Campaign Ideas and Critique?

[Eremis77]

Hello everyone. I'm a new user here, and a new D&D 4th Edition DM as well, with one session run. The last time I DMed was about 15 years ago in a West End Games Star Wars campaign. Since then I've stuck mostly to the PC or video game RPGs due to a lack of a stable group.

Though I'm still inexperienced as a DM, I think I've at least learned better techniques over the years from osmosis. (For example, though the Death Star destruction was awesome, having it happen in the game with the PCs just observing does not make a fun game session.)

I'm hoping for some feedback, advice, or plain criticism for my new campaign ideas. I just read most of the DMG 2, and like the ideas on creating the main storyline for the campaign ahead of time.

In my setting, the players are exploring a "new" continent, similar to colonists in historical USA. They learn that it's not really "new", but the previous civilization there is long gone. (Bael Turath and the tieflings.) Now humans, dwarves and Eladrin are the main races colonizing the area from the Old World.

The party started out as employees of a caravan company, escorting several wagons to a new town. I thought this would be a good way to get them all together at the start, but didn't want to force them to just act as guards for the whole campaign, so once they finish this delivery (which will happen at the start of session 2), their boss told them there's no more work for a while, unless they can find new trade contracts.

Next session, I was thinking of including a "dream sequence", where the party experiences a vision of a huge battle against overwhelming odds, and eventually loses before waking. The dream will include story hooks in the form of banners with organization emblems of future enemies, including the Iron Circle to lead them to the Reavers of Harkenwold adventure, as well as a couple others for later. The big problem I have is how to implement this idea without it being just a boring speech by me. Does anyone have any suggestions on this part?

Thanks!
Eremis

 

[lostingeneral]

If you're sticking with the dream sequence idea, then why not make it interactive?

You could make it an actual battle where the players actually fight the dream enemies to involve them a little more, and then introduce the individual groups sort of one by one as "waves" in this impossible battle so that one large speech is broken up into small chunks whenever a new group arrives.

 

[Chzbro]

Welcome!

My suggestion would be to ration out some of those clues and hooks rather than deliver them all in one big chunk. The nice thing about your dream is that many of the clues are emblems and symbols that you can describe during the combats rather than just before. The enemies will undoubtedly be wearing sigils proclaiming their affiliations that you can describe while the fight is happening. Some might even use weapons or attacks that are somehow flavored toward the organization they serve. I tend to think hooks like that would really stick.

The dream is also a good way to introduce a villain you intend to bring back later. My group tends to really love working up a righteous hate for a bad guy who has wronged them.

Do you, as a DM, have a destination in mind? In other words, do you know what the over-plot is? You don't necessarily have to have one, but having an idea about the story you'd ultimately like to tell really helps for seeding clues along the way.

 

[Eremis77]

Thanks for the advice! I like the idea of having them fight in the dream, I just wasn't sure how I might accomplish that.

I have a general idea for the campaign, but I'm trying to nail down the "general specifics" of the three tiers. First, a couple more dream details:

The dream is somewhat prophetic, showing a future battle that needs to be avoided. Among the emblems glimpsed in the dream, only one will be immediately recognized (related to a clue left by an assassin in one player's background), one will be explained soon (the Iron Circle), and one will be a major plot point later (the emblem of a Dragonborn kingdom that appears good, but ends up trying to conquer the New World - their new banner will be revealed later with this symbol on it). I'm also toying with the idea of the Standard of Eternal Battle being in the dream...the players see it in the hands of an enemy, and have to take it from him before the big battle takes place.

Basically, my campaign outline so far is this: Heroic tier, the players defend the frontier of the New World from attacks by various bandits, mercenaries and monsters. Along the way they may make alliances with several other races, including dragonborn and orcs. The heroic tier ends with the large battle from the dream. The dragonborn are a big ally in the battle, but shortly afterward, announce that the New World is theirs. Paragon tier is spent fighting the Dragonborn Empire, including traveling to different planes. I haven't decided on Epic tier yet, but figure I have time, since our group only meets once a month so far.

 

[Saracenus]

My advice on the "dream sequence" is to play it out. It's the future so it's not going to mess up a time line like a trip into the past.

How? A couple of ideas.

1. Run it like a one shot with pre-gen PCs. Make them early late heroic or very early paragon characters and the contract a series of escalating encounters above their place in the tier. This would be tough for a new EM, because higher level play is different than low heroic (lvls 1-4).

2. Run a Dread session with the jenga tower as a one off game (dread is perfect for mystery and survival horror scenarios). This would be a very tense character driven story and give your players a lot of control over how they" fail". Ultimately they hit point of failure, that's the whole point. It's what they do up until then that defines them.

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using Tapatalk

 

[Chzbro]

The dream is somewhat prophetic, showing a future battle that needs to be avoided.

In that case, you should probably have the dream feature a fight or event that effectively kills the PCs. You want them to know after the dream that it's a fight they have to avoid because it's one they can't win rather than have them thinking, "if we were more powerful or did x differently, we would own that fight."

You could invite the players to roll up higher level versions of their characters for the dream sequence...

So here's another question: why do they have to avoid the fight? Is it just that it's too tough for them, are they needed elsewhere, or is it the epicenter of some catastrophic event that destroys everything around it?

Just a thought--you mention that the dragonborn go from being allies to antagonists after this point in the future. Perhaps there is some catastrophic event that this dream foretells, and this event is what inspires the shift in the philosophy of the dragonborn. Maybe other "allies" betray the dragonborn here with some sort of arcane conflagration in an attempt to stunt the growth of their empire (or something), a plan which backfires in that it instead turns them into a powerful new enemy...

 

[Eremis77]

Cool stuff! I think I'll go for level 9 versions of the party for the dream sequence. I'm going to do the level-up myself, as it's a "possible future" dream. (They won't mind...two of the five picked premade characters, and the other two had me create theirs in the Character Builder for them to approve. I'm the only one in the group who's played D&D in the past 10 years.)

The battle is going to come eventually, so what the players need to do is weaken enough of the enemies prior to it and stengthen their allies in order for their side to win. Stop bandits from stealing supplies, convince neutral factions to choose the right side, equip and train allies, and flat out kill some of the enemy faction heads.

I like the idea of the battle itself or something near it changing the dragonborn's outlook. I'm thinking something along the lines of them being convinced (or tricked) into taking over for "the greater good", but the source of their (mis)information is either demons, evil dragons, or both.

 

[Saracenus]

I like the idea of the battle itself or something near it changing the dragonborn's outlook. I'm thinking something along the lines of them being convinced (or tricked) into taking over for "the greater good", but the source of their (mis)information is either demons, evil dragons, or both.

Or if you are an evil bastard DM, you could have two competing issues, X on one side and the Dragonborn on the other. This would have happened before the fight that determines what side the Dragonborn are on. It should be an ethical/moral choice.

Since Dragonborn are so honor bound, it could be that the character's swore an oath to some folk of import among the Dragonborn and the choice they make for X breaks that oath enraging all the Dragonborn.

The stakes for X should be high so the choice has some meaning.