Source
r/DMAcademy•
Hungrymaster

My first short campaign

Need Advice: Worldbuilding

I know there would be many better RPG systems for this but I have no experience with them and my likely players have no interest in trying anything else than 5e at the moment. All of my players except for one will be beginners.

I have been brainstorming a short shipwreck campaign with somewhere around 4-8 sessions with themes of mystery, horror, and some tropes from the TV series Lost (which I've been watching this winter.) The campaign will go somewhere like level 6-8. I would like to force six classes which the 3-4 players can choose from. The unchosen classes will be NPCs. All classes will get their own homebrew feat designed around survival and a fear system kind of like exhaustion but accumulation would trigger from actions that would require exceptional courage or other story beats. (I think I've heard Call of Cthulhu uses something like this.)

For now I'm set on an Artificer who can build shelter and gadgets from simple building blocks. A Bard who can help others' morale and fear. A ranger who can find water and food and find previsited locations without trouble. And maybe a druid who can create food and water and maybe communicate with nature.

The story beats would go something like this: 1-2 sessions of setting on the island with a bit of supernatural and scary vibes setting in, the island seems to be uninhabited. 1-2 sessions of finding traces and maybe seeing glimpses of people from the island***.

And then a couple sessions of finding the people and finding out why they are locked in this island which is actually a devil's/demon's pocket dimension where this people of changelings have to sacrifice other shipwrecked people to get out.

So first of all does all this sound feasible? I have never run a campaign shorter than 20 sessions.

Another smaller question:

Now my experienced player who has been in my main legacy campaign for a year has asked if he could use his concept of a Tiefling Warlock who's horns have grown to pierce their eyes, and had to make a pact to see through a jewel on their forehead and became a warlock through that pact. Sofar this is fine by me, but:

***I wanted to make a story beat where this player's character goes missing, is kidnapped and replaced by a changeling played by this player if they're fine with it. Would it fit if as this changeling joins the party their horns would've taken a step back and their eyes would be opened? As the changeling probably couldn't replicate a jewel they can see through.

Is this switcharoo feasible in any way to motivate the players to maybe interrogate the infiltrator to save their friend and to get in touch with the changeling people?

Do you have any fear/survival feat ideas for a Warlcok?

Anything else I should keep in mind with a campaign line this?

All flying races, forms, and familiars will be banned as traversal and scouting will be a major thing.

Posted Mar 17, 2023, 2:35 AM UTC

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MrVirtualPie•

Starting beginners at level 6 is a little sketchy unless they are adamant on learning the higher level characters. Once again since your players are beginners having an infiltrator who you want to be found out might be a little difficult for them. If you trust your players instincts and intelligence go for it though.

Feat Idea for the Warlock could be anything that relates to what their specific patron specializes in Fey patron might be good at forest tracking, Undead might be able to get a time table of when things died, etc...

Best of luck with whatever you decide to do :)

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HungrymasterOP•

The players aren't adamant on the higher levels, I mostly thought that if I want them to be able to deal with a lesser devil/demon higher levels would be necessary. They are all very well versed with complex video games so I thought they might be able to handle it but I'll think about it some more. Thanks for all the great feedback!

0
MrVirtualPie•

Like I said I don't know your players but I would probably gauge and ask them, DnD isn't necessarily a difficult system to learn but committing to learning a character of that complexity would take some time. So if they are cool with it you can be too. And there are a handful of pretty scary threats that a party could 4v1 if they approached it intelligently so them, being lower levels doesn't necessarily mean they can't fight the strong ones.

:)

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JudgeHoltman•

Don't force the characters on the players. It sounds like you have 4-6 jobs on the ship that NEED to be done, and you've designed a squad of player characters to do that job.

Just make them NPC's. Let the players pick their characters, give the ones that "choose correctly" the jobs they wanted, then have NPC's fill in the jobs nobody wants to do.

Because there's gonna be a job that nobody wants to do. You'd basically be forcing someone to do a job they don't want to do as a game for fun. This is how first impressions go bad.

If you are the only one with any TTRPG experience, then you should definitely start at Level 1. WOTC did a really good job dialing up the rules for 5e pretty smoothly in Tier 1 so players can learn the mechanics of their class without dying from information overload.

You've really gotta treat Tier 1 players with kid gloves, as they have enough HP that a Goblin crit can actually insta-kill the Wizard. Plus if they have any pre-existing expectations, they're still about 6 IRL months away from doing their most iconic stuff. If they're expecting iconic stuff, they're not totally new, and there's no shame in starting a campaign at Level 6.

To me, Level 6 is a really sweet spot. Just about everyone's iconic features are now fully functional, they've got some HP to eat a hit or two, but you can still actually kill them to death in a single encounter.

Level 8 is about where someone can top out at jumping in with zero TTRPG experience and being able to figure it out as they go. After that if you're coming in to the campaign cold, you're gonna be running a Champion Fighter or Scout/Thief Rogue for a couple sessions while you figure out literally how to play the game. Those are both very viable classes that are also extremely rules-light. I can give someone a character sheet at any level for Swordy McBoard or Sticky Fingas and have you up and running in about 5 minutes.

So, I understand where you're coming from. I will also start total newbies with Level 6 PC's pretty regularly. You've gotta REALLY know your rules, and know their character sheets/mechanics better than everyone else at the table.

The players need to understand their CHARACTERS. The flavor and intention outside of mechanics that define their character. That way you can ask them "what do you want to do" then make dreams happen with in-game mechanics.

The hands-down easiest way to do this is to ask each of your players to pick a AAA Pop Culture Icon. Disney Princesses, Marvel Heroes, WWE Superstars, minimum $100MM opening weekend stuff. Something EVERYONE at the table fully knows.

Sorcerers can be tough to run because of all the rules right? But what if I gave you a character sheet and told you that you were Princess Elsa? What would be your expectations? She's high-magic, high-charisma, very pretty, but probably not super great at taking a punch. She's more the "Sing a pretty song while turning your kingdom into a frozen hellscape" kinda character. Mechanically, that's a Half-elf White Dragon Sorcerer. CHA>DEX>INT>CON>WIS>STR.

When you tell me you want to be Elsa, all I need to know after that is "Why is she on the ship"? The mechanics are easy enough to work out, and by giving me a pop culture icon, you've already given me a dozen NPC's that EVERYONE knows to be looking for, because if you've got Elsa, Anna's and Olaf and the Moose guy is probably around here somewhere. Now you've got the whole table asking for plot hooks.

Plus there's the psychology aspect. Kristen has never played a TTRPG before, and it's her turn. The whole party is pinned down by Goblins, Cleric is bleeding out and she's gotta make a clutch play. But Kristen doesn't know what to do because Kristen has never been pinned down by a Goblin Ambush. Since Bloodaxe is an extension of who Kristen is, he doesn't know what to do either. So, instead of smashing faces, her character Bloodaxe Murderdeath, freezes, runs and dies to a salvo the next round.

But if you gave her Randy Savage (with the exact same mechanics), it's SO Much easier to get into character. Randy Savage only does 2 things: Cocaine and Smashing Faces, and he's all outta Cocaine, so he's gonna go ask those little green fellers if he has some. As a bonus, I'll load up the Traits/Ideals/Bonds/Flaws sections with Randy Savage quotes, and give out free Inspiration if you can casually work one of them into the conversation.

Now someone who is usually shy about roleplaying and figuring out how to come up with something good to say has a little minigame to play trying to use those quotes. Usually good for a solid laugh, giving everyone a chance to play.

Again, EVERYONE also immediately knows everyone's backstory and expected powers. Elsa can't take a hit, so she's not gonna make the play to go rescue Anna. But Randy Savage is a strong thiccboi who can definitely make that play without dying. Probably.

This all makes it so a "what is a d20" player can jump into a high level character and instantly know what their job is and how to be "good" at playing their character. Once everyone has a vibe for the game and campaign, then these AAA characters can ride off into the sunset at the next chapter break and someone new with mechanics and story that the player actually researched themselves can step in.

So, have them pick character archetypes that they want, then re-skin your mechanics around the characters you have. If there's jobs that HAVE to be done on the ship, backfill with NPC's like you have. Whatever mission hooks there are, have the DMNPC party go do the ones they aren't biting on "off-screen". They don't actually have to come along with the party.

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