Campaign Ideas 2011 June Edition

From Hell's Heart

In the setting, the PC's were seriously wronged by the ruling class, cast out, tortured, lost families, come up with whatever truly awful tragedy you like as per the background, just make it bad. Being nearly broken by this only one thing keeps them alive and sane ,faith and hope. Faith in each other and Hope of vengeance.

All PC's must be of evil alignment have a basic loyalty to other party members and be interested in vengeance at any cost. Its D&D on the dark-side where you can be the one drowning the world or consorting with witches and werewolves. Learn to hate and come from Hell' Heart.

Needless to say this is for select mature players who can handle it.

R.A.I.D.

Royal Army Intelligence Division.

Gear Up! We have a dead marine. Its TV's NCIS in a D&D world. The PC's are tasked with investigating crimes caused by or against members of the King's Forces. Investigate crime, espionage, terror and ordinary dirty deeds while trying to avoid disappointing from The Gnomish Duchess of Deception (or the L.J. Tibbs)

Campaign Ideas 2011 May Edition

Utopia Secret Police

Its 20 years after a mostly benevolent super being has secretly taken over the planet. All large scale war has stopped and most oppression has stopped. However as the super being does not wish to be everywhere all the time for fear of going wacko, its your jobs to stop organized crime, terrorism and all the other transnational, anti Utopian nastiness. You are the Utopia Secret police, a carefully selected, multinational force of experts because some people just can't deal with a decent world.


Royal Archaeological Delvers

Dungeon crawls and ruin raiding with a twist. Instead of freelance looters, you are a team of professional archaeologists in the employ of a King, Sandor the Wise. Instead of smash and grab it catalog, preserve, fight off monsters and Delvers , speak with monsters, uncover secrets and sometimes protect the Kingdom.

Arm of Decision

Its 2030 a new cold war, a war of limited resources in a world with NBC weapon proliferation and a ruined orbit. As near future special ops, you are the arms of decision. Your team of specialists protects national security and does all the nations dirty work, for the people. Probably.

Campaign Ideas 2011 with Reader Contribution

Just a couple of more for the grist mill..

Aberwyvern

Ars Magica in Wales during the tine of Braveheart (Edward the 1st's Era) based roughly on David Macaulay's Castles. Not only in this a period at least somewhat familiar to players through that execrable Braveheart movie but its a classically middle ages time frame with a lot going on. Having a castle built very close to a chantry is a ready made adventure seed even the players never do decide to get involved in the bigger political issues.

Shanghai Police

This was contributed by my reader Hsu Dek and its a great idea. Shanghai in the 20's and 30's was an exciting and dangerous time with lots of opportunity for a group of clever players. Its also moves nicely into broader pulp topics and WW2 as well.

A Rare Sunday Post Campaign Ideas

I usually don't post on Sunday but I was hit with a couple of cool campaign ideas ...

#1 Arrows

This is a version of the TV show Archer played straight. Espionage in an alternate now where the US is still locked into a cold war with whats left of the Soviet Union (they lost Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Eastern Germany but stayed together) China and a myriad of other states ....

#2 Back Then.

A police procedural stretching from 1975-1995 or so. The players would be young rookies and would be able to play out their careers after Vietnam to the mid 90's


#3 Island in the Fog

My take on "Lost" . Basically the PC are thrown together on a mysterious island after a fog takes them from wherever they were to there. Can they unravel the mystery of the island and discover the way home? Or do they even want too.

Campaign Ideas 2011 Late March

GURPS Pulse Guns

This is just an excuse to use GURPS Tactical Shooting with ray guns in a modern setting. Basically back in the early 70's a hobbyist found an obscure physical law that allows easy creation of ray guns from common materials. After some attempts to restrict them, the governments are now resigned to proliferation and its blasters for all. Other uses for this tech however have not seemed to come about so, its whatever the technology of the era is plus blasters.

These weapons are heavily armor piercing (armor is 1/5 as effective) and a bit more deadly and nearly recoiless but are semi auto only (6 shots per second is too much for sustained fire) and limited to a very heavy machine gun in damage (which will penetrate the side armor of a tank or the front of an APC)

Characters would be urged to take luck as hits are easy and deadly and cover only helps a little otherwise its blog standard GURPS.

Campaign Ideas 2011 #2

Dirty White Boys

Low Prospect young adults (probably White Hats or Investigators in Buff/Angel) stumble into the Supernatural

Inter-Zone

The name is a play on the rules sets (R-Tal's Interlock) . Basically this is Cyberpunk 2020 Earth vs an invasion of Mecha. It also gives men an excuse to play with Mechton Maximum Metal and every other cheeseball thing I have for these games.

Campaign Ideas 1st 2011

Space Fall

This is a cross between the old SJ games setting Sprockets and FTL Y'all. Basically its 1982 or so and a bunch of alien technology has fallen to Earth. Apparently only some people can get it to work . The PC's are some of those people and they have a spaceship (and a few other toys) and go from there ....

So what are the best types of D&D games for you to Run.

My best games are

#1 Low to medium level Sword and Sorcery stuff

#2 Humor driven games, D&D as comedy

#3 Low level fairytale and horror games


How about you?

A couple of non OSR games I want to try

Not my designs at all but I'd like to try

Dyed in the Wool or a musket-punk version of it.

Slaughter Feast which is a version of "Real World RPG Rules" the key here is the players have to play people trying to be world in a world gone murderous

And I think I'd like to give Dreamscarred Presses "3rd Dawn" in the excellent and under-appreciated Trie20 a go.. Its more a setting than a campaign but its unique enough to tweak my interest in someone else's world.

So what non OSR stuff would you like to play?

Campaign Ideas December Edition

Note sure if there will be a number two this month but here goes

Immortals

A Highlander the Gathering meets Wu-Xia knockoff where the PC's are Immortals. The key differences are that there is no rule that "There can be only one" and while Power can be stolen there is no "End of Days" or "Prize" Also as the intro might suggest "Boost" powers are quite possible and even encouraged.

Argo

Welcome to Argo house, your home, your prison, your life. P.C.'s are agoraphobics who live together in an enormous mansion created years ago by someone with the same problem. Essentially its a kind of social and mystery dungeon crawl with very detailed environments. Its highly possible I'll set this in the same universe as Ramble in which case the technology is quite a bit lower and there are no cellphones or Internet..

Among the Mighty

Yesterday you were a regular Joe or Jane . Last night you watched as a new comet "The Trailing Sword" roared overhead. Today, you are Among the Mighty. D20 modern meets D&D where the players who were regular folks suddenly become 15th level Gestalt D&D characters with all the trimmings (even the magic items!) What will you do with your newfound power?

Campaign Ideas November Edition #2

Suds

A tabletop RPG designed explicitly as a soap opera rather than an adventure game. There will be some action but its mostly drama drama drama in the vein of Melrose Place and the OC

The Mighty

Another soap game, this time more along the lines of Dallas, Falcon Crest and Dynasty

These games might use Smallville (which is designed for soaps) or amusingly GURPS which is nearish to releasing a very detailed social engineering supplement.

Campaign Ideas November Edition #1

Survival of the Fittest

After a cosmic event only the top 1/10 the human race survives. This is a post-apocalypse campaign of rebuilding and discovery not shooting and fast cars .

Sparks

Gestalt D&D with the PC's are people in the modern world who suddenly are transformed into high level D&D characters. What will you do with 15 levels and tons of magic?

On the Actual Play Agenda: Choice #3 Old School Moduel Crawl

The last D&D choice

My players have never played the old school modules so they are in for a treat if they choose this option.

Old School Module Crawl: Lightly modified Labyrinth Lord: Advanced Edition Companion meets old school modules.

On the Actual Play Agenda: Choice #2 Into the Green

The next idea...

Into the Green Wood: Fae Centric/ Swashbuckling Pathfinder with clock-punk elements

On the Actual Play Agenda: Choice #1 Borderlands

Working on some notes for the next campaign prospectus. Here is what I'll be offering my group.

The 1st offering will be : Pathfinder -- Borderlands: Classic Sandbox using very lightly modified Pathfinder and 3X

Pathfinder/3X So How about all casters are highly specialized

Just a notion that occurred to me. It might be fun to ban the generalist casters like Wizard, Druid and Cleric and allow only the highly focused caster classes.

The list would be limited to the Pathfinder Summoner and the four 3x classes, Healer, Dread Necromancer, Beguiler and War Mage.

This would provide nearly the ultimate in niche protection for casters and give the game a very distinct "powers" flavor.

What say you all?

Thinking About: Doing away with Non Human Races

I have been thinking about humanocentric gaming of late and have come to the conclusion that while there is nothing wrong with well thought out non human PC's, they are basically unnecessary.

Most of the pre Tolkien fiction doesn't have them except as half breeds. Now certainly there are of historical tales (some quite recent) involving someone alleged to have some non human ancestors like a Troll in the family lineage,Changeling (usually the human taken by the Fae) a Vampire (the Dhampir archetype that is so popular right now) and maybe someone like Cú Chulainn who was essentially god blooded and even others from non European parts of the world like the Philippines, Polynesia or Africa

Still until the influence of Tolkien (mostly) the idea of a non human protaganist was unknown. No one would have a complex non human culture or even contemplate a truly alien protagonist outside (possibly) of Sci-Fi.

I think in some ways this approach might be better. It takes encounters with Elves and Dwarves (even more cunning ones) and whatnot into the realm of the strange and mysterious, in other words the broader realm of adventure . It also gives those rare PC's a direct connection to that realm, like it or not, they were born into it.

Instead of the Mos Esiley Cantina we can concentrate on the various human cultures even cribbing from them as needed "of course those guys talk with Scots accents. They are Highlanders after all" this roots the mundane part of the game world into something like our more prosaic reality and gives us a hint more verisimilitude.

Worlds where Pseudo French, Quasi British, Kinda Irish and Sorta Scots sit down at a table make more sense than a Human, a Hafling , an Elf and a Lizardman doing the same. In the event a non human race is desired for the world it makes them even more "other"

Personally I like it but as always YMMV ...

Campaign Ideas Bonus Round

Just a few that occurred to me recently ...

Into the Big World
A party of sheltered shire folk must journey into the wider world to regain a powerful protective device. D&D with an all Halfling party.

Days of Dust
Explore the world and try to survive when essentially everyone is dead and turned to dust. Night of the Comet meets the Omega Man with twists.

The Rift Worlds Invasion
Can you hold the Imperial line and stop the invasion of a TL17 civilization?

Conquest and Glory
The Rift Worlds Invasion from the POV of the invaders. The PC's get to play the command personnel of the 1,000,000 ton TL17 cruiser Tribute of Cana as they try to get a foothold into Imperial Space despite the Jump 15 distances.

Trillion Credit Squadron
This is the classic GDW module updated. Players may either play the Imperium , who gets the eponymous tera-credit or the Rift Worlds who gain one TL17 1,000,000 Warship.

Campaign Ideas Day Fourteen

Boy its been Two Weeks already. Hard to believe. Today I am going to wrap this up with a nice long post with well everything else, including SF, Horror, Modern, Modern Fantasy and Fantasy stuff.


This Far and No Farther:
A GURPS game set in a stagnant near future. New technologies include Longeity Serum, Immune Amplification and Smart Drugs. The hitch, After a Neo Nazi Biogenic War hard science research is severely limited and controlled .
The PC's would be local police investigators on the trail of a homicide. Along the way they will discover all sorts of mad scientists illegal science labs and illegal micro fab computer chip plants.

Starlight, Iron and the End of Days:
This is DeLint style Faerie tales set in a 2050 where the demographic prediction of Phillip Longman et all are true. Less Men means the Fae have crept slowly back into the world. Normal people, poignant empty cities and greening


Revolution Rock:
Also set in the same Universe. A band of teen age friends try to get into the rock concert of the century.

Quiet Years:
A cop show set in the same Universe as above, though without any supernatural elements at all
System: Unisystem Medium or GURPS.

Project Restoration
The player characters come together while they are all working for a future government program called "Project Restoration" Since the Earths population dropped by 50% and the birth rate is really low (even with extended lifespans) the State of California decided to use a mixture of volunteers (called Tans from the uniform) and folks on alternative sentences (for various minor to moderate offenses, called Blues) from 16-25 (ish) to restore of demolish unused housing stock in hopes of making it easier to have kids (more space means more kids). said players uncover some very old problems (possibly occult) and wacky hijinks ensue.


Eldritch Hours:
Call of Cuthulu with the names and serial number filled off. New names, new faces and new horrors.

Wing Zero:Senego Dreams
Anime inspired. 6 ancient experimental ships and a rag tag commercial fleet against an alien invasion.

Under a Broken Sky:
Thundaar inspired post apocalypse super science an magic fusion using with D&D and Gamma World. . Who cares if its not logical, its fun.

They Who Were Chosen:
Modern fantasy. The PC's discover All Hell is Breaking Loose and its there job to stop it. Sort of like an all Slayer Buffy game without the background stuff


Simply Marvelous:
A return to my modified marvel universe using Beyond Human.


Faerie Triumphant:
The Elves have destroyed European civilization. But recently there has been a sliver of hope and the Fae sighting have diminished. Is it the new beginning or just a lull in the end of the world.

All the World is Trees:
Inspired by a recent thread Veridia of course. No oceans, no plains -- just trees.Tribal style adventuring with Anglo Saxon, Australian Aborigine and Native American flavor


All Along the Great River
Another Corner of Videria, this time the city states along the great river that traverses the world.


Psi-Co-Gens
Scannerque modern intrigue in the vein of Firestarter, the 24th letter , Push and Jumper. The PC's are powerful psi fugitives on the trail of the mysterious "Haven" a place where psis can live in piece. Pursuing them is "The Shop" and "The Company" both of them who want to control this powerful asset.

The Elf Killer Way
The mortals of Anar will no longer be pawns of the Elves. Its time for war. Men, Orcs, Dwarves and Halfling vs the Evil fae.

Dark Streets
Pulp Supers with more than a hint of Wold Newton.

The Grand Campaign
L1 to the Demon Web Pits – Old School

Reign of Ghosts
This is the preamble to Wielders and is set in Midrea after the 3rd apocoli. All of the faiths except three (Wicca, The Way and The Left Hand Path) were actually soul collecting beings using the power for obscure purposes. These "Gawds" were killed during the Soul Taker War changing what was a D&D world into a True 20ish one.

Bonus Campaign Ideas

Just because and just because it is just because I am posting a grip of short ideas

Ramble
"One strange day exploring a city on foot, kind of a little Adventurers in Baby Sitting meets Up with a dose of Garfield. "

Keep Her Flying
A ship and a crew is a family. Sometimes a dysfunctional one. The players are a crew of Free Traders in the Verse, after the events of Serenity.

See Ya Space Cowboy
Cowboy Bebeop in the Verse

Special Crimes Unit
Law and Order +CSI +Weird

Borderlands
Classic modules using 3x D&D with light rule changes

Little Wishes.
Petty magic on the world of Cantrip . D&D using cantrips and osirons and magic items as the only magic.

Dark Cities
Dark Fantasy possibly with NWOD rules from Mirrors