# Kingmaker Adventure Path



## Morrus (Nov 20, 2014)

Product information... View for more details


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## MerricB (Nov 21, 2014)

*3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

There are lots of good ideas in Kingmaker, but the actual game system is a pretty bad fit for the game, and the new systems don't work that well. It has some really good story design, but the implementation of the adventures often leaves a lot to be desired. Full review here: http://merricb.com/2014/11/21/kingmaker-adventure-path-review/


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## Waller (Nov 21, 2014)

*2 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Really did not enjoy this AP. It's sandboxy, but so much so that for the first couple of adventures it feels like a MMORPG as you just wander round endlessly getting quests from NPCs to clear out a monster lair or gather a thing. It got really boring really fast. I know sandbox games can be good, but an AP really needs a bit more momentum. Add to that an awful city building system and the result is one of Pathfinder's weaker APs.


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## sindarian (Nov 21, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I am currently playing in this campaign and we are on the second book.  My DM is doing a good job and the concept and story are interesting.  The concept of alliances with monsters is also very interesting. 

 However (aren't there always some of these) the beta testing of realm management is predicated on luck (rather than skill).  A few bad die rolls in a row and you wind up spending 9 game months digging out from a hole so deep you’re wondering if your fledgling kingdom will ever see the sun again.  Fortunately, it seems that events do not run on a timeline but on milestones in your empire building and exploration odyssey. 

 The other issue is that the wandering monsters and encounters that occur in the first book are too difficult for characters of level 1 and 2.  This campaign should start with level 3 characters due to the encounters being designed for sand box rather than linear game play.  Level 1 and 2 characters are too squishy to survive without some inspired play or DM fiat.


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## carrot (Nov 21, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

This is really two games in one. You have the standard adventures, which seem to have been well balanced and pose a significant challenge to most parties. The second element is managing the kingdom. This is kinda fun, but can be rather hard to manage without multiple spreadsheets...


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## Grimstaff (Nov 21, 2014)

*2 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

We were initially drawn to this AP by the promise of a return to sandboxy play, but the execution left us cold. Fans of "role play" will be especially disappointed by this AP, as it is basically wandering in search of monsters to kill for xp. Most disappointingly, the domain system reduced what could have been a great kingdom-building experience rife with rich personalities and involved resource management to a seemingly endless series of rolls and modifiers. It's not all bad - Golarian is a great setting and exploring it up close is fun - but a resourceful DM with time on his or her hands will want to custom make a bunch of non-combat encounters to add, and just skip all the kingdom-building rolls in favor of more narrative-driven development.


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## justmebd (Nov 22, 2014)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I've read some of the negative reviews, and I just do not agree with them. I usually go for more focused storylines in a large campaign, but I thought Kingmaker works in the extremely large sandbox that it is. If you go into the AP with the right expectations, this is one of the better constructed APs. The only blip is the last installment, but with the climax of Part 5, the question becomes, "What else are you going to do?" Part six either works for you or it doesn't. If it doesn't, there are plenty of other ways you can go and just ignore the last installment. If this sounds like a backhanded compliment, it is not intended to be.There is plenty of room for DMs to work with and work around. The bad guys are familiar and new at the same time. The "world" created by this AP is rich and evocative. I enjoyed working my way through the parts, as did my players. This is a great AP for anyone looking for a modern take on the "classic" DnD experience. (Unless you buy Frog God Games products, naturally).


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## Remus Lupin (Nov 22, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Really good across the board, although I'd say that the "Kingdom Building Rules" are a bit clunky and not very much fun for my group, but if your group likes that kind of thing, I'm sure it's a lot of fun.


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## Lwaxy (Nov 22, 2014)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

This AP lives and dies with the GM. The kingdom building system is very basic and needs some adaptions to your group's play style - more buildings and adapted costs amond a few other things. Yup, you need some spreadsheets and preferably someone who can map the cities and villages developing during the game. But that's all part of the fun.   

The GM is also free to insert a lot of sidequests were necessary or wanted, and it isn't too hard to leave some stuff out if the players decide not to head down that road.   If you don't like managing stuff, it's not for you.


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## Fubbles the baby cow (Nov 23, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I was a player in the Kingmaker AP, and while my review may be somewhat negative, let me say that I enjoyed the experience, particularly the kingdom building subsystem.Kingmaker is exactly what the title implies: A set of green adventurers are given a charter to explore and pacify a nearby wilderness area, with the eventual goal of founding and building a kingdom.  Paizo makes an admirable attempt to set an AP inside of a sandbox-style setting, where the main story can still be told, but the characters are free to explore and build as their hearts desire.  Pro's: The endeavor of making an adventure path with the feel of a sandbox campaign is admirable.  In many AP's, players make choices of what to do next because they know what the AP expects of them.  The assumption in Paizo's AP's is that the players know they are playing an AP, and that they will willingly follow where the story leads them.  Not so in Kingmaker.  As a player, I often had no idea of what direction the story was taking, and that lack of metagame knowledge was liberating as a player; I could feel free to pursue any plot hook presented by the GM, not knowing if it was integral to the main story, or just a side plot, or even a red herring.  The kingdom building subsystem was a welcome addition to the rules, presenting a game-within-a-game feel, and allowing the players to guide the formation and growth of their fledgling nation.Con's: While the lack of knowledge of the true main plot was often a plus, the AP doesn't really do a good job of giving hints as to what that plot may be.  We made it as far as the end of the third chapter (halfway through the AP) before a TPK from the end boss prematurely ended our kingdom-building days, and I still had absolutely no idea what the main plot was.  The AP uses a "hexploration" mechanic with a very 1st edition feel to it, but it ultimately fails because the players quickly learn that they will only face one to two encounters per day, leaving them free to nova any opponents they face in the wild with little or no concern over conservation of resources.  The 15 minute adventure day is a real problem for this AP; GM's should search the Paizo message boards for creative ways to overcome this obstacle.  Lastly, the kingdom building mechanic as presented in the AP is clunky, and can be very difficult for players to manage without knowledge of how the system works.  If players aren't very careful during the early stages of building, their kingdom will be plunged into anarchy and revolt within a year or two.  I recommend using the revised kingdom building rules in Ultimate Campaign; it goes a long way towards fixing some of the more egregious problems in the original system.So, final analysis: A good AP, but as I never was able to finish it, take my review for what it's worth.  Maybe the final half of the AP addresses some of the issues I highlight above.  Kingmaker deserves at least a grade of C+, with a B- not being out of the discussion.


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## avjax (Nov 23, 2014)

*3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

good story but as with every AP it suffers from being tied to the Pathfinder system. The need for fight after fight after fight in order to meet the XP requirements becomes a real grind by book 4.


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## Maggan (Nov 24, 2014)

*3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

The premise of Kingmaker is powerful, but it falls short on overall plot and consistency. Several key elements that players will want to explore are left undeveloped, and several other plot points that never will come into play are overdeveloped. With modification this adventure path is highly enjoyable, but if played as written it will leave many players unsatisfied. Also, the organisation of the books prove to be a hindrance for the DM to reference information once play has reached the fourth scenario.


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## solmar (Nov 24, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I enjoyed DMing the Kingmaker adventure path, but found a few things I needed to edit or trim. While the sandbox design was refreshing, the city-building, nation-developing, and army design process were clunky to say the least. I almost was looking at other variant, nation-building systems to replace the ones in the adventure path. In addition, some of the inside cover optional quests I found were a little 'video-gamey' and needed some trimming. However, the overall concept won me over and the path can truly be edited to fit almost any flavor of game. A solid path.


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## lyle.spade (Nov 24, 2014)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

When PF first came out I bought the first book in this AP and our group ran it up through book 5, lasting for over a year of weekly gaming sessions spread out over two years due to breaks. We loved books 1 and 2, given that they really established and maintained the sandbox that my players wanted. The kingdom-building rules were an interesting addition and we put those to good use, writing quite a story in the process. Book 3 was only okay, and in fact we hand-waved part of it, due to the fact that the party was just not that interested in exploring this place and that - they were leaders of a nation at this point, and wanted to operate at that level.Thus, Book 4 wasa return to that level, with them having an opportunity to adventure and fight as high-level PCs, while also waging a campaign of expansion into the Slough to their kingdom's west. Book 5, where the big war with Pitax took place, was pretty good, too, although the role of the PCs as individual actors was reduced once the war began. I created an ad hoc system that enabled them, as high-level PCs, to take part in battles alongside units that used the mass combat rules, and it worked okay...just okay enough to give them the feel of being the big butt-kickers on a battlefield of low-level mooks. We opted out of Book 6, since it took a strange turn into what was supposedly the great meta-story taking place in the background all along...but was never very well communicated throughout books 1-5. That said, I think weaving credible clues throughout over 400 pages of adventure material pointing to a shadowy, insane fey queen beastie would be really tough...and perhaps a bridge too far for Paizo. Personally I think Book 6 should have consisted of the PCs' kingdom getting involved in the civil war in Brevoy, the country from which the PCs originally came in Book 1. I think that would have provided a graceful, circular story arc that came to an end with the PCs becoming major players on one side in the civil war of their homeland, now a foreign power.As it is, Book 6 was of no interest to my group, and we ended up shelving the campaign for the time being (perhaps for good; I don't know at this point) with the PCs' kingdom working to establish itself further among its neighbors, as a kingdom would.I recommend it, but if your players really love building and running their kingdom, you might want to ignore Book 6 entirely and just let them continue in that direction.If you're interested you can see our entire campaign here, on the most excellent Obsidian Portal: https://kngmkr.obsidianportal.com/dashboard


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## Infernal Teddy (Nov 25, 2014)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

So far, my favorite Adventure Path - the sandbox format leaves enough space for the GM to insert his own adventures and little adventures without having to rewrite the whole thing. The kingdom rules are good, but should be replaced with the rulkes from Ultimate Campaign. Only letdown is the final episode.


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## Alphastream (Nov 26, 2014)

*2 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

There are some great concepts in play here, and we had a great DM, but the source material tries to embrace the sandbox concept and suffers for it. The concept is that the players will carve out their own kingdom, exploring lands as they choose and developing it as they choose. In practice, the party meanders all over the place and too often there is little of note, too few connections, and too little that feels like it matters. There is a subsystem for running the kingdom, but it is lacking and felt like a bad secondary game with many missed opportunities.


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## Lycanthropos (Nov 26, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Now that enworld.org has offered us a new system for rating and evaluating Paizo's Adventure Path, I am going to write my first review.  I must start with one of the AP that has kept playing to my gaming group for several months: Kingmaker.  Through the whole AP you can find a lot of new rules (that have been built up into the Ultimate Campaign). Exploration, creating and managing kingdoms, building armies and mass combat, interaction with the feywilds... that are so great additions to Pathfinder that they are now official rules. That's good. And interesting.  You can realize that some of these new rules were still in development (the final edition is in Ultimate Campaign), but they served well to create the mood of starting a kingdom by their own for my party.  BUT... the AP requires a lot of work from the GM in order to work. Why? Starting with the hook and plot. You are presented a country, Brevoy, close to civil war. And one of the power houses send you to start a new kingdom because it is supposed that it would be very helpful in the incoming struggle. But after this hook, no more is known about the events in Brevoy up to the 6th module. Time is supposed to pass between that first and last module. What happened in your homeland? The AP didn't say it. So you, the GM, has to work it.  I love sandbox adventures, and I asume that this kind of playing needs a very specific  kind of GM: creative, improvisation-capable, and resourceful. In this AP, you, as the GM, get enough knowledge of the enviroment in order to develop the world around the PCs. Kingmaker indeed does it. But again, it requires you a lot of work. I would have appreciated some hints abou how the centaurs could interact with the expanding kingdom or how to integrate the kobold's lair into your kingdom if you reached a peaceful agreement.  Nevertheless, some NPC are simply great: the huge owlbear, the fey queen and his entourage, etc. And several encounters are great for roleplaying (like the sprite and his friend in Stolen Land).  If you like sandbox campaign style and you are not afraid of a lot of work as a GM, this is for you. If you lack enough time to prepare your games or you were looking for a more linear campaign, that's not your AP.


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## mosaic (Nov 26, 2014)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I GM'ed Kingmaker for about two years before my players finished the series.  Tons of fun.  The sandbox nature of the story means PCs can do anything they want, from adventuring to building cities and nations.  It is a lot of work for the GM, because you have to anticipate and deal with occasional player curveballs, but rewarding none-the-less.


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## Fastjack (Nov 26, 2014)

*3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I had high hopes going in as a player and in the first book I felt like the AP was just what I wanted, but unfortunately it seemed to go a little more wayward with each succeeding book.


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## latron (Nov 26, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Excellent idea and execution for a sandbox campaign in Pathfinder. The kingdom rules subsystem leads to a lot of fun, strategic play but also roleplaying opportunities. The storyline of the six chapters however is not very well tied together in my opinion. There is not really a unifying plot unless the GM makes it happen with some work on the different adventures. But definitely recommended, with some work a 5-star AP.


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## scrubkai (Nov 27, 2014)

*3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Let me start by saying I wish I could give this a higher rating.   There is the seed of a very good campaign here, but it requires a lot of work by a dedicated  and experienced DM to bring it out.What do I mean....Parts one and two are a sandbox where the players try to carve a kingdom out of the wilds.  It's actually not a bad sandbox too.   As with all sandboxes, A good DM that can take basic outdoor encounters and bring the monsters/NPCs to life based on some basic info is needed to keep this section from feeling like an MMO.   But overall, if you DM is willing to put in some work and go along with the PCs crazy plans, the first couple books are a blast.However it should be noted: This part also introduces some of the rules designed to abstract out the running and economy of a kingdom.  At first this isn't too bad, as the players probably will have fun building a little kingdom.   However they do suffer from the same economic problems inherent in all of D&D 3.x systems and as such the system as written is very easy to break given a little thought or some bad luck.   This can quickly lead to a significant drag on the fun for any of the players who are not accountants.The second part of the adventure path (books 3 and 4) are more of what I consider a loose form adventure.   Outside events start to  put more pressure on the PCs and make this less of a sandbox, and more about the PCs reacting to those events.    The game does make some assumptions about what the PCs did in their sandbox, and the events start to become more plot driven (rather then feeling PC driven) but overall I also found this section to be reasonably well done.  I do have some questions about the execution choices here (like part 3 funneling the PCs to the hardest encounters at the very start of the adventure, rather then the end), but as long as you read advice from people who have run these before and can adjust a bit, these are also very solid entries.The last 3rd of the AP is where the biggest problems comes from.  Part 5 makes extensive use of some questionable mass combat rules,  and other then that really removes all sandbox style elements from the path in favor of a more plot driven structure.  Part 6 pretty much comes completely out of left field for the players unless the DM goes way out of his way to expose the metaplot  of the AP in books 3 to 5 far more then it is currently written in.  While not a bad adventure per say, 6 is just totally a different tone/feel from the past books, and that is not foreshadowed well at all.So overall, if you have a DM who is willing to put in the time and effort this could easily become a 5 star effort, but as written there are just too many problems to give this more then 3 stars.


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## Dragovon (Nov 29, 2014)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

This was a lot of fun.  It was well balanced and enjoyable.  However, as far as I'm concerned, the kingdom building rules that were in it (they may be better with the rewrite in the Ultimate Campaign) were slow and clunky.  The mass combat was crap...easier to just hand wave them based on some PC encounters.


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## Starfox (Dec 9, 2014)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

First, I've only read this adventure path, not actually played it. Actually, I've played the last adventure, and that adventure is part of the problem this series has. The last adventure is completely different form the rest.   In this adventure path, you have to start a young kingdom where none was before. You begin as humble explorers, but soon you advance to become landlords, then kings. You build, fortify, recruit, and finally make war. And there the series switches completely, introducing a situation that is much more fantastic than anything you've encountered before, while simultaneously being a story for children in which your adventurers-cum-statesmen are supposed to engage. Lets just say I see the final part as very optional, the adventure path is a series of 5 with an optional sixth adventure that can be played together or separately. I have rated it like this, as two separate parts, at 5 stars. Rated as a whole, I'd give it 3 stars.

And yeah, the kingdom building rules, which I have played with in another similar campaign. If used at all, they are best played out in solo sessions between GM and an interested player. It just takes to much time to add up all the numbers, and involving more than one or two players in the process bogs it down even further. IMO, they are both too detailed (too many numbers) and too rough and unfinished (can a country benefit from more than one building of a certain kind? Can a kingdom have several cities? I want my house HERE, but the rules do not support that!). I've read the campaign book, and some issues were straightened out, but overall this is not a sub-system I love. Others might love their spreadsheets more than I do.


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## NewJeffCT (Dec 13, 2014)

*3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

The first two adventures are very much a sandbox, but my group went straight for the main villain each time, no matter how often potential side quests and other options came along.  Only once the group defeated the Stag Lord & his cronies in book 1 did my group lose their laser-like focus on him and start going back & delving into exploring the area and clearing the hexes.  The same with book 2.  The other options just were not interesting enough to get them off focus.  Since I had some ideas about book 6 along the way, I did drop a few hints & some foreshadowing about what was potentially coming down the road, so book 6 didn't come completely out of left field as others have stated above.  Also, if your group isn't into bookkeeping, the DM will be the one that's left to track the ups & downs of the kingdom and its finances, which was an unforeseen chore for me.  I just had them make some decisions in the beginning and asked for reactions to major events down the road.  As I've seen elsewhere, unless the PCs really screw up their kingdom building, they'll be rolling in gold in a short time, so can buy all the help they need for the big combats down the road.  I really had to beef up some of the foes in book 4 and 5 to make them something of a challenge because of this.    Overall, a lot of good ideas, but the sandbox wasn't always that wide open, IMHO.


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## Neonchameleon (Dec 15, 2014)

*3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Tries to do some interesting things, but doesn't mesh well with the Pathfinder system - the last few modules are utterly broken by the power curve and the kingdom building rules aren't terribly fun.


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## JLant (Jan 1, 2015)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Sandbox.


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## Eminence_Grise (Jan 20, 2015)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

My group and I were able to play the first 4 modules of Kingmaker. We had a great time. The sandbox worked well with my group.My only complaint is the magic item economy and the whole kingdom rules. If I had other rules for kingdom management, I would replay this AP without hesitation.


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## mxyzplk (Jan 23, 2015)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

This AP has provided many months/years of play for many groups - you get to carve out parts of an untamed wilderness in your own order and time and grow and customize your own kingdom. Marred slightly by a sixth chapter that doesn't follow well, but much ink has been spilled on how to perfect this AP and make it all flow well.


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## PurpleDragonKnight (Dec 16, 2015)

*2 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Good AP with novel approach to exploration and kingdom building.  However plot and story suffer.  The kingdom building part is too demanding in terms of bookkeeping, and nigh impossible unless you grab one of the kingdom building excel sheet kicking around on the Paizo boards (fan-generated and based on the Paizo AP's PDF Kingmaker track sheet).  There were games where we would literally spend 3 hours crunching numbers to figure out kingdom economy scores, etc.No...


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## mistahbiru (Dec 24, 2015)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

So far so good, as with all beginnings, with a large party it can be boring at times.


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## Enrico Poli1 (Apr 3, 2018)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Kingmaker is controversial, but in the end it deserves a 5-star rating.
It is a great sandbox, as the party has to hexcrawl. This is also a weakness because most of the encounters will be very easy for a well-rested party. 
There is a great Quest system: every installment has 8 major quests and a number of lesser quests to be completed. This is fun!
The kingdom-management mini-game is fun and, at first, interesting, but after a pair of adventures becomes broken and boring. The players could also exploit it for money = unbalanced magic items.
The mass battle subsystem is crap.

Anyway, the first two adventures are really great. The third and fourth are problematic, because, in my opinion, the balance between exploration and dungeon-crawl is no more, and the hexes are only there as a background for the final dungeons, so they lose the unique feel of Kingmaker. The fifth adventure returns to the right spirit, and then we have the tournament, and some great villains! The sixth adventure is like a fairytale! In itself is a fantastic adventure, but it is very different then all other installments of the AP; plus, the BBEG hasn't been properly anticipated.

To make the Kingmaker experience, one could just play the first two adventures of the campaign. That said, this is enough to make Kingmaker one of the GREAT Paizo adventure paths that deserves to be played once.


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## zztong (Apr 13, 2018)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I enjoyed the premise and execution of the Kingmaker AP through the early modules. The DM did not care for the later modules and changed the plot, so I did not experience those as written.


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## Alex van Donkersgoed (Aug 15, 2018)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

We had a great experience with this Adventure path. We did make extensive changes and skipped almost everything in the final module, but the modules gave us a fantastic playground to play in.


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## Aluvial (Oct 20, 2018)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

I have been running this for 5 years now.   We are just finishing book 5.   I think it is a great setting and I'm really happy for a reasonable system for running kingdoms and sandbox play.   The hardcover that expanded the system along with other 3rd party publishers made for a really robust system.   I tweaked mass combat however....   2d10 rather than d20 for mass combat attacks.   It made all the difference in the world.


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## Adunaphel (Nov 20, 2018)

*5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

We played throug to level and I loved this AP. Don't know how much extra work our DM put in, but the struggle between building and adventuring was cool.
I missed this empire-building since D&D blue box and now it's back. This AP is my top priority to be continued.


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## Defender_X (Apr 16, 2022)

3 out of 5 for me. The last module was a dungeon crawl and I felt that a big final battle with armies would have been better. Covid, some players not in the game anymore, phoning it in and general fatigue with the whole path didn't help.


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## John Dallman (Apr 16, 2022)

avjax said:


> The need for fight after fight after fight in order to meet the XP requirements becomes a real grind by book 4.



We're engaged in sidestepping that entirely by running it under *GURPS Dungeon Fantasy*. In some senses we're "too tough" for parts of it, but every fight involves real risk, because GURPS criticals can be pretty deadly. 


carrot said:


> The second element is managing the kingdom. This is kinda fun, but can be rather hard to manage without multiple spreadsheets...



One of our players is a recently retired senior accountant. We've just left it all to him, apart from accepting roles in the government.


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## John R Davis (Apr 16, 2022)

4 out of 5.
Still my fav PF AP ( have run 5 to completion, abandoned 2 as they were poor,  and played 2 to the end).
Only posting as I am 16 sessions into running it for a 2nd time, so well worth joining a thread ressurection.


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## kenada (Apr 17, 2022)

*4 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*

Kingmaker was the first (and only) Pathfinder AP we played to completion. I was down on it at the time (back in 2010), but it’s turn into a favorite in retrospect. I did go quite a bit off script in terms of adventure. I added a lot of stuff between the books when the PCs were taking care of their kingdom. The exploration rules were pretty bad though, and our experience with Kingmaker has informed my current opinion on player-facing hexes (just say no) to this day.


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## Starfox (Apr 23, 2022)

Aluvial said:


> *5 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*
> 
> The hardcover that expanded the system along with other 3rd party publishers made for a really robust system.   I tweaked mass combat however....   2d10 rather than d20 for mass combat attacks.   It made all the difference in the world.



Is that finally out? I was in the kickstarter and haven't had any news of it in ages!


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## Retreater (Apr 23, 2022)

Starfox said:


> Is that finally out? I was in the kickstarter and haven't had any news of it in ages!



I don't think that was what was being referenced.
There was a PF1-era 3rd party book called "Book of the River Nations" (Jon Brazer Enterprises) that expanded the nation-building rules. That might be what was being talked about. 
To my knowledge there is still nothing from the Kickstarter update.


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## Matrix Sorcica (Apr 25, 2022)

Starfox said:


> Is that finally out? I was in the kickstarter and haven't had any news of it in ages!



It's not out. I think he's referring to _Ultimate Campaign_ and the supplements from Legendary Games.


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## SteveC (Apr 26, 2022)

From what I've heard from Reddit, the Pathfinder 2 version that was Kickstarted is due for a September release. At least that was the latest info I've seen.


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## EthanSental (Sep 23, 2022)

edit


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## billd91 (Sep 23, 2022)

SteveC said:


> From what I've heard from Reddit, the Pathfinder 2 version that was Kickstarted is due for a September release. At least that was the latest info I've seen.



It is out and it is shipping. I got my copy.
I also got the 5e Bestiary for it.


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## Starfox (Sep 23, 2022)

I thought I had ordered it on Kickstarter, but now it seems I never did.  I do hope they sell the PDF version separately - I find I read those more than the book version. But then I just got myself new glasses...

How much 5E adaption is there? I have a Kingamker campaign on hold waiting for this. We were running it with homebrew rules, and I am considering if I should reboot it with 5E or my homebrew.


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## billd91 (Sep 23, 2022)

Tons of setting monsters are given 5e stats in the 5e Bestiary, as are NPCs - both enemy and companion. Traps and haunts are also adapted. Otherwise, there are a few general notes about running Kingmaker in 5e. I think really extensive notes would have required a tome nearly as fat as the adventure itself. And the hardcover AP *IS* fat. A number of things, particularly at the start, have been added/adapted from the Kingmaker computer game that weren't in the original AP.

And, by the way, not actually Kickstarter. The crowdfunding platform was GameOnTabletop.
Interesting that on Paizo.com, the materials are now available for preorder - and not expected for another month. I guess they're making sure they've got the GameOnTabletop shipping all finished up before they start fulfilling other orders? My guess is they'll also sell PDFs separately - that would fit their MO.


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## Starfox (Sep 23, 2022)

Finding the pre-orders at Paizo.com, they say this: "*Note:*  You purchased this product  Apr 3, 2016." Seems I DID buy it. And they kept track of it too, when I did not.


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## FitzTheRuke (Sep 23, 2022)

Starfox said:


> Finding the pre-orders at Paizo.com, they say this: "*Note:* You purchased this product Apr 3, 2016." Seems I DID buy it. And they kept track of it too, when I did not.



You ordered it six and a half years ago? Have you got it?


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## Starfox (Sep 24, 2022)

Its the crowdfunding thing. Yes, it took that long.


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## billd91 (Sep 24, 2022)

Starfox said:


> Its the crowdfunding thing. Yes, it took that long.



2016 doesn't sound right to me, not for the Kingmaker 10th anniversary hardcover. The GameOnTabletop campaign started in May 2019. It's a year late compared to its estimated delivery. So, really, I guess it took a hair over 3 years to fulfill.


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## Starfox (Sep 24, 2022)

Hm, I never bought the old Kingmaker books from Paizo (I bought them used from a friend). So it was not them I was looking at...

Seems this is an artifact from when I was subscribing to their adventure path. Still very confusing. It does say in the shopping cart that I ordered it, and I have a vague memory that I did. I'll have to check with Paizo, but not now (2:30 AM here).


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## lyle.spade (Sep 24, 2022)

scrubkai said:


> *3 out of 5 rating for Kingmaker Adventure Path*
> 
> Let me start by saying I wish I could give this a higher rating.   There is the seed of a very good campaign here, but it requires a lot of work by a dedicated  and experienced DM to bring it out.What do I mean....Parts one and two are a sandbox where the players try to carve a kingdom out of the wilds.  It's actually not a bad sandbox too.   As with all sandboxes, A good DM that can take basic outdoor encounters and bring the monsters/NPCs to life based on some basic info is needed to keep this section from feeling like an MMO.   But overall, if you DM is willing to put in some work and go along with the PCs crazy plans, the first couple books are a blast.However it should be noted: This part also introduces some of the rules designed to abstract out the running and economy of a kingdom.  At first this isn't too bad, as the players probably will have fun building a little kingdom.   However they do suffer from the same economic problems inherent in all of D&D 3.x systems and as such the system as written is very easy to break given a little thought or some bad luck.   This can quickly lead to a significant drag on the fun for any of the players who are not accountants.The second part of the adventure path (books 3 and 4) are more of what I consider a loose form adventure.   Outside events start to  put more pressure on the PCs and make this less of a sandbox, and more about the PCs reacting to those events.    The game does make some assumptions about what the PCs did in their sandbox, and the events start to become more plot driven (rather then feeling PC driven) but overall I also found this section to be reasonably well done.  I do have some questions about the execution choices here (like part 3 funneling the PCs to the hardest encounters at the very start of the adventure, rather then the end), but as long as you read advice from people who have run these before and can adjust a bit, these are also very solid entries.The last 3rd of the AP is where the biggest problems comes from.  Part 5 makes extensive use of some questionable mass combat rules,  and other then that really removes all sandbox style elements from the path in favor of a more plot driven structure.  Part 6 pretty much comes completely out of left field for the players unless the DM goes way out of his way to expose the metaplot  of the AP in books 3 to 5 far more then it is currently written in.  While not a bad adventure per say, 6 is just totally a different tone/feel from the past books, and that is not foreshadowed well at all.So overall, if you have a DM who is willing to put in the time and effort this could easily become a 5 star effort, but as written there are just too many problems to give this more then 3 stars.



Well said, and for the most part I agree, although our group solved the problems with the AP differently. Books 1 and 2 were exactly what we expected, and we enjoyed them a lot - that is, carving out a fledgling realm and realizing that you can't act like a murder hobo and never experience the consequences of that on the local population. We started to lay a solid foundation for so many NPCs and B-plots in those first two books. Book 3, in our view, made little sense when set inside the kingdom building storyline. Yeah, sure the PCs are the regulators in traditional FRPGs, but the notion of sending the leaders of this new kingdom off on some errand of a dungeon crawl just didn't work for us. We ended up up drawing out the time between Books 2 & 3, building up the kingdom more, and sending having the leaders (the PCs) send a team of chosen next-gen heroes to go look into what was going on to the east. This enabled us to promote, in levels, some of the interesting NPCs and gave the players a chance to play other other characters and operate in their kingdom from a different angle. It worked well.

Books 4 and 5 we played pretty much as written, although I found myself handwaving and narrating through an increasing amount of the kingdom management rules - Paizo really buried the story under their love for mechanics by then. We enjoyed the war in Book 5, and as a group decided to not play out Book 6 at all, instead riffing on the war and other regional issues and adversaries, playing out the PCs' leadership of the kingdom for several years of in-game time, up to the point where some had had kids and the original PCs were starting to get long in the tooth. That's when we sunset the campaign, and we were all very satisfied with it.


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## Defender_X (Sep 24, 2022)

The kingdom building was fun but time consuming. The last module was a let down for me as well. But it did let me know to expect the final boss of adventure paths to a bit op. I'm mentally prepared to start planning for the boss im the path my group is in now.


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## Starfox (Oct 2, 2022)

lyle.spade said:


> as a group decided to not play out Book 6 at all



This is what I hear from every table I have heard from.


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## John R Davis (Oct 2, 2022)

My group got ship in a bottled halfway through mod 6.


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## lyle.spade (Oct 4, 2022)

Starfox said:


> This is what I hear from every table I have heard from.



I've heard it, too. The problem with the AP - and I'd say that this is the only glaring problem with it - was that the whole "crazy fey behind the scenes" plot thread wasn't developed enough, not foreshadowed enough in the first five books, and so dropping it on the party in book six was jarring...out of the blue. It felt as if the writers weren't fully clear, during the early books, about just how big the fey side of the story would be in the last book, and didn't plan well for it. I read each book in full before running it and quickly had purchased a few books ahead of where we were in the story...and the prominence of that part of the overarching story never felt as big as it suddenly did in book six. And so we decided to ignore it.


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## John Dallman (Oct 4, 2022)

lyle.spade said:


> The problem with the AP - and I'd say that this is the only glaring problem with it - was that the whole "crazy fey behind the scenes" plot thread wasn't developed enough, not foreshadowed enough in the first five books, and so dropping it on the party in book six was jarring...out of the blue.



We're in the early parts of the third book, investigating the depopulated village. I've just learned a spoiler from you, but it is not a surprise. It has been clear for a while that we have an opponent hidden behind the scenery. From my in-character notes of a few weeks ago:


> The Barony of Stagland may have an enemy. It seems plausible that the same person or organisation was (a) getting the trolls to attack civilized parts in general and (b) got the bandit leader to set the giant owlbear on us. Our nearest thing to a clue is the handwriting on the map the bandit leader had, although we have no knowledge of who wrote it.


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## payn (Oct 4, 2022)

lyle.spade said:


> I've heard it, too. The problem with the AP - and I'd say that this is the only glaring problem with it - was that the whole "crazy fey behind the scenes" plot thread wasn't developed enough, not foreshadowed enough in the first five books, and so dropping it on the party in book six was jarring...out of the blue. It felt as if the writers weren't fully clear, during the early books, about just how big the fey side of the story would be in the last book, and didn't plan well for it. I read each book in full before running it and quickly had purchased a few books ahead of where we were in the story...and the prominence of that part of the overarching story never felt as big as it suddenly did in book six. And so we decided to ignore it.



Yeap, this issue props up in a number of APs. A lot of it has to do with a quick fire publishing schedule and/or new authors of every chapter. I have found the APs to be excellent overall, but I do find at least a few major items that I see fit to change in everyone of them. I strongly suggest folks that plan to run to at least read every chapter synopsis and check a few forums so benefit from the experience of others.


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## John R Davis (Oct 4, 2022)

PF often has the " ha ha, it was I all along" villain.
The party often answer " Er, who??".

Very common in PFS


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## SteveC (Oct 4, 2022)

I had heard this issue with the Fey in the original AP and I know they fixed that in the computer game. That issue shows up in the first of second chapter (I honestly don't remember which one it is) so it was pretty clear that they were involved. Not exactly what was going on, that comes much later.


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## Retreater (Oct 4, 2022)

John R Davis said:


> PF often has the " ha ha, it was I all along" villain.
> The party often answer " Er, who??".
> 
> Very common in PFS



The best plot armor for a campaign's villain is to never mention them until you're ready for the characters to kill them.


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## Eyes of Nine (Oct 5, 2022)

John R Davis said:


> My group got ship in a bottled halfway through mod 6.



How did they react? Or was the end and done?


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## John R Davis (Oct 5, 2022)

Very well actually, despite being 14th level and playing a long time and really liking their characters. Still remains nearly everyone's favourite PF AP. 
In Ironfang Invasion it turned out Nyrissa was one of the PCs mums, and that party got to see the snowglobe collection. That also was a very very good AP we completed


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## Remus Lupin (Oct 7, 2022)

I'll say this for the video game -- it does lay the bread crumbs along the trail right from the beginning of the game. It would have been great if the modules had done a better job of doing likewise.


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## Starfox (Oct 9, 2022)

Paizo did dig up my order information for the Kingmaker crowdfund project and sent me the PDFs.  The books are lost in limbo in Hamburg, but I don't mind that so much now that I have the PDFs. My bookshelves are overfull as it is.


John R Davis said:


> PF often has the " ha ha, it was I all along" villain.
> The party often answer " Er, who??".
> 
> Very common in PFS



Yeah, this is very common, and I can see why - introducing the main villain early easily leads to a dead villain - or dead PCs. Paizo and other publishers must write for a generic group of players they don't know, so I see why they do it this way. As a DM we know our players better and can adjust to that. And a computer game can of course use railroading very effectively.

Anyway, I now have a massive amount of reading to do. My old Kingmaker campaign went on hiatus for Covid, so both I and my players have a lot of catching up to do - if we even agree to continue. * Holds thumbs


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