Rise of the Runelords - Advice and Resources

[Seerow]

So I've been on break from DMing since quarantine started, mostly because setting stuff up for online play was such a huge pain to me I couldn't deal with it. I eventually gave up and let someone else take over.

However recently I came across a Rise of the Runelords pack, that has all of the maps and statblocks from the adventure pre-loaded and ready to run, and for that kind of convenience I'm willing to pay. I've got the anniversary edition book and have been reading through it, as well as the roll20 pack. So for the most part I am ready to go.

However when looking around for advice about the adventure path, I find it hard to find any discussion surrounding it more recently than a decade old, which is a little weird for me coming off Kingmaker (which still has a pretty active community probably at least partially due to the video game renewing interest), so I figured I'd try asking here and see if anyone had run it and had any advice.

Major things I'm looking for in particular (though any general advice is also appreciated):

-What information should players have access to prior to starting the adventure? For example, I had no idea what a Runelord was until I went and did some Wiki diving. They get mentioned casually early on in Part 1 (there's a statue of one of the Runelords and a relatively easy knowledge check will identify/name drop him), does this mean the story of ancient Thassilion and the Runelords is something that the average person (or at least the average educated person) will likely know about? (Note: This is coming from the perspective of a group who has very little contact with Golarion. They got familiarized with the area around the Stolen Lands during Kingmaker, but this AP is quite literally on the other side of the map and may as well be an entirely different world for as much of that knowledge carries over)

-Are there any characters early on I should be focusing on building up more than I might guess? I've read the first two parts, and seeing Foxglove take such a prominent role in Part 2 was kind of surprising given I more or less wrote him off in Part 1. Are there other characters like this I should be paying attention to and making sure the PCs interact with/develop some connection to?

-Are there any particularly fun/interesting supplemental materials out there for use either during the campaign, or as set-up to it? Like in Kingmaker one of the devs had released a bunch of extra mini games for the Rushlight tournament, is there something similar out there for the festival that you start out in for RoTR?

[Ganorenas]

I’ve been running a few Runelords groups using Roll20’s big package, which is usually great (but sometimes the stat block links are broken). So if you found that, I a random dude on the net say that it is great!

For other npcs, my players like to kill everything with a name, but if yours like rp then most of the npcs in Sandpoint are good targets. Especially if you take the time to stat them up and let the players work with them in book 4 (the first part of book 4). It made my players appreciate having RP with them when they get to fight along side them. They don’t help much, but some help is better than none.

I would also suggest letting your players control the Black Arrows in book 3, it makes them more interesting when they get to decide the Rangers’ fates in combat (and takes some work away from you). The roll20 stat blocks don’t have a good set up for the ranged feats though, so take a look at that before you hand them the sheets or run them yourself...

In book 2 I find it a lot better to run the skinsaw gang as one big fight at the end of the sawmill, they are really weak as individuals and work better as body blockers for the boss to buff in combat with. It also makes the Justice more memorable if he spends every round buffing and the players have to wade into his mooks to start missing him XD

I organized this really well, ha.

[gijoemike]

I love rise of runelords. Great mod.


1. You need to play up that the sheriff is woefully understaffed after the first adventure. He winds up having to rely on volunteers to get scouting done. He is a good character (and one of the only competent npcs in town) but needs to be 110% tied up trying to keep everything running. That explains why he cannot help the PCs the way he wants. Later on he send an envoy to the capital for more guards (Part 3). When I ran the mod I had him skip days of sleep so he was under fatigue.

2. Before sending the PCs to the fort they NEED to go on the boar hunt with foxglove, the farm, and a scouting mission to one of the goblin camps. They also need to have at least one chance encounter suggested in the back of the first book. I would like to suggest the swamp goblins for the scouting mission and the undead skull from the back of the book . Doing so gives the PC's a much better idea of the goblin threat in the area and that odd things are happening. Second FOR LOVE GOD make sure the pcs are deep into lvl 2 if not already lvl 3 prior to the thorn thicket.

3. There is a bard and historian in town that per box text knows a lot about the old empire and runelords. The runelords and their existence was so long ago it is comparable to early GREEK empire. How many ppl in real life are early Greek experts. The whole point is they are long buried forgotten history.

3a. There is an active thieves guild and a good location to do some B&E if the group is rogue focused. Contact with the guild is somewhat dependent on which of inn the PCs stay at.

4. If there is an oracle in the group ABUSE them with visions. There is some AMAZING backstory for the town (cough cough RAVEN CARVINGS) and a language dependent scenes in the fort that the PCs haven't a hope to learn about unless they are insanely specialized to do exactly that. Side note: remark about the weird hack marks on columns, fence posts, and window sills. The PCs may ask questions.

5. Make Foxglove a nerdy fanboy of adventurers. Play it up. He is glossed over in part 1, main plot point in book 2. And RotRL does that. They will turn around and make a glossed over npc suddenly important or the focus of an adventure.

5a. Play up the Murder crows that appear in part 2. You don't want the PCs trying to escape. And constantly explain there is a stale air or something feels wrong.

6. To make part 3 of the adventure work the PCs need to understand the city political structure since the council plays an important part. I have repeated screwed that up when I DM.

7. At the end of part 3 the encounter with the big surprise NPC is INSANELY deadly. Play it as such. Winning that encounter was one of the best fights to ever take place in all my years of gaming. The setup is pretty cool, but the final fight is GLORIOUS and a surprise twist.

7a. If that NPC escapes it is hell later when they team up with their family member for revenge. If npc dies the family comes for revenge alone. To be nice to your players have that NPC at the end of part 3 try to fight to the death.

8. Play the runelord as a super cocky bastard. Because he is. Also not in his pre-spell write up look at the 3.5 transmutation spell Shifting Sands but apply it in a new way to his fighting area.

[Seerow]

Thanks both of you for your input, that is exactly the sort of thing I was looking for!

Questions/comments on a couple of the specific points

2. Before sending the PCs to the fort they NEED to go on the boar hunt with foxglove, the farm, and a scouting mission to one of the goblin camps. They also need to have at least one chance encounter suggested in the back of the first book. I would like to suggest the swamp goblins for the scouting mission and the undead skull from the back of the book . Doing so gives the PC's a much better idea of the goblin threat in the area and that odd things are happening. Second FOR LOVE GOD make sure the pcs are deep into lvl 2 if not already lvl 3 prior to the thorn thicket.

This is interesting because I have the Anniversary edition where all 6 are combined, and don't remember seeing anything remotely resembling the chance encounters you mentioned. I'll do some digging though because that does sound pretty good.

5. Make Foxglove a nerdy fanboy of adventurers. Play it up. He is glossed over in part 1, main plot point in book 2. And RotRL does that. They will turn around and make a glossed over npc suddenly important or the focus of an adventure.

Yeah I read far enough ahead to pick up on making Foxglove a bit more obvious in part 1. You mention it does this to other NPCs, any others you can think of specifically I should keep an eye out for?

[gijoemike]

I don't have the Anniversary edition.


At the back of the original book there were a few random flavor encounters

the moor monster (just tell the local legend, this is a terrible fight)
the undead skull creature in a crate on the docks
The farm may have been one of the first encounters in book 2. It foreshadows undead
There is also talk about a scouting party to various known goblin encampments. But there wasn't a map or encounter provided.

Spoiler

Show

Of the 7? tribes of goblins the bogfoot goblins fought against unification under the big bads of part 1 and were all slaughtered. Having the PCs go on the scouting trip really helps setup how ruthless the new goblin king is. "Step in line or you all die." Since the bog was farther south having just a few of them rise as zombies ties in the events of the manor house.

My favorite is to use the raven carvings to give the history of the town. But you need an oracle/visionary for this bit.