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kkortekaas
2007-06-04, 07:28 AM
Greetings Folks,
I'm toying with the idea of starting off my campaign with a flashback, but I'll give you a little bit of background info before I get to what I'm planning.

- I started the PC's off at level 2 so that they could choose EL +1 races if they so desired. As such, they haven't gone through the typical "first meeting" and they have no solid connection to one another.

- I'm starting off the Party out of Cormyr in the Forgotten Realms. As such, they require a license to actually adventure in the country, and I figured to save confusion, they are part of a pre-existing Adventuring Company (This could also explain the experience that they already have, and provide them with name for their group as they are having trouble coming up with one)

Now for the idea.

I thought it would be interesting if I asked the Players to roll for initiative right off the bat, with a Paladin type dude bellowing orders to flee

Now, I'll have to explain that the Paladin dude, is the leader of The Company of the Armored First (or some such non-sense) and that they are members of said group.

Fast forward through mad scramble through a series of dank tunnels with a howling horde of something chasing them, various NPC companions picked off one by one until they arrive at some sort of portal. This is where they (the PC's that is) escape but loose say 3 or 4 NPC party members.

Fast forward a month or two to the actual adventure.

Has anyone ever tried something like this? suggestions? Do you think this would require too much explanation? What if I was to give them a pre-amble where I identify everything? And finally, is this too "Rail-roady"

kkortekaas
2007-06-05, 06:41 AM
Anyone have suggestions?

Galdor Miriel
2007-06-05, 07:01 AM
Greetings Folks,
I'm toying with the idea of starting off my campaign with a flashback, but I'll give you a little bit of background info before I get to what I'm planning.

- I started the PC's off at level 2 so that they could choose EL +1 races if they so desired. As such, they haven't gone through the typical "first meeting" and they have no solid connection to one another.

- I'm starting off the Party out of Cormyr in the Forgotten Realms. As such, they require a license to actually adventure in the country, and I figured to save confusion, they are part of a pre-existing Adventuring Company (This could also explain the experience that they already have, and provide them with name for their group as they are having trouble coming up with one)

Now for the idea.

I thought it would be interesting if I asked the Players to roll for initiative right off the bat, with a Paladin type dude bellowing orders to flee

Now, I'll have to explain that the Paladin dude, is the leader of The Company of the Armored First (or some such non-sense) and that they are members of said group.

Fast forward through mad scramble through a series of dank tunnels with a howling horde of something chasing them, various NPC companions picked off one by one until they arrive at some sort of portal. This is where they (the PC's that is) escape but loose say 3 or 4 NPC party members.

Fast forward a month or two to the actual adventure.

Has anyone ever tried something like this? suggestions? Do you think this would require too much explanation? What if I was to give them a pre-amble where I identify everything? And finally, is this too "Rail-roady"

I think that is absolutely awesome, I love dms who do a good job of story weaving.
One idea though, why not make the first adventure the escape from that point. Have a bunch of whatever after them and see what happens. Then fast forward a couple of months, if they get away. It could be pretty small, like a random encounter then on to the main course.

I take it that this will be part of the story arc for this lucky party.

Enjoy

kkortekaas
2007-06-05, 07:16 AM
I figured I'd do something along the lines of the following:

A group of cocky adventurers bite off a bit more then they can chew, and in their frantic escape, loose a couple members of the party (all NPC's, probably a Paladin, a Wizard and a Barbarian all in a spectacular but quick fashion)

Now I want to get this powered through as quickly as possible, as I really dislike railroading the PC's and this "flashback" really has no other outcome then fleeing.

Should I give them a pre-amble with a quick blurb on all the NPC's and what they were doing at location X?

As for the story arc, This is really just an interesting way to have everyone together without falling back on the whole "you meet in a tavern" thing. It'll be followed up by an adventure occuring about 1 - 2 months after the flashback which will commence the Cormyr: Tearing of the Weave adventure.

I'm toying with the idea of bringing back at least one of the NPC's as an antagonist later in the game, but at this point I'm just thinking it out...

B!shop
2007-06-05, 08:35 AM
You can play a diceless first session for it.
A full narrative session for the escape that let you introduce every single PC.
Encounters without fight, a creepy escape from the tunnels (with some flashy events, blocked ways and similar).

With this you can have this flashback-like introduction without bothering for the PCs levels.

kkortekaas
2007-06-05, 09:08 AM
I'm not sure how much my Players would enjoy being bystandards. At least they could interact with the environments if they play through it...

B!shop
2007-06-05, 09:14 AM
Well, I'm not saying to tell them everything, I was thinking about playing a session without real pratical threats, more a narration session without dice rolls.
Something like some videogames intros (first i remind is the intro to Half Life) where you can move around without armaments or fights or deadly encounters).

The PCs won't know they will not risk too much, and you will not bother with levels, ECLs and similar problems :)

Oeryn
2007-06-05, 09:24 AM
Just a quick thought. You may want to consider a chase through some tunnels, to start it off, rather than a flight. Just in case a couple of the PCs decide they want to see what their new characters can do, and turn to fight. Starting off with an initiative roll doesn't give you time to set the mood, and they may not grasp that they need to run, at first.

It also may help to set up the time in between the flashback and the actual beginning of the game. If they narrowly escaped, there's a decent chance that whatever was chasing them is still looking. If the whatever-it-is can't find them for two months, it's inherently less scary. But if THEY were doing the chasing, and they lose their quarry, and can't pick up the trail, that may motivate them to try pretty hard at the beginning to find the bad guys.

If you're looking to make the first part scary, you could have the thing they're chasing stop every once in a while, and pick off an NPC or two, before running again. It could still be pretty spooky, given the right circumstances.

Anyway, just a thought...

kkortekaas
2007-06-05, 09:50 AM
I did consider it a chase from the begining, an all out route if you will.

Blue Paladin
2007-06-05, 01:05 PM
I dunno about this... Suppose I make a Neutral Good character. Put hours and hours of effort into his background and history. How he was an orphan that was well on the way to a life of crime until this leader-paladin straightened him out. Years of being in the company of these grizzled adventurers, dazzling the young kid with tales of wild escapades. And now that the paladin's in trouble? I would totally try to rescue the guy. And when he gets mad that I'm not following his orders, I reply, "I'd rather die as a rulebreaker than live as a coward." I then throw myself into the path of the oncoming horde to give the party a (slightly better) chance to escape...

How would you respond to a player that does that?

kkortekaas
2007-06-05, 01:36 PM
I'd have to roll with the punches, if the party thought it had a better chance facing the horde, they'd probably get captured and I'd go from there.

shaka gl
2007-06-05, 01:43 PM
As a DM, I really think this is a bad idea. Why?
Your idea is really based on shows like LOST and HEROES, I pressume. In those shows, you have flashbacks and flashforwards going all the time. But the one who sees them is the spectator, not the characters. With what you are doing, you are basically forcing them to METAGAME, as the characters and the spectators are the same thing. Just a thougth.

Valdyr
2007-06-05, 02:21 PM
I would second the notion that this is a bad idea. How would you deal with item creation feats and gear?

The wizard may argue that he spent part of the month between scene one and scene two making scrolls...

Characters may complain that they would have picked up X item between the two time periods or done Y thing. This is especially true if your flash them into the midst of a combat. Someone might claim, with some justification that they would have bought Holy Water if they knew they were going to be going into an undead filled dungeon.

I'm not saying that flashbacks/forwards can't be done, it'll just be problematic. Players rarely like having control of their characters taken away from them.

shaka gl
2007-06-05, 05:47 PM
Players rarely like having control of their characters taken away from them.

Actually, they HATE it.

Call Me Siggy
2007-06-05, 06:02 PM
I dunno about this... Suppose I make a Neutral Good character. Put hours and hours of effort into his background and history. How he was an orphan that was well on the way to a life of crime until this leader-paladin straightened him out. Years of being in the company of these grizzled adventurers, dazzling the young kid with tales of wild escapades. And now that the paladin's in trouble? I would totally try to rescue the guy. And when he gets mad that I'm not following his orders, I reply, "I'd rather die as a rulebreaker than live as a coward." I then throw myself into the path of the oncoming horde to give the party a (slightly better) chance to escape...

How would you respond to a player that does that?

In that case...send the horde at them in waves. When they get beat up, have the leader command the group to run. At the very end, have them run out, and the leader pull some amazing trick that seals off the cave while everyone is already out.

About the items...just go with whatever they have on their character sheets, and we'll assume that parts of whatever they have is what they made/bought.

Ceres
2007-06-05, 06:39 PM
I kinda like the thought, but as many others has noted, you have to be very careful about how you pull it off. Players do hate not being in control, and making a good campaign is a lot different from making a good movie.

I did actually do something similar once, but then the time span between the flashback and the next adventure about ten years. The thought was that the flashback-adventure should be when the adventure-party broke apart. My players are quite competitive, and bicker a lot amongst themselves even when I try my best to stop them, so I didn't have to do much to assure that the party would reach breaking-point. When initially making their characters, they were all supposed to have adventured together for a long time, and everyone had a thorn in the side to almost all other characters, and was quite simply sick of each other after adventuring together for several years.

Basically it was a gamble. I hoped I knew enough about my players to assure that they would act as I had planned without, and I was right. They didn't even make it to the third room in the dungeon before the fellowship ended. If they had somehow managed to settle their differences and keep adventuring together, I was fully prepared to let them keep on adventuring from there, as I am strongly opposed to railroading.

The players didn't know that I had planned for it, and were quite surprised when they found out that I had anticipated the party splitting up. As for why I decided to start the campaign in this way, one of the reasons was of course originality. But for me the most important part was the character-building process. My players are fairly good role-players, but some of them aren't that good at coming up with back stories, so basically I gave them 10 years to add to that. Everyone had to find out what turns their lives had taken over a time span of ten years, and they all had great fun coming up with stories. One had become a bartender, another had become an inquisitor. One had even gotten married and had kids.

The adventure started when the country of the players was invaded by an orc army. As former adventures they all felt obliged to do what they could to fight off the orcs (though they all had their separate reasons), and thus they all met after ten years, and decided to team up again.

This process really created the deepest and most memorable characters I've ever been a DM for, and it was all extremely fun. (Too bad the campaign ended after three sessions, though :P)

Well, my point to all this ranting is that you have to think of what you want to achieve with starting a campaign in this way. What do you gain from it? Are there possible benefits to starting in such a way that you haven't thought about (such as character-building), and what are the major problems you have to solve.

My number one tip is that if you are going to start in such an original way, you have to plan hard, and keep all possibilities open for what will happen if the players don't do as you planned. For whatever you do, don't start a campaign with railroading.

Oh, and good luck! :smallsmile:

Matthew
2007-06-09, 11:03 AM
An easy trick for this sort of thing is to plan a number of possible ways the adventurers can move from point X to point Y. They won't know they have been railroaded and you can still move on with your flashback element. Saying that, it seems that it would be a lot easier to issue the Players with a short story (or somesuch equivalent) detailing these events, discuss them and then proceed from there.