Pathfinder Campaign Setting: "Lost Cities of Golarion" [RPG]

Lost Cities of Golarion is a little bit like the brilliant combination of Cities of Golarion and Lost Kingdoms of Golarion, two other books in the Campaign Setting line.  Whereas Cities of Golarion presented six (mostly) safe cities for PCs to use as their home base, and Lost Kingdoms of Golarion detailed the rise and fall of the civilisations that gave birth to the crumbling monuments that now dot the landscape, Lost Cities of Golarion offers six ruined cities full of danger and intrigue that incorporate detailed setting lore while providing an exciting campaign’s worth of plot for PCs in the “modern” era.  That’s a really long-winded way of saying that each of the six cities detailed in this book are intended for exploration and adventure.   As you’ll see below, some of these sites can serve as the basis for a full campaign, while others may be better suited to a shorter story-arc.  Anyway, the takeaway from this review is that GMs will find a lot of great adventure ideas in this book, and it’s well-worth the purchase.

The six cities covered are Ilvarandin (a city in the Underdark), Kho (one of the ancient Shory flying cities, now crashed), Storasta (the last city to fall before the Worldwound), the Sun Temple Colony (an ancient Azlanti city across the ocean), Tumen (a city of ancient Osirion), and Xin-Shalast (golden capital of one part of ancient Thassilon). Each entry, which is about ten pages long, includes a full-page map, descriptions of various locations within the city, random encounter tables (thankfully broken up into low level, medium level, and high level, addressing one of the critiques I often make of tables like this), the full stat-block of a major new NPC or monster, and, perhaps most valuable, a section detailing adventure hooks and plot ideas for low, medium, and high-level campaigns in the city.

First up is Ilvarandin, a city deep in the Darklands (Golarion’s version of the Underdark).  Ilvarandin is a vast city, hundreds of miles wide, but seemingly deserted.  As one spends time exploring, however, small enclaves of inhabitants can be found—refugees from other parts of the Darklands, like mongrelfolk, exiled drow, morlocks, and more.  But the secret of Ilvarandin is in its core: it’s a city of intellect devourers, terrible creatures capable of taking over the bodies and minds of others!  The devourers have been in a centuries-long war with another Darklands race, the neothelids.  Why would anyone come here?  Because the intellect devourers have carefully used the bodies of explorers and others to seed legends that Ilvarandin is some kind of utopia, so that travellers from elsewhere in the Darklands (and even the surface) arrive, presenting fresh prey.  The entry includes two useful maps (one of the various sections of the city, one of the city’s core), a stat block for one of the most powerful rulers of the city (a CR 15 Intelllect devourer sorcerer), and a detailed description of a new drug called Midnight Milk—which allows intellect devourers to exercise their body thief abilities on addicts even at tremendous distances.  The hooks to an entire campaign involving Ilvarandin are natural and intriguing—the PCs can start on the surface investigating the devastating spread of this new drug in one city, eventually start to trace it back to the Darklands, and, at higher levels, visit Ilvarandin itself and get caught up in the politics and war of a strange, exotic place.  It’s a cool, well-realised location with several good plot hooks.

Second, we have Kho.  I was intrigued by Kho ever since I read about it in Pathfinder Tales novel City of Sky.  Kho was one of the ancient flying cities of the Shory Empire that filled the sky several millennia in Golarion’s past.  Whereas the fate of most are unknown, Kho fell from the sky and smashed into the ground in what is now the Barrier Wall mountains northeast of the Mwangi Expanse (or in southwest Osirion, depending on how you look at it).  In campaign terms, Kho serves as much more a site for open-ended exploration than Ilvarandin does.  There are some inhabitants for the PCs to engage (probably violently) with, including marids (genies from the plane of water), derhii (gorillas with wings!), and leukodemons (disease demons).  Overall though, I found this entry (and Kho) much blander than I had hoped.  There’s something called the Well of Axuma, a place of great magical power, but not much backstory is presented.  The hooks to get PCs to Kho (like investigating a disease spread by the leukodemons) are a little bit akin to that of Ilvarandin, but aren’t integrated organically well-enough to service an entire campaign.  And although the entry gives us stats for the derhii, they’re really the sort of creature that demands a picture.

Third in line is Storasta, the last city in ancient Sarkoris to fall to the demonic hordes that now occupy what’s called the Worldwound.  Unlike the other “lost cities” in the book, Storasta isn’t that old in an historical sense—it fell less than a century ago.  It has an interesting backstory and theme, as a place where the last surviving druids, shamans, and fey of Sarkoris assembled and unleashed their most primal magics to hold back the demon armies, thus creating a blighted, twisted place that no one, not even demons, find hospitable.  Not much now lives in Storasta beyond dark fey, mad treants, and particularly persistent demons, all fighting against each other for control of what little remains of the city.  Storasta is one of those places that’s suicidal for low-level PCs to enter, but good be a good adventure site for higher-level groups in a Worldwound-themed campaign.  And if you need a big boss, the CR 20 stat block for Carrock (a fiendish treant druid) would make a suitable challenge.  The best part about Storasta is it allows for some adventures in the Worldwound that aren’t solely focussed on fighting demons.

Fourth is the Sun Temple Colony, probably my favourite entry in the book.  This island location, far across the Arcadian Ocean, was once an Azlanti city.  Now its jungle surface is home to the crumbling ruins of that civilization, but looming above everything is the imposing Sun Temple, home to a mysterious device capable of harnessing the sun’s energies to wreak destruction.  The entire place has a fantastic, mysterious feel, and the backstory is equally intriguing: a lost colony, a trapped godling, and more!  You could certainly build a mid-length campaign around the PCs’ quest to reach the island, their interactions with the locals (figuring who among them can be trusted and who’s an evil cultist), and their penetration into the secrets of the Sun Temple.  One of the things that appeals to me the most as a GM is that it takes the PCs (and players) outside of their comfort zones: there are no magic stores, tavern common rooms, 2 gp/night inns to rest in safely, or other tempting places to teleport to.  It’d be a bit more like the t.v. show Lost, and I can see the appeal of that.

Fifth is Tumen, a monument showing the amazing hubris of the Four Pharaohs of Ascension in ancient Osirion.  Tumen is really four interconnected cities built in the middle of a vast, trackless desert on the top of a vertical cliff.  Apparently, a hundred thousand slaves died to construct it, and the Four Pharaohs didn’t care a whit!  Each of the four cities (or districts of Tumen, depending on how you think of it) holds something interesting for explorers, but I found it hard to envision what this place was like in a conceptual sense.  I think better artwork and description would have helped, as everything’s a bit opaque.  Interestingly, there are links to the storyline of the countdown clocks and the Dark Tapestry that was finished off in the Doomsday Dawn Playtest adventure, though I’m not convinced the information here matches up with what’s there.  Anyway, there’s plenty of ancient Osirion ruins and pyramids available in Pathfinder, and I don’t think Tumen is a necessary addition.

Sixth is Xin-Shalast, a city from ancient Thassilon that first appears in the Rise of the Runelords adventure path.  The entry here is written on the assumption that the events in that AP have concluded, though I think there’s some bits and pieces that would be useful for GMs who plan to run it.  The theme here is “classic gold rush”.  Expeditions from Riddleport, Magnimar, and Janderhoff are present, as are some factions of the locals, and everyone is clashing and vying to take advantage of an opportunity for untold wealth in the gold-paved streets of the city.  Environmental factors alone (like the cold and altitude) make this a lethal place for low-level PCs, but I guess it could be interesting at higher-levels to see what factions the PCs ally themselves with and what further dangers they encounter in and around Xin-Shalast (like a CR 19 Rune Giant!).  Still, I think this entry’s main value would be for groups that finish Rise of the Runelords and either want to keep playing the same characters or role up new characters to see what happens in the aftermath.

All in all, Lost Cities of Golarion is an excellent buy for GMs who want detailed, flavourful, and world-lore consistent locations to centre a homebrew campaign around.  It has the maps, random encounter tables, adventure hooks, and more that can serve as the skeleton for a campaign, while not being nearly as prescriptive as an AP in terms of plots and encounters.  As I said in my review of Lost Kingdoms of Golarion, one of the surprising strengths of the setting is its deep integration of history, and this book further showcases that aspect.  If you’re looking to build a campaign, I’d strongly suggest starting with one of the entries in this book.