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<blockquote data-quote="Uller" data-source="post: 6356754" data-attributes="member: 413">I haven't read the whole thread...but the most important advice was given early. Start small and don't script everything out.&nbsp; Sandbox campaign's are the PC's stories...the DM is just helping them construct it.&nbsp; If you have some over arching campaign story in mind, the players will still feel like they are following your script.&nbsp; Besides, maybe today the barbarian horde commanded by the evil cleric and his demon allies sounds like an interesting campaign idea, but 3 months from now you (or your players) will have thought of something more interesting.The way I do it is I start small: a village, a small outpost or a neighborhood in a bigger town or city and a couple of paragraphs of how it fits into the surrounding areas and another about what the PCs might be doing there.&nbsp; I usually &quot;railroad&quot; the PCs in the first session the same way LMoP does (I like to start a campaign with a fight or some other crisis).&nbsp; But then at the end of each session I try to give the party 2-3 concrete options of what to do next (and encourage them to come up with their own as well).&nbsp; I encourage the party to choose their next course at the end of a session so I have a week or so to detail things.&nbsp; That way you don't have to have _everything_ planned for...just the most likely stuff.&nbsp; As time passes, some options expire and new ones arise (if one option was &quot;stop the bandits from robbing the caravan&quot; once that event happens it will go away but might be replaced with a couple of new options like &quot;capture the bandits that murdered the caravan guards&quot; or &quot;find the kidnapped merchants from the caravan&quot;)When you feel like a particular theme or set of circumstances has played out, shake things up with a big event that moves the campaign along and reminds the PCs that there are other, more powerful, actors in the world.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Uller, post: 6356754, member: 413"] I haven't read the whole thread...but the most important advice was given early. Start small and don't script everything out. Sandbox campaign's are the PC's stories...the DM is just helping them construct it. If you have some over arching campaign story in mind, the players will still feel like they are following your script. Besides, maybe today the barbarian horde commanded by the evil cleric and his demon allies sounds like an interesting campaign idea, but 3 months from now you (or your players) will have thought of something more interesting. The way I do it is I start small: a village, a small outpost or a neighborhood in a bigger town or city and a couple of paragraphs of how it fits into the surrounding areas and another about what the PCs might be doing there. I usually "railroad" the PCs in the first session the same way LMoP does (I like to start a campaign with a fight or some other crisis). But then at the end of each session I try to give the party 2-3 concrete options of what to do next (and encourage them to come up with their own as well). I encourage the party to choose their next course at the end of a session so I have a week or so to detail things. That way you don't have to have _everything_ planned for...just the most likely stuff. As time passes, some options expire and new ones arise (if one option was "stop the bandits from robbing the caravan" once that event happens it will go away but might be replaced with a couple of new options like "capture the bandits that murdered the caravan guards" or "find the kidnapped merchants from the caravan") When you feel like a particular theme or set of circumstances has played out, shake things up with a big event that moves the campaign along and reminds the PCs that there are other, more powerful, actors in the world. [/QUOTE]

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