Adventure Path Three: You'd Do...

[JoeGKushner]

I'd like to see a "Silk Road" adventure path.

The campaign would feature an extremely long (and dangerous!) trade route that winds across an entire continent. It crosses every type of terrain and, perhaps, every type of climate. It is the road to the exotic West, where wondrous civilizations and bizarre cultures exist. Why travel the road? Commerce, my friend. The West features a wild array of delicacies and commodities that fetch the highest prices in the East.

However, the journey is perilous. The "road" is really more of a trail and, in some places, fades out of existence for miles at a stretch. Unimaginable creatures and savage tribes prey on those who travel West for riches and glory.

It would be an adventure in a more classic sense as the PCs (for whatever reason, be it personal enrichment or rescue/investigation of an overdue traveller) walk the road and face new environments at every step.

There are a lot of potential uses for such a campaign but it'd be a rough sell in terms of the exotic component. Some of the most intresting bits might be what the players would be trading. For example, silks, spices, (often worth more than their weight in gold), and more traditional bits like ore and magic items.

The starting as caravan guards is also a pretty standard bit too so would be easy to incorporate.

 

[Dave Turner]

There are a lot of potential uses for such a campaign but it'd be a rough sell in terms of the exotic component. Some of the most intresting bits might be what the players would be trading. For example, silks, spices, (often worth more than their weight in gold), and more traditional bits like ore and magic items.

The starting as caravan guards is also a pretty standard bit too so would be easy to incorporate.

I hadn't thought of the caravan guards hook to get the PCs involved. I had two others in mind.

First, the PCs are out for riches. This would differ markedly from the usual D&D campaign which is more idealistic. The party would be out to make their fortune. Each character could have personal reasons for needing the money (revitalize my trading family's fortunes, gain enough wealth to buy a kingdom, build the most glorious temple to one's deity, pay off a massive weregeld/bounty on one's head), but they would be focused on the money. I'm not quite sure how to pull this off within a traditional D&D dungeons-first framework, though.

Second, I thought of a rescue hook. The PCs would be searching for someone who had previously travelled the Road but never returned. This could take on some "Heart of Darkness" overtones or could be more straightforward. The NPC would be a binding thematic element at each stop along the Road.

You could have the Path set up so the PCs reach the exotic West by 10th level and have to return to their homeland by 20th level. You should have new encounters on the return trip, but you could visit old locales and NPCs as well that have changed in the wake of the PCs.

I thought the exotic element would be easier to pull off than you did in a way. You could have all kinds of bizarre stuff thrown in. It could range from different humanoid cultures (a town ruled by children and the aged are killed like "Logan's Run") to alien environments (storms which rain flower petals instead of water).

I'm not sure that the idea could be commercialized as a Dungeon Adventure Path. Well, I can't think of an immediate way to do it, at any rate. Still, it's a campaign that I've always wanted to run.

 

[JoeGKushner]

In some ways, it's too bad that Dungeon could'nt do a really off beat type of campaign.

I'd love to see them use the Illumians from Races of Destiny for example. Something where that race was going to plunge a city on the prime into the realm of Shadow to take their home city out of it.

Or something that uses them to set up a war between a country and their ancient enemies to weaken them for a final strike.

Or something that has them trying to change the players. For example, the elan and illumians are both former human races. what would happen if they turned those races into templates?

 

[takasi]

I really wish they would choose a different backdrop. I hate the way they hide behind the term "generic" to secretly promote Greyhawk. The maps, the towns, the religion, the lore, the history: enough! Pick a new setting please (FR or Eberron), and provide conversion notes for Greyhawk. You can make portable adventures in any D&D setting.

 

[JoeGKushner]

I really wish they would choose a different backdrop. I hate the way they hide behind the term "generic" to secretly promote Greyhawk. The maps, the towns, the religion, the lore, the history: enough! Pick a new setting please (FR or Eberron), and provide conversion notes for Greyhawk. You can make portable adventures in any D&D setting.

Some of the background material ties into the default Player's Handbook implied background, but a lot of it really doesn't go into Greyhawk naturally. For example, Cauldron, the Shackled City from the first arc, wasn't in Greyhawk until they (Piazo) released their new Greyhawk maps. I own many an old Greyhawk product and trust me, it isn't there.

 

[RodneyThompson]

I really wish they would choose a different backdrop. I hate the way they hide behind the term "generic" to secretly promote Greyhawk. The maps, the towns, the religion, the lore, the history: enough! Pick a new setting please (FR or Eberron), and provide conversion notes for Greyhawk. You can make portable adventures in any D&D setting.

I actually kind of have to agree. It's not such a big deal most of the time, but the latter half of Age of Worms definitely seems to take place in some Greyhawk-specific locales. I mean...(highlight for spoilers)

Spoiler

I may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure Magepoint, the Wyrmcrawl Fissue, Alhaster and Redhand are Greyhawk-specific locales, right?

I don't mind, really, and a lot of the little easter eggs in the campaign have been neat, but I do run this in a non-Greyhawk setting and it seems like I'm going to have to on-the-fly rename/rewrite some stuff. With the Shackled City Adventure Path I didn't have to change a darn thing, which was nice because Cauldron is now a staple city in my campaign world.

 

[Tinner]

For my group, the coolest part of SCAP was Test of the Smoking Eye. One of my players passed the test and received the Smoking Eye template - that was a moment that gets talked about over and over.

I'd like to see AP3 have opportunities like that. If the PC's are clever and tough and determined, they can get some kind of major benefit/change for themselves.

Going along with the "defend a site" idea mentioned above, I'd like to see AP3 send the PC's to serve as "marshalls" for some kind of frontier town. Maybe a mining book town where the PC's have to fight off monstrous invaders as well as deal with a lawless group of drunken miners, and the types of seedy undisciplined business that spring up to cater to such men,

If the PC's play their cards right they could wind up as mayors of the town, or owning the valuable mine deeds, etc.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Forget a town. I was a large city. Maybe start it off in the outlaying town, but so many adventuers start in small towns and stay there for 85% of the adventure that it makes me weep!

Thank god for Freeport, Bluffside, and even Sharn!

 

[James Jacobs]

Hi everyone! This is a really fun thread... Adventure Path III is still in the planning stages (it doesn't even have a name yet), but rest assured, there will be one starting up in Dungeon late next year. I'm not gonna go into any details about what we've got planned for it yet, aside to say that some of the posts on this very thread actually hit on some key elements, themes, and goals we're considering.

As for offbeat campaigns... what we've got planned for it right now is indeed a little offbeat. It actually makes me a little nervous in some ways since some of it is really different than what we've done with Shackled City and Age of Worms...

Anyway, in the meantime, keep this thread going! It's super-helpful to see what everyone thinks works and doesn't work in a 1st-20th level campaign.

 

[JoeGKushner]

One of the things I like about Shackled City, even though it's a little predictible, is how the events move.

Outside event A

Potential Outside event B

Dungeon Crawl C

Flood Season is a good example. As is Life's Bazar. As is Zenith Trajectory. all start off almos twithout any need for the players to do anything deliberate.