Matt put some stuff up on his twitter about the type of campaign he wants to run for the stream in August.
Here are the list of options: http://squaremans.com/Campaigns.pdf
Here is where he lets people vote for what they think is cool: https://twitter.com/mattcolville/status/877719709084336128
My vote went towards to Iron Tower, which sounds like the most interesting and atypical option of the four.
Posted Jun 22, 2017, 10:21 AM UTC
Look like the party has chosen The Iron Tower.
The players were much less interested in the Sandbox Game ("we just did that") and the Castle Omund game, probably because they wanted more meaning than just delving for treasure.
The Grand Tour probably would have won, but one player put it as their least interesting choice, which means "everyone's #2" won.
The Iron Tower is straight up the Black Company in Taglios right there. I love it.
I made the same parallel on twitter and Matt said it was a "coincidence"
Heh..."burying their doubts with their dead" is directly taken from a blurb on the back of one of the Black Company books.
I used to try to be more subtle with the stuff I steal for my campaign, but Matt showed me it's ok to brazenly steal. As long as the player's haven't read it, it's fair game!
Heck if they notice you just nod and behind the scenes make changes so they don't know everything
Which is funny because he's already stated that he has pulled ideas from the Black Company before. Since we know he knows Black Company, I'd say it's a coincidence in the same way the Black Rose was.
No shame, though. You're only as good as the people you steal from.
It is 100% an obvious ripoff of the Black Company. I actually recommend players read the books before we play, when I run the Iron Tower game.
Wait, when did you mention this...
tries to find library card
Have you ever had players who read the novels and then try to live those stories, or are your players pretty good about using the books as an inspiration for their mindset and for the nature of the world while playing their own story? It sounds like an awesome tool to get people involved, engaged, and inspired.
Not gonna lie, your use of the dead bodies bit got me to finally read the series... and it was great. The characters are so thought-out and the moral grayness is intense.
My favorite thing about the series is that it makes these lose-lose situations where the characters have to do something that is objectively "bad" (by modern standards at least)... but it makes you think, "If I were in that situation, would I have done that? Probably". And now the character is inside your head.
So anyways, thanks for pushing that series to the top of my reading list!
Which was pretty much my thought too ... cause BC is GREAT grunt level fantasy.
Totally want to see the grand tour. Has the largest potential of keeping the PCs engaged by forcing movement around the world. Plus what a cool way to explore matts game world.
I think an exploration-heavy game with Fantasy Japan and Fantasy Egypt would be awesome.
I voted for Iron Tower too, but it seems like the least likely/least suited for Uncle Matt's group given what we know about them and their interaction with politics.
But who knows, players evolve and change. Maybe they'll want to try something completely different.
I think it'll work specifically because the characters don't care about the politics of Capital, and the folks using them as chess pieces are counting on that.
I expect the characters will get to know and loathe the major players in the city and regularly talk about how all this political bullshit gives them a headache.
Ohhh that's a good point. I hadn't thought of it it that way.
I think I was trying to say that if given a choice, Iron Tower didn't seem like the type of campaign the players would pick. But I'm excited to find out what they do pick.
I hope to prove you wrong!
The major churn point with me and politics in a game is when things become a bit "too clever" and I can't follow or it becomes more tedious than engaging to keep track of everything that's happened. For example, I'm not the kind of person who knows how a movie will end, even if it's completely blatant...
The other thing that will make it appear I'm "disengaged" is when stuff happens behind closed doors; I try my best not to meta, so if my character wasn't present when some shit went down and wasn't informed... how would they ever know so they could care?
That's true. I just voted for the one which would be most atypical and fun to watch. We've already seen his sandbox. A macguffin fetch quest and a megadungeon seem pretty well trod, whereas the Iron Tower seems more up my street.
I've been reading Jon Peterson's book about the origin of D&D, so I am really curious to see what a modern version of The Ruins of Castle [Greyhawk] looks/plays like. Colville is great at mixing the best (and oft-forgotten) aspects of classic D&D into What The Game Has Become.
I'm also curious about the source material he'd use for a megadungeon like this. If he uses TSR's cheeky Castle Greyhawk book from 1988, I hope the PCs get farther than that damn gas spore that totaled my party when I was 12. (Y'see, the DM described it as a "sphere," but we thought he said "spear...")
I was going to use something like Expedition to Castle Greyhawk or Castle Whiterock or Maure Castle. But now I don't have to pick! :D
"A Dark and Hungry God Arises," all the way. I'd be hoping for a feeling of Lovecraft-ian existential doom. Possibly foiling a conspiracy to raise the god in different locales, that sort of thing.
That said, sounds pretty similar to how Matt explained he runs his games anyway. Sandbox, players follow up on rumors, and then all the sudden, they find they're fighting against a cult, and there's a god involved, who is some sort of lizard, probably.
That was probably going to be Tiamat at the end of Red Hand of Doom.
It could be either (or both) my MTG player side or my love for video games like Zelda, but I'm a sucker for visiting places with different aesthetics (which is one reason I have a hard time building a map for my campaigns because I want everything). From the comment it should be clear that I would choose the Wards of the Last Emperor, it helps that it is the the whole Vestiges of Divergence arc from CR.
Second would probably be the Iron Tower, only got to play once in a urban setting and I love politics (which is something that I have a hard time fleshing out as a DM). I would probably roll a Sharpshooter Assassin Rogue for this one.
It's amazing how equally divided those votes are.
It's not hard to understand. They're all damn good campaign pitches!
Is it just me, or are the wizards the wrong way round in the first campaign description? Is Vitae Ajax's wizard or Omund's?
Castle Ruins, I think people underestimate how versatile a megadungeon can be, and I would LOVE to see one done well by Matt.
Whatever he does, I cannot wait to steal everything possible from his campaign for my own.
I agree, I think the mega dungeon is something I should just do, and the players will see how much fun it is.
Actually I'm pretty sure there's gonna be a mega dungeon in Capital! The City of the Great Game.
I guess even if you don't do a Megadungeon in Capital you could always run a mini campaign of one (to level 5 or so) to see if they like it and want to continue. It's just cool that there can be whole ecologies, merchants and factions without leaving this sprawling insanely sized underground structure- and I haven't seen it done I just think the idea is awesome
I hope to get as much out of it as possible regardless! Thanks
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I'm not a tweeter, so I'll use this space to give the Grand Tour my vote.
The Iron Tower is the campaign I'd most like to play a PC. A Dark and Hungry God Arises is the campaign I'd most like to DM.
Whatever he ends up running, I look forward to burglarizing it with mirthful abandon.
I think it would a fun exercise to pitch hypothetical PCs (to each other) that we would run in each campaign. Not an insane amount of detail. No stat blocks. Just a 2-3 sentence summary of Race, Class, where from and the Character point of view.
For instance, if I were running a PC in the Iron Tower: I'd run Parsifal Kell, a Human Paladin of Devotion who was once a squire set to become a Knight but his father dishonored their house and now Kell, living in exile, is forced to sell his sword. Parsifal is young and naive and believes he can atone for his father's sins by fighting for just causes. Who decides what is just?
I voted for the Iron Tower as well, and though I usually play Paladins or more mundane Knights, I think I'd switch it up for this campaign, especially since that's the route you've taken.
Edit: This ended up longer than I intended...
Welch, born Caspar Pendergast, got his nickname after neglecting to pay Capital's Thieves' Guild their take on a job. When they found out he was the one who committed the heist, they asked for money he'd already spent, plunging him into their debt; never a good place to be. They sent him on suicide missions through the city that only barely covered the interest on what they said he owed.
One such mission was to sneak into a Captain of the Iron Tower's room and make a copy of a contract they had just signed within the city walls. Welch got greedy however, and after making his copy, stuck around too long, pocketing other valuables in the room. The Captain found him, and though upset, one of his scouts didn't make it back from the last contract, and Welch had made it past his guards.
The Captain offered Welch a position in the Iron Tower which he readil took, leaving Capital the next day. It's with much reluctance and a down-turned head that Welch re-enter Capital these years later, unsure if the Thieves Guild has forgotten his debt and flight, or if it'll come back to bite him in the ass.
Keldan Venadore. Elf Swashbuckler, way past his prime. Not satisfied with the apathetic, detached lives that most elves lead, Keldan set out for adventure.
He joined the Iron Tower hoping to see the world, and his wit, charm and bluster got him out of many sticky situations. That was long ago though. Over time he's risen and fallen through the ranks, and his penchant for drugs and drink has stolen his youthful vigour.
Keldan loves the Iron Tower and still acts like that reckless youth from long ago, but knows that he can't live forever. He volunteers for dangerous missions, runs his mouth and is the last to retreat. Keldan's fought enough battles to know the only glory in mercenary work is death.