D&D General City Campaign

[Paul Farquhar]

This is sort of off the subject, but I feel like it is incumbent on the GM to help provide spotlight time for players. That means, though, that players building inappropriate to the campaign characters impacts more than just themselves. It is potentially disruptive to the game they signed up to play.

Again, 5e rules: there isn't anything the players can choose that would in any way harm a city campaign.

Let's say you are going to run a thieve's guild, morally ambiguous criminal campaign.

Then you warn them in session zero that they need to create characters that are comfortable with a bit of grey. But that has nothing to do with class. Detectives are often lawful good rogues.

Do you let a player come in with a Lawful Good paladin intent on doing the Lawful Good paladin thing?

Again, 5e. There is no requirement for paladins to be lawful good, and therefore no reason to tell players they can't play a paladin.

 

[Oofta]

This is sort of off the subject, but I feel like it is incumbent on the GM to help provide spotlight time for players. That means, though, that players building inappropriate to the campaign characters impacts more than just themselves. It is potentially disruptive to the game they signed up to play.

Let's say you are going to run a thieve's guild, morally ambiguous criminal campaign. Do you let a player come in with a Lawful Good paladin intent on doing the Lawful Good paladin thing? I wouldn't. I might work with the player to come up with a paladin concept that can work with the campaign theme, but I would not want to have to constantly be dealing with the out-of-place character and their reactions to the group's criminal activities, etc. In short: I don't think players have the right to play whatever they want if they have agreed to a certain style of game. It is their responsibility to create a character that works with the campaign premise.

That's an extreme example, of course, and I don't expect any subclass absolutely could not work in a city campaign, so in essence I agree with you: as long as the player is still accepting the premise, they should be able to play what they want. But I don't think there is anything wrong with a curated list of things that would "work best" to give the players some guidance, either.

I always discuss campaign overall theme and assumptions with the players in our session 0. Being a city campaign doesn't really change anything.

 

[Reynard]

Again, 5e rules: there isn't anything the players can choose that would in any way harm a city campaign.

Then you warn them in session zero that they need to create characters that are comfortable with a bit of grey. But that has nothing to do with class. Detectives are often lawful good rogues.

Again, 5e. There is no requirement for paladins to be lawful good, and therefore no reason to tell players they can't play a paladin.

I always discuss campaign overall theme and assumptions with the players in our session 0. Being a city campaign doesn't really change anything.

Just scanning quickly through Tasha's and Xanathar's I think i was overstating the case. In my head there were more specific subclasses than are actually present. Maybe the Horizon Walker Ranger is iffy, but that would be iffy in any campaign not galivanting around the planes.

I hereby retract my question about curated subclasses.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I would make sure to have an urban ranger and an urban druid subclass available, as those have been things players have consistently wanted to have available in my games.

I don't know that you need to narrow the focus, though. Fafhrd is one of the most famous urban fantasy heroes, and he's some sort of barbarian/rogue multiclass, with a wilderness background of some sort.

 

[Retros_x]

I am thinking of Sharn as a base too. Or maybe Zobeck (but I need to find out more about that city).

I can recommend it! Love the setting, full of hooks and dramatic potential, dungeons are also very likely in the lower districts. Btw we also have a druid of spores in the group who comes from the lower district and is flavored to city mold and toxin fumes, it fits quite well.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Relatively straightforward question:

To run a city campaign (NOT a modern urban fantasy campaign a la Dresden) which version of D&D or a D&D adjacent game would you use, and why?

Please and thank you.

Note: I am not talking about setting or utility books here. I am specifically asking about your preference for a D&D rule set for a campaign that takes place primarily in a city and why you chose that rule set.

Depends on what the players are doing

Investigative, Swords of Serpentine
Underground sewer crawling, Shadowdark or straight 5e, because it's not really a city any more, it's more just dungeon crawling
Heists, Blades in the Dark (is that D&D adjacent? maybe not)
Political or Intrigue, 4e skill challenges are great

 

[Tony Vargas]

Players are likely to have an easier time setting their own pace in a city, as opposed to the usual assumed time pressure of a dungeon with the old-school trek back to town to rest, or the many days of a wilderness hexcrawl. So a D&D-like that isn't much distorted by different-length 'days.' 13th Age or 4e D&D.

Heists, Blades in the Dark (is that D&D adjacent? maybe not)

ICON is D&D-ish, and also steals(pi) from BitD, from what I've heard.

 

[Ancalagon]

Fair. I just think that it would be kind of unfair to allow a subclass that did not fit and whose abilities would be wasted a lot of the time. When i say "city campaign" I mean: the whole thing takes place in the city (and potentials dungeons beneath it). No long distance travel. No wilderness except maybe as a singualr adventure in the Haunted Park or whatever. No planar jaunts. Urban.

a good session zero can make this clear to the players. It is up to them to decide if they want to play their druid/ranger/etc anyway or not. (edit: I see this was already answered by others, sorry for the repeat)

 

[THEMNGMNT]

I love urban campaigns.

I am just about to wrap up a 60-session campaign of a remixed version of Dragon Heist. For this, 5E worked swimmingly.

Earlier this year, I ran a 60-session campaign of the Banewarrens, a 3E adventure set in Ptolus. Great adventure, great campaign. However, I ran it using Shadow of the Demon Lord. Ptolus has a not-Catholic Church, demons and devils, chaos cults, evil-aligned weapons, and a bunch of grimdark stuff that can corrupt body and soul. I felt 5E didn't really support that style very well, but SotDL did. And, yeah, I was right. SotDL works great for a gritty urban campaign, ideally about 20-40 sessions in length.

Regardless of whatever system you choose, I'd yoink the Icons from 13th Age. Icons can be easily reskinned and are essentially a faction system. Factions really help drive play in urban campaigns. They're a safety net and a fallback whenever your players go somewhere you don't expect. Rather than have to make up a poison seller on the spot, for example, you just point to the player aligned with the skeezy underworld faction and say, "The poison seller takes you into the back to show her most deadly concoctions. Tell me her name, what she's like, and how you previously met her."