Customer Reviews

Pathfinder #1 Rise Of The Runelords: Burnt Offerings (Pathfinder; Rise of the Ruinlords)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is one solid piece of work. The adventure is great and leaves you wanting more. The background and detail of Sandpoint (where the adventure begins) and the villains is colorful and imaginative. The new monsters are mostly great. And the reinvention of goblins is inspiring! All and all, very well put together. This is the first installment of the Rise of the Runelords adventure path and I can't wait till the rest are released.

The first, full color volume of a six part Adventure Path (aka: campaign) for Dungeons and Dragons (version 3.5), which offers the opening salvo adventure for a party of 1st level Player Characters. The adventure is nicely written, taking place in the coastal town of Sandport and venturing briefly into the hinterlands. In addition to the 40 pages of adventure material (not merely dungeon crawls, there is plenty of room for interactions and drama from more than a character's ability to swing a sword or cast Magic Missle), the module offers a nicely detailed overview of the town and its major Non Player Characters, some fiction offering details about the Pathfinder Society (Paizo's adventuring society, a part of the Rise of the Ruinlords and further Pathfinder Chronicles supplements), a history of a collapsed society (which is crucial to the overarching adventure path), a handful of new monsters, and a quartet of premade player characters.

By now, the full adventure path is already out (and Paizo has moved on to their second effort), but I only just recently actually had a chance to start reading the thing. Quite nice, with a quirky sense of humor (as evinced in one monster chieftain's "Steal Food, Become Food" policy, which had me rolling for a while and still makes me chuckle...). The series apparently gets quite dark as it goes (yay!), but it starts out on a more traditional footing, while doing a little for goblins what Crown of the Kobold King did so well for kobolds... That is: it makes an often overlooked or rather wasted monster type interesting!

This is really what a roleplaying adventure product should be. There is wonderful background material on the beginning region of the adventure path, really fun monsters, really interesting hooks that make what could be mundane encounters into fun story telling moments.

The creatures in the adventure have actual motivation, and the story is compelling. Not only is this a good introductory adventure, though, but the set up material for the rest of the adventure path shows you what is coming and how this adventure ties in.

In fact, in all honesty, the only real negative I can bring up is that there is a bit of real world agenda evident in some of the character backgrounds in the beginning region. For those that agree with it, its an interesting addition to the setting, and for those that disagree, its not so major a part of the plot that it would be difficult to rework or remove it, but it is potentially problematic for some touchy subjects.

However, I don't want to give the impression that this was a major part of the book. Its handled fairly well, but it could be an issue for some. Still, any controversy is greatly outweighed by the depth of this product and the combination of simple, yet brilliantly nuanced story progression.

There are the standard D&D dungeon crawls, treasure finding, and combats, but the context of these make all the difference.

While the deaths of Dragon and Dungeon magazines are regrettable, if this is what Paizo has intended to replace them with, I'm happy that it's a worthy successor.

Not just an adventure, but each issue is full of background source material, new creatures, maps, guides and tons of flavor for the Pathfinder World. I'm looking forward to running through the Rise of the Runelords campaign with my players who trust me to pick out a good product.

Speaking of which, the Pathfinder game has a free PDF available for download that has over 160 pages of updates and new ideas for 3.5. In fact, I've taken to calling it D&D 3.75. It's better than 3.5 without being as alien and obtuse as 4.0. Skills have been condensed, combat simplified but not dumbed down or turned into a bastardized pen and paper version of WoW, basic classes have been upgraded to compete with alternative and prestige classes featured in expansion books. Everything has been done logically and the side notes explain Paizo's rationale for doing so.

Overall, Pathfinder products are some of the highest quality I've seen in a while.

I've been playing for over two decades now and this is one solid adventure. There is a huge assortment of npcs to really get the roleplaying started in the sleepy little town of Sandpoint. I highly recommend this even though its still 3.5, its easily modified to make it pathfinder compatible. I wouldn't suggest missing out on this one if you can find a copy.

Again, one of Paizo's publications has reinspired my love for D&D. This adventure is rich with detail and creates a setting that makes me look forward to DMing for my group. Yes, this book entails a bit of dungeon "crawling" but the dungeons are rich with detail, plotlines, and sensible dungeon ecology, so that these crawls are more than just bloodthirsty loot-raids.

I've been playing D&D since they sold modules in Toys 'R Us (AD&D days) and Paizo's writers have evolved D&D to the point where they make TSR's publications look amateurish.

Long live Paizo. Forget Hasbro and its video-game-based 4th Edition D&D. D&D's new title is "Pathfinder."