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Running player commentary on PCat's 4E Campaign - Heroic tier (finished)
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<blockquote data-quote="Piratecat" data-source="post: 4497132" data-attributes="member: 2"><p>Since part of my brain is wrestling with a work problem, I'll talk a little about the campaign design. The Sons of Kryos guys posted an <em>amazing</em> campaign blurb a few months back, one that was truly inspirational: a world where everything was going to hell all at once and the PCs were caught in the middle. I loved it, but it was too unremittingly dark for me to be able to pull off successfully. I wanted to take a world where things have been going pretty well, make the players love it, and then have something happen that shakes up the status quo. </p><p></p><p>For me that means setting up an empire that seems to be in a decadent decline. The far provinces are talking about rebellion, no one knows what the emperor (a God clothed in flesh, according to tradition) has been up to, and there are many forces at work - some mortal and political, some far from what people might expect. For hundreds of years the power of the Emperor's Peace has kept most monsters at bay, and the Grey Guard has easily dealt with what few monsters have been willing to rear their heads. Even so, it's a terribly dangerous line of work. It's about to get more dangerous.</p><p></p><p>With the empire weakening or crumbling, the emperor's peace is disintegrating along with it. The massive Pledgestones that symbolize this protection are cracking in the countries that rebel. And that's going to bode poorly for the nearby realms. As a result, large sections of the map may shift from civilized to uncivilized. Things start getting ugly, and this coincides roughly with the growth in power of the heroes. I love the points of light concept, but I also take deep joy in city and political games. This should give me both, depending on where in the empire the PCs happen to be at any given time.</p><p></p><p>And of course, the problems of the Empire are only one part of the long-term story arc. I have some other cool things in mind, but this isn't the place to discuss them.</p><p></p><p>I've deliberately set the PCs in a country that's halfway between the civilized lands and the more wild provinces. It takes me a while to world-build, and unlike you crazy-impressive top-down guys, I can't create everything ahead of time and present it to my players. My worlds tend to accrete around the heroes as they explore. I can't really do that here since there's more backstory, but I'm keeping geography a bit vague until it forms properly. It helps that the only PC who has "history" as a skill is a warforged who has been stuck in the mud for hundreds of years, and who doesn't remember much. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite8" alt=":D" title="Big grin :D" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":D" /></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Piratecat, post: 4497132, member: 2"] Since part of my brain is wrestling with a work problem, I'll talk a little about the campaign design. The Sons of Kryos guys posted an [i]amazing[/i] campaign blurb a few months back, one that was truly inspirational: a world where everything was going to hell all at once and the PCs were caught in the middle. I loved it, but it was too unremittingly dark for me to be able to pull off successfully. I wanted to take a world where things have been going pretty well, make the players love it, and then have something happen that shakes up the status quo. For me that means setting up an empire that seems to be in a decadent decline. The far provinces are talking about rebellion, no one knows what the emperor (a God clothed in flesh, according to tradition) has been up to, and there are many forces at work - some mortal and political, some far from what people might expect. For hundreds of years the power of the Emperor's Peace has kept most monsters at bay, and the Grey Guard has easily dealt with what few monsters have been willing to rear their heads. Even so, it's a terribly dangerous line of work. It's about to get more dangerous. With the empire weakening or crumbling, the emperor's peace is disintegrating along with it. The massive Pledgestones that symbolize this protection are cracking in the countries that rebel. And that's going to bode poorly for the nearby realms. As a result, large sections of the map may shift from civilized to uncivilized. Things start getting ugly, and this coincides roughly with the growth in power of the heroes. I love the points of light concept, but I also take deep joy in city and political games. This should give me both, depending on where in the empire the PCs happen to be at any given time. And of course, the problems of the Empire are only one part of the long-term story arc. I have some other cool things in mind, but this isn't the place to discuss them. I've deliberately set the PCs in a country that's halfway between the civilized lands and the more wild provinces. It takes me a while to world-build, and unlike you crazy-impressive top-down guys, I can't create everything ahead of time and present it to my players. My worlds tend to accrete around the heroes as they explore. I can't really do that here since there's more backstory, but I'm keeping geography a bit vague until it forms properly. It helps that the only PC who has "history" as a skill is a warforged who has been stuck in the mud for hundreds of years, and who doesn't remember much. :D [/QUOTE]
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Running player commentary on PCat's 4E Campaign - Heroic tier (finished)
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