I got into D&D a little over a year ago and progressively got more and more into. Going from having one session every 2 weeks to having 3 sessions a week. I started to make my own homebrew campaign after trying out DM'ing with a one shot. I was looking for some opinions and ideas on how to refine or change some parts of it to make it better! Even if there are things that just don't make sense, I'm very open to change, I want this to be the best it can be. Buckle up, this is going to be a long read, I apologize in advance. I'm going to try and explain most of it, without going into every single detail.
In a session 0, in order to get each party member to the setting, I set up tiny sessions revolving around their individual characters. I based the setting off their backstory, either having them be in their home, village, wandering on the roads, or even in a cave researching local wildlife. Each of them had an encounter with a quasit who appeared and tried to kill of the PC. When the PC managed to kill the quasit (either by themselves or with a little help from characters in their background, as they were only lvl 1 at this point), the quasit mentions something about "the master's will" or "the king's will be done". This is to semi-reference the evil king they will be hearing about in a little bit. They are then surrounded by magical energy, swirling and humming as the light around them begins to glow brighter and they are transported through the planes. Seeing different creatures, beings, and lands on their journey to the Purple Rocks. When they arrive, they are in in a hole in that ground that is being used as a garbage dump. There is a possible encounter with some giant rats and a scavenger beast (homebrew) if you didn't want to use the quasits at the start. When they finish the rats off, a man will appear above them, standing in the rays of light, making it very hard to see them clearly. This man is D, the mysterious benefactor who brought them there. D will explain on how he used a scroll of wish to bring saviors to the purple rocks, who were destined to save the islands and its people from the evil king.
Background Info:
D will explain to them on how the king was originally a good man named Edmaris Utherall. He was a kind and benevolent king, who protected the lands and its people from harm. Many years ago (about 50-100) the nation was attacked by an adult dragon who wanted to make the islands its territory. The king and his people waged a war against it, defending their land from the dragon. The war waged for months, the people were suffering, in one of the battles, the queen was killed by dragon fire, her body never recovered. This caused the king to turn down a dark path, looking for answers and power in places that should never be seen. He eventually found the power he was seeking, in a demon (Orcus). This demon gave him power in order to defeat the dragon (I haven't decided yet whether he beat it or trapped it), in exchange for the kings servitude.
The king is being manipulated and controlled by the demon Orcus, whose main goal is to create an everlasting portal to his layer of the abyss in the purple rocks and to turn the purple rocks into a land of undeath. He plans on using the stones to raise all of the people from the PR from the dead and to create a portal using them as well. The party must stop this from happening at all costs.
Main Objective:
The main goal of my campaign is for the party to defeat the evil king that has started tormenting the Purple Rocks. To do this, they need to collect 6 magical items that once belonged to the queen, the pearls of power (Homebrew). Each of these items gives the party a spell that can be helpful to them in the story.
Pearl 1 (town of clearview)- cure wounds/ lesser restoration
Pearl 2 (bandit hideout, between Dargan and Mournstead)- Bless
Pearl 3 (fake eye of gnoll leader, near Ipsam)- misty step
Pearl 4 (in modified wand of true polymorph, Vilkstead, Noke's Tower)- polymorph
Pearl 5 (locked away in a crypt of the royal family)- Mass cure wounds
Pearl 6 (memorial room to the queen in the castle)- revivify
The first pearl is found in the town of Clearview, when the party arrives they will be on the outskirts of town and run into some bandits attacking a lord and his guards. The party can decide to help and will be introduced to Kyle Goodbarrow. They can then meet the citizens of Clearview and learn that they are celebrating for a wedding that is happening soon. Ginnie Goodbarrow (19yo) is getting married to Lord Kyle Mournstead (20yo) soon. The party will have about a day before the wedding to adventure around town and shop and learn about the purple rocks, during this time they can learn the Clearview is protected and has not had any big incidents for about 19 years. (Ginnie's father, Green, the mayor of the town, made a deal with the fey and the dryad of the forest to trade one of his children, Garret, Ginnie's twin brother, for the towns prosperity and protection to the dryad to be trained as a druid of the forest). The protection is failing lately for some reason as the town has had to fight off some goblins and bandits recently, but they don't know why its failing (only the mayor and his sister in law know the truth). During the wedding, twig blights will come out of the tree in the center of Clearview and kidnap Ginnie, taking her to Garret in the feywild. The party will then be asked to help save Ginnie and can go into the feywild to fight Garret. If they kill Garret, the dryad will say for the protection to continue, Ginnie needs to take Garretts place as the druid of the forest, giving the party a moral decision whether to save her or save the town. If they win, they will be rewarded by the town for saving Ginnie, but the protection will fall, leaving Clearview to defend itself.
The second pearl can be found in a bandit hideout. The party has a few ways to find this one, when they get to Mournstead eventually, it will be revealed that the Mayor, Matthew Mournstead (Kyle's father) has been working with the bandits and having them rob merchants and caravans on the road and splitting the money. Or on there way to Mournstead, they can be stopped by travelrs on the road who invite them to join for dinner. These are bandits in disguise who have been robbing people on these roads for weeks. If the party kills them or talks to them, they can find clues that would lead them or be led directly to the bandit camp. Inside of here, they can find a bandit captian that is holding the second pearl. They can also find some acolytes working with the bandits. These acolytes are worshippers of orcus and are practicing ways to control the undead (ghoul in the room covered in binding runes and sigils). They can find papers talking about the necrotic stones and their placement all over the the purple rocks, the sigils and runes on the ghoul and their purpose on a desk. There is also an altar in the corner with a rotten and decaying goats head on top (first hint of orcus), there is also a tapestry behind it depicting a skeletal figure with dark wings lording over an army of the undead (religion check can reveal them as orcus). The party can choose to either trick the badits into giving up the pearl or fight their way through the hideout in order to take it. They can also find letters connecting the mayor of Mournstead to them, talking about merchants and when to rob them on the road.
The third pearl can be found near the town of Ipsam. The town itself is fairly normal, but they have had villagers going missing for the last few weeks. Little by little, more and more people are vanishing, never to be seen again. If the party stays up at night to try and find out what is going on, they may see gnolls sneaking into the town at night and kidnapping anyone by themselves or staying out too late. The party can decide to follow the gnolls that night or wait until morning to track them back to their lair (harder DC if they wait till morning). They can follow the tracks to a gnoll camp, if they go in the daytime the gnolls will be asleep, save for a few guards. And if they go at night, all the gnolls will be up and at the ready for a fight. The gnolls goal is to kidnapp and change as many people as possible into gnolls. Their leader has an ancient tome of Yeengoghu that has a ritual for changing humans into gnolls (There is also a ritual to return them back into humans if the party looks for it in the tome). The leader also has a fake eye that if the party investigates, they can find it a pearl stuffed inside of his eye socket.
The fourth pearl can be found in the town of Vilkstead. For this pearl, i've repurposed a one shot I found that is probably fairly well know. I added it in for a bit more of whimsy and lightness to the campaign. In vilkstead, anywhere the party may be, either at a bar, inn, blacksmith, or merchants shop, they will be approached by a frantic sheep. This sheep is actually a wizard named Shinebright, that has been polymorphed into a sheep, he will have a scroll of speak with animals in his mouth. He will request the parties help in turning him back to a human and stopping his apprentice, who took his wand and turned against him. The party can agree to help turn him back into a human and get the modified wand of true polymorph back. The sheep can lead the party to his wizards tower, which is now being guarded by animals turned into humans (wolves and bears). They can fight their way into the tower, where they will eventually meet up with Noke, the apprentice. He will fight and when it starts looking bad, he will run into his bedroom and use the wand to turn his bed into a Bed Dragon Wyrmling. If the party manages to beat the wrymling, Noke will attempt to polymorph himself next, if he fails he will become a gibbering mouther. If he fails, the wand will be destroyed and your hope of turning Shinebright back to human right away will be dashed. But, the party will be able to find in what's left of the wand, is a pearl of power. it had been modified to change its regular polymorph spell into true polymorph.
The fifth pearl can be found inside of a mausoleum dedicated to the royal family. The paths leads through the mausoleum into a bugbear and etins new hideout. A large group of bugbears had wandered into the area and made it their home. Near the end of this pathway, there can be found an entrance to the underdark. The group searched into it and while they were in there, the bugbear chief encountered an etin and offered to guide them out in exchange for joining their group. she is the nuclear option for the bugbears, a last resort if they can't win themselves. The party can get some nice loot and magic items from this path. If the party continues, they will encounter many undead and monsters. They arrive at a gate that seems to be meant to only allow the nobles of the family to continue onwards. the party will need to fight or find another way past groups of skeletons, zombies, minotaur skeletons, black pudding, undead bugbears, ghast, and ghouls. they can even decide to help a group of darklings escape back to the feywild or destroy them. In order to get into the final vault where the pearl is stored, the party will need to defeat a wight and their zombie soldiers, the last line of defense. There is also a trapped room just before the vault that will seal the group in and fill up with poisonous gas if they cannot figure out how to stop it.
The sixth pearl can be found under the kings castle, in a memorial room dedicated to the late queen. It appears as a lavishly decorated bedchamber, serene and untouched — flowers still fresh, the scent of lavender in the air, moonlight through stained glass windows. The queen’s gown lies folded on the bed. A music box plays softly. A statue of the queen stands at the center, serene and smiling, with the final Pearl nestled in her clasped hands. When/if the party touches or disturbs the statue, the illusion cracks — reality bleeds in, and the true nature of the vault is revealed. The room twists violently. Walls rot. The bed becomes a slab of stone. The statue becomes a grieving effigy: face contorted in sorrow, fingers bloodied and cracked, still holding the pearl. The room is now filled with shades of memory and madness: Ghostly echoes of the queen, trapped in a repeating memory loop: "Why did you let me die? Why won't you let me rest?" The party can then fight a phantom version of the king, his shadow corrupted and controlled by Orcus, or a death knight standing guard over the final pearl.
Finale:
Deep under the castle, there will be a door leading down to the ritual room where the king is waiting and performing the ritual. The party can open the door either with a key found in the memorial room or with all 6 pearls of power. When they get down there, they will be met with a familiar face, D. The man who summoned them all here and set the on the path to stop the evil king, was actually the king all along. In between bouts of madness and control, he would have fleeting moments of clarity. In those moments, he decided to plant the seeds of his own destruction summoning the people who can save the nation and stop him once and for all. The party can now attempt to stop the evil king and halt the ritual from continuing. If they are able to defeat the king and perform the raven queens rite, then the gate can be closed and the purple rocks can be saved. I haven't fully fleshed out the ending yet, but my two thoughts are that the ritual needs a sacrifice, so either one of the party members or a favorite NPC can be taken for this, if they are able to be saved, then orcus can have a backup plan. He can use the kings soul as a replacement. It won't be a perfect portal/ connection to the abyss, but it would be enough for Orcus to destroy the purple rocks as revenge for stopping his plans.
If this happens, then the party could decide to fight off the hordes of the abyss to try and protect the purple rocks, or they could flee, knowing it is hopeless right now. But I thought that this could then possibly lead into an abyssal campaign where the party decides to end orcus for good. Either going to find his wand and destroy it or by taking the fight to Orcus himself inside of the abyss.
Hints/Party Visions
As the campaign goes on, they will eventually be approached by the raven queen. giving them small hints at first at what Orcus is plotting, first giving the party a vision of the necromantic stones being placed all around the purple rocks and the undeath that they bring if allowed to sit. When the party leaves Clearview after getting the first pearl is when I would give them this first vision. On the way to the next town, they can find drag marks in the roads that look to be from something heavy (one of the necrotic stones) and they can investigate it to find a bunch of goblins and some ogres transporting the stone and placing it in the woods out of the way.
They will also have the raven queen show up to them for another vision after finding the 2nd pearl. She will come to them and explain that there is a ritual to stop the king/orcus plans, that the pearls are the key to finishing this for good and we need to continue searching for them. She tells them of a ritual known as "The Raven Queen's Rite" that can be done at unholy places (like the stones) or at a portal to the abyss (Orcus overall goal) to close it for good.
So, I know that was a lot and it took me a while to type out. Sorry for any errors or spelling mistakes, I did this as fast as I could. But i would love people's opinion on my homebrew campaign! I would love the criticism so that I can improve it and refine the story as a whole. It is my first time really DM'ing and I would like to eventually DM this campaign again when I have more experience because I think that is has a lot of potential! Please let me know what you think! I have much more written for this, but a lot is not important for the main objective. Many towns have plots and quests to do, but I figured I would leave them out of this for now, but if you are interested in hearing about the other stuff, I'd be happy type it all out!
How long is the campaign supposed to last? If this is a short campaign (i.e. 3-5 sessions) then it is fine to lore-dump right at the start so the party can focus on finishing the campaign pretty quickly. However if you plan for it to last a longer than that, it is better for them to discover the lore bit by bit as they explore the world. Because discovering or figuring out the backstory of the world is fun for a lot of players and gives them a warm fuzzy feeling when they figure it out for themselves from the hints you lay out for them to find.
For instance for this campaign, I'd have D simply tell the party the king has made an alliance with Orcus an evil demon prince and this must be stopped at all costs.
First off, thank you for the comment! I planned this to be a fairly long campaign, and I think you are totally right. I shouldn't have given them all the info right at the start. Them finding it themselves would be much better of a way to get them invested in it with their characters. I think I worry too much about the players missing info and just giving it to them, rather than letting them find it on their own, in their own time.
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Hello everyone!
I got into D&D a little over a year ago and progressively got more and more into. Going from having one session every 2 weeks to having 3 sessions a week. I started to make my own homebrew campaign after trying out DM'ing with a one shot. I was looking for some opinions and ideas on how to refine or change some parts of it to make it better! Even if there are things that just don't make sense, I'm very open to change, I want this to be the best it can be. Buckle up, this is going to be a long read, I apologize in advance. I'm going to try and explain most of it, without going into every single detail.
In a session 0, in order to get each party member to the setting, I set up tiny sessions revolving around their individual characters. I based the setting off their backstory, either having them be in their home, village, wandering on the roads, or even in a cave researching local wildlife. Each of them had an encounter with a quasit who appeared and tried to kill of the PC. When the PC managed to kill the quasit (either by themselves or with a little help from characters in their background, as they were only lvl 1 at this point), the quasit mentions something about "the master's will" or "the king's will be done". This is to semi-reference the evil king they will be hearing about in a little bit. They are then surrounded by magical energy, swirling and humming as the light around them begins to glow brighter and they are transported through the planes. Seeing different creatures, beings, and lands on their journey to the Purple Rocks. When they arrive, they are in in a hole in that ground that is being used as a garbage dump. There is a possible encounter with some giant rats and a scavenger beast (homebrew) if you didn't want to use the quasits at the start. When they finish the rats off, a man will appear above them, standing in the rays of light, making it very hard to see them clearly. This man is D, the mysterious benefactor who brought them there. D will explain on how he used a scroll of wish to bring saviors to the purple rocks, who were destined to save the islands and its people from the evil king.
Background Info:
D will explain to them on how the king was originally a good man named Edmaris Utherall. He was a kind and benevolent king, who protected the lands and its people from harm. Many years ago (about 50-100) the nation was attacked by an adult dragon who wanted to make the islands its territory. The king and his people waged a war against it, defending their land from the dragon. The war waged for months, the people were suffering, in one of the battles, the queen was killed by dragon fire, her body never recovered. This caused the king to turn down a dark path, looking for answers and power in places that should never be seen. He eventually found the power he was seeking, in a demon (Orcus). This demon gave him power in order to defeat the dragon (I haven't decided yet whether he beat it or trapped it), in exchange for the kings servitude.
The king is being manipulated and controlled by the demon Orcus, whose main goal is to create an everlasting portal to his layer of the abyss in the purple rocks and to turn the purple rocks into a land of undeath. He plans on using the stones to raise all of the people from the PR from the dead and to create a portal using them as well. The party must stop this from happening at all costs.
Main Objective:
The main goal of my campaign is for the party to defeat the evil king that has started tormenting the Purple Rocks. To do this, they need to collect 6 magical items that once belonged to the queen, the pearls of power (Homebrew). Each of these items gives the party a spell that can be helpful to them in the story.
Pearl 1 (town of clearview)- cure wounds/ lesser restoration
Pearl 2 (bandit hideout, between Dargan and Mournstead)- Bless
Pearl 3 (fake eye of gnoll leader, near Ipsam)- misty step
Pearl 4 (in modified wand of true polymorph, Vilkstead, Noke's Tower)- polymorph
Pearl 5 (locked away in a crypt of the royal family)- Mass cure wounds
Pearl 6 (memorial room to the queen in the castle)- revivify
The first pearl is found in the town of Clearview, when the party arrives they will be on the outskirts of town and run into some bandits attacking a lord and his guards. The party can decide to help and will be introduced to Kyle Goodbarrow. They can then meet the citizens of Clearview and learn that they are celebrating for a wedding that is happening soon. Ginnie Goodbarrow (19yo) is getting married to Lord Kyle Mournstead (20yo) soon. The party will have about a day before the wedding to adventure around town and shop and learn about the purple rocks, during this time they can learn the Clearview is protected and has not had any big incidents for about 19 years. (Ginnie's father, Green, the mayor of the town, made a deal with the fey and the dryad of the forest to trade one of his children, Garret, Ginnie's twin brother, for the towns prosperity and protection to the dryad to be trained as a druid of the forest). The protection is failing lately for some reason as the town has had to fight off some goblins and bandits recently, but they don't know why its failing (only the mayor and his sister in law know the truth). During the wedding, twig blights will come out of the tree in the center of Clearview and kidnap Ginnie, taking her to Garret in the feywild. The party will then be asked to help save Ginnie and can go into the feywild to fight Garret. If they kill Garret, the dryad will say for the protection to continue, Ginnie needs to take Garretts place as the druid of the forest, giving the party a moral decision whether to save her or save the town. If they win, they will be rewarded by the town for saving Ginnie, but the protection will fall, leaving Clearview to defend itself.
The second pearl can be found in a bandit hideout. The party has a few ways to find this one, when they get to Mournstead eventually, it will be revealed that the Mayor, Matthew Mournstead (Kyle's father) has been working with the bandits and having them rob merchants and caravans on the road and splitting the money. Or on there way to Mournstead, they can be stopped by travelrs on the road who invite them to join for dinner. These are bandits in disguise who have been robbing people on these roads for weeks. If the party kills them or talks to them, they can find clues that would lead them or be led directly to the bandit camp. Inside of here, they can find a bandit captian that is holding the second pearl. They can also find some acolytes working with the bandits. These acolytes are worshippers of orcus and are practicing ways to control the undead (ghoul in the room covered in binding runes and sigils). They can find papers talking about the necrotic stones and their placement all over the the purple rocks, the sigils and runes on the ghoul and their purpose on a desk. There is also an altar in the corner with a rotten and decaying goats head on top (first hint of orcus), there is also a tapestry behind it depicting a skeletal figure with dark wings lording over an army of the undead (religion check can reveal them as orcus). The party can choose to either trick the badits into giving up the pearl or fight their way through the hideout in order to take it. They can also find letters connecting the mayor of Mournstead to them, talking about merchants and when to rob them on the road.
The third pearl can be found near the town of Ipsam. The town itself is fairly normal, but they have had villagers going missing for the last few weeks. Little by little, more and more people are vanishing, never to be seen again. If the party stays up at night to try and find out what is going on, they may see gnolls sneaking into the town at night and kidnapping anyone by themselves or staying out too late. The party can decide to follow the gnolls that night or wait until morning to track them back to their lair (harder DC if they wait till morning). They can follow the tracks to a gnoll camp, if they go in the daytime the gnolls will be asleep, save for a few guards. And if they go at night, all the gnolls will be up and at the ready for a fight. The gnolls goal is to kidnapp and change as many people as possible into gnolls. Their leader has an ancient tome of Yeengoghu that has a ritual for changing humans into gnolls (There is also a ritual to return them back into humans if the party looks for it in the tome). The leader also has a fake eye that if the party investigates, they can find it a pearl stuffed inside of his eye socket.
The fourth pearl can be found in the town of Vilkstead. For this pearl, i've repurposed a one shot I found that is probably fairly well know. I added it in for a bit more of whimsy and lightness to the campaign. In vilkstead, anywhere the party may be, either at a bar, inn, blacksmith, or merchants shop, they will be approached by a frantic sheep. This sheep is actually a wizard named Shinebright, that has been polymorphed into a sheep, he will have a scroll of speak with animals in his mouth. He will request the parties help in turning him back to a human and stopping his apprentice, who took his wand and turned against him. The party can agree to help turn him back into a human and get the modified wand of true polymorph back. The sheep can lead the party to his wizards tower, which is now being guarded by animals turned into humans (wolves and bears). They can fight their way into the tower, where they will eventually meet up with Noke, the apprentice. He will fight and when it starts looking bad, he will run into his bedroom and use the wand to turn his bed into a Bed Dragon Wyrmling. If the party manages to beat the wrymling, Noke will attempt to polymorph himself next, if he fails he will become a gibbering mouther. If he fails, the wand will be destroyed and your hope of turning Shinebright back to human right away will be dashed. But, the party will be able to find in what's left of the wand, is a pearl of power. it had been modified to change its regular polymorph spell into true polymorph.
The fifth pearl can be found inside of a mausoleum dedicated to the royal family. The paths leads through the mausoleum into a bugbear and etins new hideout. A large group of bugbears had wandered into the area and made it their home. Near the end of this pathway, there can be found an entrance to the underdark. The group searched into it and while they were in there, the bugbear chief encountered an etin and offered to guide them out in exchange for joining their group. she is the nuclear option for the bugbears, a last resort if they can't win themselves. The party can get some nice loot and magic items from this path. If the party continues, they will encounter many undead and monsters. They arrive at a gate that seems to be meant to only allow the nobles of the family to continue onwards. the party will need to fight or find another way past groups of skeletons, zombies, minotaur skeletons, black pudding, undead bugbears, ghast, and ghouls. they can even decide to help a group of darklings escape back to the feywild or destroy them. In order to get into the final vault where the pearl is stored, the party will need to defeat a wight and their zombie soldiers, the last line of defense. There is also a trapped room just before the vault that will seal the group in and fill up with poisonous gas if they cannot figure out how to stop it.
The sixth pearl can be found under the kings castle, in a memorial room dedicated to the late queen. It appears as a lavishly decorated bedchamber, serene and untouched — flowers still fresh, the scent of lavender in the air, moonlight through stained glass windows. The queen’s gown lies folded on the bed. A music box plays softly. A statue of the queen stands at the center, serene and smiling, with the final Pearl nestled in her clasped hands. When/if the party touches or disturbs the statue, the illusion cracks — reality bleeds in, and the true nature of the vault is revealed.
The room twists violently. Walls rot. The bed becomes a slab of stone. The statue becomes a grieving effigy: face contorted in sorrow, fingers bloodied and cracked, still holding the pearl. The room is now filled with shades of memory and madness: Ghostly echoes of the queen, trapped in a repeating memory loop: "Why did you let me die? Why won't you let me rest?" The party can then fight a phantom version of the king, his shadow corrupted and controlled by Orcus, or a death knight standing guard over the final pearl.
Finale:
Deep under the castle, there will be a door leading down to the ritual room where the king is waiting and performing the ritual. The party can open the door either with a key found in the memorial room or with all 6 pearls of power. When they get down there, they will be met with a familiar face, D. The man who summoned them all here and set the on the path to stop the evil king, was actually the king all along. In between bouts of madness and control, he would have fleeting moments of clarity. In those moments, he decided to plant the seeds of his own destruction summoning the people who can save the nation and stop him once and for all. The party can now attempt to stop the evil king and halt the ritual from continuing. If they are able to defeat the king and perform the raven queens rite, then the gate can be closed and the purple rocks can be saved. I haven't fully fleshed out the ending yet, but my two thoughts are that the ritual needs a sacrifice, so either one of the party members or a favorite NPC can be taken for this, if they are able to be saved, then orcus can have a backup plan. He can use the kings soul as a replacement. It won't be a perfect portal/ connection to the abyss, but it would be enough for Orcus to destroy the purple rocks as revenge for stopping his plans.
If this happens, then the party could decide to fight off the hordes of the abyss to try and protect the purple rocks, or they could flee, knowing it is hopeless right now. But I thought that this could then possibly lead into an abyssal campaign where the party decides to end orcus for good. Either going to find his wand and destroy it or by taking the fight to Orcus himself inside of the abyss.
Hints/Party Visions
As the campaign goes on, they will eventually be approached by the raven queen. giving them small hints at first at what Orcus is plotting, first giving the party a vision of the necromantic stones being placed all around the purple rocks and the undeath that they bring if allowed to sit. When the party leaves Clearview after getting the first pearl is when I would give them this first vision. On the way to the next town, they can find drag marks in the roads that look to be from something heavy (one of the necrotic stones) and they can investigate it to find a bunch of goblins and some ogres transporting the stone and placing it in the woods out of the way.
They will also have the raven queen show up to them for another vision after finding the 2nd pearl. She will come to them and explain that there is a ritual to stop the king/orcus plans, that the pearls are the key to finishing this for good and we need to continue searching for them. She tells them of a ritual known as "The Raven Queen's Rite" that can be done at unholy places (like the stones) or at a portal to the abyss (Orcus overall goal) to close it for good.
So, I know that was a lot and it took me a while to type out. Sorry for any errors or spelling mistakes, I did this as fast as I could. But i would love people's opinion on my homebrew campaign! I would love the criticism so that I can improve it and refine the story as a whole. It is my first time really DM'ing and I would like to eventually DM this campaign again when I have more experience because I think that is has a lot of potential! Please let me know what you think! I have much more written for this, but a lot is not important for the main objective. Many towns have plots and quests to do, but I figured I would leave them out of this for now, but if you are interested in hearing about the other stuff, I'd be happy type it all out!
How long is the campaign supposed to last? If this is a short campaign (i.e. 3-5 sessions) then it is fine to lore-dump right at the start so the party can focus on finishing the campaign pretty quickly. However if you plan for it to last a longer than that, it is better for them to discover the lore bit by bit as they explore the world. Because discovering or figuring out the backstory of the world is fun for a lot of players and gives them a warm fuzzy feeling when they figure it out for themselves from the hints you lay out for them to find.
For instance for this campaign, I'd have D simply tell the party the king has made an alliance with Orcus an evil demon prince and this must be stopped at all costs.
First off, thank you for the comment! I planned this to be a fairly long campaign, and I think you are totally right. I shouldn't have given them all the info right at the start. Them finding it themselves would be much better of a way to get them invested in it with their characters. I think I worry too much about the players missing info and just giving it to them, rather than letting them find it on their own, in their own time.