New D&D Campaign - One of Seven

It has been two months since I last wrote about our Gamemasters project, which failed. I mentioned that it "has led us to start up a new group with only a single DM." and now we have run a session 0 and played our first real session as well, already planning our next session.

Setting

We are playing in a homebrew setting that is placed on a large continent divided into four nations. We started out in the Kingdom of Lupos and quickly moved into the Principality of Sethzra where the campaign takes place.

Character 

We have created nature oriented characters. One of the players has quit after the first session. The other three players have created a Paladin of the Ancients, Druid of the Moon, and Cleric of Tempest. All three characters follow a peaceful goddess based on a monotheistic version of Eldath. This has created a very cooperative, religious, and peaceful party that attempts to avoid combat, which was why the fourth character (a combat oriented halfling rogue) has left the group, leaving the original three members that broke off from the Gamemasters project.

Expectation

I have some experience with this specific DM and I therefore have a certain expectation from his games. He is a relatively new DM and has thus much to learn. He doesn't keep track of distance, hit points, events, etc, so I expect a lot of discrepancy. I don't think he plays with monster hit points, and instead simply just decides when a monster should die. He has a lot of puzzles and mind games, and though I enjoy these, they focus on our personal skills rather than our characters' skills. He also has a number of other groups playing at the same time, which are higher level. This will also cause some issues I expect.

Game 

I don't know why the game is called One of Seven. The first session didn't actually give us any clue to the overall storyline of the campaign. We were gathered as a party to escort a countess from the Kingdom of Lupos to the Principality of Sethzra where she was to be wed to the prince there. The escort introduced us to a barren savannah land with a few forests here and there and a mountain that blocked our passage west. We came to small communities and encountered soldiers, guards, and a hydra. Eventually we finished the quest and witnessed the wedding, where an assassin used a magical bow to try and kill the prince. This is where we ended the session.

Future 

I expect that if I don't want to be railroaded too much and want to have fun, I will have to play my own game while playing in this setting and following the campaign. I'm planning on creating a map of everywhere my character goes and elaborate on our goddess, which is the main aspect of the setting that keeps our group together. The other players are also very keen on developing this deity. For example, we spent a long time at the first session randomly finding a small spring in the middle of one of the forests where we then blessed it in the name of Eldath.

D&D Modular Design

I've been playing around with the thought of releasing my setting on DriveThruRPG, but what would be different from my setting compared to other settings. I then started thinking about the new campaign I might create, and decided that if I created something modular, then it would be very different from what others release.

Modular Design
Modular design is a design approach that subdivides a system into smaller parts that can be independently created and then used in different systems. I would divide a setting into three large systems: Geography, History, and Religion. Under each of these systems there would be subsystems, and each subsystem would then have a module, for example Geography could have Topography, Races, Cultures, and under Topography there would be modules for Forest, Plain, River, Desert, etc. By doing it this way, I simply create one forest module, which can then easily be adjusted by changing certain variables, such as tree type, temperature, and size. By creating modules for everything I can easily create a setting that is adjustable from DM to DM.

My Next Campaign
An example, and starting point, would be for my next campaign where a group of adventurers arrive to an ancient broken world, which they have to rebuild and repopulate. To begin with, the party arrives to this world and the rest is up to them, creating a sandbox campaign that can be easily modified to the party's desires.

Example
To start with, I look at Geography -> Topography -> Arrival and insert a module that covers how the players reach this world. A portal from another world? A teleporation circle from another part of the world? Divine intervention? Natural planar travel? I then look at Geography -> Topography -> Elemental Land and insert a module that can be modified in size, add or remove ruins, and change the element between the four basic elements, which affects the creatures and challenges they first encounter.

And finally I look at Geography -> Topography -> River and insert a corresponding river that suits the element I chose under Elemental Land. Thus I've created the setting for the first adventure where the players arrive to this ancient broken world and need to fight their way from their arrival point to a safe area where they then can figure out what they want to do in this world. I may even use this opportunity to destroy any possiblity for them to return home from whence they came, in which case they may set out on a quest to find another way home.


 

Planning D&D Campaigns

In the past week I've been walking around thinking about future D&D games, which I'd like to share with you now.

3.5 Elemental War
We're currently playing a game set in my homebrew setting of Aspenta at the end of the 3rd Age where elementals are destroying the world with the help of temporal magic. The players are trying to defend the lands and save as many people as possible, while waiting for one of the elemental leaders to show itself. When this happens, the players will attempt to defeat the elemental and trap its essence within a powerful magical item they have crafted.

3.5 Temporal War
After the Elemental War, the world will be at the mercy of the elementals. Only a few survivors will remain. Though one of the Elemental Lords have been captured by the players, they will want to capture the other four as well. To avoid the main antagonist Ithilba from using temporal magic to simply time travel and stop them, they will use chronomancy themselves. Every time they defeat an elemental, they simply go back in time and hunt down the next elemental. Eventually, they will defeat all three remaining elemental lords at the same time and then hunt Ithilba through time to ensure that he fails.

5e Out of the Abyss
At the charity we'll be playing my own version of Out of the Abyss, where the players will have to escape an underground tiefling prison and find their way through the Underdark, only to discover that the Angels of Death have returned in demonic form.

5e Return to Aspenta 
I've been thinking about creating a module type elemental adventure where the players travel to the world of Aspenta in the 5th Age and starts rebuilding. I'm still working on the details and am usually distracted by thoughts on temporal mechanics.

5e Quest for Glory
The 1-on-1 game we're playing is currently set in the Valley of Spielburg and in the future it will spread south to the desert of Ur'Lah, following the original Quest for Glory computer game series.
 

24 hour D&D - Website for charity

For weeks I haven't had the energy to finish this month's adventure for the DMsguild. I have, however, finished the danish website for our charity. I set up the style similar to my original website and changed the logo with the D&D logo and the charity logo. I then created four subpages.

Frontpage
The frontpage simply has the poster that we'll be spreading across Denmark in a few months. It was created by Gamemaster Nina and has already been spread out across the internet, hopefully spreading more than currently. I'm doing this in danish in the hopes that it will attract more donors, but if it fails, then I'll probably be reverting to Extra-Life or something.

Support Us
The second page includes a donor button along with all the relevant information for this years charity, including the rewards you get for donating. The accumulated donations will also reward an english adventure from the DMsguild, so if you want, you can donate to the charity even if you don't understand danish. The following can be donated:

50 DKK ($7.45 Shoutout) – We give a shout-out during the event.

100 DKK ($14.90 Name) – You get to name an NPC (non-player character), magical item, city, or anything else of your choosing.

150 DKK ($22.35 Reroll) – You give a player or the DM a reroll that the person can use whenever he/she wants to. You may also give a player or the DM "advantage" on a d20 roll as per the basic D&D rules.

150 DKK ($22.35 Healing Potion) – You give a player a healing potion that the player gets to use whenever he/she wants to.

300 DKK ($44.70 Surprise) – Give the enemy "surprise" as per the D&D rules in a single encounter.

300 DKK ($44.70 Critical Success) – Give a player an automatic 20 on a d20 roll.

500 DKK ($74.50 Critical Failure) – Give a player an automatic 1 on a d20 roll.

1,337 DKK ($199.21 New Life) – The party gains an extra life, so if one of the characters die, that character gets resurrected.


2014 and 2015
The last two pages include information from our Extra-Life event in 2014 and 2015 translated into danish. The last page has a link at the bottom of the page to the trailer for the event.