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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 9046848" data-attributes="member: 42582">Upthread I think you talked about a session zero. I would say this is the time to bring along your ideas, and then see how the players respond to those ideas in building their PCs.And then you work out how you want to open the game. I don't know if you like to start your game in session zero - if that's the case, you might need at least a short break to work out some sort of opening that fits the PCs your players have come up with. Or if you like to start the game in the next session, in which case you've got a week or two to do some prep!I've looked over your posts setting out your ideas, and your bullet points, and some replies.My view is, if you're passionate about it, go for it! Hopefully your players will pick up on your passion, and so they'll go with it too! Personally I've enjoyed running "cosmological" campaigns - I ran a 10+ year one using Rolemaster quite a while ago now, and a 4e D&D one from 2009 to 2016. And when I read your ideas, that's the vibe I get - a cosmological campaign, but with the "mundane" world as the place where it plays out. So for me, that works as a pitch. I'd focus on those ideas about pantheons, avatars, and relationships between them, rather than particular ideas about how it might all turn out. And I'd share that stuff with your players! Let them enjoy and build on your enthusiasm.I've got two thoughts here.(1) I would suggest that you as GM take control of the geography. Because D&D works best when all the PCs are in the same place together.(2) But I would suggest that you let the players take control of their attitudes towards the different gods and so on. So if they think that Kord is better than Hextor, let play start from that. At least in my experience, the GM telling the players how they should feel about the different players in the cosmology makes it harder to get the players engaged in a cosmological campaign. From the player side, part of the fun of a cosmological campaign is getting to pick your side - or maybe, like some of the players in my cosmological campaigns, to reject all sides.If they agree with you that Kord and Hextor are both tyrants, then that's fine: find out what they do care about, and put that into play.I like your big picture - gods, avatars, walled cities with massed troops - more than your rats scenario. The big picture makes me want to play a templar and see if I can make my mark on the world; or play a farmer who leads a small resistance cell, who meet in a cave above the nearly-dry stream bed and say their prayers over the helmet of the templar of Hextor that the cell's founder once defeated. This is vivid, compelling stuff. If I was one of your players you'd get my buy in easily.Your scenario seems to be all about secrets the GM knows but the players don't, that may or may not come out, with stakes that may or may not matter to the players and their PCs. It doesn't really seem to draw on, or feed into, the big picture.If it was me in your situation, having thought up your big picture, I'd see how the players respond and what PCs they build, and then look for an opening scenario or situation that feeds on their energy in the same way that (hopefully) their PC building feeds on your energy.</blockquote>

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