Back to the Future- Adventuring in your own history -

[Tonguez]

Okay I'm thinking of setting the next campaign in the history of the current one anmd covering the events which developed into the current games plot.

Can it be done, how would you do it, how do you avoid making it a forgone conclusion without messing with historic continuity?

Current Game = PCs come to new Island and trigger events which cause the return of the Dark Tyrant (Half-Fiend Paraelemental (Magma) Ogre) who 150 yrs before was set to conquer the world but was stopped by a coalition of heroes

Next Game = PCs are the heroes who have come together to stop the Dark Tyrant set to conquer the world

 

[Crothian]

It really depenmds on how detailed the History is, how much is actually myth and legend and how much is fact. I think this can easily be done. The less specifics the characters know the better. I like this idea.

 

[Andrew D. Gable]

I'm doing something similar. My current campaign is set in my homebrew world, ca. 1000 years in the past. At this time, a tribal chief/later warlord is conquering other tribes and laying the foundations of the kingdom in which all my other campaigns take place.

 

[Kamard]

The only problem is if something goes horribly wrong. God knows I have players who would actively try to make the future "not happen" the way I've said it did.

 

[Crothian]

The only problem is if something goes horribly wrong. God knows I have players who would actively try to make the future "not happen" the way I've said it did.

Then you dock XP for severe meta gaming

 

[WanderingMonster]

I've done this

I originally posted a Story Hour in the orginal forum when Eric Noah still sat in the captain's chair. The gist is that the players had reached the climax of the current multi-level quest: to breech the extra-dimensional tomb of a dead god. When not all of them could make it to the next session, I added an interlude where those who did make it played the unfortunate few who were sealed in the tomb. It was a neat experience, and made for insteresting psyco-dramas when they realized they were confined to a hopeless situation. They began to resent those on the outside who had callously imprisoned them as well.

When we played the tomb in the campaign's present day, it became very powerful. When they encountered a wight wizard, they knew who it was and why he became a wight. When they saw the ghouls, they knew what drove them to first consume sentient flesh. It made the night more memorable. I was lucky that everyone was into the idea. I did railroad them, but it was appropriate for the scenario.

Cutaways, flashbacks, and interludes are effective if a) they reveal enough but not too much, and b) the participants think its fun.

 

[Agback]

G'day

My second Gehennum campaign was set a century after the first, in the aftermath of the first party's Empire-smashing exploits. The third was set two hundred years before the first, and was involved with the rise of the Theklan hegemony that later became the Empire of Gehennum. The fourth was set two hundred years later than the first campaign, but in the Gehennum that would have developed if the PCs in the first party had never lived (or had failed). Since then I have run lots of campaigns in alternative histories of Gehennum: a campaign in which the evil Samariopolitan League was brought down by the Theklans, a campaign in which it was brought down by Hospis and Borillis, a campaign in which Samariopolis was destroyed by a spellsinger from an obscure little city I've forgotten the name of; campaigns in which PCs make Hyrkanthes so secure on the throne that there is no Civil War, a campaign in which Hyrkanthes defeats Regikhord in the Civil War; several campaigns set in a Gehennum ruled by Regikhord after Jasper defeated Hyrkanthes; a campaign in which Gehennum had broken up in secessionist rebellions after the death of Jasper; several campaigns in which Gehennum had degenerated into a warring clutch of semi-feudal satrapies after the succession of Jokanan on Regikhord's death--in some of these Gehennum is reunited by Darulan the Silent, in others by other episkopoi from Elmis or Asthmara, in others the Dukes of Bethan have re-created the Iron Stone Men and sealed the disintegration of the Empire.

So Gehennum has not so much a history as a set of recurrent historical possibilities: personalities, movements, conflicts that recur in different versions of its history. This works surprisingly well: players have a good idea what they are fighting for (or against), and they have a rich (but incomplete) set of ideas about such people as Aristarkes II, Hyrkanthes, Jasper, Regikhord, Lesterra, Lysandra, Lykomorphus, Gasparion the Magnificent, Darulan the Silent, Daramalan of Kos, Aspasia.... A player familiar with this mass of stuff can easily play either a Lubber or a Salt, because he or she has played both in campaigns in which Regikhord was a spineless dickhead and campaigns in which Lesterra was a shrew and a slut.

So I say "Go for it!" And don't concern yourself with maintaining a consistent history for the campaign. It isn't necessary and it's often oppressive. If it didn't happen the way you said it did, then no worries, it didn't.

Regards,


Agback

 

[s/LaSH]

Just so long as there's plenty of unknown stuff available (which may be difficult in the past, but again may not be), it shouldn't be a problem; a few cool NPCs with no available background beyond what you discover, or a mysterious dungeon never seen in the future, could be ways to keep the interest levels up. I'd never do this if I couldn't keep the same level of discovery for the PCs in the past, which is a challenge. Railroading and alternate timelines are both good ideas if something goes horribly wrong ("You slip and accidentally trap the Elder God" is a little drastic, but...)

If all else fails, and history starts crumbling away into the cosmic toilet, there's always the old standby of powerful forces from beyond the stream of time screwing around with the PCs... see Final Fantasy games of all stripes, and the Legacy of Kain series of games (an important character in the Nosgoth universe is Mobius, Guardian of Time). Oh, and Enterprise. I think that's pretty cool when it actually does plot. The glorious thing about time travel is, because it's impossible you can break any rule you want. Heheh.