Encounters for adolescent PCs

[RangerWickett]

So the village exists near a buried portal to the plane of Limbo. Most everyone who is a native of the town was not born there, but instead was found buried in the soil of this one field near the village. Taking a cue from the Catholics, infants who die when they are not cogent enough for their morality to define an eternal resting place, go to Limbo. A few of these infants' spirits struggle to find a way to return to life, and some of them have made it through a portal into this newborn world the campaign takes place in.

The first adult adventure I have planned for the characters is for a traveling merchant to come to the town, saying that he found a dried up river full of gold, and he wants help collecting it and taking it to sell. It will be in a valley that no one from the town goes to because there is rumored to be a great monster there. The merchant claims to have magic to scare off the monster, and he just needs help to carry out the loot, which he promises to share.

So some time before this I want to hint at the presence of this monster.

The overall setting of the game is sort of a magical Bronze Age, the time before the world had settled down. Elves will be powerful in their magic, and hordes of monsters roam, for they do not fear mankind yet, and so have no need to hide in the shadows. The phrase that keeps tumbling through my head is from Genesis: "There were giants in the earth in those days."

It suggests a primordial era, a time when great things were no just possible, they were commonplace. People were constantly threatened by the creatures around them, but somehow they persevered and laid claim to the whole world. There is not yet a clear religion, and indeed, only a few creatures that might be called gods have even noticed this world. There is great potential for magic, but people do not know how to harness this power. The world is unexplored, so who knows what might lie beyond the next valley?

The driving force will be discovery. This is why the game needs to start with the players discovering the world through the eyes of their characters, and not with me just telling them what they know about the world.

Thanks for all the ideas so far.

 

[Mycanid]

Whoa ... totally different than I had assumed ranger! Anyway, looks good. I am not into extraplanar stuff that much personally, but I'm sure your players will enjoy it!

 

[RedWick]

Have them play a game of make-believe and storytelling, letting the PCs make up strange locations. Then, when they venture outside the known edges of their small world, they actually discover the places they made up, including monsters and/or treasure. Within reason, of course.

 

[Cartigan Mrryl]

If the group's highly into RP and ae up for it, maybe you can make a chart, and this'll decide their parentage. Like...

D10 Chart:
1: Expert(NPC class) parent
2: Warrior/Fighter parent
3: Wizard/Adept Parent
4: ...
..
10: No parent/ flexible parent (PCs choice)

... etc, etc. This could be thier parentage and result in their first level... Maybe make them take NPC classes for the first little while, then they can get formal training and regain 1/2 their levels as a Base class of their choice? Thus a 5th lvl Expert could become a 2nd lvl Rogue, Fighter, etc... Just a thought. It'd be pregen, but not pregen. Just a thought... because remember: You can't pick your family.

 

[RangerWickett]

Have them play a game of make-believe and storytelling, letting the PCs make up strange locations. Then, when they venture outside the known edges of their small world, they actually discover the places they made up, including monsters and/or treasure. Within reason, of course.

This is an awesome idea. You guys are inspiring me. I now want to have some form of magic that works on storytelling, where you shape the world by speaking it into existence.

Now I need to make sure that the game mechanics will work for what I have in mind. How does one make a character a bit at a time? I suppose they could get ability scores, and have no skills, and then just gain skills as they adventure. Maybe I could create a one-level "growing up" class that gives them a ton of skill points and lets them spend them however they want.

Hmm.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Pick up the Spiderwick Chronicles and blast through them all in an afternoon -- a lot of good ideas in there.

I'd also use non-swarming shimmerlings and petals from MM3. Both make magical but low danger encounters that hint at other things beyond and can effectively serve as a buffer between the kids and the big bad world.

I'd also look up the Wikipedia entry for Grimm's Fairy tales and click on any you're not familiar with. I have stolen a whole bunch of adventure ideas for my Midwood campaign from the more obscure Grimm's fairy tales, which have a totally different vibe than many D&D games.

 

[ajanders]

Goodman Games has an adventure for 1/2 level characters. TSR did a 2nd Edition adventure for 0 level characters, I think.
Unfortunately, neither of them fit your setting very well.

Do you have Unearthed Arcana? If these are truly the days of ancient legends, maybe a human goes through the three levels of the human paragon class before they grow up...so even the farmers are Human Paragon 1/Commoner 1 characters.
Your players can then roleplay growing up for three levels before officially "Choosing a Path" and a "real class".

Works for the other races too.

aja

 

[Slife]

I suppose you could get some inspiration from Oz. The super-high magic areas would be interesting, and could be altered to convey a world that's still settling down into reality. Then, too, there's the fact that there are a lot of non-lethal challenges.

 

[domino]

This is an awesome idea. You guys are inspiring me. I now want to have some form of magic that works on storytelling, where you shape the world by speaking it into existence.

You don't even need to do that. They thought they made it up completely.

And then find out they were wrong. So the next question is, how did they know about this thing they'd never seen before? Especially if you can make it seem like they didn't see it recently. Maybe a house someone mentioned has long fallen into disrepair. But some item they mentioned is still there, discarded or overlooked.

 

[RangerWickett]

I'm thinking about the town itself.

There will be two 'mayors' of the town. I need a better name, but basically these are the people in charge. The first will be a sorcerer woman named Sanni, who is the most accomplished mage of the town (being a 4th level sorcerer). She'll be the go-to person initially for learning about magic, and she might be something like a priest. However, partway through their youth, the village will get attacked by something (suggestions?) and Sanni will either die during the attack, or be driven away in the aftermath by a warrior who thinks she was in league with the enemy. The new mayor will have in his 'office' a section of wall concealed with a curtain, which he won't allow people to look behind.

I want a pair of drinking buddies who were the ones to invent alcohol. Their names are Good and Evil, and they have a girl that the two of them both are interested. Her name is Neutral.

I want some manner of minor deity or demigod to be an antagonist. He won't be a direct villain, but his motivation will go up against the PCs. I'm thinking he'll be some sort of divine explorer, looking for a place to set up dominion. He might be a petulant little jerk personally, but he's good at pulling the wool over the eyes of common folk, and later on the PCs might need the assistance of a god. Maybe he's even Prometheus-like, in that he brought technology, light, or civilization to the people of this region, but the PCs will discover he's not all bright and shiny as he pretends. I'm actually rather inspired by ooh, what's his name, in Piratecat's storyhour. The new god of undead, who likes hot vampire chicks.

Artep will be the storytelling NPC, who sends kids on errands and pays them in trinkets from his journeys. He'll be modeled on my mother, who is a children's librarian.

Later on, I want the PCs to meet some champions from other communities. One will be a traveling gnome monster hunter, driven to find away to fight against dragon fear (she can become the first paladin). Another will be a mage who is trying to bring back a dead loved one. One will be an orc mage who is trying to fix the world, and who can ally with the PCs.

Any other ideas?