Help me choose! "Shackled City" or "Age of Worms"?

[Morrus]

I really can't decide which of these two Adventure Paths to run! I have them both. I'd love to hear your thoughts on each.

If you recall my previous thread, we've decided to start with new 1st level characters rather than trying to shoehorn something into our current campaign.

So, I'm left with a choice. My players have said they're happy to go along with whichever I choose. But I can't choose between them!

 

[Psychic Warrior]

Shackled City! Because you can get the deluxe hardcover edition and have all the extras and maps that were added afterwards.

By the time you are done the Age of Worms should be in a hardcover format and you can run that then!

Then (in about 2009) you should see the Savage Tides hardcover and you are set for the next year of gaming!

 

[Morrus]

Shackled City! Because you can get the deluxe hardcover edition and have all the extras and maps that were added afterwards.

By the time you are done the Age of Worms should be in a hardcover format and you can run that then!

Then (in about 2009) you should see the Savage Tides hardcover and you are set for the next year of gaming!

Eh.. OK, sorry I wasn't clear. I'm not going to buy any hardcovers (no matter how good an idea anyone thinks that would be!) - I'll be running whichever one I choose strictly from Dungeon magazines and the support downloads at Paizo's website.

So please take into account the format/version of the AP's I'll be using.

 

[Shawn_Kehoe]

The Age of Worms contain some references to the events of Shackled City. Likewise, Shackled City hints at the coming Age of Worms, mostly in the involvement of the Ebon Triad. So if you have time to eventually run both, I guess I would do Shackled City first. Come to think of it, that's exactly what I am doing

Shawn

 

[Gundark]

I am liking the AoW. I have looked though the SC, I bought the dungeon issues but didn't look in depth. You get this sense of a Epic Adventure with AoW, you get to travel more. There seemed to be more of a plane jumping feel to SC which didn't appeal to me. The AoW is tough on the PCs (6 deaths thus far), but it's good. I would go with the AoW.

 

[MerricB]

I also had the choice, and chose to go with Age of Worms. Why? I reckoned the Paizo team would have learnt a lot from SC, so they'd get it righter in AoW.

I plan to run Savage Tide after we finish AoW. AoW has taken us about a year of fortnightly play so far to reach adventure #9 (and I'm told I run them quickly), so that's definitely something to think about.

Cheers!

 

[Davelozzi]

I would go with Age of Worms. The adventures are more varied than those in Shackled City and the pacing is great too. Age of Worms feels much more like iconic D&D to me. Lots of great villians and epic happenings.

I would definately recommend running it in Greyhawk, as despite the illusions of generic-ness, it just fits better there. In Shackled City, the whole campaign is contained enough that you can plop it down in any remote world or even run it without worrying about a world beyond the home region.

So if you have time to eventually run both, I guess I would do Shackled City first.

That said, I agree with Shawn here, if you think you will eventually want to run both. Otherwise, it's not a big enough deal to really matter.

 

[Morrus]

That said, I agree with Shawn here, if you think you will eventually want to run both. Otherwise, it's not a big enough deal to really matter.

I very much doubt we'll play both! And even if we do, whichever I choose to run looks like well over a year's gaming, so I'm not going to base the next year's gaming fun on what we might be doing in 2-3 years' time.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Age of Worms. With SCAP behind the creative staff of Paizo, the knew what to do to make an adventure path better. Age of Worms is a wonderful adventure path and I believe it to be superior in quality to SCAP. Yes, if it werent for SCAP we wouldn't have adventure paths, but is a wonderful way to keep a campaign arc, no matter the setting, with all things intertwined and working toward the end of some cause.

At first I was resistant to the adventure path idea, but it certainly makes the GM's job easier in trying to maintain a series of threaded adventures.

 

[demiurge1138]

Age of Worms, definately. The AoW as written in the magazines is a lot more polished and coherent than Shackled City was. The Shackled City hardcover does a lot to address this... but since you're going by the magazines, Age of Worms is the way to go.

Demiurge out.