101 Places to Start a Campaign

[BootStrapTommy]

Other than a tavern. You know, for science.

1. At a mentor's funeral.
2. On a ship.
3. At a gathering of clerics.

And so on...

[Oberon Kenobi]

4. In the gallows, about to be hanged.
5. At a wedding.
6. Hell.

[Draconium]

7. In a ruined city.
8. On the moon.

[Vercingex]

9. In the middle of nowhere.
10. Within a demiplane
11. In a menagerie.

[TheThan]

12. in the queen’s bedchamber
13. in the back of a wagon.
14. the abyss (since someone already got hell)
15. Dead
16. tied up after being attacked by goblins on the road (did this)
17. lost in the woods (did this)
18. in a pillory
19. In a bar maiden’s bead chamber (did this).
20. passed out drunk in an alley

[gadren]

I chose to start one campaign by sending the following out to the players:

Spoiler

Show

How this game starts depends on how the group answers the following 5 questions. The whole group must agree on the answers, instead of them being individual:

At the start of the first adventure, your group is hiding from something.
1. What are you hiding from?
2. Why are you hiding from it?
3. Where are you hiding?
4. How are you hiding?
5. Who else is hiding with you?

Think about possible answers for these. Hopefully you can all come to a consensus. Try not to constrain yourselves in your thinking: for example, your first instinct may be to think you are hiding from sort of monster, but you could also be hiding from a storm, an organization, your fans, your responsibilities, etc.

[Draconium]

21. In the middle of a haunted swamp.
22. In a dragon's lair, with the dragon's dead hatchlings surrounding you, and most of the hoard missing.
23. Atlantis.
24. The top of the world's tallest mountain.
25. On an iceberg, watching a ship sinking nearby.

[dream]

26. Wilderness outside the city: hunters and the hunter.

[Knaight]

27. On a sinking ship.
28. On a battlefield, behind an earthen mound used for cover being slowly eroded by enemy artillery.
29. In an airlock, and about to be vented.
30. In an airlock, just found with your suit oxygen running dangerously low.
31. In a throne room with a corpse on the throne - and you're the suspects.
32. In prison.

[Ryu_Bonkosi]

32. In prison.

I'm surprised it took that long to be mentioned.

33. On a train.
34. At a festival.
35. At a play.
36. At a crossroads heading into a town.
37. In the local Guild Hall.

[Eldan]

38. In Media Res (it's a city in one of my campaigns).

[CWater]

39. At the murder scene
40. In a desert
41. In a dream

[Lurkmoar]

42. New Year's Day celebration.

[DigoDragon]

43. Reporting for you first day on the job at 935 Pennsylvania Avenue NW.
44. On the beach of an uncharted island, the site of an Airbus A380 crash.
45. Awaking in a plastic prison on board a spacecraft bound for an intergalactic zoo.
46. At the 'Pearly Gates' where you are informed there has been a mixup in your paperwork.

[Yora]

47. At home.

[Tiktik Ironclaw]

48. Within the dragon's maw.
49. Somewhere...
50. The local cheesemaker's shop.
51. Dangling from a cliff.
52. In a blazing inferno.
53. Within cyberspace.
54. Your mother's basement.

[The Insanity]

55. A few miles in the air.

[Talyn]

56. In the wagon of a traveling show, about to pull into a new town.
57. Sitting around the fire in the mayor's house, listening to the storm rage outside.
58. At the gates of an abandoned castle, clutching your strange invitation.
59. On the crumbling barricades, as the nigh-endless armies of the living dead surge forward again.
60. At a poetry reading in your local coffee shop.

[Draconium]

61. Playing tennis with the BBEG.
62. At a mansion party, where everyone who isn't a party member is a vampire.
63. The center of a labyrinth.
64. Running from a herd of angry wildebeest.
65. Stuck on a giant piece of flypaper.

[Thisguy_]

66. Dangling above a pit of acid, up-side down.
67. In a mercenary camp whose cover is that they're a small village.
68. Frozen in a block of ice.
69. In bed with a hangover and a dwarf you don't recognize.
70. On the Internet, in a chat room or forum.

[Razanir]

38. In Media Res (it's a city in one of my campaigns).

71. In media res

[BootStrapTommy]

Media resolution is best resolution.

72. At the academy you just joined
73. Under the sea
74. In some dude's basement
75. In a chaotic plane where nothing makes sense

[chrisstpeter]

76) Inside someone else's body
77) Inside a bank vault, at night
78) As a statue in a beholder's lair (still aware)

[Lord Raziere]

79. Over the corpse of a god
80. In a spaceship perched on a meteor heading towards Earth
81. In the middle of the Last Castle, Of The Last City, of The Last Empire, Of The Last World Orbiting the Last Sun
82. On a platform on the top of a tower overlooking the world
83. At an important political place just after it exploded.
84. On The ceiling of the Tardis
85. In a damaged spaceship going at FTL speeds, that is about to crash.

[Milo v3]

86. In a Drop-Pod shot at a planet from space.

[Hbgplayer]

87. Encased in ice in the Wampa's cave.

4. In the gallows, about to be hanged.
5. At a wedding.
6. Hell.

Those are all the starts from the first three Pirates of the Caribbean, right?

[Oberon Kenobi]

Those are all the starts from the first three Pirates of the Caribbean, right?

*blinks*


Well I'll be damned. They are!

[Kami2awa]

87. Heaven.
88. In front of the Fourth Wall.
89. In the capsule of Apollo 11, just before launch.
90. On the Titanic.
91. After having just bailed out of an aeroplane.
92. At the end - the campaign is figuring out how you got there.
93. At the blast of Gabriel's trumpet.

[VoxRationis]

71. In media res

Technically, it's in medias res; res is accusative plural and media has to agree with it.
Anyway:
94. In a dying city, preparing to emigrate over a dangerous road.
95. In one's deathbed, having been awakened from an eternal slumber.

[Lakaz]

96: At a three-way air vent junction in the town hall.
97: In an abandoned lab, with amnesia, with their hands on the 'self destruct' button.

98: In the ruins of a recently-exploded set for the play 'a midsummer night's dream'
99: In a castle which is in the process of rapidly sinking into a swamp.

100: Breaking into the prison of a town you are mayor of
101: Being held hostage by the town guards.

All ones i've really ran, except 97 which i planned and never ran (But hope to eventually). Every pair of two were the same campaign (Seems i only get two really interesting openings per campaign apparently XD)
Sorry for taking the prestigious 101 spot by the way, guess we'll need to change the title to accomodate future posters XD