Yo,

I have looked through all the online adventures and using clues from the text, have come up with a timeline order for running the scenarios. Some of these scenarios reference "earlier" ones, or have re-occuring characters that the players would know if they played the earlier adventure.

Some of this is pure guess work.

Take a look and let me know what you think.

Suggested timeline sequence:

"St Anthony's Carnival"
"Paintball Vendetta"
"Assistant Holy Roller"
"Girls Gone Nuts!"
“Carlito’s One-way”
"Angela's Spring Break"
"Whack the Vampire"
"Tell Room Service I'm at the Roulette table"
"Donnie Cheapo"
"Deliver the Package"
"The Columbus Day Picnic"
"Joey & Gina's Wedding"
"CYA, ASAP"
"You better watch out"
"Duck da Police"
"The Million Dollar Shill"
"The Godrapper"
"The Power of Positive Thinking"
"White Avenue freeze-out"
"Sleazy Rider"
“Save the last dance for me”
"Collect Da Money"
"Da Shirt of Yer Back"
"Protect the Gooch"
"High Rollers"

Scenarios that I could not place the timeline sequence:

"The Magic PokiYugi"
"Bruno's Good Sleep"
"Finding Nino"
"Da Usual Prospects"
"Teddybear Massacre"
"Stickup Junkies"
"Sunday Dinner"
"Workin' for Mister C"
"The Blame Game"
"The Snow Harvest"

Let me know if I missed any.

Thanks,
Jack

BTW, Joey and Gina's wedding can be run repeatedly with different names (or player characters).


Since it provides a big suspicion drop with decent respect and experience, I'd wait til the characters needed the suspicion "fix" before running it.

It sort of depends upon your campagin. You can never predict which adventure the PC's will breeze through and which ones they will killed. Same thing for NPC's, Donnie Cheapo may become a life-long enemy or the PC's may decide just to avoid him. That's a pretty good list though, assuming the players don't die. Stuff like "Sleazy Rider" and "Protect da Gooch" require high level guys.

What do you think? More high level stuff or low level?

Mr. D.

More High. If you do 1/2 the adventures you get big quickly(if you do things in certain ways).

I think I agree with Gino (but no, I'm still turning down your job offer).

In the course of 4 days at Origins, I almost made 6th, and you were scrambling pretty hard for something a) appropriate and b) that I hadn't played.

with the size of our crew and what they have done and what they have bought I am just barly 10th now, I think paulie is 9th(should be with me making 10th).

Okey-doke. Let's turn things up!

Mr. D.

High is fine, as long as there is continuity maintained with the lower ones.

Jack

When you say continuity, what do you mean? Part of the problem is creating a high-level adventure that doesn't derail a campaign or isn't dependent upon it. In other words, in your campaign, Ernesto may already be dead and the Magoladros split up or gone. So building an adventure around him won't really work, per se, without major rewriting on the part of the GM.

Mr. D.

Another aspect to consider might be different numbers of PCs. I understand that 2-4 is a great number for getting started and accomodates most groups that are just starting out. I suppose we've got enough talented writers that we could easily cover writing missions that could be done with 1 or 2 players, but something that could provide sufficient challenge for more players, like say anywhere from 4-6 or 6-8 players would be useful too.

Any chance you can include recommended/suggested number and level of players for these scenarios? It would be a big help.

Jack

Well, I've always been a big believer in adjusting the adventure to suit the number and level of experience of the players. I don't just mean the level of their characters. I try to help out struggling players and throw up a few extra twists against more experienced ones.

As a rule of thumb though, any adventure that is likely to result in a gun battle should be attempted by no less than four characters with a minimum of one gun each and the feat Personal Firearms Proficiency. Here's a quick guide rated from Basic to Moderate to Advanced levels:

Basic Adventures (beginning Wiseguys)
Paulie's Little Surprise
Saint Anthony's Carnival
Paintball Vendetta
The Magi Poki Yugi
Angela's Spring Break
Donnie Cheapo
The Columbus Day Picnic
Bruno's Good Sleep
The Godrapper
Da Shirt Off Yer Back
The Power of Positive Thinking

Moderate Adventures (mid level wiseguys or beginning made men)
Assistant Holy Roller
Whack the Vampire
The Million Dollar Shill
Chick's Gone Nuts!
You Better Watch Out
Tell Room Service I'm at the Roulette Table
Joey & Gina's Wedding
Da Usual Prospects
White Avenue Freeze Out
Sunday Dinner
Collect Da Money
High Rollers

Advanced Adventures (made guys or high level wiseguys)
Deliver the Package
Finding Nino
Protect the Gooch
Duck Da Police
Sleazy Rider
Teddybear Massacre
Stickup Junkies
CYA, ASAP
Workin' for Mr. C.
The Blame Game
The Snow Harvest
Sixty Percent Solution
Comet's Surprise
Dreaming of a White Power Christmas
Johnny Get-Out
Loose Cannons
Oh, Ho Black Betty

Now, keep in mind, some of these adventures can get a lot easier or harder depending upon the decisions the characters make. Are you players having too easy or too hard of a time Jack? If it's too easy, thrown in a few cops to the keep the players on their toes. If it's too hard, cut the players some more slack. If their plan has very obvious holes, they may have misunderstood the goals.

Mr. D.

Actually, just slip a few weakness rolls in. The first missed roll, all heck should break loose. You can probably get a gun battle going in ANY scenario with sufficient weakness rolls.

There's also the old "divide the party if things are going too smoothly" trick... and it's even easier in Complete Mafia, just offer the right bait for two different players' weaknesses.



With any luck (for the GM), Johnny will be headed one way to wet his whistle and Joey will go the other looking for nose candy. At least one check should fail, so part of the party will go wandering off not working on their objective.

Actually I'm still setting up the campaign and recruiting local players. It's just that you've given us so many great scenarios it's hard to choose which ones to start with.

Jack

Of course, if you're doing an all day session, give them the scenarios where they have to think right after they've eaten.

Nothing like trying to come up with ideas when there's no blood flow to the brain because it's all in use by the digestive tract...

Save some pizza for me!

Well, what I like to do is to customize the campaign as it develops. I would say that most of the players will lose at least one character in the process of learning the game. This will probably be a good thing, because they are likely to get a better understanding of the game as they play and then decide they picked the wrong feats or skills. Once you feel the players have the characters that they will stay with during most of the campaign barring really bad luck or total idiocy, try and rewrite the scenarios to fit your groups. For instance, Donnie Cheapo appears in three adventures, but the characters may completely piss him off in the first one or even kill him. Simply switch Donnie for another old mobster, maybe one of the PC's "Dominant Parental Influence". Use the same stats, just change his name or tweak him a little. As the campaign progresses, critical NPC's can replace the NPC's provided.

Also, don't forget to use the "Extras" provided, especially 100 NPC's for your Complete Mafia Campaign. Some of the additions were pretty critical to outlining New Milan. I look forward to hearing about your campaign.

Mr. D.