I need Campaign ideas for my rp group...

[gleith]

Alright, so as it says, I need some ideas for a campaign I'm creating. So far I've decided to create an Roman/ vs Barbarian Horde basis, the characters starting as a mercenary group hired by the "Roman's."

I've also decided the Barbarian's should be led by a wizard, who was once a member of the "roman" council, but was cast out.

I've also considered making the roman's seem more like the "good guys" at the beginning, but as the story goes on giving more and more information to the contrary slowly trying to change the player's minds about them, but in the end having the Barbarian horde being ultimately evil, trying to summon a horde of war demons to destroy the world and so forth.

As of yet that is all I have decided upon.

[00dlez]

There's no real question here, but just some general thoughts from me on how to run the campaign:

Make it a constant question who is the lesser of two evils?

The Romans might employ some form of slavery, forcing captured enemies and conquered provinces to work in iron mines for war materials or pay overburdening tributes of food to support their armies

But they are only doing this in the name of greater good to defeat the truly evil barbarians who turned to the darker arts and are bent on conquering the world

Barbarian Leader
Wizard is always a good choice for a BBEG, but just from a flavor standpoint, some sort of Sorcerer/Cleric (even mystic theurge, depending on campaign level?) fits better with the barbarian feel to me. I understand its not optimized, which depending on the campaign may be a deal breaker, but I think in a "horde" setting could be neat. The BBEG could use spells like Mass Aid and Targeting Ray to buff his barbarian body guards, Mass Cure or Vigor spells to keep them up and raging hard on the PCs... Maybe use spells like Mindless Rage (Spell Comp.) to make a PC wade through his mini-horde and take a half dozen AoOs! I'm sure someone more knowledgeable than I could suggest a few more tricks to pull on the unsuspecting PCs

[OracleofSilence]

Also, just as a side note, if you are attempting to truly evoke the conflict between Romans and barbarians there are a few things to take into consideration.

First: Roman society is slowly decaying. No matter what excellent work the players do, they should slowly feel it slipping away. Corrupt or incompetent leaders, brilliant tacticians ignored for political reasons, and academics and scholars being intimidated into with holding valuable information because it would change the status quo. Similarly, war crimes are common, captured leaders are humiliated and sold into slavery, and soldiers are sometimes executed en masse. And, in addition to all this, fighting the Romans is actually like fighting the barbarians. Cause most roman soldiers are actually well armed and well trained barbarians that have signed on to what looks like the winning side.

On the reverse, the barbarians are just as savage as they sound. While in your world and in reality, they wanted to destroy the Romans, their goal was almost always their own survival and prosperity. They should be honest that they wish to see the empire fall, but there reason is just that they want its prosperity and lands. Even the most vile of earths barbarian hordes, despite all their destruction and pillaging, could be turned away with a sufficiently large bribe. This is hard to show without making the campaign easy, but just to make the games RP more interesting, the barbarians can be represented as selfish. They don't strictly speaking WANT to destroy anything permanently, but they are willing to if it will make a point and give them MORE in the long run.

of course, these are just ideas.

[LansXero]

Play (or find the sinopsis for the plot of) Shadow of Rome, it could prove interesting. Or watch "The Fall of the Roman Empire", was pretty good too.

[gleith]

Thank you all, any other ideas would be helpfull as well, however, these should be sufficient to allow me to get the story line flowing well. (=

I'm also looking for a way to really incorporate a few monster races into this as playable characters or main npcs, but I am having trouble deciding how to work them in, and have them fit into either side without seeming out of place.

[LansXero]

Go with those that mimic Roman / Greek mithology monsters. Minotaurs, medusa, mermaids, etc. should fit. Then if they are legionnaires during the wars in europe you could add french or german folklore stuff like fairies or druids or something. Or you could make the barbarian orcs, the carthaginians elves and so on xD

[Duriath]

Just locate in what moment of time in the Roman Empire you are gonna locate the campaign. They could be really really organized or just losing the grip of their "colonies" by the end because of already mentioned decadence.

Things that really make a nice campaign:

Memorable NPCs, I mean player's really hate that ****ing diplomat or so...
Memorable battles in my mind are always with something in the terrain or almost dying lol
Start small I remember a lot of the places, geography at small scale so player's get a nice grip of home

Climatic battle at the end of the campaign in an european swamp? or maybe dragons flying around the ships..

[Ancient Mage]

For a truly interesting campaign, you could make hobgoblins the romans. The hobs are the elite ruling class of rome, and they have made a vast empire that rules in a tough, but mostly fair way. The hobgoblin emperor is harsh, but overall won't randomly slaughter his people or oppress them too much. Goblins, bugbears and varags are second class citizens, but playable races.
Make humans and orcs (lots of half-orcs), the barbaric races who are constantly trying to destroy the "just" reign of the hobgoblins.
Now the moral dilemma comes, is the tyrannical regime of the hobs truly evil? They don't slaughter citizens, don't have extreme rules, etc., but they do deny many basic rights just like the romans did. And are the war-like methods of the barbarians just, or are they just as evil?

-Ancient Mage

[Zeikstraal]

Why not do the same thing as Sillycomic did? Let the party be neutral and let them choose what to do. if they will be part of the war, or taken oppertunity's on both sides.
I did something similar, and it was seriously my best session I ever did.

Look up for it Eisinar Mercenary

[gleith]

Why not do the same thing as Sillycomic did? Let the party be neutral and let them choose what to do. if they will be part of the war, or taken oppertunity's on both sides.
I did something similar, and it was seriously my best session I ever did.

Look up for it Eisinar Mercenary

I plan on starting the group out as roman mercs, loyal to the empire, but letting them see how the barbarian's group works, and how they act and letting them decide, as a group, wither or not to change sides. I'm not going to force them to choose one or the other, and no matter who they side with, the other group (romans or barbarians, depending) are going to do basically the same thing, but in a way unique to the side that the pc's are against