A questions for people who played forgotten forge [Archive] - Wizards Community

A questions for people who played forgotten forge [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
pegasuspaladin
02-12-07, 01:29 PM I was just wondering how other dm's started off the pre-made campaigns. In other words how did the PC's come to work together. Why did elaydren hire them over some other group?
Pallin Rahl
02-12-07, 01:48 PM Well... after playing together for so long, my group (myself included, when playing and not DMing) doesn't necessarily require unique and dynamic new takes on how the party meets up (though we still come come up with them on occation).

When I started my Eberron campaign, I basically told them to come up with whatever backstory they wanted... only thing that had to be in there was: why they are now a member of a particular adventurer's guild in Sharn. They didn't need to know each other or anything (matter of fact, they pretty much all wrote in that they were new members and hadn't really met many guild members yet, each other included)... just be part of the guild. Yeah, it forced a common ground right off the bat... but we know how these things go - they happily accepted it and moved on.

I ran the Forgotten Forge at a far more advanced level than it was designed for (with some key changes to make it a valid challenge for the party being level 6 or 7 at the time... advancing the humanoid enemies, made the forge area the temporary home of a couple Illithids and their Dolgaunt minions ;))... but why Elaydren choose them was the same as was suggested in the adventure itself. After the encounter on the skybridge, they were approached by a servant of Elaydren who told them she wanted to meet - given the journal that they had recently happened upon. :)
tallric_kruush
02-12-07, 02:11 PM Our first time through we had our characters meet outside the city, entering Sharn through Wroann's Gate. We all had to wait our turn in line to be interrogated by a surly dwarf guard. It was eerily similar to the beginning of Keith's "City of Towers" and was likely a borrowed directly from it, though I never asked. I had intended to do something similar to open a Ptolus campaign that never got off the ground.

You could do something similar by having the characters meet on the road, on the lightning rail, in the Terminus district (getting off the rail), on a lift within Sharn, etc...

I always thought having an incident that forced the previously unacquainted PCs to fight side-by-side was the best way to explain how they get together. If one guy saves another guy from a sword in the back during a scrap in the first encounter, that can lay the initial groundwork, making the typical "we're in a tavern, we leave, oh my...is that a murder/mugging/etc... taking place?" type thing (that seems to always start a level one adventure) more plausible. It also helps sometimes if a couple of the PCs already have a history (Eberron gives us the convenient Last War-veteran angle).

Like Pallin Rahl said above, you could just invent a backstory establishing all the connections. That's often easiest. Personally, I like to roleplay it, since the made-up stories seem to get a little too intricate for the 3-5 Level One peons supposedly involved. If you're starting with higher level PCs, though, that problem is pretty much eliminated.

Just my initial thoughts. I assume you're thinking to run the adventure? If so, have fun!
Dawn_of_an_Age
02-12-07, 02:28 PM In my campaign, the PC's were War buddies. They had served together in the Last War in one capacity or another and were in the process of journeying from First Tower to Sharn. While in First Tower they were approached by a gnome by the name of Seebo, who hired them to do a job because they seemed to have the look of capable individuals about them. At any rate once they finished that job and returned to First Tower to report and be paid they found that their patron had had to leave on urgent business.
He did however leave a note outlining how the PC's were to conclude their order of business with him.

He asked them to meet him in Sharn at the Broken Anvil Tavern, he also left a letter of credit so that they could catch the Lightning Rail at no expense to them, he apologized for the inconvenience, and assured them that they would be compensated for both their time and inconvenience. Once they finished that order of business they left to do something, I can’t remember but of course along the way they stumbled across the body of Bonal Geldom, and the rest is history, insert adventure there.
Ricohard_Draconis
02-12-07, 06:40 PM mine basically had three groups at the start:

Cannith artificer and warforged- came together out of mutual benefical arrangement.
Shifter cleric and Changeling Ranger both from the Eldeen reaches who'd met on the rail coming down to sharn
Gnome Rogue-who was in sharn as a very very very minor trust flunkee.

They happened to meet on the bridge and get attacked and then Eladren offered them a lot of money. After that everyone just assumed they were a team and so they had to become one to maintain their income and had bonded anyway.
dunkeykong
02-12-07, 09:23 PM I like using pre-made adventures for my PCs first excursion. It helps me get a feel on how they work and interact so i can better create custom adventures.

Plus, I suck at low level adventures...
Sturm Jaeger
02-13-07, 12:11 AM The encounter on the bridge more or less brings the PCs together. It could just happen as they are all in the area, and thus brings them together. Lady d'Cannith contacts them because they are by then already involved in the situation and they would have proved they can handle themselves.
pegasuspaladin
02-13-07, 10:10 AM I've already started the campaign and I was just curious about how others got it going. I had a drunk beguiler, a cleric of the silver flame, a psion and a halfling rogue (who is the bastard son of the son of the patriarch of sharn's gallanda enclave). I started it by having the cleric on a recon mission for the silver flame hiding in the shadows. The beguiler gets thrown out of the building that the cleric is hiding next to, while the psion is just out for a walk with her pet hamster. The rogue is casing the psion wearing fancy clothes to try and pickpocket her. the beguiler lands on his face, breaks his nose and the psion and cleric run to his aid. they all do a spot check and only the cleric sees the warforged jump over the edge of the bridge. the rogue does a move silently check and only rolls or 3 or 4 on the d20 and they all hear him splash in a puddle behind the psion. the beguiler sticks out a bloodied hand (from the broken nose) and says hello. the rogue creates a ball of light and runs for the bridge and then rolls another spot now that he's closer and rolls over a 20 so he sees the pouch in bonals hand and goes for it. this is where i had to change up the encounter a bit.
The warforged jumps back over the other side of the bridge closest to the rogue and pulls his axe. the rogue makes a beeline for the side of the bridge the warforged originally went over, pulls out his grappling hook and jumps over the edge (knowing full well he's probably 1000-2000 feet above ground) and luckily for him rolled a high use rope and swung under the bridge. Mind you the cleric who saw the WF jump over the edge has now seen the rogue just use the same tactic. the WF went to the edge to try and pull the grappling hook off the edge of the bridge. the cleric yelled stop and the wf turned and charged him. the battle ensued, the rogue tried to swing up and failed the ride check (he was riding the rope) and then almost failed the reflex (missed it by one) to grab the rope again and save himself. I didn't tell him he failed it but he knew he had because he rolled low. this was the party's first eberron campaign so they didn't think to use AP's right away. I was just sitting there stunned, we were only 20 min into a new and i almost have to kill a character. all of a sudden the rogue screams ACTION POINTS! i'm gonna use an action point. he only failed the dc by one so he survived and spent the rest of the battle clinging to a rope.
so the captain of the guard comes and the rogue decides to try and bluff him and fails miserably. they all give their story (cleric-silver flame, psion-sharn resident, beguiler-passing through, rogue-son of ghallanda) they get held until their stories can be checked out. the captain only has time to check out the cleric and rogue (their storiees being the easiest to verify) before lady elaydren gets them out to ask about bonal and the encounter on the bridge. the clerics story checked out. the rogue who spent the entire time in jail saying how his father would get him out and what not, his story came back differently. house ghallanda said they had never heard of him but they were still all free to go because they had powerful friends. yadda yadda yadda. that was our first session.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
pegasuspaladin 02-12-07, 01:29 PM	I was just wondering how other dm's started off the pre-made campaigns. In other words how did the PC's come to work together. Why did elaydren hire them over some other group?
Pallin Rahl 02-12-07, 01:48 PM	Well... after playing together for so long, my group (myself included, when playing and not DMing) doesn't necessarily require unique and dynamic new takes on how the party meets up (though we still come come up with them on occation). When I started my Eberron campaign, I basically told them to come up with whatever backstory they wanted... only thing that had to be in there was: why they are now a member of a particular adventurer's guild in Sharn. They didn't need to know each other or anything (matter of fact, they pretty much all wrote in that they were new members and hadn't really met many guild members yet, each other included)... just be part of the guild. Yeah, it forced a common ground right off the bat... but we know how these things go - they happily accepted it and moved on. I ran the Forgotten Forge at a far more advanced level than it was designed for (with some key changes to make it a valid challenge for the party being level 6 or 7 at the time... advancing the humanoid enemies, made the forge area the temporary home of a couple Illithids and their Dolgaunt minions ;))... but why Elaydren choose them was the same as was suggested in the adventure itself. After the encounter on the skybridge, they were approached by a servant of Elaydren who told them she wanted to meet - given the journal that they had recently happened upon. :)
tallric_kruush 02-12-07, 02:11 PM	Our first time through we had our characters meet outside the city, entering Sharn through Wroann's Gate. We all had to wait our turn in line to be interrogated by a surly dwarf guard. It was eerily similar to the beginning of Keith's "City of Towers" and was likely a borrowed directly from it, though I never asked. I had intended to do something similar to open a Ptolus campaign that never got off the ground. You could do something similar by having the characters meet on the road, on the lightning rail, in the Terminus district (getting off the rail), on a lift within Sharn, etc... I always thought having an incident that forced the previously unacquainted PCs to fight side-by-side was the best way to explain how they get together. If one guy saves another guy from a sword in the back during a scrap in the first encounter, that can lay the initial groundwork, making the typical "we're in a tavern, we leave, oh my...is that a murder/mugging/etc... taking place?" type thing (that seems to always start a level one adventure) more plausible. It also helps sometimes if a couple of the PCs already have a history (Eberron gives us the convenient Last War-veteran angle). Like Pallin Rahl said above, you could just invent a backstory establishing all the connections. That's often easiest. Personally, I like to roleplay it, since the made-up stories seem to get a little too intricate for the 3-5 Level One peons supposedly involved. If you're starting with higher level PCs, though, that problem is pretty much eliminated. Just my initial thoughts. I assume you're thinking to run the adventure? If so, have fun!
Dawn_of_an_Age 02-12-07, 02:28 PM	In my campaign, the PC's were War buddies. They had served together in the Last War in one capacity or another and were in the process of journeying from First Tower to Sharn. While in First Tower they were approached by a gnome by the name of Seebo, who hired them to do a job because they seemed to have the look of capable individuals about them. At any rate once they finished that job and returned to First Tower to report and be paid they found that their patron had had to leave on urgent business. He did however leave a note outlining how the PC's were to conclude their order of business with him. He asked them to meet him in Sharn at the Broken Anvil Tavern, he also left a letter of credit so that they could catch the Lightning Rail at no expense to them, he apologized for the inconvenience, and assured them that they would be compensated for both their time and inconvenience. Once they finished that order of business they left to do something, I can’t remember but of course along the way they stumbled across the body of Bonal Geldom, and the rest is history, insert adventure there.
Ricohard_Draconis 02-12-07, 06:40 PM	mine basically had three groups at the start: Cannith artificer and warforged- came together out of mutual benefical arrangement. Shifter cleric and Changeling Ranger both from the Eldeen reaches who'd met on the rail coming down to sharn Gnome Rogue-who was in sharn as a very very very minor trust flunkee. They happened to meet on the bridge and get attacked and then Eladren offered them a lot of money. After that everyone just assumed they were a team and so they had to become one to maintain their income and had bonded anyway.
dunkeykong 02-12-07, 09:23 PM	I like using pre-made adventures for my PCs first excursion. It helps me get a feel on how they work and interact so i can better create custom adventures. Plus, I suck at low level adventures...
Sturm Jaeger 02-13-07, 12:11 AM	The encounter on the bridge more or less brings the PCs together. It could just happen as they are all in the area, and thus brings them together. Lady d'Cannith contacts them because they are by then already involved in the situation and they would have proved they can handle themselves.
pegasuspaladin 02-13-07, 10:10 AM	I've already started the campaign and I was just curious about how others got it going. I had a drunk beguiler, a cleric of the silver flame, a psion and a halfling rogue (who is the bastard son of the son of the patriarch of sharn's gallanda enclave). I started it by having the cleric on a recon mission for the silver flame hiding in the shadows. The beguiler gets thrown out of the building that the cleric is hiding next to, while the psion is just out for a walk with her pet hamster. The rogue is casing the psion wearing fancy clothes to try and pickpocket her. the beguiler lands on his face, breaks his nose and the psion and cleric run to his aid. they all do a spot check and only the cleric sees the warforged jump over the edge of the bridge. the rogue does a move silently check and only rolls or 3 or 4 on the d20 and they all hear him splash in a puddle behind the psion. the beguiler sticks out a bloodied hand (from the broken nose) and says hello. the rogue creates a ball of light and runs for the bridge and then rolls another spot now that he's closer and rolls over a 20 so he sees the pouch in bonals hand and goes for it. this is where i had to change up the encounter a bit. The warforged jumps back over the other side of the bridge closest to the rogue and pulls his axe. the rogue makes a beeline for the side of the bridge the warforged originally went over, pulls out his grappling hook and jumps over the edge (knowing full well he's probably 1000-2000 feet above ground) and luckily for him rolled a high use rope and swung under the bridge. Mind you the cleric who saw the WF jump over the edge has now seen the rogue just use the same tactic. the WF went to the edge to try and pull the grappling hook off the edge of the bridge. the cleric yelled stop and the wf turned and charged him. the battle ensued, the rogue tried to swing up and failed the ride check (he was riding the rope) and then almost failed the reflex (missed it by one) to grab the rope again and save himself. I didn't tell him he failed it but he knew he had because he rolled low. this was the party's first eberron campaign so they didn't think to use AP's right away. I was just sitting there stunned, we were only 20 min into a new and i almost have to kill a character. all of a sudden the rogue screams ACTION POINTS! i'm gonna use an action point. he only failed the dc by one so he survived and spent the rest of the battle clinging to a rope. so the captain of the guard comes and the rogue decides to try and bluff him and fails miserably. they all give their story (cleric-silver flame, psion-sharn resident, beguiler-passing through, rogue-son of ghallanda) they get held until their stories can be checked out. the captain only has time to check out the cleric and rogue (their storiees being the easiest to verify) before lady elaydren gets them out to ask about bonal and the encounter on the bridge. the clerics story checked out. the rogue who spent the entire time in jail saying how his father would get him out and what not, his story came back differently. house ghallanda said they had never heard of him but they were still all free to go because they had powerful friends. yadda yadda yadda. that was our first session.