1EyedJack Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 I am looking for advice and opinions on what makes a great and memorable campaign just that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teh bunneh Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? All the great games I've played in (and ran) had one thing in common: memorable and characterful NPCs. If the characters are just running around and killing stuff, there's no connection to the world. If they meet people, make friends, lose friends, make enemies, remember folks' names... that's when a good campaign becomes great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Diamond Spear Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Reoccurring antagonists. They don't all have to be ones that engage in combat either. Everyone loves to hate the guy who screws with your party for years but is too well protected and connected for the party to go after directly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sbarron Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? I am looking for advice and opinions on what makes a great and memorable campaign just that. Players that really want a great campaign. I've been in a couple great campaigns, and they both included players that wanted to be there playing and having fun, and more importantly were willing to work with each other and the GM to make it happen. I've been in many more campaigns that went nowhere because even just one player wasn't into the game, didn't want to work with the team or GM, or just flat out tried to be a kill joy. I honestly think that if you can get the right group of people together, and get them working toward the common goal of having a great and memorable campaign, it will practically create itself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thia Halmades Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Barron is correct -- one of the keys to any great campaign are players who looking for a great level of immersion. "Great" also varies from group to group -- you can give some people a well written dungeon hack and they'll talk about it for years. For me, I've found six months of high drama, tension and wicked gun fights makes for some of the most memorable games I've run. Things that work for me (YMMV) -- -- Great players who develop, and continue to develop their characters -- A ----load of pre-planning; dungeons I've written on the fly, or as need requires. NPCs, as the bunny sez, require the most work. Admittedly, I often whip one up off the top of my head, which I'm told is down right unnatural, but the ones I'm most proud of are usually the result of some inspiration (Dexter Silvereyes, Thia Halmades, Thomas Lansdale are three of the "great" NPCs my players will refer too.) -- Great Antagonists. I ask hard questions. Why DOES Dr. Dimentia want to drive everyone insane? What IS his horrible secret? What does the Phantom look like behind the mask? -- Great World Development. The more YOU believe in it, the more your PCs believe in it, and the more immersive the campaign will be. If you just use "any old bartender" in "any old bar" no one's going to remember it. If you flesh out the bar's name & history (to steal from TF2V, say, "The Raven's Beak" for an antagonist) and set up some Rivalries, or give your otherwise honest PCs a need to get a little revenge, you've done what you're looking for. Because ALL of this comes down to making your players CARE. When I ran my Ravenloft campaign, I started off (I told this story at HEROcon last year, in fact) giving EVERYONE a required "disad" -- Ties to Family (-10). Although there may be rocky relationships or rivalries, or these siblings might not all get along, I gave them a shared past. They all grew up with their "Uncle" (by title, almost entirely) Hammet. Hammet was a dabbler who was working for one of my home-brewed conspiracy agencies, and was raising these children to carry on the good fight. I then killed him off screen, and pulled a classic intro: You all receive a letter, telling you that you've inherited the haunted house. I've set up a family, a base, a reason to play, and a reason to care, all in one giant shot. One of the best games I ever ran. Had to put it down, though, which is still a damn, damn shame. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archermoo Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? To my mind, the most important thing is a good group that enjoys playing together. If you have that, you can make a great campaign out of just about anything. If you don't, even the most carefully planned setting won't propel it to greatness. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dust Raven Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? While it's starting to look like a trend (coincidence, I think not!)... What has made every great campaign I have every played in or run great is a group of great players and a GM who knows them well enough to know what entertains them in the long term. It also helps if the GM and all the players are on the same wavelength as far was what entertains them. A GM who enjoys tossing together highly planned hack 'n' slash bloodfests will run a great campaign for a group of players who love that type of game. A GM who enjoys a fly by the seat of his pants melodromatic plot tied in knots campaign will run a great game for players who enjoy that. It's difficult to get these two groups to mix well though... but I have seen a well run campgin of the second cause the group to turn into the former. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lamrok Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? The one thing that makes a game irrefutably great is when players are playing characters that they LOVE to play in a setting that inspires a GM to go the extra mile. I've run games where the players couldn't get enough, but in which I felt all the blood was sucked out of me in prep. I've run games in which I could write plot after plot, and the PCs just weren't synching. Brilliant success happens when the players and the GM both can't get enough, when the players show up an immediatly start the game without the GM, when the GM spends days in prep because there's nothing he'd rather do. When this comes together, you'll have a game that will produce stories that will get retold forever. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest steamteck Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? The one thing that makes a game irrefutably great is when players are playing characters that they LOVE to play in a setting that inspires a GM to go the extra mile. I've run games where the players couldn't get enough' date=' but in which I felt all the blood was sucked out of me in prep. I've run games in which I could write plot after plot, and the PCs just weren't synching. Brilliant success happens when the players and the GM both can't get enough, when the players show up an immediatly start the game without the GM, when the GM spends days in prep because there's nothing he'd rather do. When this comes together, you'll have a game that will produce stories that will get retold forever.[/quote'] Completely true and well put. THe players actions in such games tend to give you the inspiration for the next plot. The ideas just flow from adventure to adventure. The NPCs seen like real folks that the players really care about. The players give the world a life beyond anything you could have managed alone Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OddHat Posted February 9, 2007 Report Share Posted February 9, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Naked Amazons fighting a werwolf, in slow motion, on the back of a giant monkey. Also, gorillas in diving helmets. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dust Raven Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Naked Amazons fighting a werwolf' date=' in slow motion, on the back of a giant monkey.[/quote'] No, that makes a great reality TV show. Also, gorillas in diving helmets. I have no response for that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manic Typist Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? I have no response for that. ...harpoon gun? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spidey88 Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? I would attribute the success of the best campaign I ever ran to the following factors: 1) Great players who all got along fabulously. Their characters weren't necessarily as close all the time, but they worked well together. They put in a lot of effort to talk in character, instead of "Mackie does this" when confronted with an NPC. 2) Great characters. Not only were the players involved good roleplayers, but their characters had very well-defined personalities. The characters developed signature tactics and moves (I even gave the PC's little freebies, like weapon proficiency: wrench for the mechanic character who relied on his monkeywrench for offense more often than not - just to reward him for keeping things entertaining). 3) I put in a lot of effort to make memorable NPCs with well-defined personalities, and tried to give each NPC a good description - regardless of how much screentime they got. 4) I tried very hard to keep their "random encounters" fresh and unpredictable (a PA game, so it wasn't too hard). 5) I made it very clear from the beginning what style of game I was going for (fast-paced, cinematic action), and the players followed along. I think this was important - basically, the players knew what they were in for, and went along with it. Nobody threw huge wrenches in the works (not that it was a complex campaign). 6) I didn't just describe things - I made a lot of interactive stuff too. I drew a lot of maps, represented vehicle combat with micro machines, wrote up wanted posters, etc. 7) I tried to challenge the players without crushing them - and generally erred on the side of fun. Sure, that move might be basically impossible - but wouldn't it be really, really cool? So therefore, it's not impossible in the game - just really hard. Everybody got a chance to prove how badass they were in their areas of expertise. 8) One thing I think was pretty useful was getting input from the players after every session: what did they like? What didn't they like? What did they think they were going to try next? What sort of things were they going to try and work towards? It really helped me improve things as we went along. Things I hope to have in any campaign I play in include much of the same. Biggest game-killers in my book: GMs who don't put in the effort to make you feel like you're in a fleshed-out world, and players who sleepwalk through the game without trying to get into it - the best games happen when everyone can feed off each others enthusiasm. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Goodwin Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Player characters get to make a mark on the world. The things they do matter. Players get to have their characters do cool things. What I mean is, when I create a character I usually have something cool in mind for them to do with their Powers, like maybe a cool combo of Powers. Player characters win, sometimes, and their wins matter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aylwin13 Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Don't forget the ninjas and pirates! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pinecone Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Don't forget the ninjas and pirates! Extra credit if they're Naked amazon ninjas and pirates!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peregrine Posted February 11, 2007 Report Share Posted February 11, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? A GM who runs the game for the players, not just for themselves. The story is about the PCs and the NPCs are the supporting cast, not the other way around. I also echo from upthread - the PCs get to make a mark (read as: change) the campaign world. The PCs can actually do cool stuff without their cool stuff being nullified/neutralized/marginalized. In short - it's all about the players and their characters. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dust Raven Posted February 11, 2007 Report Share Posted February 11, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? RE: Make their Mark Changing the world, even the immediate world around them, can be cool, but for me it's not required. I played in an awesome cyberpunk game years ago and none of the character made any difference in the world. From an outsider's point of view, we might as well have not existed. Sure, we got things done and sometimes made some people's life easier, or harder, but if it wasn't us it would have been someone else and we all knew it. We made our mark though. On ourselves. What matters is the change in the character. Sometimes it's a personal change. My character went from a cold hearted killing machine who only cared about the paycheck to a true team player with a quasi-conscience (and it was fun to have her life totally fracked over later in the game causing her to go berserk as reverted back to killing machine for a short time). That's what mark the made the game great. At least for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest steamteck Posted February 11, 2007 Report Share Posted February 11, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? Also, gorillas in diving helmets. I'm sure you mean gorillas with rocket packs but just mistyped Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Goodwin Posted February 11, 2007 Report Share Posted February 11, 2007 Re: What makes a great campaign great? In short - it's all about the players and their characters. Quoted for truth. And repped. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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