A City Campaign

[Evilusion]

Wow a lot of good ideas mention. Yea the journey to the sewers is plan, so is the haunted manison(Caste Amber). Just need more ideas for above ground adventures. Any other ideas throw them out there hopefully I can cobble together a good campaign from it. When I have more time I will post more on the campaign itself.

Thanks All

 

[Whimsical]

Just think about it this way. When it turns out that a building is a hive of villany, that building works out to be like an aboveground dungeon. With traps and surprises on every floor. But unlike a normal dungeon, the clever adventurer can climb the wall and work through it top-down. So be ready for that. The 3e adventure Speaker in Dreams showcases this technique very well.

 

[Whimsical]

Have you considered what kind of city you would like to use? There are several detailed urban environments for you to use. For example:

The Dungeon Master's Guide II details Saltmarsh, a coastal town of 3,850. It has a town map (no street names), and details 65 locations & basic information of the town councilors, city watch & militia, guild leaders, religious leaders, and other notable citizens. Each location is detailed in several paragraphs, which includes more detail of certain NPCs, and each location has an adventure hook suggested.

But I'm really enjoying Shackled City which I have been running for almost a year. A city set in a vocano with big secrets hidden everywhere.

But the campaing setting to use if you want to run an entire campaign, from level 1 to 20, within the walls of a city is Ptolus by Monte Cook. Not only is it a great campaing setting, but it is full of advice on how to run a campaing in a city. I'm using it to suppliment my Shackled City game.

 

[Tonguez]

1. In the last Urban adventure I ran the PCs all lived in a boarding house hand by the local midwife. When she discovered that the strange sickness which is putting all the towns children into a coma is caused by magic she asks the PCs to take a messge to an acquantance across town and in doing so the PCs find themselves battling goblin gangs, ghoul stalkers and the City Council (it did have underground elements though - including sewers, interconnected basements and a ruined 'under' city)

 

[Brimshack]

Excape from New York, but with Monsters.

 

[Whimsical]

I recommend that you read the Urban Adventures section in the 3.5 Dungeon Master's Guide, pg. 98. It has some good insight and game elements for running adventures in an urban setting. It also has a "wandering encounter" table, each entry being an example of an above-ground scenario or adventure seed.

Here is some technique from another post about creating urban adventures.

The first thing to do is background work. Who are the movers and shakers, and what do they have going on, who are they allied with, and who opposes them. I generally make up about 20 frontline groups the PCs are likely to encounter. From Dwarven supremiscists up to the town guard.
Make templates of characters from various groups so you can throw one in with almost no notice.
Draw up stand alone maps for stock locations. You know, for instance, that the players are going to go into a seedy bar. Plan for it.
Make a list of names. When you need a name, grab it off the list. Note who you gave it to, and why they're important.
Now the fun part...

Urban adventures occur in vignettes. Don't put together an overarching adventure. Do short scenes. Like this:
The PCs are on top of a building (or somewhere else they can't leave quickly) see a richly dressed woman forced into a carriage, and the carriage leaves in a hurry.
Make a book of about thirty vignettes. You'll only use about five a game, but you want to have ones appropriate for any situation the characters find themselves in readily at hand. Replace them between games.
Keep track of the enemies they make.
Throw the PCs into the chaos. They'll start drawing connections. It's human nature. They couldn't avoid it if they wanted to.
Take their most evil ideas about "what's really going on", and incorperate them. But add a twist so that they *almost* figured out what was going on, but are still suprised. (Shoot for the reaction "I should have seen that coming!")

You're flying fast and loose, so have a prop to buy time when you need it. Something to drink works well, since you can't drink and talk at the same time, and since you're talking a lot, your throat will get dry.

He goes into greater detail in follow-up posts.

 

[Soul]

Rel had an excellent story hour set in sharn, if anybody has any links I believe it had a lot of good advice for a city-based campaign.

 

[Brimshack]

I've always been fond of rival thieves guilds (2 or 3 of them). The party can choose their level of involvement, or even set themselves up in opposition to the lot of them (perhaps as a Sherrif and assistants). The trick is to place the city on a major trade route (most likely a port) give each guild an edge:

- Perhaps one has an inside line on drug smuggling operations. They have all the best connections to the distributors. Alternatively, you could use slaves the same way.

- Perhaps one guild has all the most important people in its pocket. It has bought the Captain of the Gaurd, the Priest of teh local temple, and even 1 or 2 advisors to the city's liege.

- There is a luxury item for which this port is the only real source to the outside world (a magical component perhaps, a precious metal, or a certain type of magic item even). One guild has a monopoly on that trade. Anyone else must go by overland routes, and that's way too dangerous and costly.

- Perhaps one guild dominates the docks.

- Perhaps one guildhas access to underground dungeons and a deal with a powerful force within them. If they like they can produce monster allies when needed.

- Perhaps one guild controlls the roadways into town because all the local bandits are allied with them.

 

[Tonguez]

If you can find it read the City of En thread that we did a couple of years abck. It had some good ideas in it...

 

[Evilusion]

Some detail on the citys. This take place on a island chain. There are a total of 8 citys of various size(still have to figure how big I want them). They are all boom towns also. This is due to the metal and gems being found in the past(not sure how long yet). So I have sea, city and some underground. Should form a nice campaign. It is late and still have yet to read the links. Let you know what I think when I have a chance to read them.

Thanks again for the input.