Looking for reviews and opinions on PF adventure paths

[Kol Korran]

So... Our group has recently finisehd an experimental campaign in FATE, but now we wish to play PF, I'm going to DM.

Only myself and another players know PF, but it won't be that tough to explain changes to the others. However, we do seek to play an adventure path ALL the way if possible, (Though up to about 10th level is also cool) but I'd like to hear your experiences with them. Ideally it shouldn't have too many new rules (We'd like to keep things simple), be based on no added material than the SRD (and even then, we seek to focus on core books mostly), and if possible- Epic heroic in concept.

Yes, I've heard the modules are somewhat linear, but we're ok with that it seems. We'd like something D&D like but with less preparation.

I'd like to hear on whatever adventure path you wish to speak of, but I'm particularly interested in the following (from hearsay only):
- Rise of the Rune Lords.
- Legacy of fire.
- Jade Regent.
- Serpent Skull.
- King Maker.
- Second Darkness.

Thanks in advance! :smallsmile:

[ngilop]

Rise of the Rune Lords, is IMO the best of the lot.

The game is pretty well balanced from the early goblin fights letting you know that these goblins are not the brightest so let them do some otherwise foolish things while the PC fight them to the few big bosses.


one thing I would do is switch out the two lamias the first one you encounter in part 2 is IMO waay over level, wile the 2nd lamia in part 4 is a cake walk

The lamia are CR 10 for the first one and CR 7 for the 2nd. you suppsed to be level 6 by the time you get to teh first one so a CR 10 enctouner is a bit much IMO..

other than that, Rise of the Rune Lords is the best PF adventure path by far I think

[Corlindale]

Runelords is pretty cool, and has a very traditional epic fantasy feel. I've GMed the first three chapters and it worked really well. Focuses on core material and is generally good for beginners (I played it with a group of PF - and PnP in general - newbies).

The "sister switch" is also a tactic I'd recommend, the Lamia boss in module 2 is insanely difficult for when it appears. I nerfed it heavily but it still killed 1 of the PCs. Otherwise most things worked fine without rebalancing. I think they also changed the Lamia boss in the new edition of RotR, but I haven't looked at that one.

[yougi]

I've tried Kingmaker and I'm currently a third of the way through Serpent's Skull.

Kingmaker, I didn't like. Modules span 4 levels, in which only 2-3 things advanced any kind of story: the rest were just one-off encounters. Plus, the size of the maps means that players get to rest at least once between each encounter, meaning that even those which should be trashing them end up being barely challenging. However, some parts of it are gold, and I've reused them in my other campaign.

Serpent's Skull's first module also suffers from Kingmaker's unexciting combat, but at least that is not the focus. The second module is also quite interesting (so far). It seems to be very promising, although, like I said, the first module needs a bit (or a lot, I don't know how much my DM did) of encounter adapting to be challenging to PCs.

[Craft (Cheese)]

I enjoy reading PF APs much more than I enjoy playing them. The style of campaigns those at Paizo apparently like to play is vastly different from my own. With that in mind, here are my recommendations:

- Kingmaker isn't too bad, though I'd cut out part 6 (Sound of a Thousand Screams) entirely and replace it with one of the "Beyond Kingmaker" options instead (Might I recommend the option for a Brevic civil war?). It's not that it's a bad adventure per se, it just feels like it was crammed in for no reason except "We want a journey into the First World in this adventure and we don't care how little sense it makes."

- With some heavy editing, "Haunting of Harrowstone" (Carrion Crown part 1) actually worked pretty well for my group. I cut out most of the combats and focused on creepy atmosphere instead (my favorite was when I had the PCs wake up with Lorrimor's corpse in bed beside one of them), leaving the big fight with the Splatter Man as the only time the PCs are in any actual danger (not that they knew this, of course). I had some ideas for how to similarly modify Trial of the Beast to continue the campaign, but then it just never materialized.

- I'm rather fond of the first three parts of "Curse of the Crimson Throne" but around part 4 it starts to stink big time. Scarwall might have been a pretty cool dungeon if the PCs had some actual context as to why they were exploring it besides "Let's go into this random castle on a fetch quest to get a magic sword for no reason except a quest giver told us to."

- The Brimstone Legacy was pretty cool but the rest of Jade Regent is trash. Seriously, if your players want to go to Minkai, just have them start out as Minkaians and do literally anything else besides play Jade Regent.

And now to rant:

- I lost all desire to read Reign of Winter when I read the premise for the 5th chapter, "Rasputin Must Die".

"So, the players go to Russia during the Bolshevik Revolution."

"You mean a Fantasy version of Russia during the revolution? Sounds pretty cool."

"No, the players go through a portal to Earth to Actual, Historical Russia. Except Rasputin is this mega-wizard (a 19th-level Oracle) and he's got these giant armies of mind-controlled dudes with WW1-era tanks and planes and stuff. The players are headed there because he's kidnapped one of the most dangerous villains in Golarion's history."

"So they can kill her, right?"

"No, so they can rescue her for some reason."


- "The Six Trials of Lazarod" (Council of Thieves part 2) has possibly the dumbest railroad I've ever read. The players need need to get into this abandoned Pathfinder lodge because it might have an artifact that might be able to help them get rid of the shadowbeasts that prowl Westcrown's streets at night, that might be magically trapped, so to get the information on the traps there they need to get into the Lord-Mayor's mansion to get the documents on the place.

You'd think they could just sneak in, right? No, the questgiver wants them to sign up to take part in a "Murder Play", where the actors fight against actual monsters on stage, to become actors in a play that no one has ever survived performing. They want you to do this because performing the play successfully might get the lord-mayor to invite you over to a party, where you might get a chance to sneak around and get the documents you need.

And the party would decide to do this instead of just sneaking into the manor... why, exactly!? Just sneaking into the manor has no risks that the acting plan doesn't also have, and the latter has quite a few more.

What boggles the mind most of all is how the adventure writer keeps patting himself on the back for how obviously brilliant this plan is is. Ugh.

Honestly the entirety of Council of Thieves is a mess, but that's just the worst part of it.

[ngilop]

yeah.. i ahve to agree 100% with craft there on reign of winter.. that whole adventure path could have been just not done at all and it would be for the better.. for me the story started to stink about halfway inot the 2nd part.. im surpised she made it all the way to the 5th before giving up.


serpent skull is decent ive never gotten to play it through but the overall story seems awesome, and it makes you want to play a bard and take a whip as your weapon.

[Keneth]

The game is pretty well balanced

You're kidding, right? Runelords are probably the least balanced AP of the lot. It got a little better with Anniversary Edition, but it's still a mess. Sometimes I wonder if the creators had ever actually tried running the AP, especially with those useless preconstructed iconics. :smallconfused:


one thing I would do is switch out the two lamias the first one you encounter in part 2 is IMO waay over level, wile the 2nd lamia in part 4 is a cake walk

That's what they did in Anniversary Edition. Xanesha is now a rogue 1, and Lucrecia is a sorcerer 2. Sadly, they screwed up the stat blocks so much, it's a pain to look at them.

Don't get me wrong, I do like the AP, and I've been running it for quite a while, but it's a bloody mess if you run it as-written.

[Craft (Cheese)]

On Rise of the Runelords: I've bitched about this AP in other threads, so I'll keep this one brief. My main problem with RotR is that it doesn't form together into a coherent campaign, it's just a series of random encounters and side quests that the players have no reason to embark on besides "The questgiver told me to." There's a coherent story going on but it's 100% in the background where the players can't see it. When the entire point of an AP is to have a semi-linear campaign written up and ready to go for you, this is less than satisfactory to say the least.


yeah.. i ahve to agree 100% with craft there on reign of winter.. that whole adventure path could have been just not done at all and it would be for the better.. for me the story started to stink about halfway inot the 2nd part.. im surpised she made it all the way to the 5th before giving up.

Actually, I make a point of not reading APs until I have all the parts. I've flipped through my copy of Rasputin Must Die to see if they did anything interesting with the new rules for WW1-era firearms (spoiler alert: they don't), but that's it.

I started reading Wrath of the Righteous early and am already regretting it. I'm actually pretty interested in seeing how it turns out, but I have to wait to find out :/

(The Worldwound Incursion opens really strong, probably my favorite opening for an AP as-written. Sword of Valor was kinda meh, but then again I really feel the worldwound would be an ideal place for some good-old Survival Horror gameplay (which is what I really liked about the opening), and they've opted to make the PCs Boring Invincible Heroes instead. Yet to receive my copy of Demon's Heresy.)


serpent skull is decent ive never gotten to play it through but the overall story seems awesome, and it makes you want to play a bard and take a whip as your weapon.

Serpent Skull is one of the ones I haven't read (low on my priority list because from the outside at least it looks like a boring series of dungeon crawls), but I just might read it with so many people recommending it.

[Keneth]

My main problem with RotR is that it doesn't form together into a coherent campaign, it's just a series of random encounters and side quests that the players have no reason to embark on besides "The questgiver told me to."

I have to agree with this, the AP simply does not offer any good motivation for characters to follow the storyline. Combine that with lots of player deaths, even an occasional TPK, and you'll spend half your time trying to come up with reasons for your players to keep on tracks, or thinking of how to change the storyline if the players decide not to pursue the "obvious" course of action.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Oh! One thing I haven't bitched about yet: RotR is sexist. Not just in the way it treats its female NPCs (which I can tolerate) but even in the way it treats its female players (which I cannot). The worst part of it is in The Skinsaw Murders, where the DM is explicitly told to select "the most beautiful female PC" and sexually harass her. In-character, but the effect is the same. The story is there's a serial killer running around, and he leaves these creepy love letters addressed to that PC on the bodies. When you finally find his lair, you find it's filled with erotic drawings and paintings depicting that PC with him, which the DM is told to describe in detail.

If I were playing in a game and my character walked into a room to find that, I would punch the DM in the face and walk out. This is singling out a (likely female) player and telling her "You're not welcome in my game, so I'm going to make you as uncomfortable as possible until you leave."


Now, to be more fair than the AP deserves, there are alternatives for the letters and the paintings given just in case there aren't any female PCs in the party (because the killer being female or, god forbid, being homosexual is unthinkable), but the DM is explicitly told to use these only if there is no female PC to target.


Jade Regent sort of has this problem as well, to a lesser extent. Not once, but twice the PCs walk in on a rape scene. Furthermore, near the end of the module you meet three previous Minkaian emperors whose souls have been turned into evil outsiders, all of them having backstories as to the evil things they did in life to turn them this way. I misread one of them and almost threw my laptop against the wall, that one of them had apparently been condemned to hell because she was a lesbian. Now after I read it a second time I realized this wasn't the case, but it's easy to see how I made the mistake given her backstory talks about nothing but her lesbianism, save for one easily-missed sentence that she sold her soul to become more beautiful or some crock. The subtext, I think, is plain for all to see.

[Keneth]

I don't really see a problem with any of that... The murderer in Skinsaw Murders is supposed to be a twisted obsessive creep.

And Golarion isn't supposed to be an idyllic world. Like muggers, or murderers, rapists are just par for the course. Why is it ok to tolerate one type of violent crime and not others?

[Craft (Cheese)]

Well, there's a difference between a sexist character and a sexist author. It's the latter to which I take offense. It's hard to explain exactly why I feel this way, but the Skinsaw Murders goes beyond "Okay, this murderer guy is a creep" and reaches "Okay, this DM is a creep."

[Keneth]

I don't know, I've ran the campaign with both male and female players, and none of us ever got the impression that Pett was particularly sexist, or that the murderer's obsession is any more biased towards women. Although I'll admit that I'm neither a good actor nor an excellent storyteller, so maybe that's why it never made much of an impact.

[ngilop]

edited becuase Im nice.


just want to let the world know that RP is RP and a game is a game. no need to think what happens in a game is what real life or what a person is really like.

I 'kidnapped' my best friends 'wife' and he was a bit too late to rescue her arriving to see her be eviscerated before his eyes ( he took to long inspecting the statue)

we still talk to this dy and his actual wife is alive. he holds no grudges against me for doing this in a game, he understood it was a game. I hope one day Craft is able to differtiate the two as well, it would make her game more enjoyable.

[Darksword]

All the paths are great imo. I really like the jade Reagant, the one with serpents (dont remember the name it takes place in a jungle), Reign of Winter. Also look at Wrath of Righteous. Its the current path. You will need an additional rule set called Mythic Hero's but it is going to take the hero's from level 1 to 20ish but also gain 10 mythic tiers. It is a very epic quest and I think you will like it.

[Kol Korran]

Thanks for the replies so far, although I must say they are... worrying. I'd like more info, but here are a few more specific questions (I apologize for not addressing everyone. I just wrote about specific things that concerned me):

@ ngilop: What exactly made Rise of the Runelords a good Adventure Path for you? I understand it has a very "classic" D&D feel to it, with goblins, dragons, giants and wizards and such. Is it "too" generic My friends and I have played D&D for quite a long time, I hope it doesn't repeat old themes too much... What made RotR so fun for you?

@ Craft (Cheese): Some of the concerns you mention about the adventure paths are what generally worries me about choosing to use them. My players are used to a fair amount of freedom, character involvement, and solving situations in THEIR own way. Are the adventure paths so railroady? Or do they provide enough of a base to improvise upon if (Or should I say- "when") the party does things differently?

As to RotR: I feel you REALY don't like the AP. The two main issues you wrote about are lack of character involvement (The story being in the background) and sexism. I need to read the modules to give my opinion (There have been disagreeing voices), but I believe i might deal with it. Character involvement worries me more... I highly dislike the "quest giver" method of handling adventures (Once or twice is nice, but not the entire AP). Do you think that could be salvaged with a reasonable DMing effort? I'm mostly looking for a fun AP, which does most of the work for me. (Time is a BIG issue).

Last question is about Kingmaker which on the whole you did seem to think was ok. What made this AP a good experience to you? I understood that the kingdom building and managing rules can be fun to some, tiresome to others, and some mentioned they may be somewhat broken, how did you find them?

@ Darksword: I'm intrigued by your experiences with Serpent Skull (The one with the serpents) and especially Wrath of the Righteous (My group likes over the top great epic campaigns). What exactly made them such good experiences for you? Was it their structure? combat? choices? What exactly?

Thank you all for giving advice! Please add more if you can, I'm not nearign decision yet. :smallsmile:

[Craft (Cheese)]

Some of the concerns you mention about the adventure paths are what generally worries me about choosing to use them. My players are used to a fair amount of freedom, character involvement, and solving situations in THEIR own way. Are the adventure paths so railroady? Or do they provide enough of a base to improvise upon if (Or should I say- "when") the party does things differently?

The quality on this front between the APs varies massively, unfortunately. Kingmaker is really flexible while Council of Thieves is anything but.


As to RotR: I feel you REALY don't like the AP. The two main issues you wrote about are lack of character involvement (The story being in the background) and sexism. I need to read the modules to give my opinion (There have been disagreeing voices), but I believe i might deal with it. Character involvement worries me more... I highly dislike the "quest giver" method of handling adventures (Once or twice is nice, but not the entire AP). Do you think that could be salvaged with a reasonable DMing effort? I'm mostly looking for a fun AP, which does most of the work for me. (Time is a BIG issue).

Could it be salvaged? Definitely. With reasonable effort? It depends on what you call reasonable, but I don't really think so.


Last question is about Kingmaker which on the whole you did seem to think was ok. What made this AP a good experience to you? I understood that the kingdom building and managing rules can be fun to some, tiresome to others, and some mentioned they may be somewhat broken, how did you find them?

Kingmaker is a good AP, IMO, because you can spend as much or as little time on its various elements as you like, without really breaking anything. Don't like the kingdom management minigame? Then go do something else. There's also lots of blank spaces on the map where you can add pretty much anything you want, without having to make any modifications in order to fit that into the story.

[Keneth]

Is it "too" generic?

While RotR has some pretty generic themes, it's got enough substance that it doesn't feel repetitive. I've been playing D&D pretty much since its conception, and I've ran RotR several times now, but it's always fun to go through it again. It also leaves plenty of room for a GM to really make it "your own".


My players are used to a fair amount of freedom, character involvement, and solving situations in THEIR own way. Are the adventure paths so railroady? Or do they provide enough of a base to improvise upon if (Or should I say- "when") the party does things differently?

They're as open or as closed as you want them to be. Some APs inherently offer more options, while some simply assume your players will do things exactly as described in the book. Clearly there are always situations that neither the author nor you could have predicted in advance, and when that point comes, you should be able to improvise as along as you know where the characters are supposed to be headed. So read the chapters in advance, and you shouldn't have much trouble.


Character involvement worries me more... I highly dislike the "quest giver" method of handling adventures (Once or twice is nice, but not the entire AP). Do you think that could be salvaged with a reasonable DMing effort? I'm mostly looking for a fun AP, which does most of the work for me. (Time is a BIG issue).

Regardless of which AP you choose, you'll find that none of them do most of the work for you. To really make any AP enjoyable, you'll have to work with the players to determine how to make their characters involved, and tailor the encounters to the party composition. APs are full campaigns, generally lasting at least 6 months, though they can span years depending how often you play and how far you're willing to stray from what's written. There's a ton of work involved if you want everyone to be really invested. :smallsmile:

[ngilop]

I basically got the opposite of what craft is complaining about in regards to Rise of the Runelords.

i say its classic becuase you start out just your basic average joe/janes and have to fidn some pretty foolish goblins, and you go on from there finding clues as to what is going on in the big picture, which you find out what the big picture IS in teh 3rd part.

I just 100% feel teh craft just had a bad DM with this particualr AP. that or the players were just too lazy to actually attempt to solve/figure the stuff out on their own. and EVERY QUEST ever in some guy asking for something, so idk why that seems to be an issue at all for anybody.


ive been playing D&D since 1st edition and i guess that rise of the runelords 'you start small and end up being heroes' classic big time adventure is what draws me to it. It is actually my 4th or so fave D&D adventure ( i guess they re-did it for their actual PF rules and swapped the lamaias like i mentioned) and ive just about played every single D&D advnture published ( cept that eberron bull!)

Rise o the runelords is great. and if your players take time to do more than just rush from one adventure to the next it fits together perfectly.

but like is aid basically take what craft is saying flip it around and thats how i feel about Rise of The Runelords. for me the only part in the adventure thats is stupidbadwrong was when they slapped in xanesha ( the cr 10 lamia matriarch) as a boss for when you are supposed to be lvl 5 or on the off chance 6. a bit of over kill.

Some of the boss fights are dificult ( the imp for example) but if your players are smart and can think on their feet they become doabel ( cept for xanesha)

[Keneth]

EVERY QUEST ever in some guy asking for something, so idk why that seems to be an issue at all for anybody.

That's not necessarily true. But even if you do treat quests that way, it says nothing about the characters' involvement.

For example, the heroes have just managed to defeat Xanesha, probably at the expense of one or two party members. After that, Grobaras asks you to check out what's happening with the Black Arrows for a measly reward. What if the characters say no? Maybe they don't care what's happening 400 miles away. Maybe they feel like there are better opportunities in or around Magnimar. After all, they know virtually nothing about the underlining story at that point. It's actually a wonder they've come this far. They kinda sorta get a feel for what's happening by the end of the third book, but that's already halfway through the adventure path. And even when they do, you have to give them a good reason to follow through to the end.

The AP certainly has a good underlining story, but it doesn't really make any effort to make the characters involved in it. They're just kinda stumbling through it, getting nudged from one part of Varisia to the other without any real motivation. It takes a lot of work to make the players and their characters invested if you don't want to railroad them.

[Darksword]

@ Darksword: I'm intrigued by your experiences with Serpent Skull (The one with the serpents) and especially Wrath of the Righteous (My group likes over the top great epic campaigns). What exactly made them such good experiences for you? Was it their structure? combat? choices? What exactly?

Thank you all for giving advice! Please add more if you can, I'm not nearign decision yet. :smallsmile:


I liked serpent skull ap had fun encounters. We liked the setting, it takes place in jungles and atleast with our dm there was a since of ancientness to alot of the ruins. It was just fun.

I am dming wrath of Righteous now. It is great. It is really over the top epic.As said above youll end about with 20 levels and 10 mythic tiers so the party ecl will be 25. The setting is the world wound, it is litterary hell on earth. It is a war on demons ending with the battle vs a demon lord. The feeling is epic and that is what we like.

[Malimar]

I'm a bit more than halfway through Rise of the Runelords as a player, and it's pretty solid. I don't know that it ever strays into "great" territory, but it's pretty consistently good.

I must have a good DM, because he must have used one of the non-rapey alternatives despite there being a female PC in the party. (Or else that's where he slotted in a fight with my first character, who went crazy trying to use the runewell so I switched to a different character.)

I don't know about the "the overplot is only in the background" thing. The adventure path certainly feels pretty coherent to me, if only because every boss (and some minions) has a sihedron medallion, so they're clearly all affiliated with the same organization. And most of them mention the runewell, at least in passing. It definitely feels like we're striving against some big dark Team Rocket that's trying to take over the world.

[Alleran]

As a player I liked Rise of the Runelords, although with the people saying the story was in the background and it felt unconnected, I suppose my liking for it might have been a result of my character, a wizard obsessed with history and Thassilon, so the DM was able to tie more into it.

My favourite is Kingmaker, because the whole concept of forging a kingdom from lawlessness makes me happy, and it's really easy to chop and change stuff as needed.

My other favourite is Skull & Shackles because pirates and somewhat-similar free-roam gameplay. There's an overarching questline, but really, once the party has their ship and/or are Free Captains, they can pretty much do what they want if the DM is willing to let them avoid the Isle of Empty Eyes for as long as needed.

Serpent's Skull I didn't like, because it felt like it was starting out as something... and then got sidetracked into a couple of dungeon crawls. Not a fan.

I've never played Reign of Winter, but I have read through it (was originally planning on running it, but plans changed for unrelated-to-RPG reasons), and somebody then pointed out to me that it's essentially a glorified fetch-quest (the PCs aren't saving the world, they're just on a 6-part quest to get the CR30 character who can, and she does so at the end with almost literally a wave of her hand).

[Roncorps]

What about Legacy of Fire and Second Darkness ?

[Kol Korran]

Wrath of the Righteous seems to intrigue me more and more... As does Rise of the Runelords. Along with Kingmaker, those are the three big candidates. I'm leaning more towards WotR though, Our players like big epic stuff. But I've never played with the mythic rules, are they a problem to incorporate? Are they complex because one of our players is brand new to D&D like games, and I don't want to overload...

The reason I didn't mention Skulls and Shackles is due to that our party tried a pirates campaign, but two players didn't much like that, so we're staying away from that, even though I heard it was quite good.

I would echo Roncorps' plea- Does anyone have any experience with Legacy of Fire and Second Darkness? Any other info on any of the AP is of course also welcomed! :smallamused:

[Frosty]

Anyone who hasn't checked out Way of the Wicked should do so. It is an absurdly-awesome evil campaign, and I am having SO much fun with it right now. Game doesn't start you off with any equipment, and you have to bust out of maximum security prison! How sweet is that?

[Keneth]

But I've never played with the mythic rules, are they a problem to incorporate?

Mythic rules are kinda like multiclassing. I don't think they're particularly overwhelming for players.

[Darksword]

Mythic rules are really easy to Incorporated and they really aren't complicated.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Wrath of the Righteous seems to intrigue me more and more... As does Rise of the Runelords. Along with Kingmaker, those are the three big candidates. I'm leaning more towards WotR though, Our players like big epic stuff. But I've never played with the mythic rules, are they a problem to incorporate? Are they complex because one of our players is brand new to D&D like games, and I don't want to overload...

So, WotR opinions, in a spoiler since there's a couple people here playing it:

Mythic rules make things slightly more complicated but not much more so, honestly. Much more important, though, is that WotR has the PCs leveling up really, really fast, especially early on. A new level, especially for a caster, adds much more complexity to a character than a mythic tier ever will. Here are some things to keep in mind:

- When the PCs hit MT 4, they get the ability to rest for 24 hours in just 1 hour (regaining everything except their Mythic Power, which they still need to wait 24 hours to get back). This means you're on the 15-minute adventuring day all day, every day. Depending on how you're used to adventuring this might completely throw you off guard and destroy your ability to run interesting dungeon crawls. Be prepared.

- The first chapter opens with a survival horror-y feel, which is unfortunately quickly discarded in favor of a bro-slasher (like a bro-shooter but with swords) type campaign. If you're like me and care about running the entire campaign at a consistent tone, then this is a bit of a problem.

- Paizo adventures usually assume a low-op party but I think this adventure takes the cake. Either they've set out to sell the idea that the PCs are invincible badasses that aren't threatened by anything, or that this is their first time making a mythic adventure is really showing. Expect to see APL+5 monstrosities get one-shotted before they can even act pretty regularly.

- The first two chapters have the somewhat major plot problem that the only reason the PCs are capable of accomplishing anything at all is because the real bad guys are off somewhere else and the only things opposing the party are fourth-string nobodies. Obviously you can't have 4th-level characters fighting CR 25 villains and expect them to stand any chance at all, but at least come up with a better excuse besides "The bad guys are just idiots who vastly underestimate the PCs and don't consider them to be a threat." Which is the excuse the modules actually use (!).

- Chapter 1 ends with an unnecessary Deus Ex Machina. It'd have been a much more effective ending without it, actually, as it serves no purpose except to put the game into literally cutscene mode. Just have the wardstones go crazy when they destroy the fragment and fry up all the demons at the border and show the PCs a brief vision of this happening, then skip the thing with Vorlesh altogether (giving them free "quest XP" to make up for skipping the unloseable fight with the Babau assassins).

- Mass combat sucks. In Kingmaker at least it's kinda interesting because you build, maintain, and distribute your armies yourself, but in Sword of Valor you're just given the army and resources and there's not much you can do with it in terms of tactics. Plus the numbers are fudged such that the PCs pretty much can't lose the mass combats anyway. It's showing off a subsystem for no reason except to show off a subsystem. Apparently we're going to see more mass combat later but I'm not going to hold my breath for it to be any better than what we saw in Sword of Valor.

- The campaign traits are a massive disappointment. They try to tie in the campaign traits into the story more by having each campaign trait leave an unresolved plot hook in the character's background and having these hooks built upon in the story later, except the execution is awful. Literally anything you could come up with yourself to fill in the hooks would be better than what they actually give you in the module (except maybe the Exposed to Awfulness one, that one I honestly kinda liked). The worst one is the Touched by Divinity trait, which is so laughably awful I'm not even gonna spoil it for you. It's like a bad joke.

- Arueshalae reeks of Mary Sue DMPC. The "Redeemed Succubus" is a really overdone concept and they don't do anything interesting with her to make up for her DMPC-ness.

[Kol Korran]

So, WotR opinions, in a spoiler since there's a couple people here playing it:

Mythic rules make things slightly more complicated but not much more so, honestly. Much more important, though, is that WotR has the PCs leveling up really, really fast, especially early on. A new level, especially for a caster, adds much more complexity to a character than a mythic tier ever will. Here are some things to keep in mind:

- When the PCs hit MT 4, they get the ability to rest for 24 hours in just 1 hour (regaining everything except their Mythic Power, which they still need to wait 24 hours to get back). This means you're on the 15-minute adventuring day all day, every day. Depending on how you're used to adventuring this might completely throw you off guard and destroy your ability to run interesting dungeon crawls. Be prepared.

- The first chapter opens with a survival horror-y feel, which is unfortunately quickly discarded in favor of a bro-slasher (like a bro-shooter but with swords) type campaign. If you're like me and care about running the entire campaign at a consistent tone, then this is a bit of a problem.

- Paizo adventures usually assume a low-op party but I think this adventure takes the cake. Either they've set out to sell the idea that the PCs are invincible badasses that aren't threatened by anything, or that this is their first time making a mythic adventure is really showing. Expect to see APL+5 monstrosities get one-shotted before they can even act pretty regularly.

- The first two chapters have the somewhat major plot problem that the only reason the PCs are capable of accomplishing anything at all is because the real bad guys are off somewhere else and the only things opposing the party are fourth-string nobodies. Obviously you can't have 4th-level characters fighting CR 25 villains and expect them to stand any chance at all, but at least come up with a better excuse besides "The bad guys are just idiots who vastly underestimate the PCs and don't consider them to be a threat." Which is the excuse the modules actually use (!).

- Chapter 1 ends with an unnecessary Deus Ex Machina. It'd have been a much more effective ending without it, actually, as it serves no purpose except to put the game into literally cutscene mode. Just have the wardstones go crazy when they destroy the fragment and fry up all the demons at the border and show the PCs a brief vision of this happening, then skip the thing with Vorlesh altogether (giving them free "quest XP" to make up for skipping the unloseable fight with the Babau assassins).

- Mass combat sucks. In Kingmaker at least it's kinda interesting because you build, maintain, and distribute your armies yourself, but in Sword of Valor you're just given the army and resources and there's not much you can do with it in terms of tactics. Plus the numbers are fudged such that the PCs pretty much can't lose the mass combats anyway. It's showing off a subsystem for no reason except to show off a subsystem. Apparently we're going to see more mass combat later but I'm not going to hold my breath for it to be any better than what we saw in Sword of Valor.

- The campaign traits are a massive disappointment. They try to tie in the campaign traits into the story more by having each campaign trait leave an unresolved plot hook in the character's background and having these hooks built upon in the story later, except the execution is awful. Literally anything you could come up with yourself to fill in the hooks would be better than what they actually give you in the module (except maybe the Exposed to Awfulness one, that one I honestly kinda liked). The worst one is the Touched by Divinity trait, which is so laughably awful I'm not even gonna spoil it for you. It's like a bad joke.

- Arueshalae reeks of Mary Sue DMPC. The "Redeemed Succubus" is a really overdone concept and they don't do anything interesting with her to make up for her DMPC-ness.

Yeah, thanks for your opinion. I read the first module, and yep- it needs some work. But I think the general story and concept are salvagable, though that contains more work than I planned for. I think I'll open a thread about "reworking/ refitting WotR: Worldwound incursion" or something of the like. Mostly my project, though others may come into it as well... Would love to hear some of your input for it when it comes.

[Raven777]

Legacy of Fire is usually regarded as one of the better APs (alongside Rise of the Runelords and Curse of the Crimson Throne). The complain about it that comes back the most often is that the way the end fight is handled can feel a bit anticlimactic. It is handled in a a sort of "cinematic" manner : if I remember correctly, the players fight the dragon and his mooks while the actual rampaging abomination is dealt with by an army of NPCs in the background. Then again, the PCs would stand no chance against the actual monster. I remember it to be some kind of firey Tarrasque equivalent.