The coolest campaign idea (you never used)

[Lord Zardoz]

Closest idea I have handy

I have never come up with a campaign scope adventure that I have never used. Mostly because I always seem to come up wiht my ideas within the scope of the game I am currently running.

I have, however, had several ideas for adventures that I have never gotten around to running.

The best idea that I have which has been floating around in my skull would be this one.

Early in the campaign, the players hear legends of a distant 'lost' city. The players hear of it in songs and rumors, Perhaps even going on adventures to find it that come up empty. The 'Golden City' has its streets paved with gold and bejeweled walls, really cheesy opulence. The players then come accross the pieces of a map to this lost city, and learn it can only be reached once every 17 years on the anniversary of the fall of the golden city.

Obviously, with a setup like that, the players find it. They would journey through the harshest desert that the campaign has to offer to do it. (I always imagine the city to be middle eastern in character). And they would find its high walls gleaming in the sunlight, with the gate firmly sealed, and a single golden tower rising majestically from the cities center, visible from some distance away. Up close, the gate has an inscription on its arch that reads "Welcome to Paradise. A guest for a day shall be a citizen for life"

Once inside the city, you would tell them how beautiful and perfect the city is. Polished white stone buildings, lush groves of fruit bearing trees, plenty of drinkable water flowing out of ornate fountains. And as they travel deeper inside the city, they would find things to be beyond their wildest dreams of avarice. While the roads are not literally paved in gold, they would find rich tapestries, golden hanging lamps that are unlit, and golden bas reliff's with embedded gems. Armories full of masterwork grade weapons still as sharp as the day they were forged. Of course, the art and the gold would be pretty scarce near the outer edges of the city. But the deeper they journey into the city, the more riches they discover. And this is a huge city, enough for a population of at least 100 000. So the players would find all sorts of material riches. So the players are now inside a huge beautful civic paradies that is perfectly maintained, and completely empty.

No monsters.
No traps.
Just lots of beautiful art and fountains and a golden tower in the center.

Once the players reach the tower, they would find riches are a scale that is truly retarded. Every surface would be gold or silver lined. There would be a banquet table with a great feast set, food in place, as warm as if it were just served. The food would taste heavenly should any of the players choose to eat any of it. And on the upper floors of the tower, which again has locked doors (made of gold) , but no traps, they would then find a throne room with a bas-relif that shows the city the players are in. And great ornate tablets that tell the tale of the city.

While the players examine the tablet, a voice that sounds like its coming from 100 000 years ago will ask the players "Would you like me to translate?"

The players then get to meet the lord of the city, who appears to the players as a pit fiend / Balor / Whatever. This is just a talking image of the lord of the city, so the players dont get to kill him.

"The citizens of this city made a deal, propsperity, wealth, and immortality for one year in exchange for each life given to me, as long as that life is not a citizen of the city. But if they fail to grant any sacrifices, they are all tormented in Hell. You represent the best chance for the citizens of this city to have a few more years of prosperity. If you die in this city, your soul is mine. If you are still in this city at sundown, then you become a citizen."

And since its been such a long day, the sun is starting to set. And the bells of the great temple start to ring. And now the citizens show them selves.

I figure that putting all those treasures in front of the players with no opposition will have the players driving them selves insane within 10 minutes of reaching the city. I have kept a group busy with an elaborately described door for a half hour. If I could sell the description of this lost city that well, my players will scare them selves shitless.

END COMMUNICATION

 

[redmetal]

Dungeons and Dragons - Exile

The basic premise for the campaign is quite simple. The players start on a small world which is actually a moon to a much large unsettled (as far as the inhabitants know) planet. No attempts at colonization had ever been sucessful, and teleporting to the planet caused the death of those that opened the portal.

One day a dark horde of winged beasts began to come from the sky, first in small numbers, then in increasingly large numbers, until armies of demonic creatures of all sorts began appearing and wreaking havoc on the land. Whole armies were crushed and whole cities were destroyed. It was the apocalypse, so a plot to flee came together. All the living spellcasters banded together to create thousands of portals allowing the survivors to flee from this oncoming horde into the unknown.

The players find themselves leaders of a band of stranded people left on a completely strange world full of deadly monsters and strange beasts. No magic exists from their homeland but remnants of ancient civilizations can be found documenting a completely new form of magic. One or two players would be slowing discovering the magic as the campaign progressed, moving the campaign from no magic to eventual high magic.

The players soon discover that they are not the only people on this world. Not only are their millions of other exiled peoples, their are the remaining few of the ancient civilization, who chose to stay and face the oncoming armageddon.

Can the PC's find how to stop the demons from destroying their new home? can they keep the exiles safe? can they survive the unknown?

As previously noted, adding the fear of the unknown to the players is a great thing

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

A Transhumanist fantasy world. Wizards learn how to seperate the soul from the body - and how to switch to other bodies, whether natural ones (humans or animals), achemically grown homunculi, or golems. Some rich people have a whole menagierie of bodies, while poor people have to make do with the one they were born. Death becomes a thing of the past - to truly kill someone, you have to destroy his soul.

Well, maybe I will try to work this out after I have completed Urbis...

 

[Runesong42]

While still high off Final Fantasy X, I had orignally concocted a game in the same vein as Blitzball, without all the water.

* There would be 5 players to a side, plus a "goalie".
* The goalie would guard a ring (or possibly three rings), using the rules for Deflect Missile (essentially getting the feat for free during the 'game', with increasing DC's for the three rings).
* There would be three 'forwards' and two 'defensemen'. The three fowards on foot, two defense on mounts.
* The "ball" would be a chakram (read: Frisbee, but sharp).
* The playing field would be 150' x 100'. The defense could run anywhere within the field, but would not be permitted to score.
* Both offence and defence would be armed. I mused about buckler shields and weapons of choice for the offence, defence would have lances or greatspears.
* There are no mid-play stoppages. Essentially, the PC's would have to fight the possessor of the chakram for control. Passing is encouraged, as is hurling the chakram at the opponents. Details here get sticky, but fun feats like (Improved) Disarm, (Improved) Sunder, and any combat manoeuvres would come into play here.
* Initially, the race that invented the 'game' would be a desert race of lizardmen, size Large and built tough like Ogres, but smarter.
* Victory in the game rewards the team 'captain' with the right to challenge the current tribal leader for rulership of the tribe. The Tribe leader wears an ancestral 'something', symbolic of rulership, that adds the half-dragon template and makes him a FORCE to be reckoned with.

*sigh*

All that work, and I never got a chance to test it.
Yet.

 

[rounser]

Totally ripped from Dark Sun, but I'd like to use the following concept as a starting point in a "conventional" pulp fantasy world. Start the campaign at 1st level...PCs are slaves with no gear, and are a gladiatorial team. They'd escape quite quickly, but I think the storytelling impact of starting them that way is fantastic.

 

[Nightchilde-2]

Theldia--A very basic game that would use only the 3 core books. Each city was dedicated to one of the gods from the PHB.

Carcerian Nights--The PCs start out as petitioners imprisoned in Carceri with no memory of why and no equipment. The campaign would revolve around their escape and discovery of why they were imprisoned (and vengeance on the one that imprisoned/killed them). Obviously, I'd have to bend a few rules to make it work, but that's all good.

 

[Nellisir]

The players find themselves leaders of a band of stranded people left on a completely strange world full of deadly monsters and strange beasts. No magic exists from their homeland but remnants of ancient civilizations can be found documenting a completely new form of magic. One or two players would be slowing discovering the magic as the campaign progressed, moving the campaign from no magic to eventual high magic.

The players soon discover that they are not the only people on this world. Not only are their millions of other exiled peoples, their are the remaining few of the ancient civilization, who chose to stay and face the oncoming armageddon.

Can the PC's find how to stop the demons from destroying their new home? can they keep the exiles safe? can they survive the unknown?

As previously noted, adding the fear of the unknown to the players is a great thing

Oh, I really like this one.

Nell.

 

[Gez]

I'm wanting to run a political campaign. The characters are all from a sort of noble house, trying to gain more wealth and influence through negociations, espionnage, and other intrigues; rather than through looting dead goblins.

 

[Vrecknidj]

I'm tossing around an idea right now to put the fear of the unknown back into d&d.

The basic premise is that on the campaign world, the human settlements all cling to the coast of a vast continent. The players would all start as humans and would be a part of an expedition into the interior of the continent.
Along the way, they would meet and interact with the various other races of the campaign world, and their actions would partially determine how the different races treated humanity (disdain, scorn, friendship, trust, etc.)
When the campaign is over, move the timeline ahead a few hundred years and start a new campaign. This time, however, the players can see the affects of their character's actions far into the future. It would give them a real sense of ownership of the world.

This is a fairly accurate description of my own campaign. In 1987, I started this way, and by the early 90's, I was ready to move the timeline forward. That next group had it's own new places to explore and new races to meet, etc. And then, in the late 90's, I started anew again--by this time the first PCs were legends (and in some cases deities).

Dave

 

[Slife]

The main villian isn't the person; it's his weapon/cloak/hat. No matter how many times you kill the evil wizard/knight/cleric, he keeps coming back. For added fun, let the PCs loot their kill. In addition to it's evil possesing properties, it's also a cloak of CHA +3, or something equally valuable.