I started running 5E for my family at the beginning of 2016 and after two AL modules, they asked for a homebrew campaign, surprisingly. I actually had no plans to do so: most of my group was new to 5E and one of them had never played a tabletop RPG. Running D&D for them wasn't even my idea: I had quit running D&D in 2015 because I was burned out on fantasy RPGs.
Now, don't be mistaken: I absolutely *love* writing D&D campaigns. I don't love running them quite as much. (Caveat: I've never run a game online.) But that's a different topic. What I'm here to talk about is the campaign I'm currently writing/running.
Inspired by one of my player's herpetological leanings (she's an environmental biology major who studied Australian skinks) I started looking into lizardfolk as the central element. It seemed obvious that a story about the lizardfolk being freed from slavery to the Yuan-ti and Naga would be perfect.
Here's the story so far:
PCs are hired to find a person, who they track to the border of Sword Coast and Serpent Hills. This person wants to help the Godborn of Qotal in their goal to end the strife between lizardfolk and other races, but first must defeat the Phaerimm that have returned and are wreaking havoc on the Serpent Kingdom. To do this, the Godborn seeks out the Golden Skins of the World Serpent, aka Nether Scrolls, and the PCs must decide whether to help or to gain the Nether Scrolls for themselves (or other factions also seeking it). Right now, the players are going to enter The Winding Serpent, a complex of tunnels beneath The Serpent Hills that will take them to the serpentfolk city of Ss'khanaja. Once there, they'll have to find their way to the library of one of the most powerful Naga sorcerers in the city and retrieve a book containing the location of one of the Nether Scrolls. While in the city, they'll discover that the Phaerimm are more concerned with annihilating the remains of the Sarrukh empire, starting with the Naga and Yuan-ti. They created a plague to wipe out the Lizardfolk, which the Godborn is trying to stop. One of the dramatic conflicts is going to be between the players and the Godborn, who wants to try and save the serpentfolk instead of letting the Phaerimm wipe them out first.
Obviously there's some problems here. First off, I don't think the Nether Scrolls would really be useful in terms of stopping the Phaerimm. Did just a few of them escape? Could I have them just get the one scroll and defeat maybe a few Phaerimm with it? I should probably just cave and buy Lost Empires and Serpent Kingdoms but since this is 5E, I feel like I could fudge some of this. It's a homebrew game anyway.
Any advice on how to handle the Phaerimm or the Nether Scrolls? I initially wanted this to be a shorter campaign but as usual, my ambitions have overwhelmed me. Maybe I could cheat & have them find the Nether Scroll in SS'khanaja and defeat the Phaerimm, skipping the whole dramatic conflict entirely... heck, maybe that's what the Phaerimm are after as well? I just feel like my players don't have the patience for a campaign as deep as this but I also don't want to abandon this storyline completely.
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When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
To me it usually seems easier to mod old/existing adventures, than brew everything from scratch. However, the latter is usually more exciting and fulfilling in some ways. I think it just depends on what kind of time you have in your life to invest in creating everything. Honestly, I think it can be equally fun for the players either way, and because I want to have time for other things/avoid burning myself out, I've been opting for letting pre-written stuff do most of the heavy lifting, and then moding or deviating as necessary to meet the player's needs/desires.
To me it usually seems easier to mod old/existing adventures, than brew everything from scratch. However, the latter is usually more exciting and fulfilling in some ways. I think it just depends on what kind of time you have in your life to invest in creating everything. Honestly, I think it can be equally fun for the players either way, and because I want to have time for other things/avoid burning myself out, I've been opting for letting pre-written stuff do most of the heavy lifting, and then moding or deviating as necessary to meet the player's needs/desires.
Absolutely right here. Its rough doing everything from the ground up, but if you give yourself enough time you can do it. I wrote an entire campaign from the ground up that took the characters to level 10, but I did it slowly. Set aside an hour during lunch at work, or at night. Just grabbed a journal book and jotted down ideas that came to my mind before I lost them. Then looked at the ideas to form whatever adventure sprung to life from it.
I always keep a pocket journal with pencil with me and a small little digital recorder in my work bag if I am on the go and cant write.
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Host of the Pocket Mimic Podcast, a D&D 5e Show! Join us and listen in as we build a new world step by step! (http://Pocketmimic.com) DMs vs PCs! All DMs are evil | ENnie Award Winner | OSR style in a 5e world |1000+ character souls taken | 25+ yrs exp Remember to hit the thanks button, if you feel my info was useful, it helps me know I've provided helpful information and know I'm on the right track.
Thank you so much for the feedback! I really only write campaigns I find personally exciting so it's very thrilling to hear that someone else is intrigued by it. I think the issue I have personally with using pre-written material, and it's strictly a personal hang-up because of how long I ran D&D Encounters instead of my own stuff, is that when a pre-written thing is in front of me, I get obsessive with using everything there. My desire to improvise takes a hit and I find it's easier for me to guide my players invisibly if I'm not already aware of where the walls are. Like, if I know exactly where the edge of the trail is, I'm going to get nervous if they veer towards it, but if the trail is just a pretense for them to get lost in the woods, I'm not so precious about it.
Though this has a lot to do with my own mentality that, like, if you go off the trail, don't expect everything to be as well-rendered or thought out and I definitely don't mind pointing that out at the table. Meta-gaming? Maybe, but it's just a one time thing anyway.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
You definitely inspired me to get back into that mode of actively thinking about how to fill in those gaps when I'm at work. I'd started a new job six months ago and it's one that doesn't give me much downtime for that but I manage to find an hour here or there where I can just contemplate the campaign's missing pieces. At least one fell into place recently and I'm grateful you gave the push in that direction. Turns out I needed factions within the Lizardfolk and Serpentfolk refugees and the resulting conflict is going to be the core conflict in their upcoming trek beneath the Serpent Hills. I still feel like I need to craft some actual monsters for that area too but at least that trek won't just be dead air.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
Though this has a lot to do with my own mentality that, like, if you go off the trail, don't expect everything to be as well-rendered or thought out and I definitely don't mind pointing that out at the table. Meta-gaming? Maybe, but it's just a one time thing anyway.
I think it's a bad idea to show the players your hand like that. Because honestly most of the time they have no idea what's prewritten and what's improvised. Especially if you're paraphrasing boxed text and using the module as a guide rather than a script. If you start pointing out where the seams are it can train them to see those things and it takes away from the suspension of disbelief that is required for this sort of enterprise.
I can see what you mean by that but my experience is two-fold: the first is that as someone who is very expressive instinctively, who is usually wired on coffee or whatever when running a game, as someone who has always relied on body language (both reading & expressing) I can tell that my players can tell when I'm improvising. I definitely don't do it on purpose: I agree that the ideal experience means players can't tell the difference, but it doesn't change the fact that I'm far more emotional when riffing than I am otherwise; usually I'm giddy about the potential fun to be had with the riff of the moment but if it's a situation where I'm dealing with unintended consequences, I'll start stalling or looking for space to think of how to make the situation work. If you are able to work through those problems on the spot without unintentionally revealing your hand, you've got much colder blood than I. (I'll add that I could probably try and divest myself emotionally from the game for this sake but I insist, unfortunately, that I have to have fun too.)
Given this, it just makes more sense for me to ask the group to let me regroup than to fumble and potentially make things worse.
Now, as a player (not something that happens too often) I usually only pick up on one of two "modes" that the Dungeonmaster is operating on: they have a module and I'm going to occasionally look back at that for guidance or; they have an abstract idea of what story I'm telling and they're just letting the players bounce around inside that. If I know it's the former, I'm definitely going to just play simply and let this typically well-written piece unfold but if it's the latter, I'm going to have to force myself to stay in the story and character because the 4th wall tends to gradually fall apart in that scenario. I haven't yet had the fortune (outside of GenCon) of playing with a DM who can carry a 4-hour game on their improvisational shoulders. This is why I've been stuck as Dungeonmaster for so long: I seem to have that knack. This is not bragging: I really really would love to just PLAY a tabletop RPG (even D&D) in real life but finding someone else confident enough to be a Dungeonmaster hasn't happened, at least not one that isn't already locked into an ongoing game.
TL;DR - I am extremely bad at not signaling to my players that I am improvising (read above for why), even though I understand that it can ruin suspension of disbelief. However, I also believe that the players do need to meet the Dungeonmaster halfway and if they've managed to throw my game into totally unexpected territory, I think it's fair to ask for a little leeway to cobble together a sensible response.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
I totally get that, everybody, dm included, comes to the table with a different skill set. I've always preferred to work extemporaneously in most settings (theatre, class room, presentations, performances, interviews, etc.), because of that when I started using modules to underpin my campaign it was amazing. It reduced the amount of effort I needed to put in for a game and improved the overall experience for all of us at the table. For me it's nice to have a huge load of story and options that I can draw from that I didn't have to spend hours preparing.
I got turned on to Matt Coleville, a few months back and I have to say that his mission to make everyone a dm is inspiring and he offers a wealth of awesome pro tips to improve your dming, but what's more is that he really encourages all players to have a go at it, which might be worth a suggestion to your group... just saying.
Check out his interview on the February 3rd episode of the Dragon Talk Podcast (WotC's official D&D podcast) or I highly recommend Collvile's youtube channel.
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
Well I think that my conversion of Phaerminn from 4e to 5e was good.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
The armor class type should be in parentheses; "hover" should be in parentheses; Insight should probably be +7; "At Will" and "1/Day Each" should be "At will" and "1/day each", respectively; "poisoned", in the bite attack, should be tooltipped; "Action Ranged Attack.MeleeWeapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 10ft., one target. Hit: 9 (2d6+2) bludgeoning damage plus 7 (2d6) poison damage." should have a name other than "action ranged attack", and should have a space between "melee" and "weapon"; "The phaerminn uses its innate spellcasting to cast a spell." could read better, but so could bits of some of the monsters from Tyranny of Dragons and Lost Mine of Phandelver, so that's not really very high priority; there should be a space in between "100" and "ft." in the thing's last lair action; and the aforementioned "ft." might be better as "feet".
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
I had already noticed the mistake in the insight modifier. It had originally had a lower CR. Most of the other things were mere typos and things I forgot to add. Here's the finished version:
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
I had already noticed the mistake in the insight modifier. It had originally had a lower CR. Most of the other things were mere typos and things I forgot to add. Here's the finished version:
I didn't know you were on right now so I hoped it was approved by the time you saw the message.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
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I started running 5E for my family at the beginning of 2016 and after two AL modules, they asked for a homebrew campaign, surprisingly. I actually had no plans to do so: most of my group was new to 5E and one of them had never played a tabletop RPG. Running D&D for them wasn't even my idea: I had quit running D&D in 2015 because I was burned out on fantasy RPGs.
Now, don't be mistaken: I absolutely *love* writing D&D campaigns. I don't love running them quite as much. (Caveat: I've never run a game online.) But that's a different topic. What I'm here to talk about is the campaign I'm currently writing/running.
Inspired by one of my player's herpetological leanings (she's an environmental biology major who studied Australian skinks) I started looking into lizardfolk as the central element. It seemed obvious that a story about the lizardfolk being freed from slavery to the Yuan-ti and Naga would be perfect.
Here's the story so far:
PCs are hired to find a person, who they track to the border of Sword Coast and Serpent Hills. This person wants to help the Godborn of Qotal in their goal to end the strife between lizardfolk and other races, but first must defeat the Phaerimm that have returned and are wreaking havoc on the Serpent Kingdom. To do this, the Godborn seeks out the Golden Skins of the World Serpent, aka Nether Scrolls, and the PCs must decide whether to help or to gain the Nether Scrolls for themselves (or other factions also seeking it). Right now, the players are going to enter The Winding Serpent, a complex of tunnels beneath The Serpent Hills that will take them to the serpentfolk city of Ss'khanaja. Once there, they'll have to find their way to the library of one of the most powerful Naga sorcerers in the city and retrieve a book containing the location of one of the Nether Scrolls. While in the city, they'll discover that the Phaerimm are more concerned with annihilating the remains of the Sarrukh empire, starting with the Naga and Yuan-ti. They created a plague to wipe out the Lizardfolk, which the Godborn is trying to stop. One of the dramatic conflicts is going to be between the players and the Godborn, who wants to try and save the serpentfolk instead of letting the Phaerimm wipe them out first.
Obviously there's some problems here. First off, I don't think the Nether Scrolls would really be useful in terms of stopping the Phaerimm. Did just a few of them escape? Could I have them just get the one scroll and defeat maybe a few Phaerimm with it? I should probably just cave and buy Lost Empires and Serpent Kingdoms but since this is 5E, I feel like I could fudge some of this. It's a homebrew game anyway.
Any advice on how to handle the Phaerimm or the Nether Scrolls? I initially wanted this to be a shorter campaign but as usual, my ambitions have overwhelmed me. Maybe I could cheat & have them find the Nether Scroll in SS'khanaja and defeat the Phaerimm, skipping the whole dramatic conflict entirely... heck, maybe that's what the Phaerimm are after as well? I just feel like my players don't have the patience for a campaign as deep as this but I also don't want to abandon this storyline completely.
When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
This sounds like an awesome campaign.
To me it usually seems easier to mod old/existing adventures, than brew everything from scratch. However, the latter is usually more exciting and fulfilling in some ways. I think it just depends on what kind of time you have in your life to invest in creating everything. Honestly, I think it can be equally fun for the players either way, and because I want to have time for other things/avoid burning myself out, I've been opting for letting pre-written stuff do most of the heavy lifting, and then moding or deviating as necessary to meet the player's needs/desires.
Host of the Pocket Mimic Podcast, a D&D 5e Show! Join us and listen in as we build a new world step by step! (http://Pocketmimic.com)
DMs vs PCs! All DMs are evil | ENnie Award Winner | OSR style in a 5e world |1000+ character souls taken | 25+ yrs exp
Remember to hit the thanks button, if you feel my info was useful, it helps me know I've provided helpful information and know I'm on the right track.
Thank you so much for the feedback! I really only write campaigns I find personally exciting so it's very thrilling to hear that someone else is intrigued by it. I think the issue I have personally with using pre-written material, and it's strictly a personal hang-up because of how long I ran D&D Encounters instead of my own stuff, is that when a pre-written thing is in front of me, I get obsessive with using everything there. My desire to improvise takes a hit and I find it's easier for me to guide my players invisibly if I'm not already aware of where the walls are. Like, if I know exactly where the edge of the trail is, I'm going to get nervous if they veer towards it, but if the trail is just a pretense for them to get lost in the woods, I'm not so precious about it.
Though this has a lot to do with my own mentality that, like, if you go off the trail, don't expect everything to be as well-rendered or thought out and I definitely don't mind pointing that out at the table. Meta-gaming? Maybe, but it's just a one time thing anyway.
When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
You definitely inspired me to get back into that mode of actively thinking about how to fill in those gaps when I'm at work. I'd started a new job six months ago and it's one that doesn't give me much downtime for that but I manage to find an hour here or there where I can just contemplate the campaign's missing pieces. At least one fell into place recently and I'm grateful you gave the push in that direction. Turns out I needed factions within the Lizardfolk and Serpentfolk refugees and the resulting conflict is going to be the core conflict in their upcoming trek beneath the Serpent Hills. I still feel like I need to craft some actual monsters for that area too but at least that trek won't just be dead air.
When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
I can see what you mean by that but my experience is two-fold: the first is that as someone who is very expressive instinctively, who is usually wired on coffee or whatever when running a game, as someone who has always relied on body language (both reading & expressing) I can tell that my players can tell when I'm improvising. I definitely don't do it on purpose: I agree that the ideal experience means players can't tell the difference, but it doesn't change the fact that I'm far more emotional when riffing than I am otherwise; usually I'm giddy about the potential fun to be had with the riff of the moment but if it's a situation where I'm dealing with unintended consequences, I'll start stalling or looking for space to think of how to make the situation work. If you are able to work through those problems on the spot without unintentionally revealing your hand, you've got much colder blood than I. (I'll add that I could probably try and divest myself emotionally from the game for this sake but I insist, unfortunately, that I have to have fun too.)
Given this, it just makes more sense for me to ask the group to let me regroup than to fumble and potentially make things worse.
Now, as a player (not something that happens too often) I usually only pick up on one of two "modes" that the Dungeonmaster is operating on: they have a module and I'm going to occasionally look back at that for guidance or; they have an abstract idea of what story I'm telling and they're just letting the players bounce around inside that. If I know it's the former, I'm definitely going to just play simply and let this typically well-written piece unfold but if it's the latter, I'm going to have to force myself to stay in the story and character because the 4th wall tends to gradually fall apart in that scenario. I haven't yet had the fortune (outside of GenCon) of playing with a DM who can carry a 4-hour game on their improvisational shoulders. This is why I've been stuck as Dungeonmaster for so long: I seem to have that knack. This is not bragging: I really really would love to just PLAY a tabletop RPG (even D&D) in real life but finding someone else confident enough to be a Dungeonmaster hasn't happened, at least not one that isn't already locked into an ongoing game.
TL;DR - I am extremely bad at not signaling to my players that I am improvising (read above for why), even though I understand that it can ruin suspension of disbelief. However, I also believe that the players do need to meet the Dungeonmaster halfway and if they've managed to throw my game into totally unexpected territory, I think it's fair to ask for a little leeway to cobble together a sensible response.
When you’re creating your own shit, man, even the sky ain’t the limit. ~ Miles Davis
I totally get that, everybody, dm included, comes to the table with a different skill set. I've always preferred to work extemporaneously in most settings (theatre, class room, presentations, performances, interviews, etc.), because of that when I started using modules to underpin my campaign it was amazing. It reduced the amount of effort I needed to put in for a game and improved the overall experience for all of us at the table. For me it's nice to have a huge load of story and options that I can draw from that I didn't have to spend hours preparing.
I got turned on to Matt Coleville, a few months back and I have to say that his mission to make everyone a dm is inspiring and he offers a wealth of awesome pro tips to improve your dming, but what's more is that he really encourages all players to have a go at it, which might be worth a suggestion to your group... just saying.
Check out his interview on the February 3rd episode of the Dragon Talk Podcast (WotC's official D&D podcast) or I highly recommend Collvile's youtube channel.
Matthew Colville <----link to his youtube channel
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
Well I think that my conversion of Phaerminn from 4e to 5e was good.
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
Ok. What needs to be changed? The lair actions?
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
I had already noticed the mistake in the insight modifier. It had originally had a lower CR. Most of the other things were mere typos and things I forgot to add. Here's the finished version:
Phaerminn
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
Tooltips (Help/aid)
I didn't know you were on right now so I hoped it was approved by the time you saw the message.
Devious serpent folk devoid of compassion, yuan-ti manipulate other creatures by arousing their doubts, evoking their fears, and elevating and crushing their hopes. From remote temples in jungles, swamps, and deserts, the yuan-ti plot to supplant and dominate all other races and to make themselves gods.