RotRL or CotCT

[DEP]

So I am stuck between which AP to get? I was wondering which do you feel has more depth and was more fun to run and/or play in? Also, what the story line is for both?

I didnt post this in Paizo because it would have been posted in one of the forums for the AP and not the other, so I felt it would have been biased.

Thanks

 

[Morpheus]

So I am stuck between which AP to get? I was wondering which do you feel has more depth and was more fun to run and/or play in? Also, what the story line is for both?

I didnt post this in Paizo because it would have been posted in one of the forums for the AP and not the other, so I felt it would have been biased.

Thanks

I'm about to start running CotCT myself. I like the idea of having a campaign set within a city-lots of investigation, mystery, etc.

 

[azhrei_fje]

I'm a charter subscriber and I've read both of the AP's but haven't played or GMed either one. If/when I'm able to GM again, I will probably do them in order, not because I think RotRL is particularly any better than CotCT, but because it will provide a good introduction to the rule tweaks since I would be using the PF Beta ruleset. Plus, I plan to use MapTool to run the game, so I'm more likely to find prebuilt maps and tokens for the older AP than the newer one.

I think the CotCT is more to my liking, though it only barely edges out RotRL. Sorry I don't have any real experience with either of them.

 

[gribble]

So I am stuck between which AP to get? I was wondering which do you feel has more depth and was more fun to run and/or play in? Also, what the story line is for both?

Well, they're both very different. The very high level plot summaries of each are:

Spoiler

RotRL: An ancient evil has awakened and his minions are once again active in the lands of Varisia. The PCs fight first against his minions and other trouble stirred up in his wake, slowly uncovering and then facing the forgotten threat. RotRL is primarily about discovery - both of the lands of Varisia (it involves a lot of travel) and of what is really going on.
CotCT: The fragile peace of the great city of Korvosa is broken with the death of the king. As further misfortune befalls the city, the civil disorder is revealed to be a plot of the Queen, who has become corrupted by an ancient and powerful artifact. CotCT is more of a typical city-based adventure, although there are some forays out of the city at later levels.

Both have a lot of depth, but at a high level I guess the choice is between dungeon/wilderness (RotRL) vs urban/dungeon (CotCT) adventuring.

 

[Hammerhead]

Spoilers follow:

I think Rise of the Runelords is a better AP; to be honest, CotCT isn't all that 'investigation, mystery, urban.' It's pretty clear who the bad guys are, especially once those doctors show up. And you end up in a lot of dungeons. And the mystery of Blackjack is something of a joke.

Queen Evil is a pretty worthless overall villain, and probably won't even last a round against 15th level characters. She's a bard...what kind of group can take pride in defeating the evil machinations of a bard? Worst of all, the final confrontation with the Queen doesn't even have a bunch of elite troops that she can inspire. I don't think beating up a trophy wife (even a fiendishly empowered one) can compare to beating up one of the kings of an ancient, evil, decadent empire whose evil was legendary.

CotCT also has one of those filler adventures so beloved of CRPGs...the one where you have to help a group of people, to earn the favor necessary to help them later. Lame. The 5th adventure of CotCT is better than the comparing one in RotRL, which is a "theme" dungeon. Also, the tarot deck thing is cool, but I'd be unsure about how well I could implement it as a DM.

In short, go with the first one.

 

[Freakohollik]

I played through the first 3 RotRL adventures and thought they were all terrible. For a bit of background, my group likes to explore dungeons and come across interesting traps, puzzles, and encounters. We're not very interested in the story of the adventures or the AP. Our experience was that all the dungeons were terrible with nothing memorable encountered in any of them.

As for the "story", after 3 adventures we had no idea about any kind of overarching story or coherent plot connecting the adventures. Kind of ruins the "path" part of adventure path.

Our DM was frequently annoyed reading the room entries as they would go into way too much backstory about the inhabitants in every room. We'd never find out any of it since they'd be dead in a few rounds. He read it to us a couple times to make fun of how irrelevant it was.

I peaked at the boss of the last adventure and its really lame. Its a

Spoiler

human wizard

. Not only is that really boring and unoriginal, he could be easily beaten with

Spoiler

grapple

.

 

[freyar]

I played through the first 3 RotRL adventures and thought they were all terrible. For a bit of background, my group likes to explore dungeons and come across interesting traps, puzzles, and encounters. We're not very interested in the story of the adventures or the AP. Our experience was that all the dungeons were terrible with nothing memorable encountered in any of them.

As for the "story", after 3 adventures we had no idea about any kind of overarching story or coherent plot connecting the adventures. Kind of ruins the "path" part of adventure path.

Our DM was frequently annoyed reading the room entries as they would go into way too much backstory about the inhabitants in every room. We'd never find out any of it since they'd be dead in a few rounds. He read it to us a couple times to make fun of how irrelevant it was.

I peaked at the boss of the last adventure and its really lame. Its a

Spoiler

human wizard

. Not only is that really boring and unoriginal, he could be easily beaten with

Spoiler

grapple

.

Forgive me for saying so, but it doesn't sound like your group's play style really works well with any adventure paths, since you're not interested in the story. What seems to be the great strength of the Paizo APs is the overarching story.

To the OP: I don't have CotCT, but RotRL seemed great on a read-through. Your group would need to enjoy digging into history, though, since that's a lot of what it's about.

 

[amethal]

I've read both, but haven't run either of them yet (finishing WotBS first).

RotRL is more varied, as it covers a lot more of Varisia than CotCT does. Individually, I prefer the RotRL adventures as in my opinion they have more "that's really cool" moments than CotCT.

However, CotCT is more structured and the adventures flow much better from one into the next. Korvosa is an interesting city, and whilst the PCs are supposed to get attached to Sandpoint in RotRL they spend most of their time somewhere else, whereas they can really get to know Korvosa.

Depending on your players, some might struggle to come up with a reason for their characters to go adventuring in RotRL - it wouldn't be an issue with my group, but from comments on the Paizo boards some have had problems in this area.

On the other hand, a gung ho party who prefers a direct approach to dealing with evil may find the intricacies of solving Korvosa's problems in CotCT fairly frustrating.

 

[Virtue]

I have read them both im going to start out by running RORLs but im biased I love using Giants as enemies

 

[bento]

We just finished the first book of the CotCT AP and so far it's delivering what I and my group were looking for in an AP. Here's what initial attracted us to the AP, and so far how its turned out:

Character Development: I wanted a game where the players felt like they could really invest themselves in their characters. The Guide to Korvosa was an excellent investment and each of them has a list of NPC contacts and plot hooks that give us plenty to do when we're not playing out of the AP.

Clear Hero Roles: A big part of CotCT is having the players rise from simple city folk to well-established heroes. The players really have to care about being the "good guys" for this AP to pay off. The first book gives them several important NPCs that provide them with adventures that help the players begin to build a solid reputation. If your players like to play evil, or rogue all time, you might have a problem with the overall plot.

Fleshed-Out Setting: Between the Korvosa Guide and the AP books there is plenty of "fluff" to build a game on. Besides running the adventures out of the book I've also run one two-session side adventure using the background material. Korvosa, as far as fantasy cities go, is pretty human-centric and much lower-magic than a city like Sharn (Eberron). There are plenty of interesting groups your players can interact with.

Fun Stuff: I like it when there's more than standard 3.5 rule encounters. In the first AP book we had three of them. The most well known "fun item" in CotCT is the Harrow Deck, a fortune telling deck which is used to kick off the adventure and set the theme for each AP book. Two other "fun things" that we enjoyed in the first book was the "Knivesies" fight at the local crime-lord's hideout and a roof top chase. The roof top chase used note cards you create and as the players go from card to card they are given a challenge. Fun things that helped take the game out of the standard 3.5 mind set.

Interesting NPCs and Villains: I guess you could say that NPCs are as interesting as you make them, and to date I'm probably batting around .500. There are some that the players have taken to, while others are rather flat. Oh well, at least they remember some of their names.


Downside to CotCC:

• Periods of "sit quiet while I read this two page passage to you"
• Background material that never comes into play
• Books layout makes it difficult to find information
• You'll want to buy and read ahead as some early NPCs are important in later books
• It costs $120 for the AP set, not including Harrow Deck and City Guide

I hope this helps. We're certainly enjoying it and will probably be playing this for another year or two.