A recently resurrected thread/poll about "The DM's Percentage" made me think a bit about the structure of each of the campaigns that I have run in the past, the most recent being foremost in my thoughts. I thought I'd take a moment to break said campaigns (again, starting with the most recent) into their individual components and see if it inspired any of you to do the same. I should note, my purposes in doing this are entirely selfish; I'm always on the lookout for cool ideas to steal, and I am essentially asking all of you to leave yours unguarded.
In reading this, keep in mind that the items that I identify as the components of a campaign are not the same for everyone; they're actually probably going to be different for each of my own campaigns as I begin to dissect them.
Campaign, The Most Recent
Plot: The plot involves the PCs being sent out to discover the fate a caravan which was supposed to have arrived in their city some time earlier.
The caravan is actually quite easy to find, being located just off teh road between their city and its city of origin. An early plot reversal occurs here, in which the PCs find that the caravan was transporting a collection of dangerous books. The recovery of said books then becomes the object of the remainder of the campaign (as opposed to the relatively short time spent investigating the fate of the caravan).
Setting: The setting is taken pretty much straight from the FRCS and the Silver Marches supplement, any variation owing pretty much to my inability to recall exactly every detail of such works (i.e. I try to remain faithful to the source material, but if I don't recall a detail, I wing it, then incorporate said "wing" into teh canon of my campaign).
Theme: Shortly after settling on the plot (and while debating the merits of FR with Eberron with myself and my players), I established the theme of my campaign...The Realms, but not as you know them; lower magic (especially in terms of items); a healthy injection of pulp action (which made me strongly reconsider using Eberron as the setting); an unhelathy injection of lovecraftian horror (keeping in mind that I have read very little Lovecraft- 1 short story- but he seemed to be big into cursed books/things man wasnot supposed to know, and I wanted those things to be a part of my game); PCs that squabble like soap opera characters (and have soap opera like subplots linked to them); and finally moral murkiness.
Subplots: The subplots were largely of my own design (or were joint creations with my players). One subplot involved a cleric of Tempus who had fled noth to Sundabar from Cormyr following a romantic encounter with a wealthy merchant's underage daughter; I had the daughter, a year older and herself now a fledgeling adventurer, travelling north with the caravan mentioned in the plot section above; of course she became a prisoner for the goblins which participated in the raid on the caravan. Another subplot was stolen from a children's novel (I don't recall the title, but I read the back cover summary at a local bookstore). It involved a Shadow Weave wizard (who was an old friend of the party's Shadow Weave sorcerer) pursuing a young human witch who had taken up with said goblins; it turns out the wizard had killed the girls mother and burned their home (after turning their village against them), and the girl had joined up with the goblins to seek revenge against her village. To complicate matters, the party's druid was actually a friend of teh girl and her murdered mother.
Mechanics/Details (Rules): We used the core rules essentially unchanged. That said, I am a pretty loose DM, favoring story over mechanics. If I don't knowa rule, I am not above making one up on the spot and running with it. That said, if the correct ruling can quickly be brought to my attention, I'll run with that instead (or, more likely, use it in the future). Anyway, beyond teh core rules, I told them that pretty much anything from official WOTC sources was fair game. We decidied beofre the game to use action points from unearthed arcana, and I let one player tweak a spell point system from that same source.
Mechanics/Details (Maps): For the region, I used maps from the FRCS and the Silver Marches. For a goblin lair, I Googled "goblin lair" which turned up a fully stocked map. For an orc lair, I Googled something akin to "dwarven outpost", as I wanted the orcs to be lairing in an abandoned dwarven outpost (plus Google failed me when I searched for "orc lair").
Mechanics/Details (Antagonists): Two of the BBEGs in the game are Kyanus the Pale and Synnoch the Black Flame. The party has obviously yet to face either of these (and I have not even attempted to stat them out). One of the PCs does know them however. The party's dwarven necromancer was a student of Kyanus the Pale; said dwarven necromancer was also responsible for freeing Synnoch the Black Flame (who happened to be Kyanus' mentor)from his tomb (Synnoch shortly thereafter destroyed the dwarf's hold). Both names were taken from the Hero Builder's Guidebook, their epithets are my own (and fairly unoriginal), they're both liches (Synnoch considerably older than Kyanus).
Early encounters in the campaign were with goblins, some of them mounted on wolves. I really like the image of the wolf-riding goblin which can be seen throughout various fantasy sources (LOTR movies, goblin minis for Warhammer). I also liked the way Boromir got peppered with arrows, so I gave one of the goblins some fighter levels and made him nasty with a bow. I decided that worgs or dire wolves would make too powerful mounts for first-level PCs, so I mounted the goblins on normal wolves. The stats for the other goblins came pretty much from the MM, though I altered their selection of weapons (thinking spears and short bows much better than morning stars for the image I had).
One difficulty that I had in the game was trying to decide how I would make the orcs and goblins different from one another. Obviously, I mounted some of teh goblins on wolves, but this really only applied in one encounter outside teh goblin lair. When I started populating the lairs, the orcs and goblins looked a lot alike. The Slayer's Guide series by Mongoose proved invaluable in differentiating the two races, and I really tried to use teh way the two races fought as a key differentiator. The goblins used traps liberally to defend their lair (the orcs used only two and they were basically rearmed dwarven traps). The goblins were fond of ambushes, often retreating and circling back on the party (the orcs threw themselves mightily at the characters...and had bigger more deadly weapons).
I also wan6ted to make sure that the lairs contained things other than goblins and orcs respectively. The goblin lair got a room full of bats, a giant spider (worshiped by the goblins as an avatar of Maglubiyet), the witch girl (mentioned above), a bugbear king (can't remember if he got any fighter levels or not). I also made the goblin women and children different mechanically (weaker, less well armed or armored) than the males/warriors; I injected a bit of personality into them by making many of them the personal harem of the bugbear king and tormentors of the human prisoner (see subplots above). Other classed goblins included a shaman amongst the wolfriders (here I used the adept NPC class from the DMG) and a cleric in the lair.
the orcs had considerably less variation in their lair. The women and children were again less well armed or armored, but rather than living in the back of the lair, they were kept out front as something of a first defense. Most of the orc warriors were used as written in the MM. I did add a chief with some fighetr levels; a shaman with some cleric of Malar and sorcerer levels; a female expert (cook, brewer, poisoner) who fought with a poisoned cooking knife. In terms of noncreature dressing, the inclusion of mrog (a drink made of fermenetd blood and honey) again from the Slayer's Guide series prompted some intersting discussion between the party's half-orc fighter, his NPC father (a full orc, but generally good guy), and the rest of the party.
Mechanics/Details (Protagonists): I had to include an arthritic old crone in the marketplace; the hard of hearing elderly NPC has been a staple of my game since a DM I knew years ago used one to great comedic affect.
I knew I had to name a local member of the watch Gooch. It was a name that I had been wanting to use for a long time (after having seen someone by said name running for jailer near my hometown). I basically made him a thuggish, redneck superior officer to the cleric of Tempus in the party.
The party also included a trio of dwarven soldier NPCs (taken directly from teh MM) and their sergeant. The sergeant was a ranger/rogue (strongly modeled off a previous character of mine) who was actually spying on the dwarven necromancer. This fact was never revealed and said dwarf died fighting orc women. I am tempted to re-introduce him under a different guise, since no one realized his ulterior motives (and let the dead dwarf be just another dead dwarven sergeant).
Meleghost Maurmeril (name taken from the FRCS) was the Shadow Weave wizard mentioned above. I based him strongly off the witch hunters from the WH40K setting and real world inquisitor/demagogue types.
I guess that's about it. Sorry this was soooooooo long. I am hopeful to hear how the rest of you dissect your current campaigns. If this thread has any success, I'll take a look at some of my older campaigns as well. Similarly, I'll be happy to field any questions to stimulate flow of ideas.
Chad
In reading this, keep in mind that the items that I identify as the components of a campaign are not the same for everyone; they're actually probably going to be different for each of my own campaigns as I begin to dissect them.
Campaign, The Most Recent
Plot: The plot involves the PCs being sent out to discover the fate a caravan which was supposed to have arrived in their city some time earlier.
The caravan is actually quite easy to find, being located just off teh road between their city and its city of origin. An early plot reversal occurs here, in which the PCs find that the caravan was transporting a collection of dangerous books. The recovery of said books then becomes the object of the remainder of the campaign (as opposed to the relatively short time spent investigating the fate of the caravan).
Setting: The setting is taken pretty much straight from the FRCS and the Silver Marches supplement, any variation owing pretty much to my inability to recall exactly every detail of such works (i.e. I try to remain faithful to the source material, but if I don't recall a detail, I wing it, then incorporate said "wing" into teh canon of my campaign).
Theme: Shortly after settling on the plot (and while debating the merits of FR with Eberron with myself and my players), I established the theme of my campaign...The Realms, but not as you know them; lower magic (especially in terms of items); a healthy injection of pulp action (which made me strongly reconsider using Eberron as the setting); an unhelathy injection of lovecraftian horror (keeping in mind that I have read very little Lovecraft- 1 short story- but he seemed to be big into cursed books/things man wasnot supposed to know, and I wanted those things to be a part of my game); PCs that squabble like soap opera characters (and have soap opera like subplots linked to them); and finally moral murkiness.
Subplots: The subplots were largely of my own design (or were joint creations with my players). One subplot involved a cleric of Tempus who had fled noth to Sundabar from Cormyr following a romantic encounter with a wealthy merchant's underage daughter; I had the daughter, a year older and herself now a fledgeling adventurer, travelling north with the caravan mentioned in the plot section above; of course she became a prisoner for the goblins which participated in the raid on the caravan. Another subplot was stolen from a children's novel (I don't recall the title, but I read the back cover summary at a local bookstore). It involved a Shadow Weave wizard (who was an old friend of the party's Shadow Weave sorcerer) pursuing a young human witch who had taken up with said goblins; it turns out the wizard had killed the girls mother and burned their home (after turning their village against them), and the girl had joined up with the goblins to seek revenge against her village. To complicate matters, the party's druid was actually a friend of teh girl and her murdered mother.
Mechanics/Details (Rules): We used the core rules essentially unchanged. That said, I am a pretty loose DM, favoring story over mechanics. If I don't knowa rule, I am not above making one up on the spot and running with it. That said, if the correct ruling can quickly be brought to my attention, I'll run with that instead (or, more likely, use it in the future). Anyway, beyond teh core rules, I told them that pretty much anything from official WOTC sources was fair game. We decidied beofre the game to use action points from unearthed arcana, and I let one player tweak a spell point system from that same source.
Mechanics/Details (Maps): For the region, I used maps from the FRCS and the Silver Marches. For a goblin lair, I Googled "goblin lair" which turned up a fully stocked map. For an orc lair, I Googled something akin to "dwarven outpost", as I wanted the orcs to be lairing in an abandoned dwarven outpost (plus Google failed me when I searched for "orc lair").
Mechanics/Details (Antagonists): Two of the BBEGs in the game are Kyanus the Pale and Synnoch the Black Flame. The party has obviously yet to face either of these (and I have not even attempted to stat them out). One of the PCs does know them however. The party's dwarven necromancer was a student of Kyanus the Pale; said dwarven necromancer was also responsible for freeing Synnoch the Black Flame (who happened to be Kyanus' mentor)from his tomb (Synnoch shortly thereafter destroyed the dwarf's hold). Both names were taken from the Hero Builder's Guidebook, their epithets are my own (and fairly unoriginal), they're both liches (Synnoch considerably older than Kyanus).
Early encounters in the campaign were with goblins, some of them mounted on wolves. I really like the image of the wolf-riding goblin which can be seen throughout various fantasy sources (LOTR movies, goblin minis for Warhammer). I also liked the way Boromir got peppered with arrows, so I gave one of the goblins some fighter levels and made him nasty with a bow. I decided that worgs or dire wolves would make too powerful mounts for first-level PCs, so I mounted the goblins on normal wolves. The stats for the other goblins came pretty much from the MM, though I altered their selection of weapons (thinking spears and short bows much better than morning stars for the image I had).
One difficulty that I had in the game was trying to decide how I would make the orcs and goblins different from one another. Obviously, I mounted some of teh goblins on wolves, but this really only applied in one encounter outside teh goblin lair. When I started populating the lairs, the orcs and goblins looked a lot alike. The Slayer's Guide series by Mongoose proved invaluable in differentiating the two races, and I really tried to use teh way the two races fought as a key differentiator. The goblins used traps liberally to defend their lair (the orcs used only two and they were basically rearmed dwarven traps). The goblins were fond of ambushes, often retreating and circling back on the party (the orcs threw themselves mightily at the characters...and had bigger more deadly weapons).
I also wan6ted to make sure that the lairs contained things other than goblins and orcs respectively. The goblin lair got a room full of bats, a giant spider (worshiped by the goblins as an avatar of Maglubiyet), the witch girl (mentioned above), a bugbear king (can't remember if he got any fighter levels or not). I also made the goblin women and children different mechanically (weaker, less well armed or armored) than the males/warriors; I injected a bit of personality into them by making many of them the personal harem of the bugbear king and tormentors of the human prisoner (see subplots above). Other classed goblins included a shaman amongst the wolfriders (here I used the adept NPC class from the DMG) and a cleric in the lair.
the orcs had considerably less variation in their lair. The women and children were again less well armed or armored, but rather than living in the back of the lair, they were kept out front as something of a first defense. Most of the orc warriors were used as written in the MM. I did add a chief with some fighetr levels; a shaman with some cleric of Malar and sorcerer levels; a female expert (cook, brewer, poisoner) who fought with a poisoned cooking knife. In terms of noncreature dressing, the inclusion of mrog (a drink made of fermenetd blood and honey) again from the Slayer's Guide series prompted some intersting discussion between the party's half-orc fighter, his NPC father (a full orc, but generally good guy), and the rest of the party.
Mechanics/Details (Protagonists): I had to include an arthritic old crone in the marketplace; the hard of hearing elderly NPC has been a staple of my game since a DM I knew years ago used one to great comedic affect.
I knew I had to name a local member of the watch Gooch. It was a name that I had been wanting to use for a long time (after having seen someone by said name running for jailer near my hometown). I basically made him a thuggish, redneck superior officer to the cleric of Tempus in the party.
The party also included a trio of dwarven soldier NPCs (taken directly from teh MM) and their sergeant. The sergeant was a ranger/rogue (strongly modeled off a previous character of mine) who was actually spying on the dwarven necromancer. This fact was never revealed and said dwarf died fighting orc women. I am tempted to re-introduce him under a different guise, since no one realized his ulterior motives (and let the dead dwarf be just another dead dwarven sergeant).
Meleghost Maurmeril (name taken from the FRCS) was the Shadow Weave wizard mentioned above. I based him strongly off the witch hunters from the WH40K setting and real world inquisitor/demagogue types.
I guess that's about it. Sorry this was soooooooo long. I am hopeful to hear how the rest of you dissect your current campaigns. If this thread has any success, I'll take a look at some of my older campaigns as well. Similarly, I'll be happy to field any questions to stimulate flow of ideas.
Chad
