Idea for a part-time heroes campaign - critique requested

[paddyfool]

So, I'd had an idea for a campaign I'd like to run, sometime, in which the characters would have two lives - one, as a member of an adventuring party, and another as a noteworthy citizen of a particular city. So that not only would they be developing their characters as adventurers, they'd also be building careers/businesses/whatever in the city. Such characters would have the following stipulations:
- A backstory that details their particular career start and projected path, giving them a clear stake in building a life in this specific city, whether via career interests, family ties, or whatever
- Required to take skills that fit that path; probably full ranks in at least one profession or craft skill for most, but going easy on skill-monkeys in this way (see first example below).

To make this easier, I was also thinking of saying that any Tier 3 or below classes (I've lost the link to the Tier system, but Tier 3 or below is pretty much everyone except full casters) could go gestalt with one career-suitable NPC class of their choice.

Some ideas for party members:
- A treasure-hunting rogue, and his path in his mafia-style family business (rogue//warrior, with a roguish skill set that fits the path).
- A wizard with a career as a scholar researching ancient texts etc. (straight wizard, lots of knowledge skills, languages etc.).
- A cleric establishing the first place of worship for his particular faith in the city (cleric or cloistered cleric, full ranks in profession: priest).
- An expert swordsman and blacksmith with a young family to look after (warblade//expert, full ranks in craft: swords, craft: armour).

What I'm wondering is - what problems would you foresee in this? I foresee a few:
- Bards. About the only NPC classes that offer anything to a bard in gestalt would be adept or warrior; I find it a little hard to imagine a background, and professional path, for a bard that would suitably fit such combinations, particularly as bard pretty much defines their profession for them. Perhaps a bard//warrior could just be a slightly more hard-edged bard, or a bard//adept could be the wayward, minstrel son from a family of healers, who brews up a few healing potions etc. when stuck for gigs or adventure.

- Keeping the adventures suitably varied while also keeping them within a small radius of the city. I've an idea for it to be a old, once powerful city that has gone a long way downhill and although it remains fairly populous, is not as much as it was... old abandoned outlying areas of the city gone entirely to rack and ruin, and sinking into a swamp or being overgrown by jungle; most of the population having pulled back within the old city walls for safety from miscellaneous dangers etc., but also challenged by threats from factions within.

Also, does this sound like the sort of adventure you'd be interested in playing, or not so much?

[Rhydeble]

If you have the Bard be a part-time minstrel And give him levels in Expert, you could enable him/her to perform on a LOT of stuff.

[paddyfool]

With gestalt, you take the higher skill points total from the two classes, not the sum of the skill points total; expert (6/level) therefore offers nothing to a bard (6/level) mechanically at all. As DM, however, I could always fudge it and offer a bard who wanted to play lots of stuff 8 skill points per level... compared to what some other NPC classes would offer gestalt (warrior - full BAB, all weapon/armour proficiencies, good fort save) it really wouldn't be too high-powered.

EDIT: Any more critiques? In particular, would you find this fun to play/build, or would it just be irritating?

[Glyde]

A bard could be the leader of a prominent theater troupe, looking to expand their acts and maybe travel to other cities to perform.

[paddyfool]

Nice fluff, indeed. And it could possibly be worked into bard//warrior pretty well - a buff lead actor/actress who's competent at stunts and fight scenes, perhaps. So yeah, bard wouldn't be such a problem at all.

Incidentally, I've just found the tier thread (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=1002.0), which explains in more detail what "tier three or below means".

[Rhiannon87]

That's a pretty intriguing idea... one of the campaigns I'm in is going to be moving in this direction, once we get back to our home city and deal with some assassinations there. Everyone is going to end up employed by the government in some capacity, which means we'll have lots of fun RP and politicking to do in between adventures.

The one problem I could see with what you're describing is cohesiveness. When the group is adventuring, it'll be easy to run-- everyone at the table will be in the same place at the same time, all working together. But when they go back to their non-heroic lives, it's going to splinter. Everyone is going to want your attention for whatever interesting scene they've got in mind, and there's a high potential for boredom as you go from one player to another, dealing with whatever they're doing at home this week.

Unless you're planning on just having all that stuff stay in the background and never actually play it out, but from the amount of thought you've put into this, it doesn't seem like that's your intention.

[Olo Demonsbane]

This would be a good PbP game...the characters could adventure together while you have seperate threads for the characters home-lives.

[paddyfool]

Rhiannon, that's a very good point. Unless this was modified so that they were all part of the same organisation in the city, it would be well-nigh impossible to work that side of their character into group play. The only way I see to make it work with live sessions would be to run that side of their lives would have to be run by email with each player between sessions, with each roleplaying as much or as little as their player's non-adventuring life as they felt like, and each session they'd go off on an adventure together, possibly one enabled by plot hooks from their other lives. I know, however, that in-between session stuff rarely gets fully resolved before the next session, but perhaps if it was kept relatively simple it might work. Hrm.

Demonsbane, I think that's a good suggestion as well, even though I personally don't want to run a PbP game.

[Rhiannon87]

Rhiannon, that's a very good point. Unless this was modified so that they were all part of the same organisation in the city, it would be well-nigh impossible to work that side of their character into group play. The only way I see to make it work with live sessions would be to run that side of their lives would have to be run by email with each player between sessions, with each roleplaying as much or as little as their player's non-adventuring life as they felt like, and each session they'd go off on an adventure together, possibly one enabled by plot hooks from their other lives. I know, however, that in-between session stuff rarely gets fully resolved before the next session, but perhaps if it was kept relatively simple it might work. Hrm.


I've done some stuff like this with my DM on occasion, but it's usually just been a conversation or two, a couple scenes that take place in one night in-game. Trying to do a longer span of time might be trickier, especially if your players aren't reliable with e-mail.

I think using their non-adventuring lives as potential for plot hooks is a great idea (best way to motivate a party is to have the motivation be internal), but I'm still not sure how to resolve the disconnect between their private lives and adventuring lives. Even having a couple of the characters know each other outside of adventuring would alleviate the problem only slightly; they might be able to do things on their own together, with your permission.

Although, once the characters know each other better, you might be able to have some fun with them visiting each other while not adventuring. "Well, we finished killing the mind flayer and freeing the thralls. Wanna come back to my place for dinner and meet my kids?"

[Korivan]

This reminds me of the Anime show called "Rune Soldier" I think... It was those exact classes that had lives that they tried to balance all the while trying to make it rich by adventuring. Good show. But back to point. About getting people to know each other, you can just have them all start from the same village/city having grown up together...though thats somewhat of a copout. Love the concept, kinda forces them to develop thier character and people tend to love characters they grow into. My advise, give them family, promissing bussiness, or something that gives them a reason to want this. If they're like some of the people I play with, they'll rob suck up the petty cash, sell off thier assests, buy a +3 horse and ride off into the sunset.