Cool Hooks or Rails for "Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil"?

[Mr Beer]

So I'm going to be running Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil soon and there's not really any solid motivation for the party to a) go to Hommlet and b) get engaged in investigating and destroying the Tharizdun cult. While my players are pretty cooperative, I'd like to have them logically interested in getting into the adventure rather than just shrugging and telling them that's the game I've got planned.

What says the Playground?

[Kaptin Keen]

So I'm going to be running Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil soon and there's not really any solid motivation for the party to a) go to Hommlet and b) get engaged in investigating and destroying the Tharizdun cult. While my players are pretty cooperative, I'd like to have them logically interested in getting into the adventure rather than just shrugging and telling them that's the game I've got planned.

What says the Playground?

When my group played the game, the GM was pretty straight forward. There's a little keep outside Hommlet - I don't know if that's actually in the module, or he put it there. He basically sent us there on a quest to retrive some item (I believe it was a holy sword for our paladin), then take over the keep. To secure our new lands, we had to check out this old, ruined temple. Bam.

[tomandtish]

When my group played the game, the GM was pretty straight forward. There's a little keep outside Hommlet - I don't know if that's actually in the module, or he put it there. He basically sent us there on a quest to retrive some item (I believe it was a holy sword for our paladin), then take over the keep. To secure our new lands, we had to check out this old, ruined temple. Bam.

It is there. Rufus and Burne originally built a tower that has since become a keep.

[Composer99]

So I'm going to be running Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil soon and there's not really any solid motivation for the party to a) go to Hommlet and b) get engaged in investigating and destroying the Tharizdun cult. While my players are pretty cooperative, I'd like to have them logically interested in getting into the adventure rather than just shrugging and telling them that's the game I've got planned.

What says the Playground?

Are you starting a brand-new campaign or integrating into an existing one?

If starting a new campaign, you get buy-in, or not, at the metagame level only. If the players agree to that adventure, they come up with characters who have reasons to want to embark upon it.

If fitting into an existing game, do the same thing at the metagame level, but in the in-game level the players help you come up with reasons why their existing characters would want to go to Hommlet etc.

If you want to get buy-in in-game, come up with inducements that you know will appeal to the characters based on their personalities, desires, and goals.

(By "get buy-in", rather than shrugging and telling your players what you have planned, I mean polling them for interest.)

[JNAProductions]

Yeah, I'll echo Composer.

talk to your players, out of character, and get them to figure out why the PCs are invested. Help them, of course, but they should share the burden.