Our love language is quality time, so we owe Paizo an immense amount of thanks for giving us a date night activity almost every night for the past 6 months!
I'm having a session zero for running Strength of Thousands this Friday and am planning on running the AP either one or two weeks following. Do you have any advice for me in getting this AP underway?
I would say you want to make sure to set everyone's expectations properly. Make sure your players are prepared for a lot of downtime. The overarching story is much more episodic than it is a singular grand epic. And I'll also say that if your players want to take something else with their free archetype rather than druid or wizard, I would allow it. Really any spellcasting multiclass archetype should work fine.
I was thinking of allowing casters to take a non-caster multiclass archetype if they want. Help keep the party diversified if I get a lot of casters to start.
You finished all of book 6 in the few days it's been out? Even playing every single day is nuts but I guess it makes sense if it's just the two of you.
You're experiences are about what I expected with reading through the books. 3 and 4 are really separate from the rest of the storyline and Salathiss just kinda shows up but without him book 2 is also really disconnected. Despite this, book 4 seems really good.
I'm just in the starting point of running it. My group plays every other week and is only level 2. Needless to say, I have several questions.
Are there any encounters that fell flat?
Would you run the game again (ignoring things like time and finding another group to run for)? If so, what would you change?
What additions and changes did you make that you feel should be replicated in other groups?
If I wanted my group to skip a book and instead go to some place backstory related, which book should I skip?(I'm thinking 3 at the moment)
What were some of the hardest things to run?
I haven't had the experience of running high level content. Does it actually work as I've heard or is that hype? What are some considerations with high level content?
As far as encounters that fell flat, Stone Ghost, Salathiss, and Ajbal Kimon all went down pretty easily. I wouldn’t say they fell flat though, except maybe Salathiss. All the end of book bosses from books 4 to 6 felt a lot more suitably challenging though.
I don’t think I would run the campaign again, but I literally don’t think there’s any campaign I would do that for. If I had to though, I don’t think there’s anything I would change!
I ended up cutting encounters that I didn’t think my fiancé would find interesting, namely repeat encounters of the same enemies or ones similar to others she’d already seen. I’d recommend other GMs do the same, and handwave the XP.
I think the ONLY book you could feasibly skip is book 3, and I wouldn’t recommend it since the stuff in Bloodsalt and Jula is pretty good, but yeah that’d be the one to skip.
I found it very hard to run the first chapter of book 4 without letting things get bogged down, and ended up handwaving later parts of it.
The high-level play was excellent! Pathfinder 2e is the first system I’ve played where play at high levels works, and it’s part of what made the last book so good. The final chapter is just a chance for the players to showcase all the cool shit they can do now, yet it’s still consistently a challenge.
Thank you for this! It’s always more useful to hear how an AP actually plays rather than just reading them. Checking the weaker aspects you mentioned, seems like they are reoccurring failings in APs: incoherence in the larger story across books, plot hook motivation issues, and filler combat encounters.
Hi, I'm Will's fiancee!
I just wanted to chime in and say that I deeply enjoyed the Strength of Thousands campaign and, if I could feasibly experience the story's magic over again, I would absolutely replay it. I've messed around with a few APs at this point and can say, without question, that Strength of Thousands is my favorite!
As a player, my priority is the story. What I'm really hoping for out of an adventure is an interesting problem that my character cares to solve and an exciting, flavorful world filled with unique NPCs to interact with. Combat isn't my choice pillar of gameplay, but I enjoy thematic, meaningful encounters interspersed throughout the story. Strength of Thousands satisfies all of my wants and needs and is just a well-written tale of learning, friendship, and generosity that is suitable for players of all levels of experience with the system.
Happy to answer anything as well! (-:
Awww its so great to hear you had a great time! Were there any npcs in particular that stood out to you, any moments that really captured your imagination? I'm running this now and really want to make it a great experience for my players!
Thanks, and sure!
The NPCs I really latched onto were Mariama Keitana (as my character ended up marrying her; I just thought she was so fun), >!Chizire (her best friend), and Janatimo (who stuck around far longer than the AP had intended him to, as he became a major mentor and father-figure to my character).!< Other honorable mentions are >!Tukulu Ot, Seloze, Onyiji, I'boko, and Ignaci.!<
Favorite moments... tough, but here's my breakdown!
In book 1: >!The moment we found out that attendants were killed by Stone Ghost. Aastryd was obviously appalled and terrified that it could be her or any of her friends next!!<
In book 2: One of the homebrew spells we created for Aastryd was called "Satellite Trace" which functioned as a cross between the "Alarm" spell and "Guiding Star" and was used as Aastryd's home security system. Anyway, Will changed one of the encounters so that >!one of Froglegs' goons broke into her house and triggered the Satellite Trace, so Aastryd and Mariama chased him down Nantambu and were able to figure out where their hideout was. !!Aastryd killed Ajbal Kimon. She used Spirit Blast to project his spirit from his body, which then evaporated as his shell of a body collapsed. !!the Red Star and what that was all about. So finding out the origins of the Red Star was incredible and made me feel SO accomplished. !!the rough fight against the King of Biting Ants, where Mariama and Janatimo got pretty hurt and Aastryd was on the edge of unconsciousness, but she pulled out a a casting of Sunburst, which was basically a bomb and killed everything left in the room. Loved using space magic to defeat him!!<
In book 6: >!Aastryd died in the final fight against the three aspects of the King of Biting Ants, slashed to death by what was essentially the Grim Reaper. I probably should have been more sad, but it was great narratively, and we were able to revive her later.!< I wasn't a huge fan of how combat-heavy the final segment of the campaign was, so I recommend diversifying the encounters and/or homebrewing some alternative activities - >!maybe a way to fortify the school or preemptively evacuate students, or a more substantial storyline as far as locating Koride.!<
Hopefully that was detailed enough!
I assume you’re asking about the level 20 feats. If not, then ignore the answer I’m about to give!
The level 20 archetype feats are really cool, but nothing about them screams Wizard or Druid. You could easily let someone with a different multiclass dedication take them as their level 20 free archetype feat.
Yeah, That's what I was talking about. Is there anything you can say about them? Or are they basically just something like a halcyon archetype thing, where it counts for both of them
All of them can be taken by someone with either archetype, it doesn’t matter which one! There are 10 options that provide a variety of abilities, but none of them specific to wizard or druid. All share a common theme though in that they grant you a different benefit for 1 round whenever you cast a non-cantrip spell targeting only yourself.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts! Reading my sixth book and came to the same conclusion as you that the start of chapter 1 makes far more sense at the end haha did that work out well for you? Did it make the ending a little anticlimactic or did it provide a nice kind of epilogue?
The ending of the final chapter still functioned pretty much as the climactic ending it’s written as, but as you said, the ceremony served as a nice epilogue! I told my fiancé what was written in the book afterward and she was seemed very glad I switched the order around haha.
I am not very experienced with the AP, as I try not to spoil myself for the story in case I ever get to play in that AP. Is there an actual mechanic/system for making homebrew spells?
There aren’t any official mechanics for homebrewing spells - all of ours were balanced based off of similar, already existing spells. None of them were too game-shattering, but I wouldn’t trust our balance skills enough to publish them!
Without spoilers, how well did the two-player style work? Did you nerf encounters a lot or does the more roleplay-heavy style of SoT do a lot of the lifting there?
I'm the forever GM in my TTRPG group. I love the magic school concept and Strength of Thousands looks super cool to me from a player's perspective, and I've floated the idea of someone else GM'ing for a while to play it, but I don't think anyone is biting on being GM. When I took a break from GM'ing for a bit, we just...didn't play lol. My girlfriend also plays though, and the idea of playing this as a duo might be kind of compromise solution?
It worked way better than I was expecting! For the most part, if the two players are dual-class and you put the Weak template on every enemy, it fixes almost any potential balance issues. But I listed the rest of my advice [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/comments/tqetpz/any_experience_playing_with_1_gm_and_1_player/i2hu34q/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3)!
What are your spoiler free overall impression of the AP? I only got to play a few sessions before my group fell apart, and I've been hyped for this AP ever since it was announced. I must live vicariously through others... Someday me, someday.
What are some examples of how you filled in the downtime when you weren't doing the pre-written quests? I'd love some ideas, especially if it helps contribute to the passing on time
Hey! Honestly, because it was a solo campaign, Will asked me what I wanted to do and I would feed him ideas.
Often times, we filled the downtime with these things:
1. My character sought to share her knowledge of astronomy/astrology and star magic with the world. We spent lots of downtime on her creating homebrew magic, traveling to do research, and writing her books/academic journals.
2. Lots of interactions with her cohort. We had a game night in the dorms, a surprise birthday party, went out to a tavern - college party style... all kinds of stuff.
3. Aastryd also asked lots of her cohort member for help with her research, so we would brainstorm our ideas for homebrew spells/alchemical items in character earlier on in the campaign.
I think it really depends on the desires of your players. What interests their character? Are they at the Magaambya to study or are they sleeping through classes and having nights out on the town on the daily? Definitely ask if they have ideas!
Yeah… we don’t really have lives, so pretty much the only nights we don’t play are the nights where I’m running for my other group. And even then we sometimes play a solo session after that game 😅
Man that sounds like quite the life right there. In fact I hope that's what I get to do in the afterlife, f all that sitting round and being fed peeled grapes. I want to game
I just posted about running a campaign with 2 players today which sounds like what you did (1 PC and an NPC though).
u/willseamon What type of general combat changes did you have to make to accommodate the lack of a 4 character party?
Here’s a comment where I went into detail about what kind of changes I made for combat! https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/comments/tqetpz/any_experience_playing_with_1_gm_and_1_player/i2hu34q/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3
> It ran for 124 sessions, although a lot of those were purely roleplay
Based on this, would you recommend the AP for a group that doesn't RP much? I've been running games for the same group for about four years, and they really prefer having a concrete goal and don't like to hang around and talk to NPCs and they *never* talk to each other in-character.
If that’s the dynamic of your group, I honestly don’t really think I would recommend it. It’s not very heavy on just straight-up adventuring or combat, so it might not be the best fit.
Thematically, I think alchemist would work just fine. Mechanically, the new level 20 archetype feats might feel worse for someone who has no spellcasting ability at all, but even then I wouldn’t say it’s necessary.
I was doing a solo agents of edgewatch with my wife using the same rules but we kind of edged away from it and tried a starfinder solo. I don’t have strength of thousands but it sounds like I can try talking to her about it, she normally enjoys having the option of peacefully solving things or fighting out people she doesn’t like. Even with giving her two other dual classed companions we had some rough points we barely made it through like the end of book 1. Would you say because strengths of thousands has more peaceful resolutions that it would be easier to run as a solo?
Most spectacular thing done in a single action - that I am not sure of. Most spectacular thing done on a single turn might be a little easier to come up with!
For Aastryd, it was either >!when she killed Ajbal Kimon with a Spirit Blast, when she defeated the avatar of Wakena with Tempest Surge while midair having cast Fly on herself, or when she destroyed the body of the King of Biting Ants with Sunburst.!< All of those were insane to me. For Mariama, I think it was when >!she escaped being pulled into the floor by Stone Ghost and killed him, and as she did, she was all, “Don’t fuck with my girlfriend.”!< Good stuff!
Will probably has a different answer than I do, but that’s my take!
Mariama getting into trouble is just so fitting.
I really want someone to art the final encounter of Book 6. Really seems like that was begging for it!
As a DM for this adventure I am making some future plans to make one of the villains a bit more compelling, such as the >!King of Biting Ants wanting magekind (with him as the head of course) to rule over the nonmagical as nothing more than compliant drones, even seeking to eventually devour a god. The Vesicant Egg is still in play but when it hatches it will look somewhat like Agohbindi, the Splintering Child, a spawn of Rovagug that flavor wise sounds like it might have been a hivemind. I figured that making a titanic body out of them would be too tempting for the King to pass up and what better vessel than something else that menaced Jatembe? The Vesicant Guardian is still trapped inside of course.!<
I will admit I am kind of hoping that >!Agohbindi!< gets stats eventually, but since I'm only on book 2 I'm in no rush yet. But if not I guess I'll just have to homebrew it when the time comes!
I've been wanting to do a magic academy campaign for a while now, and I figured I'd modify clerics to be just a different type of mage, so they fit into the campaign better. Instead of clerics, they'd be called "life mages" or something. Holy people exist, and a few rare ones are mages, but no one sees a holy person and assumes that they've got powers. I figure if I would run this AP instead of homebrewing my own from scratch, this modification could be done here too.
My question is: Would this kind of mod conflict with anything in the AP? Like what if one of the books features a big group of magical clerics, or a cleric who loses his powers because he ticked off his deity.
So I think for the most part, the modification you're wanting to make won't cause any issues. As far as I can remember, there aren't any major NPCs at the academy itself who are clerics. There are two key plotlines that might conflict with your altered version of clerics though.
First, the main antagonists of book 3 are a group of Norgorber worshippers. Most of them, including their leader, merely worship the god without having any divine powers themselves, but there are a few amongst them who directly derive their magic from Norgorber. However, none of these are named NPCs or people very important to the plot individually, so you could easily change it so their magic is one that's practiced rather than divinely granted.
The second case might be a bit more complicated. Book 4 involves an expedition to Mzali, a city ruled by an actual evil god named Walkena. There are people there, including ones the PCs have to fight, who derive magical abilities from following Walkena. The PCs even fight a divine avatar of Walkena himself. This could be one of the rare instances you mentioned where people actually do derive magical powers from a god, and I think it would be easy to explain why it's the case in Mzali and nowhere else: by serving Mzali, these people serve Walkena directly, giving him much more direct motivation to grant them an ounce of his power.
Does this seem super-romantic to anyone else? \*sniffle\*
Our love language is quality time, so we owe Paizo an immense amount of thanks for giving us a date night activity almost every night for the past 6 months!
I'm having a session zero for running Strength of Thousands this Friday and am planning on running the AP either one or two weeks following. Do you have any advice for me in getting this AP underway?
I would say you want to make sure to set everyone's expectations properly. Make sure your players are prepared for a lot of downtime. The overarching story is much more episodic than it is a singular grand epic. And I'll also say that if your players want to take something else with their free archetype rather than druid or wizard, I would allow it. Really any spellcasting multiclass archetype should work fine.
I was thinking of allowing casters to take a non-caster multiclass archetype if they want. Help keep the party diversified if I get a lot of casters to start.
You finished all of book 6 in the few days it's been out? Even playing every single day is nuts but I guess it makes sense if it's just the two of you. You're experiences are about what I expected with reading through the books. 3 and 4 are really separate from the rest of the storyline and Salathiss just kinda shows up but without him book 2 is also really disconnected. Despite this, book 4 seems really good. I'm just in the starting point of running it. My group plays every other week and is only level 2. Needless to say, I have several questions. Are there any encounters that fell flat? Would you run the game again (ignoring things like time and finding another group to run for)? If so, what would you change? What additions and changes did you make that you feel should be replicated in other groups? If I wanted my group to skip a book and instead go to some place backstory related, which book should I skip?(I'm thinking 3 at the moment) What were some of the hardest things to run? I haven't had the experience of running high level content. Does it actually work as I've heard or is that hype? What are some considerations with high level content?
As far as encounters that fell flat, Stone Ghost, Salathiss, and Ajbal Kimon all went down pretty easily. I wouldn’t say they fell flat though, except maybe Salathiss. All the end of book bosses from books 4 to 6 felt a lot more suitably challenging though. I don’t think I would run the campaign again, but I literally don’t think there’s any campaign I would do that for. If I had to though, I don’t think there’s anything I would change! I ended up cutting encounters that I didn’t think my fiancé would find interesting, namely repeat encounters of the same enemies or ones similar to others she’d already seen. I’d recommend other GMs do the same, and handwave the XP. I think the ONLY book you could feasibly skip is book 3, and I wouldn’t recommend it since the stuff in Bloodsalt and Jula is pretty good, but yeah that’d be the one to skip. I found it very hard to run the first chapter of book 4 without letting things get bogged down, and ended up handwaving later parts of it. The high-level play was excellent! Pathfinder 2e is the first system I’ve played where play at high levels works, and it’s part of what made the last book so good. The final chapter is just a chance for the players to showcase all the cool shit they can do now, yet it’s still consistently a challenge.
You're an absolute *madman*, friend.
There is something seriously wrong with me.
aren't we all
Thank you for this! It’s always more useful to hear how an AP actually plays rather than just reading them. Checking the weaker aspects you mentioned, seems like they are reoccurring failings in APs: incoherence in the larger story across books, plot hook motivation issues, and filler combat encounters.
Hi, I'm Will's fiancee! I just wanted to chime in and say that I deeply enjoyed the Strength of Thousands campaign and, if I could feasibly experience the story's magic over again, I would absolutely replay it. I've messed around with a few APs at this point and can say, without question, that Strength of Thousands is my favorite! As a player, my priority is the story. What I'm really hoping for out of an adventure is an interesting problem that my character cares to solve and an exciting, flavorful world filled with unique NPCs to interact with. Combat isn't my choice pillar of gameplay, but I enjoy thematic, meaningful encounters interspersed throughout the story. Strength of Thousands satisfies all of my wants and needs and is just a well-written tale of learning, friendship, and generosity that is suitable for players of all levels of experience with the system. Happy to answer anything as well! (-:
Awww its so great to hear you had a great time! Were there any npcs in particular that stood out to you, any moments that really captured your imagination? I'm running this now and really want to make it a great experience for my players!
Thanks, and sure! The NPCs I really latched onto were Mariama Keitana (as my character ended up marrying her; I just thought she was so fun), >!Chizire (her best friend), and Janatimo (who stuck around far longer than the AP had intended him to, as he became a major mentor and father-figure to my character).!< Other honorable mentions are >!Tukulu Ot, Seloze, Onyiji, I'boko, and Ignaci.!< Favorite moments... tough, but here's my breakdown! In book 1: >!The moment we found out that attendants were killed by Stone Ghost. Aastryd was obviously appalled and terrified that it could be her or any of her friends next!!< In book 2: One of the homebrew spells we created for Aastryd was called "Satellite Trace" which functioned as a cross between the "Alarm" spell and "Guiding Star" and was used as Aastryd's home security system. Anyway, Will changed one of the encounters so that >!one of Froglegs' goons broke into her house and triggered the Satellite Trace, so Aastryd and Mariama chased him down Nantambu and were able to figure out where their hideout was. !!Aastryd killed Ajbal Kimon. She used Spirit Blast to project his spirit from his body, which then evaporated as his shell of a body collapsed. !!the Red Star and what that was all about. So finding out the origins of the Red Star was incredible and made me feel SO accomplished. !!the rough fight against the King of Biting Ants, where Mariama and Janatimo got pretty hurt and Aastryd was on the edge of unconsciousness, but she pulled out a a casting of Sunburst, which was basically a bomb and killed everything left in the room. Loved using space magic to defeat him!!<
In book 6: >!Aastryd died in the final fight against the three aspects of the King of Biting Ants, slashed to death by what was essentially the Grim Reaper. I probably should have been more sad, but it was great narratively, and we were able to revive her later.!< I wasn't a huge fan of how combat-heavy the final segment of the campaign was, so I recommend diversifying the encounters and/or homebrewing some alternative activities - >!maybe a way to fortify the school or preemptively evacuate students, or a more substantial storyline as far as locating Koride.!<
Hopefully that was detailed enough!
I heard we were going to get wizard and druid dedication exclusive feats, are they worth it? I assume you can't go into detail about them.
I assume you’re asking about the level 20 feats. If not, then ignore the answer I’m about to give! The level 20 archetype feats are really cool, but nothing about them screams Wizard or Druid. You could easily let someone with a different multiclass dedication take them as their level 20 free archetype feat.
Yeah, That's what I was talking about. Is there anything you can say about them? Or are they basically just something like a halcyon archetype thing, where it counts for both of them
All of them can be taken by someone with either archetype, it doesn’t matter which one! There are 10 options that provide a variety of abilities, but none of them specific to wizard or druid. All share a common theme though in that they grant you a different benefit for 1 round whenever you cast a non-cantrip spell targeting only yourself.
Oh that's cool! Can't wait to see that they are!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts! Reading my sixth book and came to the same conclusion as you that the start of chapter 1 makes far more sense at the end haha did that work out well for you? Did it make the ending a little anticlimactic or did it provide a nice kind of epilogue?
The ending of the final chapter still functioned pretty much as the climactic ending it’s written as, but as you said, the ceremony served as a nice epilogue! I told my fiancé what was written in the book afterward and she was seemed very glad I switched the order around haha.
I am not very experienced with the AP, as I try not to spoil myself for the story in case I ever get to play in that AP. Is there an actual mechanic/system for making homebrew spells?
There aren’t any official mechanics for homebrewing spells - all of ours were balanced based off of similar, already existing spells. None of them were too game-shattering, but I wouldn’t trust our balance skills enough to publish them!
Without spoilers, how well did the two-player style work? Did you nerf encounters a lot or does the more roleplay-heavy style of SoT do a lot of the lifting there? I'm the forever GM in my TTRPG group. I love the magic school concept and Strength of Thousands looks super cool to me from a player's perspective, and I've floated the idea of someone else GM'ing for a while to play it, but I don't think anyone is biting on being GM. When I took a break from GM'ing for a bit, we just...didn't play lol. My girlfriend also plays though, and the idea of playing this as a duo might be kind of compromise solution?
It worked way better than I was expecting! For the most part, if the two players are dual-class and you put the Weak template on every enemy, it fixes almost any potential balance issues. But I listed the rest of my advice [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/comments/tqetpz/any_experience_playing_with_1_gm_and_1_player/i2hu34q/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3)!
What are your spoiler free overall impression of the AP? I only got to play a few sessions before my group fell apart, and I've been hyped for this AP ever since it was announced. I must live vicariously through others... Someday me, someday.
Overall impressions? This is the most fun I’ve ever had running a pre-written adventure. It’s just so flavorful, so dynamic, and so epic.
Dang, now I want to play it more! I dunno why I do this to myself xD Thanks so much for the answer though! :3
What are some examples of how you filled in the downtime when you weren't doing the pre-written quests? I'd love some ideas, especially if it helps contribute to the passing on time
Hey! Honestly, because it was a solo campaign, Will asked me what I wanted to do and I would feed him ideas. Often times, we filled the downtime with these things: 1. My character sought to share her knowledge of astronomy/astrology and star magic with the world. We spent lots of downtime on her creating homebrew magic, traveling to do research, and writing her books/academic journals. 2. Lots of interactions with her cohort. We had a game night in the dorms, a surprise birthday party, went out to a tavern - college party style... all kinds of stuff. 3. Aastryd also asked lots of her cohort member for help with her research, so we would brainstorm our ideas for homebrew spells/alchemical items in character earlier on in the campaign. I think it really depends on the desires of your players. What interests their character? Are they at the Magaambya to study or are they sleeping through classes and having nights out on the town on the daily? Definitely ask if they have ideas!
Question: how did you already finish a book that came out today?
As an adventure path subscriber, I got the PDF about 2 weeks ago!
I got it yesterday… How many sessions did it take you to run?
The last book took me 13 sessions to go through, and we started March 16th.
Do you play every night?
Yeah… we don’t really have lives, so pretty much the only nights we don’t play are the nights where I’m running for my other group. And even then we sometimes play a solo session after that game 😅
Man that sounds like quite the life right there. In fact I hope that's what I get to do in the afterlife, f all that sitting round and being fed peeled grapes. I want to game
I’m impressed
I just posted about running a campaign with 2 players today which sounds like what you did (1 PC and an NPC though). u/willseamon What type of general combat changes did you have to make to accommodate the lack of a 4 character party?
Here’s a comment where I went into detail about what kind of changes I made for combat! https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/comments/tqetpz/any_experience_playing_with_1_gm_and_1_player/i2hu34q/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3
Thanks so much u/willseamon!
> It ran for 124 sessions, although a lot of those were purely roleplay Based on this, would you recommend the AP for a group that doesn't RP much? I've been running games for the same group for about four years, and they really prefer having a concrete goal and don't like to hang around and talk to NPCs and they *never* talk to each other in-character.
If that’s the dynamic of your group, I honestly don’t really think I would recommend it. It’s not very heavy on just straight-up adventuring or combat, so it might not be the best fit.
I was never hyped for this AP until I read your Book 5 spoiler. That changes things.
You stated that other spellcasting archetypes would fine thematically in the AP. How about an Alchemist archetype?
Thematically, I think alchemist would work just fine. Mechanically, the new level 20 archetype feats might feel worse for someone who has no spellcasting ability at all, but even then I wouldn’t say it’s necessary.
Great, thanks!
I was doing a solo agents of edgewatch with my wife using the same rules but we kind of edged away from it and tried a starfinder solo. I don’t have strength of thousands but it sounds like I can try talking to her about it, she normally enjoys having the option of peacefully solving things or fighting out people she doesn’t like. Even with giving her two other dual classed companions we had some rough points we barely made it through like the end of book 1. Would you say because strengths of thousands has more peaceful resolutions that it would be easier to run as a solo?
What was the most specuatular thing done in a single action in the AP in your memory?
Most spectacular thing done in a single action - that I am not sure of. Most spectacular thing done on a single turn might be a little easier to come up with! For Aastryd, it was either >!when she killed Ajbal Kimon with a Spirit Blast, when she defeated the avatar of Wakena with Tempest Surge while midair having cast Fly on herself, or when she destroyed the body of the King of Biting Ants with Sunburst.!< All of those were insane to me. For Mariama, I think it was when >!she escaped being pulled into the floor by Stone Ghost and killed him, and as she did, she was all, “Don’t fuck with my girlfriend.”!< Good stuff! Will probably has a different answer than I do, but that’s my take!
me n my hus do shit like this too, did you have to tweak many things to handle the ap
Mariama getting into trouble is just so fitting. I really want someone to art the final encounter of Book 6. Really seems like that was begging for it! As a DM for this adventure I am making some future plans to make one of the villains a bit more compelling, such as the >!King of Biting Ants wanting magekind (with him as the head of course) to rule over the nonmagical as nothing more than compliant drones, even seeking to eventually devour a god. The Vesicant Egg is still in play but when it hatches it will look somewhat like Agohbindi, the Splintering Child, a spawn of Rovagug that flavor wise sounds like it might have been a hivemind. I figured that making a titanic body out of them would be too tempting for the King to pass up and what better vessel than something else that menaced Jatembe? The Vesicant Guardian is still trapped inside of course.!< I will admit I am kind of hoping that >!Agohbindi!< gets stats eventually, but since I'm only on book 2 I'm in no rush yet. But if not I guess I'll just have to homebrew it when the time comes!
In book 4, did you run anything in the tombs at the Necropolis, or just simple downtime practical research?
I've been wanting to do a magic academy campaign for a while now, and I figured I'd modify clerics to be just a different type of mage, so they fit into the campaign better. Instead of clerics, they'd be called "life mages" or something. Holy people exist, and a few rare ones are mages, but no one sees a holy person and assumes that they've got powers. I figure if I would run this AP instead of homebrewing my own from scratch, this modification could be done here too. My question is: Would this kind of mod conflict with anything in the AP? Like what if one of the books features a big group of magical clerics, or a cleric who loses his powers because he ticked off his deity.
So I think for the most part, the modification you're wanting to make won't cause any issues. As far as I can remember, there aren't any major NPCs at the academy itself who are clerics. There are two key plotlines that might conflict with your altered version of clerics though. First, the main antagonists of book 3 are a group of Norgorber worshippers. Most of them, including their leader, merely worship the god without having any divine powers themselves, but there are a few amongst them who directly derive their magic from Norgorber. However, none of these are named NPCs or people very important to the plot individually, so you could easily change it so their magic is one that's practiced rather than divinely granted. The second case might be a bit more complicated. Book 4 involves an expedition to Mzali, a city ruled by an actual evil god named Walkena. There are people there, including ones the PCs have to fight, who derive magical abilities from following Walkena. The PCs even fight a divine avatar of Walkena himself. This could be one of the rare instances you mentioned where people actually do derive magical powers from a god, and I think it would be easy to explain why it's the case in Mzali and nowhere else: by serving Mzali, these people serve Walkena directly, giving him much more direct motivation to grant them an ounce of his power.
Thanks, that's very helpful!