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32 pages, 2007, $12.99
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Story
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17
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Enjoyability
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16
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Adaptability
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17
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Intelligibility
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17
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Overall
17
Solid Hit
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Review Scoring
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With Crown of the Kobold King, and the prequel Hollow's
Last Hope, Paizo Publishing has taken the first step in introducing the world
to their ambitious new Campaign Setting, Pathfinder Chronicles. Crown of
the Kobold King, written by Nicolas Logue, is not as expansive as the upcoming
Pathfinder Adventure Path: Rise of the Rune Lords, but the GameMastery Modules are not
meant to be complete campaigns in the new setting, just adventures that the Game Master
can drop into a campaign set in the Pathfinder Chronicles world, or any world for that matter.
The Crown of the Kobold King adventure begins in the sleepy, frontier town of
Falcon's Hollow, and can be used as a direct followup to Paizo Publishing's
Hollow's Last Hope which was distributed during Free RPG Day and is available as
a PDF download free of charge from Paizo Publishing's website. It is a wilderness and
dungeon adventure designed for a party of level 2 characters.
As one would expect from the title, kobolds play a large role in this adventure,
and the author has taken great pains to elevate the kobolds from their usual
position of cannon fodder to masterminds of a devious plot to harm the children of
Falcon's Hollow. Kobolds are not the only monsters that await the adventurers in this
title, however. Dwarf ghosts, a young werewolf and numerous other forest and dungeon
dwelling beasts stand in the way as well.
Crown of the Kobold King provides helpful advice for the Game Master through
a half dozen "Designer Notes" sections to give insight as to what the author was
thinking regarding design choices taken in the development of the adventure. The
adventure also provides the Game Master with three new items and two new monsters
that can easily be incorporated into other settings.
With all the hype and anticipation surrounding the Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign
Setting and associated adventures, it would be easy for the first effort to have fallen
short. Instead, capitalizing on the years of experienced honed from writing and
publishing adventures in Dungeon magazine, the author has presented Game
Masters and players with an intriguing and fun first foray into the world of Golarion.
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