Campaign Story Addition, good or bad idea?


Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion


First off let me say I hope I'm putting this in the right place category wise. I'm sorry if it isn't.

Second I will explain my campaign I'm running with my friends.

It's set in a loose version of Golarion, so I can fudge directions and such (I'm terrible with maps and history) and it involves my version of Asmodeus' contract with the other gods coming to term and he is pre-emptivly invading the world and actively causing problems for the gods so they can't interfere.

In the mortal realm a war between Asmodeus' cults and pretty much everyone has exploded with each country doing their best against the onslaught of the devils. The PCs are mercenaries/part of an attempt to build a much needed light house. They serves as the patrolling guards and scouts and one day happen upon a weird broken spear shaft. This shaft ends up giving them all weird dreams and making them ill upon return to the base. When they eventually recover, a cult has amassed outside the small outpost's gates and are rushing into attack. The attack WILL kill them, I won't go into details but it's not going to be fun.

Following their deaths they will find themselves not quite dead and in the presence of a god (Thinking Cayden Cailean) who divulges the secret of the spear haft. It's part of the spear that killed Asmodeus' brother and is the only way to invalidate his contract by ressurecting the dead god. Cayden charges them with completting a mission to do just that, even bringing them back to life. From there they would gather the necessary pieces to reforge the spear and bring Ihys back to being. This is the basic premise, a 3 stage easter egg hunt where most dangers will be traps and hazards.

However, I recently though of adding in a fourth part to the hunt involving a "Book of Life" wherein all the names and true names of all beings are kept and where Asmodeus did most of his sabotage to remove Ihys' name from history be scribbling out Ihys' name and making off with the special ink required to write in it. He would advertise he has the ink hidden and locked in a deep vault in his palace and only uses it when signing important contracts. In reality it's with a low level clerk in the 1st level of hell. The party would need this ink to add Ihys' name BACK into the book as part of his resurrection.

Does anyone think this is a good or bad idea?

Thirdly, thank you for your time.

Grand Lodge

I think putting the Book in the game is a very good idea, not just because it sounds more fun to me personally than the "search for the easter eggs" parts with the traps & hazards, but because of the new dynamic it creates in the campaign design....

Your easter egg hunts are three seemingly identical -- or at least very similar -- adventure types. A "Go-to-Hell-and-get-a-Book" adventure is a different adventure type. And dynamic types of adventure make for better gaming in the campaign. (Depending on the group's personal preferences, of course.)

The only thing that seems bad about your campaign is the "They WILL die!" part. That kind of Railroading is very NOT cool. (Though, obviously you know your group better than I!)

My suggestion is that you segue the fight in which they die....

Give the PCs a tough fight against the Devils, including a Devil-Commander they've come to know and hate, and one that they win (perhaps even gaining a level), though with great difficulty.
THEN "tell them" that immediately after the fight a horde of Greater Devils (or whatever) arrives and kills them all. And immediately they wake up in "Celestia" (or wherever) and Cayden Cailean tells them they're dead but is gonna restore them back to life with a mission to win the war.

This way the Players don't get frustrated in the middle of a hopeless fight (which takes a few hours, likely, of game time) creating some not-very-fun roleplay time and/or, worse, the PCs come up with some crazy and good way to escape (You know one of them will, at least!), and then you're more of a jerk-off because you have to force them (or that one) back to the hopeless fight.

They're not likely to love that you have a god restore them with a new mission. They may even likely resent Cayden Cailean.

Anyway, that's my two copper pieces.
Good luck!


W E Ray wrote:

I think putting the Book in the game is a very good idea, not just because it sounds more fun to me personally than the "search for the easter eggs" parts with the traps & hazards, but because of the new dynamic it creates in the campaign design....

Your easter egg hunts are three seemingly identical -- or at least very similar -- adventure types. A "Go-to-Hell-and-get-a-Book" adventure is a different adventure type. And dynamic types of adventure make for better gaming in the campaign. (Depending on the group's personal preferences, of course.)

The only thing that seems bad about your campaign is the "They WILL die!" part. That kind of Railroading is very NOT cool. (Though, obviously you know your group better than I!)

My suggestion is that you segue the fight in which they die....

Give the PCs a tough fight against the Devils, including a Devil-Commander they've come to know and hate, and one that they win (perhaps even gaining a level), though with great difficulty.
THEN "tell them" that immediately after the fight a horde of Greater Devils (or whatever) arrives and kills them all. And immediately they wake up in "Celestia" (or wherever) and Cayden Cailean tells them they're dead but is gonna restore them back to life with a mission to win the war.

This way the Players don't get frustrated in the middle of a hopeless fight (which takes a few hours, likely, of game time) creating some not-very-fun roleplay time and/or, worse, the PCs come up with some crazy and good way to escape (You know one of them will, at least!), and then you're more of a jerk-off because you have to force them (or that one) back to the hopeless fight.

They're not likely to love that you have a god restore them with a new mission. They may even likely resent Cayden Cailean.

Anyway, that's my two copper pieces.
Good luck!

Ah, I'm sorry I wasn't clear. The "They will die" part was part of the intro to the the actual game. The game's already started, though I can toss this in there when they got to actually FINDING the ritual to resurrect Ihys.

My group's used to plot intro's railroading us for the first game with me, they know it lets me setup what I need to to get my story started. From then on out I let them take the reigns and it will become less and less my story and more theirs. Although we all agreed the fight was gonna take forever given the amount of devils besieging them and so we did a cut to fast forward with me describing their commanded leaping onto a pit-fiend and impaling it through the skull while she got gutted. Their arrival revealed both the corpses still present, but collapsed to dust upon investigation. They all had fun once I let the reigns go, even choosing the hardest path to continue along the adventure, albeit unknowingly.

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