Campaign Planning - anyone want to help? - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 07, 2014 3:19:38	I'm working on getting a pair of campaigns ready for D&D 5e. One is pretty much golden, and the other I am planning specifically as a delay tactic so that I can take more time getting the "golden" one ready (lots of minis to paint for it). My idea for the campaign that I will run first to buy more time to prep for the other is to use Waterdeep as a sandbox to set the PCs loose in, and I know that at least half the party will be locals. I don't have many ideas for what sort of events to have going on for the PCs to potentially involve themselves in... I orignally thought that my owning pretty much every book or boxed set released that deals with Waterdeep or UnderMountain would be a benefit to getting this campaign ready to run, but now I am just finding myself overwhelmed by having so much information at hand and I don't even know where to start. The only idea I have actually come up with is to have some enemy that the PCs make along the way set them up for serious crimes and establish a conspiracy to have them sentenced to UnderMountain, but I don't want to start the campaign that way because my intent is to show how a dungeon can be a part of an adventure and story without that adventure being "a dungeon crawl" and the story being "the PCs explore and/or clear out the dungeon." Any suggestions for plot hooks that would keep adventurers in and around the city, occasionally dipping in to parts of UnderMountain for reasons beyond "dungeon crawling", and would play up the unique features of Waterdeep would be greatly appreciated... especially if they come along with suggestions as to which of this stack of related products I can crack open to find the relevant setting details they play on. It's been so long since I used a published setting that I think I may have forgotten how to do it, so thanks in advance for any help.
#2 iserith Jul 07, 2014 6:32:22	Wish I could help. I know squat about Waterdeep and generally eschew published settings because canon can often run counter to a "Yes, and..." manner of playing. Every time a player's assumption must be corrected because of canon, I die a little inside. If I were to run something in a published city, I'd give the players a brief list of antagonist organizations they can establish their characters as being in opposition to, then use the actions of those organizations as ways to drive adventure. I'd set it up using the Fronts design of Dungeon World which is game and setting neutral. The moves in each type of Danger can give you loads of ideas to make these organizations do things the PCs can react to. If you have a dungeon location to be explored, tie the organizations the players expressed interest in to it. Then start in the middle of action and see where it goes from there. The key part of running any city-based campaign, in my view, is to keep the action moving. When the players are sitting around in taverns or going shopping, it's time to make something happen. The general moves provided under each Danger in the Front system gives great inspiration for this. It should never be "What do you do?" Rather it should be "This thing happens. What do you do?" Keep them reacting and the level of action and drama high. Good luck.
#3 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 07, 2014 7:04:01	Thanks for the response iserith, I figured you'd be the first to help out. I will definitely check out Fronts. I've read a bit of Dungeon World already and found very useful ideas (my favorite so far being their adventurer's pack and how it dramatically reduces the time spent prepping for a particular adventure). I agree with you about published settings... I am only using one this time around because, well, I have a bunch of products I paid good money for and haven't used yet and I am trying to do as little work on this "stall tactic" campaign as is possible so that I can direct as much of my available prep time as possible towards preparing the other campaign I have in the works, which is actually the inaugural campaign of my group's cooperative home-brew setting. Also, you are absolutely right about keeping the action moving... I know my group, and all but two of them basically freeze up any time they don't have a clear "lead" to follow. I am actually considering changing my mind about the campaign and starting in media res with the party already having been set up by some unknown conspirator(s) and sentenced to UnderMountain, with the goals of escape followed by tracking down said conspirator(s) and getting vengeance/justice - if for no other reason than because I would then already be prepared for the first few sessions, and could use the players' ideas brought out in role-play as to who it was that set them up and why. ...I'll be mulling that over until I've had the chance to ask the group members if they are interested in that kind of a start.
#4 iserith Jul 07, 2014 7:19:37	AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
(Reply to #4) AaronOfBarbaria	iserith wrote:
#6 iserith Jul 07, 2014 10:29:31	AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
#7 The_Jester Jul 07, 2014 15:38:27	I've always wanted to run a plague in Waterdeep. Big cities get dangerous with plagues. It's easy to dismiss plagues as simple problems in D&D with clerics who can just cast remove disease, but there are a very limited number of clerics potent enough to cast the spell. If a disease was highly contagious but had a long incubation time the number of sick people would quickly outnumber the clerics ability to cure. At first things are simple. There's a little illness going around so people need casual labour to replace ill people. Guards and exterminators and the like. Then word of the illness begins to spread and the town needs to be locked down, and new helps is needed to guard the walls or track down people who escaped the quarantine. And people need to protect their buisnesses from looters. Clerics need to be escorted to wealthy and important people who are ill, and there are supplies of mundane curatives that need to be procured. Lots can happen.
#8 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 07, 2014 15:42:21	Definitely something I haven't done with D&D before... and I think I can easily find a way to attach a plague to the same conspiracy that gets the characters sentenced to the dungeon. Thanks for the thought food, Jester.
#9 aaronil Jul 07, 2014 16:42:06	AaronofBarbaria wrote:
(Reply to #9) AaronOfBarbaria	aaronil wrote:
#11 iserith Jul 07, 2014 18:54:19	A plague sounds interesting. If I were to do something like that and had a nice big map, I'd use some plastic overlays and mark off the infected areas by district or zones or whatever and make something of a game of trying to cure with those zones and stop others from spreading. Kind of like Pandemic. Do nothing or do something but not fast enough and it can get out hand fast.
#12 ivstin Jul 07, 2014 19:53:21	iserith wrote:
#13 Kravell Jul 08, 2014 7:33:36	Check out Vornheim (pay what you want): http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/91110/Vornheim-The-Complete-City-Kit?manufacturers_id=2795 It has a variety of ideas, random tables, and interesting ideas for city adventures. I really like God's Chess: This is an extension of the ordinary rules of RPGs that can be used by players and GMs interested in exploring the political machinations among various factions within a city (or continent, or world, if the campaign is played out on that canvas). God’s Chess is played between ordinary sessions of the game, and the results of God’s Chess matches should be reflected by changes in the world of the ordinary game during the next session. 1: Take a map of the city (or continent, or world) and grid it off into an 8-row, 8-column grid – like a chessboard. 2: A player (one who likes to play chess) chooses a faction in the RPG whose interests are more-or-less aligned with his or her PC’s. For example: a player playing Robin Hood might choose The Merry Men, and a player playing a loyal cleric of some god might choose that god’s church. The GM chooses a rival faction (for example, the soldiers of Prince John, or a satanic cult). 3: The GM and player play an ordinary game of chess – on the gridded map or on a normal chessboard. 4: When the game is finished, the two players then note which pieces remain on the board and which square they occupy (with reference to the corresponding squares of territory on the gameworld map). A bishop in a given square means that chess player’s faction has a cleric sympathetic to them in that area. For example... A rook in a given square means that chess player’s faction controls a building in that area. For example Etc.
#14 edwin_su Jul 08, 2014 7:45:13	AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
#15 bawylie Jul 08, 2014 12:31:25	Skip the stall campaign. Run two sessions called "craft day." Have players paint minis, build paper craft, terrain, etc. tease the new campaign during the craft sessions. Ultimate player buy-in.
(Reply to #13) AaronOfBarbaria	Kravell wrote:
#17 Malarky Jul 08, 2014 15:32:53	the recent murder in baulder gate taught me alot about citys.. namly vocal factions, the poor the thieves, the nobels the wealthy and the workers the merchants or police, and how they all want to be in controll.. make a faction give them an ideal and flaw.. have them strut about and offer the pcs jobs that will game them advantage and maybe disatvange another faction.. was a fabulious campaign, have certain areas of the city have 1 faction in controll, slums, nobel gate houses, docks, etc.. they all need to mingle.. its virtual civil war. if your delveing a dungon , do they have a sponser to work for .. who wants somethign in the the dungeon or stop someelse getting it.. do they want to be seen helping clear the dungoen.. for political gain... does the dungeon hide a secret they want hidden so woudl sent a counter force to stop an expidition., are the pcs aligned to a particular factions, do loyalties blur depending whos in command? top of head thoughts.. prefect murder in baulder gate is allmost what you dicribed you wanted - with out the dungeon is all.. if has you initial approched by 2 of the 3 main group to do jabs .. time constraints in travling across the city ment you can only do 1 .. then the 3 factons joins in , you can perhaps keep 2 happy.. but the 3rd one will find out about your involvment eventualy and probably turn hostible on you.. meaning if your in there part of the city you better be good with the other factions you may need them factions for cover.. or be sent to undermountain unsome tumped up charge.. i ment the recnt module not the pc game though the pc game i remeber had you pic a faction i think,.. thieves or guards.. the module did have the factions decend in to there darkersides though.. blackmail, draconian laws, vandalisum, etc.. sorry about the spelling in this post.. its late..
#18 Ksetrat Jul 08, 2014 15:59:31	Ideas for events in town which can lead to interesting events; Local newspaper that has 'odd jobs' around the city and outlying farms. bandits attacking just north of the town on the main road, pack of wolves ruining a farm, shop keeper is losing a lot of inventory and looking for help (probably wouldn't post in the gazette for this, but could ask someone they trusted), local blacksmith is getting married to the butchers daughter join in for drinks and dancing! any of these kind of things have the potential for problems to come up; if you are trying to keep them completely in the town, the wedding would be good. specially if they are friendly with the blacksmith who extended the invite. have the wedding somewhat clash with the schedule of the local archery tournament or something. the group needs to duck out before the party finishes in order to compete. blacksmith murdered at own wedding! heroes to blame! it wouldn't be too hard to have each of the different items tie into the conspiracy, specially if selected items are picked up on the way. hope that helps some! i'm stuck at work still and have to get back to it.
(Reply to #17) AaronOfBarbaria	Malarky wrote:
#20 Prom Jul 09, 2014 5:17:31	I've recently run some adventure sessions in WaterDeep. I had the local fishing trade get into trouble when fishing boats go missing, the party had to talk to the locals and catch a ride on a ship to find out what was causing boats to go missing. A kraken, pirates or an angry sea god might be sinking ship by creating massive storms. I also had farmers livestock going missing, which lead to the discovery of large holes in the fields and a purple worm feeding on the locals on the outer edge of the city. A rip-off idea from the movie Tremors. There's a mountain right next to the city, so volcanic eruptions and earthquakes could keep them busy, might be the result of a Tarrasque trying to wake-up after a long sleep. Godzilla might be an easy steal. I'm a big James bond fan, maybe your players are secret agents undercover, trying to find the leader of a criminal organization with intentions to change the ruling factions in WaterDeep.
#21 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 09, 2014 5:36:31	Many cool ideas, Prom, thanks for posting. I especially like the idea of borrowing from Tremors, as my wife loves those movies (so do I, but it is more relevant that she does since she will be a player, and thus in on the fun parts).
#22 arjomanes Jul 09, 2014 10:38:48	Kravell wrote:
(Reply to #21) bawylie	AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
#24 Prom Jul 11, 2014 6:20:14	AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
#25 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 27, 2014 9:44:04	Thanks again for all the help, everybody. In the last couple of weeks, circumstances have changed quite a lot and I am actually going to be able to skip the stall campaign and launch into a revised and expanded version of the launch-campaign for my group's collaboratively built campaign setting. I am very excitd about it (to the point that I have decided I don't at all care if I start it prior to painting all the minis I wanted to for it - but I did get a friend to agree to help out, so I might actually manage anyways), and have been doing prep-work everywhere that I can. However, I am not wanting to let the ideas generated in this thread go to waste, so I am working out how to incorporate as many of them as I can without it feeling bolted-on, and I could use a bit of help with that if anyone is interested. I have to run off and get myself presentable for a meal with the wife's family, but I will be back sometime later with the rough outline of the campaign and what few ideas for incorporating the ideas generated here I've had. (I meant to type them up now... but it went all wonky and I ran out of time - and figured better to post now and remind folk's this thread even exists.)
#26 DM_HEEGZ Jul 27, 2014 11:11:10	I plan to run the Tyranny of Dragons books as they are published. I will also be running my players through all of the major cities and countries of the Realms to sort of educate them a bit. To do so, I will be stealing the factions and using them for plot hooks to keep my PCs running about. Probably going to rely on the Lords Alliance and focus on the political and mililtary situations as the players run all over fighting battles and trying to influence events. My fall back is to use the Harpers, but they may be more of a side quest faction. For Waterdeep specifically I plan to use various noble houses, religious temples, and the political movers and shakers from my 2ed and 3ed sourcebooks. I also hope to delve into Undermountain at some point, but probably will wait on that until the second adventure is published and the PCs are higher level. There was an article from this summer on WOTC about recent Cult of Dragon activity and plots around Waterdeep which you could use directly as well. You can read it here: http://wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/ftr/20140625 [edit] Just read your last post, lol. I'll leave my comment in case any one else reads it and wants to use it for some urban or Waterdeep based stuff that ties into the Tyranny of Dragons plot.
(Reply to #26) AaronOfBarbaria	DM_HEEGZ wrote:
#28 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 28, 2014 3:07:33	Now, to finally get down to that rough outline I mentioned. Brief bit about the history of the setting Unknown to the world at large, a war between secret societies has been raging on for hundreds of years - one group working to maintain balance (the Order of the Shining Eye), and the other traveling back from the far future in an attempt to unravel all of existence and return the multiverse to the formless chaos they believe it was born from (the Agents of Chaos). Prior campaigns have dealt with some of the moves and countermoves of this secret war, but the current group of PCs will have no knowledge of its existence until they learn of it in play. The setting is heavily inspired by older Final Fantasy videogames, and includes a few select technological advances beyond what D&D settings normally have - specifically steam power and firearms - while still remaining largely medieval and not at all "Wild West" besides.
#29 Danny_Montanny Jul 28, 2014 4:31:11	The plague (some sort mummy rot) has caused it's fallen victims to reanimate under the dragon's control. What will they use their pawns for? How long does it take for the Order to figure out what's really going on? All out zombie carnage, or higher intelligence undead? I would go with the other capitol as it's a port city and we don't want this plague spreading to the rest of the world.
#30 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 28, 2014 5:29:16	Thanks for the input, Danny - you've got me thinking about making a specific type or sub-type of undead that is unique to being a result of this plague. At the very least, adding a zombie-panic scenario could spice up the plague scenario - though the timing is a bit tricky considering that burning the bodies is the obvious way to try to stop the plague from spreading from corpses to the living. Seems like, logically, the plague would either have to seem like it isn't actually contagious (or at least not easily contagious) so that a lot of bodies killed by it are left around the city long enough that a significant number of them can rise as undead all at once, or the plague would have to be a sudden and horrific transformation of some number of people into contagion-propagating undead. I like the sound of that, actually, 1 in 6 people throughout the city are transformed over a single night into undead that create more of their kind by killing the living and seem to want nothing but to make more of their kind, and so the city closes up tight to prevent any of the undead from escaping, but it falls to the PCs to investigate and resolve the situation (one way or the other).
#31 Danny_Montanny Jul 28, 2014 6:18:27	It's breath weapon could be a caustic cloud that kills and infects the victim. In turn their slam attacks could spread a lesser form of the disease. The initial undead that contact could be your higher undead and wouldn't have to be very many. They rise in the wake of the attack and since not all of the dead rise, they'll go unnoticed. They spread through the city and slowly start spreading their disease and increasing their undead minions (regular zombies). Are the disappearances of an increasing number of people enough to warrant the PCs to investigate? Can the regular zombies spread the disease? Do the higher undead have a means to proliferate their kind (some sort of daily attack)? If the PCs fail to stop the plan the zombies are released to rampage when the dragon feels their numbers are enough. Or everyone killed by the dragon could rise all at once. A dragon could easily take out 1/6 of a large city's populous. Any NPC type would turn into the higher undead and the rest would be mindless rampaging zombies under their control. Now you've got an immediate major threat.
#32 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 28, 2014 6:26:15	Wonderful suggestion in regards to the breath weapon being the cause - especially because that explanation makes it super easy to have the plague as a drop-in even that can happen at any time the dragon-mummy is wanting to cause a distraction.
#33 Danny_Montanny Jul 28, 2014 7:05:37	Was the release of the dragons a part of this bluff? Just a distraction so the Cult can further it's plans relatively unopposed? Does the Order know of the bluff and are just biding time for the Cult to make it's mistake? Either way, pop culture references or standard tropes are always fun, regardless if they're side quests or part of the main story.
#34 AaronOfBarbaria Jul 28, 2014 7:50:57	The dragons are not part of the bluff, they are the ones that fell for the bluff. The bluff involves a story about their being this mythical beast that used to show up every 200 years and annihilate an entire culture, then go back into dormancy, and it being just barely defeated and imprisoned by this one wizard (who the tale says was the only survivor of the conflict, despite having assembled an army of over 1,000 to face the beast) - with that wizard then founding an academy that geomantically bolsters the imprisonment spell keeping the beast locked away. The actual truth of the matter is that the Order of the Shining Eye made up that story, faked enough evidence to make it convincing, and then built the academy to look like it enhances an imprisonment spell - but inside the "prison" is one of the most powerful members of the Order of the Shining Eye, being kept alive and fed magical power. This accomplishes two things. The first is to keep the Agents of Chaos attacking a predictable (and high defensible) target. The second is to be sure that when the Agents of Chaos finally succeed at breaking the spell and emptying the "prison" that it will be a resounding defeat for them (because the wizard that they think is "the beast" is a potent necromancer, and thus is the perfect nemsis to the undead dragons that lead the Agents of Chaos).

Post/Author/DateTime

Post

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 07, 2014 3:19:38

I'm working on getting a pair of campaigns ready for D&D 5e. One is pretty much golden, and the other I am planning specifically as a delay tactic so that I can take more time getting the "golden" one ready (lots of minis to paint for it).

My idea for the campaign that I will run first to buy more time to prep for the other is to use Waterdeep as a sandbox to set the PCs loose in, and I know that at least half the party will be locals.

I don't have many ideas for what sort of events to have going on for the PCs to potentially involve themselves in... I orignally thought that my owning pretty much every book or boxed set released that deals with Waterdeep or UnderMountain would be a benefit to getting this campaign ready to run, but now I am just finding myself overwhelmed by having so much information at hand and I don't even know where to start.

The only idea I have actually come up with is to have some enemy that the PCs make along the way set them up for serious crimes and establish a conspiracy to have them sentenced to UnderMountain, but I don't want to start the campaign that way because my intent is to show how a dungeon can be a part of an adventure and story without that adventure being "a dungeon crawl" and the story being "the PCs explore and/or clear out the dungeon."

Any suggestions for plot hooks that would keep adventurers in and around the city, occasionally dipping in to parts of UnderMountain for reasons beyond "dungeon crawling", and would play up the unique features of Waterdeep would be greatly appreciated... especially if they come along with suggestions as to which of this stack of related products I can crack open to find the relevant setting details they play on.

It's been so long since I used a published setting that I think I may have forgotten how to do it, so thanks in advance for any help.

iserith

Jul 07, 2014 6:32:22

Wish I could help. I know squat about Waterdeep and generally eschew published settings because canon can often run counter to a "Yes, and..." manner of playing. Every time a player's assumption must be corrected because of canon, I die a little inside.

If I were to run something in a published city, I'd give the players a brief list of antagonist organizations they can establish their characters as being in opposition to, then use the actions of those organizations as ways to drive adventure. I'd set it up using the Fronts design of Dungeon World which is game and setting neutral. The moves in each type of Danger can give you loads of ideas to make these organizations do things the PCs can react to. If you have a dungeon location to be explored, tie the organizations the players expressed interest in to it. Then start in the middle of action and see where it goes from there.

The key part of running any city-based campaign, in my view, is to keep the action moving. When the players are sitting around in taverns or going shopping, it's time to make something happen. The general moves provided under each Danger in the Front system gives great inspiration for this. It should never be "What do you do?" Rather it should be "This thing happens. What do you do?" Keep them reacting and the level of action and drama high.

Good luck.

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 07, 2014 7:04:01

Thanks for the response iserith, I figured you'd be the first to help out.

I will definitely check out Fronts. I've read a bit of Dungeon World already and found very useful ideas (my favorite so far being their adventurer's pack and how it dramatically reduces the time spent prepping for a particular adventure).

I agree with you about published settings... I am only using one this time around because, well, I have a bunch of products I paid good money for and haven't used yet and I am trying to do as little work on this "stall tactic" campaign as is possible so that I can direct as much of my available prep time as possible towards preparing the other campaign I have in the works, which is actually the inaugural campaign of my group's cooperative home-brew setting.

Also, you are absolutely right about keeping the action moving... I know my group, and all but two of them basically freeze up any time they don't have a clear "lead" to follow.

I am actually considering changing my mind about the campaign and starting in media res with the party already having been set up by some unknown conspirator(s) and sentenced to UnderMountain, with the goals of escape followed by tracking down said conspirator(s) and getting vengeance/justice - if for no other reason than because I would then already be prepared for the first few sessions, and could use the players' ideas brought out in role-play as to who it was that set them up and why.

...I'll be mulling that over until I've had the chance to ask the group members if they are interested in that kind of a start.

iserith

Jul 07, 2014 7:19:37

AaronOfBarbaria wrote:

(Reply to #4)

AaronOfBarbaria

iserith wrote:

iserith

Jul 07, 2014 10:29:31

AaronOfBarbaria wrote:

The_Jester

Jul 07, 2014 15:38:27

I've always wanted to run a plague in Waterdeep.

Big cities get dangerous with plagues. It's easy to dismiss plagues as simple problems in D&D with clerics who can just cast remove disease, but there are a very limited number of clerics potent enough to cast the spell. If a disease was highly contagious but had a long incubation time the number of sick people would quickly outnumber the clerics ability to cure.

At first things are simple. There's a little illness going around so people need casual labour to replace ill people. Guards and exterminators and the like.

Then word of the illness begins to spread and the town needs to be locked down, and new helps is needed to guard the walls or track down people who escaped the quarantine. And people need to protect their buisnesses from looters.

Clerics need to be escorted to wealthy and important people who are ill, and there are supplies of mundane curatives that need to be procured.

Lots can happen.

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 07, 2014 15:42:21

Definitely something I haven't done with D&D before... and I think I can easily find a way to attach a plague to the same conspiracy that gets the characters sentenced to the dungeon.

Thanks for the thought food, Jester.

aaronil

Jul 07, 2014 16:42:06

AaronofBarbaria wrote:

(Reply to #9)

AaronOfBarbaria

aaronil wrote:

#11

iserith

Jul 07, 2014 18:54:19

A plague sounds interesting. If I were to do something like that and had a nice big map, I'd use some plastic overlays and mark off the infected areas by district or zones or whatever and make something of a game of trying to cure with those zones and stop others from spreading. Kind of like Pandemic. Do nothing or do something but not fast enough and it can get out hand fast.

#12

ivstin

Jul 07, 2014 19:53:21

iserith wrote:

#13

Kravell

Jul 08, 2014 7:33:36

Check out Vornheim (pay what you want):

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/91110/Vornheim-The-Complete-City-Kit?manufacturers_id=2795

It has a variety of ideas, random tables, and interesting ideas for city adventures. I really like God's Chess:

This is an extension of the ordinary rules of RPGs that can be used by players and GMs interested in exploring the political machinations among various factions within a city (or continent, or world, if the campaign is played out on that canvas). God’s Chess is played between ordinary sessions of the game, and the results of God’s Chess matches should be reflected by changes in the world of the ordinary game during the next session.

1: Take a map of the city (or continent, or world) and grid it off into an 8-row, 8-column grid – like a chessboard.

2: A player (one who likes to play chess) chooses a faction in the RPG whose interests are more-or-less aligned with his or her PC’s. For example: a player playing Robin Hood might choose The Merry Men, and a player playing a loyal cleric of some god might choose that god’s church. The GM chooses a rival faction (for example, the soldiers of Prince John, or a satanic cult).

3: The GM and player play an ordinary game of chess – on the gridded map or on a normal chessboard.

4: When the game is finished, the two players then note which pieces remain on the board and which square they occupy (with reference to the corresponding squares of territory on the gameworld map).

A bishop in a given square means that chess player’s faction has a cleric sympathetic to them in that area. For example...

A rook in a given square means that chess player’s faction controls a building in that area. For example

Etc.

#14

edwin_su

Jul 08, 2014 7:45:13

AaronOfBarbaria wrote:

#15

bawylie

Jul 08, 2014 12:31:25

Skip the stall campaign.

Run two sessions called "craft day." Have players paint minis, build paper craft, terrain, etc.

tease the new campaign during the craft sessions.

Ultimate player buy-in.

(Reply to #13)

AaronOfBarbaria

Kravell wrote:

#17

Malarky

Jul 08, 2014 15:32:53

the recent murder in baulder gate taught me alot about citys.. namly vocal factions, the poor the thieves, the nobels the wealthy and the workers the merchants or police, and how they all want to be in controll..

make a faction give them an ideal and flaw.. have them strut about and offer the pcs jobs that will game them advantage and maybe disatvange another faction.. was a fabulious campaign,

have certain areas of the city have 1 faction in controll, slums, nobel gate houses, docks, etc.. they all need to mingle.. its virtual civil war.

if your delveing a dungon , do they have a sponser to work for .. who wants somethign in the the dungeon or stop someelse getting it.. do they want to be seen helping clear the dungoen.. for political gain... does the dungeon hide a secret they want hidden so woudl sent a counter force to stop an expidition.,

are the pcs aligned to a particular factions, do loyalties blur depending whos in command?

top of head thoughts..

prefect murder in baulder gate is allmost what you dicribed you wanted - with out the dungeon is all..

if has you initial approched by 2 of the 3 main group to do jabs .. time constraints in travling across the city ment you can only do 1 ..

then the 3 factons joins in , you can perhaps keep 2 happy.. but the 3rd one will find out about your involvment eventualy and probably turn hostible on you.. meaning if your in there part of the city you better be good with the other factions you may need them factions for cover..

or be sent to undermountain unsome tumped up charge..

i ment the recnt module not the pc game though the pc game i remeber had you pic a faction i think,.. thieves or guards..

the module did have the factions decend in to there darkersides though.. blackmail, draconian laws, vandalisum, etc..

sorry about the spelling in this post.. its late..

#18

Ksetrat

Jul 08, 2014 15:59:31

Ideas for events in town which can lead to interesting events;

Local newspaper that has 'odd jobs' around the city and outlying farms. bandits attacking just north of the town on the main road, pack of wolves ruining a farm, shop keeper is losing a lot of inventory and looking for help (probably wouldn't post in the gazette for this, but could ask someone they trusted), local blacksmith is getting married to the butchers daughter join in for drinks and dancing!

any of these kind of things have the potential for problems to come up; if you are trying to keep them completely in the town, the wedding would be good. specially if they are friendly with the blacksmith who extended the invite. have the wedding somewhat clash with the schedule of the local archery tournament or something. the group needs to duck out before the party finishes in order to compete.

blacksmith murdered at own wedding! heroes to blame!

it wouldn't be too hard to have each of the different items tie into the conspiracy, specially if selected items are picked up on the way.

hope that helps some! i'm stuck at work still and have to get back to it.

(Reply to #17)

AaronOfBarbaria

Malarky wrote:

#20

Prom

Jul 09, 2014 5:17:31

I've recently run some adventure sessions in WaterDeep. I had the local fishing trade get into trouble when fishing boats go missing, the party had to talk to the locals and catch a ride on a ship to find out what was causing boats to go missing. A kraken, pirates or an angry sea god might be sinking ship by creating massive storms. I also had farmers livestock going missing, which lead to the discovery of large holes in the fields and a purple worm feeding on the locals on the outer edge of the city. A rip-off idea from the movie Tremors. There's a mountain right next to the city, so volcanic eruptions and earthquakes could keep them busy, might be the result of a Tarrasque trying to wake-up after a long sleep. Godzilla might be an easy steal.

I'm a big James bond fan, maybe your players are secret agents undercover, trying to find the leader of a criminal organization with intentions to change the ruling factions in WaterDeep.

#21

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 09, 2014 5:36:31

Many cool ideas, Prom, thanks for posting.

I especially like the idea of borrowing from Tremors, as my wife loves those movies (so do I, but it is more relevant that she does since she will be a player, and thus in on the fun parts).

#22

arjomanes

Jul 09, 2014 10:38:48

Kravell wrote:

(Reply to #21)

bawylie

AaronOfBarbaria wrote:

#24

Prom

Jul 11, 2014 6:20:14

AaronOfBarbaria wrote:

#25

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 27, 2014 9:44:04

Thanks again for all the help, everybody.

In the last couple of weeks, circumstances have changed quite a lot and I am actually going to be able to skip the stall campaign and launch into a revised and expanded version of the launch-campaign for my group's collaboratively built campaign setting.

I am very excitd about it (to the point that I have decided I don't at all care if I start it prior to painting all the minis I wanted to for it - but I did get a friend to agree to help out, so I might actually manage anyways), and have been doing prep-work everywhere that I can.

However, I am not wanting to let the ideas generated in this thread go to waste, so I am working out how to incorporate as many of them as I can without it feeling bolted-on, and I could use a bit of help with that if anyone is interested.

I have to run off and get myself presentable for a meal with the wife's family, but I will be back sometime later with the rough outline of the campaign and what few ideas for incorporating the ideas generated here I've had. (I meant to type them up now... but it went all wonky and I ran out of time - and figured better to post now and remind folk's this thread even exists.)

#26

DM_HEEGZ

Jul 27, 2014 11:11:10

I plan to run the Tyranny of Dragons books as they are published. I will also be running my players through all of the major cities and countries of the Realms to sort of educate them a bit. To do so, I will be stealing the factions and using them for plot hooks to keep my PCs running about. Probably going to rely on the Lords Alliance and focus on the political and mililtary situations as the players run all over fighting battles and trying to influence events. My fall back is to use the Harpers, but they may be more of a side quest faction.

For Waterdeep specifically I plan to use various noble houses, religious temples, and the political movers and shakers from my 2ed and 3ed sourcebooks. I also hope to delve into Undermountain at some point, but probably will wait on that until the second adventure is published and the PCs are higher level. There was an article from this summer on WOTC about recent Cult of Dragon activity and plots around Waterdeep which you could use directly as well. You can read it here:

http://wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/ftr/20140625

[edit]

Just read your last post, lol. I'll leave my comment in case any one else reads it and wants to use it for some urban or Waterdeep based stuff that ties into the Tyranny of Dragons plot.

(Reply to #26)

AaronOfBarbaria

DM_HEEGZ wrote:

#28

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 28, 2014 3:07:33

Now, to finally get down to that rough outline I mentioned.

Brief bit about the history of the setting

Unknown to the world at large, a war between secret societies has been raging on for hundreds of years - one group working to maintain balance (the Order of the Shining Eye), and the other traveling back from the far future in an attempt to unravel all of existence and return the multiverse to the formless chaos they believe it was born from (the Agents of Chaos).

Prior campaigns have dealt with some of the moves and countermoves of this secret war, but the current group of PCs will have no knowledge of its existence until they learn of it in play.

The setting is heavily inspired by older Final Fantasy videogames, and includes a few select technological advances beyond what D&D settings normally have - specifically steam power and firearms - while still remaining largely medieval and not at all "Wild West" besides.

#29

Danny_Montanny

Jul 28, 2014 4:31:11

The plague (some sort mummy rot) has caused it's fallen victims to reanimate under the dragon's control. What will they use their pawns for? How long does it take for the Order to figure out what's really going on? All out zombie carnage, or higher intelligence undead? I would go with the other capitol as it's a port city and we don't want this plague spreading to the rest of the world.

#30

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 28, 2014 5:29:16

Thanks for the input, Danny - you've got me thinking about making a specific type or sub-type of undead that is unique to being a result of this plague.

At the very least, adding a zombie-panic scenario could spice up the plague scenario - though the timing is a bit tricky considering that burning the bodies is the obvious way to try to stop the plague from spreading from corpses to the living.

Seems like, logically, the plague would either have to seem like it isn't actually contagious (or at least not easily contagious) so that a lot of bodies killed by it are left around the city long enough that a significant number of them can rise as undead all at once, or the plague would have to be a sudden and horrific transformation of some number of people into contagion-propagating undead.

I like the sound of that, actually, 1 in 6 people throughout the city are transformed over a single night into undead that create more of their kind by killing the living and seem to want nothing but to make more of their kind, and so the city closes up tight to prevent any of the undead from escaping, but it falls to the PCs to investigate and resolve the situation (one way or the other).

#31

Danny_Montanny

Jul 28, 2014 6:18:27

It's breath weapon could be a caustic cloud that kills and infects the victim. In turn their slam attacks could spread a lesser form of the disease. The initial undead that contact could be your higher undead and wouldn't have to be very many. They rise in the wake of the attack and since not all of the dead rise, they'll go unnoticed. They spread through the city and slowly start spreading their disease and increasing their undead minions (regular zombies). Are the disappearances of an increasing number of people enough to warrant the PCs to investigate? Can the regular zombies spread the disease? Do the higher undead have a means to proliferate their kind (some sort of daily attack)? If the PCs fail to stop the plan the zombies are released to rampage when the dragon feels their numbers are enough.

Or everyone killed by the dragon could rise all at once. A dragon could easily take out 1/6 of a large city's populous. Any NPC type would turn into the higher undead and the rest would be mindless rampaging zombies under their control. Now you've got an immediate major threat.

#32

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 28, 2014 6:26:15

Wonderful suggestion in regards to the breath weapon being the cause - especially because that explanation makes it super easy to have the plague as a drop-in even that can happen at any time the dragon-mummy is wanting to cause a distraction.

#33

Danny_Montanny

Jul 28, 2014 7:05:37

Was the release of the dragons a part of this bluff? Just a distraction so the Cult can further it's plans relatively unopposed? Does the Order know of the bluff and are just biding time for the Cult to make it's mistake? Either way, pop culture references or standard tropes are always fun, regardless if they're side quests or part of the main story.

#34

AaronOfBarbaria

Jul 28, 2014 7:50:57

The dragons are not part of the bluff, they are the ones that fell for the bluff.

The bluff involves a story about their being this mythical beast that used to show up every 200 years and annihilate an entire culture, then go back into dormancy, and it being just barely defeated and imprisoned by this one wizard (who the tale says was the only survivor of the conflict, despite having assembled an army of over 1,000 to face the beast) - with that wizard then founding an academy that geomantically bolsters the imprisonment spell keeping the beast locked away.

The actual truth of the matter is that the Order of the Shining Eye made up that story, faked enough evidence to make it convincing, and then built the academy to look like it enhances an imprisonment spell - but inside the "prison" is one of the most powerful members of the Order of the Shining Eye, being kept alive and fed magical power. This accomplishes two things. The first is to keep the Agents of Chaos attacking a predictable (and high defensible) target. The second is to be sure that when the Agents of Chaos finally succeed at breaking the spell and emptying the "prison" that it will be a resounding defeat for them (because the wizard that they think is "the beast" is a potent necromancer, and thus is the perfect nemsis to the undead dragons that lead the Agents of Chaos).