/tg/ - Traditional Games

> Give me your best ideas for kicking off a campaign and plothooks to pull a game out of aimless sandbox more.

You look back over your shoulder and see that the river of molten lava doesn't stop. You look to your left at scantily clad half drow, half fairy, half dragon, half slut paladin-assassin, you look to your right at totally uninterested half "in your face", half "I'm gonna mop the floor with Tarrasques" overpowered gamebreaking build and you pray to any gods you know that neither horses & carriage, nor your skills (DC:???) are gonna fail you.

In the meantime you start to wonder how you get into this mess…

>>310788

1

>First one is mimic eggs, and thus the party must remove the infestation they have caused by spending the platinum, Pirates of the Caribbean cursed gold style, or Party is hunted down by Variant Dragons, like the fucking Aerodragon

2

>Book of Vile Darkness, and various artifacts mentioned in D&D 3.5

4

>New world, all deities dead (probably) alignment system gone, Old Ones and servitor races have arrived

5

>Ghostwalk Campign setting, or Ravenloft

6

>Ravenloft, Party did some horrid shit with Grazz't doing some Sangionous tier crap and are now in the Demiplane of Dread, probably made a Darklord they have to kill and it's either a party member or one of 3 additional NPCs caught in their drunken antics.

After their last successful adventure, your PCs have been nominated for public office by the adoring public and must now deal with being in a political campaign.

Alternately, they're thrust into office without even an election by virtue of having outperformed and/or killed the previous office-holders – and now they have to run the castle/town/kingdom.

>Parts gets kidnapped by bandits

>Beaten into submission

>Tasked with stealing first campaign MacGuffin because the bandits already tried, failed, and would get recognized.

>Bandits are part of a large criminal network, will get gutted if their boss realizes they've failed in the first place, but will also gut you if they come to understand that you've betrayed or failed them.

>Meanwhile, a second crime group wants the exact same object and offers to save the party's ass in exchange for cooperation.

>>310788

A much better version of the old "everyone over 25 dies" would be that everyone under 60 dies or disappears.

>Welcome to… OLD WORLD!

>You've all met in enough taverns and received enough quests from cloaked figures in the corner. Time for something else besides slaying the dragon, getting the treasure, and saving the princess.

It only happened to me once.

>>311025

>everyone over 5 ft tall ties

>Gnomes, Halfings, and Dwarfs only

WELCOME TO… SHORTWORLD

>>311033

> everyone has over 5 ft tall ties

> it is illegal to have a tie less than 5 ft

Welcome to… TIE WORLD

>>311102

>The characters have in one way or another ended up in the same prison cell aboard a slave (air)ship when an opportunity to escape present it self, when the ship's boarded by monsters!

>The characters crosses path, and upon questioning different people realizes that they are tracking down the same person who had scammed/stole from all of them at separate occasion.

>>311102

>everyone is frozen in time for 5 seconds

>WELCOME TO… ZA WARUDO

>>311102

Sienar Fleet Systems presents…

>>311236

Here's some more because why not

>A Kolyarut, Marut, and Zelekhut show up in your village saying it's a dead end

>the city guard is being taken over by dopplegangers, are able to frame people perfectly, being paid off by someone who doesn't seem to be involved at all

>the mayor is found dead in a well

>children have been being kidnapped and strange low hanging clouds (vampires in gaseous forms) have been seen flying over the city

>Party is accompanying a caravan with some wizards in it. A wizard apprentice kills his mentor, takes an intelligent item off his body and proceeds to become a BBEG

>The prince of a powerful empire is mindseeded and the only person who realizes is his tutor

>shipwrecked on a previously unknown island, local inhabitants are terrified because the island hops planes in a specified order and the next plane is a bad one

>land is plagued with monstrous insects who devour valuable whole and take it somewhere far to the north. If an insect is killed, it may be cut open to find treasure

Something I threw together for a campaign that never happened:

>Darkness surrounds each of you, there is no light except for what seems to eminate from each of your chests, a golden glow that gives each of you some faint aura to see each other by.

>A cloaked figure stands before you, face hidden by a deep hood.

>(deep voice) "SO HERE YOU STAND."

>A piece of parchment appearing from the deep cloak, a quill materialising to scrawl across it.

>(If the players attempt to read what is on it, they see nothing)

>"WOULD YOU LIKE TO TELL ME WHO YOU ARE? YOUR NAMES WILL DO, THOUGH YOU MAY SAY WHAT YOU WILL."

>(The players recite their characters names, plus any other information they decide to divulge, if they refuse, the figure will skip them, saying "VERY WELL.")

>"AND CAN YOU TELL ME THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF YOUR DEATH?"

>Any answer other than confusion is met with some variation of >"YOU DO NOT KNOW, BUT THIS IS A THING THAT NEVER CAME TO BE FOR YOU.", the figure never laughs.

>After each hero either tells their stories or declines to, the figure nods.

>"IT SEEMS NONE OF YOU REMEMBER YOUR OATHS. YOU WILL REVISIT YOUR PAST, ADVENTURERS (number), AND TELL ME HOW YOU CAME TO BE HERE WHEN WE MEET AGAIN."

>The figure dissolves into the shadows, parchment falling to the floor and rolling towards you.

The parchment appears to be a map, and though it falls flat, an almighty breeze pulls each of you towards it.

>It grows bigger and bigger, the darkness beginning to shatter as pricks of light begin to pierce the darkness.

>The map grows bigger and bigger, rounding to become the whole world as you fall. One by one you pass out, suffocating in the fall.

>(To the players) When you wake up, where are you?

>>312474

I tried

I had their city immediately explode from a modified locate city bomb and had everyone in it revived as zombies, then had an army of ant-papists invade. It was a good campaign.

>>311121

>>311223

What?

>>311121

>>311223

What?

>>322329

>>322334

What's not to get about a high society adventure?

All these plothooks are good but you need to think on how will you implement them.

I mean, imagine you're a DM and some guy brings out the worst kind of asshole to the table, a character that has no thirst for adventure, doesn't care about anything but himself (the world and his life included) and is generally a contrarian to any hero build.

This has actually happened to me, and I had to scrap a plot because of it more than once

Rather than doing mental gymnastics to goad your players together, have a representative of fate itself drag them where they need to be, all while telling them what they need to do - or else.

>>311244

How was the shipwrecked one? i sort of wnated to run an adventure with a bunch of PC's trying to gather up gear so they can survie on a desserted island and shit.

>>310785

If you've played Path of Exile, pretty much that. You're a bunch of exiles who've been dumped on some godforsaken accursed continent with only a rudimentary civilization and it's up to you guys to make the best of it, dig up ancient secrets, and ultimately either make your way home or build something greater where you are.

One really fun one we had was that the players were a bunch of political prisoners, criminals or other unwanted characters that the local empire's version of the CIA decided to drop into the neighboring kingdom to saw chaos and generally act as murderhobos. The campaign would start as a bunch of convoys would travel across the border, with the players acting as refugees. Then the border patrol comes, gets ambushed, and their equipment is divided to the players.

Your first goal from the caravan leader / CIA bossman? Dress up as the soldiers of the kingdom you're invading, and go to find other criminals / deserters / bandits and see if you can get on top of the food chain.

You make friends with the new girl at school, but she blows up the world.

You all meet at a tavern because all of you have been hired to kill the owner. The owner is an ancient vampire.

Aliens show up and start teaching people unusual and powerful magic which causes city-destroying disasters when someone messes up a spell.

The party wakes up in some kind of broken underground laboratory, fight their way to the surface, and find thousands of years have passed and the world was destroyed.

>>310785

>The party gathers at a funeral for a famous human tavern owner.

>As per the instructions of his will they must gather at said tavern to be delt what they have been willed.

>Tavern turns out to be trick house levels of hidden doors/chests/fake walls

>The party must search for what they have been willed to gain rightful ownership.

>In finding some items and such learn about the tavern owner and his many adventures he went on.

PHASE II

>Tavern gets raided by local gang while party does this, giving them proper time to explorer of course

>Rag tag combat ensues due to no one being allowed to bring weapons to the funeral and the party wanting to go to the tavern asap for free stuff

>Tavern is burned down during the fight, this would be the 83rd time the tavern has been burned down.

PHASE III

>Party is invited to a meeting with a large group of adventurers.

>The gang is getting out of hand and has committed many crimes including but not limited to burgalarsonarsony, murder, stealing/use of/distributing of highly experimental narcotics and public indecency.

>Police force has had enough and wants to take the fight to the gang head quarters

>Que campaign ala the raid

Im a bit dissapointed in myself. My current campaign opened up with a cliche "You were all captured by hobgoblins and brought to a hobgoblin prison, you will be sold into slavery soon if you do not act"

I kinda suck at creating first adventure hooks, trying to get the PCs to all know each other after not having met before.

I was thinking on how I could start my next campaign and I do like the idea of the players meeting/first adventure being something along the lines of they contaminated a magic plauge spreads through the country and need to team up before it eats away at their bodies.

Creates a unique premise, gives reason why strangers start working together, and creates a neat creepy timer for the first mission

>>312774

Ive actually always wanted to run a game like that. I am a sucker for that "real people in a fantasy world" trope and I loved the through of doing it in an RPG.

Kind of people I play with would neer be interested though

Best plot hook is whichever one the pc bite. Need the players to investigate place/person X? Well just have all roads lead to it. They don't care about the learned professor who's invited them to his mansion/university to find out about the problems plaguing the McTavish farm, but have however found the baker the most fascinating thing since sliced bread? Fine. The baker now regales them with tales of how his old fishing buddy McTavish came upon hard times with blah blah blah. Too often a GM will get caught up in the HOW he forgets the WHY. Sure, the baker won't know the extra special details (like how to hurt/banish said things) but after a bloody nose or two, he could then suggest the old professor to them.

Best thing to do when you start a new campaign is to pitch your players an idea before they roll characters. "I'm gonna run a game where all of you are part of a group that does X." Knowing beforehand gets them thinking in the right direction and they'll be far more open to it. If you have 'THAT GUY' in the group that just HAS to do the opposite of what you say, just roll with it and hold the fucktard responsible for his actions. Or better yet, the group responsible for his actions.

Having your player be part of a task force (modern/scifi) or chartered privater (sea/space) or band/group put together by some lord/rich patron can provide focus. The lenght of the leash should be discussed before hand. A task-force would have a shorter one with the ones in charge handing out assignments/orders, privateer the longest with an overall goal (attack our nation/worlds enemies and protect our interests, but otherwise you're free). The lord/patron might send word that he wants X done or Y area watched but would more likely only ask for things that he deemed important to his interests with little micro managing.

Campaign focuses:

>An old power (guild/nation/star empire/ect) that once had a strangle grip on trade/resource/routes has been severly weakened by a protracted war with another power. The PCs are working for a third, younger power that sees an opportunity to get a piece of the pie. Thing is, so do a lot of others, do they negotiate with them or just try to grab all they can? Resources are limited, the more the pcs can do with less, the more that will be available later and/or the more secure their past gains will be.

>The PCs are hired(possibly part of a this or prison deal) by a setting appropriate group (guild/government agency/corporation) to investigate the odd goings on in a distant village/town/city/space station. They are to observe, make reports, but not kick doors down or assault anyone. See, they don't have any jurisdiction there and no one is sure if the foreign government is in on it or not. The problem? Someone has been abducting a very specific type of person and preforming experiments on them. The few bodies that have been found showed that foreign organ of an unknown origin have been grafted to them.

>>328536

Like the plague idea. Just design getting the parts to the cure be in a location that requires each character's abilities to get. Whether it be traps the thief disarms, undead the cleric turns, infected the fighter, uh, fights or what ever. Just make it so each player comes away thinking, 'Sure am glad X was there to take care of that!" Just have your players make their characters first so you can tailor the adventure to fit.

>Get 8 people ready for a game

>have them roll up whatever they want.

>Characters made, players are set, DM begins.

"You find yourself at a table surrounded by 7 enemies, roll initiative."

Another one was: "You have been tasked willingly or unwillingly to escort these peasants from one town to the other."

>DM sets up a chess board

>tells us that every time we make progress, a player gets to move any piece on the board.

>Informs us that if we die in the campaign then we can't move a chess piece.

>Find out we aren't restricted to one color on the chess board.

>After numerous sessions, we are still no where near finishing the game.

>Chess board has boiled down to just a few pieces on the board.

>Mage manages to checkmate the White King.

>GM gives the Mage the magical mcguffin that will either solve the main issue of the campaign or turn it down a road of absolute fuckery.

>The fuckery begins.

The Sun has died. In it's place hangs a dim light in a hazy sky. Things will only get worse from here as the creatures of nightmare make their way into your world. Will you be able to find a new Sun or maybe resurrect the one now passed.

>>312474

This seems pretty interesting, and inspired me to put together a similar idea:

>you all wake up in a dark and indistinct room

>you are sitting in a chair - but are unable to so much as twitch

>there are other figures in chairs near you which you cannot make out any details of - and you now realize there is a poorly lit (by what if any source you cannot tell) table in front of you all

>suddenly a figure clad in fine all-concealing silks appears, and the only flesh of theirs you can see is their corpse-pale skin, ragged bloodied lips, and yellowed jagged teeth - all formed into a sadistic grin

>the figure puts its silk-clad hands on the table, and begins to unfold a parchment map out of thin air.

>"now now, don't worry. i'm a demon of my word." the grin seems to widen. "and as we agreed, the fate of your souls is up to only the finest of determinations.." he finishes unfolding the map, and while you cannot make out its exact features, you realize it's segmented into hexagons

>he waves both his hands over the table, and when your view of is no longer obscured you can see a wooden box of pewter figurines, and a multitude of exotic bone die where once was only shadow.

>"a game of chance and skill." the demon, whose name you now remember is Tepeki, declares. He puts his hands together, then pulls them apart. there's a deck of cards there which he begins to shuffle.

>"the rules are simple: defeat all twenty two of my major arcana and any number of my minor arcana, and I return you to life. but should all of you fall at once, i drag your souls off into the abyss. see? simple." Tepeki finishes shuffling, and pulls a wooden divider from underneath the table. he hides the cards, and some other things you cannot see, behind the divider. then he grabs the wooden box of pewter figurines and holds it out to each of you in turn

>somehow mesmerized, you grab the figurine that seems to call to you

>and you wake up with the rest of your party in a [location]. you all immediately realize that your body, equipment, armor, weapons, and everything around you seems.. parchment or painting-like. shadows and details seemingly inked or scratched in with charcoal. colors too bright or too dull. and the facial features of your companions.. of iffy quality.

>up above, in the blue zenith of the sky, you see a familiar grin looming like a god

>"let the games begin"

Shamelessly stolen from Hand of Fate.

This opening would require a campaign to be based around it, though. And presumably Tepeki would be the heckling killer dungeon master for the party.

Up to anyone who uses this as to whether or not Tepeki actually wants their souls, or simply wanted a group to run through his OC donut steel setting and villains.

>>310785

Gather your group. Offer them drinks OOC. Under each cup or soda can, there is a sticker/permanent marker mark. All are black, save that one is (green/blue/etc.) and another is (red/etc.).

"Congratulations! If you have a (green) mark under your cup, your character has been fatally poisoned by (BBEG Name Here) to die slowly. You must now search for a cure!"

"Oh, yeah, and if you have the (RED) mark… well, you'll see!"

The point here is, the (RED) mark can be used for various hyper-specific fuckery. Perhaps the BBEG didn't like (Character)'s face, or (Character) farted loudly in his direction? Well, BBEG has a long reach, and WOE will BEFALL the (Character) with the RED MARK! As GM, you can use this as its own sub-story, with assassins or possessed persons hunting down Red Mark, or perhaps Red Mark has the secret to defeating BBEG all along (or the Cure for Green Mark) and BBEG casting God-like magic to turn Red Mark randomly into a Toad from thousands of miles away is his attempt at slowing the Party down.

In short, you, the GM can use Green Mark to push the campaign along (have them suffer random, minorly annoying effects at first, have them grow if the group dallies too long, etc.) and the Red Mark for unexpected fuckery.

>>310785

Your party is being hunted down by assassins. Incredibly inept assassins.

It turns out that some level 1 dork was traumatized by one of their first adventures, and has been blowing vast sums of gold on hirelings to get petty revenge against a bunch of guys for whom it was but tuesday.

Not exactly 100% non-cliched, but have the party be a cell in an assassin's and/or thieves' guild.

>>310785

in contemporary settings players start in a car trunk (on their way to be dumped off a cliff) for either debts or getting too close to the (((truth))), if it's the latter i sometimes take away their character sheets while giving blanks they need to fill in in the process through the difficulties of tests they get.

Once i introduced a new player who had a trait allowing for hibernation as a body in a car wreck, and one of the earlier players tried stealing his shoes.

>>328756

Been done before.

>>310785

Players get shipwrecked off the coast of an uncharted land and have to deal with scare supplies, wildlife, exposure and hostile natives, orcs in my case.

>>332007

https://pastebin.com/Q3cEjtGu

Better version.

The PCs have great power but they're actually lunatics in an asylum

>>328465

>You make friends with the new girl at school, but she blows up the world.

I'm pretty sure I watched that anime.

The kingdom's royal lineage is a tragic one. The king had four children, his wife passing away after the fourth, and he refused to re-marry. Over time, each child perished in freak accidents. The king fell into despair at the loss of his family and shut himself away in his chambers for years. Reclusive and mysterious, the mourning king grows old and sickly, until one day.

One day the king emerges and makes an announcement in front of the largest audience his presence can summon. He presents a lengthy list of names, some of them renowned, some of them members of the noble class, some of them completely obscure and unknown.

The king declares, "For years I have known my children were murdered, and for years I have put everything I have into finding those who orchestrated their deaths. Every name on this list is a murderer of my children. I will die soon, and so I decree: whoever brings me the most heads of those named on this list will inherit my crown."

The kingdom immediately falls into chaos as every hitman, bounty hunter, miscreant, criminal element, low-life, and murderhobo goes on a crown-sanctioned headhunt.

A Neutral or Evil party may participate in the headhunt, competing against other parties pursuing every name on the king's hit-list. However a Good party may instead opt to search for what may be a surviving heir to the throne, one whose body was never actually found (of course) so as to stop the madness and bloodshed. Or depose the obviously-mad kind, whatever the players prefer.

>>337800

I'm planning to run this campaign in the (hopefully near) future.

The last campaign I ran: the PCs are sent to hell to kill the devil (actually Hextor, but devil is a better tagline) The method: being ritually sacrificed in Hextor's honour during session 1 in such a way as to condemn their souls to Hextor's realm forever.

>>338067

That sounds like the perfect punchline after a session or 20!

>>310785

Current campaign (Pathfinder)

>Evil emperor using his power and that of a giant traitorous (to his own kind) dragon are hunting down all of the (Planes)walkers, who walk planes.

>Walkers used for centuries to support businesses, economies, kingdoms, and cultures worldwide.

>rumors that a surviving walker is back and is in a forgotten temple in the middle of a desert that rips everything apart and even if you survive you can get lost forever if you know jack shit on how it works.

>Party starts as small resistance movement.

>give many options:grow resistance, join kingdom's army, just overthrow it for yourselves completely

>give players options on how to go about these tasks: use the tactics of the resistance movement to take over the kingdom yourselves as lvl 20 gods, require joining the army to even get a foothold for the resistance, etc.

>Let them do planar bullshit to make it more fun!

>>337977

reminds me of skyrim or oblivion

>You're all in adjacent jail cells…

You all meet on a ferry when pirates try to rob it.

Kill a Screaming cunt farm owner

Put silver mine under her land

Hilarity ensues

I have had a really stupid idea for introducing domain play early on, and I might spring it on my players.

>Just finish el generico dungeon

>Come out with loot and levels and all that

>An agent of the Lord of the Manor arrives to seize the rightful treasures of the lord (as it was on his land) after a period of time

>Introduce players to Taxes, working with the various heads of the feudal system, etc. in one fell swoop

The idea is that they manage to play the complex system of moving parts that is Medieval politics to their benefit so that they can forge alliances and potentially obtain resources that they would otherwise be unable to get, while adding more to prep time and dungeon delving that isn't just extra items.

Or, alternatively, they go full 'Don't tread on me' and become Outlaws. Either way is good.

>A massive ruin has been discovered. You are one of hundreds of people on sight. Some as expedition security, some as researchers, some as to simply observe and report any important discoveries.

>the Dark Lord has been slain and his army scattered. Do you wish to avenge your old friend, and how do you survive now that your base has fallen?

>FANTASY SPY THRILLER

Players start off shipwrecked on a beach with no memory of events prior and blanks in their skills on character sheet they can fill out based on properly figuring out difficulty of test they do

Alternatively in a trunk of a car, being driven off into a pit, off a cliff, for execution.

>Orcs have overrun your village, killing your family and most of the people you know. You and the other party members were among the survivors and were taken back as prisoners. Better escape before dinner time.

I was thinking of making my characters start on a ship that gets boarded by pirates. The players have two choices:

>sneak past the pirates and leave the ship by boat

>try to take back the boat

If they fail at either they get captured and offered a job by the pirate cap'n, if they refuse they get jailed

If they succeed at recapturing the ship they get rewarded by the captain and become moderately famous

If they run away they end up in a random location.

>>351408

Also each ending would confer a certain level of difficulty. Joining the bandits would be easy, fucking off would be normal, and recapping the ship would be hard.

Bomp