Party make-up for Rise of the Runelords

[thorimar]

My group is soon to begin Rise of the Runelords adventure path. At this point only the cleric is locked in on his concept (that is me). What I'm trying to get is a sense of what classes/abilities/competencies are key to the adventure so when we sit down to develop concepts we make sure anything important is covered. Our current game, which I am DMing has no primary casters, but the adventure and party makeup are very successful. We hope to have the same kind of success in our next game, so any advise is appreciated. DM or player input welcome.

Thorimar

 

[moritheil]

Don't know it, but the general advice I can offer is to err on the side of more magic users rather than fewer, in most settings.

I've rarely heard, "Darn, if we only had one more fighter!" Conversely, parties have often said, "If only we had a <insert spellcasting class here>!"

 

[A Passing Maniac]

As with all of Paizo's adventure paths, Rise of the Runelords is written with the idea that the game will be played by a group that includes a Fighter, Rogue, Cleric, and Wizard. Although a DM can of course alter adventures to better suit his or her players' characters, with the adventures as written, some obstacles are significantly harder to get around without at least one of each of the standard four classes (or suitable replacements) in the party. Both players and DMs should keep that in mind--the former when creating their characters, and the latter for when the former inevitably create a party consisting of a Rogue, Ninja, Scout, and Ranger.

 

[moritheil]

Rogue, Ninja, Scout, and Ranger.

This actually happens surprisingly often IME, despite being usually acknowledged as worse than the converse, an all-caster group.

 

[theredrobedwizard]

For the record, we finished RotRL just yesterday. Our party composition (core rules and RotRL materials only, mind you) was:

Human (Shoanti) Ranger 2/Barbarian 1/Fighter 1/Rogue 1/Horizon Walker 10
Half-Orc Druid 14/Barbarian 1
Elf Bard 12/Wizard 3
Halfling Rogue 3/Fighter 4/Duelist 8

Our second group (Team Go-All-The-Time) is looking like this (as of magazine 2)

Warforged (Warblade 5)
Warforged Scout (Warlock 5)
Warforged Scout (Scout 5)
Warforged Scout (Factotum 5)
Elan (Crusader 5)

-TRRW
edit: made a few mistakes on the second party.

 

[Wolfwood2]

My group is soon to begin Rise of the Runelords adventure path. At this point only the cleric is locked in on his concept (that is me). What I'm trying to get is a sense of what classes/abilities/competencies are key to the adventure so when we sit down to develop concepts we make sure anything important is covered. Our current game, which I am DMing has no primary casters, but the adventure and party makeup are very successful. We hope to have the same kind of success in our next game, so any advise is appreciated. DM or player input welcome.

My group is currently playing through the third adventure, Hook Mountain Massacre. We have:

Human Beguiler
Half-Orc Barbarian/Ranger
Gnome Jester (bard variant from Dragon Compendium)
Human Cleric
Human Factotum

I'll echo that the adventure is really designed around having a melee fighter, a divine caster, and some sort of arcane caster (rogue is optional). Be prepared to deal with enemies who use invisibility. Be prepared to deal with enemies who are very tough in melee. (At the very least, some ranged attacks would not be amiss.) Teamwork is the key.

Many encounters will utilize multiple opponents. That's why having a caster who can do battlefield control is so useful, because fighter types can only kill so many foes a round.

Having one or more characters with social skills won't hurt either. The adventure path really rewards roleplaying and talking to NPCs. Sandpointe is richly detailed, and it can be a whole lot of fun getting involved with the lives of the townspeople. Don't keep your distance thinking it's only a 'starter town'.

 

[Gwaihir]

My group starts next week. we are using Gestalt classes

Shoanti Barbarian/Mystic
Varisian Fighter/Rogue
Varisian Ranger/Sorcerer
Halfling Rogue/Wizard

Wish me luck.

 

[Carpe DM]

I'm not running RotRL, but I have the magazines and use the encounters in my own campaign. Despite what's said above, you're going to need a fighter, preferably one with some ability to keep the bad guys off other members of the party. (Knight goes a *long* way, especially a Knight with a reach weapon).

Here's why: Paizo's doing a full-on adventure path, which means you can rapidly get in over your head resource-wise. If you're out of spells, tough, because here comes the next encounter.

Second, Paizo does like multiple-person encounters, and they do like the sneak attack damage, but they do not like high attack bonuses or AC. This means fighters are more effective than usual: power attack pays off, high AC pays off, but low AC in a Paizo adventure means that you are lunchmeat.

I kill a PC a session on average if the fighter doesn't show up. He's shown up a few times in a row, now, and I haven't killed anyone in nearly three sessions. It makes a huge, huge difference.

cheers,

Carpe

 

[DM_Jeff]

I am running this camapign and the players are in gamer heaven. The characters are thus:

human binder/sorcerer
human paladin
human scout/fighter
human spirit shaman

-DM Jeff

 

[Rauol_Duke]

take 2... first post eaten by the boards

After we finish up STAP, I will be running Rise of the Runelords. So far we have:

A Chelaxian (outcast) Sorcerer
A Shoanti Barbarian
A Varisian Fighter (who fights with a Varisian bladed scarf)
A Varisian Rogue/Cleric of Desna
A Dwarven Cleric of Torag

I'm a bit disappointed that no one is playing a wizard, since there's so much cool wizard-related stuff in the campaign, but I'm sure I'll kill off more than a few of them and they will see the error of their ways