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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Moving Pictures" data-source="post: 9646518" data-attributes="member: 7052268">As someone else has already indicated in a less-than-subtle way, you're into railroad terrain ... which can be problematic.My approach is inherently sandboxy. What this means is that things will happen that the party has no control over, no knowledge of.... like volcano eruptions far away. My players are Greg, Tanya, Pardeep and Jaimie, and you better not read past this line if you're here.So. Let me delve into a conceptual approach for my campaign: a triple full moon, which only happens once every 200-plus years, or so. That's going to be an epic spiritual/religious moment. I would like to time a campaign end on that clock.... but I am not tied to that. The basic idea is that in my world, there are three classes of deities: greater gods, lesser gods, and demideities. Their powers are not absolute and infinite, and are in fact tied to the number and power (see: level) of worshippers. In time, deities have bounced from one tier to the other... those who gain worshippers gain power. Currently, the Gnomish pair of deities are weakening at a rapid rate. Even the gnomes are turning to human faiths that are more able to assist them.That may become a campaign end: some demideity kidnapping a high priest of a greater god for sacrifice under the three moons to trigger the ascention of a nasty deity to the next level of power. It's a thought: I haven't created the forces that would do that, yet. I don't need to.In the immediate national context, I have started to introduce factions and politics to my group: a group of horse-riding plains-living folks evicted from their homelands 475 years ago... some want their lands back. The main nation used to be a collection of powerful dukes under a monarchy. The monarchy is gone, replaced by a house of lords, but some who trace their bloodline to the old Dukes want to reclaim power.The main church is a prototypical mother-goddess religion, deeply entwined with the main nation. But the high priestess, revered and loved, is growing old. She has just stepped down, paving the way for the faith (and the goddess) to select a new high priest.The Goddess, Huran, sensing that she is losing followers because of a very real tie to this main nation, is going to guide her potent priests to select a leader who is more of a universalist. He will immediately begin detatching the faith from the operations of government. The goal is to counter some of the failings of being perceived as the "official government religion." While the church has been paid well by the government to do things like have clerics in every town, city and some villages to perform the fantasy equivalent of taxpayer funded medicare, the church requires its entry level clerics to serve in defined posts.Gifted, freedom-hunting youth are more interested in other faiths, such as a rising competitor - ironically, Huran's daughter. Alessa is a free-spirited deity whose followers were historically nature clerics (I have no druids) but recently, Alessa's powers have increased and now the faith is creating normal clerics - competing for the same resources.OK. So this is long-winded. But you see here a backdrop for things that may draw the players into various elements.There are Dukes present, especially those in the north of the country, who would love to see the House of Lords weakened, because it would give them greater power to shatter the system and return to a feudal monarchy. The shift in the Huran faith will create political uncertainty.The entry-level/introductory adventure saw the party become aware of a plot to assassinate the son of a baron - or the baron, they still aren't sure. SOme nefarious crime lord had been retained to poison high-price, fancy whiskey with arsenic. If the party follows this trail in the future, it may lead to a political rival trying to undermine certain elements within the House of Lords.The party just finished an adventure where they assisted in brokering a cease-hostilities arrangement with goblins eager to reclaim lands that were once theirs.And who might benefit from the main nation ceding terrain in the south, and appearing weak? Perhaps the same individual who would benefit from a southern leader dying mysteriously in six to eight months.... Or maybe it's two different northern power-brokers unknowingly targetting the same area/people for similar purposes.The key is to create a storyline and a dynamic that is flexible. Undertand the motivations of your key baddies. The party has no idea who the baddies are.... not a clue. But that will reveal itself in time.Yesterday, Caislingairn, the most potent premier-league rugby team in the country for decades, and last year's premier-league champion just lost to Gamble and Stoke 24-19. Their season record is 0-4-1, and the team appears in shambles. The mutterings in the pubs suggest the rugby-bonkers citizenry is already doubtful Caislingairn can defend its title.</blockquote>

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