So I want to start a campaign with party sitting in tavern (I love the old school to it). Then suddenly half the people drop dead. And as they go outside the tavern they find the same results, half the folks, randomly are dead. I need a hook on what would cause this to happen. I can fill in the details, but am stump on who and why they would cause this. The world would go up in anarchy. Because various leaders would die as well.
If I have the gods turn their back on the world, would clerics lose all their spells?
If half the people disappeared what would happen in a D&D setting such as Faerun, Greyhawk?
Now let's say the 50% who disappeared were good people
Because the Avengers just dealt with this scenario on a universal scale, it feels forced to see it apply to faerun for a different reason. There really is no good reason to eliminate 50% of the population randomly, except for dealing with at least perceived overpopulation. The other possible scenario, and this would apply to your "good people" variable, is maybe some deity raptured just the souls of his faithful. I think that latter scenario works best if you localize the effect. Maybe some community heavily worships Corellon, and one day Corellon decides to call his faithful in that region to a paradise prepared for them.
Snicker.. Simple Thanos did it.. yup that one.. it may be that a portal was open to another Verse of the Multiverse.. and leaked in. If you want them to fix-it they may need to reopen that same portal at the right time.
P.S. And it may be that the one who opened the portal Died.
So I was working on an apocalypse novel and here's what happened in the story:
Aliens sent meteors to earth to basically bug bomb it with a particular infectant that would kill all humans. That way they could come harvest the planet's resources. The vector here was a flesh eating yeast that would consume a body, and then when it had no food, die itself leaving no real trace (except for an alcohol smelling residue). Maybe something similar is at work here? Some kind of infection that only impacts half the world's "humanoid" population? Maybe it's a precursor for something like Mind Flayers to come in and kill and enslave everyone?
The king's mages experimented with a method to make magic more powerful. They found a way to siphon energy from the ethereal plane through pores in space. The experiment backfired, and in a chain reaction energy from the ethereal plane randomly "poked" through pores all throughout the world. Anyone unfortunate enough to be hit by one is killed.
The event might also be centered around where the experiment was conducted. Where our heroes partied, only half of people died, but close to the mages it might be everyone... while at the far ends of the continent there might be little damage. This creates a power vacuum that might lead to an invasion.
You could even make it more visual, with the dead people being impaled on spikes of energy.
I would first ask the question: Is the party just lucky to be outside the 50% or is there some in-story reason they all survived? (That is assuming they all survived. I could be wrong, but that doesn't seem like fun to have players randomly just die.)
That would be some really special luck if it was just luck, but in the latter situation, that means it's not really random and you can explore the patterns in the party dynamics to come up with a reason and a purpose for specific exclusions around the plane.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider. My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong. I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲 “It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
What if it was just humans?? Would other races gather to take over their lands? Which race or races? Would the elves and dwarves help to prevent that if such race was orcs or goblinoids?
I like that thought. No I would not just kill off a party member day one.
Dude.
You totally kill of a PC on Day One. You get one player you're able to talk to. You plot. The two of you make their character. You maybe even include that character in the art you commission for the campaign. You give the party a good hour to RP, get through the "Get to know you". Then you ask them to roll SOMEthing and you do "Follow up" rolls until your "mark" either wins or loses out of the party.
Dead.
That's it. Just dead. Let the party process it. Let the other 3 players go "oh crap.. this is real... soandso just DIED in session 1". Your partner will be (usually) okay with missing out on a few minutes of a session while the party has a chance to meet the "real" character played by the player (another survivor).
Trust me, if you can get a player to buy in with you to have fun with the rest of the party, everyone wins. I did this with my party when "the domain of dread" was pulling at all their dark fears. One player agreed to play a shadow version of her character and together we pulled a third player into a real serious moral quandary. And we could kill the shadow version of the PC without actually killing the PC but because Molly was playing the part of the shadow the whole scene was the more real.
VRGtR discusses some of the genres of Horror, this would definitely fit the Disaster Horror Genre
I guess an important question is do you want this cataclysm to just be the environment that the adventures take place in or something that the adventurers can actually do something about
“It cannot be seen, cannot be felt, Cannot be heard, cannot be smelt, It lies behind stars and under hills, And empty holes it fills, It comes first and follows after, Ends life, kills laughter.” J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
Instead of "half the populace", maybe a specific race or hybrid combination would be more appropriate. Also some of the effects of this would be pretty intense. Leaders of said race/hybrid would leave a power vacuum, affluent people have estates to ransack and companies to acquire without their presence, supply lines could be very effected, certain industries might be monopolized by the race (Dwarves and smithing for example).
Some things to consider: Obviously depending on party race make-up, you'll want to avoid their chosen races, but a family member or closely friended NPCs would effect the group directly. Or to add more intrigue, make it a race/hybrid that a party member is but it doesn't effect them mysteriously. Character story arc ensues.
Also, you can pick an effect you'd like to create (City is run by a man/woman of effected race, party is hired to help create order until a vote happens, while investigating the candidates and their motives).
Keep it regional. So if half the populace dies, make it in just a particular area.
Just some ideas, as what you've proposed, and some of the particulars I've listed above might be something I implement in my own campaign. Good luck!
If I have the gods turn their back on the world, would clerics lose all their spells?
This is the third time I've referenced the Avatar Trilogy on this forum recently. I'm very sorry to all for that.
In those books, divine magic only worked within a mile of a deity's avatar for a while. In that way, clerics might also learn that they were physically close to their god. It was interesting.
I came here to send the same thing as LanternNoir. I was the "plant" player with our DM in our last campaign and would love to be the sacrificial character in this scenario. Spending all the get to know each other time, roleplaying, etc will give this action in world weight. Then your player's new character will be a plot hook to move the story forward.
I would first ask the question: Is the party just lucky to be outside the 50% or is there some in-story reason they all survived? (That is assuming they all survived. I could be wrong, but that doesn't seem like fun to have players randomly just die.)
That would be some really special luck if it was just luck, but in the latter situation, that means it's not really random and you can explore the patterns in the party dynamics to come up with a reason and a purpose for specific exclusions around the plane.
Hmm, also depends on whether they were already a (complete) party before the event.
If the PCs already formed a party and all of that party survived, then it really is lucky or perhaps by design that they were unaffected by the event.
Alternatively they might all be strangers in a pub. There was no "party" before the event. Once half of the people in the pub died, some of the survivors banded together. This forms the party.
Or maybe the PCs were part of a larger party (group of friends/colleagues) who were spending downtime at the pub, and some of them (played as NPCs in the first session) died. In this case the party is affected by the event. They lost some friends, and the survivors continued to stick together.
how the party survived (plot armour) is largely irrelevant here - the big question is where does the story go from there? What do you have planned for the party once half the world has died? Is it an ongoing thing, where people just keep dying on the streets? Does the party have to fix the event, or go back in time, or do they just get on with things in this new, less populated world?
If the party is not doing anything further involving this sudden death wave, then "why" can simply be "nobody knows". Let the players form some theories, and then pick whichever one you like and start working with that.
potential random ideas for you:
Half the population just vanished, at random. They can still be seen in mirrors, however, and they can see you in mirrors - to them, the other half of the population vanished. Party may need to find a way to stitch the two halves of the world back together into one frame.
Half the population died at random. Everywhere they go, the story is the same - until they notice that it's always a day or two ago, everywhere they go. They realise that they are somehow causing the deaths, within a radius of themselves, and have to break the curse.
A God and a Devil (or Demon, I forget which fits here) have amassed two armies to fight for them, and these souls have left their bodies behind. The bodies don't decay, and as each warrior "dies" in the war, their soul is returned to them. The party needs to find out how to get to the war, pick a side to win (perhaps the stakes are everyone's souls) and then fight it.
A hive mind which was more powerful than anyone suspected has been slain, and with it half the people of the world have simply fallen dead - turns out, the hivemind was a god-like being which protected the world from >insert threat here<. Bonus points if the threat is highly chaotic, and requires utter cohesion and timing to keep it back (the likes of which a planet-spanning hivemind would have). Further bonus points if the party kills the hive-mind.
Go religious/spiritual. Perhaps in your world, there is a great room filled with candles in the land of the gods which each represent the life of a person. In one fell swoop, some evil being has filled half the room with darkness, snuffing out the candles of half the world. Now the party needs to track them down, only to be held to ransom as the evil one pulls out >party size< candles, still burning, and the party realises he has their souls in his hand. This is a good time to conspire to kill a party member, for emphasis - if the player agrees!
Thanks for all the input and awesome ideas. At first I was picturing the party not knowing one another but in the same place when it happened. But the idea of LanternNoir and InguzNT of snuffing a player out on day one or day 2 is awesome. Will add drama.
To ThorukDuckSlayer, yes what is the hook for the party? to solve the mystery or to take advantage of the chaos that will ensue. I was planning on being ready for both avenues.
Also loved the mirror idea and the curse of the party.
Appreciate the thoughts guys, now it is time to start laying it out.
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So I want to start a campaign with party sitting in tavern (I love the old school to it). Then suddenly half the people drop dead. And as they go outside the tavern they find the same results, half the folks, randomly are dead. I need a hook on what would cause this to happen. I can fill in the details, but am stump on who and why they would cause this. The world would go up in anarchy. Because various leaders would die as well.
If I have the gods turn their back on the world, would clerics lose all their spells?
If half the people disappeared what would happen in a D&D setting such as Faerun, Greyhawk?
Now let's say the 50% who disappeared were good people
Some bigbaddy snapped his fingers. IMO, you should define 'folks' though...humans, humanoids, just player races, everything with INT>X?
I personally don't think the world would go up in anarchy...it would definitely be a mess but you will have lost half of the idiots too.
Guide to the Five Factions (PWYW)
Deck of Decks
Because the Avengers just dealt with this scenario on a universal scale, it feels forced to see it apply to faerun for a different reason. There really is no good reason to eliminate 50% of the population randomly, except for dealing with at least perceived overpopulation. The other possible scenario, and this would apply to your "good people" variable, is maybe some deity raptured just the souls of his faithful. I think that latter scenario works best if you localize the effect. Maybe some community heavily worships Corellon, and one day Corellon decides to call his faithful in that region to a paradise prepared for them.
Snicker.. Simple Thanos did it.. yup that one.. it may be that a portal was open to another Verse of the Multiverse.. and leaked in.
If you want them to fix-it they may need to reopen that same portal at the right time.
P.S. And it may be that the one who opened the portal Died.
Itinerant Deputy Shire-reave Tomas Burrfoot - world walker, Raft-captain, speaker to his dead
Toddy Shelfungus- Rider of the Order of Ill Luck, Speaker to Friends of Friends, and Horribly big nosed
Jarl Archi of Jenisis Glade Fee- Noble Knight of the Dragonborn Goldcrest Clan, Sorcerer of the Noble Investigator;y; Knightly order of the Wolfhound
So I was working on an apocalypse novel and here's what happened in the story:
Aliens sent meteors to earth to basically bug bomb it with a particular infectant that would kill all humans. That way they could come harvest the planet's resources. The vector here was a flesh eating yeast that would consume a body, and then when it had no food, die itself leaving no real trace (except for an alcohol smelling residue). Maybe something similar is at work here? Some kind of infection that only impacts half the world's "humanoid" population? Maybe it's a precursor for something like Mind Flayers to come in and kill and enslave everyone?
"Teller of tales, dreamer of dreams"
Tips, Tricks, Maps: Lantern Noir Presents
**Streams hosted at at twitch.tv/LaternNoir
The king's mages experimented with a method to make magic more powerful. They found a way to siphon energy from the ethereal plane through pores in space. The experiment backfired, and in a chain reaction energy from the ethereal plane randomly "poked" through pores all throughout the world. Anyone unfortunate enough to be hit by one is killed.
The event might also be centered around where the experiment was conducted. Where our heroes partied, only half of people died, but close to the mages it might be everyone... while at the far ends of the continent there might be little damage. This creates a power vacuum that might lead to an invasion.
You could even make it more visual, with the dead people being impaled on spikes of energy.
I would first ask the question: Is the party just lucky to be outside the 50% or is there some in-story reason they all survived? (That is assuming they all survived. I could be wrong, but that doesn't seem like fun to have players randomly just die.)
That would be some really special luck if it was just luck, but in the latter situation, that means it's not really random and you can explore the patterns in the party dynamics to come up with a reason and a purpose for specific exclusions around the plane.
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider.
My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong.
I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲
“It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
I like that thought. No I would not just kill off a party member day one.
What if it was just humans?? Would other races gather to take over their lands? Which race or races? Would the elves and dwarves help to prevent that if such race was orcs or goblinoids?
Dude.
You totally kill of a PC on Day One. You get one player you're able to talk to. You plot. The two of you make their character. You maybe even include that character in the art you commission for the campaign. You give the party a good hour to RP, get through the "Get to know you". Then you ask them to roll SOMEthing and you do "Follow up" rolls until your "mark" either wins or loses out of the party.
Dead.
That's it. Just dead. Let the party process it. Let the other 3 players go "oh crap.. this is real... soandso just DIED in session 1". Your partner will be (usually) okay with missing out on a few minutes of a session while the party has a chance to meet the "real" character played by the player (another survivor).
Trust me, if you can get a player to buy in with you to have fun with the rest of the party, everyone wins. I did this with my party when "the domain of dread" was pulling at all their dark fears. One player agreed to play a shadow version of her character and together we pulled a third player into a real serious moral quandary. And we could kill the shadow version of the PC without actually killing the PC but because Molly was playing the part of the shadow the whole scene was the more real.
"Teller of tales, dreamer of dreams"
Tips, Tricks, Maps: Lantern Noir Presents
**Streams hosted at at twitch.tv/LaternNoir
VRGtR discusses some of the genres of Horror, this would definitely fit the Disaster Horror Genre
I guess an important question is do you want this cataclysm to just be the environment that the adventures take place in or something that the adventurers can actually do something about
“It cannot be seen, cannot be felt, Cannot be heard, cannot be smelt, It lies behind stars and under hills, And empty holes it fills, It comes first and follows after, Ends life, kills laughter.” J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
Instead of "half the populace", maybe a specific race or hybrid combination would be more appropriate. Also some of the effects of this would be pretty intense. Leaders of said race/hybrid would leave a power vacuum, affluent people have estates to ransack and companies to acquire without their presence, supply lines could be very effected, certain industries might be monopolized by the race (Dwarves and smithing for example).
Some things to consider:
Obviously depending on party race make-up, you'll want to avoid their chosen races, but a family member or closely friended NPCs would effect the group directly. Or to add more intrigue, make it a race/hybrid that a party member is but it doesn't effect them mysteriously. Character story arc ensues.
Also, you can pick an effect you'd like to create (City is run by a man/woman of effected race, party is hired to help create order until a vote happens, while investigating the candidates and their motives).
Keep it regional. So if half the populace dies, make it in just a particular area.
Just some ideas, as what you've proposed, and some of the particulars I've listed above might be something I implement in my own campaign. Good luck!
This is the third time I've referenced the Avatar Trilogy on this forum recently. I'm very sorry to all for that.
In those books, divine magic only worked within a mile of a deity's avatar for a while. In that way, clerics might also learn that they were physically close to their god. It was interesting.
Perhaps AO wants to weaken the gods.
I came here to send the same thing as LanternNoir. I was the "plant" player with our DM in our last campaign and would love to be the sacrificial character in this scenario. Spending all the get to know each other time, roleplaying, etc will give this action in world weight. Then your player's new character will be a plot hook to move the story forward.
Hmm, also depends on whether they were already a (complete) party before the event.
how the party survived (plot armour) is largely irrelevant here - the big question is where does the story go from there? What do you have planned for the party once half the world has died? Is it an ongoing thing, where people just keep dying on the streets? Does the party have to fix the event, or go back in time, or do they just get on with things in this new, less populated world?
If the party is not doing anything further involving this sudden death wave, then "why" can simply be "nobody knows". Let the players form some theories, and then pick whichever one you like and start working with that.
potential random ideas for you:
Have fun!
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Thanks for all the input and awesome ideas. At first I was picturing the party not knowing one another but in the same place when it happened. But the idea of LanternNoir and InguzNT of snuffing a player out on day one or day 2 is awesome. Will add drama.
To ThorukDuckSlayer, yes what is the hook for the party? to solve the mystery or to take advantage of the chaos that will ensue. I was planning on being ready for both avenues.
Also loved the mirror idea and the curse of the party.
Appreciate the thoughts guys, now it is time to start laying it out.