Out of curiosity what ideas for campaigns have you come up with that either never got to run or ended up running as a one shot because it never got any further?
Here let me start with an idea I had recently.
A galleon travelling to the mainland is attacked by a vessel commanded by forces who took the opportunity to attack this ship due to them carrying members of a race they disliked.
For the purposes here they had elves aboard travelling from their ancestral lands that the humans on the other ship were denied passage to and feeling disgruntled and egged on by members of a cult they attacked the other ship ending up sinking both ships.
A survivor from both vessels ended up on a raft that eventually reached the shore the only reason they didn't attack the other is because the human sailor pulled the elven maiden out of the water asking for a truce as he didn't agree with the actions of his late Captain.
Once they reach the coast they end up travelling together until they reach a rather primitive peasant village where they received shelter and aid from the locals.
It eventually turns out they need their help as the local rulers have called for aid and whilst they lack anyone capable of answering the call perhaps the new arrivals can respond on their behalf and get the aid they need to get home.
The sailor only agrees when he learns there's a monetary reward involved, the elf refuses until she discovers a half elf indentured into service with the village apparently he escaped his former captors and the villagers caught him and are conflicted as whilst they could send him back they would rather find a way to free him instead but none of them are prepared to defy the edict he's under.
The elven maiden only agrees to answer that call if they agree to her adopting the half elf thus both freeing him and leaving him in her custody so she can properly help him learn about his mother's people given she's the first full blooded elf he's met.
The trio are accompanied by the unruly daughter of their host who lets them think she got her parents agreement only to learn when they reach the dwarven fortress that she lied about that part almost getting them into trouble but a dwarven mage intervenes.
They met the king and queen learning whilst the Mountain Dwarven King is the latest in a long line of rulers his wife is from a Desert Dwarven community who spent millennia above ground in the middle of the desert so are naturally darker skinned something shared by their half elven companion who escaped from her homeland.
Apparently someone has attacked her homeland and her husband wants to send a scouting team to investigate in return they would be very well paid for their efforts.
The Sailor has no problem, their halfling tagalong is more interested in what awaits them, the half elf isn't happy to returning there but ends up persuading his foster mother into agreeing as she might find the answers behind his parentage even if it risks his freedom in the process.
Sorry any game that starts off like this would have problems.
How would you handle this?
You're all recruited to answer a call for aid from the local ruler a dwarven king who seeks help to investigate attacks on his wife's people.
Does that sound better than the above?
Please put your own idea down you never know we all need inspiration every now and again!
My friend, I am thoroughly confused. Few questions for clarification:
Is this a campaign you’re actually trying to run? Or is this all just for fun and you’re filling time coming up with ideas?
Are the characters mentioned NPCs or player characters? If they’re NPCs, you’re putting WAY too much effort into the development of these characters’ journey. Keep it simple!! It’ll help alleviate a lot of DM headaches, trust me. If they’re PCs, it’s good to know motivations but work with your players to really flesh out what they want. Use Flaws, Bonds, Traits, etc. to hone on these things rather than purely narrative restrictions.
Overall, you seem to have given this a lot of thought. That’s great but if this is a legit campaign idea and not a novel, stick to the one sentence you have at the end of your post, and then have your players help you craft the rest. Remember, this is a collaborative story telling game. Most players I’ve had would not respond well to just riding along for the DM’s narrative. They want to contribute and help you grow the story and the world they play in.
Just my two cents btw, take or leave whatever you will. Feel free to craft your game however you see fit.
I think one game idea I've been sitting on for a while is a sort of West-marches style game where everyone plays as a member or officer in an ongoing campaign/crusade made up of various good-aligned nations and races, pushing gradually across evil and chaos-infested wastes where demon lords and vampires and what have you have made their strongholds for some time. It's all building up to a big conflict with the big bad, and for a while that's just the pace of the game - set up a camp in a defensible location, defeat or undermine the enemy's tactical situation in the area until they withdraw, consolidate your forces, gain xp, magic items, rank, what have you, then push deeper into enemy territory. There's a certain sense of foreboding about the whole thing, as if it should be a lot harder to claim the territory and advances that you are given the level of the threat that you are up against.
Eventually, though, you get to the BBEG's fortress, and that's where you realize that it's all been a trap all along. A climactic battle ensues, with those in the party narrowly surviving and escaping the near wholesale destruction of the good guy's forces. The second half of the campaign is a fighting retreat back across the territory you once won from enemies, only this time the carefully prepared traps and defenses of the land are turned against you, until at the very last whatever scattered remnants of your glorious force endure make a desperate last stand for all the marbles, as it were.
The outline of the idea comes from a different game system that is based on a different game system called blades in the dark - specifically an adaptation for it that draws inspiration from Glenn Cook's the Black Company and the gritty, military story of a fighting retreat set in a world where magic and fantasy stuff exists.
While i played from about the age of 8-21 I did take a lot of time off in my adult years so I’m slowly returning. Normally I would conjure up a home brew world scheme but I was thinking about keeping it simpler. I was considering using forgotten realm setting and establishing and using some existing laws of the world from dieties to local militia. You could take a small town/city and build an entire campaign based on the world the city and any more you can scrounge up. Take for example the town of Silverymoon, you could keep an entire party and campaign going centred around one little town. I figured as long as the world and it’s laws were created and balanced the actual adventures practically write themselves by mutual participation. I suppose that’s why I like books like lots of the rings and dragonlance…the world are beautifully built- after that the adventures write themselves
Early on in my DMing career I had an idea about a campaign that would begin with the characters being brought together at the funeral of one of the most illustrious adventurer/heroes of the day, with the party being bequeathed in their will a series of keys with no explanation as to what they go to, prompting them to go off adventuring to solve the mystery.
What the players don't know is that the hero turned evil towards the end of their life and, in efforts to prolong it, locked their soul away in a sequestered part of the Abyss. They left the key mystery as a trap, with breadcrumbs out in the world leading the adventurers to the treasure they conceal, as a way to lure them out to the final door in the Abyss, where the one who opened the door would become possessed by the former hero's soul. That player (who would have to be on board to play the secret baddie of the campaign-- a big ask which is why I never ran it) would then work secretly to amass power in their bid for world domination/evil schemes for as long as they can manage without being found out.
If the players ever did go "hey X player is acting really strangely lately" I was fully prepared to roll with it and give them a chance to exorcise the hero's soul from their friend, after which they leave to possess someone else and become more of a traditional campaign bad guy.
Its the kind of campaign that you really need the right player who's gonna be on board for it to work, which is a finicky situation since you need to make sure they'd be on board without revealing so much that you're spoiling the plot. Maybe someday though...
Out of curiosity what ideas for campaigns have you come up with that either never got to run or ended up running as a one shot because it never got any further?
Here let me start with an idea I had recently.
A galleon travelling to the mainland is attacked by a vessel commanded by forces who took the opportunity to attack this ship due to them carrying members of a race they disliked.
For the purposes here they had elves aboard travelling from their ancestral lands that the humans on the other ship were denied passage to and feeling disgruntled and egged on by members of a cult they attacked the other ship ending up sinking both ships.
A survivor from both vessels ended up on a raft that eventually reached the shore the only reason they didn't attack the other is because the human sailor pulled the elven maiden out of the water asking for a truce as he didn't agree with the actions of his late Captain.
Once they reach the coast they end up travelling together until they reach a rather primitive peasant village where they received shelter and aid from the locals.
It eventually turns out they need their help as the local rulers have called for aid and whilst they lack anyone capable of answering the call perhaps the new arrivals can respond on their behalf and get the aid they need to get home.
The sailor only agrees when he learns there's a monetary reward involved, the elf refuses until she discovers a half elf indentured into service with the village apparently he escaped his former captors and the villagers caught him and are conflicted as whilst they could send him back they would rather find a way to free him instead but none of them are prepared to defy the edict he's under.
The elven maiden only agrees to answer that call if they agree to her adopting the half elf thus both freeing him and leaving him in her custody so she can properly help him learn about his mother's people given she's the first full blooded elf he's met.
The trio are accompanied by the unruly daughter of their host who lets them think she got her parents agreement only to learn when they reach the dwarven fortress that she lied about that part almost getting them into trouble but a dwarven mage intervenes.
They met the king and queen learning whilst the Mountain Dwarven King is the latest in a long line of rulers his wife is from a Desert Dwarven community who spent millennia above ground in the middle of the desert so are naturally darker skinned something shared by their half elven companion who escaped from her homeland.
Apparently someone has attacked her homeland and her husband wants to send a scouting team to investigate in return they would be very well paid for their efforts.
The Sailor has no problem, their halfling tagalong is more interested in what awaits them, the half elf isn't happy to returning there but ends up persuading his foster mother into agreeing as she might find the answers behind his parentage even if it risks his freedom in the process.
Sorry any game that starts off like this would have problems.
How would you handle this?
You're all recruited to answer a call for aid from the local ruler a dwarven king who seeks help to investigate attacks on his wife's people.
Does that sound better than the above?
Please put your own idea down you never know we all need inspiration every now and again!
My friend, I am thoroughly confused. Few questions for clarification:
Is this a campaign you’re actually trying to run? Or is this all just for fun and you’re filling time coming up with ideas?
Are the characters mentioned NPCs or player characters? If they’re NPCs, you’re putting WAY too much effort into the development of these characters’ journey. Keep it simple!! It’ll help alleviate a lot of DM headaches, trust me. If they’re PCs, it’s good to know motivations but work with your players to really flesh out what they want. Use Flaws, Bonds, Traits, etc. to hone on these things rather than purely narrative restrictions.
Overall, you seem to have given this a lot of thought. That’s great but if this is a legit campaign idea and not a novel, stick to the one sentence you have at the end of your post, and then have your players help you craft the rest. Remember, this is a collaborative story telling game. Most players I’ve had would not respond well to just riding along for the DM’s narrative. They want to contribute and help you grow the story and the world they play in.
Just my two cents btw, take or leave whatever you will. Feel free to craft your game however you see fit.
Profile pic - credit to artist unknown
I think one game idea I've been sitting on for a while is a sort of West-marches style game where everyone plays as a member or officer in an ongoing campaign/crusade made up of various good-aligned nations and races, pushing gradually across evil and chaos-infested wastes where demon lords and vampires and what have you have made their strongholds for some time. It's all building up to a big conflict with the big bad, and for a while that's just the pace of the game - set up a camp in a defensible location, defeat or undermine the enemy's tactical situation in the area until they withdraw, consolidate your forces, gain xp, magic items, rank, what have you, then push deeper into enemy territory. There's a certain sense of foreboding about the whole thing, as if it should be a lot harder to claim the territory and advances that you are given the level of the threat that you are up against.
Eventually, though, you get to the BBEG's fortress, and that's where you realize that it's all been a trap all along. A climactic battle ensues, with those in the party narrowly surviving and escaping the near wholesale destruction of the good guy's forces. The second half of the campaign is a fighting retreat back across the territory you once won from enemies, only this time the carefully prepared traps and defenses of the land are turned against you, until at the very last whatever scattered remnants of your glorious force endure make a desperate last stand for all the marbles, as it were.
The outline of the idea comes from a different game system that is based on a different game system called blades in the dark - specifically an adaptation for it that draws inspiration from Glenn Cook's the Black Company and the gritty, military story of a fighting retreat set in a world where magic and fantasy stuff exists.
While i played from about the age of 8-21 I did take a lot of time off in my adult years so I’m slowly returning. Normally I would conjure up a home brew world scheme but I was thinking about keeping it simpler. I was considering using forgotten realm setting and establishing and using some existing laws of the world from dieties to local militia. You could take a small town/city and build an entire campaign based on the world the city and any more you can scrounge up. Take for example the town of Silverymoon, you could keep an entire party and campaign going centred around one little town.
I figured as long as the world and it’s laws were created and balanced the actual adventures practically write themselves by mutual participation. I suppose that’s why I like books like lots of the rings and dragonlance…the world are beautifully built- after that the adventures write themselves
Early on in my DMing career I had an idea about a campaign that would begin with the characters being brought together at the funeral of one of the most illustrious adventurer/heroes of the day, with the party being bequeathed in their will a series of keys with no explanation as to what they go to, prompting them to go off adventuring to solve the mystery.
What the players don't know is that the hero turned evil towards the end of their life and, in efforts to prolong it, locked their soul away in a sequestered part of the Abyss. They left the key mystery as a trap, with breadcrumbs out in the world leading the adventurers to the treasure they conceal, as a way to lure them out to the final door in the Abyss, where the one who opened the door would become possessed by the former hero's soul. That player (who would have to be on board to play the secret baddie of the campaign-- a big ask which is why I never ran it) would then work secretly to amass power in their bid for world domination/evil schemes for as long as they can manage without being found out.
If the players ever did go "hey X player is acting really strangely lately" I was fully prepared to roll with it and give them a chance to exorcise the hero's soul from their friend, after which they leave to possess someone else and become more of a traditional campaign bad guy.
Its the kind of campaign that you really need the right player who's gonna be on board for it to work, which is a finicky situation since you need to make sure they'd be on board without revealing so much that you're spoiling the plot. Maybe someday though...