Looking for feedback (campaign intro)

[Tortoise]

I'm attaching the pdf I've just given to a number of potential players in my new campaign and was looking to see what other people think about it.

This is for a sandbox style game for the heroic levels with the idea of moving to a more focused style upon hitting Paragon tier.

Thanks in advance.

 

[The Shaman]

I'm not sure if you're looking for feedback on the setting, or on the .pdf as a player resource, or both. My comments are a little all over the place.

1. I love that picture of Smaug. It's also a great reminder that treasure needs to save against breath weapons.

2. For me a 'sandbox' setting doesn't include a lot of player-metagenerated content. Players change the setting through their characters by exploration and interaction with the setting during actual play, not by creating it whole-cloth out-of-game.

3. I really dislike checklists of questions in any case.

4. Is it really necessary to force the adventurers to be prisoners at the start? Why can't they be just fortune- and glory-seekers who share a common starting point?

5. I don't see anything by way of advice to players intended to facilitate their participation in a game with no adventure path to follow. Thirty years ago no one needed an explanation on how this works; now it seems to be something of a lost art.

 

[Tortoise]

I'm not sure if you're looking for feedback on the setting, or on the .pdf as a player resource, or both. My comments are a little all over the place.

1. I love that picture of Smaug. It's also a great reminder that treasure needs to save against breath weapons.

2. For me a 'sandbox' setting doesn't include a lot of player-metagenerated content. Players change the setting through their characters by exploration and interaction with the setting during actual play, not by creating it whole-cloth out-of-game.

3. I really dislike checklists of questions in any case.

4. Is it really necessary to force the adventurers to be prisoners at the start? Why can't they be just fortune- and glory-seekers who share a common starting point?

5. I don't see anything by way of advice to players intended to facilitate their participation in a game with no adventure path to follow. Thirty years ago no one needed an explanation on how this works; now it seems to be something of a lost art.

Thanks for the feedback. Looking for feedback on both the setting and the pdf design actually.

Some clarification from me (perhaps more of it is needed in the pdf for the players).

The idea of the questions is to get the players invested in the growth of the campaign world by helping develope what they'll be playing in once they break from the heroic levels of the sandbox out into the wider world.

The reason for not restricting them with a path is to allow them the freedom of selecting where they want to explore.. The players let the DM know in advance that "next session we want to explore area X" and the GM prepares it and the random encounters that could be dealt with going to and from that location.

The prisoner aspect is a bit of a meta-plot in the background for future use. It helps the players come up with ideas early on about what they might want to do once they get back out into the wider world.