What's the most amazing start to a new campaign you've ever done?

[Draethen Vontrair]

I once started a campaign where the pcs were soldiers on opposing sides in a war involving two races, one pc is in the forest, the other is running towards the mountain. The mountain one found a small roofless cave at the edge of the mountain, his commander was hiding behind the wall. A huge rock then lands on the commander, killing him instantly. The other pc enters,and they notice a hidden door to a small cave. They enter. Seconds later another huge rock lands and blocks the entrance, they spend a century in the cave, sustained by a magic dinnerware set that they found, walking and end up on another continent, not knowing anything about this new land.
Their goal was to find out who won.

They eventually found out their entire races had been obliterated by the gods for the war, and they were the last. They claimed their countries at like lvl 16 and started to try and conquer the world by lvl 18. (chaotic evil, the both of them)

 

[Evilhalfling]

"Three days after the sun was swallowed by a giant flying pyramid, your team is ordered to guard wagons moving from the city of ____ to _____.

Every one started as members of a large mercenary group/army for hire, and had made appropriate characters.

It was basically night + winter rather than a complete apocalypse, but it got colder every day. (which was now marked by the rotation of the moon). In the course of the (short) campaign the sun was eventually replaced by a ball of fire created by fire priests, and this managed to keep the plants alive, but the sun was never recovered.

A perfect illustration of living as a peon in a magical world. We had enormous fun working out the small scale problems, while Role Playing going into denial about the end of the world.

 

[Raven Crowking]

In 2nd Edition, I allowed the players to make 4th level PCs, and allowed them to choose what magic items (in addition to mundane equipment) they wanted. They were allowed to use any resource books available.

The campaign began as they awoke in a room with stone sarcophogi -- one per PC -- and a weird glowing ball. This artifact, known as the Planar Fisher, was used by a group of wizards to capture beings from other planes and run them through a gauntlet maze for their amusement. They also bet heavily on the outcome.

The Planar Fisher brought in the being, plus the being's mundane equipment. It filtered out magic stuff.

The players had a blast, and I didn't have to explain the new campaign world they found themselves in -- they got to discover it for themselves as their characters did.

RC

 

[Nyaricus]

Consider these ideas completely stolen.

Thanks That's wicked I got a fan

I can discuss more minuatae at your leasure if you wish:

Nyaricus -at- hotmail -dot- com.

 

[howandwhy99]

The best beginning session I've ever run was for 4 players. They all made up characters on the spot and told me their backgrounds in private. I had nothing planned, but threading the backgrounds together I came up with an idea. Making two pairings, I helped the PCs who had no goals to come up with some that tied in to my beginning.

I started each pair separate from the other. In separate towns even. One was a rogue who was seeking revenge for his dead parents. He brought his fighter friend along in confidence to help kill the killer.

The other party had a ranger who had been caught stealing and was now escaping the law with the help of a shady wizard. They were making for the wizard's mentor in another town as both were low on funds and needed to hide.

The session took about 5 hours and switched back and forth quickly between each group. As each played out separate encounters and conversations, they soon learned both teams sought the same person. The players were really good about in-character knowledge and OOC knowledge. It was fun to see them plotting and planning on separate sides of the room as one group was desperately seeking their mentor wizard (who they had learned was in danger and being hunted), while the other two found more and more clues to who killed the PCs parents.

The session ended with a big combat including everyone. The apprentice pair had finally found the lair of the elder wizard just as the rogue pairing was breaking in from the ceiling to kill him. There were some secret doors and rooms found, the wiz cast darkness on the area, and the ensuing brawl had the PCs not knowing who they were grappling in the darkness.

When everything finally worked out IIRC the rogues had won, but the elder wizard had escaped. The 2 winners accused the other 2 of working with an evil mastermind and likely killing the one PC's parents upon his orders. The accusations and explanations went on a good while. Eventually they searched the apartments and found evidence of the wizard master double-crossing all sorts of people (including his apprentice!!).

At the end of the session they headed off together to find him and bring him to justice (or kill him depending on the PC). Unfortunately, the next game was nowhere near as fun, but que sera sera.


I'm hoping this Sunday's AoW campaign start is going to be a whole lot better than this.

 

[Ruined]

My favorite one had lots of promise, but the game didn't continue long due to scheduling problems. All the players made 1st lvl PCs and let me have a copy. When they arrived for the first session, I handed them characters, but they were all modified - each PC was 12th lvl, armed with appropriate magic items and the like.

They were accompanying a powerful mage to end a threat to the lands. They got a chance to wield the high power for a fight or two before reaching the end point. They get into a fight with a vile necromancer who enacts this ritual. Cords of black energy course through all the PCs, draining and paralyzing them, and they can see the shadows in the room start to take on their appearance. The spell ends and the tower disappears dropping them to the snowy ground below. The mage with them is dead, their items have all been destroyed (a la disjunction, even the intelligent sword), and you guessed it, the PCs are now all 1st level.

One of the premises of the campaign was tracking down and eliminating the shades that had stolen their essence, some of whom had begun to impersonate the PCs. It also made the concept of levelling make more sense, as killing the shades released their essence, allowing them to regain power/memories/etc.

*sigh*

 

[Snapdragyn]

In the new campaign that we started this weekend, the session began with a TPK -- although can you actually call it a TPK when the party hasn't even met yet?

Each character dies & finds himself in a misty forest of ghostly trees; the ones w/ appropriate Knowledge checks soon realized this was the Spirit Realm. One by one they blundered into each other (real fun when they found the neanderthal who doesn't yet share any common language with them). While they're talking & trying to communicate with the big hairy guy, a couple of orcs attack... & the one they kill just dissolves into mist. Hrm.

Was a short session, but looking forward to bringing in another PC next session & heading them on into the deeper mystery of why they're there but not feeling the urge to travel deeper in (as normal souls would).

 

[Nebulous]

My favorite one had lots of promise, but the game didn't continue long due to scheduling problems. All the players made 1st lvl PCs and let me have a copy. When they arrived for the first session, I handed them characters, but they were all modified - each PC was 12th lvl, armed with appropriate magic items and the like.

They were accompanying a powerful mage to end a threat to the lands. They got a chance to wield the high power for a fight or two before reaching the end point. They get into a fight with a vile necromancer who enacts this ritual. Cords of black energy course through all the PCs, draining and paralyzing them, and they can see the shadows in the room start to take on their appearance. The spell ends and the tower disappears dropping them to the snowy ground below. The mage with them is dead, their items have all been destroyed (a la disjunction, even the intelligent sword), and you guessed it, the PCs are now all 1st level.

One of the premises of the campaign was tracking down and eliminating the shades that had stolen their essence, some of whom had begun to impersonate the PCs. It also made the concept of levelling make more sense, as killing the shades released their essence, allowing them to regain power/memories/etc.

*sigh*

That's a REALLY neat idea for a campaign.

 

[Technomancer]

In the Navy in nuclear engineering training, our DM had us play ourselves. A freak training accident caused a nuclear reactor to blow up, the explosion from which blew us completely out of this world to the actual game world.

 

[Draethen Vontrair]

Another one I tried started with one pc waking up in a sewer. He knows why he is there (to fight the necromancer), and that he died when he fought him. He headed up to town and found that it was destroyed, ruined buildings and charred ground. He sights a caravan in the distance. When asked, the people of the caravan tell him that it was destroyed 250 years ago, and that the necromancer who did it is now king of thw country. he joins up with some of the guards of the caravan, and they set off to get revenge.

The campaign ended soon after when the dude from the sewer had to move...