Adventure begins! So how do the PCs know each other?

I am starting a new campaign and I am tossing around a few ideas for how they know each other. There are many schools of thought here, and I'd like to get an idea how YOUR campaigns started.

It's common to make PC related to each other, or part of the same military company or the same village, but often PC backgrounds (of which I let the players to determine 80%) are varied and these common hooks don't work.

Some DMs are of the mind that the PCs, as a party, should come up with their OWN motivations why they are together and require that these reasons be a cohesive enough to prevent a party explosion.

I have read about some DMs that build the starting relationships themselves and require that the players conform for the sake of party unity and fun for all. Then there are those that feel that the PC need not be best friends, but more like co-workers. i.e. they have the same reasons for being together, but they might not hang out on a Saturday night because they have their own individual interests. I see this as becoming more problematic in urban adventures than wilderness ones.

There are players and GMs that feel that it is fun to have tension and disagreement among the party but they share a common goal, despite their personal motivations for this goal.

What are your techniques as players and DMs to ensure fun for all? What are your philosophies about party unity and motivation and how have your parties come together?

It depenjds on the group really. My current campaign they all started out staying in the same haunted Inn and investigating that haunting was the first adventure. They did well with that so the Mayor of the town hired them all as a group to help her with a bigger problem. Over the first 4 session that was those two adventures the group came together and it worked well.

My last Buffy and Star Wars games we spent a session in character creation and during that session I had the player make character that would all know each other. I am also going to do that with my next Changeling game this fall.

My last Modern game had the group all be part of the same government agency. Before characters were made all of them had the, what I thought were simple instructions, of making a character that would be part of this agency. Not everyone was able to do that though.

I tend towards the let the players write their own background (which should include a reason for them to go adventuring) then I work with them on a specific reason they are wherever the campaign will start. I usually like to include a few connections between some of the players so that their is party cohesion but these connections could be as relatives, friends, acquaintances or even enemies. In one case with a married couple we actually had their two characters have a long rivalry as heads of rival adventuring troupes who now having moved on, have met and are instantly suspicious of eachother and refuse to let the other out of their sight.

Heres a few examples from campaigns I played or ran:
All the characters are travelling late in the fall through a mountain town. An early heavy winter storm hits, trapping the characters in the town for the next few months. Winter is very harsh, which brings humanoids down from the surrounding mountains to raid the town. The town lo on food will may not survive the winter without help.

The characters have been captured either for legitimate crimes, prisoners of war, or because their very existence is illegal. (Lawful Evil empire, run by humans, but the military is drawn mostly from goblinoids.) The characters come together in a mining camp where most prisoners end up being worked to death. They experience the tortures of the camp and interact with prisoner NPCs and Guards until they have a chance to escape, but will they take a route deeper into caverns just unearthed in the mine or try to escape to the surface.

The characters are sent by their master, teacher, mentor, or employer to buy a unique item that has just become available at a local curio shop. Upon arrival they notice the shop being robbed by a group of thugs, at least one escapes with the Macguffin and the search insues either the party decides to work together themselves or their respective mentors agree to cooperate.

The characters have come to a small town to investigate a mysterious natural or magical phenomenon when a unique little girl is kidnapped by evil humanoids. The heroes set of to rescue her only to find out that something greater is behind this and find themselves chasing her captors across half the continent before finding and rescuing the next goddess of magic. (You will be shocked to find out this was set in Fearun.)

For my Age of Worms game, I typed up a little background for each character; I didn't write their history, just gave them an idea of how they fit in. Four were natives to Diamond Lake, one was a dwarf exile who had lived their for years, and the other two were outsiders.

In the backgrounds, the dwarf and one other character had been hanging in a bar, and they met a member of an adventuring team that had come to town. They learned that she was there to explore one of the burial cairns, and they had the idea that maybe they could find treasure in another cairn. Between them, I gave them reasons to invite the other characters. If anyone knew any other characters previously, that was up to them. But, they all had a invite to the adventure.

Okay, this is a little long, but it gives an example of how the characters in my campaign come together.

My last campaign was comprised of a barbarian, druid, fighter (player joined the second session), paladin and rogue.

Note: I run a homebrew setting. Druids in the setting are found only among certain barbarians clans where they serve as diplomats and spiritual leaders. Paladins are based in one specific country far to the south of the barbarian lands. Rogues, well they are found nearly everywhere.


Pre-game: I offered the players of the druid and the barbarian a chance to have their characters know each other. Once I filled them in on the recent happenings and some cultural information, the two players decided that the druid and the barbarian were from the same clan and did know each other. The druid was sent by his superiors to negotiate the release of the Jarl's daughter via diplomatic means. The barbarian volunteered to be his bodyguard in hope of gaining prestige within his clan. The two set out together by ship to an island.

Unfortunately, the Paladin was not from the same region. However, the player of the paladin has been in other campaigns of mine and has familiarity with the campaign setting. He decided he wanted his character to be on a mission to find out what happened to some PCs from a previous campaign, who never returned. He wanted one of those PCs to be the older sister of his character. So, I told him that the clerics for whom whose temple his paladin served had visions- the visions involved an island ruled by wizards and that the wizards were somehow involved with his sister's disappearance.

The player of the rogue asked if he could be from the island which would give the characters a guide should the characters team up. I agreed that it was a good idea. I gave the player some information about the island. I then asked him about his rogue's background. He told me about the rogue including how the character hung out at the docks where he lived off the money he stole from foreigners just arriving to the island.

The first session:
The rogue was at the docks looking for some pockets to pick when he spotted the barbarian and druid disembarking a ship. As the druid and barbarian stood out more so than many of the other disembarking passengers, the rogue took them to be easy marks and attemptied to steal the druid's money poutch.

The rogue's attempt would have been successful had he not been spotted by another new arrival- the paladin.

A fight between the barbarian and rogue was about to ensue, but the paladin calmed matters.

Not wanting to waste time witht he rogue, the druid told the barbarian that a battle with the rogue would not bring prestige and was, therefore, a waste of time. However, knowing the paladin was a member of specific relgious order, the druid invited the paladin to accompany them in a search of food and lodging in hope that he could discuss securing the paladin's aid in case diplomacy failed.

Meanwhile, the rogue decided he wanted another crack at the druid's money poutch and, if possible, the paladin's poutch as well. So, he tailed them to the inn using the crowd as cover. Once at the inn, the rogue found a seat and oveheard the druid tell the paladin of his mission to secure the release of the Jarl's daughter.

Having heard rumors that a foreign nobleman was being held nearby and assuming that there would be a hefty reward, the rogue approached the druid, apologized, and offered his services.

Instead of diplomatically securing the release of the Jarl's daughter and unable to turn to local officials (the local wizard's guild that ruled the city were the one's holding her), the group broke in to where she was being held and stole her back.

Unfortunately, the getaway was not clean. In their escape, the party reached the docks with some wizards and guards in pursuit. The party crossed paths with a fighter (a new player). The fighter had just been chased by a press gang. In the poorly lit light of the docks, the fighter mistook a local wizard chasing the party as a member of the press gang so he fired his bow at the wizard-killing him. Two members of the militia saw what happened and mistook the fighter as a member of the party. So, the fighter was now on the run and the party now had a murder rap hanging over their collective head.

The group managed to escape on a departing ship and they banded together more formally. The paladin stayed to ensure that the Jarl's daughter got back safely and, in return, the druid and barbarian agreed to help him find his sister. Meanwhile, The fighter was invited along, because the party assumed that he had willfully come to their aid . The fighter never told them otherwise and decided to join for a chance at adventure and money. And, as for the rogue stayed with the group, because he knew that the wizards would eventually find him if he stayed on the island and come looking for him now that he had left- better to stay with a group that might protect him (and, of course, he needed to collect his reward).

In my current campaign one character (the warlock) is the daughter of a prince. She went on her "Shearing" (a period of 1 year where she went out into the world on her own to survive and show she was a capable and competent individual) and another character was her cousin (fighter on the path to prestige paladin class) who swore to travel with her and protect her from great danger. The third character was her brother's best friend and he promised to travel with her as well to act as companion and consellor on the journey (rouge/swashbuckling type).

During their journey they met a wizard whose master miscast teleport leaving the apprentice abandoned far from home. He travelled with them for safety. Later, when they were thought lost in the Kingdom of Blackmoor (World of Greyhawk) a druid who served the order that the young princess's mother knew well was sent to see if she was still alive after the party's horses were found wandering across the wild.

After surviving a particularly ugly battle with brigands they found the small treasure horde of the villainous band. Within the small cache of wealth was a strange crystal heart. A short time later a beautiful woman suddenly appeared near them. The crystal was a "Gen's Heart" and when the mythic gen is sent away by her master she appears in a mortal form near the object. So now that caracter randomly appears with the group when her evil master tires of her amusements.

And now a year has passed, the princess has returned to her family's lands with her expanded enterouge and a young night (the newest player) has sworn to serve her interests and protect her during the time of trouble ahead (they have made Ivid less than happy with them).

That's the tale of how my party has grown and how they are all linked together.

In a different game I ran that was set in Rel Astra, the characters were hired by a sage to retreive an item for him. Later he hired them again. Then one found a map and knew he could count on "duping" a few others to assist. They came to be known as a mercenary-adventurer band of sorts and even share a houe they purchased in the city with their wealth, still they don't really trust one another and work to one up eachother all the time (but don't dare let someone else screw with one of em).

Another campaign featured three criminals who were part of a larger adventuring group but relieved those who possessed strong moral standards of excess wealth and made off into the sunset. They then formed a small band of brigands and took to having some fun. Eventually the brigand lessers broke from the dark trio and wandered off to find their own wealth, which included a crystal that was actually a "Gen's Heart". The brigands then met a rather competent group of heroes. And well, you know the rest.

Greg K said:

Okay, this is a little long, but it gives an example of how the characters in my campaign come together.

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It sounded like it started out well, though the rogue going back for seconds was a bit dubious, but as a hook to get them all together it seemed to work well. Are there any specific party conflicts brewing?

harmyn said:

After surviving a particularly ugly battle with brigands they found the small treasure horde of the villainous band. Within the small cache of wealth was a strange crystal heart. A short time later a beautiful woman suddenly appeared near them. The crystal was a "Gen's Heart" and when the mythic gen is sent away by her master she appears in a mortal form near the object. So now that caracter randomly appears with the group when her evil master tires of her amusements.

Click to expand...

harmyn said:

Another campaign featured three criminals who were part of a larger adventuring group but relieved those who possessed strong moral standards of excess wealth and made off into the sunset. They then formed a small band of brigands and took to having some fun. Eventually the brigand lessers broke from the dark trio and wandered off to find their own wealth, which included a crystal that was actually a "Gen's Heart". The brigands then met a rather competent group of heroes. And well, you know the rest.

Click to expand...

This is cool. Were the two adventuring parties acutally the same players? Was the adventure designed to have one campaign "end" so to speak?

catsclaw227 said:

It sounded like it started out well, though the rogue going back for seconds was a bit dubious, but as a hook to get them all together it seemed to work well. Are there any specific party conflicts brewing?

Click to expand...

Yeah, there were defintiely conflicts. The characters were suspicious of the rogue for quite a while, but they came to accept him. In addition, there were times when members came into conflict as to whose leaders to deliver important news to first.

As for the rogue going back for seconds, the rogue was initially trying to get information on the characters so that he could steal from wherever they were staying (and as metagame to help try and unite the group). In the player's defense, there were other occurences of the rogue returning at a later date to reattempt failed thievery just to have the character prove that he could do it

catsclaw227 said:

This is cool. Were the two adventuring parties acutally the same players? Was the adventure designed to have one campaign "end" so to speak?

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Yep. Same players. They decided they wanted to play good guys again but the players wanted to get some finality with their villain characters. Since the campaigns all took place in the same world I used the new campaign to wrap up the old campaign. Everyone was very happy with it actually.