I've tried searching the forums and didn't find anything that seems to match, so my apologies if a similar question has been answered before and I just lack the keywords to find it.
My players are in a self created world. Currently they believe it to be a standard medieval setting with some minor steampunk elements. The world is actually post-apocalyptic, however; I don't want them to realize that ... yet (It one of the big plot twists). Question is how to I describe a ruined modern city to the Characters without giving the game away to the players?
My Best effort so far has been:
"You clear the ridge and before you stretches the ancient ruins you have been seeking. A gridded network of once towering stone and metal obelisks that lay in a crumbling heap. Here and there you see a few barely standing survivors leaning and laying akimbo across their fallen brethren." You can make our sunlight passing through a few vaguely rectangular openings, a way in perhaps?"
I worried it might be giving too much away and would appreciate any feedback or opinions.
I've recently finished watching Lost. A bit of advice - don't go out of your way to mislead them, it can cause frustration and resentment. At least, not if they know that there is a mystery to be solved. If it's intended to be a compete surprise, then that's less of an issue.
I'd emphasise that this "ancient" civilisation had quite a different architecture. Perhaps talk about how the structures seem to be held up as if by magic (referencing the particularly strong materials and techniques etc used in their construction that allow otherwise impossible buildings). I'd avoid referencing the actual materials (metal, etc), as that would be a heavy clue that they're futuristic, and not magical or ancient - metal in most medieval fantasies wouldn't have been moved in high enough quantities to make cities out of. A medieval peasant would be so awe-inspired by the height of our impossibly tall buildings that they wouldn't think to look at the materials used.
Otherwise, I think it works great.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
You may want to avoid terms that imply unnatural regularity. Rather than 'gridded', perhaps describe the ruins as 'densely packed' or 'nested close to each other', because the moment you say 'grid', there's a lot of bells that go off in somebody's mind. Similarly with things like 'rectangular opening'. You can imply that instead without saying it, using lines like "even after uncounted eons, the entrance is still almost jarringly angular, with sharp corners lingering in its ruined, ragged shape". if the characters deliberately investigate these things you can start laying it out - if they start surveying the ruins and drawing up maps you can perhaps have them notice that building placement seems oddly regular, but you can also lean into the motions of eons. A city won't stay nicely gridded after a few thousand years of wear and tear and also globe-spanning catastrophe.
Heh, the first rule of camouflage is 'break up the outline'. It's the same thing when you're trying to camouflage ideas with your words - make sure the thing you're describing is accurate, but not described in the same way anyone else would describe the thing. Don't describe doors or windows - describe odd perforations in the ancient shells of these bizarre structures, too regular to be accidental but too numerous to allow for adequate defense. Don't describe concrete and construction steel - despite an odd, crumbling off-greyish stone, of a sort no one in the party has ever seen before, that seems to be bizarrely ubiquitous and a patina of rust covering everything in sight, especially dense around narrow cavities in the ancient stone. Describe details nobody would know or care about when describing a modern-day city or building - perhaps mention the deep slits between these ancient constructions where water has worn away the ground, or describe the way lichen and clinging vines crawl in odd, angling patterns up the flanks of the aged stone.
Actively go out of your way to avoid using short descriptors. Everything should be at least three adjectives long. In a way, you should be intentionally trying to sound like you're struggling to come up with proper descriptions for this stuff, like it's so weird and abnormal that the right words are hard to find. That will help sell the alien-ness of the idea and seed your players' minds with the idea that this stuff is weird.
And, frankly? They may see through it anyways, especially if you have a particularly perceptive player. But even if they do, they may well appreciate the effort you went to in order to try and disguise the idea.
Debating whether the gymnastics of a "Planet of the Apes" are worth it aside (me, I let the players in on the "joke" early, but each their own) you're neglecting the shroud of reclamation with which nature can (to follow up on Yuriel) break the lines. Look at some of the Art Direction for Horizon Zero Dawn, and there are plenty of as good if not better art books out there where the artist imagines what "our world" would look like millennia after we've passed. I mean, it's bad editing in "reality" but in the Robotech saga the remains of the Battle of Monument City are basically three tall plateau type formations under which are buried the SDF-1 SDF-2 and I think Khyron's ship (maybe to bury the radiation from their destruction? I really don't remember but I think the McKinley novels tried to explain it). Planet of the 'Apes, the statue of liberty (which in our world is on an island) was jutting out of a coastline. Don't discount erosion, tectonic events, and the shear fact most modern building materials actually aren't build to last too far into the great beyond to level your playing field, and jut out a fragment to the party as you want to drop puzzle pieces. Even Ozymandias was found in fragments, and he thought he would be eternal.
Just to touch on the "should" debate once more, you do have to ask "what's the pay off" of withholding this from the players? Like is determining "when" the game is set really going to matter to the character's objectives or is it just a "far out" moment and the irony is only something you're holding back to gift the players when they've "earned it." In-game mysteries are one thing, but mysteries that really only the players will appreciate and the characters are stuck with ironically distant, I dunno, I think it's more fun to have players in on the joke very early on. Having a joke only you're in on, not so much.
A piece of architecture based on the Luxor Casino complex and fragments of the Vegas strip is an important locale to my game, the players know darned well what it is, but to the characters it's just the "Duned Pyramid of Abandominion" with The Resistance largely based out of a tiered stone structure the players know to be a parking structure.
Edit: one last note, if you do "string them along" you run the risk of some players who really lean into the visual side of their imagination being very disappointed or perhaps having some significant cognitive dissonance between their vision up to the reveal contra to the appreciation you're hoping for.
I experienced this very reveal, in a D&D game, not that long ago! Like Yurei said, I think the key is to continue using the same fantasy language to describe it. There are no highways, there are stilled rivers of hardened magma. No apartment complexes, only stark fortresses with what must have been hundreds of cannons or ballistas aimed through their walls, that have been removed or destroyed by time.
You probably also ought to assume it won't be as mind boggling as you hope. It's possible your players will recognize it right away, so the fun of it needs to be, probably about 50% or so, in the exploration. Like what's interesting about this setup? I'd say it's largely in discovering just how little of our modern way of life would be salvageable; at least in a strictly narrative context it would be, but realistically your players will probably be more interested in whether they can find junk from the old world and use it. And guarantee that they're going to be looking for guns. Try to reimagine objects as having some alternative medieval fantasy usage, so you can maintain that everything is ruined while not having to fully deny them finding any loot. Like maybe there's a busted up flatscreen TV -- er, a damaged onyx plaque seemingly filled with shriveled, petrified guts, as though it were an animal once -- that glows in the presence of magic. (What strange barbarians these folk must have been, not to even do taxidermy on their trophies before mounting them!) I'm sure you've already come up with some of these. They should probably be the focus of your prep.
We'd all love to be able to craft that AHA moment where weeks of clues and hints all fall into place and suddenly make sense. This kind of thing happens in novels all the time after all.
But D&D is not a novel. The PCs can interact with the world and ask questions about it - and if you make the scene compelling, they will. You are very quickly put into the position where you either have to intentionally mislead the players or fess up and ruin your surprise moment, and I agree that misleading is not a great technique.
Be ready for the possibility that they figure it out immediately, and don't let that bum you out. All it really does is pull the players into the storyline. Now they get to look at modern ruins through their characters' eyes. They get to play along with the scenario and you can still have the reveal to the characters later. Their input may very well make the setting even better.
So after reading all the responses I came up with this,
"You clear the ridge and before you is the ancient ruins you have been seeking. A pile of crumbling, disjoined rubble and dusty arid sand dunes as far as your eyes can see, Once towering obelisks of a light grey stone stone you can not place lay half buried in a unstable heap. Here and there you see a few barely standing survivors leaning and laying akimbo across their fallen brethren, like fallen trees in a forest after a storm. Half buried in sand, their edges rounded by the wind and bite of time, You can make out sunlight passing through a few worn openings, a way in perhaps?"
The main AHA moment will be them discovering that the "Dragon" of the ruins is actually an intelligent biological super weapon (a survivor of the ancient war that caused the devastation) that has been manipulating the local populace in order to continue hiding and surviving, it assumes that the enemy is doing the same as it is, hiding and biding time. (Basically making a quadruped flesh golem with really high INT) They can choose to assist it or fight it either way it will provide a massive lore dump for them. Basically this is the moment when they learn everything and have to decide how proceed leave things as they are, restart the war against the "demons", seek the demons out, or whatever other plan they come up with that I probably haven't even considered. (most likely the last of those knowing my crew)
And thanks for all the input much appreciated <(^_^)>
Indeed! Looks great and handled well.. Particularly appreciate that there is a choice in how the players handle it rather than expecting only one specific response.
Are you kidding with these guys I've have had to lay out almost 5 individual campaigns. Of the 5 the "Ancient Dragon in the Ruins" was the only one they stumbled on lol.. Which is ok I can reuse the Missing Princess, Magical Artifacts Flooding the Market, The Evil Empire to the North invading, and the Mystery of the Haunted Apple Kingdom for later. Like I said these guys keep me on my toes and I have learned to prepare for almost everything. (Still boggling over the 2 fighters in the party deciding that trying to hold a bridge against 30+ foot soldiers in a shield wall formation and covered by archery support was a better choice than taking the clearly safe escape route. Hilariously they actually pulled it off only survived due to the Warforged destroying the bridge when he only had 2 HP left. ) Never Underestimate the Players (O.o)
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I've tried searching the forums and didn't find anything that seems to match, so my apologies if a similar question has been answered before and I just lack the keywords to find it.
My players are in a self created world. Currently they believe it to be a standard medieval setting with some minor steampunk elements. The world is actually post-apocalyptic, however; I don't want them to realize that ... yet (It one of the big plot twists). Question is how to I describe a ruined modern city to the Characters without giving the game away to the players?
My Best effort so far has been:
"You clear the ridge and before you stretches the ancient ruins you have been seeking. A gridded network of once towering stone and metal obelisks that lay in a crumbling heap. Here and there you see a few barely standing survivors leaning and laying akimbo across their fallen brethren." You can make our sunlight passing through a few vaguely rectangular openings, a way in perhaps?"
I worried it might be giving too much away and would appreciate any feedback or opinions.
Thats pretty good , maybe try to add in some power lines, but use unclear wording like you did with the buildings.
My homebrew content: Monsters, subclasses, Magic items, Feats, spells, races, backgrounds
I think that does a good job of describing a destroyed modern city without making it obvious.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium
I've recently finished watching Lost. A bit of advice - don't go out of your way to mislead them, it can cause frustration and resentment. At least, not if they know that there is a mystery to be solved. If it's intended to be a compete surprise, then that's less of an issue.
I'd emphasise that this "ancient" civilisation had quite a different architecture. Perhaps talk about how the structures seem to be held up as if by magic (referencing the particularly strong materials and techniques etc used in their construction that allow otherwise impossible buildings). I'd avoid referencing the actual materials (metal, etc), as that would be a heavy clue that they're futuristic, and not magical or ancient - metal in most medieval fantasies wouldn't have been moved in high enough quantities to make cities out of. A medieval peasant would be so awe-inspired by the height of our impossibly tall buildings that they wouldn't think to look at the materials used.
Otherwise, I think it works great.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
You may want to avoid terms that imply unnatural regularity. Rather than 'gridded', perhaps describe the ruins as 'densely packed' or 'nested close to each other', because the moment you say 'grid', there's a lot of bells that go off in somebody's mind. Similarly with things like 'rectangular opening'. You can imply that instead without saying it, using lines like "even after uncounted eons, the entrance is still almost jarringly angular, with sharp corners lingering in its ruined, ragged shape". if the characters deliberately investigate these things you can start laying it out - if they start surveying the ruins and drawing up maps you can perhaps have them notice that building placement seems oddly regular, but you can also lean into the motions of eons. A city won't stay nicely gridded after a few thousand years of wear and tear and also globe-spanning catastrophe.
Heh, the first rule of camouflage is 'break up the outline'. It's the same thing when you're trying to camouflage ideas with your words - make sure the thing you're describing is accurate, but not described in the same way anyone else would describe the thing. Don't describe doors or windows - describe odd perforations in the ancient shells of these bizarre structures, too regular to be accidental but too numerous to allow for adequate defense. Don't describe concrete and construction steel - despite an odd, crumbling off-greyish stone, of a sort no one in the party has ever seen before, that seems to be bizarrely ubiquitous and a patina of rust covering everything in sight, especially dense around narrow cavities in the ancient stone. Describe details nobody would know or care about when describing a modern-day city or building - perhaps mention the deep slits between these ancient constructions where water has worn away the ground, or describe the way lichen and clinging vines crawl in odd, angling patterns up the flanks of the aged stone.
Actively go out of your way to avoid using short descriptors. Everything should be at least three adjectives long. In a way, you should be intentionally trying to sound like you're struggling to come up with proper descriptions for this stuff, like it's so weird and abnormal that the right words are hard to find. That will help sell the alien-ness of the idea and seed your players' minds with the idea that this stuff is weird.
And, frankly? They may see through it anyways, especially if you have a particularly perceptive player. But even if they do, they may well appreciate the effort you went to in order to try and disguise the idea.
Please do not contact or message me.
Debating whether the gymnastics of a "Planet of the Apes" are worth it aside (me, I let the players in on the "joke" early, but each their own) you're neglecting the shroud of reclamation with which nature can (to follow up on Yuriel) break the lines. Look at some of the Art Direction for Horizon Zero Dawn, and there are plenty of as good if not better art books out there where the artist imagines what "our world" would look like millennia after we've passed. I mean, it's bad editing in "reality" but in the Robotech saga the remains of the Battle of Monument City are basically three tall plateau type formations under which are buried the SDF-1 SDF-2 and I think Khyron's ship (maybe to bury the radiation from their destruction? I really don't remember but I think the McKinley novels tried to explain it). Planet of the 'Apes, the statue of liberty (which in our world is on an island) was jutting out of a coastline. Don't discount erosion, tectonic events, and the shear fact most modern building materials actually aren't build to last too far into the great beyond to level your playing field, and jut out a fragment to the party as you want to drop puzzle pieces. Even Ozymandias was found in fragments, and he thought he would be eternal.
Just to touch on the "should" debate once more, you do have to ask "what's the pay off" of withholding this from the players? Like is determining "when" the game is set really going to matter to the character's objectives or is it just a "far out" moment and the irony is only something you're holding back to gift the players when they've "earned it." In-game mysteries are one thing, but mysteries that really only the players will appreciate and the characters are stuck with ironically distant, I dunno, I think it's more fun to have players in on the joke very early on. Having a joke only you're in on, not so much.
A piece of architecture based on the Luxor Casino complex and fragments of the Vegas strip is an important locale to my game, the players know darned well what it is, but to the characters it's just the "Duned Pyramid of Abandominion" with The Resistance largely based out of a tiered stone structure the players know to be a parking structure.
Edit: one last note, if you do "string them along" you run the risk of some players who really lean into the visual side of their imagination being very disappointed or perhaps having some significant cognitive dissonance between their vision up to the reveal contra to the appreciation you're hoping for.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
I experienced this very reveal, in a D&D game, not that long ago! Like Yurei said, I think the key is to continue using the same fantasy language to describe it. There are no highways, there are stilled rivers of hardened magma. No apartment complexes, only stark fortresses with what must have been hundreds of cannons or ballistas aimed through their walls, that have been removed or destroyed by time.
You probably also ought to assume it won't be as mind boggling as you hope. It's possible your players will recognize it right away, so the fun of it needs to be, probably about 50% or so, in the exploration. Like what's interesting about this setup? I'd say it's largely in discovering just how little of our modern way of life would be salvageable; at least in a strictly narrative context it would be, but realistically your players will probably be more interested in whether they can find junk from the old world and use it. And guarantee that they're going to be looking for guns. Try to reimagine objects as having some alternative medieval fantasy usage, so you can maintain that everything is ruined while not having to fully deny them finding any loot. Like maybe there's a busted up flatscreen TV -- er, a damaged onyx plaque seemingly filled with shriveled, petrified guts, as though it were an animal once -- that glows in the presence of magic. (What strange barbarians these folk must have been, not to even do taxidermy on their trophies before mounting them!) I'm sure you've already come up with some of these. They should probably be the focus of your prep.
We'd all love to be able to craft that AHA moment where weeks of clues and hints all fall into place and suddenly make sense. This kind of thing happens in novels all the time after all.
But D&D is not a novel. The PCs can interact with the world and ask questions about it - and if you make the scene compelling, they will. You are very quickly put into the position where you either have to intentionally mislead the players or fess up and ruin your surprise moment, and I agree that misleading is not a great technique.
Be ready for the possibility that they figure it out immediately, and don't let that bum you out. All it really does is pull the players into the storyline. Now they get to look at modern ruins through their characters' eyes. They get to play along with the scenario and you can still have the reveal to the characters later. Their input may very well make the setting even better.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
So after reading all the responses I came up with this,
"You clear the ridge and before you is the ancient ruins you have been seeking. A pile of crumbling, disjoined rubble and dusty arid sand dunes as far as your eyes can see, Once towering obelisks of a light grey stone stone you can not place lay half buried in a unstable heap. Here and there you see a few barely standing survivors leaning and laying akimbo across their fallen brethren, like fallen trees in a forest after a storm. Half buried in sand, their edges rounded by the wind and bite of time, You can make out sunlight passing through a few worn openings, a way in perhaps?"
The main AHA moment will be them discovering that the "Dragon" of the ruins is actually an intelligent biological super weapon (a survivor of the ancient war that caused the devastation) that has been manipulating the local populace in order to continue hiding and surviving, it assumes that the enemy is doing the same as it is, hiding and biding time. (Basically making a quadruped flesh golem with really high INT) They can choose to assist it or fight it either way it will provide a massive lore dump for them. Basically this is the moment when they learn everything and have to decide how proceed leave things as they are, restart the war against the "demons", seek the demons out, or whatever other plan they come up with that I probably haven't even considered. (most likely the last of those knowing my crew)
And thanks for all the input much appreciated <(^_^)>
That sounds like a great start to me. Hope it works out for you and your players dig the game. Good luck, Vernigar!
Please do not contact or message me.
Are you kidding with these guys I've have had to lay out almost 5 individual campaigns. Of the 5 the "Ancient Dragon in the Ruins" was the only one they stumbled on lol.. Which is ok I can reuse the Missing Princess, Magical Artifacts Flooding the Market, The Evil Empire to the North invading, and the Mystery of the Haunted Apple Kingdom for later. Like I said these guys keep me on my toes and I have learned to prepare for almost everything. (Still boggling over the 2 fighters in the party deciding that trying to hold a bridge against 30+ foot soldiers in a shield wall formation and covered by archery support was a better choice than taking the clearly safe escape route. Hilariously they actually pulled it off only survived due to the Warforged destroying the bridge when he only had 2 HP left. ) Never Underestimate the Players (O.o)