I’m sorry to hear you aren’t enjoying it. My party seem to be having a blast. I think this is one of the difficulties of a player judging a module without understanding how much of it was influenced by the DM.
I've been playing since the 1970s. You don't need to assume I'm incapable of evaluating the situation. A lot of my evaluation stems out of the specific PLAYER materials.
I’m not sure if you’re aware but the DM guidance specifically states that the boar targets a hunter guide on its first round, not a PC. The boar is also bleeding heavily so gains a level of exhaustion each round. By my maths there’s about a 1 in four chance of a PC dying in the encounter less if they optimized. But that doesn’t mean the end of character at that point because of the paths. I don’t want to spoil things, but dying in the boar encounter is not player death.
Everything you spoke about there is design of which I'm highly critical.
Dictating player strategy, assuming that a hunter will be a primary target and heroes will not try to PROTECT their allies, a 25% chance of outright death in the first encounter ... and then making death a fake out? These are all bad design philosophies. A module should anticipate likely player strategies, but it should not ASSUME them, or be reliant upon those assumptions.
I think you’re being a bit harsh. Most of these Paladin spells are already on other Oath’s lists and the example of haste doesn’t come online until 9th level by which point the party almost certainly has far more beneficial stuff. Not to mention that most of these spells are concentration and the Paladin is already tight on spell slots. Sure the fear aura is good but other Oaths also have a fear aura or other similar powers. DC 14 is good at 3rd level but let’s be honest a normal paladins saves at that point are probably going to be DC13 and balance will reduce its effectiveness when they get to higher levels.
Most paladin spell levels are spent on smites, so your concentration idea holds no water. Further, it isn't the presence of one or two of these spells on the same list - it is the presence of all of them. Across the board, the spell lists in the player options tend very strong, often gravitating towards the spells that are class features in disguise like find familiar, hunter's mark/hex, etc...
It does make me chuckle that the Amazon is too Wonder Woman when WW is directly based on an Amazon and is the representation most modern players are going to be familiar with. This seems like a bit of a low blow. Particularly as they have several abilities that WW doesn’t seem to.
YMMV. However, this design feels out of place with the materials, is poorly balanced (every attack made against the ranger in our party for the last 10 sessions has effectively been against AC 25), and feels more like a comic book character than a greek inspired figure.
I’ll be honest I don’t understand this part. The epic paths are there to give players compelling reasons to engage with the campaign world. Early on they are part of the main campaign but as campaign expands into its sandbox it gives you reasons to explore. Maybe you haven’t got to this bit yet...
You already have reason to explore, and they do not encourage you to explore unique options enabled by the selection of an Epic Destony ... the storyline just falls in your lap, unmotivated, and without effort. You don't have have to try to obtain your epic destiny. The DM is essentially just telling you when it happens as you go along ... and the way it is written, you get to pick magic items as rewards for reaching certain parts of the adventure? I just completed my Epic Destiny, and it felt highly destined ... (it was going to happen regardless of any effort on my part), but does not feel Epic.
All in all, you are of course entitled to your opinion and I’m sorry you feel the campaign isn’t very good. I can’t help feeling this is because you’re seeing half the picture.
I'm most of the way through the sandbox. My assessment is based upon a lengthy play experience here with a pretty darn good DM. My perspective is based upon the experience of a player, which most people usingt he module will be... so perhaps is more relevant than that of a DM that sees everything behind the screen... (although it isn't like the stuff behind the screen is too myserious ... when a big secret is that characters with distinctive names are in fact ... the beings with those distinct names that the PCs have heard about and are described in the play materials ... well ... weak sauce.
You're a DM. You elected to run the campaign. You're invested. This gives you a tendency towards bias in support of the thing you selected. I'm someone that was presented with the option. I did not choose it. I am experiencing it as a receptive audience.
All this being said, I would consider running this as an adventure path with meaningful rewrites to address my concerns. The basic storyline is interesting, but the implementation is flawed, the mechanical aspects are problematic, and you could take the basic ideas of the Epic Desitny concepts and make them more interesting by adding significant additions to the setting that RELY upon the epic destony storyline and provide options for failure rather than just being 'toss ons' we get for free.
