First Campaign

[Rapidgator]

So I`ve become our group`s DM its been 8-12 months, and we decided to play D&D 5th edition, and we played the hoard of the dragon queen first chapter, yet I didnt like it very much, and I think that I could write a campaign, my first one, so i want some help, tricks and tips if possible.

I have an idea in mind, which would be a campaign that focused on having the party to protect a NPC which they need to solve a mystery, it would have more puzzles than combat.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umo7rH3K5iM
I heard this song, and it gave me the idea for the campaign to start in some bard meeting or festival to sing and tell tales, and I want to make this song one part of the puzzle. The seeting is eberron

Can you help me?

[Lolzyking]

I have an idea in mind, which would be a campaign that focused on having the party to protect a NPC which they need to solve a mystery, it would have more puzzles than combat.
Can you help me?

Be very careful with these, if you make them to reliant on the npc, it will essentially be dmpc railroading

just because you want the npc to be important, if a player is smart, and has an idea that works for your puzzle, but you want the npc to solve it, don't shoot them down, if they really hate your npc, they will kill him, or find a way to let him die.

A party isn't a single player story with a big need for a 24/7 supporting role character, a party is the entire main cast.

[Ninja_Prawn]

Lolzy is right. It is not wise to hang your campaign on an NPC (unless they're a major villain). The campaign is the players' story and you have to let them have agency within it.

Puzzles are fine, as long as you make sure there are multiple paths through them and at least one obvious answer. Don't let yourself get in a situation where the party cannot proceed with the story unless it passes a specific skill check, either, because they're guaranteed to fail it if you do.

A useful trick: show your party a puzzle they can't solve, then later on, give them the tools to solve it. The next time they encounter he same problem, they'll feel really clever and observant for putting their new abilities to work.

[Lolzyking]

I'm even willing to say your problem Hotdq is that you have no control, or as the dm invested in the story ( I know I was)

When I ran Hotdq, I decided to change up its fundamentals, I decided that Tiamat, along with the dragon masks, 5 sacrifices needed to be made, 5 characters in the world would embody one her heads, and for the ritual they had to die wearing the mask, for this I decided to make one of the pcs a sacrifice (with their permission) I was lucky enough to have a flame genasi draconic sorcerer to use for that.

I found giving hotdq and Rot a personal touch made them more interesting.

[ronlugge]

Puzzles are fine, as long as you make sure there are multiple paths through them and at least one obvious answer.

And speaking from experience, never assume that what you think is obvious others will too.

[MrStabby]

Also don't assume the opposite either.

I once had a social puzzle to solve a theft with a number of people lying and different degrees of evidence against people and the knowledge that at least one could change faces...

I built up just enough evidence (I thought) to make it interesting and engaging. About half way through exploring the problem one of my players declared he had solved it - and indeed he had. There was much more evidence there than was needed - no time was spent speaking to the other NPCs or exploring the other places where people were.

I was kind of short on material prepared at that point as i had thought I had much longer.

[Ninja_Prawn]

I was kind of short on material prepared at that point as i had thought I had much longer.

The lesson for the OP, then, is that you should prepare more material just in case, because puzzles can go on for longer - or be solved sooner - than you might expect.

It's generally better to err towards giving too much evidence and accepting that an observant/intelligent player may solve it before gathering every piece, rather than relying on players to be geniuses all the time.

Also, use red herrings, but do it sparingly. If your players like exploring or finding hidden stuff, include dead-end branches with little rewards (at the end of the day, dungeons and puzzles are both decision trees with nodes and branches).

[MrStabby]

The lesson for the OP, then, is that you should prepare more material just in case, because puzzles can go on for longer - or be solved sooner - than you might expect.

It's generally better to err towards giving too much evidence and accepting that an observant/intelligent player may solve it before gathering every piece, rather than relying on players to be geniuses all the time.

Also, use red herrings, but do it sparingly. If your players like exploring or finding hidden stuff, include dead-end branches with little rewards (at the end of the day, dungeons and puzzles are both decision trees with nodes and branches).

True.

I now have lists of plot hooks, side quests, random events, consequences from previous adventures and thematically fitting random encounters ready to patch any gaps/use if the players do not go down the route I expect.

Actually that seems to be another point. Your players may not go/want to go where you tell them to go. Having as little as possible contingent upon any kind of narrow action is good.

[Eisenheim]

The best place to start building a campaign, IMO, is with a clear idea of the role the PCs have in world: are they town guards, prophesied heroes, soldiers of fortune, etc.?

Once you have a clear idea of what the PCs will be, it's easy to start thinking of the adventures they will reasonably run into. Wait on specifics until you know something about the characters, so that you an fine-tune your plot to have hooks the PCs will care about. Don't make your campaign generic like a module.