What is your favorite PLOT

[da newt]

I've run into a string of campaigns whose basic plot has failed to draw me in. Mostly they require way too much mashing of the suspension of disbelief button to keep my PC motivated to keep risking their life over and over again with just a few other idiots as allies.

What are your favorite adventures / plots hooks and what makes them worthy of your emotional investment? What motivates your PCs to risk life and limb?

[Lokishade]

I play DnD with my friends, but all they seem to come up with is: Mercenary work.

Once, we were fully fledged knights that got captured by an invading Drow force. We even fought alongside the crown price, but my friend quickly lost focus and ran out of ideas.


I ran a game once. My campaign started in the town the players happened to be at the moment. It got suddenly invaded by demons and then they all died in battle. A Valkyrie witnessed their deaths and revived them as Einherjar. They all knew in advance and agreed on this. This was the premice, the "you meet at an inn" moment.

Under the Valkyrie's wing, they liberated a desecrated temple of Freya. The place then served as HQ. From then on, the goddess noticed evil in the world using the sacred pool as a magical satelite monitor and sent the players on missions to slowly but surely cleanse the world from evil.

At the end of each mission, I gave them two artifacts. One they had to send to Odin to pay respects (if they didn't, the Valkyrie didn't gain levels). The other they could keep and effect massive change in the world. Like a vial of Holy Water so potent it could wipe out any undead or demon and permanently consecrate a square mile. Or a spear made with the fang of Jormundgandr, a poison tip so potent it instakilled anything that wasn't immune to poison. Had they decided to wield it, every natural 1 could have resulted in accidentally scratching an ally, or themselves. They showed restraint and offered it.

Through these missions, I weaved intrigue, which was not necessarily picked up by my players. But that's the beauty of it. They didn't have to amass clues in order to progress further. The clues served to make the world feel alive.

The campaign was ended by a TPK before I could reveal the big twists I had in mind. To get rid of them, their enemies gave them all proper resurections so they could return to their normal lives, in their separate ways. The town where everyone had been killed had long been liberated at this point.

I tried to pick it up from there by making the group reconvene, but the charm was gone, I lost focus and ran out of ideas. It was the unique setup that made this magical and consistent.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Survival, avoiding poverty and death. I like gritty worlds where you're fighting just to stay alive, basically what I liked about Darksun. That'll help keep a group together and focused even if they don't have much else in common.

[JonBeowulf]

The best I've played started out as "figure out why/how the world is hundreds of islands floating in the sky" and ended up being a choice between "fix the world" and "destroy the being responsible". We had a fantastic DM running it and we created mild intra-party conflict because my Vengeance Pally wanted to kill the BBEG and the Celestial Warlock wanted to heal the world. Rest of the group went along with whoever won the most recent debate. It was a seriously epic campaign.

I generally don't do "favorites" because they tend to change over time. I like plots that tell a good story and make the world feel real. Sometimes the princess needs rescuing or the dragon needs slaying. As long as it makes sense in the world and is somehow challenging, I'm good.

[Zhorn]

Beach episodes :smallwink:
they always have the best plot

[Sparky McDibben]

I specifically avoid plotting, but my favorite scenarios to design involve taking something basic and remixing it. So, for example, an orc invasion. Then I'd remix it by changing one thing: the orcs aren't a single clan, but are instead dozens of werewolf packs looking to establish a hunting territory, so they're immune to weaponry. And instead of smashing everything, they carefully eat no more than one in ten humans, always taking from the weak, the sick, or the lame (to make sure there will be humans enough for later). The orcs take care not to damage food sources for the humans, but they actively hunt down any casters (the only people really able to hurt them) and stop all silver production.

How do the PCs handle that? Hell if I know. But it's something memorable, at least.

[Kurt Kurageous]

Beach episodes :smallwink:
they always have the best plot

I don't regularly watch anime and even I know about that. Beach episodes have the best fan service...

I'm pretty sure there is a universal plot list (TVTropes website?) you could peruse and choose.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Plots

[J-H]

Forget TV Tropes. You want The 36 Plots (https://www.rpglibrary.org/articles/storytelling/36plots.php).

For D&D, the most popular are probably:
Deliverance
Vengeance
Conflict with a God

[Kurt Kurageous]

Forget TV Tropes. You want The 36 Plots (https://www.rpglibrary.org/articles/storytelling/36plots.php).

For D&D, the most popular are probably:
Deliverance
Vengeance
Conflict with a God

Oh, I forgot about that one! Thanks for the reminder!

[Catullus64]

One of my absolute favorites is to have the PCs be in the middle of a village, caravan, or small town when a crisis erupts; a crisis too big in scale for the PCs to be able to combat it directly (massive ecological catastrophe, giant rampaging monster, invasion, et al), but instead they are thrust/bribed into a leadership role to shepherd the people in an evacuation, fighting off attacks, scouting the wilderness, resolving disputes and so forth, all the while trying to keep as many people alive as possible.

Yes, I did start running a campaigns or questlines like this just after I played The Banner Saga. Pure coincidence.

[Joe the Rat]

I play DnD with my friends, but all they seem to come up with is: Mercenary work.

Going old school - you are motivated by gold, and then getting more gold because you spent it all on blackjack and hookers three dragon ante and festhalls.