To railroad or not to railroad?

[howandwhy99]

Do you really want the PC's to run through the Burning Plague adventure?

Easiest way to start them out? Infect them with the plague. As the only able-bodied citizens left in a quarentined town they'll have INCREDIBLE motivation to find a cure.

But seeing as that is borderline railroading, I'd give them a few other options to cure themselves besides the mine.

EDIT: Looking back I must say I like Connail's suggestion the best. As characters who are the only ones to survive the illness, they will be in high demand. Each could have been passing through for there own personal reasons, but a share of silver and saving the town isn't a bad hook at all.

 

[dreaded_beast]

Great responses everyone!

To answer a few questions, first, this game will start of a new campaign hopefully. Depending on whether or not the group plays well together and if we can get one or more people in the future, that will determnie the longevity of the campaign.

That being said, my "campaign plan" so far is to have the PCs go on a few "unrelated" adventures and do lots of "hand-holding" (or rail-roading if you want to call it that) at the lower levels. When I say "hand-holding", I mean that they will probably start off the first couple of adventures with an "exposition" as to what the adventure is and their goal. Mainly because they have either not played DND in a while or not played at all, so I want to make things simple for them and myself. As they adventure and gain experience both in game and in real life, they will learn more about the world they live in and how their choices can affect the world. Plus, it will give me sometime to get more experience DMing this group and DMing in general. Hopefully, once they get a few levels under their belt, then the "hand-holding" can cease and then they can "wander" around a bit more.

To the adventure at hand, the PCs all come from the area, if not the village of Dantredun which is affected by the plague. All the PCs have brief character bios that I can hopefully work into the campaign as it progresses. Their character bios aren't detailed yet, but I figure we can fill in the details as the campaign progress and the players learn more about the world they are in.

The campaign world is Greyhawk, in the Blackmoor area. It will be more or less my own version of Blackmoor, but still somewhat recognizable from what is in the Greyhawk Gazetter.

 

[James Heard]

I have to admit, that doesn't sound to me like railroading -- more like starting in medias res.

Although in that case, you may as well go whole hog and start the campaign with them immediately being ambushed by goblins in front of the cave: "Roll initiative!" After which you can explain the backstory, and give them a chance to either charge in with the retreating goblins, or investigate the situation in the town.

I'm with the quoted poster. It's a perfectly fine way to start a game, especially with new players. I think I might give everyone a heads up in character creation though, for the veteran player - "Guys, the action is going to start REALLY QUICKLY in this game so I can introduce you to combat. Please be ready to fight from the time we start." And then I'd toss in some mooks on the PC side to help drag the backstory out through interaction (or let the players kill them and figure out that they've just screwed up, or whatever). If you're really brave you can attempt a flashback right after the fighting ends, but I don't know if I'd trust that with new players - you might be tempted to REALLY railroad them in a flashback.

 

[dreaded_beast]

Do you really want the PC's to run through the Burning Plague adventure?

Sure!

Mind if I ask if you have an aversion to the Burning Plague module?

 

[howandwhy99]

Mind if I ask if you have an aversion to the Burning Plague module?

No, not at all. It was just a lead in for the next few sentences I had wrote. It is a pretty good adventure, but it was tough to think up a good way to get the group together and still willfully enter a disease-ridden mine. I'm not sure any single method will convince them to stay together after its completion.

I don't know if I can stress starting with a grouping of adventures enough (or at least having different leads after the 1st). This way the players have a choice and almost never feel compelled to complete one task or another. It is all their choice. All you do is present a world where heroes are needed.

The most enjoyable games I've played in are where the players go off the beaten track and just have fun for themselves. From the instance before: instead of picking one of the 4 directions/modules to enter, the PCs might instead focus on the overcrowding and potential starvation problem in Hommlet. The players come up with the idea of building a large granary and start a contest to give 6 pigs to whomever donates the most grain to it. Let the players make their plans, say promoting it with barkers in nearby villages and give them regular feedback on the consequences of their actions. If they are successful, maybe they just saved the town by collecting enough free grain to feed the townsfolk. Seeing as 6 pigs cost far less than the grain they collected, they can recoup their investment from the town for 1/2 the granary's worth. Or so would be the plan. (of course, some PC's are always looking to make the quick buck, but that's okay too).

Most players I know are unwilling to ask what lies a week's journey out of town and then have the guts to go there. It ruins the DM's plan supposedly. But as long as you plan for these eventualities beforehand, you should be okay. Just make sure the bit of world they begin in is interesting, and pencil in a few modules nearby along the speediest ways out.