Then I'd be willing to play in that, depending on how the posting rate was set up.

That sounds like a lot of fun to me as well!

How do you all feel about hex crawl campaigns?

In reply to karuoun (msg # 179):

I generally like them, but there have been a few I've been involved in that fail due to how long it takes to do those kinds of things.

What is a hex crawl?  Is that some form of dungeon crawl?

Where I've seen it used is as part of a campaign where you are exploring a large area, usually broken down into hexes so that you can see where you've done your exploring to date.

Think Kingmaker's overland exploration...

So, you're offering to run Kingmaker, right??? :)

In reply to BasicSet77DM (msg # 184):

Gapes, and steps back, grabs a bucket of popcorn and waits to see what happens.

I've been reading a fair amount of ancient modules from when I began running Dungeons and Dragons in the late 80s/ early 90s.  Modules set in the Grand Duchy of Karameikos.  I remember that these modules made me fall in love with running games - and to hate it too.  I wondered why.

I am a very poor amateur fiction writer in my spare time, I am studying the art of crafting a story.  To do this, I've been looking at the work of Dan Harmon (writer for Rick and Morty, Community) and his work in Harmonquest.  He has a specific structure to his stories that make them compelling - and I have found myself realising that this can be adapted to make my Dungeons and Dragons games dynamic - less location based, more based on the needs of narrative.

What I would like to do is to combine the setting of Karameikos with the ideas contained in certain generic and Mystara-focused modules to create interesting adventures for a group.  My problem is that I'm not so familiar with Pathfinder rules (though I am familiar with DnD 3.5) and I'd need players who could cope with my occasional requests for aid during combats.  I know of, and use, the PFSRD as well as possessing copies of the rules themselves.

So, I would love to find out if this sort of game sounds at all interesting, first of all, and if anyone would be willing to be my 'Expert' for the crunch of fights for a few encounters, until I am a little more confident in the rules. Also, would ditching the endless dungeon crawls that the old modules provide to create more 'narrative' themed plots and scenes be enjoyable?  I welcome any constructive feedback.

Thank you.

I've been playing in a GURPS game based on classic D&D modules for over nine years now.  It has a very strong sense of narrative even during dungeon crawling.  For instance, one series of adventures followed a gnomish infantryman in his trek to escape the Underdark, and those adventures would fit right in with the Odyssey.  (Perhaps a touch hyperbolic, but not too far from the truth.)  For some reason, it's easier to pull this off in GURPS than in D&D or Pathfinder, but a PF game that employed that sense of narrative would be excellent and would certainly fit in with published modules.  I'd love to play, but I'm hardly a PF expert, and I'd be useless in helping with rule clarifications.

Sounds interesting, I started mid 3.5 with a group who had been playing a long time so I never really experienced modules.  I've never gm'd Pathfinder (though I plan to this year) but I am pretty familiar with rules and decent at looking stuff up.

Slowly putting together a game where players build a commercial empire (as big or small as they wish to grow to). It's a bit number crunchy in some aspects, but is geared toward players being able to develop any kind of business that they wish to have, from mercenary companies to being the largest gem cutter in the world, etc.


Is that something people seem interested in?

In reply to Lord_Johnny (msg # 189):

That sounds interesting. what kind of setting? It would be fun on ships in an area like the Mediterranean. Or maybe as a Gypsy band wandering around.

In reply to Lord_Johnny (msg # 189):

Is it intended to be run from within Pathfinder?  Is your plan to utilize anything out of the Pathfinder Downtime rules?  Or is your plan to have it really separate from Pathfinder?

I'm thinking of running a stone age style campaign.  Moderate fantasy aspects, but limited classes, weapons, and armor and only using the "Primitive man" race.  I'm Thinking I want to focus mostly on survival, claiming resources, and maybe building a village.  Looking at taking a lot of ideas from the Realm of the Mammoth Lords.  Lots of mega fauna and prehistoric beasties to hunt and watch out for.
I'm not aiming for historical accuracy. A "fantasy stone age" style setting, if you will.

Just curious if there is interest here.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:20, Tue 15 May 2018.

In reply to Lord_Johnny (msg # 189):

I have been wanting to check out the ultimate campaign rules if that is what you are using?

Not a game I'm planning on running any time soon but an amusing idea I had:

Everyone's a bard! The players are part of a band that is trying to go on tour but get roped into adventure. I'm thinking an awful lot of AP's and modules could fit into this... imagine Serpent's Skull as a bunch of shipwrecked minstrels :P

Every character can specialize in a different instrument and given the wide range of archetypes should have a bit of variety enough to muddle through most adventures

In reply to praguepride (msg # 194):

I think there are many great “everyone’s a x” combinations - rarely do I see groups put together with any other vision of wholeness than “need tank, support, healing, damage”. ‘Everyone is capable of stealthing properly’ <- even just that would add a lot to both story and facing encounters. “Everyone is family” - how about a Rise of the Runelords starting off in little Sandpoint where a whole family of siblings and cousins gets tangled up in the mess, perhaps the GM has old granny be a curious lady in her eighties, constantly walking into the dangers threatening Sandpoint? Everyone’s a sorcerer? The bloodlines add more excitement than the wizard schools do, and with arcane magic the group can become versatile enough to handle the many low-level encounters as well as the big bad :)

You're right. Everyone's a fighter(type) soldier in the same mercenary company. Everyone's a wizard part of a wizard school. Everyone's a thief in a thieves guild etc.

I guess I was thinking about something like The Green Room where the PCs are just trying to be a band but are thrown into the middle of a crazy adventure and are kind of forced to become heroes but yeah...everyone's an X are all kind of like that.

Most fun thing I ever saw on rPoL: Everyone's a farmer. You're all level 1 commoners! Now let's go fight some goblins :P

Would anyone be interested in a pure RNG character creation game? You roll 4d6 drop lowest in order so you dont know what you will play. Then using background section from Ultimate Campaign you randomly generate your backstory. I was  thinking might be a change of pace to not come in knowing what you will play. It has a real old school feel to it where high scores are treasured as rare and low scores are seen as RP opportunities instead of deal breakers.

I am up for that idea.

Sounds interesting. Maybe with a caveat that you get to reroll if your modifiers are +1 or less.

I would love to see someone tackle having their highest stat be a 9. I would also love that opportunity tp play a schmuck and make him a hero

The concept of investing time and energy into an RNG generator is almost a perfect encapsulation of the things I find most horrifying about real life and seek to escape most ardently in roleplaying games. I've never understood the idea of low stats or weak characters as roleplaying "opportunities," their defining relationship to the average is that they literally have less opportunity. Less impact, less narrative power, they fade; the old school paradigm was you tossed your sheet together in a second, threw it into a meatgrinder, and when it inevitably died you had a second or third or fourth sheet ready to go, you wrote it up during the DM's bathroom break. Nothing was a dealbreaker because nothing was important.

I'm sure the game will do well and I wish you every success, I just don't get it. Won't get it, I suppose.