Pathfinder 1E Experiences with Paizo's Shackled City

[Kunimatyu]

A couple threads have mentioned Paizo Publishing's Shackled City Adventure Path, and they've piqued my curiosity. I've read the review and the little .pdf introduction on the main Paizo site, so I know the basic plotline -- it's a cool idea! -- but what I don't know is how it plays.

I'm curious what other ENWorlders' experiences with the Adventure Path have been.

Also, Erik, what are your thoughts on adapting the Shackled City to Iron Heroes? Is there too much magic required, or could a creative party pull it off?

 

[Vascant]

There are some elements that do require magic to handle, in fact the solution to some challanges are magic items themselves.

How does it play, with some editing to handle flow and seemless progression it has been a great path thus far for my now 12th level group or as I refer to as my mid group. I am currently using the city as the starting point for my low level (all 1st and 2nd) as well, though they are not directly involved in the AP, they have been victims and heroes to some of the fallout from it. Just a side note, both groups have completely different players in them so no one has any OC knowledge concerning the real events.

The only real let down in presentation is along the the AP, parts of the city get destroyed. Dungeon did a great job of mapping everything else, why not give us a map for the city after the destruction?

The key I have found in the AP is your players really need to be made to feel they are apart of the city and have grown up there. There are not many settings to mapped out in the same area from 1-20th level.

 

[Nightfall]

Which is probably why both Cauldron and now Diamond Lake are looking so damn cool.

 

[James Jacobs]

The only real let down in presentation is along the the AP, parts of the city get destroyed. Dungeon did a great job of mapping everything else, why not give us a map for the city after the destruction?

We didn't include a post-destruction map of the city in the original run for two reasons:

1: We didn't have the space to do another map in the issues in question.
2: We didn't have the budge tot do another map in the issues in question.

Fortunately, this was something we were able to fix with the Hardcover release of Shackled City—there's a nice big foldout map (along with a picture) of what Cauldron looks like after the campaign is over.

 

[Nightfall]

Sweet! Another reason to add this to my list!

 

[Bob the Reaver]

Though we havent played the AP (probly in a year or so) I can say the Hardcover is awsome. Already one of my favorite DnD books. What it is lacking however is a coversion document (like the Age of Worms AP). We play in Eberron and Shackeld City is a planes/cosmology heavy plot, I need a convesion (thats why it will probly be a year before we get to the AP, we only play 12-14 times a year).

 

[Baragos]

I'm running the campaign out of the Dungeon magazines now. We've reached the end of the 4th chapter (Demonskar Legacy) and all save one player really likes the campaign. The last player complains mostly because he's not happy with ow his weird character fits in, or doesn't fit in.

But except for that one, all of us agree that it's the best "module" we've run. There's great variance in the different modules and by chapter 4 some of the pieces have started falling into play, so the players are keen on discovering more.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Fortunately, this was something we were able to fix with the Hardcover release of Shackled City—there's a nice big foldout map (along with a picture) of what Cauldron looks like after the campaign is over.

Will the hardback also include the poster map of Cauldron thatwas released in the magazinbe before it was destroyed?

 

[JoeGKushner]

The only real let down in presentation is along the the AP, parts of the city get destroyed. Dungeon did a great job of mapping everything else, why not give us a map for the city after the destruction?

The collected edition has that on the back of the regular map of Cauldron and it's a big map too.