Just some of my thoughts on the SoW series, so more spoilers!
For the love of sanity do not try to use Scales of War plots to be less work for yourself. I have never in 25 years of roleplaying seen more plot holes and wtf moments in a campaign than that series. Seriously, those old Fighting Fantasy adventures had a more consistent and reasonable plot than some of the adventures in that series.
The worst cuplrit is the Umbraforge adventure, some lowlights include:
- A guy on the run from his crimelord boss deciding to go solo into his bosses fortress rather than just run away
Perhaps a bit crazy, but not too bad ... he either goes on the run with his boss in full control of all his resources, or he disrupts his boss' operations to buy himself time to really hole up. Tenuous, I agree, but there's something there.
- TLow level PCs follow a guy through a portal to the shadowfell with no compelling reason
Depends on how 'good' the party is, really. I mean, this is the guy who supplied a whole army with weapons that allowed them to be a major threat to the area. The PCs might have an interest in stopping him doing so again. The PCs should also be under the impression that the guy will be out to get them in the near future, so best to strike at him now.
- The PCs stop bad guy A from blowing up a factory used to commit crimes against nature to aid bad guy B invading the world. No explaination offered.
Yes, it does make little sense for the PCs to stop the bad guy before he complete his sabotage. I'm inclined to not let the PCs know what he's up to, just find where he is. They may still not stop him, but often PCs are shoot first, sort things out later.
- A lifetime criminal sees the PCs fight some random ogres and decides "gee they are noble, I should turn my life around" and turns against her boss.
- The PCs trust this person
This was a bit of a stretch as it is written. She's really only there to direct the PCs to the next fight, but ends up giving too much information that gives little motivation to the PCs (see the point above).
I'm planning on her being a bit of a recurring NPC, so getting rid of the connections to the main boss and having her be more mercenary. She'll still approach them for her wanting Modra to die quick rather than suffer at the hands of his boss, but won't have any info on what his plans are.
- The PCs surrender as soon as more guards turn up
- They let the bad guy solique, then hop into a portal and disappear
- An earthquake just so happens to hit at the exact right moment to let them escape
This is a bit of a sticky situation. The idea of course is that the PCs are supposed to be highly outnumbered/outmatched so that they don't attack the BBEG too soon. The trick is getting the PCs to stand down, rather than go out in a blaze of glory.
I think the intent of this entire sequence is supposed to mimic a dramatic cinematic fight. BBEG makes his offer to join forces, gets the heroic snub, orders his minions to do away with the PCs and leaves, then the earthquakes happen to throw a wrench into the plans and give the PCs a desperate escape before everything goes kablooie. Classic movie villainy.
Cool, given that your interested in SoW, I'll focus on the good things that can be used to make a sweet campaign.
The core plot elements of Scales of War can be a solid basis of a campaign.
*** Spoilers Incoming ***
- Low heroic has a simple basis. Bad guy arms dealers are giving weapons to orcs and hobgoblins to encourage them to cause problems. Good basis, easy to work with, many plot holes are easily avoided. Establishes some investigation and enmity with the heroic BBEG.
Yes, the first module is one of the modules I changed a few fights on. A bit too slavish to using the MM for baddies. Wererats? Gnomes? A bit of a mess, but can be fairly easily tweaked.
- Mid heroic, is really not connected to the plot, almost at all. That is not a bad thing. With the help of that pbworks page, you can tie them in more closely, but consider using this time to further individual PC quests and background stories.
Mines of Karak is pretty tenuously connected, I agree. Den of the Destroyer seems like it is at the time, but does end up introducing a major NPC and ally to the PCs that plays a fairly pivotal role throughout most of the paragon and epic tier.
- High heroic is good, they see the culmination of the big fights that low heroic fortold and they get to take on the first BBEG. The investigations around town need a little work, but that is easily done.
- Paragon introduces some very tenuous reasons to travel to different places, however once the PCs are there, the adventures seem internally consistent for the most part. I think at this stage it becomes easier to lose sight of why they are doing the running around. I think you need to play up the effect the war is having on the world, as much of the game revolves around a war that is not in fact taking place.
That is one thing that is really missing from the paragon tier. There's a war going on, that the good guys are apparently losing, or at least barely keeping their footing. But there's no real sense of this, at least as written. A couple of events happen, but nothing really gives the sense of desperation, so that is something that will have to be added by the DM. It really should have that LotR feel that defeat is imminent at every turn.
- I am yet to play Epic, but the last couple of adventures look really fun. The few before that seem I am less sure about.
So as I originally said, SoW won't save you from having to come up with a plot yourself really. It overly complicates a simple basis to start with, but you can easily re-write weird plot items and keep the same encounters for the most part. After that initial hurdle, there are a few filler adventures which are fine and can he left out for a less railroaded feel.
Coming up with plots and reasons for PCs to do things is the fun bit though, I just appreciate having a bunch of encounters already laid out for me and it is pretty good at that. The advice on that pbworks site is great for making the encounters a little more sensible and less gygaxian. The authors say they could only use MM1 at that stage, so had to have odd monster combinations.
Once you have completed heroic tier, I think that the campaign takes on a life of its own, so the plot suggestions and suggested reason for doing things become less of an issue. The correlation between the theoretical campaign the authors are writing for and how any individual groups campaign actually plays widens as the AP continues. That is fine though.
There really is just a framework here to work with. On it's own, it's a series of linear adventures that feature a lot of combat, interspersed with Skill Challenges and a scattering of role-play scenes. Why it seems to be good for a casual group. With some work, it can be made more indepth and role-play-rich. Depends on what you and your group are looking for.