Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 gamefreak180 Aug 31, 2015 15:05:45	ok so I thought it would be best to come here? I am still a newbie dm and i have alot of ideas flowing and I've come to an idea for the premise of a campaign  or atleast get a few adventures out of the idea. So my idea is thus; the party starts off with stopping a ritual in a  City's crypt to raise roughly 1000+ corpses to capture/overthrow the city.  Those that are doing the ritual are cultists of a sect of a cult of vecna. Now when the party stops the ritual one of them finds a piece of parchment that whne they pick it up starts to have words form across it as that is happening a voice is reading the text to the party (think a more sophisticated non screaming howler from harry potter). it roughly says "well done mortals you have not only foiled my plan but have garnerd my attention and ire." now as to who is saying this not sure if it should be a vampire, lich or vecna himself saying this. If it is the vampire or lich then safe to assume that later on the party would be fighting said villain.   Not long after word has spread of the foiled plan a mysterious figure comes to the party saying that his master wishes to aid the party giving them power to fight the cult of vecna in exchange for something. Not sure about the something but the idea would be that this man represents a cult of orcus. so the idea would be depending on how the party reacts they could unwillingly help out a cult of orcus, or now here is the big thing i am needing advice on is then gaining the ire of the orcus cult. This then would  cause two evil cults to have their attention on the party thus causing essentially two major villains/groups that the party will have to tackle to save the day.  would this be overkill?   now if i go this route would it be best to alternate the main villain and if so who should i have be the figurehead of the group i was thinking a lich or vampire for vecna and vampire or death night for orcus?   thoughts? ideas? concerns? advice? any information will be helpfull. and as a whole it will more than likely be an undead focused campaing but if you guys have ideas to spice it up some please let me know.   The party is - lvl 1 scorcerer -lvl1 beat stick or stab master type class (player hasnt picked yet but it will be melee focused with little to no spell casting.)
#2 Macv12 Aug 31, 2015 16:42:17	Could be interesting if the two cults also hate each other. You could have a Romance of the Three Kingdoms scenario where one faction allies with another to win a particular battle, then the defeated faction allies with one of the victors for the next. Might add some extra depth to player decisions, since they potentially have really powerful resources to call on by pitting the cults against each other, but having to be careful with diplomacy, subterfuge, etc. Depends on the players.
#3 Barky Sep 01, 2015 1:14:40	I like campaigns with depth. Two villains with different agendas adds depth, makes things more interesting. Also makes things more complicated, and therefore harder to pull off. I offer up two tidbits:   -- make the two factions significantly different. If one consists of intelligent undead monsters, have the other one consist of warrior-priests and humanoid goons, or a thieves' guild and their sorceror allies. This will keep encounters from getting stale ("well, it's Bob's Campaign night, time to kill more undead :yawn:"). It will also let players use different abilities and stretch different muscles. It will also make it easier to tell which faction is which. -- beware of NPC vs. NPC combat. With multiple factions, there's a temptation to plop the NPCs into the middle of a guild war or something. The DM then spends a lot of time rolling dice for NPCs fighting each other. This bores the players and stalls the game. Make it a "cold war" between factions, where neither side is allowed to directly fight the other, ans are using the players to do their dirty work.   Good luck!
#4 iserith Sep 01, 2015 6:18:10	The *World games introduced me to the idea of Fronts. I'd already been doing it for years, of course, but never in such a formal or organized fashion.    Dungeon World wrote:
#5 gamefreak180 Sep 01, 2015 7:24:05	Thank you guys this helps me out a great deal. It is also good to know that i am roughly on a good track for my idea.
#6 gamefreak180 Sep 01, 2015 10:48:06	ok so one thing i was thinking of is even with overlap have one big difference the vecna cult would have stronger spellcasting while the orcus cult would have stronger melee. another idea taking what Barky said while both would have undead (maybe even bandits and mercs) but the vecna cult would have more humans and more priests/clerics, wizards and rogues.  while orcus would have more fiendish inspired people and will have more paladin oathbreakers, eldritch knights and warlocks. would that help diversify the two?
#7 Yunru Sep 01, 2015 11:01:30	Yes but what will narratively distinguish them?
#8 iserith Sep 01, 2015 11:10:50	gamefreak180 wrote:
#9 gamefreak180 Sep 01, 2015 11:12:30	Yunru wrote: