Whenever I've DM'd, I've made changes to my player's campaigns so that it was "My Campaign". My players have now been playing through the SC campaign for two-and-a-half years of play and I've made a few substitutions that have worked out very well. Here are a few of my changes (at a high level).
I'd be VERY interested in hearing what other substitutions and changes other DM's have made that have generated a lot of player enthusiasm.
1) Life's Bazaar - Played through as is. The team had LOTS of fun in Jzadirune and then a knock-down-drag-out fight with Kazmojen in the Malachite Fortress. On www.theRPGenius.com website, there are a number of files which add wonderful color and flavor details to the city of Cauldron!
2) Flood Season - Due to a player death, our team instead trekked off to Sasserine in search of a rez (I used the "City State of the Invincible Overlord" from Necromancer Games, and it's a VERY fun and unique place for players to experience!). The players then went on a quest into the Amedio Jungle to earn the 5,000 gp for the rez (using "The Elephant's Graveyard" adventure from Dungeon Magazine #15).
When the team arrived back in Cauldron, they went hunting for a Wand of Water Control in Richard Pett's "The Styes" module.
3) Zenith's Trajectory - I first ran our team through The Demonskar Ball - from DelvesDeep on www.theRPGenius.com. It was a HOOT! And our players had wonderful opportunities to interact with many of the Cauldron personalities, including Lord Valanthru.
Our team then followed the Zenith module verbatim until they entered the Underdark on their way to the Shrine. At this point, I replaced the small Kuo-Toa temple in the original SC module with Gary Gygax's "Shrine of the Kuo-Toa" module D2 (with key SC campaign locations and encounters cut-and-pasted into the shrine). My player characters met up with Gygax's Svirfneblin team early in the adventure and they agreed to work with each other to invade the Shrine. And instead of a few battles in the original Zenith module, the players were involved in HUGE battles across Gygax's Kuo Toa city. It was epic.
4) Demonskar Legacy - My team battled through the tax riot and also the fire elemental attack, and are now making their way to find Alek Tercival. Alek is imprisoned in the starry mirror, but the starry mirror is in a midlevel section of Monte Cook's "Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil" module. When my players arrive in Hommlet in a session or two, they'll know that something's up... I have a couple of players who are well aware of historical D&D modules such as ToEE and have played the ToEE computer game, so my PLAYERS will have an idea of what might be coming, but their CHARACTERS will be a bit surprised.
Hurm.
Hrmm... originally I had planned on converting the whole thing to take place in the Forgotten Realms but quickly decided it wasn't worth the effort when none of the players actually seemed to care about even looking at any of the FR books for options or tying themselves to the world. So to keep things easy I kept it in Greyhawk.
Life's Bazaar ran pretty standard though they did make contact with Tygot Mispas in this first adventure (looking for other prominent gnomes who might know the history of Jzadirune in town and I have presented him as a historian of the town of sorts... they LOVE his dog).
After Life's Bazaar my Paladin of St. Cuthbert took on Terem as her squire of sorts. This has worked out quite well with a large emotional reaction when he went missing again.
The same Paladin quickly decided that she would like a romantic relationship with either Vhalantru or Alek Tercival and ended up with a relationship with Alek. The implications of this one were great as well.
I wanted to give the players some choice in adventures so for fun I hit them with the hook to Drakthar's Way at the same time as Valhantru offered to sponser their entry into a Challenge of Champions event in Sasserine. They chose to go for the Challenge of Champions (and Vhalantru tried to push them to take up adventuring there instead due to all the different options and oportunities there instead of Cauldron... it will be fun when they remember this in the next few sessions since we just started Lords of Oblivion). I also had the violence of the goblins escalate and several murders occured before the Stormblades stepped in and "saved the city." That really got the rivalry going well.
The party rogue has had a strange relationship going with Jill and the last laugh that has played very well into things.
The party cleric is considering challenging Cpt. Skellerang under the old law of peers (he is a noble as well).
Other than that things have run pretty much "on track" for most of the campaign.
One very interesting thing that has happened has been very cinemactic scenes at the end of most adventures, usually with criticals from the Critical hit deck.
One example was Nabthateron casting reverse gravity (he was tall enough to just brace himself with one pair of arms and roll out) but on the very next attack the Paladin got a critical and actually ended up severing his head. So I described it as him still being upside down and laughing at them as she realized that put his throat in range and took the shot.
I had a visiting player (not a normal thing for us) while they were down in the Kopru Ruins in Flood Season, so I had him play Sgt. Krewis. Krewis had been married to the red headed priest (name suddenly escapes me) and was the only survivor to her attack when she turned on the guards. He did a great job role-playing when they finally were able to confront her but was unable to stop the fight. With one critical and some crazy dice rolling for damage combined with another critical hit card he disemboweled his unrepentant wife, threw down his sword and marched out of the ongoing battle crying for his lost love... it was great. Anyway, lots of moments like those.
I used the not so random encounters that were fleshed out for occipitus from the rpgenius (sorry, I don't remember the auther, but it worked really well as I think it helped give the feeling of being on a plane of the abyss better than the module alone).
Hrmm... what else... The party save Alek Tercival in Demonscar Legacy and sent him back via teleport (with a mage who teleported right back) to the walls over redgorge just as the battle was about to stop. He was able to recind his challenge, tell his story, stop the war as it started and presented the head of the Lord of Demonscar while telling the story of the PCs bravery.
Anyway... overall it has been a fantastic campaign for the palyers.
Sean Mahoney
Those are some excellent highlights, Sean!
I have a question for you.
When you use the critical hit deck in your game, isn't it a bit harsh on the players when they are on the receiving end of a critical hit? Over the course of the campaign with dozens of battles, I'd imagine that each of the players would take quite a few nasty hits...
Where in the campaign are your players? Have you finished it?
Thanks for the tip about Occipitus. I'll take a look at the notes for Occipitus on the RPGenius website since I also am looking to give that environment a much stronger feel as a strange otherworld.
Within the next couple of sessions, my players will be quite surprised to find themselves looking for Alek in the ToEE.
Hurm.
When you use the critical hit deck in your game, isn't it a bit harsh on the players when they are on the receiving end of a critical hit? Over the course of the campaign with dozens of battles, I'd imagine that each of the players would take quite a few nasty hits...
Surprisingly it hasn't caused much of an issue. So far in the campaign I have been able to pull from it 4 times or so... not much at all for how far they are.
Part of the reason for this is that I only allow "main bad guys" to pull from the deck. Typically this means no more than 2-3 people/creatures per adventure. That makes a LOT less chances to get a critical hit.
Where in the campaign are your players? Have you finished it?
We just finished The Secrets of the Soul Pillars at the end of last session (Vitriss Bale was a very tough fight for them and the first time that deck really bit them... literally with the dragon scoring triple damage with a bite that put out the paladins eye and took her to -10 hp)
They were able to do a little bit of research and discussion to kick off Lords of Oblivion. They are just now, for the first time realizing that Vhalantru might be a problem. They REALLY don't like that idea.
Sean Mahoney
Now that I have thought about it a little bit, I realize that I left out where I think I did the most customization in order to tie the PCs to the game world. In their backgrounds...
Xale & Tamzin Malarky - Cleric & Paladin of St. Cuthbert (respectively)
Born to a minor noble family (noble trait was taken) that was particularly religious and involved in the church of St. Cuthbert, both Tamzin and her twin brother, Xale Malarky (the Cleric of the party) entered the service of the church.
I gave this player a handout with information on all the nobles of the town and had her family have membership at the Cusp of Sunrise which she was used to attending.
The Paladin and the Cleric both start the campaign at the orphanage where they had been sent by Jenya to let the head mistriss know that the church was dedicated to finding the culprits and was stepping in to find a resolution. They did some initial interviews and noted that the grounds person was missing (more on him later).
They threw me for a little bit of a loop when the cleric refused to leave the orphans unguarded and the paladin left on her own to go back to the church and inform Jenya of what they had found. My plan was to have them both jumped for the initial combat (replacing Rufus), but the Paladin got this honor on her own and the cleric missed out on the first battle.
Tyler Tarlintal - Rogue
Son of the prominent merchant Maavu, Tyler was often left to himself as his father rallied for some cause of the people or another. Tyler ended up falling in with a bad crowd and came to the attention of one Revus Twindaggers who was a member of the guild known as the Last Laugh. Tyler ended up accepting a mission from the Last Laugh in return for training and excitement. He just never thought that the mission they gave him would be exciting... Tyler took on work as the groundskeeper at a local orphanage and was told to watch out for the boy Terrem (this replaces Patch in the adventure). Things went tragically wrong when Tyler found his charge missing and a note for him to meet with Revus at the Tipped Tankard. This meeting was the initial scene for him in the campaign with Revus telling him if he didn't find that boy, and fast, that they were both dead... the Last Laugh does not brook failures. The meeting broke up abruptly when Revus noticed they were being watched by a couple of undercover watchmen.
The watchmen were none other than Sgt Krewis and a PC Ranger who was working his last night with the watch (this PC, Dai'i, only lasted through the first adventure before he and another player had to drop). The watch had been keeping an eye on the local thieves guilds / gangs for any connection with the disappearances and Krewis figured he could have a "goodbye, keep in touch" drink with Dai'i while keeping their eyes on Revus and anyone he met with. When they saw the rogues flee they split up and gave chase with Krewis going after Revus and Dai'i after Tyler.
The chase was a fun scene but about the time that the Ranger lost his prey (who had gone to the roofs) they both heard the first blows of a fight and the "oof" of the Paladin as she hit the ground from the Last Laugh ambush.
Essentially I tied everyone to the backstory of the campaign as much as I could. This way they each had some important clues as to what was going on. The Paladin and Cleric knew Jenya and could get the group together. The Rogue bought the locks at the orphanage from Ghelve and installed them himself. The Ranger had information from the city watch on who was missing and their personal information.
It all worked out really well and gave us a great kickoff to a campaign that they already felt tied into.
Sean Mahoney