Hello! I've been playing DnD for about a year now, and deeply love it. About 6 months ago I began jotting down ideas and sketches of a homebrew world, which has since expanded into a huge Google Doc of notes, ideas, lore, geography, politics, cultures and conflicts going on throughout a continent I call Orace. As of now, the document spans some two hundred pages. I have consistently ran into two issues, however. The first is mapmaking. I have a map of the world I created which I am happy with, but the DM's Guidebook suggests lots of other maps to make, and I'm just not sure where to find them or how to make them, or which ones I might need. I use Roll20 and plan to host over Discord, and thus far making maps has been challenging. My second issue involves plothooks. I have a lot of ideas, a lot of conflicts throughout the continent I think the players could get involved with, but I'm just not sure how to approach it, or where to start them. Should I just let them wander around and toss some hooks at them through events and NPCs and see which ones they latch onto? I definitely do not wish to railroad them, but at the same time, my biggest priority is to keep them engaged and enjoying it. I'm just not sure where to start them or how to go about planning sessions. Are there any resources for running home brew campaigns, map making, session planning, etc.? Right now, I have five players, however one is kinda waffling about dropping out due to a busy schedule, one is a complete newbie, one is mildly experienced, and two are fantastic players I've known for a while. Any advice helps, thank you!
Im not sure about the map part, but about the hooks, i think a good start would be a simple but not too short hook, talk about it with your players so they can make characters who would care about this initial hook, and while persuing this first thing start planting the seeds to other things that are happening so when this first part is done the players have liberty to pursue what they want.
Railroading is not good, but worse than railroading is the players not knowing what to do or where to go, without a sense of purpose.
I have been DMing a group of noobs and it has been great so far. And I know you don't want to railroad players too much but having the first adventure/dungeon railroaded in can be ok. Think of it like a tutorial. I started the adventure with. "You are all in a caravan going to local town. Why you are there is up to you. Them boom. Goblin ambush. Driver is injured what do you do.! I knew I didn't want to hit them with a half hour of story and history so I am lightly sprinkling it in as the explore the rest of the world. Once they save the day they finish escorting the caravan to town and then give them some adventure hook tastes and see where they go. As for map making? For making a new continent/country, don't necessarily make it, at least not in stone. Think it it more like a modular board and you place the preices into the map as everything unfolds Let them build the map as they explore with out them even knowing it. You can even put up a big poster board on the wall and draw the map as they do things. Then when all said and done they/you have an awesome souvoneer of the game. Either way good luck and have fun!!
If you want to make your own maps, campaign cartographer is fantastic. You make your own maps, they're not pre-gen, as far as I know. It's spendy, and not at all user friendly, but the maps are really pretty.
As for the campaign, have a session 0. Start off giving the players a brief outline of the world and what's happening in it, and let them decide what interests them out of character. You could even give them a few ideas about what you're most interested in running, and see what they latch on to. Then you have a better idea of what kind of plot everyone wants. It also helps them pick useful backgrounds (so no one is a sailor in a landlocked campaign, for example). You can also use it to establish other expectations: How hardcore will you all roleplay. How combat heavy will the sessions be. Let the players determine how well the characters know each other, if at all. Take care of the meta game stuff before the first session, and it will really help make everything run more smoothly as you go along.
I have run a bunch of homebrew worlds and the best way i have found is to slowly start introducing things to the players. they start in an out of the way farming town, most of which are pretty much the same no mater the world and work towards the bigger adventures and lore filled areas from there learning as they go. It is also important to remember that the characters might know something the players may not so make sure you stop them and inform them before letting them make what is an obviously bad choice.
Also i always start my players with a reason they have joined together and a simple mission to start. It skips the awkward why are we teaming up with each other RP that we already know the outcome of anyway.
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Once rolled a -2 on a perception check
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Hello! I've been playing DnD for about a year now, and deeply love it. About 6 months ago I began jotting down ideas and sketches of a homebrew world, which has since expanded into a huge Google Doc of notes, ideas, lore, geography, politics, cultures and conflicts going on throughout a continent I call Orace. As of now, the document spans some two hundred pages. I have consistently ran into two issues, however. The first is mapmaking. I have a map of the world I created which I am happy with, but the DM's Guidebook suggests lots of other maps to make, and I'm just not sure where to find them or how to make them, or which ones I might need. I use Roll20 and plan to host over Discord, and thus far making maps has been challenging. My second issue involves plothooks. I have a lot of ideas, a lot of conflicts throughout the continent I think the players could get involved with, but I'm just not sure how to approach it, or where to start them. Should I just let them wander around and toss some hooks at them through events and NPCs and see which ones they latch onto? I definitely do not wish to railroad them, but at the same time, my biggest priority is to keep them engaged and enjoying it. I'm just not sure where to start them or how to go about planning sessions. Are there any resources for running home brew campaigns, map making, session planning, etc.? Right now, I have five players, however one is kinda waffling about dropping out due to a busy schedule, one is a complete newbie, one is mildly experienced, and two are fantastic players I've known for a while. Any advice helps, thank you!
Im not sure about the map part, but about the hooks, i think a good start would be a simple but not too short hook, talk about it with your players so they can make characters who would care about this initial hook, and while persuing this first thing start planting the seeds to other things that are happening so when this first part is done the players have liberty to pursue what they want.
Railroading is not good, but worse than railroading is the players not knowing what to do or where to go, without a sense of purpose.
I have been DMing a group of noobs and it has been great so far. And I know you don't want to railroad players too much but having the first adventure/dungeon railroaded in can be ok. Think of it like a tutorial. I started the adventure with. "You are all in a caravan going to local town. Why you are there is up to you. Them boom. Goblin ambush. Driver is injured what do you do.! I knew I didn't want to hit them with a half hour of story and history so I am lightly sprinkling it in as the explore the rest of the world. Once they save the day they finish escorting the caravan to town and then give them some adventure hook tastes and see where they go. As for map making? For making a new continent/country, don't necessarily make it, at least not in stone. Think it it more like a modular board and you place the preices into the map as everything unfolds Let them build the map as they explore with out them even knowing it. You can even put up a big poster board on the wall and draw the map as they do things. Then when all said and done they/you have an awesome souvoneer of the game. Either way good luck and have fun!!
If you want to make your own maps, campaign cartographer is fantastic. You make your own maps, they're not pre-gen, as far as I know. It's spendy, and not at all user friendly, but the maps are really pretty.
As for the campaign, have a session 0. Start off giving the players a brief outline of the world and what's happening in it, and let them decide what interests them out of character. You could even give them a few ideas about what you're most interested in running, and see what they latch on to. Then you have a better idea of what kind of plot everyone wants. It also helps them pick useful backgrounds (so no one is a sailor in a landlocked campaign, for example). You can also use it to establish other expectations: How hardcore will you all roleplay. How combat heavy will the sessions be. Let the players determine how well the characters know each other, if at all. Take care of the meta game stuff before the first session, and it will really help make everything run more smoothly as you go along.
If you're using Roll20, there's plenty of art on there for designing overworld maps.
I have run a bunch of homebrew worlds and the best way i have found is to slowly start introducing things to the players. they start in an out of the way farming town, most of which are pretty much the same no mater the world and work towards the bigger adventures and lore filled areas from there learning as they go. It is also important to remember that the characters might know something the players may not so make sure you stop them and inform them before letting them make what is an obviously bad choice.
Also i always start my players with a reason they have joined together and a simple mission to start. It skips the awkward why are we teaming up with each other RP that we already know the outcome of anyway.
Once rolled a -2 on a perception check