How do you start a campaign?

[Feeroper]

Hey everyone,

I'm about to begin DMing (for the first time ever - 4e) with a group of friends who are mostly new to pen and paper RPG's. I had planned on running a few Dungeon Delves first, for the entire groups benefit, to get my feet wet with being a DM, and their feet wet with playing a P&P RPG. Perhaps afterwards, depending on how it all goes, I am going to run a heoroic level WotC official Module to get into something a little more beefy, but eventually I want to get to a home made campaign, which brings me to my question:

How do you start your campaign? Do you generally have an idea or skeleton of the overal story arc you want them to pass through over a certain amount of time (months, years etc..)? Do you have your main antagonist setup even if its going to be a looooong time before the PC's even hear a whisper of his/her name? Are all your adventures through the campaign pre-determined, or at least pre-determined as best they can be?

-or-

Do you just start them on an adventure or quest, one at a time, and make it up as you go campaign-wise, and let the story find itself?

I know alot of this will depend on the group you play with, but I just wanted to get an idea of how others approach it, what works, what doesn't.

It is my hope (assuming the game is well recieved by my new group) that I can start a grand campaign eventually, even if it is born out of one of the Delves or WotC adventures and goes from there (possibly requiring some retcon). At some point though, I would want to have a fairly pre-determined story set, or at least some pre-determined circumstances that I can throw at the players, see how they react, and find a way to steer them in the right direction story wise, making them feel like it was their decision to follow this path (or maybe they will force my hand into doing something different that I wouldnt have thought of to begin with, who knows).

Anyways, Im rambling now. So if anyone has any advice or experiences to share regarding their campaigns, Id be very appretiative. Thanks!

 

[Halivar]

"Ok, you guys are in a tavern. What kind of beer are you drinking?"

 

[Krensky]

Same way I end them.

Explosions and fire.

 

[Scotley]

I don't think there is a 'right' answer to your question. I've been DMing for a very looong time and I've done it both ways. My recommendation at this point is that you keep things very simple and don't do too much work in advance. The reasons for this advice mainly come down to the inexperience of the group. You haven't played with them long enough to know what they like. If you put tons of work into a game only to discover that they players want something else it will be a very unsatisfying experience. I believe starting out with delves and pre-packaged adventures will help you learn about the players and their individual styles. There is a lot of good advice at

Roleplaying Tips - RPG advice for roleplayers, gamemasters, all role-playing systems

Once the players get comfortable with the game you might try some surveys or questionnaires which can be found on the site above. Campaigns are very much a collaborative effort. These new to the game players are going to need a little work before they are ready to give you the collaboration that is required to make a huge planned out game work. Bring them along slowly, educate yourself and try a fairly simple story arc first. Good Luck and remember to worry more about having fun than building a perfect campaign.

 

[Quickleaf]

I'm about to begin DMing (for the first time ever - 4e) with a group of friends who are mostly new to pen and paper RPG's. I had planned on running a few Dungeon Delves first, for the entire groups benefit, to get my feet wet with being a DM, and their feet wet with playing a P&P RPG. Perhaps afterwards, depending on how it all goes, I am going to run a heoroic level WotC official Module to get into something a little more beefy, but eventually I want to get to a home made campaign, which brings me to my question:

Way to pick up the DM banner! It's a wise decision to start slow and will help you get a better read on what the group likes. And it's great you're thinking about a campaign already - I've found the more into the game I am the more it draws the other players in and the more fun everyone has.

So you asked a ton of great questions.

I am on the excessive preparation end of the scale, so this is what works for me, not necessarily what I recommend for you and your group. Take what works for you and leave the rest.

I've also attached a couple pdfs of campaign planning I've been doing for a campaign that's going to begin in August (yes I'm a bit OCPD planning 6 months in advance for a D&D campaign).

Preparation improves improvisation
The clearer you are on how events progress, what major NPCs want to accomplish, the history of the setting, even how your encounter scripts look - the clearer you are the easier it will be to improvise because you'll know how to respond to the unexpected in a way that doesn't break from the storyline but enhances it.
Likewise, have all the maps & minis & dice you need, read the adventure beforehand, have a list of NPC names, etc. This will not only speed up gameplay, but make improvising more enjoyable for you.

Start with a bang
I let the players decide how (or if) their characters know each other, then start with an exciting scene that lets the players test drive their PCs' abilities and sets the tone for the rest of the campaign. For me, the first adventure is critical because it's where the theme of your campaign is created and "unspoken promises" are made. If the nation is oppressed by a tyrant, you're making the unspoken promise with the players that their characters will play a critical role in weakening or overthrowing the tyrant.

Remember act 2
A lot of D&D games forget that the second act of a story is meant to develop the characters. In many D&D games this is filled with meaningless decisions (left or right door), and lots of fighting and traps. Fighting and traps are great, just give them meaning - why is it important they finish this quest? what other side quests are they interested in pursuing? do any of the characters (PCs/NPCs) change because of this encounter? what does the overland journey tell us about what makes the PCs tick? Make a meaningful and fun second act and the players will love watching their characters shine.

Never confuse illusion of choice with real choice
This one is more complex. While I do plan every adventure in advance, there's lots of choices the PCs can make within each adventure that will change the campaign. I determine the plot (mostly), and the players determine how their PCs navigate it. The PCs (usually) can't alter the order of the adventures they'll face, but they can change the parameters of an adventure, for example whether they infiltrate a prison using stealth, guile, force, or some combination.

Anyhow, that's some of my advice. Listen to what other folks have to say and see what works for you.

 

[kenmarable]

My (long-winded, sorry) advice both from my own experience and in thinking what might work best for a first time DM is:

#1: Campaign Theme/Hook
Come up with a general theme/motivation for the campaign. This is best if it’s done with the players as well. For example, I ran an Eberron campaign based around Morgrave University and most of the PCs were students or professors (but also had a journalist along as well). Of course I had all kinds of grand plans, but it was great having some grounding hook for everyone that most of the adventures could spring up from.

Other ones I’ve used are artifact hunters, resurrecting dead gods (that one is Epic level, of course), survivors of locations wiped out by an undead army teaming up to stop it, escaped slaves fleeing through the Underdark, group of powerful heroes called from across the nation to help with a giant invasion, and so on.

The entire campaign need not be tied to that theme, but sometimes it is (like the Morgrave or undead army ones), and others are just starting points that wind up leading elsewhere (like the escaped slave one led to being in the middle of a battle between two gods).

#2: Start simple
My best adventure beginnings have often had nothing to do with the overall campaign. It’s to the point where I now just plan on something mostly unrelated to start things off, but maybe has some hooks for the future (like meeting a mysterious patron who wants to employ them for much of the campaign). This also helps the players because in the first couple few sessions, they are most likely still getting into their PCs and working on understanding them (mechanics and personality). So you don’t want to be dumping too much heavy campaign info on them until after they are comfortable with their PCs.

#3: Be flexible if you want a full epic storyline
I’ve tried having everything clearly planned out with intricate links, and that has always utterly failed. What has worked great, however, is having just pieces of the puzzle. For example, this NPC has some major secret that will come into play in any of 2 or 3 possible ways. Or I would like this certain event to happen, but it can fit into the storyline a couple different places.

Players will focus on things you planned on being insignificant and will entirely skip paths you had planned. Minor, throw-away villains will take on a life of their own and become major players, and sometimes even the major villains will be pushed off stage as no longer relevant.

So rather than planning out everything, I’ve found it works best to pick out the elements that you are most interested in including (also taking a hard look at whether those elements are fun for the players – I dumped entire really cool subplots after I realized the PCs would just be spectators). Then keep your focus on those and how to shift the current events to see how you can take advantage of them to bring in those elements. Does that make sense? So instead of trying to steer that action towards some outcome, look for opportunities that arise to grab onto.

I’m to the point now where I try not to plan any details beyond the next session. Even the session after that is fuzzy and vague until I know what happens this time.

#4: Look for hooks from the players
Also, the best plots I’ve run have pretty much all come from player ideas. If you ask a player “what sort of stuff would you like your PC to be involved in?” 8 times out of 10, you’ll get nothing (and 2 times out of 10, you’ll get entire treatises and elaborate stories rivaling any TV drama and far too much to use). Instead ask players for backgrounds – especially if you can give them specific questions. For example, in the Eberron campaign, I asked them what their PC did during the Last War. One of them was a Jorasco halfling cleric, and thinking about that one question came up with the idea of being a pacifist who deserted during the war. So sometimes the questions can lead to background ideas that then lead to fun subplots.

Ask about family members (another player in the Eberron campaign had an illegitimate daughter that she had to give up. Now there’s some story potential I would never have come up with on my own!) Ask about mentors. Ask about interests beyond combat and adventuring – “If you weren’t an adventurer or decided to retire, what sort of career do you think you would have?”

Even as you go along, it can be useful. At-Will has a nice blog about that just today infact. It talks about assigning homework to your players. Good stuff that I’m definitely going to include.

#5: Flesh out NPCs, but be prepared for them to be ignored
I try to have most of the NPCs they interact with socially (as opposed to kill and take their stuff) to have an adventure hook or two. Maybe it’s something simple like needing a delivery, or the merchant’s daughter is sneaking away at night to visit her half-orc love. Or maybe it’s something much larger like the weird guy running the scroll shop is part of a secret organization and is watching the PCs as potential recruits. 90% of these hooks are never followed or even mentioned. But sometimes the players will find a NPC interesting, and then I toss the hook out there and see if they want to follow up and make that NPC even more involved. Often it’s still ignored, but then, at least, it’s the players’ choice. But if they ever do pick up on one of the hooks, it is rewarding to see a throw-away NPC just needed to buy and sell weapons, become a major influence in the campaign.

But now I have rambled long enough, and much longer than I planned. Either way, just have fun.

 

[Rechan]

I've done it all different ways, from super planning, to "Hey I have an idea let's do it" to "I just want to play D&D, grab some characters, we'll BS our way through."

These days, I am trying to get a routine and stick to it.

I either sit everyone down and say, "What kind of campaign would you guys like/not like?" Or, I toss out 3-4 different campaign ideas, and see which one they like. Then I try to get everyone to make their characters together - this both handles issues of "I want to play a rogue" "I want to play a rogue too", and it helps as far as background; I require PCs to have a reason to stick with the party and play well with others.

 

[Rechan]

As far as advice and adventures go, I second kenmarable's post.

Pay close attention to #3. Because PCs are the bane of planning. They can run in the opposite direction from what you have prepped.

Here's a trick you can play: run your first session as you planned. You don't need a great story. But, afterwards, look at what your players responded to. Look what they had interest in. Look what happened. Now, pick up pieces from what happened, and actually run with those. Make those the story, so it looks like you had foreshadowing and all this other stuff when you infact didn't.

On that same vein of players being unpredictable - if they do something you didn't expect, go with it. If you need to, say "Five minute break," and give yourself some time to think. But if the players, rather than wanting to kick in the front door and go in guns blazing, want to sneak in the back, and you didn't think about the security, well, don't fret.

This is very much the case of modules. Modules assume one or two ways forward. If the party does something the module doesn't account for - or, if the module has one or two ways, and the party can't figure that out (like say, clues they need to find, a puzzle they need to beat). Look out for this; throw them a bone if they're stuck. Either with an int check, or let their next attempt succeed ("Why yes, there is a secret door there, and you find a key in it.")

Players are very forgiving. As long as you make sure they're having a good time, they'll ignore the clicheness of your plot or the cheese of your villain.

 

[Aberzanzorax]

Overall, I find that the most imporant things when starting a campaign are:


Giving the players a sense of the world (if they don't already have one). I really want the feel of the world to be captured in session #1 (and the next couple of sessions).

Giving them a chance to show where they shine and where they don't.

Giving them opportunities to integrate with each other as a group. They need a reason to stick together (and I usually find the best reason is friendship and common goals).

 

[Jack7]

I usually start out by giving the players a mission, quest, or objective. (Of course a campaign is a whole different thing than an adventure/single-game.)

Sometimes I sneak the mission on them, or they discover it by accident, sometimes it is assigned.

Of course it is always much easier to run a campaign if you have a consistent setting/background/milieu than if you don't. Campaigns are usually about things taking place in a consistent, coherent, stable background and world setting so that one objective flows into another.

So I'd say if you're gonna run a real campaign then get/make/buy/develop a real world/setting/background. Course that world doesn't have to be real complicated, you can kinda put it together as you go and it'll change over time anyways. But at least you'll have a backdrop so that your campaign objectives will make sense in context of the story of the campaign.

Anywho, good luck and don't be discouraged by the details.
You'll learn as you go along.
Everybody does.