How to incorporate twists into a campaign


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I am making a world and I have two twists that I'm not sure how to incorporate them:
First the characters start off in the world of Pathfinder but then are eventually whisked away to another world that has different rules that govern magic. But these rules wouldn't come into affect until they are in the new world. Should I tell the players and spring the changes on them so they are surprised when it happens or tell them about the changes and ruin the surprise.

Second at some point in the game they will get betrayed and two things could happen. They could be immobilized and what ever happens happens. This would happen around mid levels but then they would be rescued and then have to stop their betrayer. Or they could build their characters to higher levels and be betrayed but the betrayal kills them and then a new campaign starts with the goal of fixing what happened to the world which was caused by their earlier characters. Now I was originally going to do the second option but I know that it takes time and planning to make characters and dying would tick them off pretty good but it would start a whole new campaign.

Thanks for the help.


1) For the first part, you've got to know your group. Some groups love being given a change like that and then dealing with the adversity. Others will feel like you've gone out of your way to screw with them.

2) For the betrayal: wait and see how things develop. It might be the PCs live, aren't captured, die, whatever. You're scripting this scene without even knowing how your group's going to act. You might well TPK before then for that matter.


Changing the rules of magic: If someone's made a Sorcerer and then the character changes completely as a result, that could be annoying. But without more information I don't know if this would be a problem.

Betraying the party: I'd say it's a bad thing to decide in advance that the party is going to be betrayed and murdered as this takes away the ability of the players to affect fate. What if they see it coming? What if they take precautions, escape and seek vengeance? A good GM can come up with alternative paths where no matter what happens, an interesting narrative results. The party dying and a new party taking their place is just one possible outcome.

Sczarni

Have the players create two mid-level characters each. At the first session, have them play one character, and then, at the second session, play the other. Lie and say you just want to let them figure out which they prefer. By the third or fourth session, players will know which is their primary (preferred) character. Now spring the trap. Send them upon a mission from which they cannot escape. Inform them the next session will begin a rescue mission to be carried out by the secondary characters. Drag it out for a second session. Maybe the primary characters have been moved to be used as living statues, due to a magic or poison that immobilized them. Once found, a cure for this condition must be found.


Have the noble or heroic tasks the party face, be an advantage (if not a setup) to the BBEG.

Example: Party recovers for the town important item [X], BBEG has in the meantime put a curse or debilitating substance on said item. Bringing it back like the good people they are (i'm assuming) spells doom for the town.


Through this I will refer to World A (the world they start on), and World B (the world they go to). Also, these are only my opinions. Do not take what I say to be 100% on what you should or should not do. Do not let me dissuade you from running it, I simply ask that you look at what I have to say, and see the impact that some options could have. Use this to hopefully fill any missing gaps, as these are questions that would run through my head as a player.

Shaden wrote:

I am making a world and I have two twists that I'm not sure how to incorporate them:

First the characters start off in the world of Pathfinder but then are eventually whisked away to another world that has different rules that govern magic. But these rules wouldn't come into affect until they are in the new world.

As a player, this is what I am thinking:

What are these rules? How do they change how magic works? Will casting PCs (Wizard/Sorcerer/Cleric/etc) be able to learn how these rules work and use them to cast spells normally? Is magic harder to use here, or easier? Why? Can a caster even cast anything? Why didn't I get my will save before being teleported?

As a GM/Rules Lawyer I am wondering:
Does this fundamentally change the core mechanics of magic? If so, how? Why does this world have such different rules of magic that it is worth bringing up? Does this completely shut down casters? Will they be able to learn how to utilize this new way of casting?
Is this world even in the same universe? If it is indeed in another universe, do the gods from World A have power in World B? If the gods' power does not reach here, the following classes are virtually useless, as they lose most or all of their abilities, until they either change to a deity in World B, or can gain a connection with their deity: If these classes are not gaining power from a deity, they will still possibly be fine.

Spoiler:

Cleric - Treat as a fallen Cleric
Druid - This may still be fine as I find druidic magic odd, but seperation from their world may cause issues
Paladin - A paladin without connection to their deity should be treated as a fallen paladin
Ranger - Arguable to be either way here, but see druid
Inquisitor - Treat as a fallen Inquisitor
Oracle - Should lose all class abilities, and possibly even their curse
Witch - Patron, this could potentially cause them to lose all of their abilities, or be entirely unaffected
Antipaladin - See paladin
Hunter - See Druid
Shaman - See Oracle and Witch
Warpriest - See Cleric

Due to magic being changed, the following classes could have unforseen issues:

Spoiler:

Barbarian - Certain rage powers may stop working
Bard - Shouldn 't be able to use Bardic performances, as they are magical in nature
Monk - Could lose ki and ki abilities, depends on your personal viewpoints on spirit magics (This affects: Ki pool, Wholeness of Body, Diamond Body, Abundant Step, Quivering Palm, Empty body, and probably Perfect Self)
Sorcerer - Should lose access to most, if not all of their bloodline powers. Could effectively make this class equivalent to a commoner
Wizard - Nothing in this class should really work here, but if magic from World A that was applied in World A still works in World B, then their familiar/Arcane bond will be fine. They should lose access to all school abilities as all of that time spent learning schools and how that works no longer has any real meaning anymore. This class basically turns into a commoner (with less feats for their level as a lot of those feats probably went into spellcasting.)
Alchemist - A lot of this class shouldn't work in World B.
Cavalier - Huh? Why is this here? It's possible that they could be considered to have done something against their orders code, though those are specific codes
Magus - Should basically be only slightly more useful than the wizard, too much for me to even go into here
Summoner - Does World B even have access to the same planes as World A?
Witch - has actually been covered with the divine classes
Ninja - See Monk
I do not wish to keep going with this.

Now I know a lot of this has been fairly negative, and there have been a lot of questions. This could be interesting to have as a temporary setback. While frustrating, it forces those characters back a bit, and makes them have to solve their problems in a way they wouldn't ordinarily be have to. However, some classes are affected by this a lot more than others. With primary arcane casters potentially being useless until they learn how to tap into the magic of World B, and divine casters potentially being completely cut off from that which gives them magic, this could cause those playing those characters to not have fun. Alternatively they may love it. That just depends on the individual player.

Shaden wrote:
Should I tell the players and spring the changes on them so they are surprised when it happens or tell them about the changes and ruin the surprise.

That depends on your players. If you think they would rather be surprised, then let them be surprised, though if you plan on the setbacks to be a permanent issue (and not an issue they clan learn their way out of), then I would highly suggest at least attempting to guide them away from some problem classes, and possibly even banning the use of certain classes. If you plan on it just being a setback for a session or two, then sure don't warn them, don't try to pull them away from certain classes, just let them find out.

If they don't like nasty surprises like this, and will probably take things very negatively, I'd suggest letting them know that at some point things will change a lot, and possibly just let them know that entire twist.

Shaden wrote:
Second at some point in the game they will get betrayed and two things could happen. They could be immobilized and what ever happens happens. This would happen around mid levels but then they would be rescued and then have to stop their betrayer.

Keep in mind that there are a lot of ways to become mobile again, possibly even before your betrayer even gets away. Most of this involves magic, though occasionally an alchemical item could get them out just as easily. Or the 20 Str Barbarian could go rage and just walk out.

As far as being saved, I don't really like that as a player. I've been in the middle of a fight with a BBEG, and had everything stolen from a long, grueling, gritty battle, simply because the DM decided to have a squad of elite soldiers show up and finish him off.
Then of course there was the time where my level 10-12 magus went toe to toe with a level 20 lich, hit him with Black Tentacles, got hit with (I forgot the name but it summons shackles to pin you), and the only reason I lived was because he was completely out of spells, due to a fight we had been seeing with another level 20 wizard and me technically working for him (that is a long story.) I was even left to die there by the lich and everyone else. Probably the only reason I lived after the fight, was due to the party's Dwarven fighter was off defending a church. So I picked up my dead friend and went home after being freed by said Dwarf.
Moral of that story? I enjoyed going into a fight that I full-well knew I would not come out of alive much more than having the end of a well earned fight stolen from me by some Elite NPC squad.

Shaden wrote:
Or they could build their characters to higher levels and be betrayed but the betrayal kills them and then a new campaign starts with the goal of fixing what happened to the world which was caused by their earlier characters. Now I was originally going to do the second option but I know that it takes time and planning to make characters and dying would tick them off pretty good but it would start a whole new campaign.

No rolls, you die sucks. It's boring, and probably should make the players annoyed.

Personal tangent that focuses more on me than your issue. Leaving it as it does have a bit of an example, but really only from the GM end.
Spoiler:
I actually did that once. I instantly regretted it, but it's what happens when you're running with no real planned material, and have been going about 48 hours straight. That and an argument on why a character shouldn't be dropped down to evil after he's been going murdohobo had me a bit mad at him, so I ended up just going with "Guard shows up, knows what you did, you die." But I was immensely tired. And I wasn't a good GM then anyway. Granted I still don't think I'm all that good, but I do try a lot more than I did then. And then there's obviously the annoyance of fighting someone that is immeasurably more powerful than you are. That has.... a bit of an annoyance to it, and is something I try to avoid, but I am concerned it will come up in the Star Wars game I'm running right now where the PCs could end up trying to punch Vader.

With this twist, honestly I would just find a good stopping point for the first group. Wrap things up. Do closure. Have them kill the BBEG even. Do end of game stuff. Tell them their characters went on to build that inn they wanted. Whatever. Then when PC group #2 shows up, they find out that the old BBEG was just a minor guy. Now the real BBEG has shown his face, has forced PC group #1 together, killed them, and now it's up to PC group #2 to avenge their old characters.
But leave the deaths of PC group #1 offscreen at all times. Just say that it happens, and the only person that truly knows what happened is the BBEG.

Wow, looking back at that, that is a lot. I apologize for my input being that long.


Force-killing the party is a pretty bad idea. You could definitely spring the betrayal on them, and have the traitor person put up a tough fight. If the guy tries to kill off the PCs, the whole point of the combat system is that they have a chance to fight back. It's okay because it's a legitimate challenge. But just waving your hands and saying "suddenly you all die because the plot demands it" is going to frustrate your players, especially at higher levels where they've put effort into developing their characters. It's basically telling them that their choices and character builds have little effect on the campaign.


I personally wouldn't even attempt the first idea. you're essentially changing the rules of the game mid game without anyones agreement. to me a challenge is to either use your game knowledge to exploit a weakness or creativity to think off something effective and out of the box. You'll be removing you're players frame of reference.

the second, betrayal is tricky. for starters your players might not trust the guy whose suppose to betray them, and rightly so. you'd have to go out of your way to convince them that he's a good guy so when he does betray them it just seems out of character and a cheat. what makes a good twist is the clues, you have to place clues that the character will betray them and hope they don't pick up on them until after he betrays them.

a good twist isn't just an unexpected twist, it has to be something that is plausible and consistent within the story you've created. its like if your watching the avengers, and all of a sudden out of nowhere, Thor just chokes tony stark to death during the shawarma scene. it would be unexpected but it would be stupid and just plain dumb.


As for the betrayal itself, I don't think you need to leave clues necessarily such that the players can fully anticipate the betrayal. Or at least avoid making it predictable. Just make sure that you mention parts of the plot that could explain the betrayal, so that in retrospect it would make sense. Also, you could give the character a high Bluff skill, and then make a silent GM roll whenever a clue would otherwise become obvious.

Scarab Sages

My advice: don't do either.

It is annoying to play for awhile with a group with certain expectations, then suddenly be locked out and not be able to play what you created. These all make fun ideas for books, but not improvisational storytelling where you want everyone else to have fun too. Forcing them to be dead, to be frozen, or anything like that, should be off limits.

If you want to change magic, change it beforehand, and talk with the players about it. At a minimum get buyin and feedback first from at least one player so you have an ally for your changes and can make recommendations. But note making magic systems is hard, and it is difficult to make it actually fair and consistent. You may likely end up with just a bunch of complaining because one week you ruled one way and later you ruled differently, but you think you ruled the same way. Look at the rules forum here.

If you want a twist, let the NPC actually have different motivations than the players realize, and that they've been used all along. Maybe the goal is still the same, so the players can choose to join the NPC, or get revenge for (insert whatever happened, abandoned just before the big bad end guy, or got PCs in trouble and blamed for something the NPC did, etc).

Both of these ideas are basically "OK you are done now, we are changing everything to work my way" They are not about improving fun for the players or giving them choices.

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