Campaign's End: Advice!

[Vrylakos]

Ok... so, my 3 year campaign is coming to an end.

Big epic ending.

In short, the half-celestial 1/Cleric 13 leader has been ordered by his god to take the obsidian needle, an artifact akin to the ultimate nullifier or the You're Dead card, to the top of a mountain formerly inhabited by a council of dragons for unknown reasons.

The reason: the Beneath, the primordial hungry darkness that exists beneath the floating islands of my campaign, is about to rise up and consume life, memories, islands, hope in random amounts, sending the world into a figurative and literal Dark Age.

Only the heart of the Creator God turned it back the first time.
This time, though the cleric knows it not, he has to slay his goddess, the goddess of healing and plants. Finally he'll understand why she cast him out of her worship!

The Forces of Evil have prophecied that something will appear atop that mountain to stop them from achieving dominion. They don't know it will be the incarnation-point for Avasha, the goddess. So, the forces of Evil have entrenched themselves around this mountain in the wilderness of a good kingdom. They have an army there, and more arriving.

The party will need to summon all the goodwill they've gathered in their 3 years of adventuring to bolster the troops of the local king.

I'm planning on using Fields of Blood for the battles, and then cutting to the interior of the mountain where the groups BIG Nemesis, the now half-fiend doppleganger cleric Hazriel will be ready to dropkick their behinds. Also, a marilith will feature because... because I want them to fight a marilith. Is that so wrong? (ok, there's better reasons than that though I'm torn between retrofitting the marilith to be an aberration and thus a handmaiden of the Goddess of Trickery, Secrets and Aberrations - who is pictured in statues and such as very much like a marilith in appearance -think the Brom painting 'Inferno'.)

So, Cleric guy has found his father, who was an ascended celestial servant of the god of war/protection, and thus found closure for his story arc. His only other closure is the party-wide desire to kill Hazriel.

Adamante, the fencer/assassin/fighter who stabs people to death and is cursed with a fiendish protecter in his veins that saves him whenever he falls unconscious - he's the heir to a devil-plagued city. As long as the devils protect the human royalty of the city, the devils get to live in the city. A sort of scorched earth agreement to prevent the victory of the city's rivals. Ideally he'd get closure on his plotline - Hazriel the doppleganger stole a portion of Adamante's blood, and has managed to contact the devils using it to imbue him with devil-essence to make him a half-fiend. Possibly if Hazriel hurts Adamante, the original contract will be void due to the devils technically hurting the man they were sworn to defend, thus freeing the city? Sound plausible? Or cheesy? Still, Adamante will have to figure this out, or get some big hints.

Other players are a bit more problematic. Like closure for the bard and the psychic warrior.

(ack! back in a bit to continue!)

Vrylakos

 

[ironmani]

Want an ending they wont expect? Have them lose. Seriously. Whole cities laid to waste, hero falling in battle, death of gods, the works. Then you could use something akin to the Midnight setting where a new group of heroes have to restore the balance if you were going to start another campaign. At least that would be my take....

 

[Grapeshot]

Want an ending they wont expect? Have them lose. Seriously. Whole cities laid to waste, hero falling in battle, death of gods, the works. Then you could use something akin to the Midnight setting where a new group of heroes have to restore the balance if you were going to start another campaign. At least that would be my take....

That doesn't sound like an ending to a three_year campaign.

Here are my suggestions. Think EPIC. I mean larger than any epic ending to any movie that you have ever seen. Use music (tapes/cd's) use props and handouts. Make it big.

 

[Vrylakos]

Want an ending they wont expect? Have them lose. Seriously. Whole cities laid to waste, hero falling in battle, death of gods, the works. Then you could use something akin to the Midnight setting where a new group of heroes have to restore the balance if you were going to start another campaign. At least that would be my take....

While I'm all for kicking the table out normally, they sort of already did this in the 'mid season break' adventure, wherein they totally failed to liberate their hometown from vampires, who in turn chased them in their skyship and destroyed the engine, thus sending them plummeting down down down...

Months later, when we finally got up the nerve to redeem the party's lame liberation attempt, we picked up with them enslaved to a barely-known race, and not sure how they got their. The slave adventures we fun, but I don't want to make thing TOO grim at the end.

Thanks for the tip, though. There are enough adventures they lost that they will make good fodder for game when I return to the setting.

Vrylakos

 

[Vrylakos]

So, music... I use music a lot already. I'll probably load up Cinema Choral Classics II: Apocalypse for this one. Oh yes.

Props and handouts... Hm, gotta think on those.

I once asked them what their ideal death for their character would be.

The Psychic Warrior expressed interest in being killed in a fight, as he's sort of a tragic figure. So, should I kill him in the epic end? Hm, and it should be for a point. Not sure what to do with those two thoughts, though.

Vrylakos

 

[iwatt]

For the Psychic Warrior, there's always the death holding off enemies while his companions seal a portal to hell. If you gotta go make it count I always say

 

[Kugar]

Well you want to tie things together in a BIG way. Maybe the Psychic Warrior and Bard need to be there. If the forces of good's plan includes offering up a god, they may need people to help clean up some of the messiness. I could see a huge psyichic backlash and the warrior needing to weather the power of a dying god so that others are spared. Perhps this onslaught manafests as a huge chaotic fight in the warrior's mind or on the astral plane. Even if he survives, he still would be changed. Or, maybe the gathered forces will need a leader, someone to lead the charge up the mountain before the cut scene. A glorious battle where he has to face off against a evil creature/general cutting swathes across the battlefield alone while everone else goes on. The nifty "running 2 battles at once" dynamic can work well here. Was it a sacrifice or will he reunite with everyone at the end?

Ack read druid instead of bard - the following was never really written, move along.
Similarly, what happens when the divine manafestation of healing and plants disappear. Maybe the goddess needs a vessle to channel some of her power to and the ex-cleric is to buisy killing her to take the mantle. For a short period the druid would be totally vested with divinity and still know it was only a portion of what the goddess sacrificed. Or maybe the plant life starts decaying and the druid has to decide between battling and channeling life energy from his god to couter the expanding decay. All said and done when the divinity is striped from his form, how will the druid react. What would it be like beign the personal manifistation of the druidic ideal.

 

[Guillaume]

For the bard, how about being the sole surviving witness to it all. The new prophet of the new world sort of thing. The tragic lone figure with too many painful memories who has to make sure that the world never forgets.

Just a thought

 

[silentspace]

Seriously, you're not going to plan their endings, are you? Why not just let the dice, and the player's own actions, decide? At epic levels, even if you plan a TPK, players should have the ability to escape. Fleeing and seeing the world fall into darkness would be a very different ending than fighting to the last breath and dying. It really shouldn't be a TPK though. That lacks drama! The players need a chance to survive, and a chance to triumph! Even if its a relatively small chance...

Do the players know this is going to be the end of the campaign? Do they expect to live/die/whatever?

I love your setup. Very epic.

 

[MerakSpielman]

Yeah, you don't want to railroad them into the exact dramatic, epic ending you personally are envisioning.