Campaign Workshop: Fixing stuck games and writers blocks

[Yora]

I frequently get stuck with ideas I have for adventures, and it's probably the same for most GMs. So bring whatever you're having trouble with and let's share ideas what could be done about them.

In the next adventure of my campaign, things got started by two brothers exploring a stone circle in the forest and accidentally awakening its guardian who killed one of the two. The other one killed the guardian and dragged the corpse back home, but the guardian reforms every nightfall and wants to get the body back. The death of a person inside the stone circle was regarded as the start of a sacrifice to activate the stones power, and now the guardian will not rest until the sacrifice is completed.
However, the surviving brother does not know that and believes the guardian has followed him back to the village to kill him as well, because the corpse is being prepared for burial in the same house. But the burial preparations have warded the house against spirits, so the guardian keeps circling it every night trying to find a way inside.
My assumption how things will play out:
1. The PCs see the guardian in the village and fight it, but learn that it's futile one way or another.
2. The PCs question the surviving brother and learn about the stone circle.
3. The PCs travel to the circle and enter the underground chambers to find wall painings showing the sacrifice ritual (the village shaman might help them out interpreting the images if the players don't figure it out themselves).
4. The PCs have to get the corpse, as the family isn't too keen about having him sacrificed to an apparently evil spirit.
5. The PCs get the corpse to the stones, perform the last steps, and the land is blessed with good harvest for a year and the guardian goes back to sleep.

Looks good so far. However, I would like to make the exploration of the ancient underground chamber a big event in itself. I could always put some goblins or giant centipides in there, but that doesn't quite strike me as appropriate for the theme of the adventure. I want to highlight the exploration of a sanctuary of ancient druids, but don't have any ideas what the PCs could be finding down there? Any ideas?

[JeminiZero]

Well obviously, since te Druids already decided to use a Guardian to hunt down human sacrifices, it won't be surprising is they use similiar Guardians to guard their chambers, no?

What if the PCs decide NOT to go with the sacrifice option (What will happen to the soul of the sacrifice? Maybe the ritual casts it to Asmodeus! Also, who knows if the images are right? Maybe its a bluff? Maybe completing the ritual will summon an elder evil.)

They instead try to stop the Guardian permanently, by razing the chamber and circle. Or they try and contain the Guardian by copying the funery rites that ward the spirit form the house, and making a containing field around the circle.

[Yora]

Good point. There should be other solutions, but not necessarily better ones.

The guardian could reincarnate not in the center of the stones, but in the underground chamber. Adding a room with a large idol resembling the guardian would open the possibility to destroy it and prevent any further manifestations. However, destroying an ancient idol within a site that helps maling the area more fertile would likely have significant negative effects. Same thing if the manage to seal the chamber and permanently trap the guardian.

Sacrificing the other brother instead could be an option, but if the players would try that it would just be too much fun to not make it completely futile.:smallbiggrin:
I also think it would be interesting if the survivor does not tell the full story of how they actually woke the guardian. Not that it would make a difference, but it would add some more mystery. It can't be that he tried to kill his brother, because then he wouldn't have returned with the body. But they could have tried something stupid which they had known to be forbidden.

[Kol Korran]

Hmmmm... some ideas. It would be great to know what sort of a purpose this druid grove had, but I'm suggesting some things on a more general basis. My ideas aim to make the exploration of the sacred druid... "Abode" more interesting and thematic:

1) The groves' net: Instead of a normal dungeon/ cave, I suggest to make it into something else, a bit more of a puzzle. The grove doesn't transport the party into a cave, a normal dungeon. Instead, the grove transport the party into... other groves, some of them quite far, all in various states of degeneration and falling out, but partially active yet. So each "room" of the dungeon is a grove in a different local, where the druid organization once acted- on the shores of a sea cliff, near an iceberg, deep in the jungle, atop a high mountain, and so on, you get the idea.

But how do you move between groves? Here I suggest to add a certain element of a puzzle (Not one that will get the game stuck, one that will add a bit of a mystery and theme). The groves have standing stones, and one each stone there is a mark, perhaps in druidic, referring to some theme or concept of the druid lore. By going between two stones you arrive at a grove that has some semblance at the joining of these two marks. (For example, by moving between "water" and "mountain" you might get to the grove by the iceberg). Not all stones have been left standing, quite a few fell, so fewer possibilities remain. but the feeling that the access to more groves could be left. It creates a sort of a dungeons since some groves can lead to only a limited number of groves and so on.

You can have some "secret rooms" with potential things to help the party, if they make some far reaching conclusions of how some of these portals work, such as somehow linking two not immediately close stones or perhaps finding a more ingenious way of "stepping between" two stones (Like above a third). I leave that to you and your players. Just don't make these a must to complete the adventure, or supply many clues, as by the the 3 clues rule.

2) The caretakers: The ancienct druids left this grove (or linked net of groves) To the care taking of either weaker (yet still powerful.. level 7-8 I think) druids, or alternatively to some nature spirits/ fey. If it's the druids, then they have tied their essence/ self to certain spirits and concepts, becoming forces that protect the groves, instead of just druids. They each tied themselves to certain concepts and aspects of the druids lore and frame of thought, which powers their current form. (I'm thinking of things like Mountain- unrelenting, enduring ,unchanging. Community- protection, comfort, sharing, strength in numbers and so on. Better than just "fire/ earth/ water/ bla bla")

But though these are conceptual spirits, they are also personalities of the druids/ fey themselves, who may have eroded through the passage of time, and may not fully be who they were. In this way you can capture 4 things- the concepts of druid lore, interesting and varied personalities of the people behind the mistletoe, the degradation of time, and how it affects mortals, and lastly- complex and rich "NPCs" of a sort for your PCs to interact with.

Some of these guardians kept their senses, some have lost some of their humanity (or dwarfity or whatever), and some may have been lost alltogether. The idea is to have them interacting differently with the PCs- some may hinder them, some may try to use them, some may genuinely help them, some might ignore them and so on.

I suggest not too many, up to 4-6 active major spirit druids. More will just get them lost. It's complex enough as it is.

1-2 of these spirits may be the originator of the guardian that you put outside, or it may be something different alltogether. The same one or a different one may be responsible for performing the ritual (Or it may be the surprise, see below), and may be either manipulative, pushy or outright hostile against the PCs. Other spirits may have agendas of their own, such as a druid spirit who is tired of this place and seeks to get free. In short- give them personalities.

How do the PCs interact with them? Either socially, of a sort, or through their concepts and environment (Especially fitting if you use the net of groves idea. Some spirits may be more comfortable/ formidable/ uneasy at certain locations). And of course the normal Adventure stuff- fighting things, overcoming traps and such. I imagine the spirits cannot be fought directly, as they may use some of their (limited!) power to manifest to a degree in a place (A mountai nspirit may create an earth elemental, or get the PCs leg stuck, or get them slowed/ paralized), but their power sources, their links to this realm may be weakened (Perhaps you'd like some sort of a mini- boss fight in the right grove or "chamber")

If the PCs free one of these, you might have an intriguing recurring NPC.

3) The surprise: Most good adventures have an element of surprise in them. Going through caves. groves and such is fine, but the players aren't surprised. (Unless that's the part of the wall paintings you mentioned?) But what if the party learns there is another humanoid in the caves? Someone who has been here recently? And perhaps this person have even lured the two brothers into the caves? Perhaps this person even suggested the PCs explore the caves, and seek to make them the last pieces of the sacrifice? This person may be someone from the village, either a druid, or perhaps someone else who seeks to tap/ use either the pwoer of the guardian spirit/s druids, or the have sought the wall painitings and now seeks to make sure noe one knows of their involvement.

This person may have got to use the powers of one or two of the druid guardians, either tricking them, subjugating them, or perhaps killing them and using their powers in a limited fashion?

Anyway, you got a surprise in the form of a "TRAITOR!" from the village, :smallwink: and the plotgets a bit of an extra twist, and a bit more tension.

I hope this helps, I'd love to hear how it ended up coming about. Good luck!

[Zombimode]

I frequently get stuck with ideas I have for adventures, and it's probably the same for most GMs. So bring whatever you're having trouble with and let's share ideas what could be done about them.

In the next adventure of my campaign, things got started by two brothers exploring a stone circle in the forest and accidentally awakening its guardian who killed one of the two. The other one killed the guardian and dragged the corpse back home, but the guardian reforms every nightfall and wants to get the body back. The death of a person inside the stone circle was regarded as the start of a sacrifice to activate the stones power, and now the guardian will not rest until the sacrifice is completed.
However, the surviving brother does not know that and believes the guardian has followed him back to the village to kill him as well, because the corpse is being prepared for burial in the same house. But the burial preparations have warded the house against spirits, so the guardian keeps circling it every night trying to find a way inside.
My assumption how things will play out:
1. The PCs see the guardian in the village and fight it, but learn that it's futile one way or another.
2. The PCs question the surviving brother and learn about the stone circle.
3. The PCs travel to the circle and enter the underground chambers to find wall painings showing the sacrifice ritual (the village shaman might help them out interpreting the images if the players don't figure it out themselves).
4. The PCs have to get the corpse, as the family isn't too keen about having him sacrificed to an apparently evil spirit.
5. The PCs get the corpse to the stones, perform the last steps, and the land is blessed with good harvest for a year and the guardian goes back to sleep.

Looks good so far. However, I would like to make the exploration of the ancient underground chamber a big event in itself. I could always put some goblins or giant centipides in there, but that doesn't quite strike me as appropriate for the theme of the adventure. I want to highlight the exploration of a sanctuary of ancient druids, but don't have any ideas what the PCs could be finding down there? Any ideas?

Ah, barring an incredible coincidence, this is The Automatic Hound from Dungeon 148 :smallsmile:
I have only recently read through the adventure and found the premise to be quite interesting but the adventure itself rather poorly written. It could very well lead the PCs to scratch their heads not knowing what to do.

One of the main ideas in the original adventure is the confrontation of the established religion & society (represented by the church of St. Cuthbert) with the druidic ways of old. If your setting has something similar, you could build upon this conflict. The ancient chambers could contain more information about the old tradition but also on how life was different back then.

In terms of opposition, you could also build upon this. The straight forward proposition would be to have the party opposed by some "extremists" of the established religions.
Or, for a maybe more interesting turn of events, the modern druidic cults (if the exist) have likewise abolished at least some parts of the ways of old (the living sacrifice part for instance) and try to hinder the PCs to reenact on the past.

[Yora]

I ran that game last friday and it went quite well, I would say. We had two new players and switched to another system, so we started playing rather late.
The changess I made was to remove the local church entirely and store the corpse on the family farm, where the regular funeral preparations protected the house from dangerous spirits. The old descriptions of the ritual were put in an underground chamber below the stone circle.
The creature I changed into a yeth hound, which was more appropriate for my setting and happen to only come from their lairs during night, as well as having the ability to travel very quickly.
One flaw in the original adventure, that someone pointed out, is the lack of any alternative solution if thr PCs don't figure it out or don't want to make the sacrifice. So I added a stone idol to the underground chambers, which holds the spirits true essence and returns it to life every sunset.
Destroying the idol or sealing the chambers would have been possible alternative solutions.
I removed the whole end fight, as that served no purpose for the adventure, and the only other things where some fire beetles in the chamber and an ogre on the road.

I already have an idea for the next adventure. Freeing slaves who dig at the bottom of an abandoned mine should be much easier to make into a good dungeon crawl. Have them sneak through old tunnels to get around guards undetected and stuff.:smallamused:

[Yora]

My next game is coming up in a week and I already have a good outline. However, I am wondering if any of you have some idea to spice things up a bit more. I have a great idea for the story, but some trouble with locations and encounters.

0: A messenger arrives, teling one of the PCs that the hermit under whom he studied has disappeared and his home was found ransacked. There also have been other people disappearing in the area for the past week or so.
1: The party sets out for the hermits home to find clues what's going on.
2: At the hut they see some bandits looting the place for food, tools, and other useful stuff that hasn't been taken yet. The players can follow them as they leave, kill them and follow their trail, or capture one to get the location of their camp.
3: The party arrives at an old gnome mine. They can try to force open the gate at the end of the main shaft, or sneak throgh side passages to reach the rooms where the bandits live.
4: The bandits have 8 gnome slaves who are digging for a treasure that is supposed to be hidden there. The PCs have to defeat the bandits, free the slaves, or whatever else they chose to do, but in the end they learn about a group of raiders from the marshes, who are capturing slaves and sold the gnomes to the bandits for a share of the treasure. Either the gnomes or any captured bandit can tell them about the raiders camp, but there will also be an air genasi who is one of the raiders and will escape from the mine to catch up with the raiders. The PCs should probably be able to take the bandits horses and take as much food as they think they'll need from their stores. They can also get two of the gnomes to come with them and tend to the horses when the PCs need to go ahead on foot.
5. When the party arrives at the camp, the raiders have already left and are heading back to the marshes. With all theit captives and through the marshes, they will be slow and easy to follow, and the PCs might catch up to them before they reach their village. However, if the air genasi has escaped, he will have warned them and there will be traps and ambushes. The leader of the raiders is another genasi, but the rest are marsh barbarians.
(5a. At the edge of the marshes, there is a river and the raiders scrificed one of the captives to the river spirit. If the PCs don't make some kind of scrifice, they can cross the river, but will be attacked when they return later on their way back home.)
6. Before the PCs reach the slave caravan, they'll meet the hermit. He wasn't captured at all, but saw the raiders and has been following them home to return later and get reinforcements for a rescue. The party can attempt to attack the caravan with the hermits help, or continue to track them and see what happens.
7. In the village of the barbarians, a genasi witch and her gang have taken charge, with the chief and his son following her willingly. However, the sons wife wants the genasi gone and is willing to let the PCs take all the slaves if they kill the genasi, probalbly the chief, and possibly her husband.
8. The party returns back home with the freed slaves. They will be slow and need a lot of food for everyone, so depending on how they freed the slaves and the state in which the village was left, they might be pursued. And then there will possibly be the river spirit who demands a sacrifice to let people leave the marshes.

Motivation should not be a problem. One PC is the student of the missing hermit, so he will have to save his master. The fighter has already established himself as being very serious about protecting the commoners of his clan, so he will not think twice to get his people back. And the gnome slaves will be from the same clan as the gnome scout PC, so she will be more than happy to accept the pleas of her kinsfolk to rescue their relatives still with the raiders. Making the players feel that they need to find the raiders and have to follow their train immediately won't be an issue. The players will railroad themselves. Also, there are always multiple options to find a location or get inside a place, so it should feel much more freeform than it actually is.

There are two sections which are still troublesome. Exploring the abandoned mine, and getting the slaves out of the village. The mine could be great fun since it's bronze age technology and made by gnomes, and that means lots of crawling around in single file. The main shaft and the storerooms where the bandits camp are normal size, though. However, if the PCs chose to be sneaky and not batter down the old wooden gate of the section where the bandits have their camp. They need to have exciting things happening in the side passages. One possible route I am considering is a flooded section, which will be used by the diggers to dump the rock and dirt from the excavation one level above. The PCs can climb up the hole in the ceiling and come out behind the guards. It even could be used to sneak out the gnomes without the bandits noticing it.
Do you have any ideas what else the PCs might have tp deal with in an abandoned mine? Kol Korans idea of "something else being down there" would probably work great here as well.
Some more encounters in the marshes would probably also be good.

Another thing I would like to add would be an unexpected and significant turn of events at some point during the adventure. Realizing the raiders are led by air genasi and that the hermit was never captured are unexpected, but it doesn't really change anything or would require the PCs to rethink their current approach.

[Kurgan]

For the mines, maybe the digging has awaken an old earth elemental, or a handful of lesser earth elementals. If the players are sneaky, maybe they can overhear the bandits talking about it, or maybe the bandits just assume that the gnomes are escaping, as I doubt that full grown humans are crawling on hands and knees. "Lost another one in the South Passage. Tell Grigor to go over there and make sure our little helper doesn't get too far." That sort of thing.

For a twist/turn of events? Maybe the slavers are working with people from within the towns they are taking people from? Or maybe they are gathering together the slaves as a tribute to a greater power on the far side of the marsh?

[Kol Korran]

Hmmm, some thoughts:
1) The mines: I like the idea of a flooded section. Though in my experience most players see that as a blocked off option immediately, since they rarely if ever put ranks in swim, and consider an underwater tunnel a danger far too likely to end in death (drowning). It just puts people off. but partially submerged section is something else...

As to what else can be found in the mine? Well, a few ideas:
- ghosts/ remains of the former miners: Why was the mine closed in the first place? Perhaps due to some accidents or some unnatural occurrences. Perhaps some minor undead, or maybe a ghost? A ghost can be negotiated with perhaps, and can lead to an interesting roleplay encounter. You can also put an obstacle that need not be fought, but avoided- perhaps something on the line of 1-2 allips that are tied to a location (that the party needs to pass), that keep babbling and moaning about the circumstances of their deaths. The party may wish to avoid them (quite strong), so they need a distraction, turn undead or something.

- Perhaps the reason the bandits didn't get to the sections the PCs are in is because of blocked passages. The PCs need to find a way to get into the main mine. 2 ideas for that: Either some left over magical mining equipment (I'm thinking animated objects or the automatons of MM2). The party need to find a way to make them work for the party, but also need to keep them in check since the magic is wearing off, and they are not fully reliable. Or perhaps... Xorn! Yep, that earth critter from the end of the first MM. The mine was abandoned once a few of these creatures made it their habitat (perhaps they are considered holy to the gnomes? Or perhaps just really tough pests). Any way, the party may meet some, need to deal with them (An interesting negotiation indeed!) and maybe get their help to dig back to the mine, and perhaps even fight/ distract the bandits)

- If the party is high enough level, and you want to make it a bit more of a horror experience, I'd suggest the gibbering mouther, especially my rendition of it (Check my sig for the compendium). It could be the remains of the former miners or such, and again can either prove like an interesting fight, or an interesting interaction. And it is certainly a VERY good reason why the mine was closed.

- Some none monster challenges: shaky construction- at some points the mine is unstable, and can perhaps collapse (or have a few loose rocks from the ceiling) fall off. Some places can have unbreathable air (especially sunken parts. Great to add for a sudden combat). For flavor, the gnomes might have automated illusions in parts of the maze, like safety announcements and such ("A helmet on your head, keeps you from being dead!") and so on.

2) Twists and turns: If the party know what an air Genasi is, and unless they have a very specific lore in the campaign that makes them such an oddity, then I don't think it will surprise people. Most players would just consider this an odd race, but little else.

Is the slave operation just for slaves, or for something else? Knowing it's (possibly ulterior) purpose could help us here)

I'm not quite sure to the twist, but some possible ideas I'm throwing out there:
- While some people are slaves, quite a few of those who follow aren't, and do not seek to be saved. They come following some sort of a promise, an influential message, a vision or something. Are they brain washed? Is it truly their own will? Who to save? Who not to? What exactly is going on?

- The hermit seems to be cooperating with the slavers! This could be either due to him believing them (If you follow the idea above), or it could be charmed, or perhaps it acts as a spy, trying to infiltrate the Genasi's gang and understand what is going on. He may consider the PCs actions as interruptive, and seek they will depart to allow him to reveal a "greater danger". How you play this is really up to the way the PCs interact with him.

- In the marches the slavers suddenly split- Some lead half the slaves to the village, half to another place to be sold/ sacrificed/ sent off. The party needs to decide who they follow, but that means the other group might be lost...

- The Genasi witch: What is she doing in the village? Just accumulating slaves, or is she in the oldest of D&D fashions using them for some ritual? What sort of a ritual? Awakening some sort of spirit? Turning the slaves into semi- genasi? Something else altogether? Perhaps the genasi was herself once someone else, and whatever drives her turned her as well. Perhaps she was even someone the PCs knew, and cared for? Will they risk killing her (I'm using her just because of the traditional gender for witch. Sorry) or will they try and capture her (far more difficult I'd assume).

- The hermit may be ok, but he may also give hints at belonging to some other group, some kind of watchers over the realm, or other secret sect that play in this game. Or he might show that he is not just a gnome, but possibly something else as well, some sort of a... creature? Can the party trust him?

Other points
3) The marches: My group would try to free the slaves in the marches. They won't likely wait for the village, since that will just be much harder. I suggest to prepare the defenses nicely. This is something players often like to strategize for. If they do catch up to the slavers, I see little chance for them leaving them alone and not freeing them all there and then.

Also, great for marches the stirges from my link. The slavers might have ointments and repellents against them, but I doubt the PCs will.

4) River spirit: Having it interact with the PCs after they dealt with the main threat feels quite anticlimactic. I suggest dealing with it on the way there. Sure, they will not sacrifice, but let them do some other negotiation with it. If the genasi is conjuring up something, that may interest the spirit as well, and may enable the PCs one free pass, IF they manage to persuade her they are up to the task.

On their way back it feels a bit redundant.

Good luck to ya!