Pathfinder Adventure Paths

[BiblioRook]

My gaming club is going to be looking into expanding it's collection again and lately I've been thinking picking up some Adventure Paths might be good. I was wondering if anyone would be able to sum up all the different Paths so I would be able to explain them to the people making the purchasing and to see what they may or may not prefer to buy into.
Stuff like Setting (Urban adventures as compared to dungeon crawls or jungle treks), Theme (Pirates, Horror, etc), and Gameplay style (Political intrigue, High Stealth, Action-Adventure filled with traps, Hack-n-Slash) would all be great highlights. Thanks.

The only one I'm really closely familiar with is Skull 'n Shackles... and as it is that one is pretty straight forward as to what to expect. I have a very basic understanding on some of the others (Like Second Darkness being on Drow, Carrion Crown having alot of Classic Horror, and Kingmaker you run a kingdom), but not enough I think to really explain any of them to anyone.

[Bigbeefie]

My gaming club is going to be looking into expanding it's collection again and lately I've been thinking picking up some Adventure Paths might be good. I was wondering if anyone would be able to sum up all the different Paths so I would be able to explain them to the people making the purchasing and to see what they may or may not prefer to buy into.
Stuff like Setting (Urban adventures as compared to dungeon crawls or jungle treks), Theme (Pirates, Horror, etc), and Gameplay style (Political intrigue, High Stealth, Action-Adventure filled with traps, Hack-n-Slash) would all be great highlights. Thanks.

The only one I'm really closely familiar with is Skull 'n Shackles... and as it is that one is pretty straight forward as to what to expect. I have a very basic understanding on some of the others (Like Second Darkness being on Drow, Carrion Crown having alot of Classic Horror, and Kingmaker you run a kingdom), but not enough I think to really explain any of them to anyone.

Go to Piazo and download the free Players Handbook for EACH AP. It will tell you a bit about each of them. Hands down if your looking to invest in a good campaign/books...Buy Rise of the Runelords Anniversary edition. Hands down one of the Top APs. Has tons of Horror, hack-n-slash, investigations, and One of the most Iconic ultimate villians.

[Corlindale]

I Second Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition. It's a huge and very diverse adventure path, and the book itself is great value for money (6 modules in 1), not to mention being beautifully printed and illustrated. And simply having everything in one big book is just so much cooler than juggling 6 smaller volumes around.

Otherwise, a few comments on the ones I have played or GM'ed:

Carrion Crown is, as mentioned, classic horror. Each chapter has a particular theme related to classic horror tropes and creatures (like ghosts, werewolves, etc...). Also has a good bit of investigation. It's not perfect and does suffer from a bit of "dungeoncrawlitis" at later stages (like most paths, in my experience), but I still like it very much. Enough to GM it now after having played through it a few years ago.

Skulls and Shackles is about pirates! Quite free-form, and well-suited if you want to play a neutral or evil sort of party for a change (since most other paths tend to be geared towards Good characters).

Serpent's Skull is "Indiana Jones"-themed. I only GM'ed the first chapter, which is all about surviving a shipwreck on a remote island far from civilization. But from what I've read of the rest it is pretty much all about exploring jungles and temple ruins in search of ancient civilizations.

Wrath of the Righteous, which is currently still being published, is all about holy crusades against encroaching demon armies. Nice if you want to play holy warriors of Goodness and Justice. Also the first path to officially use the Mythic rules, so could be a nice choice if you want to try out some really superpowered characters.

[BiblioRook]

Yeah, the Runelords Anniversary Edition was what I was planning on pitching if nothing else ended up looking more interesting for them, it seemed a pretty safe bet. Only thing I had against it really was it's (literal physical) size.

One of the big reasons from my club's prospective for getting some of the Adventure Paths is to maybe encourage new DMs to give DMing a shot (or if nothing else, for people to just run more games period). A 4 pound hardbound tome might come off a tad intimidating to those kinds of people.

Realistically we were probably looking moreso on just picking up the first two if any one Adventure Path, maybe the third too if feeling ambitious. Granted though, really when it comes to cost (which is probably our biggest issue), getting the Runelord Anniversary Edition would still probably come out cheaper then 2-3 individual Path modules...