Does your campaign have a theme and mood?

[Mercule]

I've seen a lot of books (WoD, Eberron, others) trumpet having a theme, mood, and title for a campaign. Myself, I've never been able to lay a finger on exactly what the theme and mood of my games are.

I'm just wondering how many GMs have a theme/mood/title that could be succinctly written down (word or phrase, not paragraph) for their games. If you've got 'em, what are they? How did you nail it down?

 

[the Jester]

There's not enough range in the potential answers. How about 'sometimes' have a theme?

 

[haiiro]

My current campaign has a theme, but I don't force it on the PCs (if that makes any sense). I'm content to see it slowly emerge -- we've been playing for a year and I don't think any of the players have seen enough to say "That's the theme! Right there! Boo-ya!"

It's also my first campaign to have a theme -- at least, one that I thought about in the design stages -- which is fun in and of itself.

 

[Pants]

My mood right now is:
A gritty, urban, political mish-mash of guns, sorcery, intruige, high-flying adventure, airships, and multi-planar escapades. Throw in some demons, morally ambiguous 'heroes,' and lots of cloak and dagger stuff.

It's basically a mish-mash of everything I like into one semi-cohesive whole.

 

[Hammerhead]

My campaign and world's theme is hope, since it takes place a few years after a great magical disaster as people try to rebuild and stuff.

 

[Ry]

My mood right now is:
A gritty, urban, political mish-mash of guns, sorcery, intruige, high-flying adventure, airships, and multi-planar escapades. Throw in some demons, morally ambiguous 'heroes,' and lots of cloak and dagger stuff.

It's basically a mish-mash of everything I like into one semi-cohesive whole.

You wrote Eberron?!

 

[sfedi]

I'm just wondering how many GMs have a theme/mood/title that could be succinctly written down (word or phrase, not paragraph) for their games. If you've got 'em, what are they? How did you nail it down?

Lately I always do campaigns with mood and theme:

Galia
It's a world. Where magic is not so powerfull, but Nature is.
The other strong presence in the world are Light and Darkness.
Feys and Elves are Divine rather than nature oriented.
Dwarves and Gnomes are Nature oriented.
Half-orcs are Dark oriented.
And there's always tension between the Divine and the Natural.
The mood of this world (and all campaigns that take place in it) is the constant struggle between being human (and thus, neutral) to been noble, good, lawful (thus, Divine)
The Light forces emobdy ideals, perfection and eternity.
The Dark froces embody corruption, chaos and tyranny.
The Nature forces embody evolution, contradictions, organization and competition.

Name: Low Matters, took place in Galia (see above)
A campaign where all PCs were Halflings, and they had to uncover a long lost secret deep underground. This discovery would have a dramatic impact on their lives and in the world. It was very Indiana Jones-esque in mood.

Name: DarkQuest, took place in Galia (see above)
A campaign for only 2 characters, a Druid and a Dark Mage (a Wizard of the Darkness) that revolved around finding an old weapon, which was created by Druids, but corrupted by Darkness. Then, there would be the conflict of what to do with such a weapon (it was sort of Spirit of the Land Undead) while only the cooperation of a Druid and a Dark Mage could control the creature.

Name: DarkSeed, took place in FR, more precisely in Undermountain.
The mood I wanted to make was of paranoia, like in Alien.
You never knew when or where the danger would come from.
And I succeeded at it
Players got too stressed though
It revolved around a curse that affected most characters, but that it will ultimately empower them.

Last, there's the campaign of the Adventure Path modules...

 

[Telperion]

I'm not fully awake yet, so I'll just throw you some keywords and concepts .

Theme:

Chivalry vs. survival.
Madness vs. righteous wrath.
True faith vs. an easier, but ultimately destructive, path.

Mood:

Grim reality clashes with hopes and dreams.
Sacrifices must be made for the Greater Good.
Do you trust yourself enough to take up the mantle of "Defender of Law, Order, Good and Light", or do you seek a new champion?
When your own leaders crumble under the assault of Evil who do you turn to?

 

[was]

There's usually a background theme with a lot of other stuff going on in the meanwhile.

 

[Crothian]

Right now I am exploring the divine verse the mortals, hubris, and taking mortals down the road that leads to divine beings.