Matrix Sorcica writes:
Hi, very interested in this. Do you have notes, campaign outline, lessons learned etc.? I read your campaign blog, but find it difficult to extract the reasonss as to why you mashed the two AP's the way you did.
Thanks.

My answer:
I didn't write an outline in advance, I don't do a huge amount of prep. The basic idea was that Karzoug's rise and the quest for the Sihedron proceeded in parrallel and the PCs & GM would usually have a choice what to do next, to get away from the very linear feel that bugged me running Crimson Throne. I also did not want the "let's get to the end of the line" feel I felt running Crimson Throne, where the goal was always to beat the BBEG at the end of book 6. I felt it was better to have too much material and do what interested the players. I was trying to get something of a living world feel within the constraints of an AP.
Lessons learned - well I found I worried too much trying to convert countless weird monsters from PF Bestiary 2/3 to 5e, in retrospect it worked best when I just ignored them, maybe used an existing 5e monster, maybe made something up whole cloth. Shattered Star especially, but Runelords also in places, suffers from too many strings of static monsters sitting in rooms. It worked best when PCs could evade or negotiate, or a bunch of monsters ganged up in one big fight.
I did find that 5e play balance remained good even at high level; unlike in Pathfinder the battles never felt trivial.