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View Full Version : DM Help New Campaign Idea, but in need of minor plot hooks



Mongobear
2014-03-14, 06:11 PM
So, I am beginning a new 3.5 Campaign in 2 weeks, and I have my main, over-arching story thought out, but I can't think of the minor story arcs to tie everything together.

The initial focus on the adventure as a whole is an adaptation of the Pathfinder Adventure Path "Curse of the Crimson Throne" at least as far as the Queen being possessed by some powerful ancient evil force, and slowly kills off her husband, the true King via poison, in an attempt to take over the kingdom herself. However, the whole civil disorder and anything included in the rest of the adventure path isnt being used.

My main goals for the campaign are as follows:

1) Get the PCs involved with Royal Duties, via either Hired on as Guards, "Privateer/Letters of Marque" style contracts from the Queen, or accidental involvement from random heroic deeds that catches the Queens attention thus earning the PCs a reward.

2) Have the PCs working for the Royalty unknowingly assisting in the "evil powers" plot to truely overthrow the country.

3) After several false missions of "Royal Importance" the PCs figure out that they have been duped and that the Queen is under the sway of something "wholly evil" and decide to try and stop her/it.

4) The PCs try to figure out what exactly it is that the Queen is being controlled by, and attempt to gather whatever super-awesome weapon of goodness can stop it.

5) The PCs must effectively infiltrate/attack the castle to gain entry to the Queens chambers, confronting her and a horde of her brainwashed minions, thus beginning a prolonged battle Final Fantasy style, where they must use the Super-Awesome Weapon of Goodness to draw out the true evil, and then put an end to it forever, or reseal it back into a new stasis prison.


Now, I know exactly how I would like each of these main 5 events to happen, however the actual efforts of getting from one to the other is whats causing my true headaches. Every time I come up with something I think will work well, I think it sounds too cliche, and abandon the idea. But at this point, I am beginning to think I have to go with cliche or else I will never get the adventure ready for next weekend.

Any tips/ideas/plot hooks would be much welcomed!

Also, this adventure/campaign is intended to be mostly a RP/Story based setting, where plot interaction is valued more than combat prowess, However combat will be used as needed if someone completely blunders a social interaction. So If you can please limit any tips and ideas to be less of a "Rambo the Castle and slaughter the guards" and more of a "Convince the Captain of the Guard of the corruption, and have him pull his most loyal subordinates aside to help the PCs"


P.S. The Adventure is starting at level 5-6 depending on LA/Race choices. The basic creation rules are 4 Class levels, plus LA/HD up to 2 are allowed.

I would just adapt the actual Pathfinder adventure back to 3.5, but its made for level 1, so I would have to raise levels as well as reverse engineer as well, So I am just going for my own homebrew version, themed after the basic concepts of the printed adventure.

Fabletop
2014-03-14, 06:47 PM
Some ideas:

Someone close to the Queen but really her enemy brings on the PCs to act as her advocates when the true purpose revealed to the PCs is exposing her corruption (the 1st & early 2nd Acts would focus on this arrangement)
The Queen embraces the PCs as useful emmissaries, not knowing they're acting against her-she should offer them something that forces a dilemma (the PCs must choose to serve her completely or her foel
The PCs do what they want, accidentally tripping through encounters that eventually favor the Queen or her foe
I get plot/story hooks from my relevant NPCs; they have their agendas which the PCs fall into


Ever watch a spider spin a web? Each NPC is a line in that web. Each of their goals catches the PCs at some point. And each line draws the PCs deeper into the truth of what's going on, how it affects the realm and how they can change events forever.

Yeah. I've watched too many soap operas:smallamused:

Mongobear
2014-03-18, 03:22 PM
Hmm I like some of these suggestions, however they are more akin to my main 5 plot devices above. Im not saying theyre wrong, but they fall more inline with major hooks, and not segues between each of them, which is what I really am looking for.

FishBonePendant
2014-03-18, 04:05 PM
If the Queen is slowly taking over the country you could set up a rescue of an NPC who the party is friendly towards like a merchant or wizard who has provided help for them in the past.

In a recent campaign of mine the party's rogue had a romantic relationship with a magical craftswoman. She ended up being kidnapped by vampire spawn controlled by the main villain and turned into a vampire herself. The party then had to choice to invade a hostile mine to get diamonds for resurrection or find a banished cleric who helped vampires survive in daylight.

Ring_of_Gyges
2014-03-18, 04:36 PM
Some random hooks:

1) While travelling the PC's are set upon by bandits, who they defeat only to learn that the crown hadn't been able to track them down and are duly grateful for the help and keeps the PC's in mind for further work.

Too martial? While travelling, the PC's discover that the next village on their route is totally abandoned. Everything looks fine, but a couple hundred villagers are missing. The PC's discover the horrible secret and put a stop to the cause, the crown is duly grateful and keeps the PC's in mind for further work.

2) The PC's are approached by the crown to recover holy relics, sacred to the king's faith. The McGuffins let you send them anywhere and do anything. Want a dungeon crawl? One is in a dungeon. Want a diplomatic adventure? One is owned by a neighboring king who will need persuasion or a cunning heist. Want detective work? One was stolen by pirates years ago and you'll need to discover what became of the crew and where the treasure is buried. Want exploration? One was taken by a missionary priest into the back beyond to preach to the heathens and has never heard from again. Want romance? A wealthy merchant will give his up, but not for money (he has plenty of that) he wants his daughter married into the aristocracy. Etc...

McGuffins (or "plot tokens" as my wife calls them) are cliche, but for a very good reason, they're super useful.

3) The PC's, now trusted servants, are offered knighthoods to track down and capture or kill a traitor to the throne, a renegade priest turned to devil worship. Nope, he's a loyal priest who has worked out who the Queen really is, and what the artifacts really do, and is running for his life.

4) After refusing to kill the priest, the PC's are on the run now too. The priest is now your source of adventures. He has a list of plot tokens he needs to identify the Queen's true form. Steal a document. Gain access to a library. Rescue a scholar.

5) Sounds like an adventure to me. Super weapon in hand, queen finally in sight, have fun storming the castle!

Honest Tiefling
2014-03-18, 11:30 PM
1) Get the PCs involved with Royal Duties, via either Hired on as Guards, "Privateer/Letters of Marque" style contracts from the Queen, or accidental involvement from random heroic deeds that catches the Queens attention thus earning the PCs a reward.

So...How long ago was the Queen widowed? Call me a jerk, but it could work if the queen decides that she's done producing heirs and can move on to more...Enjoyable affairs. Or a daughter/son should she not work out for some reason.

Otherwise, have another band of heroes brag about how they got a sweet gig working for Queeny-pants. Have one of them knock over one of the PCs' drinks and other annoying things.

Mongobear
2014-03-18, 11:42 PM
Well, the published adventure that I am basing the whole thing off of has the King and Queen both alive at the start, and then she offs the poor guy a few adventures in due to....stuff.

In my version, I plan on this having already happened ~5 years before the PCs hook up, and the kingdom is now on the verge of falling apart but the PCs end up blundering into a situation that attracts her attention completely by chance, thus beginning a series of tragedies, coincidences, and Soap Opera plot holes the size of a small country.

Mongobear
2014-03-19, 02:59 AM
Well, the published adventure that I am basing the whole thing off of has the King and Queen both alive at the start, and then she offs the poor guy a few adventures in due to....stuff.

In my version, I plan on this having already happened ~5 years before the PCs hook up, and the kingdom is now on the verge of falling apart but the PCs end up blundering into a situation that attracts her attention completely by chance, thus beginning a series of tragedies, coincidences, and Soap Opera plot holes the size of a small country.

So I have spent a lot of today rewriting the Pathfinder Adventure Path "Curse of the Crimson Throne" for D&D 3.5 as well as adapting it for higher levels and changing the flow of events involved to match my own Homebrew world. I would like you people's opinions on the into to it I plan to hand out to my players to give them an idea of how the "state of the union" so to speak is currently in the world.

And most of this is a simple copy/paste straight from the book, but I have adapted the timelines as well as names and events to my own worlds timeline. The kingdom itself is very Transylvanian in culture, I based it off of Barovia from the Ravenloft setting, but without any of the Ravenloft specific stuff, as well as adding "ovich" to the end of my names for a good stereotypical fantasy setting reminiscent of the original AD&D Ravenloft module.


Background History of Syldavia


Rokasia, the Jewel of Syldavia, has long sparkled on Syldavia’s southern shore. Established over 1200 years ago by a Conqueror whose name is long lost to the sands of time, the city now commands its own destiny. A line of Rokasian kings and queens emerged to rule the city, establishing an infamous seat power—the Crimson Throne. Rulers have sat upon the Crimson Throne for nearly a dozen centuries, and the city has flourished.

Yet recently, the monarchy seems almost on the brink of disaster. The farmlands, long bountiful and overly abundant, seem to be withering away, barely capable of sustaining the country side--let alone the entire kingdom. The lush forests often used for wild game and timber is seemingly warped and feral, often a danger to those entering. The Crimson Throne is cursed daily by the lower class, who barely have the means to survive, and are little more than serfs wallowing in the filth of the slums. The Middle Class and Nobility are likewise suffering from the withering of the land, many Noble families are barely wealthy enough to maintain their lavish lifestyle, some so far indebted to others, they use political weddings as a means to repay their massive debts.

What was once a prize to be won is now a curse it seems. No monarch of Rokasia has died of old age for 200 years, and none have produced an heir while ruling. Even though King Edovich II controls Rokasia more fully than any previous monarch, that control remains tenuous, and many secretly count the days until their latest king falls to what they call the Curse of the Crimson Throne.

The city of Rokasia began nearly 1300 years ago, in 407 AR, when refugees of the Rokasan Empire expanded north into the Balkarian Wilds. Here, they encountered a large tribe of primitive barbarians dwelling around an immense pyramid on the shores of a deep bay—a perfect site for a city! So as usual for most advanced cultures upon encountering a less advanced civilization, they immediately began eradicating the inhabitants of this new land to claim it as their own. Much bloodshed eventually left the primitives defeated, driven back to the harsh Balkar Mountains, and the city that grew on the site was named after the Empire they fled in fear.

Yet even as Rokasia flourished and grew, surviving even the inevitable re-invasion by the united tribes of the disjointed barbarians they defeated 20 years earlier, few bothered to ask why the barbarians had dwelt here. None of Rokasia’s citizens, from beggar to king, realized that the barbarians were actually guardians, and that deep inside the pyramidal structure destined to become Castle Rokasa, hid great and powerful relics sealing the power of a Demigod defeated on the feilds of battle in an age long forgotten. For the past 1300 years, Rokasia has grown and expanded, unaware that beneath the city’s foundation rests the languishing soul of a being of pure evil and cruelty.

Today, Rokasia’s reigning King Edovich II is feared by all the right people. His rule is steady, even if his insatiate appetites for extravagance drain the city’s coffers. His ability to navigate the rocks and shoals of court diplomacy earned the city favorable trade agreements with many neighboring countries twice Sylvanias size, but rumors persisted of the king’s womanizing habits and his spendthrift ways. Despite his fondness for a soft touch, he has to date produced no heir to the throne, the latest in a line of rulers seemingly affected by the "Curse of the Crimson Throne". Edicts proclaim Edovich II the Saffron King, likening his reign to one of abundance, in which honey and spice flood the markets. The city’s downtrodden have another name for Edovich, though—the Stirge King, a man whose squandering ways are slowly bleeding his city dry.

Whispers of Edovich II’s taste for scandalously young companionship have dogged the king throughout his rule, and thus when he finally wed, it was no surprise that his bride was barely a third of his age. Queen Natalya Ileosa was a woman of breathtaking beauty, with red hair like the sunset, chaste alabaster skin, and features so fetching many claimed her mother must have been a nymph queen, as surely no mortal woman could give birth to a beauty such as she. Most of Rokasia’s nobles worry of the dangers of placing a trophy wife within hands’ reach of the Crimson Throne, but Ileosa’s interest in the city seemed secondary to the life of luxury combined with the seemingly unstoppable "Withering" of the countryside, they haven't the time to truely voice their opinion of the scandal. Besides, with the more-than-competent Seneschal Nolan Kalepovich guarding Castle Rokasia’s interests while the true King is busy with his newest bride, these noble families feel they have little to worry about and that the withering shall soon pass.

They are about to learn how wrong they are...

veti
2014-03-19, 04:55 PM
Question: why does the death of the king automatically lead to the whole kingdom going to heck? Kings die all the time, it's what they do, and most of the time the kingdom continues just fine.

Read up on the story of Catherine de' Medici in France. She presided over one of the most gruesome and painful periods in French history. Now, she wasn't a particularly nice person, but the point is, even if she had been, it's probable there's not much she could have done about it.

So imagine a genuinely noble, idealistic version of Catherine employing your PCs. As they travel about on their missions, they see - everywhere - her orders being comprehensively ignored, in favour of people building their own power bases, and the reports fed back to her are almost complete fabrications. What they see is arrogant nobles trying to manipulate her into making bad decisions. There's little they can do about this, because they can't be everywhere, the senior nobles have their own adventuring parties just as high-level as the PCs, and the queen doesn't want to start a war. If they talk to the nobles, they just say "the queen means well, but she's weak, we can't trust her, we have to look after ourselves".

Have the queen make some questionable decisions, and the party tasked with carrying them out. When they arrive at the scene, it becomes obvious that their orders are based on false information and will lead to an outcome that's just plain bad for everyone, except maybe the almost-visibly-gloating noble nearby. Let them decide what to do at that point.

If they decide to do the right thing (i.e. something other than what they've been told) and report back honestly to the queen, she flies into a rage and sends them on some particularly long and arduous mission as a punishment. That would be a good time for them to encounter the (fringe insane conspiracy) theory that she's possessed. This may be true, or it may not. If by this time the party has come up with some feasible plan for reasserting the queen's authority within the bounds of a mundane political crisis, personally I'd go with that; otherwise, "de-possessing" the queen becomes the goal and climax of the campaign, followed by awed nobles re-swearing allegiance, rainbows and unicorns for all.

Mongobear
2014-03-19, 05:31 PM
Question: why does the death of the king automatically lead to the whole kingdom going to heck? Kings die all the time, it's what they do, and most of the time the kingdom continues just fine.


Its not so much a matter of just a King dies and everything goes to hell all of a sudden. The entire Kingdom for the past decade or two has been on a slow decline due to stuff, and the peasant masses are on the verge of an uprising due to the poor conditions they face, and lack of any real solution being presented by those in charge.

On top of that, once the king does die, the throne passes to a Queen who has,

1) Never actually ruled over anything, thus has absolutely zero experience in an actual position of power;

and

2) Has been corrupted/possessed by en entity wholly outside the realm of reason. Think if C'thulu corrupted our entire government and started taking over/causing as much chaos as possible. Her political decisions/decrees immediately upon claiming the throne are so radical and contrary to the best interests of the Kingdom, the people completely lose it.

Deaxsa
2014-03-19, 05:57 PM
Its not so much a matter of just a King dies and everything goes to hell all of a sudden. The entire Kingdom for the past decade or two has been on a slow decline due to stuff, and the peasant masses are on the verge of an uprising due to the poor conditions they face, and lack of any real solution being presented by those in charge.

On top of that, once the king does die, the throne passes to a Queen who has,

1) Never actually ruled over anything, thus has absolutely zero experience in an actual position of power;

and

2) Has been corrupted/possessed by en entity wholly outside the realm of reason. Think if C'thulu corrupted our entire government and started taking over/causing as much chaos as possible. Her political decisions/decrees immediately upon claiming the throne are so radical and contrary to the best interests of the Kingdom, the people completely lose it.

i think 2 is the important one, 1 is pretty superficial.after all, she really HAS been ruling at least to SOME degree.. and there are advisors if she does not know what's going on. and she's been watching a country be ruled from the best vantage point ever.

my advice to you is to (somehow) rig up a scenario where, after the king dies, the "queen" is consolidating power. and then the party runs into her (because she's doing evil), only she manages to break free for a couple minutes, and explains the situation. now, the party can either help her covertly, and free the queen, or they can expose her secret and depose her with help of the members of society who were already fighting the "Queen's" exploits. either way, they'll have a hard time (fight the possessed queen/free the possessed queen)

before this whole event occurs, the party could be fighting their way into recognition, while political stuff happens around them. maybe they work for a minor noble or tradesman?

after the event, they could take the fight to the possessor? the weak, recovering queen assists the party in
-protecting the realm from these threats and then destroying the threats
-becoming spies/agents/operatives of the queen
-the queen was pregnant and has a kid, this kid is like a source from the witcher saga, and they need to find him/her a teacher ASAP(or the kid loses control and turns into a nuke). maybe a dragon, a high level mage, some sort of kung-fu master.
-the king rises as an undead monstrosity, and raises the dead soldiers and noblemen of the city against the living in revenge, only he's unaware that she's safe now

etc, etc.

edit: the trick to making the whole "you don't know about the king yet" is to actually tell them about the king. MAKE it relevant to them. maybe some odd laws are being passed that affect them directly, or the guards start disappearing, and the citizens are hiring mercs to replace the guards, etc. (also, i like having a sort of "prologue" part, in which the players can consolidate their team, find out who the other characters are, make a system that works, etc. but that's just mho)

Ring_of_Gyges
2014-03-20, 07:02 PM
Looks great, glad the McGuffins helped.

Here are some options for things going downhill once the king dies:

Succession Crisis! There were lots of different inheritance schemes in the real middle ages, but I don't think any of them would result in a Queen inheriting once the king dies. To inherit a title you need to be a blood relative of the king. If the king has no children the crown will go to an uncle, a brother, or some child or grandchild of an uncle or brother.

Syldavia, of course, is a fictional nation, it can have any inheritance laws you like, but a muddy succession is a great breeding ground for civil war. Suppose she doesn't kill the king outright, but renders him comatose or otherwise addled and incapacitated and declares herself Regent. She rules in practice, but angry Uncle Heir-ovich is pissed because he wants to inherit the throne. He claims he should be regent because he's the heir. He challenges her right to be regent, you could throw in some pretty ugly misogyny about a slip of a girl being in charge, and plots against her.

Alternate complexity if the law makes the Queen the heir, but only if you think women can inherit, and the law is kinda vague on women inheriting with historical precedent on each side (i.e. strong capable women managed it, but weaker queens lost out against other claimants, and when the succession wars end everybody pragmatically agrees that the person who won is legally entitled to the throne).

Bonus bonus complexity if the Queen is pregnant! Unborn children don't inherit unless they're born. So, king's incapacitated, Queen declares herself regent, Uncle grumbles and starts gathering support for his being regent. Lots of moral ambiguity all round if you want it unclear who the good guys and bad guys are. Need to make the Uncle look worse? Have the PC's foil a plot to murder her unborn child. Need to make the Queen look worse? The PC's work out the murder plot was her idea and she sacrificed an assassin to the PC's to paint Uncle as really really vile. Need to add support for Uncle? Have the PC's intercept a courier carrying letters from the king to his uncle saying if he were ever incapacitated he'd want to die rather than linger and he wanted his beloved uncle to take the throne. Now, of course, the letter is ten years old and written before the King married and before he had a child, but one side can use it.

The conflict over the succession can be as covert or overt as you want. It could be spies and diplomats trying to get enough of the nobles behind one faction or another. Alternately it could be various relatives declaring themselves king and raising their armies. Meanwhile all the other nobles in the kingdom don't know who to send their taxes to and who to support in a war, leading to all kinds of mess as the government breaks down.

Succession crises may not be your cup of tea, I love them though. It would give you a lot of opportunities to have the Queen sending PC's on missions against the Uncle and for her to take on a darker and darker tone as the conflict becomes nastier (ever read Game of Thrones? 10 second summary. The king dies and the succession is really debatable. Everything becomes horrible and no one will ever be happy again. It's a little oversimplified, but I stand by it).

She can start with unobjectionable things like diplomatic outreach to local nobles (nobles who want something adventure flavored done to prove the Queen can solve problems, go down a dungeon, solve a mystery, etc...).

Eventually she can ask the PC's to do things like plant evidence against rivals (dishonorable, but for the greater good!). If they go along with it, she can move on to darker and darker stuff, assassinate minor barons who won't join her but who's heir's would for example. Also as time passes it can become increasingly clear her child isn't right. Supernatural omens and signs can intimate she's carrying a demon baby and no good will come of it. I think setting her up in a war that starts cold and turns hot and which starts with honorable tactics and gets steadily nastier would work well with your plan to gradually expose the Queen as evil.

Shahanshah
2014-03-20, 11:34 PM
I love succession crises. Ring_of_Gyges, if you don't mind, I'm definitely filing some of those ideas away for use in my civil-war-because-of-succession-crisis campaign.

Depending on how sadistic you are, maybe have the Queen accuse a former ally of the PCs (who's been nothing but nice to them) of heinous crimes and say he must be stopped, sending them out to do the deed? Maybe this could be the tipping point that they realise something is up?

Other than that my best advice would be to give the evil entity a clear and logical plan that it wishes to accomplish. Even if it's just "cause as much destruction as possible" have them pursue a specific avenue to cause that (intentionally rile the peasants into a revolt that can be brutally crushed? Deliberately alienate the nobles of the kingdom to start a war?) It'll make it easier to come up with tasks for the Queen to send the PCs on and plots in general if you know exactly what the evil entity wants to achieve, and then figure out how it will go about achieving this.

Ring_of_Gyges
2014-03-21, 12:10 AM
File away, that's what we're here for, giving each other ideas.

Mongobear
2014-03-21, 01:32 AM
Heh, I haven't read Game of Thrones, but I have watched the first 2 seasons of the HBO or whatever series. Infact, I am even hilariously extatic that one of my players is making a Dawrven Paladin (my own homebrew rewrite, not the core version) of Ollidamra that he is basing off of Tyrion Lannister, so hilarity is almost guarenteed to ensue.

However, I am basing a lot of my political intrigue, and noble houses' interactions of some of the inner-workings between the families in GoT. i,e. the most powerful house of the 10 ruling houses is similar to the Lannisters, always the richest, loaning money, most amount of governing power in court, lil bit of incest, etc.

One of based off of the Starks to a degree, theyre the only truely "noble" of the houses, caring more for the people than for their own extravagance, as well as living in the far northernmost region of Syldavia, guarding the ancient passage into the Balkarian Mountains, instead of the Wall with the Knight of the Black.

My biggest problem, is that I have not SERIOUSLY DMed for several years, and I am not the greatest at coming up with solutions on the fly should a player toss some huge wrench into the gears of my plot, I tend to take some of that stuff almost personally and have to leave the table at times to figure what solution if any I can pull to salvage the nights adventure.

It will probably just come with more experience, once I get into things, but I am just a little intimidated at possibly jumping the gun, or ruining some major plot reveal because I got too overzealous with this adventure. I also hope trying to pull off this style of game as opposed to our usual "Kick in the door, collect the loot" style dungeon crawl as my first adventure in a few years doesnt backfire and just devolve into that type of game, mostly since I am attempting to cater to a group of 2 heavy RPers, 2 Rambos-in-training, and a "i can RP or be Rambo depending on the day" kind of guy. I am trying to strike an even medium between the two of them, but I dont want to turn our game nights into 3 hours slogs of constant combat, or an episode of "The Young and the Restless."

Shahanshah
2014-03-21, 02:06 AM
I have had that same problem in the past! And my current campaign is also inspired by Game of Thrones!

The way I'm sorting it out is by not having an established plot. I have factions, and each have their goals, and each try to court the PCs to go along with it; but what happens next is determined by the PCs actions.

So my first session, for instance, had the three different factions vying for power each give the PCs a quest, and each promise a different reward to represent the faction's priorities. The PCs then responded by attempting to fleece all three by agreeing to be hired by everyone without telling them about the other two. So when all three quest-givers turned up at the same time I had them act as their characters dictated.

Now, as I set up future sessions, I mentally note the result of the whole shmozzle (though the PCs tried to get all three rewards, they ended up offending two of the them, so it was that last faction that really won out) and then figure how each faction will react to that.

If that makes sense? This way, no matter what crazy stuff the PCs get up to, they can never derail your plot, because there isn't an established plot to derail.

Ring_of_Gyges
2014-03-21, 01:18 PM
My biggest problem, is that I have not SERIOUSLY DMed for several years, and I am not the greatest at coming up with solutions on the fly should a player toss some huge wrench into the gears of my plot, I tend to take some of that stuff almost personally and have to leave the table at times to figure what solution if any I can pull to salvage the nights adventure.

I think you're in good shape, you've got a solid outline for where you want things to go, but I don't think you need (or even should want) much more than an outline.

PC's are going to do weird stuff. The adventure is going to go off the rails. That's fine, it's good fun. Think about the relevant NPC's and have them react in authentic ways and don't sweat it if the plot veers in an unexpected direction.

I remember a Star Wars game I ran were the PC's were supposed to meet a rebel contact who would give them a mission, but their contact was sneaking into to the meeting site. The PC's scouted out the meeting site, saw an armed guy sneaking around, panicked, and shot him dead. My plot for the adventure didn't survive scene 1.

I forget the details, but they ended up storming an Imperial base, shooting a bunch of people, and making off in stolen tie fighters. Good times.

Its better to give the PC's free rein to do whatever damn fool thing comes into their heads than worry too much about the plan. It's all a continuum of course, but at one end is railroading and that's no fun. Err on the side of chaos. :)

Mongobear
2014-03-21, 03:12 PM
I think you're in good shape, you've got a solid outline for where you want things to go, but I don't think you need (or even should want) much more than an outline.

Yeah the more I think about it, the more I want to go with a generic "Family A, B, C are persuing goals X, Y, Z respectively. And attempt to pull the PCs into it, to the benefit/detriment of all those involved.


PC's are going to do weird stuff. The adventure is going to go off the rails. That's fine, it's good fun. Think about the relevant NPC's and have them react in authentic ways and don't sweat it if the plot veers in an unexpected direction.

The only problem I foresee with this though, is that compared to some of what I have read on this site as far as "dysfunctional PC groups" is pretty take compared to some of what our group has done in the past.

I can recall vividly a set of adventures in the past year where we were colonists of sorts in a new land that was relatively unsettled aside from a few indigenous elves in a nearby forest. As opposed to a usual adventure, there was a period of 2-3 years (in game time) over ~3 sessions, where the sessions revolved entirely around building up the town, and settling the surrounding lands, Age of Empires style.

Instead of actually helping with these activities, for the first year or so, our parties Cleric of "Wee Jas", who we later found out was actually a LE worshipper of Asmodeus, slowly was corrupting the entire town, constantly passing notes in secret to the DM, and starting a cult.

Once we got the town up and running, the players decided to host a great celebration, Thanksgiving style, like in the old days. The Cleric volunteered to take responsibility in arranging the meal and preparing everything, reasoning that he hasn't done much in the past and as his way of making ammends. We all agreed, and went on a small tour of the surrounding lands to fully appraise what all we have done.

A few days later, the meal is about to take place, the Cleric has made what appears to be a wonderful display of a meal, with every food imaginable for the times, and several types of ale, wine, etc. All of the townsfolk, not affiliated/dominated with his "cult" and all of the PCs except him dig in and start having a great time.

This Cleric begins giving a speech you would expect for such an occasion, but in actuality, is using Silent Spell to cast a "ritual spell" he has arranged in secret with the DM, to sacrifice such a large number to Asmodeus, for being "willing" since, he argued, they willingly ate the food.

So Ritual complete, everyone who was eating the food, PCs included, suddenly burst into Hellfire or something, die, and have their souls forever imprisoned in Asmodeus's gallery of playthings. The Duke of Hell even makes an appearance on the Material Plane after this little stunt, and grants the Cleric some ungodly number of Wishes/boons due to sacrificing somewhere near 500 people at once.

Suffice it to say, campaign was over, and the Cleric became the next BBEG for our Epic Level Campaign, since he went from level ~8 to somewhere in the mid 20s from all of his wishes, hooray DM fiat for Wish wording.

This is the type of shennanigans I would like to avoid. Normally I would have never of had a problem with the above circumstances if they would have either played out over the course of months of actual play time, or we were actually going for an evil campaign. The entire basis of that adventure was "You are goodly people loyal to the crown being paid to venture to unknown lands and settle them for the Crown" and one guy had to ruin the entire thing cause he felt like being a head cultist/"satan" worshipper.


I remember a Star Wars game I ran were the PC's were supposed to meet a rebel contact who would give them a mission, but their contact was sneaking into to the meeting site. The PC's scouted out the meeting site, saw an armed guy sneaking around, panicked, and shot him dead. My plot for the adventure didn't survive scene 1.

I forget the details, but they ended up storming an Imperial base, shooting a bunch of people, and making off in stolen tie fighters. Good times.

Yeah in our group, we would have shot him dead, raped his corpse, completed the mission anyways, joined the Dark Side, ate some cookies, killed Luke and company, raped their corpses, went back to the Emperor, ate some more cookies, killed the Emperor, raped his corpse, cried all the cookies were gone, blown up Coruscant with the Death Star, blown up the Death Star, went to Dagobah, redeemed ourselves to the Light Side, killed Yoda, raped his corpse, then discovered a secret recipe for force cookies and never adventure again.


Its better to give the PC's free rein to do whatever damn fool thing comes into their heads than worry too much about the plan. It's all a continuum of course, but at one end is railroading and that's no fun. Err on the side of chaos. :)

I certainly dont want to be a railroad conductor, but I dont want the world to be a literal "Sandbox" where they can do anything they want. Id like the world as a whole to have "guide-rails" that allow a certain degree of wiggle room, but that ultimately keeps them on track from point A to point B, and not A to Q to 7 to M back to A reverse plot to -228 then finally to B.