Getting PCs together

[njorgard]

Something different...

I once read about this guy who started out an adventure with his players going to "Fantasy Island". Ricardo Montalban (a.k.a Mr Rourke) made them live out their fantasy by placing them inside this "Sword and Sorcery" realm as the characters they were going to play. At the end of the campaign, all the characters get killed in this epic battle and are brought back to "reality" by Mr. Montalban. Go figure...

I know is kinda silly, but I laughed myself stupid when I read it. At least is something different.

 

[Deadguy]

Get Them to Do the Work

This method depends on your players understanding your setting a bit - but then I generally find that time invested at the start giving them an overview of how the game will work is always worthwhile.

So, get them to create their characters together - I find that that can actually be quite enjoyable in a good social setting. But get them to work out their connections one to another. I generally advise against everyone knowing everyone else. Instead if each knows one of two otehrs you have a natural chain of connections.

As an example, I know a group, consisting of a Human Wizard, Half-Elf Cleric, Dwarf Fighter, Human Barbarian and an Elven Rogue. Well, it turned out that things hinged around the Half-Elf Cleric. He was a priest of a God of Travel, and knew the Elf Rogue, as that character's father was a diplomat that the Clerical Order had escorted on one occasion and protected from an orc attack. They'd spent time together as guests in the diplomat's home, and he'd made friends with the somewhat sleazy young Elf. Meanwhile, the Dwarf had signed on for a while as a caravan guard and had accompanied the Half-Elf in the past. The Dwarf's father, a master swordsmith, had employed the services of a Wizard in the past, to complete a commission for a magic sword. The wizard involved was the deputy guildmaster of a large town, whose nephew was following in his footsteps (the Human Wizard), so he knew of the Dwarf's family by reputation. At the same time, he was also acquainted with the Human Barbarian, a hard-living trapper from the fringes of the kingdom, who'd sold the pelts of several strange animals he'd captured to the Wizard's uncle. After getting into a druken brawl, they were fast friends.

So everyone has some story to hang their association on, and they can feel that they might have met even if they weren't "adventurers".

 

[Eosin the Red]

I always try to use very unexpected ways of getting my parties together.

1) all PC's were traveling with a caravan (not guards, just travelling) when it is attaced by a powerful necromancer. One of the (powerful) NPC's begins to fight the necromancer, the PC's rush to his side - just in time for a death spell. POOF, all PC's dead. They find themselves in an oasis with all kinds of ethereal beings - it is a kind of purgatory for those who are killed by undead. The had a fate which has been circumvented because the undead are abominations that aren't accounted for by destiny/the gods. They must cross the Plain of Dreams and get past the guardians in order to live again.

After surviving death, the PC's find sanctuary with an old hermit. He is the "mystic scholar" type. He asks them to stay together and visit a friend of his several days travel to the north. The PC's find out from the friend that they no longer have a fate. [kind of a David Eddings thing].