What Makes a good ending to a campaign?

Well first of all, how much time do you have ?

If it's as much as you can, then think about your favourite TV series that actually had a story arc (like B5). What makes it great is for the story arc to be resoved.

Obviously, save the city/realm/world scenarios are kind of hard to pull in Planescape, but hey, if you ran dead gods to the end then wouldn't your players feel proud ?

You need to end on a high note. They have to achieve something important not just for them.

Sammael99 said:

Well first of all, how much time do you have ?

If it's as much as you can, then think about your favourite TV series that actually had a story arc (like B5). What makes it great is for the story arc to be resoved.

Obviously, save the city/realm/world scenarios are kind of hard to pull in Planescape, but hey, if you ran dead gods to the end then wouldn't your players feel proud ?

You need to end on a high note. They have to achieve something important not just for them.

Click to expand...

I've got about 9 or 10 weeks. I've got a few arcs that will come to a head. I'm not sure what I'm looking for. I just want something that will be memorable and give them a sense of finish.

guedo79 said:

So here's the question: What campaign endings have to been a part of that was memorable? What made it special? Was it combat or just roleplaying?

Was it done softly with lots of description and follow up or did it just end?

Click to expand...

I played a character from 1-20 in AL Qa *FRICKEN* Dim.

The last two adventures were a great way to end the campeign-

First- the pc was captured and held on trial by some evil minor Caliph for war crimes. The Grand Caliph had ordered if the pc could pay restitutions for the damage done during that time, then he should be let free. So- while he was held in some gallows, npc's from throughout the campeign came to offer money to help get him free.

It was a totally rp adventure- with a look back at past adventures and see the impact the pc had on the world.

Second and final adventure- the pc was finally reuniting with his one true love (and first wife), but she had been cursed recently to be destroyed along with any man she kissed.

The pc's genie double(a cursed outcast genie forced to live a mortal life as a clone of someone else) kidnapped her and brought her to a volcano on the verge of erupting.

The fought on a rock bridge over the lava- the pc was getting his butt handed to him until his true love helped him knock the villian into the lava (you have to love a folding boat).

The volcano began to erupt and there was no time to escape. As the lava began to rise around them- they kissed.

Fate (an intelligent force in Al Qa *FRICKEN* Dim) twisted the nature of the curse so their souls became intermingled. They spent the rest of eternity together- something life did not allow.


So- what makes an ending special?

If you can do something that ties a lot of the campeign together, then that is a good start.

Giving the pc's what they want is also nice. I regularly ask pc's how they envision the end of their characters (death or retirement)- I then try to make that come true when dramatically appropriate.

SD

I just ended my first 3e campaign.

Some of the players were grumpy for a week about it and how it came to be, but now, they either accept it and are getting into their new characters or plainly love the ending.

I'll try to make it short. TPK, almost.
Here is the "a bit less short" version.

It was the end of an apocalyptic scenario, where an Evil (30 HD) Balor seeking revenge tried to destroy Everything, by killing the Goddess-Planet of Nature-Cycle of life. One gate remained, from where he gathered an army of Tanar'ri (PC's had destroyed every other gate on the continent). The PC's, knowing this, gathered their own army of proud warriors. And a climactic apocalyptic battle ensued. Everyone but the wizard, who got trapped on an other plane, got either their head chopped or were plainly killed by the Balor.

But after every one got killed, it was time for revelation and lessons.
1. Never, EVER make a deal with a 30 HD Balor to doom the planet and everyone on it to get something in exchange
2. Never try to double-cross the Balor you made a deal with
3. Dispel. As often as you can.
4. Stay close together when you know of a teleporting 30 HD Balor roaming the battlefield
5. Share. Help each other out and share everything you know with the others, in order to see the "big picture"
6. Never free a Balor from imprisonment when you have a hint it will seek revenge
7. Be very scared when the freed Balor doesn't slay you then and there.

So the PC's have failed. They doomed the world. But now we're starting a new campaign 170 years ahead in time, and the players do not fully understand how and why there still is a planet. And their original PC's are either seen with disgust, cursed, blamed for the current state of things or labelled as incompetent fools... It'll be a lot of fun!

Re: Re: What Makes a good ending to a campaign?

Sagan Darkside said:

I played a character from 1-20 in AL Qa *FRICKEN* Dim.

The last two adventures were a great way to end the campeign-

First- the pc was captured and held on trial by some evil minor Caliph for war crimes. The Grand Caliph had ordered if the pc could pay restitutions for the damage done during that time, then he should be let free. So- while he was held in some gallows, npc's from throughout the campeign came to offer money to help get him free.

It was a totally rp adventure- with a look back at past adventures and see the impact the pc had on the world.

SD

Click to expand...

"It's a Wonderful Life"!

Cool wrap-up, kind of like a penultimate flashback show just before the big finale.

My old campaign ended something like this:

Tharizdun (GH) had woken up and was getting ready to eat nature. The pcs had assembled an artifact that gave them absolute mastery over life, death, space, time, matter and energy, and it wasn't enough to stop Tharizdun's Angels of the Apocalypse.

They tried to wake Nature up so she could defend herself, using the Locus (the cube that they'd assembled). Unfortunately, when they tried I told them to roll percentile dice and said, "You want to roll low."

98.

A secondary roll followed.

99.

They destroyed several planes, including their own, but they failed. Tharizdun ate the multiverse.

Of course, that later led to my current campaign world, and crazy crazy things happening.

Hey guedo,

The story arcs you have running - what's the longest or most involved one?

Take that arc, make it into something really huge, and then allow the PCs to wrap up that arc (hopefully using the method of the "showdown" with the bad guys). Then, give the rewards for that story arc and make sure the rewards are huge and life altering (maybe having PCs get lands, power, etc that make them more likely to NOT adventure, and instead become important NPCs in your world).

The idea is to make the PC's permanant fixtures in your world, and use them (or more appropriately the things they accomplished) as the basis for future characters (making them descendents or aware of the former PCs exploits).

Resolving the main conflict of the campaign.

Sub-plots aren't as important. It's always nice to be able to picture the PCs doing other things. But they know they've already done the big stuff.

I have made one successful and one failed attempt to end a campaign. The successful one ended with the players returning home from saving the world and was allowed to install their characters as NPCs in the world. They set them up as master weapon-trainers, laboratory wizards and such.

The failed attempt was planned to end in the same manner. Though I made the mistake of telling the players before hand that the campaign was about to end. "There is only this one mission left for you to take care of." One of the players (and perhaps the rest agreed) thought it would be pointless to continue developing the character if we were going to end anyway. I didn't think so but we never did get to finish up.

Run the 2E adventure The Apocalypse Stone. That adventure is meant to be the end of a campaign (admittedly, the end of a 2E campaign to usher in 3E, but its all good).

That one has a lot of ideas for endings...most of them downers. You fail and the world is destroyed...you succeed, and its panic and civil disorder everywhere...you fail but escape, and get cursed by the gods...gotta love it.

An ending that isn't all happy-happy can be very memorable, only partly because no one expects it. It doesn't have to be a TPK either, hence why I advocate The Apocalypse Stone as being the adventure of choice for ending a campaign.