D&D 4E first time dm creating 4e world, help pls?

[Flipguarder]

My name is Jon. SPOILER ALERT SAM

first off I have posted something similar, but I figure its a better fit here in the 4e forum.
Second off I don't need praise. Equally I don't need rudeness. second time posting here, but I've had my fair share of forums

I'm relatively knew to D&D. I'm in the middle of my first campaign. I have a possibly insane aspiration to run our first 4e campaign. I have things worked out. My goal here is to display what I have so far. I hope that I can gain some insight on what I could include in addition to whether or not what I have now works.

The universe is in chaos. the planes are changing, reforming, barriers are breaking down. Gods are dying and a new mysterious Gods are appearing, declaring their divinity with great shows of power and influence. A shaky alliance of Evil deities bent on shifting the changes towards their own selfish goals. The forces of Good fight back but are being held at bay by another mysterious and powerful group calling themselves the "seeds of Pandorym" (yes that one). This group is also claiming responsibility for dozens of worldwide perils. The most pronounced ones being a dark spiral tower that floats across the planet commonly reffered to as mid-world. And a giant red moon has appeared in the sky, bringing with it, a wave of aggression and fear that sweeps the land. (this is the information given to the pcs at the start and the intro to my world)

The main quest (the longest part of the adventure) is focused on getting an ancient relic "an essence holder" back to Corellon Larethian, who has been trapped in Shadow fell by the Raven Queen and her allies. This cube carries the lion's share of Corellon's divine power. He did this because the Evil alliance has discovered a way to absorb the divine power of dieties, and he secured his at the last minute before capture.

Running sessions with the characters in solo, I have them all end by sleeping and waking in seperate prison cells with the essence holder and a book of lies a fun little device I cooked up. when they get out of the prison they use what is essentially a stargate that travels between planes to leave where they are (shadowfell) to go back to midworld. Where they witness one of the many battles between the two alliances near the dark tower and under the red moon.

Obviously, being in this situation is going to be overwhelming for heroic tier characters. Their main ally actually is their main enemy as well. A Rakshasa sorcerer named Sylar (who is very evil, and pre-campaign, was dominating a large colony of Gnolls for destructive purposes) was captured and tortured into submission himself by Pandorym and made insane, he now functions as Pandoryms #2. Of course he fights this imprisonment and has developed a split personality. He used this to secure the "fated ones" and "lose" the essence he had captured from one of Corellon's temples. Also being #2 means establishing the defenses for many of Pandorym's self proclaimed temples. This means "interesting" situations involving treasure and traps for the first ten levels or so. After which such fun will be replaced by more mature situations (not adult).

The campaign will go to the 30 lvl cap and I see at that point the characters fighting pandorym himself, killing Sylar at around level 19. And then joining the Dieties in direct battle through epic levels and slowly destroying the evil alliance.

thats the storyline I have down,

Ive created several dungeons including the Shadowfell Jail they start in, some teifling ruins, the dark tower, a kuo-tua colony and a dwarven temple dedicated to protect a relic needed desperately by the PCs. I have the reasons the PCS would go to these places but don't want to rant insanely.

I would like advice on what else I could put in using this. I do have a cosmology worked out. but again won't go into unless asked. any notable npcs would be appreciated. as would additional ideas for pretty much everything. If you are still reading this, thanks for the attention.

 

[Jack99]

I am personally not a big fan of the : You are level 1, here is an artifact, your goal is to destroy a guy that eats gods for breakfast.-style.

Often it becomes and feels too much like rail-roading, and a lot of players don't like that. Now, your players might, I am sure that you know them better than I.

So therefore, my suggestion would be to delay the plot a bit, maybe have them start off on earth, then slowly acquire the knowledge and the essence. I don't understand, from what you have written, why it is necessary to start them off in SF, then push them through a gate back to earth, etc etc.

Good luck with it

Cheers,

 

[ObsidianCrane]

This sounds like the summary for a Paragon leading to Epic campaign rather than one starting at 1st level.

Take a look at the zeitgeist article on the WotC site - your idea looks like a great example of that.

You could easily start the campaign at 1st level get the characters/players familiar with the world and invested in it then start the strife and by the time they are escaping that prison in the Shadowfell they could be mid to high Paragon tier and starting to think about Epic and their destinies and the chance to become a god's right hand man etc.

 

[Flipguarder]

The reason I used the artifact is this.

I was trying to find a reason to keep the group together for the beginning levels. In our current campaign our personalitys were so different (not alignment, but personality) that we ended up parting ways, and our DM was like, oooook, I guess we're done.

When they get back to Mid-world if they try to leave the group they begin to go insane. That is because the red moon is there. It was created by Sylar and is now maintained by Gnolls living in the Dark tower. The only way to counteract it is to use a spell that I develped called sanctify. this specifically counteracts the spell the WORLD is under and is what creates my points of light situation. Because many cities and most towns couldn't counteract it in time. Most temples have priests high enough to use this ritual on a city. I have all of the info on these spell effectsl if you want it. The reason the PCS don't immediately die, is because one of the side effects of the Essence is its constant generation of this effect.

And don't think I tell these guys ANY of this at level 1. For the first ten levels, their situation is more along the lines of, OMG what the hell is happening to this world, and how can we stop it. Giant armies, God battles, entire towns going insane, they will see these at 1st level, but they won't really be able to affect those. What they will do is slowly learn and then counteract the lesser effects of the Red moon (small villages, urban fights, smaller dungeons) finally counqering the Dark tower and defeating the Gnoll outpost established there, ending the effect at level 10. And issueing the characters into the real quest and their knowledge of the essence and Corellon's capture.

I don't mean to be argumentative, just to show people the other info I have to better explain the situation.

If this still seems like railroading to you guys please let me know. The way the world is set up they have extensive range of what they can do based on the geography being pre-set up. "Hey you guys see a ship, you wanna go sail somewhere, great. You want to go to the temple to understand what the essence is, thats fine to. You wanna leave the city and go say..... south for no reason. GREAT!" I wanted to create a feeling of freedom to combat the feeling of "I cant do anything about all this"

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I agree with the others that this sounds like a good premise for 15th level and above, and a bit crazy for 1st level.

However, if it's the story you want to tell, and it sounds like it is, you should tell it your way. Honestly, you don't sound like you need too much help.

Fitz

 

[Spinachcat]

What is the longest campaign your group has achieved? How many levels were gained between the first session and the final one for that campaign?

I ask this because it sounds like you are creating an overly huge arc. Be realistic about how many sessions your group really plays before a campaign collapses. You can still do this campaign, but you might need to do "level jumps" where after PCs may gain x2 or x5 XP so they can reach the desired level for the endgame.

The best way to get players to stay together is to say to the players THIS IS THE GAME and that is why we are staying together. If a campaign ends because everyone wants to be a special snowflake in their corner of the planet, then players need smacking. If a character's personality is the problem, the player needs to change it pronto OR retire that character and bring one to the party with a much less asshat personality. If it is a player personality that is ending campaigns, kick that player to the curb.

 

[Novem5er]

I think it's a great idea. I love the red moon appearing as both a harbinger and a catalyst for aggression.

I have no problems setting 1 level players off on an epic quest because, over 30 levels, there's plenty of room to get side tracked for a couple adventures, or for the DM to adjust events according to the PCs (inevitably) out-of-left field solutions.

However, one key concept of fantasy is that new adventurers start small.

Yes, Frodo was told right away that the One Ring was directly connected to Sauron and held the power to control the world... but BILBO thought it was just a lucky find.

I definitely suggest that the Heroic levels are spent completing small goals: breaking out of prison, saving a single village, finding a helpful item (the cube?), and rescuing a local sage.

Towards the beginning of the Paragon levels, the players should start to understand that they are uniquely positioned to solve a much larger problem. Maybe the sage they rescued gives them clues to the true power of the cube? Minor villains of the Heroic levels are discovered to be henchmen of a greater evil?

It looks like you're on the right track. I'd just let the players have FUN for the first few levels especially. Give them attainable goals without putting the weight of the world on their back, then, to keep them interested, up the tension as they gain levels by revealing more and more of the plot.

 

[Iron Sky]

It sounds like an interesting campaign, but I personally have found that games that start too epic tend to fizzle out, especially with experienced players who are accustomed to the level of freedom that can be found in RPGs.

If the players are all fairly new, it might work, especially if they are used to computer or console RPGs where the plot is pre-existing and not co-created the way it can be with direct personal access to the person who created the world(the DM) while you're playing.

As for keeping players together(and as a general tip I find extremely useful), I tell my players to create 5 Quirks and 5 Secrets about their character when they make them, gaining 1% of a level worth of XP per Quirk or Secret they create(so 100 starting xp for level 1 characters if they do them all). They aren't required, but they give the players a small incentive to do them.

Quirks are little things that make the character distinctive and are usually pretty obvious if you spend any amount of time with that character. These tend to add physical flavor and personality to a character. Examples from my player's characters:

Growls when thinking.
Wears dozens of archery medals any time in civilization and brags about them.
Ends every battle - no matter how gory - with just one splotch of blood on them that they flick off(for a particularly anime-like game).
Has silver hair.

Secrets don't have to be huge, just are things that usually aren't revealed unless you spend alot of time with the character, if then. These tend to add backstory, personality, goals, and plot hooks for the DM, especially if the player leaves them open-ended for the DM to figure out. Examples from my player's characters:

Used to be the best-friend of the campaign's main villain, but repented.
Has a son.
A hero in his homeland for being the only one to survive a battle, but only he knows that the reason the battle happened was that he was the scout and led his army into an ambush that - by chance - only he survived.

Secrets are great for linking characters together. If one character's secret is: "Home village razed by a bandit leader who wields a black greataxe" and another's is: "Was enslaved by a band of gnolls", you have an instant link if you add a band of gnoll bandits led by one with a greataxe to your game. Tell the first player that the bandits were gnolls and the second that the gnolls that enslaved him were bandits and then let them find out in game that they share a common enemy.

That's a subtle tool for uniting the party that I've come to rely on, in addition to the usual bag of tricks.

Some players may resent being "railroaded" into your plot by starting in prison and "spoon fed" the plot/what they are supposed to do for the campaign. If they see it as your plot, there will be far less interest and committment, in my experiences as player and DM, than if they "discover" the plot and make it theirs. Which is easy to say, but it's taken me over 10 years of fairly regular DMing to be able to do so on a regular basis(especially with players that all have 10+ years of play experience and are pretty jaded - "oh, it's the 'we start in a tavern' PC intro...")

Other ways to start a game include having them be attacked during the first encounter while they are all strangers and having them stand against a common foe(easy), throw them into an interesting social/environmental situation and figure out how to make them find common interests/work together(harder) or making characters that already know each other and have them come up with a "group theme" so they start out united(easy, but loses the fun of meeting the other PCs for the first time). I'm sure there's other ways, but those are the ones that come to mind off the top of my head.

The most brutal method I've used to keep players together I use mainly in dark, gritty games(which my games often are - points of light is going to be an easy transition for me since all the games I've ever run were pretty much points of light anyway(or apocalyptic, or both)).

With this method, if player A decides he's going to do his own thing, maybe he gets attacked by a band of gnoll bandits(whose leader maybe uses a greataxe) and dies because he can't take them all alone, players B, C, and D(and A when he makes a new character) usually get the idea. If your players get really upset about character death, this one might not work so well.

For new DMs, I'd recommend not getting too epic too fast. I did it when I was first starting and only got away with it because my players were all new to roleplaying too. It also makes the transition to DMing easier. Worrying about what happens with Foozleville by the Foozlemonster Cave and the Foozleloot Ruins gives you a chance to wet your feet for DMing(which is much harder than it looks) without also having to keep track of epic world-wide events, dozens of main characters, artifacts, etc.

The most basic and consistant rule of DMing I've found is:
Most of the time, the players - if given the freedom to do so - will do something you don't expect/didn't plan for.

Your choices are:
A) Don't give the players that freedom. (Most common starting DM tactic, often leading to less immersion and feeling of free-will in your game, especially with experienced players).
B) Be flexible and learn to improvise until you can find a way to get them back to what you planned (better option, unfortunately usually only comes with practice)
C) Run a game open-ended enough that the players can do whatever they choose (requires lots of improvisational DMing experience, a quick imagination and/or a very fleshed out world that you know intimately).

This reply is long-winded and possibly more than you really cared about, but hopefully there's something in there helpful or at least interesting.

If your players are fairly new, your job is pretty easy and they'll probably go along with whatever(personalities permitting) as they won't have expectations yet as to how roleplaying "should be".

Welcome to the DM ranks and good luck. It can be difficult and frustrating work, but as a player I've never felt anywhere near the level of satisfaction I've felt during/after running a great session.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

The reason I used the artifact is this.

I was trying to find a reason to keep the group together for the beginning levels. In our current campaign our personalitys were so different (not alignment, but personality) that we ended up parting ways, and our DM was like, oooook, I guess we're done.

Here's a fun trick that works: get the players to write up why their characters like each other and are adventuring together. That way the onus is on them to explain why a band of individuals of disparate temperaments would want to hang out together, and the responsibility for holding the game together is out of your hands. Also, you don't need a deus ex machina to enforce party cohesion.

The thing is, players owe this to the DM. The DM goes to all the trouble of writing a bunch of adventures and a world to have them in, and the best the players can come up with to support the game is to say "well, my elf doesn't like that dwarf, so he's leaving"? That's totally weak, and disrespectful of the hard work the DM is putting in to make a fun game possible for the group.

This is actually the sort of thing that a group should sit down and talk about, rather than leave it unsaid so that it can undermine the fun that you're trying to have together.

 

[Flipguarder]

thanks first and foremost thank you all for your replies, its impossible to recieve too much advice as a beginning dm.

Im not worried about creating relationships between the characters. But just due to role-playing I imagine this scenario. I'm in prison, these other guys are in prison, we escape. "see ya, I got stuff to do.", not "hey, lets join forces and solve the world's problems."

I like the idea of giving the characters secrets and quirks that establish more of a relationship with eachother. But I'll work that out when they create them


I don't understand the idea of not spoon-feeding the plot. If you mean that I shouldnt explain every plot point to them, I dont plan on doing that, if you are saying I should let the characters develop the plot, I dont understand how to do that. There are story reasons why they are in prison originally. after that the main idea is the Characters are dropped on midworld and given the choice to go essentially ANYWHERE. I have the whole material plane mapped out and I plan on having adventures available in most places.

Throughout their travels (not that epic, being attacked by gnolls, being shipwrecked on a kuo-tua lair, stopping a slave trade, various urban encounters) I will drop hints about whats happening eventually leading to the knowledge at lvl 8-10 that the Dark tower is the cause for the world-wide aggression, after stopping it they will know that Corellon Larethian is captured and they(pcs) hold his essence, they will spend the next 10 lvls trying to find him by traveling through various planes and going to various temples. My npcs will give them advice, but most of the time, where they wanna go is up to them, everything is already set up

as for the over arc problem, I plan on this being a bi-weekly game lasting 4 hrs each with levels being gained about every 7-9 encounters. 3-5 encounters per session mean that the game will last a maximum of 10 months and a minimum of about 4 months, we've been playing for 4 months now, and are level 11 a lot of story is involved but it will be pretty condensed, not as much fluff as most campaigns. the exp system im using is WWWAAAYY simplified, as my current dm does it. which is basically based on encounters per level with exceptions on both story/noncombat encounters and encounter difficulty. A battle with an ecl 2 or 3 levels above them will count as 2 encounters and vice-versa.

as for iron skies rule for DMing, is planning for most pc plans and winging it after that a workable plan, or will characters strive to make my campaign useless by making unrealistic decisions. "I have 10,000 gold, i want to buy a house and get a job"

I appreciate the comments and would love any other advice or questions, I find it helps to get other's views on my idea, whether good or bad.