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Hi guys. So I'm making a fun campaign for my players and I'm a first time gm. Now I have run modules myself in the past but for my story I'm looking to add alot of flavor into my campaign to make it fun and not just another adventure/campaign that my players go through.
In past games I played, I played with dm's who somehow at the beginning start off in a way that just draws players attention and keeps them wanting more and more of their story. I ask them myself "what's your secret"? They always tell me that just touching a players sense of wonder and curiousity is the best way to go.
While I whole-heartedly agree with that statement I don't think thats the only way to go so I'd like to ask expert gm's out there who have been gaming for years: What do you think makes a great and memorable adventure or campaign?
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This isn't anything official, but when I write and run my campaigns, I try to do the following:
Keep the groups small, 3-5 players at the most. Its important that everyone be able to show up for all the games and cutting down on players cuts down on no-shows. It also keeps everyone actively involved, not waiting an hour or more for their turn in combat to come around.
I try to write in one sub-plot for each character as well as an over-reaching plotline that ties them all together. A classic example of this would be the way I've started many a campaign: everyopne wakes up on the side of a hill with no memory of how they got their, no memory of their past and no knowledge of one another. There will usually be a chest with a handful of select items and perhaps a mysterious note left for them. The over-reaching subplot is 'how did we come to be here and for what purpose' while the individual subplot would be 'who was I'? What's great about that is the player might over time discover that he was someone very different than he has chosen to be and it can lead to some very interesting RP opportunities. Tons of more specific examples from play to give but it would take all day.
I use a handful of minor theater techniques - for one thing, I'll select a piece of music (usually from some movie score) that I feel captures the mood of the campaign I want to run. I'll play it immediately before we begin and during that time everyone stays silent, re-reading their notes from the previous session, updating their character sheets or just getting into that headspace that is their character. Kind of like the opening credits of a favorite TV show signalling its now time to be 'there'.
Another technique I use is I make everyone stand for combat. We have a seated area for RP and a table to the side for our combat. Standing keeps everyone involved and creates a sense of urgency about what we are doing. I'll even lower the lights and play by candles or small lamps while underground or at night. Minor things that can go a long way towards suspension of disbelief.
I'm a big fan of recurring characters, both villainous and otherwise, and of having people, places and events that seem innocuous early on take on larger significance as the game progresses. Things PC's do actually impact the world and events take place, people live and die and change whether the PC's are there or not.
Ultimately its about having a group who share a vision of what fantasy role-play is to them and having a GM who listens and responds to that.
One other little thing - my players very rarely die. That's due in large part to their skill at character building and their use of tactics, but at the end of the day a beloved character dieing is fun for no one, especially if its as a result of bad dice rolls and not to some greater purpose. I fudge plenty of dice-rolls to prevent death, but will often exact some penalty as a result - the loss of a magic item or a permanent condition (like losing an eye).
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Evil GM = Fun GM
Mostly I find moral simplicity to be boring! I enjoy creating situations where there are consequences for actions, and I'm pretty good at coming up with consequences the player's hadn't thought of.
Recently a healer NPC was going to be replaced with a PC. So I had the BBEG vampire cast a high powered Charm Person on the NPC, and she quite willingly joined him in teleporting away. Next the players discover the plague ravaging the major city is cured by an exlir containing vampire blood serum. Oh, and the city leaders put a bounty on the head of the new vampire in town. So... is the NPC a vampire? Looks like it. She's still healing people, and the city's adventurers are going after her for the bounty. What's a party to do?
Also I enjoy it when I come up with a situation, but not a solution. I love seeing what my players come up with. Often it's something I'd not thought of.
(P.S. The first line is a quote from my players... I'm SO proud of myself. B-))
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This isn't anything official, but when I write and run my campaigns, I try to do the following:
Keep the groups small, 3-5 players at the most. Its important that everyone be able to show up for all the games and cutting down on players cuts down on no-shows. It also keeps everyone actively involved, not waiting an hour or more for their turn in combat to come around.
I try to write in one sub-plot for each character as well as an over-reaching plotline that ties them all together. A classic example of this would be the way I've started many a campaign: everyopne wakes up on the side of a hill with no memory of how they got their, no memory of their past and no knowledge of one another. There will usually be a chest with a handful of select items and perhaps a mysterious note left for them. The over-reaching subplot is 'how did we come to be here and for what purpose' while the individual subplot would be 'who was I'? What's great about that is the player might over time discover that he was someone very different than he has chosen to be and it can lead to some very interesting RP opportunities. Tons of more specific examples from play to give but it would take all day.
I use a handful of minor theater techniques - for one thing, I'll select a piece of music (usually from some movie score) that I feel captures the mood of the campaign I want to run. I'll play it immediately before we begin and during that time everyone stays silent, re-reading their notes from the previous session, updating their character sheets or just getting into that headspace that is their character. Kind of like the opening credits of a favorite TV show signalling its now time to be 'there'.
Another technique I use is I make everyone stand for combat. We have a seated area for RP and a table to the side for our combat. Standing keeps everyone involved and creates a sense of urgency about what we are doing. I'll even lower the lights and play by candles or small lamps while underground or at night. Minor things that can go a...
So you basically just give players questions and you give them leave to explore and find out at their own pace the answer to those questions which most likely will end up leading to more questions? Thats a really epic idea and to me this is a great way to keep players in many ways wanting to find out more and keeps the story interesting because it gives the players a good reason to keep playing. One thing I know that lots of roleplayers love especially me is exploring the unknown so I think this is a fantastic idea!!
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Evil GM = Fun GM
Mostly I find moral simplicity to be boring! I enjoy creating situations where there are consequences for actions, and I'm pretty good at coming up with consequences the player's hadn't thought of.
Recently a healer NPC was going to be replaced with a PC. So I had the BBEG vampire cast a high powered Charm Person on the NPC, and she quite willingly joined him in teleporting away. Next the players discover the plague ravaging the major city is cured by an exlir containing vampire blood serum. Oh, and the city leaders put a bounty on the head of the new vampire in town. So... is the NPC a vampire? Looks like it. She's still healing people, and the city's adventurers are going after her for the bounty. What's a party to do?
Also I enjoy it when I come up with a situation, but not a solution. I love seeing what my players come up with. Often it's something I'd not thought of.
(P.S. The first line is a quote from my players... I'm SO proud of myself. B-))
Lol I like those kind of decisions too. It's a great way to give players a sense of reality in their games because quite often in rl we make choices and are unaware or unable to compensate for the consequences of our actions. I see too many games where its just so linear and players really just have "one path to follow" and not have like many forks in the road to choose from so yeah thats really cool!
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I start a game usually with a conflict, a fight of some kind in the very first scene. It tells the players this will be dangerous, there will be action, don't sit back and expect to be held by the hand.
Immediately after that initial conflict I begin world building. By that I mean I introduce the players to NPCs, some important, some not important at all. I let the players interact with the NPCs and react to what they are doing, whether simply exploring, or wenching, or getting drunk in every bar available. I always slide in an important NPC or two very early in the game, usually just a casual mention, and move on.
The most important part of the story, for me, is to make it all feel real. I want the players to to "see" the town streets, I want them to "see" the villagers, and I want them to FEEL their home is threatened when stuff starts to happen.
The plot will carry itself, the important part to me, is creating fun, interesting and engaging NPCs to bring that plot to life.
I personally like to start a campaign either with a mystery or in media res. I find both to be great ways to really get players excited and into the thick of the game quickly.
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A thing that I think is important to a good campaign, but kind of a challenge to do in practice, is to keep the right amount of focus on where the campaign is going in the future.
If you start the campaign with some idea of where you want to end up long term, you can start planting clues and recurring npcs early on. That sort of thing makes it feel much more like a campaign and less like a disjointed sequence of adventures. You can also plan for which parts of the story will give each PC a chance to shine.
On the other hand, remember that you are not a movie director, with complete control of how the story goes. If your PCs ignore a clue, or decide they don't want to talk to an npc, let them have some influence on how things play out. It can be a campaign killer if the players feel they are marching from point to point, acting out scenes the GM has already written. Give them important, campaign influencing, decisions to make and being willing to go in whatever direction they decide to go.
There are kilometers of books on the subject of how to make a gripping story - for a novel/movie/whatever medium that doesn't provide interactivity. Still, there is a lot to learn there.
The first thing you need to understand is that there are story structures that work in the human psyche, and there are those that do not. Generally, every interesting story begins with a question, and the story lasts until that question has an answer. After that answer exists, you have time for an ending, nothing more. The traditional movie structure is 1) Setting the stage (presenting the question and world), 2) rising conflict, 3) showdown/climax (answering the question), and 4) denouement (relaxation). So, hit them with the question the very first thing that happens. Don't stop there, however, but make bleeding CERTAIN they have understood the question. Then, once that is done, you can toss stuff at them that may seem unconnected to the plot, and some of this you can then weave into the plot. It is okay if they don't understand how the showdown answers the question until the struggle is done, though.
This gives you the start and the end. Keep the end fuzzy and changeable, but have something in mind. But now you need stuff to fill it out with. You have a few jobs to do here. First, you need to present the elements that will be important to the plot. This includes NPCs, some monsters, some items, a political issue, and whatever else. If you want the prince of the realm sacrifice himself at the end, they need to get to know him somehow, and this should happen at or near the beginning. More specifically: Foreshadowing. If the heroes at the end stand to fight a horrible big bad, but have no idea about the first thing about him, you missed something along the way. Show them the disaster scenes the villain left behind. Make them hate him, preferably even before they meet him the first time. In a RPG, it is dangerous to let them meet a villain before the showdown, because they could decide to try to kill him earlier, and this is a problem you need to plan for. Otherwise, you keep making bigger and bigger holes to dump the heroes into, keeping in mind that there needs to be MORE THAN ONE way out of each hole. Otherwise they WILL get stuck. The minimum you should plan for is three solutions to each concrete problem, to avoid this.
The holes also need to be spaced. If every single session is a slog through indescribable horror and danger and suffering, they won't care. Give them positive episodes between dangerous ones, and the danger hits much harder, because the players are emotionally invested. Spend quite a bit of time to make NPCs they can relate to. People who help them. People who like them.
If you structure a story/campaign this way, the players will usually get involved. But there is one more thing to remember: Decide before the campaign what the PCs are supposed to be doing during the campaign. If they raid dungeons, play at courtly intrigue, fight bloodthirsty invaders in large battles, you need to know this FIRST. The reason is that after the first two or maybe three sessions, you will not easily be able to change this expectation from the players. If you start with full on dungeon hacks, the players will expect more of the same. So: Make sure that all you want in the campaign is represented right from the start. If you have a magnificent court drama planned for later, set them before a social challenge before they get to dungeon delve.
Lol I like those kind of decisions too. It's a great way to give players a sense of reality in their games because quite often in rl we make choices and are unaware or unable to compensate for the consequences of our actions. I see too many games where its just so linear and players really just have "one path to follow" and not have like many forks in the road to choose from so yeah thats really cool!Evil GM = Fun GM
Mostly I find moral simplicity to be boring! I enjoy creating situations where there are consequences for actions, and I'm pretty good at coming up with consequences the player's hadn't thought of.
Recently a healer NPC was going to be replaced with a PC. So I had the BBEG vampire cast a high powered Charm Person on the NPC, and she quite willingly joined him in teleporting away. Next the players discover the plague ravaging the major city is cured by an exlir containing vampire blood serum. Oh, and the city leaders put a bounty on the head of the new vampire in town. So... is the NPC a vampire? Looks like it. She's still healing people, and the city's adventurers are going after her for the bounty. What's a party to do?
Also I enjoy it when I come up with a situation, but not a solution. I love seeing what my players come up with. Often it's something I'd not thought of.
(P.S. The first line is a quote from my players... I'm SO proud of myself. B-))
One thing to be cautious of is when you give players room to explore they tend to take two paths, and neither are the one you envisioned and planned for.
Either parties take off in the totally wrong direction full of false assumptions from what they do know. Or, they hunker down and wait for the big clue they know you're about to give them while it hangs on the wall of their room at the inn.
Both outcomes are fine you as DM just need to be prepared and act accordingly. You as DM have to aggressively insert your story, or be very adept at adopting the players story.
If you're fortunate enough to get a very active party, then move the story to fit their actions. If you had planned for them to find the dungeon South of town, but they head North, move the dungeon. Basically have your encounters, and put them in the players path in a manner that fits what they're doing, and furthers your story.
If they're passsive then give them the push they need. Reveal information even if they aren't looking for it. Find a reason to have them encounter something or someone that would call for a knowledge or interaction roll. Then have the player that rolls highest know the answer or get it through the interaction. Don't let your campaign momentum die while waiting for a party to go to the one place and do the one action successfully that will get them the next piece of the puzzle.
Don't make players responsible for remembering everything that went on in game. We are people with lives that dump more important information on us daily than say the crest an NPC had tatooed on his wrist. If the players need to remember it, and it's something the characters should at least have a chance to remember have them roll a knowledge local check (or something else appropriate), and give them the memory. Having a character know something the player doesn't is not a trick, and it doesn't leave the player feeling that you just gave it to them.
You want it fun, and complex enough to be challenging. However, you also don't want to put such a burden on player memory or hope they find a single string of logic in the game that you lose them. Remember it's not you vs them it's a collaborative effort.
Incorporate their ideas. Let them pick up odd things (I currently have a dwarf barbarian riding a Rhino that has a manticore mask on it, and the dwarf has a screaming monkey head mounted above his head). If you listen often what they want to do gives you more material, or more color for what you have planned. When they feel they have some authorship, and aren't just trespassing in your adventure it ties them to the game. If a player wants a certain back story use it tweak it some, but let the story ride through you just give the hard facts like family and npc contacts coming out of it, physical addresses, etc... The more you encourage creativity the more they'll express.
Mechanically don't be afraid to discuss things. When I run across an action that I'm not sure how to rule on we talk it over. I have the final say, but I try to take it all in and figure out the method that works best to provide a reasonable and fair outcome. Again you're making it our game intead of your game, and that gets buy in and keeps players at the table. Same thing if you don't like how something works, or you've ruled one way; if someone shows you the rules that cover that and they're different than your ruling change even if you prefer your ruling. Letting the players "win" a rules debate means they won't think of you as arbitrary on the little things so you can be on the big ones. Because sometimes as a DM you have to make a hard call, if you've alienated them on every decision up to the big one you can lose the party, if you haven't then when a big one goes against them they'll move forward.
Lol I like those kind of decisions too. It's a great way to give players a sense of reality in their games because quite often in rl we make choices and are unaware or unable to compensate for the consequences of our actions. I see too many games where its just so linear and players really just have "one path to follow" and not have like many forks in the road to choose from so yeah thats really cool!
Actually the way it all got started was I wanted to introduce a new group of players into a campaign world I had developed, but I hated 'faking it' when it came to all the historical and cultural stuff their characters should know but that the players didn't... so I used that as a way to kick off the campaign, letting players explore the world as the characters rediscovered it.
I ran it kind of like an episodic television show. They would go on adventures but there would always be hooks that hinted at one player's history or another, or clues about who had done that to them that would tie in. It wasn't as sandboxy as it sounds.
I remember there was a time when two PC's were kidnapped by different groups - one found himself in the lair of a group of assassins, a society of which he had apparently been a member before his disappearance. He had been contracted to assassinate the local ruler, a figurehead type known as the Beyess (Bay-ess)... and with money paid and accepted, he was honor bound to carry it out or his life would be forfeit.
Every generation the country was scoured for the most intelligent and beautiful of young girls who would be chosen as candidates for this position and after years of intense schooling in all (and I mean ALL) the arts, one would be selected as 'The First', and would serve as the visible leader for their people, engage in all diplomatic functions, etc. while in reality the country was ruled by a shadow council who gave her her marching orders. There was always a 'Second' operating in the shadows at the Council's behest, waiting to take over should something befall The First or she be touched by scandal. The Beyess was traditionally wildly popular with the people and her assassination had been in fact secretly directed by the Council in order to 1) get rid of a free-spirited and difficult to manipulate figurehead, 2) supplant her with the vicious and spiteful but utterly loyal Second, and 3) to instigate war with a neighboring country.
At any rate, the other player discovered he had been captured by agents of the Beyess herself and snuck into her palace where it was revealed she and he had been clandestine lovers - he being a pirate and smuggler type - and she had had people quietly scouring the countryside for him ever since his disappearance, suspecting the Council's complicity. Let's just say it made for some interesting RP between the two PC's when they finally met back up.
The possibilities really are endless. A PC may discover that he had a Father who needed to be avenged, a sister who had disappeared the same time as he and needed to be found. A hero might discover he had been a villain an uncouth lout might discover himself heir to a noble title... who they were doesn't affect who they are any more than they want it to, but the repercussions of who they've become might still need to be dealt with. Think Total Recall x however many number of players you have.
A few things from my play book that might be of use...
Always try to end on a cliff hanger or grand reveal as much as possible each game session.
Have fun - allow the players to pull crazy things off with a good die roll. In fact, if they give something really plausible, just allow it. Be flexible.
If the players shoulders are slumped, they have banged their head against a problem and aren't making progress - take a break, bring out the chocolate muffins/cookies, take 5 minutes to talk as friends.
A fun session always leads to a well remembered campaign, so always strive for fun, the rest is easy then.
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I love making things personal to my players' characters. This can happen by integrating their background stories deeply in my campaign, or by noticing that they took a strong like or dislike to a specific NPC and play on it.
Example : One Vampire-The Dark Ages campaign started with the PCs waking up as powerless prisoners in the dungeons of the Inquisition. I noticed how they strongly reacted to the jibes of a guard and ended up pretty much hating his guts. Most naturally, he was promoted to leading their group to their target and received his due reward when the PCs unexpectedly regained their vampiric powers.
One technique I love is using the backstory of the PCs and then twisting it a little in ways the PCs cannot know or would refuse to admit. I consider the backstory of the PC as being the story told by the character himself and try to imagine how it could be different in depth while still the same on the surface. Note however that some players will be highly protective of their PC's backstory so always remember to respect them.
Example : in the same campaign, I used an event of illusions to show the past of the characters in a very different light to their fellow party members. They ended up with a healthy respect (and distrust) for the seemingly-goofy and harmless Malkavian in their midst.
More generally, I love introducing some twists in things that the players take for granted and especially show some depths of gray in even the most white and black situation.
Example : the villagers who took the wounded PCs in and helped them recover are in fact cannibals, but their larders were already well-stocked, which is why they did not devour the PCs at once. Or the BBEG Necromancer is actually driven to help the love of his life get resurrection and does not realize how his necromantic experiments are damaging the cycle of death and life.
Finally, I enjoy putting mysteries in the events my players face. One of the best moment I GMed was having the aforementioned Vampire PCs trying to identify the local plants to make sense of where in hell they actually were.
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A few things from my play book that might be of use...
Always try to end on a cliff hanger or grand reveal as much as possible each game session.
Have fun - allow the players to pull crazy things off with a good die roll. In fact, if they give something really plausible, just allow it. Be flexible.
If the players shoulders are slumped, they have banged their head against a problem and aren't making progress - take a break, bring out the chocolate muffins/cookies, take 5 minutes to talk as friends.
A fun session always leads to a well remembered campaign, so always strive for fun, the rest is easy then.
Good idea. I try ending with a cliff hanger lol but my players end up wanting more and more.