Thursday, March 26, 2009

The LL Campaign in 25 Words or Less

Over at “Malevolent & Benign”, Max has asked for descriptions of home-brew campaigns in 25 words or less. It's a tough challenge, more so for me because I think the players and I are still feeling our way around the Labyrinth Lord campaign I'm DMing. Here's a shot:

Titans vs. Gods on a young world of mystery where adventurers plunder the treasures of the past, risking awakening buried dangers.

Meh. Accurate, so far as it goes, but I don't think that really captures the flavor of the campaign. Noisms suggested ditching the sentence and just unleashing the flood of words. That might look like:

Titans vs. Gods, carnivorous riding birds, early Iron Age, shattered empires, storied ruins, steamy jungles, pirates, returning fey, dangerous magic, vengeful monsters bearing ancient grudges.

That's a bit better. But the truth is, I'd probably need to revisit this in a few months anyway. Partly because the players and I will have better shaken out what our mutual interests are, but also because the PCs will be higher level and will probably have gotten themselves entangled in some larger plot. At this point I have no idea what it will be, but that's the usual pattern for my campaigns. And I'm hoping to get a bit in of the old school “end game” of clearing the wilderness and building strongholds of some sort which will change things yet again.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I would definitely say the second blurb is superior. The first blurb looked to me like virtually any D&D campaign, while the second one filled me with a burning need to game.

trollsmyth said...

Yeah, I completely agree. I need to make it hyperlinked, though.

Natalie said...

"Doom" repeated for 25 words wouldn't be a helpful summary, I suppose.

Stronghold-building sounds fun. I take it these are plans for *way* down the line?

trollsmyth said...

Doom by slime, doom by spider, doom by angry-turtle-guy... ;)

As for the stronghold-building, that really depends. Traditionally, it happens after you've reached "name level", usually 9th or 10th. That said, I've had players at around 5th or so move into a dungeon they've cleared, or adopt a small hamlet and build fortifications for it.

I made the world, but it's yours to explore as you will. Right now, your options are limited by your relative poverty. I don't think it will be too long before you've got enough gold to purchase a bireme and hire a crew if you decide to go pirate. The Temple of Uban is going to pay good coin for successful ruin explorers, so you might prefer a more formal relationship with them. The elves, though, are also going to need a new team now that their last one got slapped down by the gefirir. Lots of opportunities for dwarves who are clever and enterprising.