There are many reasons for travel and those can be very useful for setting the mood in media res. Compare a campaign that opens with the PCs hired to explore an unknown region, with one that opens with them as refugees fleeing a war. The tone changes completely, even if the contents of the character sheets are still the same. They could be pilgrims or bodyguards upon a pleasure cruise.
The means of transport is also important to establish setting and mood. A group of PC refugees trudging along a rough road to possible safety would be gritty, and GMs could invoke the sick and elderly, or diminishing food supplies to add a note of tension to the scenario. Besides, it’s a great way to have disparate individuals come together.
Starting an adventure on a pleasure cruise instead gives a different scope of activities - murder mysteries, perhaps, as the PC bodyguards try to prevent the next killing with the limited evidence the have. Or espionage as PC spies insinuate themselves into the lives of their marks. Such a setting would be dramatic, slightly larger than life, diamonds, champagne, and cocktail dresses.
Motivation for travel is another thing to explore. While piety is the main reason for pilgrimages, each of the pilgrims may have a different motivation. One may be seeking an indulgence. Another may wish to pray for healing. A third could be a servant trudging along behind their mistress. Theological and cosmological differences between members of the party can make for entertaining arguments, and further motivation for dark deeds in hostelries.
Account also for the reach of the law, and the conditions of travel. For example, the Inca Empire did not have draft or riding livestock of any kind, but excellent road infrastructure meant that runners could convey messages through the empire. The Romans maintained a network of highways and fortifications that survive to this day, 1500+ years from the fall of the Empire.
How far does the infrastructure go? Do the PCs travel along stretches of well-maintained road, taking their rest at coaching inns or hostelries until they reach the borderlands, where all is rough and untamed? Who takes care of the infrastructure? Hired laborers? Slaves? Prisoners? The road may not be guarded or maintained if a government has been overthrown or is in flux.
Imagine sending a group of adventurers to another state, as news has not arrived in some time. They travel along the roads, well-maintained in their kingdom, with bustling trade, a bit of crowding from peddlers and pilgrims, and safe inns to rest in. They cross the border and there it is the road, but there are no guards and the route is deserted. The mood changes completely. Where did the people go? Are they in hiding, or did a plague strike the nation?
Travel can happen against the traveler’s will. The PCs could have been captured by a slave raid, or criminals sentenced to transport to the colonies for indentured work. They could be stowaways who find out too late that the ship is not going where they thought it would. These would all set a scene for the party’s origins and help inform the plot.
A group of escaped slaves could try to find safety in other lands, or try to start an uprising. Convicts transported for indentured labor could be pressed into trailblazing and exploration work, expendable as they are. And a group of passengers marooned on an off-course starship will navigate their way back to civilization before time and supplies run out. A particularly irreverent take could have the PCs escorting the world’s first tourist around, as in the late Terry Pratchett’s The Colour of Magic.
Other narratives about travel can be gleefully raided for ideas - a good GM is a good thief. The Odyssey has a man seeking his way home, the Journey to the West a group of pilgrims seeking scriptures. Event Horizon crams the characters in a ship that wants to kill them, and Hell On Wheels is about the construction of the transcontinental railroad.
Make the PCs starfarers, navigators, explorers, or a group that was traveling together in a magical airship until it crashes on a remote, inaccessible island, and let’s hope they packed their walking shoes.
Contributed by M.W. Simmes. See her previous worldbuilding article in this series here.
The means of transport is also important to establish setting and mood. A group of PC refugees trudging along a rough road to possible safety would be gritty, and GMs could invoke the sick and elderly, or diminishing food supplies to add a note of tension to the scenario. Besides, it’s a great way to have disparate individuals come together.
Starting an adventure on a pleasure cruise instead gives a different scope of activities - murder mysteries, perhaps, as the PC bodyguards try to prevent the next killing with the limited evidence the have. Or espionage as PC spies insinuate themselves into the lives of their marks. Such a setting would be dramatic, slightly larger than life, diamonds, champagne, and cocktail dresses.
Motivation for travel is another thing to explore. While piety is the main reason for pilgrimages, each of the pilgrims may have a different motivation. One may be seeking an indulgence. Another may wish to pray for healing. A third could be a servant trudging along behind their mistress. Theological and cosmological differences between members of the party can make for entertaining arguments, and further motivation for dark deeds in hostelries.
Account also for the reach of the law, and the conditions of travel. For example, the Inca Empire did not have draft or riding livestock of any kind, but excellent road infrastructure meant that runners could convey messages through the empire. The Romans maintained a network of highways and fortifications that survive to this day, 1500+ years from the fall of the Empire.
How far does the infrastructure go? Do the PCs travel along stretches of well-maintained road, taking their rest at coaching inns or hostelries until they reach the borderlands, where all is rough and untamed? Who takes care of the infrastructure? Hired laborers? Slaves? Prisoners? The road may not be guarded or maintained if a government has been overthrown or is in flux.
Imagine sending a group of adventurers to another state, as news has not arrived in some time. They travel along the roads, well-maintained in their kingdom, with bustling trade, a bit of crowding from peddlers and pilgrims, and safe inns to rest in. They cross the border and there it is the road, but there are no guards and the route is deserted. The mood changes completely. Where did the people go? Are they in hiding, or did a plague strike the nation?
Travel can happen against the traveler’s will. The PCs could have been captured by a slave raid, or criminals sentenced to transport to the colonies for indentured work. They could be stowaways who find out too late that the ship is not going where they thought it would. These would all set a scene for the party’s origins and help inform the plot.
A group of escaped slaves could try to find safety in other lands, or try to start an uprising. Convicts transported for indentured labor could be pressed into trailblazing and exploration work, expendable as they are. And a group of passengers marooned on an off-course starship will navigate their way back to civilization before time and supplies run out. A particularly irreverent take could have the PCs escorting the world’s first tourist around, as in the late Terry Pratchett’s The Colour of Magic.
Other narratives about travel can be gleefully raided for ideas - a good GM is a good thief. The Odyssey has a man seeking his way home, the Journey to the West a group of pilgrims seeking scriptures. Event Horizon crams the characters in a ship that wants to kill them, and Hell On Wheels is about the construction of the transcontinental railroad.
Make the PCs starfarers, navigators, explorers, or a group that was traveling together in a magical airship until it crashes on a remote, inaccessible island, and let’s hope they packed their walking shoes.
Contributed by M.W. Simmes. See her previous worldbuilding article in this series here.
