 4 or so PCs and it was a lot of fun! We did the whole Dragonlance saga the same way.
That said, yeah... I'll never forget the story about the GMPC in a Shadowrun game back in college who somehow managed to win the lottery and got a lot of spending money for stuff... HIGHLY SUSPECT! :-)
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That said, yeah... I'll never forget the story about the GMPC in a Shadowrun game back in college who somehow managed to win the lottery and got a lot of spending money for stuff... HIGHLY SUSPECT! :-)
"I'm just trying to showcase all the cool stuff you folks will be able to buy after you do a bunch of jobs."
"Yeah, but this guy is supposed to be our friend, so could he just loan us some so we're less likely to die on this job?"
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Exactly. Again, I talk about this organization and thematic style IN Iron Gods... in the forewords. Those sections at the start of each volume were a great place for the developer to pull aside the curtain and speak directy to the reader, to reveal some behind the scenes content, additional game content that we didn't have room for in the adventure, or talk about the practice of adventure creation. I miss them, but the perception was that no one read them, and the other adventure developers at the time hated writing them, so they went away.
I loved the forwards as a look behind-the-scenes. I also miss the old Developer's Commentary Youtube Videos y'all did for Pathfinder Fridays.
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I'm guessing words will be printer on paper with pretty artwork and it will be bound together with a spine.
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I loved the forwards as a look behind-the-scenes. I also miss the old Developer's Commentary Youtube Videos y'all did for Pathfinder Fridays.
Those were fun. Diving into a lore topic for the better part of an hour didn't just let us share our excitement and a few secrets; it also let us hear fans' questions, concoct not-yet-necessarily-canon answers, and learn what excites the audience.
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I maybe be an odd Duck, but I loved the npcs in jade reagent as did my table. Having strong reoccurring npcs always make the story more personal. Caring for them, learning from them, sometimes outpacing them. I never got to finish it due to player issues, but the books we did got to were really fun.
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I loved the forwards as a look behind-the-scenes. I also miss the old Developer's Commentary Youtube Videos y'all did for Pathfinder Fridays.Those were fun. Diving into a lore topic for the better part of an hour didn't just let us share our excitement and a few secrets; it also let us hear fans' questions, concoct not-yet-necessarily-canon answers, and learn what excites the audience.
I wish they would make a comeback! It provides so much additional context for the GM. I especially loved the one before book 5 of War for the Crown talking about all the pieces of media that inspired Axis.
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I maybe be an odd Duck, but I loved the npcs in jade reagent as did my table. Having strong reoccurring npcs always make the story more personal. Caring for them, learning from them, sometimes outpacing them. I never got to finish it due to player issues, but the books we did got to were really fun.
I've never read Jade regent, and to be honest this NPC chatter is kind of selling me on it. Perhaps because of the Kingmaker Companion Guide, my tolerance for well-rounded NPCs with competing agendas is pretty high.
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I maybe be an odd Duck, but I loved the npcs in jade reagent as did my table. Having strong reoccurring npcs always make the story more personal. Caring for them, learning from them, sometimes outpacing them. I never got to finish it due to player issues, but the books we did got to were really fun.
One of the things best aps tend to have is recurring NPC cast, such as Curse of the Crimson Throne's cast :'D
It's why I'm bit confused of people assuming party npcs are inherently bad. Then again I'm running for table that used to take leadership feats for cohorts back in 1e
(I'm running jade regent in 2e so I translated the npcs as 2e pc stats blocks, but the mechanical part isn't the hard part, its really been hard to involve npcs in the events and give them enough spotlight :'D Its part of why I just decided to make two final books sandbox homebrew, its much easier to involve npcs like that)
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Not sure what "Mini AP" means, but if that means a 11–20 3 part Adventure Path, then the Stolen Fate Adventure Path, which starts in Absalom, makes an easy transition from Abomination Vaults to a new campaign.But note that Stolen Fate has no through line with Abomination Vaults' plot and themes.
How likely are we to at some point get a 1-10 AP that left PCs well positioned for proceeding into Fists of the Ruby Phoenix? Not expecting or asking for plot throughline here, but something with thematic/subgenre expectations that would connect on well there would be very cool.
I've mentioned before that the shorter APs are essentially a no-go for my current plausible player groups, though Quest for Frozen Flame might turn out an exception if I skew it somewhat more isolated and stonepunk than written, and am very much looking forward to seeing whether/how Stolen Fate might work following on from one of the 1-10 APs.
If you're asking for a 1-10 AP that ends with the PCs near where Ruby Phoenix begins, not likely. The goal of Ruby Phoenix was that it requires "heroes who have proven themselves" in order to get invited to try out for the tournament, which means that ANY 1—10 Adventure Path was intended to be one positioned for proceeding into that Adventure Path.
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I maybe be an odd Duck, but I loved the npcs in jade reagent as did my table. Having strong reoccurring npcs always make the story more personal. Caring for them, learning from them, sometimes outpacing them. I never got to finish it due to player issues, but the books we did got to were really fun.I've never read Jade regent, and to be honest this NPC chatter is kind of selling me on it. Perhaps because of the Kingmaker Companion Guide, my tolerance for well-rounded NPCs with competing agendas is pretty high.
Well rounded NPC's can also help anchor players to the setting who don't have strong connections with the PC's. My partner insisted on playing a ysoki in our game even though I told him it would be isolating since everyone else in the party is human or elf, and I was right. So I brought in an NPC from his caravan days, she's not around a lot but it let him talk with someone he had a connection with. After that he told me he felt really plugged in and excited now to move forward.
I think it's important to remember that, at the end of the day, the story is not what we the GM's are telling. It's what the players are receiving. They're the storytellers in the end.
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Creative Director
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If you're asking for a 1-10 AP that ends with the PCs near where Ruby Phoenix begins, not likely. The goal of Ruby Phoenix was that it requires "heroes who have proven themselves" in order to get invited to try out for the tournament, which means that ANY 1—10 Adventure Path was intended to be one positioned for proceeding into that Adventure Path.I wasn't asking for a 1-10 to end with heroes geographically near where Ruby Phoenix begins, cool though that would be; was thinking more of a 1-10 that encouraged a party coming through it to think of themselves as "we are a team of people good at what we do who enjoy basically respectful competition with professional equals" more so than, say, "we heroically defend our local homeland or tribe from ten levels' worth of adversaries most of whom we think in terms of killing." (Maybe, for example, by putting in one or two rival adventuring parties who are not jerks or going to turn on the PCs at some point by default.)
If anything, I think it would work better for my potential player groups, in terms of psychological plausibility, to get a team for Ruby Phoenix out of playing the first half of Strength of Thousands, with its emphasis on being part of a community and on non-murdery solutions to many problems, than out of the existing 1-10 APs that I have read (not got to Outlaws of Alkenstar yet). Though realistically that will never happen because we'd all be overwhelmingly more likely to want to finish Strength of Thousands.
Ah, fair enough. That said, I still think any 1–10 Adventure Path does that job. Pathifnder is at its heart a team-focused game, so any 1–10 Adventure Path should have the party come out thinking of themselves as a team of people who are good at what they do, and whose triumphs as a team earned us respect and fame in the region we have reached 10th level in. Which should be enough for an invitation to join any tournament to come their way.
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Indeed and one of the reasons I like 11-20 APs is I like the stories of "people who have each individually done impressive things coming together later in their life to do something"
Like if you want to play the tough, cynical veteran with the heart of goldit's hard to be that guy at level 1. It feels weird to be a level 1 character whose story involves "I've been fighting wars for kings and the like for the last decade".