I've been where you are now with the whole campaign thing, and I agree with what everyone else has said about the PC's getting captured. Either start the story on the island, or change the encounter to something more like what other people have suggested with some of the NPC's getting captured. If you're going to have them level up when you get to the camp then I would suggest having an extra encounter with some of the pirates, maybe capturing them to provide a reason for the pirate attack that isn't just random, although that works fine as well. I also agree with the whole skill challenges thing, and you could add a few more with piloting the pirate ship etc. Providing an incentive to get back at the pirates could be by having them capture NPC's and then, if the party win overall, have the captain and other high-ranking pirates sail away in a smaller boat during the fighting to warn the island, or you have the party find things on the pirate's ship that give them that incentive (eg. something about the island being full of treasure if the party react well to that, or some kind of RP hook that could involve one of the players if backstory allows, etc.). Then with your questions about the main camp I would have a nominally large pirate presence, but having the biggest ships out at sea, so there are less pirates there at that point, maybe even making it a bigger thing of the pirates controlling the whole island and suffocating trade in the entire area as pirate overlords or something like that. This would allow for a realistic amount of pirates as well as giving larger scope for the PC's to avoid them, and you could make this the whole campaign if you want (you probably have other ideas, so feel free to ignore that). As others have said, it would be cool to have the pirates be sahuaguin or something like that.
Also, everyone else - calm down! This is TristamD2's first campaign, there will always be areas for improvement, and if done well, the whole captured thing could work really well, as long as the DM gives opportunities for the party to get inventive aboard the pirate ship, and maybe even escape before they reach the island.
Tristam, these are just suggestions, but I hope they help, and good luck for the campaign!
(Apologies for the weird writing style, I was just kind of going with the flow)
I see many people offering up, "Just start them as being captured". How is this any less railroading than:
I am planning to attack their ship with pirates and capture them. If they lose to them they will end up in the pirates camp on an island as "slaves" that need to farm ores in order to supply materials the pirtes can use to forge their armor/weapons etc and need to find a way out/a way to escape.
If they win against the pirates they will also need to set foot on the island to get materials to repair their ship and eventually get to the pirates lair.
If you open a scenario with, "You were captured and now have to break out," this is just the opening to the story. It is not causing actions taken by the players during play to be rendered irrelevant, because they took no actions. You still need to make sure they are on board with this. But my experience is that if you come to a group of players and say, "I'd like to run an adventure on a pirate island but you guys will need to start out captured first, is that OK?" people will say yes. But if you do something like put a challenge in the game, and no matter what they do, they still end up captured -- if they figure this out, they become frustrated.
You're right, the end result is the same. But all my experience tells me to do it the first way ("just start out captured") rather than the 2nd way (win or lose a fight you end up in the same place).
So since you obviously agree that it's semantics and railroading, don't make it sound like anything else. LOL.
I agree with the OPs method of getting players into the story and yours equally. They both work, better for some groups than others. As a player, I like the OPs way better, I feel regardless of the railroading, it provides more player agency on how you get there. Your way, you are just there, because I say so.
Hey guys, I really appreciate all of your feedback :)
Maybe I have not given you enough information:
The ship they are on is a small ship (crew of 10 + 3 guards because of the missing people). One member of the crew is actually a spy/pirate that collects information and killed one crewman. I wanted to do a little cluedo-like game where my PCs find out about the upcoming attack and can come up with something but - as you all certainly know - they did not do as I planned and totally ****ed up and ended up as the suspects and were put into detention in seperate rooms. At night our rogue PC picked the lock of his "cell" and freed two other PCs (the third roll was a 4 for the last lock) and then we ended the session.
I do not plan to attack them with a quantity of 30 pirates or something but with about 12-14, I think this will be an interesting first encounter and as somebody already said:there is also non-lethal dmg.
But maybe you are right and I should let them "win" against them and have them find some clues on their ship, I think then they will go to the pirate island. If not I am sure I can come up with another fun idea for them ^.^
I also do not plan to interfere with my PCs freedom of choice. Of course I would like them to do things like I have planned things out but this never works. I think that adapting to the PCs choices is the best thing to do but a little push into the "planned" direction is in my opinion not that dramatic at all :) The only thing I want my player to have is fun while enjoying my world.
I hope all of you are doing well :)
Kind regards, TristramD2
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I've been where you are now with the whole campaign thing, and I agree with what everyone else has said about the PC's getting captured. Either start the story on the island, or change the encounter to something more like what other people have suggested with some of the NPC's getting captured. If you're going to have them level up when you get to the camp then I would suggest having an extra encounter with some of the pirates, maybe capturing them to provide a reason for the pirate attack that isn't just random, although that works fine as well. I also agree with the whole skill challenges thing, and you could add a few more with piloting the pirate ship etc. Providing an incentive to get back at the pirates could be by having them capture NPC's and then, if the party win overall, have the captain and other high-ranking pirates sail away in a smaller boat during the fighting to warn the island, or you have the party find things on the pirate's ship that give them that incentive (eg. something about the island being full of treasure if the party react well to that, or some kind of RP hook that could involve one of the players if backstory allows, etc.). Then with your questions about the main camp I would have a nominally large pirate presence, but having the biggest ships out at sea, so there are less pirates there at that point, maybe even making it a bigger thing of the pirates controlling the whole island and suffocating trade in the entire area as pirate overlords or something like that. This would allow for a realistic amount of pirates as well as giving larger scope for the PC's to avoid them, and you could make this the whole campaign if you want (you probably have other ideas, so feel free to ignore that). As others have said, it would be cool to have the pirates be sahuaguin or something like that.
Also, everyone else - calm down! This is TristamD2's first campaign, there will always be areas for improvement, and if done well, the whole captured thing could work really well, as long as the DM gives opportunities for the party to get inventive aboard the pirate ship, and maybe even escape before they reach the island.
Tristam, these are just suggestions, but I hope they help, and good luck for the campaign!
(Apologies for the weird writing style, I was just kind of going with the flow)
So since you obviously agree that it's semantics and railroading, don't make it sound like anything else. LOL.
I agree with the OPs method of getting players into the story and yours equally. They both work, better for some groups than others. As a player, I like the OPs way better, I feel regardless of the railroading, it provides more player agency on how you get there. Your way, you are just there, because I say so.
Hey guys, I really appreciate all of your feedback :)
Maybe I have not given you enough information:
The ship they are on is a small ship (crew of 10 + 3 guards because of the missing people). One member of the crew is actually a spy/pirate that collects information and killed one crewman. I wanted to do a little cluedo-like game where my PCs find out about the upcoming attack and can come up with something but - as you all certainly know - they did not do as I planned and totally ****ed up and ended up as the suspects and were put into detention in seperate rooms. At night our rogue PC picked the lock of his "cell" and freed two other PCs (the third roll was a 4 for the last lock) and then we ended the session.
I do not plan to attack them with a quantity of 30 pirates or something but with about 12-14, I think this will be an interesting first encounter and as somebody already said:there is also non-lethal dmg.
But maybe you are right and I should let them "win" against them and have them find some clues on their ship, I think then they will go to the pirate island. If not I am sure I can come up with another fun idea for them ^.^
I also do not plan to interfere with my PCs freedom of choice. Of course I would like them to do things like I have planned things out but this never works. I think that adapting to the PCs choices is the best thing to do but a little push into the "planned" direction is in my opinion not that dramatic at all :) The only thing I want my player to have is fun while enjoying my world.
I hope all of you are doing well :)
Kind regards, TristramD2