need some plot hooks for my campaign

[iwatt]

Plot hook 1: The great Plains 1st anual card game. Only the best 40 can play, and the entree fee is 2,500 gp, for a grand prize of 100,000 gp.

Plot hook 2: You find the corpse of an old prospector. In his hand he holds the deed to a mine near a small town. When you arrive in town though, you discover the mine has become the hideout of a bandit gang.

Plot hook 3: As you amble into town, you see the sherrif throwing his badge away and riding off like a bat out of hell. In the distance you hear the rumbling approach of horses. The townspeople begin to run into their houses screaming " It's Black Bart coming to kill us..."

 

[TheLe]

Just build a whole quest around finding an artifact, or killing an evil wizard.

That's pretty standard.

`Le

 

[Ravilah]

The Plains people have lived in harmony with the land for hundreds of years. The Tribe of the Buffalo and the Tribe of the Hawk long ago set aside their differences and have dwelt in peace for almost two generations.
But now something is destroying the land. The animals die, the grass withers, and nature grows harsh and cruel. The answer is obvious: the People of the Towns are destroying the land with their farms, fences, waste, and excess. The Buffallo Tribe is hesitant to start war (they turn to their gods, for they are a reglious people), but the Hawk Tribe sharpens their spears for war (and the occassional ruthless raid on the townsfolk).
Meanwhile, the people in the towns are also experiencing problems with their cattle and crops. The weather is getting too hot and dry, yet lightning storms frequently wreak havoc. To make matters worse, savages from the plain have been attacking settlers and raiding towns ("It must be those dang Buffalo people").
Into this uneasy environment our heroes inadvertently stumble. Lots of mini-quests to go with:
1. Save the girl kidnapped by Hawk raiders
2. Go slay the chief of those barbarous Buffallo people!
3. The town's old well went dry, but this new water source has an aboleth in it.
4. The Buffallo gods require the wood of three sacred trees so the shaman can ask the
gods for help.
5. Food is getting scarce. The Silver Spur gang has stolen a whole food shipment and is
hording it in a cave (And they are unwittingly about to awaken an ancient creature that
sleeps in the back of that cave).
6. ETC...

What no one realizes is that a cult-like third tribe has formed near the Hills, and they are attempting a powerful summoning ritual whereby their chieftain will become the avatar of their god. This "god" is really just a powerful demon, whose specialty is in all that sickens, blights, and abjures the natural order.

Our heroes must discover what is really happening to the land, keep the various peoples from war, and destroy this horrible Cult Tribe.

Is this at all what you are thinking of?

R

 

[Dolom]

A major theme in western inspired stories is land rights. Whether for grazing, minerals/resources, farming, water, whatever, conflict over land and its uses is a surefire plot hook.

Or give them a cargo wagon named Serenity and chronicle their wacky adventures smuggling goods and visiting frontier towns righting wrongs and singing songs.

 

[Terwox]

Plot idea: Run some miniquests based on the town where the sheriff was killed.

Get the characters attached to the town, defend it from bandits, get one of them married if you can.

Then, the whole world turns into zombies, and it's a fight for survival ala Dawn of the Dead or somesuch.

...Westerns and zombies are supposed to go together!

It's an idea. It's not necessarily a GOOD idea, but it's a campaign idea!

 

[fnork de sporg]

The most obvious of western plots.

Those bandits and desperadoes are really working for the evil Land Baron. By murdering the lawmen he hoped to panic the people of the town and convince them to sell their land to him for bargain prices. Being rich he can pretty much hire as many thugs as he wants, and being very well connected politically there's little chance of getting him arrested without undeniable evidence, and even that's presuming the sheriff is honest. And of course if you just go ahead and kill him you'll all be hanged for murder, or at the very least forced to flee your homes. And that's if you ever get close enough to him to give it a try.

You could run a whole campaign about this guy's wacky schemes to steal everybody's lands, easy. For even more material to mine please take note of Boss Hogg on the Dukes of Hazzard.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Here's something I always do when working out my campaign: Think up some Bad Guys.

These shouldn't be run-off-the-mill Bad Guys you defeat at the end of an adventure. No, these should be enemies whose minions will keep the PCs occupied for a long time. Don't even bother to give them stats at the moment - just think of their general resources, abilities, goals, and minions. They need a Grand Plan, too - a dragon sitting in a remote mountain cave on his hoard might be scary, but if that's all he is doing he is uninteresting. The Bad Guys want to achive something, and this is what will set adventures in motion.

Because once you know the Grand Plan, you will be easily able to figure out how to involve the PCs. Perhaps it is as simple as some of his minions riding into town and trying to take it over. But perhaps they are mining a vital resource nearby, using zombies as miners. Or maybe these minions are pursuing a Damsel in Distress who knows Vital Information and whom the PCs can protect, or Free from Captivity (and no, the plot idea doesn't have to be original - all it matters is the execution... ). First the PCs will battle the Bad Guys' Minions, then their Henchmen (better minions who often have agendas of their own), and when they reach high level, the Bad Guys themselves.

With this setup, adventures pretty much write themselves. I suggest thinking up several, so that you can switch between different storylines if one gets stale. I'd say create one human Bad Guy (a wealthy rancher, a mad wizard, etc.), a nonhuman but still humanoid Bad Guy (an orc warlord or ogre magi) and a truly monstrous one (a powerful undead or an ancient dragon who does have goals for the world around him). Then think up their Grand Plans, their Minions, and you are good to go...

Your thoughts?

 

[LostSoul]

Westerns are cool.

We are playing by the arcana evolved rules and the group consist of almost twenty year old humans: twin champions; a champion of light (the local priest, typical zombie hunting catholicy dressed guy) and a chapion of death (his twin brother and opposite, he is the town's undertaker), there is a Magister who is a traveling shaman raised by the Litorians (plains folk who live off of the land and follow the buffalo herds), a gambler (unfettered), and a slinger (don't remember for sure his class, one of the combatants).

My first thought is to ask the players what they want to see. Ask them if they have any NPCs in mind, like a cousin or an old rival or something like that. One line will do that determines their relationship (like "Glom the bounty-hunter who hates my guts").

Hmm...

 

[punkorange]

Thanks so much for the advice.
Jürgen Hubert, I will definately be going your route with the major background plans, and Lostsoul, I will also make it a requirement for them to come up with some NPCs that I can write up.

Is anyone else familiar with arcana evolved? I'm looking for other places to fit races in. I have already established the litorians as the plainsfolk and the humans as, well typical humans. Unlike the arcana evolved setting, humans are the dominant species as of now.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Thanks so much for the advice.
Jürgen Hubert, I will definately be going your route with the major background plans,

Got any ideas for the Big Bad Guys?

One I used in my last campaign was an extremely powerful demonic entity called the "Father of Wyrms". The players were creeped out when they encountered a half-fiendish wyrmling green dragon. They were even more creeped out when they encountered a half-fiendish juvenile silver dragon some time after that...