D&D 5E Last Hurrah mini-campaign: Looking for brilliant ideas for an adventure to end all adventures

[Mercurius]

Here's the situation. My family is moving across country this summer, from NH to Colorado. I want to design a "last hurrah" mini-campaign for my gaming group of seven plus years. We've been pretty on-and-off for the last few years, but it would be fun to get the dice out one more time before I leave.

By "mini-campaign" I mean 6-8 sessions. We'd be starting at the end of February or early March, and then playing every other week into June. I suppose we could throw in a couple Google Hangout sessions if need be, but I'm not a big fan of that approach.

So here's what I'm hoping to get from the collective erudition and imagination of EN World: Ideas for a mini-campaign, from the basic idea to specific locations, situations, and encounters. What I want is a kind of "best of" adventure, something that includes a diversity of D&Disms, but is tightly focused. I'm thinking something like a classic dragon-slaying quest - more classic tropes done well, then weird and novel. Something that packs a punch - as I said in the title, an adventure to end all adventures!

I'm flexible about levels, but if we're talking a "sweet-spot" adventure I'm thinking of starting them at 5th.

OK folks, have at it.

 

[ccs]

End goal: The party has to destroy the 4E Martial Power Source.

Why?: I don't know.
HOW??: I really don't know.

This silly goal came about a few years ago as my one group brainstormed rediculous epic scsle adventure ideas.

 

[Mistwell]

Here's the situation. My family is moving across country this summer, from NH to Colorado.

Where in Colorado?

 

[Curmudjinn]

Run a riff on the classic Baldur's Gate, with tons of Easter eggs and nods to other books and settings on side-quests and visited areas.
Make sure to place a previous character or two from each player within the game as well.

The end could be gathering powers of dead gods to knock the others from the heavens similar to the Time of Troubles. When the world begins to unravel, they could all awake in a morgue in Sigil.. or something.

 

[Rhenny]

Why don't you create a meta-game (self referential) in which the PCs have to help an old friend travel really far. Then, at the end, they have to say goodbye. Of course, you can create lots of complications on the way, and flesh out the reason for the journey, and the ultimate situation where the PCs say goodbye. It will be like your parting words.

 

[Eltab]

The last chapters of Rise of Tiamat may help you.
Not only do your PCs have to knock off the Red Wizards performing their Evil Ritual (TM), the PCs have to enter the portal themselves and clobber on Tiamat so she's too weak to go through herself. Fight 5 Dragons at once !

More seriously, what were the highlights and lowlights of your campaigns together? What did somebody do that was epic*? Reference them during the journey. Bring along a Bard NPC who is sometimes helpful and sometimes writing notes for future epic ballads - the PCs' exploits.

* Personal examples (Hoard of the Dragon Queen / Rise of Tiamat):
My Paladin jumped into 30 feet of water to save our drowning Rogue while wearing Plate Armor (and a rope).
Playing Ancient White Dragon and driving half the party to Death Saves before the Bard pulled out a Staff of Healing and max'ed it out - restoring every PC to max HP.
Ranger/Rogue in same fight gets Crit with Arrow of Dragon Slaying on Round One, death shot to finish fight, and misses everything else in between.
Druid casts Plant Growth on a platoon of kobolds so Wizard can Fireball the (immobilized) lot - insta-kill 2/3 of total encounter
My Paladin chasing a doppleganger and yelling for the Wizard, "I need some artillery !" (including IRL yell because the player was at the far end of a crowded noisy room)
"Loch Ness Monster" attacks a longboat; all the PCs stay safe / dry but all the ship's crew fall overboard.

 

[Eltab]

Make sure to place a previous character or two from each player within the game as well.

+1
Especially if they went down heroically, or the group was just not the same without them.
If they did something silly or self-destructive, their ghost can show up and utter a warning - "Don't do what I did, you durn fools. And I don't need reminded either !"

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Steal a page from Logan's Run. If you remember, Sandman Logan had a secret mission to " find Sanctuary", but this caused him to become hunted by his fellow Sandmen. In addition, as he was fleeing, he is forced off the path he was supposed to follow and had an unfortunate encounter with a crazy robot. In the end, Logan does not "find Sanctuary" but instead frees his fellow citizens from a slavery they didn't even suspect.

So, give the PCs a mission. As they set out, forces- perhaps former allies- conspire to take them out. Circumstances force them away from their goal, but in the process, they find an even more important goal, which they complete.

Maybe...they're sent to recover a magical MacGuffin that does something they know not, but which they have been told will finally help the rulers of their city defeat their rival city-state, with which they have been at war for some time. Along the way, they discover that the MacGuffin will enable someone to perform a necromantic ritual that is roughly like detonating an A-Bomb. The other city won't just be defeated, it will be obliterated...and the ritual's performers will become liches. Choosing not to complete their mission is not enough. Their failure will just result in others being sent out for the MacGuffin. They have to defeat their masters or destroy the MacGuffin...or both.

 

[Mercurius]

Where in Colorado?

Denver area, probably west side (Jefferson county).

 

[Mercurius]

Thanks all for the ideas. Much to mull through.

Keep 'em coming.