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View Full Version : DM Help Story advice? :)



Bücherdiebin
2019-08-10, 09:53 AM
Hi guys! :)

I am kinda stuck at one point in my campaign, maybe someone has some ideas or advice for me.
A new player will be joining the group mid-campaign, after playing a Oneshot with us (DMed by someone else). We all created new characters just for the oneshot because the other DM wanted to have a "fresh start". Now the new player would like to transfer his character into my campaign, and it turned out one of my players also liked his other characters better, so they will join us together.

The problem is, that they wnat to keep their story, so i can't just move them to my setting - the characters need a coherent reason why they join the adventuring party (I'm not a huge fan of just letting character appear and disappear without a reason, it kinda takes away from the logic in my opinion).

Of course it's fun > coherency, and if I don't find a good reasoning to inrtegrate them into the story, i will go back to the option of just letting them join without a hook, but first i'd like to try my best to keep it stringent first.

About the campaign (Zarraksas, Rose, Shiliath and Skaros- stop reading now, or Bricky Mc Brickbrick will find you!): The group is on a mission to stop a former demon lord, who, when he fell from power, nested into a human. They are on a time limit, since they know the demon will probably use the equinox (which is in two weeks) to try to rid himself of his weak, mortal prison and return to power (and do really really bad things, seeking to sow chaos and hatred.. well you know the drill).
He doesn't have any minions yet as he lost all his power around 100 years ago, and dark minions tend to not give a damn as soon as their master grows weak.

Sooo right now one of the characters (in the main campaign) managed to get himself into prison for using magic in a place where magic is strictly forbidden for unlicensed ppl, which is why I thought it might be a good hook to meet the new characters there (also being punished for unknowingly using magic in the restricted area), so they can break out together and already form a bond.

But before that can happen, I need to come up with a reason why the two newbies would come to the city in the first place.

The Oneshot of the other DM used a different setting than me (same universe, but in a completely different place). Our characters licked on a stone (yepp, you read right ^^) and where teleported some other place where we had to fulfill a quest to get back home. Since the DM of the oneshot didn't offer an explanation on how the stone (standing in the middle of a market place for centuries, btw) suddenly became magical, and where exactly (another place, another time, another plane...) we landed, i am pretty free on how to interpret the stone and maybe utilize it in my attempt to motivate the characters.

I think the biggest motivator for both of the PCs that now want to join the main group would be a threat to their village, as they are 18 and 19 years old and stioll live there with their parents.
I would like to use their bonds to motivate them to go to Phlan - but how? They are not best friends (or no friends at all, coming to think about it) and are happy and content in their village, so they wouldn't just go adventuring together without a reason.

My first thought was to say that the stone is a portal, which only opens at certain times (equinox for example), so in order to seal the portal and protect their village from evil they need to go out and well... do stuff.
But as the demon doesn't have minions, that doesn't make a lot of sense, bc how would they make the connection to some nameless demon who is fought in secret by 4 normal people (they are level 3, so no folk heros yet)? I'm also not a fan of just saying "you have a vision and are inexplainably drawn to some random place, because... butter."

Just teleporting the characters to Phlan without their permission would have the major drawback that their aim realistically speking wouldn't be to slay some demon, but to find out what the hell has happened and then get abck home as sioon as possible, so I think finding a reason for them to leave the village by choice would make keeping the group together a lot easier later on.

So in my opinion (and maybe i'm wrong, if you think differently i would love to hear your opinion), a personal bond and motivation in a similar direction as the party's motivation would be nice, opposed to just saying "i want to play, so my character needs to come along.. okay i will just randomly follow the group and pretend that's normal." I have had some bad experience with that, characters who just don't have any personal reason for being there, except the standard generic "saving the world" motivator, tend to give up mid-campaign because they just can't justify risking their lifes for something they don't even care about..

I hope the concentrated brain power of some of the most passionate DMs and Players (you :D) will help me to knock some sense into this ^^

Anyway, thank you so much for reading my wall of text! And congrats that you made it through :D I'm looking forward to your answers!

Love,
Lia

King of Nowhere
2019-08-10, 10:01 AM
as much as you can tell about the campaign, you and your players know it better. and they especially know better what kind of motivation would work for them.

talk to them, discuss plot hoooks and what could be a good way to motivate those characters. in my group we did that every time someone wanted to swap characters, and it always worked fine.

Bücherdiebin
2019-08-10, 10:16 AM
as much as you can tell about the campaign, you and your players know it better. and they especially know better what kind of motivation would work for them.

talk to them, discuss plot hoooks and what could be a good way to motivate those characters. in my group we did that every time someone wanted to swap characters, and it always worked fine.

Thanks for your advice, it is much appreciated. Sadly but I already tried that. It's kinda the dynamic of my group that they expect me to do stuff like this. They provided me with their background and told me their wish to carry over their characters, the rest is on me. I think they also would be fine if they just suddenly appeared in the story, it's just my thing that I want everything to make sense :D so as I'm the one who cares I am the one who has to come up with a solution with my self-created problem. Additionally, one of the two players is entirely new to D&D, the Oneshot was his very first session and he is still very unsure about the inner workings and doesn't have a lot of ideas. Which is fine, but means that I'm now brainstorming ^-^

Of course I know my campaign best, but I hoped that I could still get some other ideas, as my players have none and I'm kinda stuck :)

My question is not so much about the inner workings - I know what would move my characters: defending their town and their families. But as written above, I'm lacking ideas on how to pose a threat to the town so their motivation has a specific goal, without killing all of their family, and how to make their goal a similar one as the party's (destroying the demon).

Kol Korran
2019-08-10, 01:23 PM
Some ideas:
First of all, you can do some sort of a time skip between the time the one shot took place, and the current time in your campaign, to fit some story in. As to potential solutions to your problem:
1- The stone didn't teleport them back. The teleporting magic got skewed (Perhaps the demon was trying some summoning spell, or research) and they got telelported near it, possibly seeing its true form/ learning something horrific about it (perhaps the demon used live victims to fuel his spell/ research?). The duo escaped, and possibly ruined the demon's plan. They may have went to the guards/ law authority for help, but got blamed for the mess instead, and imprisoned. In jail they just happen to meet someone who'd actually listen and believe them.
They now seek to both redeem their names & stop the horrific being, and the demon seeks revenge upon the duo. ("I could have gotten away with it of it wasn't for those meddling kids").
2- The stone did telelport them home! But not happily ever after. I know you said the demon has no worshipers, but perhapsz he has some lowly ones? Some folk found some mention of the demon in that village (invent a reason), and decided to become cultist for his return. Heck, the teleporting stone may have even been some sort of an ancient relic from the demon's full power time, which they activated (wrongly) to try and worship it!
But, when it becomes clear it didn't work, and that some youth got mixed up in it, the cultist seek to shut up the youth and try to appease the demon in another way. So, the cultist broke into their himes, and killed/ kidnapped some family members, (perhapz while the PCs were away?) And left a note/ warning on the lines of: "All hail <Glorious demon's name here>! Do not interfere with it's magnificent plans again, or <family member> will suffer the consequences!". The cultists then took their prisoners to offer to the demon. (Which may like the offer, or be furious about it). Anyway, the duo now seeks to rescue their family, and stop the demon sending these cultists!
Why only these two, and not the other PCa from the one shot? Perhaps the attempts on the other PCs houses failed, or the other PCs decided to check a different trail, or perhapa they are part of the kidnapped?

Just 2 ideas

Bücherdiebin
2019-08-10, 01:39 PM
Some ideas:
First of all, you can do some sort of a time skip between the time the one shot took place, and the current time in your campaign, to fit some story in. As to potential solutions to your problem:
1- The stone didn't teleport them back. The teleporting magic got skewed (Perhaps the demon was trying some summoning spell, or research) and they got telelported near it, possibly seeing its true form/ learning something horrific about it (perhaps the demon used live victims to fuel his spell/ research?). The duo escaped, and possibly ruined the demon's plan. They may have went to the guards/ law authority for help, but got blamed for the mess instead, and imprisoned. In jail they just happen to meet someone who'd actually listen and believe them.
They now seek to both redeem their names & stop the horrific being, and the demon seeks revenge upon the duo. ("I could have gotten away with it of it wasn't for those meddling kids").
2- The stone did telelport them home! But not happily ever after. I know you said the demon has no worshipers, but perhapsz he has some lowly ones? Some folk found some mention of the demon in that village (invent a reason), and decided to become cultist for his return. Heck, the teleporting stone may have even been some sort of an ancient relic from the demon's full power time, which they activated (wrongly) to try and worship it!
But, when it becomes clear it didn't work, and that some youth got mixed up in it, the cultist seek to shut up the youth and try to appease the demon in another way. So, the cultist broke into their himes, and killed/ kidnapped some family members, (perhapz while the PCs were away?) And left a note/ warning on the lines of: "All hail <Glorious demon's name here>! Do not interfere with it's magnificent plans again, or <family member> will suffer the consequences!". The cultists then took their prisoners to offer to the demon. (Which may like the offer, or be furious about it). Anyway, the duo now seeks to rescue their family, and stop the demon sending these cultists!
Why only these two, and not the other PCa from the one shot? Perhaps the attempts on the other PCs houses failed, or the other PCs decided to check a different trail, or perhapa they are part of the kidnapped?

Just 2 ideas

You are my hero! Those ideas are amazing. I got kinda stuck to this one idea that just wouldn't work and couldn't think of anything else. Now I have something new to work with :) thank you!

RNightstalker
2019-08-13, 05:22 PM
The two "new" PC's could be in prison with the other and the three of them escape together.
"How can I thank you for getting me out of there?"
"Take us with you!"

Bücherdiebin
2019-08-13, 05:40 PM
The two "new" PC's could be in prison with the other and the three of them escape together.
"How can I thank you for getting me out of there?"
"Take us with you!"

That's actually quite close to what I've thought, that part of the story was pretty much set :) I just needed a motivation for them to actually go to the city where the chap is imprisoned, as the Oneshot took place quite a few miles away.

Anyway, I've scrapped pretty much all of the story I have been working on for the past months and am now starting over (although the prison as a meeting point will stay ^-^)

But thank you all for your advice!!

Tawmis
2019-08-14, 05:19 PM
Hi guys! :)
I am kinda stuck at one point in my campaign, maybe someone has some ideas or advice for me.
A new player will be joining the group mid-campaign, after playing a Oneshot with us (DMed by someone else). We all created new characters just for the oneshot because the other DM wanted to have a "fresh start". Now the new player would like to transfer his character into my campaign, and it turned out one of my players also liked his other characters better, so they will join us together.

The problem is, that they wnat to keep their story, so i can't just move them to my setting - the characters need a coherent reason why they join the adventuring party (I'm not a huge fan of just letting character appear and disappear without a reason, it kinda takes away from the logic in my opinion).

The group is on a mission to stop a former demon lord, who, when he fell from power, nested into a human. They are on a time limit, since they know the demon will probably use the equinox (which is in two weeks) to try to rid himself of his weak, mortal prison and return to power (and do really really bad things, seeking to sow chaos and hatred.. well you know the drill).


Your answer is right in there.

Why not say that when this Demon Lord fell from power, it caused rips in reality.
As a result, your two new players, in the middle of chasing someone, all fell through a rift (believed to have been a teleportation portal).
That rift throws the two new players, and said "evil" person they were chasing into your world.
This gives them an excuse to be on your world.
And also a potential villain to use later.

farothel
2019-08-15, 04:25 AM
Some ideas:
First of all, you can do some sort of a time skip between the time the one shot took place, and the current time in your campaign, to fit some story in. As to potential solutions to your problem:
1- The stone didn't teleport them back. The teleporting magic got skewed (Perhaps the demon was trying some summoning spell, or research) and they got telelported near it, possibly seeing its true form/ learning something horrific about it (perhaps the demon used live victims to fuel his spell/ research?). The duo escaped, and possibly ruined the demon's plan. They may have went to the guards/ law authority for help, but got blamed for the mess instead, and imprisoned. In jail they just happen to meet someone who'd actually listen and believe them.
They now seek to both redeem their names & stop the horrific being, and the demon seeks revenge upon the duo. ("I could have gotten away with it of it wasn't for those meddling kids").
2- The stone did telelport them home! But not happily ever after. I know you said the demon has no worshipers, but perhapsz he has some lowly ones? Some folk found some mention of the demon in that village (invent a reason), and decided to become cultist for his return. Heck, the teleporting stone may have even been some sort of an ancient relic from the demon's full power time, which they activated (wrongly) to try and worship it!
But, when it becomes clear it didn't work, and that some youth got mixed up in it, the cultist seek to shut up the youth and try to appease the demon in another way. So, the cultist broke into their himes, and killed/ kidnapped some family members, (perhapz while the PCs were away?) And left a note/ warning on the lines of: "All hail <Glorious demon's name here>! Do not interfere with it's magnificent plans again, or <family member> will suffer the consequences!". The cultists then took their prisoners to offer to the demon. (Which may like the offer, or be furious about it). Anyway, the duo now seeks to rescue their family, and stop the demon sending these cultists!
Why only these two, and not the other PCa from the one shot? Perhaps the attempts on the other PCs houses failed, or the other PCs decided to check a different trail, or perhapa they are part of the kidnapped?

Just 2 ideas

I would have those cultists destroy/sacrifice the village to their demon lord as part of his return to full power. The two PCs were not there for some reason or other and come back to see the carnage taking place. Then it becomes a revenge plot. But number 2 above sounds better, as not every player likes their background being destroyed like that.