General idea for a new campaign

[Gnaritas]

So, in a few months my current campaign will probably come to an end.
After that the previous DM will take on a new campaign.
At that point i will start building on my own new campaign to start after his.

The last two campaigns (one of mine, one of his) were about the same general "type". You are in place A, go to place B to do something, find out something, realise you can go to point C or D and do something to end up in point E to finish the campaign. The places they go to are for the most part "known" areas and civilized.

I want to make some general suggestions to the players as to what they would like for my next campaign. What i have so far:

1. A city campaign.
Well, this could also be a village, a fortress, a castle, an island, but i will name it city here after. Because they will spend most of their time here, i can make more detailed work of this city, there can be more NPC's that they will get to know better and better. They can use more of their own history: "hey, lets go to that temple of Tyr we helped 2 weeks ago" instead of "is there a temple in this town?" or "well, i don't really know how to get in contact with the rogue-guild, but i can recognise the thief we caught stealing from my moneypouch last week and we can talk to him...".

2. Explore the unknown
Here they would explore unknown, probably strange worlds. Whether they have an airship, a teleport device or are plane-travelling. Every world will be quite different, but linked together in some way, the reason they are travelling to each of those places.

3. Post apocalyptic
Probably sort of like Fallout.

I will ask the players themselves for ideas, but maybe you guys can give some more example to throw at them and see which one they would like best.

[2-HeadedGiraffe]

I'm not sure I have more general ideas. I tend to come up with some of the story, some encounters I'd like to run, etc. and see where it goes from there. My last campaign (on which my comic Beaches and Basilisks, as linked in signature, is based) was set in a world with just islands and ocean, no major continents. I wanted to use a lot of the water creatures and give players the options for aquatic animal companions/mounts, and so forth that I never see used. So there the setting led to the idea.

I'm curious, how short are your campaigns that you plan them two in advance? Just wondering.

[Gnaritas]

Our last two campaigns lasted about 15 months each. We play once a week, but sometimes it's cancelled, so i guess 45 sessions a year, and they take about 3 hours. So about 150-200 hours per campaign.
When my campaign ends i get about a year to get things ready, which means i can either take it easy or not take it easy and have a lot of details worked out.

An aquatic campaign is something to think about.

[Callista]

Just remember to give that city a volunteer fire brigade. You'll need it.

[2-HeadedGiraffe]

I ran into a few difficulties with a partially-aquatic setting. Mainly, the players will not get into the water if there's land around and you give them a choice. I did get a player who'd been separated from the group to fight about waist-deep in water and a couple combats from on boats, but that was about it. Also, seriously consider the logistics and tactics of fighting underwater if you do get the players there. It's a three-dimensional space, so don't have your creatures attack as if it were a plane.

Edit: You could deal with the first issue by encouraging everyone to play races that are at home in the water. Maybe drop the level adjustment off something like merfolk or make the aquatic variants of standard races the standard.

[Callista]

It can be somewhat difficult to work 3D combat anyway, but you're going to have to deal with that on land--any flying creature (including the party wizard) will be working in three dimensions. So I don't think that really makes underwater locations such a drawback; you'll be dealing with the same problem anyway.

[2-HeadedGiraffe]

It can be somewhat difficult to work 3D combat anyway, but you're going to have to deal with that on land--any flying creature (including the party wizard) will be working in three dimensions. So I don't think that really makes underwater locations such a drawback; you'll be dealing with the same problem anyway.

Underwater, I think, gets more complicated because everyone in the combat will be able to move that way, not just certain characters. Well, not strictly benthic (bottom-dwelling) creatures, but still. I suppose there's just more to keep track of, not actually more complications.

[The Dark Fiddler]

2. Explore the unknown
Here they would explore unknown, probably strange worlds. Whether they have an airship, a teleport device or are plane-travelling. Every world will be quite different, but linked together in some way, the reason they are travelling to each of those places.

3. Post apocalyptic
Probably sort of like Fallout.

It's funny that these two are ideas I've been wanting to do for a while too.

Perhaps a campaign where the players are fallen gods trying to regain their divinity? Or perhaps where they are all gladiators (optional: the operation is secretly run by Mindflayers)? Perhaps even people arrested for horrible horrible crimes that they did not commit who escape to try and prove their innocence and bring the actual villains to justice?