Firstly I would like to thank you all for the plethora of responses to my original post! I hadn’t expected so much engagement! I read each of your comments eager and earnestly.
TLDR - pcs have offered limited input into world building and expressed desire to have some light rails to keep them on task. Theme fate vs free will.
A lot of responses offered excellent general principles and advice on how to get the ball rolling, much appreciated! A handful of responses requested additional information please see below if you would like to delve into my crazy person string board.
I’ve started with fishing a few lines from each player about who they would like their character to be in the world.
We’ve landed with a orc barb who has been dishonourably discharged from his junior officer military career for refusing orders to subdue a village suffering from unrest during a food shortage. They now work odd private mercenary contracts primarily security details.
A gnomish divination wizard who recently graduated from academy who could only find work as a cartographer for a regional ley line siphoning conglomerate.
An arsonist ranger who I managed to steer into a fire worshipping cultist whose cult has been persecuted for their destructive tendencies. They’ve been displaced since the destruction of their sect forcing them to work odd jobs to make ends meet.
The fourth party member makes up for his lack of imagination with willingness to show up 🤣 and has opted for total amnesia. We will leverage the freedom offered and have plot hooks to pull and memory drip feed that should help keep us on narrative.
We’ve spoken about what type of campaign we would like to run and collectively the party understands they want a compelling plot but have a tendency to get lost in the weeds without direction. (previous campaign I ran with them as a player ended up some weird fishing village builder where we had a significant combat that destroyed the shanti town, followed by multiple sessions of rebuilding and ultimately lost interest).
The theme of our campaign is fate vs free will.
I’m no Brennan Lee Mulligan and free will might be philosophically heavy to unpack but I have some literary works to draw inspiration from.
Primarily influences for our narrative James Islington’s Licanius trilogy - a story following a young hero with a magical gift of future sight on an epic quest of good vs evil when you already know how it ends for you. This description doesn’t do the series justice if you haven’t read any of James work both this series and his hierarchy series are 5 star chefs kiss technical magic systems with masterful narratives and compelling characters work. I will die on that hill.
Christopher Ruocchio’s The Sun Eater series - an epic space opera spanning over 1000 narrative years following a wayward hero on a rollercoaster of character arcs all guided by the shortest path to the future that must be. A truly epic story that will see more than a few nods in our campaign.
If you are familiar with either of these works they have a strong emphasis on fate with agency. Seeing glimpses of the future but not enough of the picture to know how your actions will lead you too it…. The plot twist at the end of the Licanius trilogy.. damn James.
To get things started I have semi compartmentalized sessions 0’s planned where after I’ve firmed up character sheets our wizard will be commissioned on a surveying assignment cut to our Barb and Ranger meeting as part of a team hired for security for aforementioned surveying project.
Our session 1 is when our players will meet our 4th party member I have a couple of hooks to ensure this goes smoothly ideally one of our wizards mentors will hurriedly give our pc an artifact with a sigil on it that’s glows (brighter the closer it gets to our 4th pc) with a vague description about a light to guide those who find themselves surrounded by darkness.
Our mentor is actually under duress compelled by our 4th pc to deliver the artifact to our wizard before they had their memories wiped but this won’t be revealed until much later lol
Our wizard will have a vision of things to come during their first long rest that plants the seeds for their next encounter. These visions and 4th pc memory drops are going to be my primary hooks but between major plot points I am hoping to yes and most shenanigans.
I have a home brewed divination system similar to critical roles desperate measures flavoured to allow expending critical resources.. high level spell slots / death saves to reach out through possible realities and choose more favourable outcomes to hopefully prevent bad rng from derailing the plot for us.
Our setting will be Delos nod to Handrian Marlowe’s home-world. I’ll establish the regional map, layout the 3 factions in a power struggle in the region and draw attention to a large portion of the map that’s shrouded in mists which is said to be home to many banes from a forgotten age when bbeg and our deities warred over the fate of the world.
Our hero’s will hopefully by session 5 or so uncover that one of the factions is actually a puppet regime headed by the bbeg who is seeking to remove individual agency locking the world into its darkest timeline.
If you made it this far thank you so much :) this community is awesome! Any thoughts or feedback is more than welcomed I’m aware the party may derail me on their own 🤣
2 Comments
Zonetrooper@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 4d
Okay so, part of this is knowing your group.
Are they the kind of people okay with a relatively straightforward plot (see bad thing -> stop bad thing) or do they want more agency in approaching situations? Are they interested in being the collaborative team of friends & allies, or are they the kind of people who like chaos gremlins who'll throw wrenches into things? Do they chase side quests like catnip, or get frustrated if anything takes them away from the central plot? Are they typically suspicious of NPCs, or will they leeroy into things?
A lot of this is things that will develop in Session 0; despite the name, it doesn't need to be one session. Other bits are things you will learn over time. For example, I've learned that for my group, if I want an NPC to survive a fight to reappear later, they need to either leave early or I have to throw something really big at them to make them back off - otherwise, they will move heaven and earth to ensure everything dies. My players have learned too: Our chaos gremlins have learned to moderate their gremlin-ness so they can have fun, without frustrating others.
These are pretty independent of themes or setting, so you can figure them out regardless of what kind of campaign you run!
grausames_G@discuss.tchncs.de · 2 pts · 23h
That sounds so fun. I am happy for your players and I hope they treasure you.