Call for Feedback: What kind of a campaign are you in?
Following the success of our recent series on puzzles and investigation campaigns, in coming weeks I intend to continue writing articles on major thematic elements and campaign types.
What I’m getting at here
Since this site is pretty much all about you, loyal readers, I want to make sure that I get to your campaigns first. If you really want to hear my $0.02 on the type of campaign you are running (or participating in) go ahead and post a comment below and I will run a few articles together discussing those thematic elements or campaign types.
If I don’t get any feedback, you’ll be subjected to whatever takes my fancy on Friday! Our recent campaigns here at SR Headquarters have been overland style campaigns, where our party has to travel long distances to accomplish goals and advance the plot. Barring no comments, I will likely start my new series by examining this type of campaign along with common problems, pitfalls, and benefits.
So let’s hear it!
At the end of the month, I will be beginning a paranormal game, wherein the players are Investigators caught in the middle of conspiracies, aliens, magic, etc..
I am also in the process of world building for a new campaign, in which I expect to let the players witness a lot of the world’s alliances and powers forming, as the world will be somewhat younger than the other campaigns we have played. Another side effect is that the world will be relatively low fantasy, with lesser access to magic. Several of the gods will still be being discovered, and none of the magic academies, guilds, etc have formed either.
One of my players is also preparing a somewhat-modern Mafia game. Unfortunately, I don’t have too many details yet, but it will be running with Complete Mafia for d20.
The characters are vikings returning home after a long raid or other trip. They were thought dead and are not recognised. The village’s chief is dead, but net yet buried. A giant is terrorising the place and wants the corpse for some probably unholy purpose.
System shall be Burning Wheel.
Now you know almost as much as I do.
Inspiration: Fury of Nifur by Eero Tuovinen
I’ll be running a campaign in Ptolus in which PCs will be happy to risk their lives in the Dungeon under the city to get away from the political intrigue.
I am doing a mash-up campaign where I mix a fiendish plot to take over Ptolus with a Wild Goose chase aimed at killing an aspect of Lolth’s while an Iron Hero PC searches for the original home world where her Magic-Dead people were kidnapped from and imprisoned on Carceri…
I’m running a Frostburn campaign that has a story arc behind everything. However, the problem I have is with players who unexpectedly and often without warning drop out of the game. I have three, maybe four, players that I can rely on.
Additionally i have a problem with subtly, i tend to drop clues and information but unless I hit them over the head with a clue by four, they don’t get it.
Wow, lots to work with here! Thanks for the input, now where to start… hmmm…
I’m running a D&D every other week campaign. With an ahistorical ancient(Egyptian/Greek/Babylonian) feel as opposed to D&D’s typical pseudo-medieval feel.
The campaign is high magic, epic heroic, with (soon) a lot of elder god/cthulu type horror. The players will either stop the “demons” or the gods will die and the world will end.
I’ve tried to make as few mechanical changes as possible. Which is tough as so much of D&D is tied into it’s Alignment/cosmology/pseudo-medievalness.
One example is cleric’s summon planar ally spell. No celestials here thank you, instead they call forth legendary hero’s from the cleric’s culture’s past.
I’ve also tried to gently introduce players to “crazy” world that is unlike 90% of other fantasy(aka D&D) settings.
Ideas for getting players “into” your homebrew world?
I am currently running a VtR Campaign set in Prague that mixes up a main political theme with a horror mood.
Frickin nightmare to plan/run but its got a great flavour.
I’m planning a Forgotten Realms campaign in which the PCs are orcs and goblins. It’s set in Vassa, in the far north, and the players are the de facto “bad guys” of the campaign. They’re part of a horde under the control of whatever new evil is inhabiting the Castle Perilous.
I have my campaign wiki hosted at: http://v.dave.peyton.googlepages.com/smokesun.html
Looks like you just asked for everyone to tell you about their campaign 🙂 (it’s like talking about characters, for DMs!)
So here’s mine:
Kill Bill meets Wanted meets D&D
The party has recently discovered that the history they know is wrong and evil dragons have been running all the major countries for centuries. Now they’re trying to find the good dragons, while getting revenge on the minions of the evil dragons that killed the party (they got better) and destroyed their families. Possibly some empire-building to come.
Nice Dave the Game. I really like your idea and I’d ask to borrow it if I weren’t already running a game. I’m DMing a generic 3.5 game (I’m a new DM) in which the PC’s have been transported to the past to find some missing relics, which they will need to slay a demon. However, they do not know that the demon is actually the one that sent them back in time so that they can use the relics to set him free. They have to deal with the demon’s cult, warring barbarian tribes, and family history during the process.
nate- Steal away!
I like the time-travel angle in your game, then again, I’m a sucker for time-travel stories. Dealing with PC’s ancestors directly is a great way to use backstory.
Dave: You a sucker for time travel? Is that a genetics thing? 🙂
😛