Rise of the Runelords: When things go terribly, terribly wrong (SPOILERS)

[Thealtruistorc]

So just a few hours ago, I finished GMing my first session of Rise of the Runelords with a group of new players. However, after playing through the first leg of the adventure, I'm not sure if I can progress the storyline.

The goblin attack at the beginning started off as you'd expect, with the heroes doing the things heroes do. The issues began when one of the PCs asked if he could join the Goblins in looting the carnival. Things got worse when we ran into Aldern Foxglove trapped behind the barrel by the group of goblins. Almost unanimously, the party agreed to team up with the goblins in killing him.

Even after the goblins struck at the PCs, they continued to push all their force on Foxglove, all because they "didn't like the way he was dressed" and believed that "a rich man like that deserves to die" (The character saying this was a ranger claiming to be chaotic good, and he threw a tantrum when I told him he was entering CE territory). Eventually, I had Foxglove enter the combat and kill several of the goblins himself, only to have the PCs unleash brute force on the guy until he was forced to retreat.

To make things worse, the city guard had to be pulled in to take the party into custody (after our wizard had initiated PvP with the rogue). Stripped of their weapons, everyone except our rogue (who was a bystander throughout this whole affair) is now in the custody of the Sandpoint guard. If turned loose, I'm guessing that the "heroes" will just start attacking civilians again.

Burnt Offerings is allegedly supposed to give the heroes a reason to value Sandpoint, but all the adventure has done up to now is give Sandpoint a reason to hate the heroes. I'm thinking of just bailing on this campaign as a whole, as there is no way that the story is going to work when the PCs just want to hurt people. Is there any way that this setup could work, or should I just start over with a new adventure or even a new group?

[weckar]

Probably being one of a minority of people who has not played nor read this campaign... I'd say roll with it, if you can. You'd have to throw the prewritten module mostly out the window, but you have a great setup here for a villainous (or at least anti-heroic) campaign here that I'd personally hate to waste. That is if you're comfortable with that.

From the sounds of it though, you can throw out the modules anyway. I wonder what drove your players to go Psycho like that, because this is clearly a form of rebellion vs the DM...

[CockroachTeaParty]

You should talk with your group about game expectations. If they signed on to play the adventure path, that should go with a certain understanding of the underlying themes and a willingness to see the 'story' progress.

If your players just want to goof off, the game can accommodate it, but not necessarily a specific adventure path. If you have the option, hunting down Hell's Vengeance of Way of the Wicked would give your group plenty of outlets to be psychotic murderhobos.

But if you dropped some skrilla on a copy of the Anniversary Edition or some-such, and these are your regular players, just have a chat with them.

The first time I ran rune lords, the party quickly grew mega-neutral-borderline-evil. Fortunately, they were very mercenary, and could be motivated by money. I'm not sure why a sane person would want to team up with the goblins, though. Perhaps they want to play in a campaign where everyone is a goblin?

[weckar]

I'm not sure why a sane person would want to team up with the goblins, though.Because bouncy overconfident pyros make for the best drinking buddies?