[DM]- How to get party together at beginning of new campaign?

Hello there everyone, I'm kind of new to DM'ing and I'm going to be starting a new campaign shortly. The group is already established, we've had other DM's run a few different games that we've played in, but now I'm going to take my turn at DM'ing.

I want a more emphasis on roleplaying in my campaign, compared to just hack and slash. I want players to immerse themselves into their character and actually breathe life into them! I'm going to give these characters and extra 4 skill points at first lvl to be spent on "craft" or "profession" types of skills. I'm going to make these characters keep track of encumbrence of their character, and make them eat food and drink water every day. They'll need to hunt for new food, or pick it off of a branch, and they'll need to cook their food.

So far, what I'm thinking of, is having them start in a small town, say, that is well known for producing some of the best cheese around. I've also thought that we can start just after the ending of a small faire that happened in said town, and that gives them a bit of why they went to this town (they went to the faire). Beyond that, I'm not entirely sure of how to get these 5 different people "together"..?

I don't entirely have a "story-line" planned, when I said I'd run a game I kind of just invisioned multiple little quests/jobs that they could run. Say, deliver this to this person that lives in a secluded area, bandits are being problematic over in this area, I went to visit my families grave sight and the undead where up and walking about, etc.. etc.. Is that a problem that I don't have a real story planned? Any suggestions?

Also, as a side note that doesn't really need to be answered, I saw in another thread where someone had mentioned about having the PC's be settlers and starting up a new town.. I'd like to incorporate that somehow as well, but I'd like it to be close to this current town, but I'm not really sure how to do that. I dunno, I just kind of thought it would be fun to have the PC's be apart of building a new town and getting to govern some or all of it's choices.

So, if you could help in any way, I'd greatly appreciate it! I think of myself as "kind of" creative, but would love to hear others' ideas!

~Wonka

THe is only one inn in town. and there is only one room available at the inn. the common room.

do they trust each other enough to sleep together?

the only way for them to know is to interact and roleplay the tension and bond building.

then have something stolen. and see who gets blamed.

All fairs have games of dexterity and strength.

Have your players compete against each other and townspeople NPCs in some games.

Archery - Each gets competitor gets 3 arrows. Come up with DCs to hit closer to the bullseye.

Foot races.

Boulder Throw.

Tight Rope walking.

Lifting.

Horsemanship.

Pie eating contests.

Since your characters are heroes in the making and have stats usually much better than the average commoner NPC, they should naturally rise to the top of the games. Feeds right into a hook for the next adventure. The winners of the games have that 'right stuff' to handle a 'special task'.

Getting the characters together is always a bit contrived. With my group, we've done the "important person is recruiting a batch of heroes/agents" a few too many times, but it does work.

A good way to do it is have them all in one place for whatever reason, and they are the only witnesses of a terrible crime. Optionally, the authorities could arrive and assume the characters are behind it all. They have to band together to get away from the cops and prove their innocence.

Once they're together, they generally stay together. The players do want to play D&D together, after all.

If all else fails, you could go for the tried-and-true D&D cliche of getting a party together: Have them all meet in a tavern!

I just told the players they had to know at least two other characters. How , when etc was up to them. They all built backgrounds around that to some extent. Some were just as simple as "I met him during the war since he was a messenger and I a scout we crossed paths." It worked well and felt less forced or contrived since it up to them They just ran into each other after the war.

if you are running a small town don't neccessarily have them together the first session you can build story and background over several sessions as individuals before they are drawn into being a group gives each of them a deeper more realistic interest in the story.

Later

Or they could all be the victims of a crime.

For info on starting a town, check out A Magical Medieval Society: Western Europe by Expeditious Retreat Press.

Once I told the party that they were all the sons and daughters of a retired adventuring party.

Another time I told them they were childhood friends.

In the end, does it really matter? It's contrived any way you do it.

Feeding off of the last post, you can have some sort of figure (I was going to say "authority figure," but that doesn't have to be the case) present each of them with some sort of notice. (I'm being deliberately vague.) In a current campaign I'm in, all the PC's received letters saying "Come help" and we all did, because we all had reasons to want to go. That's a good way to set it up for your campaign, anyway, because then they have a contact who gets them these gigs. Of course, if you have people who wouldn't take you up on the offer, you have to make some other reason for them to show up.

Just make sure you have some that last longer than a few sessions, otherwise it will feel like you're throwing together one-session encounters, which isn't as much fun as it might seem.

DM Toad,

That's a great idea! And, it's actually kind of like the one that I used in my first ever campaign.. although that one was a sort of fish-festival.. hehe. I REALLY want to avoid the "you're all in a tavern when..." sort of thing.

I could run with what I had previously said about the cheese festival, and just sort of back it up a bit, so that they are there for the Faire itself and have the games available for them to compete in!

As per how I could run it, the Archery one is easy enough, as well as tight-rope walking (balance skill). How would you suggest to do the others? A few strength checks for the boulder pick up and throw? How would you do the "foot races"..? What do you mean by "horsemanship"..? Pie eating contest..? no idea how to run that one in game mechanic terms! hehe.

Here's the kind of characters that the group has come up with so far:

Human Barbarian
Elven Sorcerer
Half-Elven Monk
(undetermined) Rogue
(undetermined) (undetermined) - but, I know this player, it will more then likely be a Fighter

(they don't have a cleric, and that's fine really. As this is more based on roleplaying, they can make friends with an npc cleric and ask him/her to join the party.. and that gives me a personality to roleplay with them )