Bugworlds
2014-04-02, 12:29 AM
While my mind was wandering at work, I came up with a potentially fun way to start off a campaign.
Premise:
Players would start off on the boarder of a forest and a field, as level 0 (race only) characters. Monsters which are too powerful for them to fight chase them further into the field where they discover a hut/house/yard/small fort or something along the lines of that. At this point they meet the resident who explains to them the monsters from the forest (which happens to circle the field) have been coming out more and more regularly. He doesn't think he can hold them off any longer for his help had died in the last wave of monsters, but he would be glad to offer his land and cooperation in exchange for the party to defend the post for a bit.
It is at this point players are given at least 1 experience, giving them a class level. By making them pick a species they'll gravitate towards something they like, and by waiting for a goal to be given a strong class for the job is likely to occur. This could all happen by giving the premise to the players before it starts, but I like the idea of having a first session for building characters and limiting time that optimization can be researched.
Of course he dies in the next wave to appear, but not after making it clear the strength of the monsters which are in the forest; and that it is nearly impossible to try to leave through the forest until they are much stronger.
Depending on the patients of the players, or how much they enjoy defending the land, the challenge of escaping would need to be adjusted. Once this game has gone on long enough the players would be able to leave the area, find a village/town/castle, and then hunt down the source of the threat.
Rules:
Every 1d10 days another wave appears, of appropriate CR to the party. This CR would go up a bit faster than the players for they will be encouraged to build defences. Use a smaller dice and lower CR's for more waves, or just smaller dice for a more threatened feel.
Each day would have eight hours to work, no working sixteen hours or all day and night unless you're undead, a construct, or something else to shed your time-working limitations.
Defences and expansions such as walls, pits, extra buildings, farms (good luck maintaining a garden when monsters run through it, though) and all the other fun stuff players could think of would be crafted with standard crafting rules. I think this would make use of, what seems to be, a lengthy amount of time needed for most crafting projects. I think this game would also give a trap maker lots of opportunity to have some fun.
Resources would be acquired by some sort of delivery every 7 days + (1d6-3.5 days) by an NPC who has a way to and from the defending location; be that magic or just knowledge of the forest. This would mean players need to think ahead, and make their orders carefully.
Monsters would drop resources along with treasure, if treasure is not enough to fuel the purchases. Each monster could have a chance of dropping a 'magic item shard,' calculated by (CR x 10%). When a player, or the party, has enough of these to make an item they could hammer them together for a magic item. Lesser magical items would need 5 (or so, not sure how well this system would work), while stronger magic items would need more.
Building materials, potions, food, and all other needs which don't make sense to appear but would be useful or needed could come through drops. Due to events happening according to dice roll there's chance for a delivery to happen at the same time as an attack, work to be interrupted, and I'm sure random events could be factored in for more fun and flavours.
So...
What do you think? What would work, what would need tweeking, what would be needed to be added on? What about other random events? Would this be too tedious and an accelerated crafting system should be put in place? If one was to stretch this into the main focus of a campaign it could be fun to give everyone the Leadership feat for free and have more help show up. How's that sound?
Premise:
Players would start off on the boarder of a forest and a field, as level 0 (race only) characters. Monsters which are too powerful for them to fight chase them further into the field where they discover a hut/house/yard/small fort or something along the lines of that. At this point they meet the resident who explains to them the monsters from the forest (which happens to circle the field) have been coming out more and more regularly. He doesn't think he can hold them off any longer for his help had died in the last wave of monsters, but he would be glad to offer his land and cooperation in exchange for the party to defend the post for a bit.
It is at this point players are given at least 1 experience, giving them a class level. By making them pick a species they'll gravitate towards something they like, and by waiting for a goal to be given a strong class for the job is likely to occur. This could all happen by giving the premise to the players before it starts, but I like the idea of having a first session for building characters and limiting time that optimization can be researched.
Of course he dies in the next wave to appear, but not after making it clear the strength of the monsters which are in the forest; and that it is nearly impossible to try to leave through the forest until they are much stronger.
Depending on the patients of the players, or how much they enjoy defending the land, the challenge of escaping would need to be adjusted. Once this game has gone on long enough the players would be able to leave the area, find a village/town/castle, and then hunt down the source of the threat.
Rules:
Every 1d10 days another wave appears, of appropriate CR to the party. This CR would go up a bit faster than the players for they will be encouraged to build defences. Use a smaller dice and lower CR's for more waves, or just smaller dice for a more threatened feel.
Each day would have eight hours to work, no working sixteen hours or all day and night unless you're undead, a construct, or something else to shed your time-working limitations.
Defences and expansions such as walls, pits, extra buildings, farms (good luck maintaining a garden when monsters run through it, though) and all the other fun stuff players could think of would be crafted with standard crafting rules. I think this would make use of, what seems to be, a lengthy amount of time needed for most crafting projects. I think this game would also give a trap maker lots of opportunity to have some fun.
Resources would be acquired by some sort of delivery every 7 days + (1d6-3.5 days) by an NPC who has a way to and from the defending location; be that magic or just knowledge of the forest. This would mean players need to think ahead, and make their orders carefully.
Monsters would drop resources along with treasure, if treasure is not enough to fuel the purchases. Each monster could have a chance of dropping a 'magic item shard,' calculated by (CR x 10%). When a player, or the party, has enough of these to make an item they could hammer them together for a magic item. Lesser magical items would need 5 (or so, not sure how well this system would work), while stronger magic items would need more.
Building materials, potions, food, and all other needs which don't make sense to appear but would be useful or needed could come through drops. Due to events happening according to dice roll there's chance for a delivery to happen at the same time as an attack, work to be interrupted, and I'm sure random events could be factored in for more fun and flavours.
So...
What do you think? What would work, what would need tweeking, what would be needed to be added on? What about other random events? Would this be too tedious and an accelerated crafting system should be put in place? If one was to stretch this into the main focus of a campaign it could be fun to give everyone the Leadership feat for free and have more help show up. How's that sound?