Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Roivas 12-28-06, 04:23 AM	Okay I'm already bald, but! Here is my idea for a new way to get my players interested in D&D again, giving them every single gold piece they would attain from 1st-20th at first level. Meaning once they finish making their characters and go through the first dungeon they will find a small room deep at the bottom level, containing a ridiculous amount of gold. I also intend to toss in several artifacts and a few items of my own design. So while I know that CRs would be screwed up for some time I think this could be an interesting start to a campaign. They wouldn't have many hit points but everything else about them would compansate for this. So would this work as an adventure hook? Am I setting myself up for a silly game? Or would this force my players into intense paraniod behaviour?
CroBob 12-28-06, 04:41 AM	No first level adventurers would keep that much money for very long. Clever thieves and powerful monsters would discover them and rob them. At best.
Roivas 12-28-06, 04:50 AM	That's actually what I plan to build the campain around. Their attempts to conceal and protect their vast wealth. Maybe my players can wow me with a plan to keep what they earn? If not the game can be about them trying to get back what was stolen from them.
CroBob 12-28-06, 04:55 AM	If that's the whole concept of the game, sure, go for it. I can imagine some fun with it right now. The question is, what form does the treasure take? Can they get somwehere they can spend it? Yeah, I could imagine a fun campaign like that. Not quite the heroic scene I prefer, but still with potential to rival it if done right.
Roivas 12-28-06, 05:02 AM	The plan is to have about 200,000 in pure gold coins, an old spell book or two with about 120 spells, the hand of Vecna, the talisman of the sphere, a few major wonderous items randomly rolled, a small hill of gems totalling 100,000 gp in value, and I may add more. This is meant to be a way over the top kind of game, but in time I might work some other stories into it. It's up to the players how they liquidate the wealth, distribute it, and guard it. I'll just whip up the world's reactions to their sudden jump in pocket change, but I expect to use a hoard stealer at least once.
CroBob 12-28-06, 05:10 AM	Active adult dragons who are interested in mortal affairs (even the good ones), might judge the PCs as unworthy of such vast amounts of wealth, and take it. All the local thugs would team up for such a major haul. There are simply so many people who might notice and attempt to take their money that I'd have to spend an hour or so just listing them!
Roivas 12-28-06, 05:21 AM	Yes but none of these people would be completely clairvoiant. This massive treasure is in a place that most of the world has forgotten, left in a place long considered to be worthless. The players will just luck out and find this treasure trove through chance. I can't stop thinking of all the ways this could come crashing down around my players ears, but no one will be watching a meaningless part of the world that has nothing to offer. Nor will anyone be scrying on some pathetic seeming 1st level weaklings, until suitable reasons are given. If my players do this right they could become major world shakers of my world. If they blunder through this they will just be another set of rotten corpses on the road to glory.
Potato Weasel 12-28-06, 08:35 AM	Well, think of the reasons such wealth would be sealed away in a place no one would ever look. Say, a curse on it all, an undead curse.. involving pirates.. that'd be original.. But really, it could all (or in part) formerly have been part of an epic artifact that nearly destroyed the world, and after it was discovered even the pieces retained power, they were collected and sealed away.. And ancient dragons and wizards are -always- scrying backwoods towns no ones ever heard of. Thats the only place threats to their evil reigns of terror ever come from. That and the backwoods busty human/elven/dwarven/halfling/catfolk/nymph/half celestial maids. But thats another topic.
Gr8tyrant 12-28-06, 08:47 AM	i think its a cool idea, but be careful because with that kinda cash and prizes they may not have a lot to look forward to as the progress. you may be hooking them for now just to lose them in a session or two. on a side note, the party i run got an artifact in their first dungeon crawl, it melded with a player and they have been trying to figure out what it was, how to use it and how to get rid of it. it has actually allowed for a lot of fun encounters with mages trying to buy their party memembers and later to assassinate them for the item. i think your idea will yeild the same for a while. just make sure they can keep upgrading because thats half the damn fun. if you have the same plus 4 long sword from level 1 - 10 it will get old even if its awesome.
pita 12-28-06, 11:11 AM	Give them CRs that are 3 higher than the group's normal. Also, if they're not paranoid, they're being followed. That will always be rule #1 of my DM's handbook.
Divel Unwin 12-28-06, 02:06 PM	This is a GREAT IDEA but you don't need to drive yourself as crazy as you think with the CR... First: THE HORDE Stack up as many jems and coins as you like. This won't matter much in the end. The items are the tricky part. You don't want them waving a Staff of the Magi around at 1st level. Easiest way to fix this, leveling items and arcane lore. See, if the items require specific spells cast to activate for a new user, or require characters of certain skill levels to awaken, then the items could be all powerful relics that still need to power up. If you make a few simple trick to getting things to work based on level, they'll only be using those power items when they figure it out (preferably when they are wise and powerful enough to figure it out). Also, make sure the horde is deep and down an narrow, awkwardly shaped hole or something. This way trying to get it all out will take longer and many trips. They'll be more likely to leave most of it after first discovering it in order to come back for it when they have the right supplies to deal with the shear size of the find. Second: SPENDING Ok, so your PCs come out of the cave with full pockets and big smiles. Well, that's fine, but their going back to a village or town that isn't fit to sell anything they want. If you make sure not to run one of those "Love Potion and Singing Sword" shop campaigns were magic stores litter the streets, the PCs should have a hard time buying that Necklace of Fireballs. I mean, the fellow who owns it has money himself and needs the fireballs to deal with enemies. Third: SETTING Now what if the land the cavern on is suddenly occupied by an invading force (it was on the border of two kingdoms) and the PCs are obviously natives of the invaded kingdom? It would be really interesting if they constantly had to sneak over the suddenly moved border to access the gold and transporting it out in bulk would be WAY TOO RISKY. What if some of the gold has markings that the PCs don't really care about? Little do they now that once in circultion among those that exchange foreign currency, a bard or sage of some sorts identifies the coins as being from a legendary treasure thought to be a myth. Now a whole slew of interesting characters and organizations are interested for their own reasons. A raging war, hostile border lands, greedy treasure hunters... it seems this campaign would start off light and eventually grow at the right pace to challenge the PCs all the way to level 20. :D
Penchant_Conjurer 12-28-06, 02:08 PM	That sounds like lots of RP opportunity. Since you didn't inlcude a portable hole or BoH there, they essentially have to start living in the dungeon until they figure out what to do. Who do they tell? Who do they look out for? Does the rogue take a sack of gems and start painting the town red and therefore tip off everyone that someone has gotten rich? I would forego the idea of a conventional adventure with monsters and flesh out the nearby city with NPC's of every type and level. This is where the PC's have to go and the people they have to deal with in order to take the treasure. Time to max out ranks in sense motive and Knowledge (nobility and Royalty)!
albinomonkeyking 12-28-06, 02:55 PM	My initial reaction was that you are completely mad, but once I think about it more it could be a lot of fun. My only suggestion (as most have already been said) is to be careful of what you send after them. I mean, obviously a dragons attention could be piqued by this, but if it would result in, ya know, party annihilation, that wouldn't be too fun. So, as long as you are careful to keep a good many of the things coming after them managable in a RPing, combat, or skill use sense then I don't see a problem. Afterall, how bittersweet would it be to get all those goods and then have a CR 17 dragon roll up and take it?
quarkstomper 12-30-06, 01:59 PM	And perhaps the horde isn't as abandoned as they thought. Remember the story of Ali Baba?
aramilcaelvan 12-30-06, 02:08 PM	Be advised to think of the location of this horde. My first thought is to have an abandoned keep within a slum of a major metropolis. The PCs are just bopping around, looking for something to do, and they decide to see what's in the keep. They discover that it goes down about half as far as it goes up, and and the lowest basement floor, there is a long staircase. As the bottom of the staircase is said treasure. Now, if I were the PCs, my first thought would be to try to aquire the keep from the king, it would make a great defence for their treasure. They could use some of the gold to fix up the keep, hire residents (valets, cooks, grooms, soldiers, that type of thing) and go from there. Instead of them being adventurers, they would all become nobles, and all their "adventures" would be in the city. Just a thought.
Airos 12-30-06, 11:26 PM	I once played in a game similar to this. The DM didn't want to run "all that boring, low-level stuff" like Orcs and Kobolds. He wanted tough-as-nails, knock down drag out fights. So we started out at something like 30th level or so. I was very bored. He didn't care one way or another about races/templates, just as long as our ECL was 30. After something like +17 ECL and 13 character levels, I had more or less completed my build. I didn't have anything to look forward to as far as character advancement. Then we met up with this Wizard. He was the single most powerful Wizard in all the land, and his city was being attacked by... I forget. "Bad guys". So he proceeds to equip us for the coming battle... We had free access to any non-artifact magic item in the DMG. I didn't have anything to look forward to as far as wealth. Then he gave each of us dragons. :rolleyes: So, yeah, this lasted for about all of one adventure before I explained to him that, while yes it was a very cool idea to just jump into epic like that, my character had no reason to adventure at all, since he had everything he ever wanted out of life. Power, wealth, even a dragon companion. Please, make sure you talk this idea over with your players. Make sure that they want all their wealth up front, and that they've got reasons for adventuring other than "to strike it rich". A couple of quick questions; Do you plan on giving them any treasure rewards as they progress from 1-20, or is it just one lump sum up front and that's it? What happens if one player decides to make a new character, due to either death or not liking the character they're playing. How would you handle bringing in a new character, and see to it that their wealth was equal to the rest of the party? Just my :twocents:
PhaedrusXY 12-31-06, 12:10 AM	Sounds hilarious. I say go for it. Most of the concerns you need have been laid out in the previous posts. I will just take a second to disagree with Airos on one point. Don't tell them what you have planned before the first adventure. That would ruin all the fun of seeing their faces when they find "The Horde". :D
BeefotronX 12-31-06, 04:42 AM	I had an idea for something like this a while back, left to gather dust somewhere in my box of campaign ideas. My thesis is that the most likely place to find an unattended Legendary Treasure is the lair of a deceased dragon. It's quite easy to imagine a dragon being killed without anyone knowing where its lair is. If the lair is well hidden enough, the hoard will remain intact for quite some time. A great wyrm would not only have the most humongous hoard, but also be able to hide it extremely well. In order for a low level party to find something like that, maybe someone else actually found the hoard first a long time ago. However, since he was alone and too greedy to let anyone else in on the secret, he was unable to spend more than a small fraction of the hoard, and most of the treasure is still there. The finder could have left clues to the hoard's location somewhere before his death, which the PCs could find. This logic sets a few things up nicely: 1) Being the hoard of a great wyrm, it's going to have several layers of protection, of which the original finder probably only got past a few. This means that even if the PCs control the location, most of the treasure can be inaccessible until higher levels. 2) Whatever the original finder was able to reach, he probably took the most valuable and portable items first, so anything left in those areas will tend to be things like silver pieces and bulky art items, and not very much gold, platinum, gems, or magic items. This would help ensure the first phase of the adventure focuses on figuring out how to move the treasure that's available as well as accessing the rest of it, without handing out lots of easy magical solutions to that problem.