Homebrewing is a double-edged sword. In one hand you're going to have to do more work as a GM. In the other hand though, you get so much freedom as your campaign progresses.
When I built my first setting I started out when some general thoughts about plot. My personal example was the party joining a guild. From that point I designed the city involved with the guild. From that point I started trying to figure out some of the culture of the area which lead to designing the country.
I'm big into political science so at that point I started creating the political situation of the country *(enemies and allies). This lead to a world map...etc, etc.
So I built from micro to macro. Some people start the other way around.
However I do a lot of filling in the holes as I go. I'm currently doing my second campaign in my setting and at this point the characters are exploring in depth aspects of the setting as they adventure.
In my experience there will be moments where you're bound to have a hole in your world that will be noticed by a player. This occurred with me and so I spent time with my players designing the aspect of the world I'd not fully fleshed out.
Well i started with a concept for a game, and designed a world map. I picked one location on the map and decided that it would be the center for my game, and that i would expand out into the surrounding area`s little by little; like the above poster mentioned sometimes your going to have a hole in the world (like were pc`s come from); but nothing that you can retcon later in the game.
Have a plot.
Having a plot is different than having a campaign world. The plot is the thing that the characters are trying to get done.
Now, having a plot doesn't mean every single adventure advances the plot, and in fact I'd recommend against that, but you want the whole thing to have a purpose or over time it'll just peter out. Once you've got a plot, then you can fill in only the needed detail. Any more than that is a waste - and you're better off keeping just a few steps ahead of the players.
The beauty about having a plot is that you can put bits and pieces and recurring characters in there, sometimes months later, and it all makes more sense and seems real. If there's just a lot of unconnected adventures (like plopping prefab modules into your campaign world willy nilly) then it doesn't seem like a coherent whole.
One last piece of advice: write a campaign journal. Not only does it keep the players interested, what you'll find yourself doing is rounding out the world as you do it. In the game it might just have been:
They ate in a tavern in the town of Nodrin
... but you can elaborate later:
They stopped at the Stone Soup tavern in Nodrin, and ordered several ales from the bartender Joshton, who recommended the local brown ale. There were two barmaids, and the food was decent though not like the fine meal they had at the Fighting Lion in the city of Kendrith the night before.
It also gives you something to refer back to for prior events, which if you're planning a long-term campaign is crucial, and you can post it on any of many sites so that the players can read it once posted - which also builds interest in the next game and keeps the players interested in the plot.
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An aside: There was an excellent series in Dungeon before WoTC shot it in the head; it was about campaign building, and one thing that always stuck with me was when you create a place, always define a secret.
It might not come into play in that game, or the next few, but at some point the characters will run across one secret or another and have that "aha!" moment ... and it gives you tidbits of plot hooks to use when the time suits you.
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No matter how cool and how awesome your campaign world is, very few of your players will be excited by it. I've run multiple homebrew campaigns, and that was the mistake I made in the early ones. I thought my friends would be excited to explore a new world. They weren't. It turns out that I'm not as good at the world-making thing as Tolkein.
Who knew?
So you do need plot. Plot should not be too hard to find, but it needs to exist, it needs to be good, and it can't be too subtle. It doesn't need to be awesome and epic at first - it needs to have a good hook.
Can you tell us more about the adventure you want to create? Are any of your players looking forward to making a certain character? The best plots have the characters woven in, rather than brought in as separate modules.
Good ideas above, re: filling in the holes as you go.
I haven't played in a purchased setting since 1985 (Greyhawk). I was using homebrew settings before then and have been ever since. Some work out better than others, but a few things I've learned along the way:
- You don't need to know all the details of the world. Working from the inside out is doable.
- You don't have to come up with all the ideas yourself. Let the players build the world too. Grab details from their backgrounds and things they say and weave them into the whole picture.
- Have at least a vague notion of what's going on locally (politically, culturally) that can impact events and the way NPCs act/respond.
- Throw multiple adventure hooks out there until one sticks.
- Let the PCs' ambitions drive the story, rather than making a story to drive the PCs.
I don't even keep a world map anymore. I have a region map. A few weeks ago a new player joined and wanted to play a Saurian monk. He said, "I come from the mountains in the west." Then he looked at me to confirm, asking, "Are there mountains to the west?" I said there were. Now I know that there are mountains somewhere to the west, and at least one Saurian community dwelling there. Didn't know that before.
Keep good notes so you don't get caught in a contradiction later.
This approach works well for me, YMMV.
EDIT: I want to weigh in on what Lyrax is saying. There's a lot of truth in what he's saying. My campaign right now is only working so well because there is a plot. I didn't start with a plot, though; I started with a situation affecting the region. There really were many options open to them: just surviving the situation, capitalizing on the situation, or fixing the situation. They bit on the "fix the situation" lure, but I honestly thought they'd just ignore the situation and deal with its consequences as they went about their pursuits. So...TL;DR plot's important, maybe even critical, but the DM only needs to lay the groundwork for the players to drive the plot direction.
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To go along with gbonehead's advice: Make stuff up CONSTANTLY. The only time you shouldn't be throwing in random details is when you're doing it enough that the players get bored.
To elaborate: When you're sitting at the table allow yourself to relax, let your mind wander a bit as you're describing a scene. Pick one of the things that pops into your head as you describe it and throw it in there. It doesn't have to have significance (in fact, I'd encourage you to ignore potential significance), it can just be a pile of bags of grain. It could be that a person speaks up about you insulting orcs instead of sitting quietly like most around you do. It could be that the bartender has placed a weapon behind the bar. It could even be that the cave has several pits and paths that don't lead anywhere or are just too small for anyone to fit through. Maybe the stable boy is a talkative one who keeps mixing up his sayings, to the amusement of the customers. All of these things hint at possibilities that let the players' minds wander.
Now here's stage two: Feed off of the players' ideas. You say that the bartender has a weapon behind the bar. A player pipes up that they believe it may be because of crime and wants to investigate. Or in the cave situation, maybe a player wonders about the possibility of smaller creatures living in the caves that can fit through those gaps. In either case you can latch onto that idea and make it reality. Don't always latch to their ideas, but sometimes is good enough. It helps them feel like they understand the world.
So there you have it. Throw out details without too much concern for significance and let players assign potential significance, or even let yourself do it later when you realize it might connect. All you need is a starting point (almost everyone uses a bar, but I used a train once).
I run every fantasy campaign I GM in the same world I've been doing that for going on 30 years.
When I started, I began with the major plot, then created the world for the plot to develop. Originally it was an epic end-of-the world plot with a final confrontation planned that would determine the fate of the world for generations. To provide a setting for that epic of a plot I drew dozens of maps. I divided the world into wild and settled areas and then divided the settled areas into political unit. For each unit I defined a political system (Kingdom, Democracy, Empire, Feudal, et.) And then laid out each country's major political players. Then I created a worldwide economic structure based around farming, mining, logging, manufacturing, services and trade. Then I laid out all the major and most of the mid-sized cities and mapped out trade routes.
Then I sat down with the players and using very high level maps and descriptions told them the basic story of the world and gave them some hooks to choose from to start the campaign. Once they chose a hook, we rolled up characters, introduced them to each other and the adventure began.
That first campaign went for two years. They saved the world. Their names are now legendary heros to most of the civilized world. But life goes on and new threats arise, and even old conquests sometimes don't stay conquored.
I am just now wrapping up the details of my first Pathfinder campaign in this world. The players are about to start in a town named after one of the original PCs from that first epic campaign.
When I start a new campaign it always starts with a general idea. What do I want the players to do? what is the over all goal and how do I get them there?
The one I've got going now started with the idea of the PCs being hired by a Tavern owner in a city to help find his missing barmaids. From there they followed leads and found the mayor of the city was a vampire and he had killed and turned them. They tryed to deal with him only to get thier collective butts handed to them and the vampire escape.
From there I thought more about the city. If the mayor was a vampire wouldnt he try to put his people in key position? So from that I made more adventure to investigate other key members on the city. My style is to only write one adventure ahead. Years of exp have shown me that the PCs with mess up everything you are trying to go for. If you write that in 3 adventure from now that npc that they met will go to them with key plot info asking for help your going to be pissed when they deside to kill him and eat his family when they first meet him. Or when you base a campaign around a curtain kingdom only to have the PCs burn it half to the ground in massive urban combat. Then slaughter the gaurds instead of answering questions about what happened and flee.
Part of it depends on just homebrewed it is...Do you want it to have a similar feel to an existing setting like the old Ravenlft, or Tolkienesue, or something totally non-traditional like having the entire campaign from 1st to 20th level in limbo an you will have to make new rules and classes, or having a "modern" Golarion where all the classes, rules, cities, etc. are the same, they just have modern firearms and fighter jets instead of bows and horses.
Thing is...and I say this as someone who has GM'ed more than been a Player...hombrew setting are about the GM than the player whether we like to admit it or not. Your setting could make Tolkien weep in jealousy and if the players think it limits their characters, or their characters suck in your setting, they will hate it.
The number one way I get interest is to ask players what kind of characte they have never played but always wanted to. I hombrewed the crap out of one campaign that all the players loved and they thought it was the best ever...but my setting was ctually aweaker than I planned and my plotline ran out after 8 sessions. The secret? One guy said he wanted to be Alucard from the Helsing anime and another guy wanted to be Blade from the movie series and I took one for the team and had to rebuild some of my bad guys just so they could be the character they dreamed of playing.
SO...start with THEIR ideas...then add your plot line, then put in the details later. And during game play, listen carefully to their questions and think before you answer. They could be giving you a whole new perspective on how to do things. I had a simple question once during a 3.5 Ebberron based setting, that was so good I ended up with a seriously fun setting that diverged a lot from the Ebberon world but lasted longer than the actual group did...it led to a new campaign with another set of players.
By the way, I would NOT advocate giving in quite as much as I did...creating an Alucard that didn't rip through everything in one session was harder than the actual setting.
Well, in my case it was as simple as sitting around at a cookout in 2006 and everyone going "hey, we should play D&D again. You know what would be cool? Playing an epic campaign. Burt, can you do that?" Silly me, I said, "sure, I can do that."
The rest has all been filling in plot. Since the characters started at 6th-level, they've grown a lot with the campaign, and big chunks of things are because the players wanted something; the current story arc is because one of the players did not yet have a weapon of legacy (talk about great plot elements), so I decide that it would have to be granted him by his half-giant clan, and we went from there. I just worked in elements that would support the game's plot as well as the subplot of "Knuckles the half-giant wants a weapon of legacy."
And you know what's the hardest thing for me? Names. Ugh.
And you know what's the hardest thing for me? Names. Ugh.
Man, this stuff is gold! I've been writing a campaign setting for about a year now with an associated adventure. While the setting is fine, I'm getting the impression more and more that my campaign might be too...defined. I have a clear purpose and the more I think on it, the more I realize I've pigeon-holed the party. I've left nothing for them to decide. I'm loving the idea of building on their motives and ambitions. I think it will keep me on my toes, in a state of borderline-panic, as I scramble to accommodate new developments, but that's exactly the kind of adventure that I wish I could play in myself! I am officially inspired.
Is this too linear or does it sound like a good basic idea of a way to get started?
I like it. Gets them focused early until they get their bearings and chemistry all worked out, then a world of possibilities opens up for them.
I built my PF/D&D world based on what I wanted to do, then built a world that made sense for it.
I wanted a way for a monster campaign to work. That was point one. So, how do I do that while still leaving it possible for core races to exist?
I built a continent where evil won. Mostly. The monstrous races drove the core races off the continent, mostly. Other than a couple of big hold outs, the whole continent went evil. Then it fell apart and warred amongst itself. The denizens got tired of it and rebelled to neutrality. There's two good holdouts, a giant fortress city in the middle of the continent (where the PCs come from), and a swamp kingdom that walled itself off from the rest of the continent. From there, I said huh, well, where did the core races *go*?
The southern continent of course! Now that's an overcrowded continent (all the refugees from the north) that thinks the northern continent is pure evil (except for the swamps). Heavily developed, almost all good or neutral lands. Most conflict is war or intrigue over territory and resources.
So... what else is there? I then asked myself. Well, probably a smaller continent, 1/3 the size of the other two. Eastern mystical. Mystical, hmmm, that's awesome. So, it's a continent with a thin strip of habitable lands around a ring of mountain ranges. A giant wall (great wall of asia continent for the win!) seals off the coast from the interior. The interior is constantly covered with fog, and all sorts of evils await there. The natives call it Yomi. :)
So, where are my tech and psionics places? Hmm, don't have one they fit into....
Ok, new places. Need a way for magic not to be there so psionics and tech take over. Atlantis! No, don't want it at the bottom of the ocean... Anti-Atlantis! The island didn't sink, it got blown into the sky by idiots playing with powerful magics they didn't understand! Whole place is magic unstable, cast a detect magic, nothing happens, or you blow up and take 2 square blocks with you! Tech and Psionics work fine though. Hmm, how do the locals get around? Skyships and wings! How'd they get wings? Magic mutated their ancestors! Ok, good, world built. :)
Well, do what you want. That's why it's a homebrew. There are basically no limits - beyond what you and your players like and dislike. You don't have to worry about anyone else.
You can start at the top and work your way down, you can start at the bottom and work your way up, you can start somewhere in the middle... whatever you think you like.
If I were to start a brand new campaign world for a game from scratch right now, and didn't have specific wants for it (like "This world needs to have 100,000 years of backstory and the dominant species are elves ruling the world with their mental psi-powers"), I'd probably do something like this:
If you don't want to go too far off the beaten path here, you can just assume that the world doesn't have any exotic properties when you look at the big picture. Or not assume anything much.
Unless you have some special ideas here, you can leave things open, so the players can have a hand in shaping the world when they create their characters.
Remember that while balance is not everything, it shouldn't be ignored, either. Look at the changes you make and consider the implications.
The last three points are interconnected to some degree, of course: A story-driven campaign with an overarching plot can be planned ahead a lot better than a completely spontaneous, character-driven campaign.
Maybe ask them to create more than just stats on a sheet. Tell them to think of a background story. Depending on how much of the world you want to create personally, you can let them make up stuff (for example, the player with the knightly character can get to make up a chivalrous kingdom or help you with details)
It's not necessary to do so, but if the story later leads them to that chivalrous kingdom the knight character comes from and it turns out that during his absence, things turned for the worse and the mysterious villains are working in the shadows to destroy the country, that character and his player will have a much bigger and more personal stake in the outcome of the campaign.
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This can be a continuous process. It's often good to have a general idea of the overarching story (if you want one) and come up with details as the campaign progresses.
And one very important piece of advice:
Ask people for criticism. Productive, but honest criticism. Don't go into the defensive when it turns out that what you thought was a blast was boring to the players. Doesn't have to happen, but it's possible, and you can't always spot problems (especially since not everyone will readily but reasonably tell you about them without being asked).
The general goal for them is that they will start off in the brig of a slave ship, having been captured and are being taken to be sold (they can still have any back story they want, but it just has to have had an opportunity for them to have been kidnapped at some point).
It might not be a bad idea to get feedback about that idea beforehand. Not everyone likes being powerless in the game, and starting as captives is as powerless as it gets.
Plus, I think that there are people who have started adventures or campaigns that way more than often enough and will not be very enthusiastic to repeat this yet another time.
It's like the old "you meet in a tavern and decide to be adventurers" thing.
It doesn't have to be like this, maybe everyone is fine with it, but you should ask.
At the end of the dungeon they will fight the big bad guy for while, and he will run through a portal and (hopefully) the PC's will chase him.
Another possible snag: You might plan that he escapes, but this assumes that they don't drop him before he can run away. You should be ready for that possibility.
And be very, very weary of doing a "scripted event", i.e. the guy escapes no matter what they do. For a lot of people, this is the worst case scenario: Things that happen like they do because the GM wants them to happen that way, and there's nothing the players can do. You can annoy people big time with railroading, especially if it's obvious that they can't make a difference!
A great way to get ideas for fleshing out the world you are creating and the narrative arc of the story is to get your players involved.
Before you start the campaign, give your players some general ideas about the world, then ask them to come up with how they'd like to fit into it. Oftentimes, your players will have character concepts that they've wanted to play for years, and your job is simply to figure out how to integrate the ideas into your story.
For example, if you have a player who wants to be a paladin, let her do some of the work coming up with the organization, history and philosophy of the order she hopes to join. Have her tell you about the mentor who she served as a squire. Get her to tell you about her character's family.
Get a few players giving you detail like this, and the campaign will practically write itself.
And you know what's the hardest thing for me? Names. Ugh.
Something that I have found helpful is to pick a phonetic style. For example, I like to think of elven having as being spoken lightly with the tip of the tongue, so I sat down going through the alphabet sounding out combinations to look for phonetics that match that, such as -lia and eth-. Then to make a complete name I just combine them in natural sounding ways and using the example above I got Ethilia. While the dwarves are going to have much heavier sounds that use the back of the tongue like -om and br-, leading me to develop the name Bronstrom for a dwarven town.
So pick a style.
Sound out a bunch of letter combinations.
Write down the combinations that match what you're looking for.
Piece the combinations together in a way that seems natural.
Now you got all your important town and people names.
Extend it to have a prepared list of names on hand just in case you need some on the fly.
Hey all, here's my question. I am trying to get a homebrew campaign going at my local store, and I have had this great overarching campaign idea for a few years. However, now that I am trying to put it down on paper and create individual sessions, I am having trouble. I was wondering what other people normally do when they decide they want to homebrew a campaign: Do you normally start with an awesome and epic plot, and fill in the holes as you go, or start with the first session and then kind of build off of that as you go? Also, any general homebrewing advice would be welcome =)
Thanks!
There's more than one way to do it of course. I started out by designing the world. The epic bits will pretty much add themselves. Detail the starting area, the major personalities / conflicts / history / religions and cultures of the immediate area. Have an idea of what is in the larger world around it. It's a "sandbox" style game. Adventure plots can be laid onto this type of background where appropriate. It is more work in a lot of ways, but my game started in 1974 and it's still going. It was designed as a setting for a Chainmail miniatures fantasy campaign. D&D came out and it transitioned into a D&D campaign / world. That gave it a sense of "history" and culture. This type of game builds it's own history after a while, and gains in complexity and scope as time goes on. In short, it grows with the players and can be expanded to meet new needs / ideas.
And you know what's the hardest thing for me? Names. Ugh.
Pick words from foreign languages you don't know. That's always fun.
Imagine someone not speaking English and deciding that these are lovely names:
Okay, some of those should be recognisable in lots of other languages, but not all languages are related.
For example, I know a few Japanese words that have a nice ring to them, and if you don't know what they mean, you could consider them great names. And create oriental characters with names even most porn stars would not choose ;-)
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Is this too linear or does it sound like a good basic idea of a way to get started?
It has been my experience that players usually don't mind a linear adventure at the start of a new campaign in a new world. They need to get their bearings, they need to figure out what they're doing in the new world, they don't know any of the countries or groups or religions or popular monsters, and they might not even be aware of all their options. The linear plot should expose them to a lot of these things.
Perhaps your group is different. I'd warn them that first part of the plot is linear and railroad-y. I imagine they'll be okay with that. If not, you may have to loosen up your murder mystery/dungeon crawl area.
For a good example of a campaign going off the tracks and having player input help create the world, check out Darths & Droids web comic. Is humorous sci-fi campaign but is good example of a gaming style. As a way of introducing gaming to my daughter, am having her read through it. It's not rule specific (other than mentioning standard d20 dice) but more for the concepts of RPG.
For myself, world building is my favorite part of gaming. I've been away for about 10 years but now that daughter is old enough (10 years old; what a coincidence I stopped gaming), I'm working up a Girl Genius/Stardust themed area with a Scooby Doo style mystery to be solved (Old Man Jenkins is trying to drive away towns folk from some hidden item), suitable for 4th graders. Because there's a slight steam punk flavor to things, will be having artificer/mad scientist class available.
While I have a general idea for the flavor of the world, I don't have an large campaign goal in mind yet. I'm going to be starting with an isolated village with a 5 mile radius mapped out. This will include some natural encounter areas as well as a few ruins/tombs places.
Try and find a copy of the Old TSR Worldbuilder's Guidebook. :D
I'm completely sold on player-driven campaigns, but should I have an overarching plot that I work them into, or let their decisions dictate who the ultimate baddie is going to be? More to the point, where would you all say the balance is between player-driven plot and railroad plot? I understand I'm asking for opinion.
I'm completely sold on player-driven campaigns, but should I have an overarching plot that I work them into, or let their decisions dictate who the ultimate baddie is going to be? More to the point, where would you all say the balance is between player-driven plot and railroad plot? I understand I'm asking for opinion.
I try to have a world with a lot of options. In general my players want to play heroes so I give them lots of targets to get heroic about. I generally try to tie this into the players' backstory work.
As I said several posts above, I do all of my campaigns in a custom designed world that I first created almost three decades ago. The world is highly detailed with lots of high-level NPCs who interact with each other, and whose minions or followers go out and do their bidding. Then, of course, there is no reason not to have garden-variety villains in most every town. And that's not even looking into dungeon crawls or kobold lairs, of which my world has plenty.
The way I started my latest campaign, for which my players are just now wrapping up their character creation, was to give my players a high-level overview of the world and its history (some of my players already know this). I describe the major cities and the major geopolitical activities, such as trade wars, bandits or pirates, civil wars, skirmishes, rogue monsters incursions, legendary treasure troves... whatever. Then I give them a choice of what style of campaign they want to be in. Some players like straightforward dungeon crawls, others like high intrigue and conspiracy. This time the group opted for a "palace intrigue" campaign since we've never really done one of those before.
So I generated a minor civil war between two opposing royal families in a part of the world governed by city-states which are mostly autonomous but which pay a tithe to a large kingdom for protection by the King's army. The players are looking to capitalize on the unrest and pick up some cash as mercenaries. Two of the players came up with great backstories for their characters which tie into the longer-term story of the world, which is always fantastic.
Had they wanted to do something else, I'd have simply plopped them down somewhere else in the world and gone with that.
All of this becomes part of the history of the world for future parties to learn about and expand upon.
I'm completely sold on player-driven campaigns, but should I have an overarching plot that I work them into, or let their decisions dictate who the ultimate baddie is going to be? More to the point, where would you all say the balance is between player-driven plot and railroad plot? I understand I'm asking for opinion.
The best plot is one that the players think is wholly player-driven, but has been scripted from the first dungeon door.
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Dig through the really old D&D stuff. It has a treasure trove of Ideas. I found an Article from 1978 Dragon Magazine about Optional Random Demon Design (beyond the basic demons already used).
I am adding it to my D&D.
OPTIONAL RULES
BASE ABILITIES
• Gate Travel (Lets make this Dimension Door)
• Magic Resistance 50% + 5%/level
• Immune to Normal Weapons at Level 4+
Choose Demon Class (Cleric or Magicuser): The article then provides a selection of abilities that seem to be drawn from the spell lists. So basically a demon either has access to either Wizard Spells or Cleric Spells but not both.
We should probably set them as Simply Humans with either the Wizard or Cleric Class.
Appearance: Roll twice on the Dungeon encounter table and mix the resulting creature (one must be from the Human or Animal Tables and the other from a Monster species.
Examples –
Name: Kuro the Priest
RACE: 'Albino Crow' (Shiroi-Karasu)
CLERIC OF ORCUS (L5); STR(7), INT(13), WIS(16), DEX(13), CON (9), CHA(4); 32HP; AL: Neutral (Evil); 75% Spell Resistance; Immune to Normal Weapons; Gate Travel; Spells (as level 5 Cleric); Description: Likes to pass itself off as a Plague-warden (aka Cleric) and is never seen without it's 'mask', black full length robes and black broad-brimmed hat). It is usually involved in the burial of the victims of the Maisma (which it spreads thanks to the fleas it carries). Currently wanders about the Plague ridden lands of Heldann. Undisguised this fiend has the body of a Human, and the Head and Legs of a White Carrion Bird (Albino Crow).
Name: Daku the Sage
RACE: 'Devil-Frog' (Akuma-Kaeru)
MAGICUSER (L1); STR(9), INT(18), DEX(7), CON(15), CHA(18); 4HP; AL Chaotic (Neutral); 55% Spell Resistance; Gate Travel; Spells (as 1st level Magic-user); Description: Daku is often mistaken for a Deformed Kobold or Goblin, allowing him to move unidentified amongst these humanoids. He looks like a cross between a giant toad and a Goblin. He considers himself Leadership material and is currently attempting to unify a band of Kobolds under his rule in Caves north of Threshold. He has taught some of the Smarter Kobolds how to read and instructed them all that if they find documents, they are to bring them to him.
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I'm completely sold on player-driven campaigns, but should I have an overarching plot that I work them into, or let their decisions dictate who the ultimate baddie is going to be? More to the point, where would you all say the balance is between player-driven plot and railroad plot? I understand I'm asking for opinion.The best plot is one that the players think is wholly player-driven, but has been scripted from the first dungeon door.
The best plot is one the players can have an effect on.
So rather than 'the players will stop the cultists in the nick of time!', instead 'the cultists are here preparing the sacrifice, what will happen when the PCs show up?'
Thus the DM is setting the scene, but the action is written by the players.
On the original topic, I let the players build the setting. I tell them what there is in the area, and they choose where to go. What they do shapes the setting based on how they react to what they encounter.
Perfect example in Kirth's Aviona campaign. He ran Nick Logue's Carnival of Tears for us. Due to not having the right resources, our party failed to save the logger's village. Now, there is the legend of the lost village and how it was mysteriously reclaimed by the forest. A great hook to explore for future characters.
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The best way to get your players excited and perhaps even intrigue them is to surprise them with the idea that your homebrew isn't a carbon copy of Greyhawk or the Forgotten Realms or Middle Earth or Golarion.
Easiest way to do that is to play with their assumptions. In the campaign I am currently running, I actually had the players roleplay through the acquisition of some of their equipment. Not the little stuff, but certain things like buying their weapons. And then they hit a stable... "Do you have any horses for sale?" "I'm sorry... did you say 'horse'? What is 'horse'?"
It was a little thing, minor, throw-away... but every single one of my players sat up in their chairs and went "What? No horses?" And that, of course, lead to the inevitable "What are used instead of horses?"
So load your world with these differences. Elves have been extinct for 10,000 years, and their ruins are the source of high adventure. Goblins, orcs, and ogres are actually three extreme examples of the same species. The standard precious metals don't exist and have been replaced by something else as the "treasure of choice".
Be creative. But always take the time to think the consequences of these changes through. What ARE they using instead of horses?
Hey all, here's my question.
I have found that creating a 'world framework' allows you to prepare for the EPIC, but always start play with an introductory 'zone' to get the players into the flow of things.
To use a blatant WoW reference, the first adventure or 3 should be in a 'valley of trials'. Move out into the successive zones as the party 'ripens'. Mount Doom can bloody well wait!
I've only ever run homebrew campaigns, and how I prep them depends largely on the level range I'm looking to run.
For the most part though, I tend to design macro then funnel down to micro. I start with a map - I used to make entire world maps in my younger days but eventually got frustrated with how much work went into places that my players never got to.
Now, the largest map I'll make is a continent - though I always try to include at least 3 major countries. Then, I start labeling places on the map. The Shattered Vale, The Wailing Cliffs, Rivermeet Lake... etc etc.
Once I have the map labeled, I try to focus on some of the locations I like the most, and then consider why a group of adventures would need to move from one to another. Then I think of how they'd move from one to another.
That then tends to bubble up into an overarching plot. I've gotten into the habit of only having a very loose plot structure though. Too many times, nearly every time it seems, I'd have something planned and it'd be great. Then, the party does something that gives me an EVEN BETTER idea and I abandon most of what I had prepped and run with the new idea.
My players, so long as they haven't been lying to me for past 8 years, have loved it and thought I'd had it all planned out like some grand Machiavellian masterplot. If they knew how much I actually blurted out on the spot, I think they'd be surprised.
I am assuming by campaign you mean extended adventure, and not a campaign setting.
I start with a general idea of the problem being caused by villain X. I come up with a beginning(how they get involved), and an ending(how and where the game will end). I then start to work on the middle, but I don't set things in stone. That way the players have flexibility.
I am assuming by campaign you mean extended adventure, and not an campaign setting.
I start with a general idea of the problem being caused by villian X. I come up with a beginning(how they get involved), and an ending(how and where the game will end). I then start to work on the middle, but I don't set things in stone. That way the players have flexibility.
I do like this piece of advice.
For me I have an idea of a major plot confrontation I have been kicking around for a while. and a location i want to start at
I cheat I use a topographical map of North America because major cities (except Vegas) are built on resource/transit effective locales (St. Louis is built in the same location as the mound builder city of Kahokia). I can look at actual pictures and go I want Dwarves here Elfs here, approximately this many ancient dragons through out the continent,etc.
I can set up regions and say all fighters from the Florida, Georgia Carolina's based region must be from these archetypes, all the rogues from there will be these archetypes. The area of north arizona all casters are wordcasters, etc. the when a player goes I want to play X class with Y archetype i can go ohhh OK you are from Z go look at pictures of this geographic feature (the mesas of north arizona, the blue ridge, etc. to get a feel for what environment you are from).
I want the players to contribute to helping me flesh out the world the customs the biases etc of the regions. I co-opt them into becoming co-creators and make them vested on multiple levels. At least that is the hope.
It is the only way I can fathom making players interested in your setting as well as the story.
I start with one game element - a creature, a spell, a class, or a magic item. I reverse engineer, from end goals or from origin story, building backward into an adventure.
This always creates adventures which are effectively stories that make sense, not dependent on the PCs, who will come in seemingly out of nowhere and affect everything. I also have a plot which can be revealed (or remain a mystery) as the game progresses.
This inevitably forces my hand and making new content to make it all work, which creates a domino effect, requiring more and more content, until I find myself with a massive campaign in a customized game world.
Example: I love Trogs, so I started by making a Trog society. Since (in 3.5) their favored class is Cleric, I had to make in centered around religion, as Clerics are the "elite" which they gravitate toward. Their world was shaped by divine magic wielded by their leaders over the generations - Stone Shape and Create Water, for examples. Heavy on the temples. Lots of usage of the Underground flora/fauna, such as a captured Gelatinous cube imprisoned in a pit and fed garbage & septics. I have Trog combat methodology, based around low level Cleric buffs. All kinds of things.
Next thing I know, I have a culture, a society, and I've built an entire religion, and finally an origin myth as to how the society came to be, which tied into an ancient, deadly, sealed "trial passage" for their prospective high priests to earn their title... which led to another, central Trog society which is all undead in a vast necropolis which will "one day rise up to take back all"... leading to the origins of the world relating to Dragons, and the cruelty of the ancient Gods of Chaos (which explains why Trogs speak draconic - their ancestors are the vile offspring of Dragons and Glabrezu, devolved and inbred over many, many generations).
The adventure setting is called "Those Who Would Not Sleep", referring to the first Trogs society I created, which escaped the central one who doomed themselves to undeath as a last resort against losing a war against the Dwarves. The intro starts with 2 methods:
One is by defending a town against a Stone Giant raid, where the group finds out that the Stone Giants are only raiding out of desperation, as the "horrid little lizards which come at night" have been bleeding them dry, stealing their children and their food. If the party can end the attacks of the night lizards (Trogs), the Giants will make amends.
The other is via greed, where the party quests for the fabled Sword of Chaos; a vile and powerful weapon of dark power, which is also a prison for the soul of an invincible legendary evil warrior. It is surrounded by guardians and deadly traps, and sealed away deep in the earth, it's location only known to a circle of Druids who were entrusted with protecting its secret location. To get there, you have to go deep into Trog territory...