Looking for Campaign Starter ideas

[ReeboKesh]

Hey Enworlders.
I'm looking for any threads or links that offer a lot of ideas on how to start a new campaign.
If anyone can post some handy links that would be great!
Thanks in advance
Reebo

 

[mhensley]

Ray Winninger's "Dungeoncraft" Essays
http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/dnd/dungeoncraft/

 

[Asmor]

You might try Yax's Instant Campaign Builder series.

Also check out Ryan Stoughton's Great Hundred project, which aims to create self-contained articles which describe a setting, but can easily be adapted to any campaign.

And my Encounter-a-Day blog, despite the name, features a lot of world building ideas like organizations, religions, races, etc that you can use for inspiration or even steal wholesale. [/shameless plug]

 

[ReeboKesh]

Thanks guys those links look great. I probably should have been a little clearer with my request. I wasn't after any setting building tips.

I was hoping someone had a list of ways to start the first session of a campaign without using the following:
- PCs meet in a tavern
- PCs are all slaves and need to escape
- the PCs are undead and must find out how they 'died'
- the PCs are shipwrecked on an island
- the PCs all work for the same organization
- the PCs all have amnesia

I'm not saying any of the above are bad its just that I have used them all before to kick off a campaign. Anyhoo I've thought up a way to start the campaign so all is good. Still if anyone wants to add a list like I mentioned feel free to highjack this thread or start are new one.
Thanks
Reebo

 

[Pbartender]

I can't take credit for this one, but I've always wanted to try it...

Campaign Prelude: All the players make exceptionally high-level characters. The game begins in the midst of the action... An epic battle in which the heroes are hopelessly outnumbered, and inevitably you must stack the numbers against them in such a manner that they all die heroically by the end of the first game session.

The REAL Campaign: All the players make fairly low-level characters. Each of the new characters has a close connection to one of the previous high-level characters. The news of their deaths has just arrived... GAME ON!


The trick is to not let the player in on the second half until after they all get TPKed in the first part.

 

[Asmor]

I can't take credit for this one, but I've always wanted to try it...

Campaign Prelude: All the players make exceptionally high-level characters. The game begins in the midst of the action... An epic battle in which the heroes are hopelessly outnumbered, and inevitably you must stack the numbers against them in such a manner that they all die heroically by the end of the first game session.

The REAL Campaign: All the players make fairly low-level characters. Each of the new characters has a close connection to one of the previous high-level characters. The news of their deaths has just arrived... GAME ON!


The trick is to not let the player in on the second half until after they all get TPKed in the first part.

Ooh, that sounds fun.

For a twist, how about instead of a campaign prelude, a prelude campaign: the PCs all make high level characters, start in the midst of an epic battle, then when all hope seems lost and the PCs look like they're about to be overrun... Fade to black, and start from the beginning, telling the tale of how they got into that predicament in the first place and more importantly, what secret weapon they have that's going to get them out of it! Imagine negotiating with an efreet in the Brass city to send in fire elementals to back them up, then when you finally get to that battle for real, you cut back to where we left off and just before the PCs are overrun the skies darken, clouds form swirling vortices, and flaming elementals pour out to turn the tide of battle.

Could give the players some sweet control over the story... Say at the first session, Grok the half-orc barbarian screams at the villain "THIS IS FOR TEARING OUT MY EYE!" or the paladin says a prayer calling on the strength of all those slaughtered at the battle of Fangmarsh Keep so many years ago... Then when you're playing the real campaign, you can start working to make all those past events they mentioned actually happen.

 

[Dross]

I was hoping someone had a list of ways to start the first session of a campaign without using the following:
- PCs meet in a tavern
- PCs are all slaves and need to escape
- the PCs are undead and must find out how they 'died'
- the PCs are shipwrecked on an island
- the PCs all work for the same organization
- the PCs all have amnesia

Ask the players? Not trying to be facetious here but maybe they have an idea (even if it ends up being one of the above).

Use several of the above at once, not just one?

Have the PC's all know each other before adventuring. Had a campaign where three of us were going to be siblings: Human, 1/2-elf & 1/2-orc, same mother. On several occasions PCs were childhood friends or the equivelent.

One or more PCs are slaves/servants/squires/hired by other PCs. Or their families are.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Campaign Prelude: All the players make exceptionally high-level characters. The game begins in the midst of the action... An epic battle in which the heroes are hopelessly outnumbered, and inevitably you must stack the numbers against them in such a manner that they all die heroically by the end of the first game session.

The REAL Campaign: All the players make fairly low-level characters. Each of the new characters has a close connection to one of the previous high-level characters. The news of their deaths has just arrived... GAME ON!


The trick is to not let the player in on the second half until after they all get TPKed in the first part.

Big meanie! Do you have any idea how long it takes the average joe to make a high-level PC?!

 

[dmccoy1693]

I'd recommend talking to the players. But you might also what to check out this. Its a free NPC with campaign idea produced by Bards and Sages (written be me). Basic premise of the first adventure is the players help safeguard fleeing civilians to safety as they meet the campaign's main villian, a druid with awakened dinosaurs.

 

[humble minion]

PCs blink themselves into consciousness in the middle of a battlefield - they're standing fully armed and armoured and wondering what the hell's going on or who all these people are. Turns out they were magically enchanted by some BBEG into being cannon-fodder for his armies, but when someone or other finally killed off BBEG and broke his spell, they're thousands of miles from their (different) homes, they're surrounded by goblins and orcs who are ALSO waking up from the spell and are ready to return to their normal way of treating small groups of tasty humans, and they've been fighting for the last X years in the army of the most reviled tyrant in a century, so nobody's feeling all that inclined to help them. All they can trust is each other.

Can they get away from the battlefield before all the orcs get themselves organised? Can they escape the vengeful vigilantes who want all of deceased-BBEG's minions' heads on pikes? Can they find their way home, and what happened to their famillies? Can they carve a place for themselves in the new world, after the old nations and cities were devastated by BBEG's massive war and kingdoms & institutions lie in rubble? What happened to BBEG's treasury? And what if it turns out the heroes who defeated BBEG did so by making some very questionable deals with very, very questionable entities, and what price will these deals have in the long run?