I'd swap the "The last two round. Adventure relates to Episode. Each Season is a Campaign. The Master Plot covers a broader range. One example that works is Steven Moffat's treatment for Dr Who S5-7 with the 11th Doctor and the "Cracks In Time". Each episode was an individual adventure, but many of the first series related to the Cracks in Time,. At the end of that first series for Matt Smith everyone was led to believe that the Cracks In Time "Campaign" was over. The second series revolved around the Doctor's death being foretold and unavoidable and the sinister "Silence", and Matts final series as the Doctor took him full circle to end on the same planet where he was said to be buried, only to be finally confronted by the last of The Cracks In Time, where he ultimately met his demise, but gained a whole new set of regenerations by virtue of the last Crack In Time allowing him to contact his long lost people... The Cracks in Time were the Master Plot which ultimately led to the Return of Gallifrey, while each of the three seasons had its own Campaign theme, "The Cracks In Time" "The Impossible Astronaut" and (very poor use of repetition in my opinion) "The Impossible Girl". Personally I thought Moffat made shit up as he went along and half of the connections between stories made no sense to the point where he literally had to have a bunch of people standing round a table to try and explain all the connections at the end of the "Campaign" (STILL leaving a load of unfinished plot lines...) and he was not the greatest Long Form writer. (He was spectacularly good at One and Done stories and Girl In The Fireplace remains my favourite episode of Dr Who ever - and I've been watching it for over 50 years...) But his use of the "Campaign Style" structure was solid. Sorry... went off at a bit of a tangent there...
I recently finished my 18th session of campaign I created with four players. Me thinking I'm being a great GM, allow them to take a more relaxed way of playing the campaign, so they can build a good sense of comfort in the world. I somehow ended the session with the players creating a new kingdom to the north, fighting off the Empire that previously ruled that area. They are now planning in between sessions as to how expand their kingdom and form their own Empire. I love that they're officially thinking about the sessions now, but they have literally just murdered half a kingdom.
Perhaps..If you dont mind my input, you should have created a disaster or made the kingdom corrupt? Making a coup more morally acceptable. Or perhaps use that info to start a rebellion due to the bloody rebellion. That would allow you to have the commoners chase them out with the empire at their heels.....would create a sense of drama. Ehhh just ideas :D
When it comes to making a campaign, I like to refer to an old saying I found on a Magic Card: “I don’t have a plan. Just a goal. The rest will work itself out.” Basically, I start with a beginning adventure, and a place I want the story to end, and I go from there, letting the story grow organically.
jesternario that was my intuition also, I'm just looking into making my first campaign. I'm glad someone here employs the strategy my mind concocted to some success. Cheers and good luck.
I just create a world with a few villains and see where they go. they might fight the villains, they might join the villains, they might ignore the villains and watch the world burn while they just get a boat and STRAIGHT UP LEAVE GOD-DANG CONTINENT!!! LIKE, WHY?!?!?
@@Fishcrab I searched Scryfall's flavor text options and came up with no match for that quote. One that I did run across that seems fitting comes from the card Contentious Plan, and it reads: "Niv-Mizzet had perfected a plan, but he had no control over the mortal minds who had to agree to implement it." Niv being our humble narrator and GM, and the Gatewatch being the murder hobos he has to wrangle.
I have a campaign with ten players that we’ve been playing for 14 sessions. The backstory started 25 years ago with 3 of the players old characters. It’s all tied together Lots of fun
One issue about scale you didn't make clear enough. Scale determines detail. If you are playing risk, the map does not even need to show where the cities are. If you are playing clue, you need every room mapped out.
Ehhh, I agree with you to an extent, because tabletop rpgs NEED as much detail as can be given at a moment where Clue is just a kitchen, or a dining room, doesn't really matter what it consists of.
I would argue that in some campaigns it's a better idea to dump the players in the deep end of the weirdness pool instead of giving them what they expect in an unexpected way. One of the most interesting games I ever GM'd went with this idea, where the players had to learn what was normal for this world. In the beginning, they kept saying how they felt like they were Alice down the rabbit hole, but by the end, they felt at home in this world where Post offices are the faces of eldritch horrors and one player turned into a haunted disembodied hand (he got better)
My best advice for making campaigns, after the steps you described. 1. Start browsing the Monster Manual and just build your own more limited libary of Monsters, which fit into your setting, best sorted by geography or affinity, this helps alot once you get to encounter building and also allows you to quickly generate random encounters etc. 2. Start from small and go to big: start with the starting town, city, castle, spaceship whatever, then go to the region and elements of interest in that region, work up to country, continent, world etc. don't start by drawing a world map and then randomly filling that out, your chances are high that half of that stuff will not be relevant for the first weeks, months or ever.
I actually just started GMing my first campaign ever yesterday. I used alot of your videos to help me with the technical aspects and concepts. Built a whole region from scratch and have a master plot fairly well hashed out. Gotta say I love it so far, and my players seem to be enjoying themselves. Thanks a million Guy!
Your defining terms reminds me of the evil wedding planner from Galavant. "Alright, for clarity, we have the wedding plan, the color scheme, and the evil plot."
I want to get my friends into the game, so I decided to make my own campaign. I’m relatively new to D&D although I’ve always had a basic knowledge and have recently been a lot more interested. I love storytelling and I’m good at studying up on things I enjoy. I’m going for something fairly vanilla since it’s for new players, but I plan to add a few twists and put things on a slightly larger scale than they would expect. I’m probably going to use an NPC character that at the start helps teach the rules without spending 30-40 minutes trying to explain them, and then use later on as a plot progressor (if needed), recurring character, and later villain.
This is so goddamn helpful. My friends and I discovered d&d and became super interested, and then they decided that after a few normal games, I should create an ENTIRE campaign for them. It didn't go badly at all thanks to videos like this on RUclips. Thank you so much!
I'm running a champain world where the whole champain takes place in one city the size irland. The idea is that several cities were working on a secret project to create teleporters between them. However acident caused a MASSIVE rip in space and time and sqeezed all the cities into one incredibly dence part of the world. The whole theame of the champain is Noire with the party dealing with crime sydacites and waves of monsters and socities all in one place.
I played in a similar campaign. There were four major factions each pushing their own agenda to keep our post apocalyptic game world from dying. After one of the three moons was blown up by a faction, the PCs were motivated to stop the factions from causing any more harm. We had an awesome dm. He is autistic with a flat affect and monotone voice, but he watched a bunch of vids like this and was still able to bring our bleak and desolate game world to life.
This is sensational. I'm getting ready to start a d&d game with a homebrew setting (5e rules) in February, and this video and the ones that follow will be very helpful.
Thank you Guy, I really enjoy watching your videos. I have been creating my own setting over the past few months and filling it with NPC’s, secrets, and lore. You made my heart skip a beat when you said that if my players don’t care about my setting it’s all just a big waste of time. Right now I have a small and willing group of players I am leading through the lost mine of Phandelver as a new game master. I’m beginning to realize that I don’t have to have all the answers for the next campaign, just as you said things will happen and I can make it up on the fly. I’ve also learned that I can always let my players actions shape the lore of the world. Looking forward to the next video, Cheers!
I suggest that you don't use D&D. Use a more simplified ruleset for someone that age. Dungeon World is really good. Five torches is even better as a D&D starter for someone younger if you want to then transition to full 5E rules.
I have been tinkering with the idea of doing a some GMing for a group of long time friends and these two videos really helped me look at the process from a broader perspective than I initially had. It really got the got the photons flowing. Thanks again for sharing these little gold nuggets of insight with each video.
Wow. Just wanted to let you know that the plot video and this one have been the most helpful vids I've found so far. So glad I discovered this channel. Love what you are doing! Thank you.
Thank you so much for creating these videos! They are so helpful an informative. As someone that is trying to DM for the first time they are amazing lifesavers!
Royal 97 Dragon Age 2 had the best STORY of all three current DA games. Each character had a beginning, middle, and end. Everyone progressed as a person. Even the city grew as a character. It was a visual novel with combat. :-) Also, Anders is best waifu, fight me.
Your video seems to always come at the right time! I just started a session of D&D and i wanted to use a world of mine and your advice gives me so much ideas to work with and they are so simple to follow! i tend to make thing complicated and it help me a lot!!!!
Presently making a one-off campaign and in the beginning, it felt very overwhelming like how you put it at the start of the video, but breaking it down into where I'd like the story to go and how the characters should try to do to get there, it's gotten a bit less claustrophobic. Though now I feel if it goes over well, I'll end up wanting to make my own world and see where the players take it.
Just played my first one shot over the weekend. I've now got the bug and had an idea for a premise of the campaign. I now have 80% of the first like 4-5 encounters, multiple options for each obstacle, 3 maps drawn for dungeons and towns, as well as a small history for the area.... It is Monday...
Just for saying someting about star trek I love it. I'm realizin how huge these is going to be. I'm a little trefied but really looking forward of going for these
A campaign is like a Zelda game. You go to different places, help different kind of people, kill monsters, solve mysteries, and in the end, all seems to be connected to each other, and you need those connections you made to destroy the bad guy. Legend of Aang also does this.
Good video! I haven't really run many true campaigns myself because each one tends to be a year long endeavor or even longer, like my last campaign that lasted nearly four years. I think one issue I had is it's hard to guess at how to increase difficulty and escalate things smoothly, rather than abruptly, over time. I figured things out and the players were satisfied but I'm planning a new campaign and I want to do it even better.
I find it’s better to keep good notes on what happens in the gaming sessions than to plan too far ahead. Keep a list of those minor NPCs and have them come back later at important points in the story. It gives the impression of having had things planned out. Also, key for me, is thinking about how the PC actions affect NPCs who are not around during gaming events. How does the PCs burning down an antagonist’s stronghold affect the gut who supplied food for the stronghold, and things along those lines.
Writing a berserk inspired campaign... I’ll be DM’ing my 2 friends and I’m planning on having one sacrifice the other to become an apotstle for the main climax (2nd player will either reincarnate with added boosts & buff or create a new character with buffs) or if he doesn’t want to sacrifice his friend skull knight will appear & save the 2, with the rest of the campaign oriented around slaying the god hand!!! Wish me luck 😂😂😂
Been watching many of this gent's videos. I had no idea he was from S. Africa until he mentioned it. After I heard him say 'thirty or forty', I finally caught the accent.
Having just watched through the Star Wars Saga (minus Episode 7, but including Rogue One), I would argue that all 6 (or 7, including Rogue One) make up the campaign of star wars, as one could view it as Darth Vader's (or even the Emperor's) story. Not important though. Totally followed your line of thought. I just thought it interesting that you viewed the two trilogies as separate campaigns, opposite my viewpoint.
I've never played a TTRPG as either a player or GM, and neither have my friends, in fact I've owned the DnD starter kit AND 5 extra dice sets for about a month and all I've done is read over the tiny rule book over and over. (I rather not spoil the campaign, Lost Mines, for myself in case I ever did want to play a premade campaign.) Yet despite my complete lack of knowledge nothing interests me more than the idea of creating a world and watching said world come to life. I've been watching Critical Role, pain stakingly mind you because 3 hours is a godly amount of time to sit around doing pretty much nothing, and I just finished TAZ: Balance just last week and the way Matt Mercer and Griffin Mcelroy have inspired me makes me feel like a little kid again. I can't wait to start making my own campaigns with this series as a guide to get me started,because despite being completely new I feel you've presented all of this in an easy to digest way!
Can you do a video about how to portray the adventures as agents of some entity that gives them missions and task, while still letting them feel like the authors of their own destiny?
Off topic suggestion for video/question: Several times I've had players make characters based off of other fictional characters for a campaign, i.e. make "The Punisher" or "Rick Sanchez" How do you feel about these types of characters and how much of the characters world and backstory should you bring into your campaign if any?
Following up to this I read something online talking about how much of a pain it can be to incorporate the massive rich detail of a preexisting fictional character. If the GM asks what your backstory is and the player replied "just watch this movie series" then something needs to be done. I once had a player that wanted to be Goku. No. I'm not watching every episode of DBZ.
Personally, I've played parodies of established characters. But I still wrote out the back story to be my own interpretation of things. In other words, the established character was a starting point and I still made the character my own. I would encourage any "Goku" players at your table to put a spin on the character. This might help remove preconceived notions on how their character will progress in the story since the character is different. They may also transition into thinking, "What would MY character do?" rather than being stuck with, "How would the Punisher react?" and being upset when they can't think of an answer. Hope this gives some ideas!
God I love voyager, and it's a perfect example for other things like characters leaving and characters joining with characters like (spoilers): Seven of Nine joining or Kes leaving. Voyager is honestly such a good D&D example and I'd love to see a video sometime maybe comparing the two.
Thank God!!!! I've been in the middle of making a campaign in 6 days. I was only told to make a 1shot campaign on Nov 27th. We play on the 3rd of December... And I've never GM'd before... And I've got 4/5/6 Players (depending who shows up) AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH STRRRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!! Thanks for some help.
Nice. I started GMing for a few of my friends a couple of weeks ago. We're still in a stage where they head out on random adventures every week, but I have an idea in how to tie them all together into a greater narrative. I suspect the reason they have only tried going off the rails once was because we mostly do computer gaming. Unfortunately the dice betrayed them for the required stealth checks, so they missed an opportunity to catch an important NPC in a lie.
Thomas Eddy my campaign began because, like you, my players were on a random adventure and i decided it would be cool if they found a lich phylactery and now they are chasing it down qnd trying to stop the lich from returning. Sometimes the best things arent planned out. Try to let inspiration take you.
greetings! I recently found your channel a few months ago and have loved it since! thanks for all your in-depth videos scrutinizing many different aspects of gaming. I was wondering if you planned on doing a review of different gaming systems. I'm not a big fan of D&D because to me it feels too "run and gun" and I don't like the linear character creation and development. I have played GURPS and Game of Thrones and was looking for your take on them. Thanks and keep up the great work!
I'm from the future and these videos are going to help future future me in my future campaigns. Fun words aside, something Terrible, evil, and sickening has happened to star wars 7, 8, and 9.
I have problems on going from big to small. I mean how to go from idea of a campaign to cutting to adventures that have sense and don't feel just poorly connected.
Reporting from 2021. The Sequel Trilogy was run by one DM, taken over by another DM for a while, and then the original DM came back to take every plot he missed super personally. PvP is everywhere.
How about advice for RPG in a chat room? Most chat RP does not have a mechanics system and focuses more on storytelling and dialogue. There may or may not be a GM, but there is usually a charismatic player who drives the storyline. Players may jump in or jump out, lurk and view while looking for a way to take part, stay for a while and get bored or ignored and then leave. Sometimes players just can't get things to work and end up describing their characters or getting into a Mary Sue combat dual. I've been trying to start an RP in this environment but have difficulty coming up with a plot that keeps players interested.
Never played rpg games, that weren't video games, always had an interest. Just wanna throw out a possible ideal for a campaign. This is just an outline, but some parts are key. Flush out the rest how you will. 1)kingdom/space empire is in a conflict(ie federation vs romulans, Britian vs france, azeroth vs horde) players area is recruiting(some volunteers, some professional soliders, some travellers kidnapped and put into battle) for an unexpected enemy expedition or new small threat. [Prologue] 2) split players into different positions (soliders, volunteers, kidnapped)-pick based on character backstory, randomize based on initiative, or combination 3)introduce extra characters(big bas guy/some upper and lesser henchmen[disguised as normal]) 4-give roles(front line soldiers, healers, magic support, infantry)-give all members similar gear. 5)go meet the threat 6)threat bigger than expected-bad guy set up ambush(dont reveal till later) 7) characters way outclassed/outmanned-make them fight for their lives-kill them and some introduced charaters. 8) have new character heal characters not horribly mutilated(all players, some introduced good, bad)-big baddie "killed" disappeared 9) area ransacked- players awake alone behind enemy lines need to get safe. 10)progress along these lines with party(other characters go their own way)-hiding, supplies, civilian survivors, safety, escape, checking bodies/razed towns for supplies. 11)bring back nonplayer characters through out play-even big bad guy(not revealed)-minions revealed and not revealed. 12)intergrate bad guy into campaign Just thought this would be an interesting to play.
I am not an experienced GM. In the past I had a slight tendency toward railroading, so I've started a semi-homebrew campaign for practice. It's sandbox by design, so I didn't have any specific plot to railroad along. The players all got to design anything they wanted, with any backstory. Then I had each of them design or give me a villain to use. It's played over Discord, and is very slow paced, to give me time. I'm still working on bringing the PCs together (I had about a 50% casualty rate among players, which wasn't surprising). I think I have a main villain created, that can be compartmentalized into several chunks, but I don't yet have one of the PC's linked into the story. I don't have a specific question, but I am open to any advice anyone has to offer for this situation. Just tips or tricks to make things better/easier.
Master TMO I guess it’s too late now but for next time it’s easier if the party starts already together. You can have them incorporate each other into their characters’ backstories. One good piece of advice I heard is to ask each one to give you a reason why they would die for another member of the party-or something along those lines, it could be anything like just a good memory or adventure they had together. That keeps the party together for practical reasons (it’s way harder to run a game when the party is split up) and it enriches their history. And as for plot/railroading, it might be helpful to have a couple of preplanned encounters that can be easily adapted for wherever they players decide to go. So even if they don’t “follow the plot” it’s easier to get them back on track, or at least give them something to do when they get to wherever they decided to go
The separate starting was a side-effect of making anything they wanted with any backstory. And I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to get a little practice with the system and GMing before I had to juggle all the players in a single situation. I didn't really think it would take this long to get them together, or realize that it meant I would effectively be running 4 separate games at the same time. Live and learn, I suppose!
idk if anyone else thought of this. but the idea is have two different d&d groups that run in the same world at the time period. the events of on campaign effect the other and vice versa. your thoughts?
I'm doing this right now.It's tricky. The thing I found most helpful is keeping a calendar not of the sessions, but of the actual in-game days. This allows me to know what effects group A based off of what group B has done and vice versa. For Example: Group A stopped an assassination of a king from some nasty drow. Group B was then charged by the drow queen to carry out the same assassination since her initial attempt was thwarted (by group A). One thing leads to another and by the time Group A got back to the city the king is married to the drow queen. And the group's mind was blown. I even have a players' ghost who died in one group haunting the other. It has been really fun and I enjoy the balancing act, but I do also send them on very different quests so they dont get tempted to kill the other party.
@@sethd.coulter1875 i am actually planing to do the same thing with my group, if you dont mind could you email me a pic of the calendar so i can get a clear picture of what you mean?
Episode I, II, and III of Star Wars were not the original three movies. They were made as a backstory or a prequel for the actual three original movies which are now titled episodes IV, V, and VI.
We first started play games like can you survive games like dan plan does it ended when my friend took the infinite hat and put the whole universe in the hat and now “hat universe” had begun
I don't want to be an alarmist, but you have a lich just behind you. The dead can be so patient.
Corvus5200 The lich also needs to hear his advice on running the Cities and People rpg for his zombie buddies before killing him
I swear to god u gave me a heart attack.....
@@theanarkiddie4569 weird?.
Plot twist: Guy is the Phylactory.
Mardel Nairoz Whooosh
So basically,
Game = episode
Current Over Arching Objective = season
Campaign = series
Hotel=Trivago
Red robin = yum
Me = I agree
I'm halfway through the video and this is all the info I've got so far
I'd swap the "The last two round.
Adventure relates to Episode.
Each Season is a Campaign.
The Master Plot covers a broader range.
One example that works is Steven Moffat's treatment for Dr Who S5-7 with the 11th Doctor and the "Cracks In Time". Each episode was an individual adventure, but many of the first series related to the Cracks in Time,. At the end of that first series for Matt Smith everyone was led to believe that the Cracks In Time "Campaign" was over. The second series revolved around the Doctor's death being foretold and unavoidable and the sinister "Silence", and Matts final series as the Doctor took him full circle to end on the same planet where he was said to be buried, only to be finally confronted by the last of The Cracks In Time, where he ultimately met his demise, but gained a whole new set of regenerations by virtue of the last Crack In Time allowing him to contact his long lost people...
The Cracks in Time were the Master Plot which ultimately led to the Return of Gallifrey, while each of the three seasons had its own Campaign theme, "The Cracks In Time" "The Impossible Astronaut" and (very poor use of repetition in my opinion) "The Impossible Girl".
Personally I thought Moffat made shit up as he went along and half of the connections between stories made no sense to the point where he literally had to have a bunch of people standing round a table to try and explain all the connections at the end of the "Campaign" (STILL leaving a load of unfinished plot lines...) and he was not the greatest Long Form writer. (He was spectacularly good at One and Done stories and Girl In The Fireplace remains my favourite episode of Dr Who ever - and I've been watching it for over 50 years...)
But his use of the "Campaign Style" structure was solid.
Sorry... went off at a bit of a tangent there...
I recently finished my 18th session of campaign I created with four players. Me thinking I'm being a great GM, allow them to take a more relaxed way of playing the campaign, so they can build a good sense of comfort in the world. I somehow ended the session with the players creating a new kingdom to the north, fighting off the Empire that previously ruled that area. They are now planning in between sessions as to how expand their kingdom and form their own Empire.
I love that they're officially thinking about the sessions now, but they have literally just murdered half a kingdom.
Rachel Amber My PCs took over a city a couple sessions ago
This sounds like a multi player version of fallout mix Skyrim but good not 76
I once ran a campaign that ended in the characters' "City" being destroyed when some invading forces (That THEY provoked) overthrew there empire.
My pcs burnt a city to the ground they were hired to liberate via assassination of false rulers
Perhaps..If you dont mind my input, you should have created a disaster or made the kingdom corrupt? Making a coup more morally acceptable. Or perhaps use that info to start a rebellion due to the bloody rebellion. That would allow you to have the commoners chase them out with the empire at their heels.....would create a sense of drama. Ehhh just ideas :D
When it comes to making a campaign, I like to refer to an old saying I found on a Magic Card: “I don’t have a plan. Just a goal. The rest will work itself out.” Basically, I start with a beginning adventure, and a place I want the story to end, and I go from there, letting the story grow organically.
jesternario that was my intuition also, I'm just looking into making my first campaign. I'm glad someone here employs the strategy my mind concocted to some success. Cheers and good luck.
I just create a world with a few villains and see where they go. they might fight the villains, they might join the villains, they might ignore the villains and watch the world burn while they just get a boat and STRAIGHT UP LEAVE GOD-DANG CONTINENT!!! LIKE, WHY?!?!?
@@tfrenchiestfry3673 Judging by the inferred tone, a party went with the 'ignore villians' option?
What card? I feel like I've seen that
@@Fishcrab I searched Scryfall's flavor text options and came up with no match for that quote.
One that I did run across that seems fitting comes from the card Contentious Plan, and it reads:
"Niv-Mizzet had perfected a plan, but he had no control over the mortal minds who had to agree to implement it."
Niv being our humble narrator and GM, and the Gatewatch being the murder hobos he has to wrangle.
this is one of the best timings youtube have ever done.. i just started to plan a session for my friends like yesterday :D
same
George Edwards ^
Same!
thomas jensen it's because Google is always listening to you 💥💥💥
Same here. I just got a monster Manuel for christmass, and some of the creatures in it gave me an idea for a one-off.
I have a campaign with ten players that we’ve been playing for 14 sessions. The backstory started 25 years ago with 3 of the players old characters.
It’s all tied together
Lots of fun
One issue about scale you didn't make clear enough. Scale determines detail. If you are playing risk, the map does not even need to show where the cities are. If you are playing clue, you need every room mapped out.
Ehhh, I agree with you to an extent, because tabletop rpgs NEED as much detail as can be given at a moment where Clue is just a kitchen, or a dining room, doesn't really matter what it consists of.
I would argue that in some campaigns it's a better idea to dump the players in the deep end of the weirdness pool instead of giving them what they expect in an unexpected way. One of the most interesting games I ever GM'd went with this idea, where the players had to learn what was normal for this world. In the beginning, they kept saying how they felt like they were Alice down the rabbit hole, but by the end, they felt at home in this world where Post offices are the faces of eldritch horrors and one player turned into a haunted disembodied hand (he got better)
he got better. that roleplay healthcare is the best
My best advice for making campaigns, after the steps you described. 1. Start browsing the Monster Manual and just build your own more limited libary of Monsters, which fit into your setting, best sorted by geography or affinity, this helps alot once you get to encounter building and also allows you to quickly generate random encounters etc.
2. Start from small and go to big: start with the starting town, city, castle, spaceship whatever, then go to the region and elements of interest in that region, work up to country, continent, world etc. don't start by drawing a world map and then randomly filling that out, your chances are high that half of that stuff will not be relevant for the first weeks, months or ever.
'A' and 'lot' are two separate words.
Really good advice.
I actually just started GMing my first campaign ever yesterday. I used alot of your videos to help me with the technical aspects and concepts. Built a whole region from scratch and have a master plot fairly well hashed out. Gotta say I love it so far, and my players seem to be enjoying themselves. Thanks a million Guy!
grinningmoon90 how's the campaign going?
Grinning Moon
Drop yourself on them, my man. Good luck!
Just wanted to say i love your voice, its so calming and intriguing yet dramatic!! Keep up the good work my guy
Your defining terms reminds me of the evil wedding planner from Galavant. "Alright, for clarity, we have the wedding plan, the color scheme, and the evil plot."
In 4 days my starter set will get in and my Dungeons & Dragons adventure will begin.
How'd the first goblin fight go?
Are you still playing?
are ye winning son?
Joystick Warrior oh ha ha I just saw this, my first goblin fight was great, and I’ve been playing ever since
The Potter my party and I try to play every Saturday and Sunday but the pandemic has made it a bit tricky
Star wars 7, 8, and 9, hilariously in this scenario, wasn’t planned for an overarching master plot.
I want to get my friends into the game, so I decided to make my own campaign. I’m relatively new to D&D although I’ve always had a basic knowledge and have recently been a lot more interested. I love storytelling and I’m good at studying up on things I enjoy. I’m going for something fairly vanilla since it’s for new players, but I plan to add a few twists and put things on a slightly larger scale than they would expect. I’m probably going to use an NPC character that at the start helps teach the rules without spending 30-40 minutes trying to explain them, and then use later on as a plot progressor (if needed), recurring character, and later villain.
This is so goddamn helpful. My friends and I discovered d&d and became super interested, and then they decided that after a few normal games, I should create an ENTIRE campaign for them. It didn't go badly at all thanks to videos like this on RUclips. Thank you so much!
You remind me a lot of Shad from Shadiversity. So much so, that I'm curious if you're his brother or something
Shad actually does have a youtuber brother. He has an art channel called "Draw With Jazza".
Kodyjay Jesus thank you! I though I was the only one
@@jitterydrum8508 Wait.....what?
I was actually thinking just this same thing right before i read this comment. Everyone have an upvote
@@charcoalangel7536 Ikr, it's mad!
Best DM voice ever.
I'm running a champain world where the whole champain takes place in one city the size irland. The idea is that several cities were working on a secret project to create teleporters between them. However acident caused a MASSIVE rip in space and time and sqeezed all the cities into one incredibly dence part of the world.
The whole theame of the champain is Noire with the party dealing with crime sydacites and waves of monsters and socities all in one place.
I played in a similar campaign. There were four major factions each pushing their own agenda to keep our post apocalyptic game world from dying. After one of the three moons was blown up by a faction, the PCs were motivated to stop the factions from causing any more harm. We had an awesome dm. He is autistic with a flat affect and monotone voice, but he watched a bunch of vids like this and was still able to bring our bleak and desolate game world to life.
Thanks for sharing your advice- it has been such a pleasure binging these videos!
I constantly feel that something epic is going to happen, you're voice is so awesome!
This is sensational. I'm getting ready to start a d&d game with a homebrew setting (5e rules) in February, and this video and the ones that follow will be very helpful.
Thank you Guy, I really enjoy watching your videos. I have been creating my own setting over the past few months and filling it with NPC’s, secrets, and lore. You made my heart skip a beat when you said that if my players don’t care about my setting it’s all just a big waste of time. Right now I have a small and willing group of players I am leading through the lost mine of Phandelver as a new game master. I’m beginning to realize that I don’t have to have all the answers for the next campaign, just as you said things will happen and I can make it up on the fly. I’ve also learned that I can always let my players actions shape the lore of the world. Looking forward to the next video, Cheers!
This was very helpful, I'm actually just starting my very first campaign and I'd love to use these tips
Despite the fumbled pitch at the end, consider it sold lol. Incredibly constructive, can't wait to see more.
I'm starting a game my 9yo son. It's going to be our first time as playing. I can't wait. We're getting the Essentials Kit
I suggest that you don't use D&D. Use a more simplified ruleset for someone that age. Dungeon World is really good. Five torches is even better as a D&D starter for someone younger if you want to then transition to full 5E rules.
I have been tinkering with the idea of doing a some GMing for a group of long time friends and these two videos really helped me look at the process from a broader perspective than I initially had. It really got the got the photons flowing. Thanks again for sharing these little gold nuggets of insight with each video.
Would love to join one of your “campaigns” now since you have a way to make everything so scientific! ❤️.
Just wanted to point out that you are my absolute favorite content creator on RUclips! I love your videos so much
Wow. Just wanted to let you know that the plot video and this one have been the most helpful vids I've found so far. So glad I discovered this channel. Love what you are doing! Thank you.
Thank you so much for creating these videos! They are so helpful an informative. As someone that is trying to DM for the first time they are amazing lifesavers!
Dragon Age 2 is a good example for a massive campaign taking place in one city.
Royal 97 Dragon Age 2 is a great example of what to never do
Why? Sure the gameplay mechanics where inferior to the first one but story and generally structure-wise it's great.
Royal 97 Dragon Age 2 had the best STORY of all three current DA games. Each character had a beginning, middle, and end. Everyone progressed as a person. Even the city grew as a character. It was a visual novel with combat. :-)
Also, Anders is best waifu, fight me.
Nicholas Smith I actually agree with you. Except with the thing about Anders. He was cooler in Awakening. And Varric is obviously the top waifu.
...but not a great game
Your video seems to always come at the right time! I just started a session of D&D and i wanted to use a world of mine and your advice gives me so much ideas to work with and they are so simple to follow! i tend to make thing complicated and it help me a lot!!!!
Damn now I really want a Mass Effect System.
Presently making a one-off campaign and in the beginning, it felt very overwhelming like how you put it at the start of the video, but breaking it down into where I'd like the story to go and how the characters should try to do to get there, it's gotten a bit less claustrophobic.
Though now I feel if it goes over well, I'll end up wanting to make my own world and see where the players take it.
I like making a random map and coming up with the campaign as I go
Just played my first one shot over the weekend.
I've now got the bug and had an idea for a premise of the campaign.
I now have 80% of the first like 4-5 encounters, multiple options for each obstacle, 3 maps drawn for dungeons and towns, as well as a small history for the area....
It is Monday...
Just discovered this great channel as I post videos on being your own GM. Thanks for great material!
Just for saying someting about star trek I love it. I'm realizin how huge these is going to be. I'm a little trefied but really looking forward of going for these
Ooo, this is automatically getting added to my playlist of Guy's videos I've found particularly helpful. And I haven't even watched it yet.
A campaign is like a Zelda game. You go to different places, help different kind of people, kill monsters, solve mysteries, and in the end, all seems to be connected to each other, and you need those connections you made to destroy the bad guy. Legend of Aang also does this.
Love your examples! They really flesh out your explanations
Very Helpful I have some other gaming systems that I am looking for help to improve.
Good video! I haven't really run many true campaigns myself because each one tends to be a year long endeavor or even longer, like my last campaign that lasted nearly four years. I think one issue I had is it's hard to guess at how to increase difficulty and escalate things smoothly, rather than abruptly, over time. I figured things out and the players were satisfied but I'm planning a new campaign and I want to do it even better.
This man sounds like a wise flipping wizard. Subscribing.
I’m over here trying to make a campaign in one day cause we starting this campaign Wednesday night. Why did I agree to be dm
I find it’s better to keep good notes on what happens in the gaming sessions than to plan too far ahead. Keep a list of those minor NPCs and have them come back later at important points in the story. It gives the impression of having had things planned out. Also, key for me, is thinking about how the PC actions affect NPCs who are not around during gaming events. How does the PCs burning down an antagonist’s stronghold affect the gut who supplied food for the stronghold, and things along those lines.
Thank you David Attenborough for teaching me how to build a campaign
exactly lol
What about survival champanes?
Great video and great advice 👍👍👍
Writing a berserk inspired campaign... I’ll be DM’ing my 2 friends and I’m planning on having one sacrifice the other to become an apotstle for the main climax (2nd player will either reincarnate with added boosts & buff or create a new character with buffs) or if he doesn’t want to sacrifice his friend skull knight will appear & save the 2, with the rest of the campaign oriented around slaying the god hand!!! Wish me luck 😂😂😂
Been watching many of this gent's videos. I had no idea he was from S. Africa until he mentioned it. After I heard him say 'thirty or forty', I finally caught the accent.
11:50
Having just watched through the Star Wars Saga (minus Episode 7, but including Rogue One), I would argue that all 6 (or 7, including Rogue One) make up the campaign of star wars, as one could view it as Darth Vader's (or even the Emperor's) story. Not important though. Totally followed your line of thought. I just thought it interesting that you viewed the two trilogies as separate campaigns, opposite my viewpoint.
I've never played a TTRPG as either a player or GM, and neither have my friends, in fact I've owned the DnD starter kit AND 5 extra dice sets for about a month and all I've done is read over the tiny rule book over and over. (I rather not spoil the campaign, Lost Mines, for myself in case I ever did want to play a premade campaign.) Yet despite my complete lack of knowledge nothing interests me more than the idea of creating a world and watching said world come to life. I've been watching Critical Role, pain stakingly mind you because 3 hours is a godly amount of time to sit around doing pretty much nothing, and I just finished TAZ: Balance just last week and the way Matt Mercer and Griffin Mcelroy have inspired me makes me feel like a little kid again. I can't wait to start making my own campaigns with this series as a guide to get me started,because despite being completely new I feel you've presented all of this in an easy to digest way!
Has anyone else fallen in love with this guys voice?
Can you do a video about how to portray the adventures as agents of some entity that gives them missions and task, while still letting them feel like the authors of their own destiny?
They play warlocks.
Wow. Great video. It must be easier to dm when you’re David Attenborough.
Off topic suggestion for video/question: Several times I've had players make characters based off of other fictional characters for a campaign, i.e. make "The Punisher" or "Rick Sanchez" How do you feel about these types of characters and how much of the characters world and backstory should you bring into your campaign if any?
Following up to this I read something online talking about how much of a pain it can be to incorporate the massive rich detail of a preexisting fictional character. If the GM asks what your backstory is and the player replied "just watch this movie series" then something needs to be done. I once had a player that wanted to be Goku. No. I'm not watching every episode of DBZ.
Personally, I've played parodies of established characters. But I still wrote out the back story to be my own interpretation of things. In other words, the established character was a starting point and I still made the character my own.
I would encourage any "Goku" players at your table to put a spin on the character. This might help remove preconceived notions on how their character will progress in the story since the character is different. They may also transition into thinking, "What would MY character do?" rather than being stuck with, "How would the Punisher react?" and being upset when they can't think of an answer.
Hope this gives some ideas!
God I love voyager, and it's a perfect example for other things like characters leaving and characters joining with characters like (spoilers):
Seven of Nine joining or Kes leaving. Voyager is honestly such a good D&D example and I'd love to see a video sometime maybe comparing the two.
Really great advice!
Thank God!!!!
I've been in the middle of making a campaign in 6 days.
I was only told to make a 1shot campaign on Nov 27th.
We play on the 3rd of December...
And I've never GM'd before...
And I've got 4/5/6 Players (depending who shows up)
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
STRRRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!
Thanks for some help.
you can do it man :)
I literally have no idea what I'm doing and I'm definetely gonna fuck this up
The timings is great. I'm stuck trying to figure out a local (city scale) modern super hero game.
Nice. I started GMing for a few of my friends a couple of weeks ago. We're still in a stage where they head out on random adventures every week, but I have an idea in how to tie them all together into a greater narrative. I suspect the reason they have only tried going off the rails once was because we mostly do computer gaming. Unfortunately the dice betrayed them for the required stealth checks, so they missed an opportunity to catch an important NPC in a lie.
Thomas Eddy my campaign began because, like you, my players were on a random adventure and i decided it would be cool if they found a lich phylactery and now they are chasing it down qnd trying to stop the lich from returning. Sometimes the best things arent planned out. Try to let inspiration take you.
Thomas Eddy just remember to try and give them a second opportunity at speaking with the npc, sometimes it can be crucial.
Your voice alone is why you’re probably a great GM.
Currently formulating a campaign for guildmasters of ravnica, and I’m struggling a bit with a campaign lol.
greetings! I recently found your channel a few months ago and have loved it since! thanks for all your in-depth videos scrutinizing many different aspects of gaming. I was wondering if you planned on doing a review of different gaming systems. I'm not a big fan of D&D because to me it feels too "run and gun" and I don't like the linear character creation and development. I have played GURPS and Game of Thrones and was looking for your take on them. Thanks and keep up the great work!
Will you be doing a videos about tips etc. for new call of Cthulhu keepers?
Fantastic as always!
Ayy I've been waiting for this for a long time!
Actually, in South America should be a good exploration scenario, though.
Like in Brazil during the hereditary captaincy and colonization.
I personally learned that you can make the campaign as the players go through the world, also known as “Go with the Flow”.
Do you have a video on turning a favorite movie into a campaign?
THANK YOU. I NEEDED THIS.
2021 check ing in and your star wars prediction falls for flat. Maybe the directors should have watched your videos!
Oh the hope we had for star wars 7,8 and 9... crushed to dust... Anyways, great vid! I love it!
Emergent Gameplay
Look up Ivan Ortega and his work on The Last Jedi. He is our new hope now!
We lost hope sadly
What in youe oppion would be the best way to make a planet in space campain?
I'm from the future and these videos are going to help future future me in my future campaigns. Fun words aside, something Terrible, evil, and sickening has happened to star wars 7, 8, and 9.
Well it is easy. "This station is now the ultimate power in the universe!"
Very nice explaining till now. Keep it up :-)
What's your opinion of Starfinder, Web Goblin?
I have problems on going from big to small. I mean how to go from idea of a campaign to cutting to adventures that have sense and don't feel just poorly connected.
Reporting from 2021. The Sequel Trilogy was run by one DM, taken over by another DM for a while, and then the original DM came back to take every plot he missed super personally.
PvP is everywhere.
How about advice for RPG in a chat room? Most chat RP does not have a mechanics system and focuses more on storytelling and dialogue. There may or may not be a GM, but there is usually a charismatic player who drives the storyline. Players may jump in or jump out, lurk and view while looking for a way to take part, stay for a while and get bored or ignored and then leave. Sometimes players just can't get things to work and end up describing their characters or getting into a Mary Sue combat dual.
I've been trying to start an RP in this environment but have difficulty coming up with a plot that keeps players interested.
make the speed 1.25
Omg this makes the video so much better
Thank you. Made it way better
god thanks you comrade
Thanks bro
I would normaly like a comment like this, but im not gonna cus the number of likes os 69
also
*_nice_*
Hi, thanks for the consistently fantastic content! I am just getting into the Fate core system... any chance on any vids on this style of RPG? :-)
link for how to run / create a master plot? ..... xD no playlist or does the name is another one?
I just get nervous my plot will suck. How to come up with good plots?
But where did you get that wizard robe?
Never played rpg games, that weren't video games, always had an interest. Just wanna throw out a possible ideal for a campaign. This is just an outline, but some parts are key. Flush out the rest how you will.
1)kingdom/space empire is in a conflict(ie federation vs romulans,
Britian vs france, azeroth vs horde) players area is recruiting(some volunteers, some professional soliders, some travellers kidnapped and put into battle) for an unexpected enemy expedition or new small threat. [Prologue]
2) split players into different positions (soliders, volunteers, kidnapped)-pick based on character backstory, randomize based on initiative, or combination
3)introduce extra characters(big bas guy/some upper and lesser henchmen[disguised as normal])
4-give roles(front line soldiers, healers, magic support, infantry)-give all members similar gear.
5)go meet the threat
6)threat bigger than expected-bad guy set up ambush(dont reveal till later)
7) characters way outclassed/outmanned-make them fight for their lives-kill them and some introduced charaters.
8) have new character heal characters not horribly mutilated(all players, some introduced good, bad)-big baddie "killed" disappeared
9) area ransacked- players awake alone behind enemy lines need to get safe.
10)progress along these lines with party(other characters go their own way)-hiding, supplies, civilian survivors, safety, escape, checking bodies/razed towns for supplies.
11)bring back nonplayer characters through out play-even big bad guy(not revealed)-minions revealed and not revealed.
12)intergrate bad guy into campaign
Just thought this would be an interesting to play.
Ambush will let players test characters, if they dont like, maybe they died and can play a newly resurrected character.
I am not an experienced GM. In the past I had a slight tendency toward railroading, so I've started a semi-homebrew campaign for practice. It's sandbox by design, so I didn't have any specific plot to railroad along. The players all got to design anything they wanted, with any backstory. Then I had each of them design or give me a villain to use. It's played over Discord, and is very slow paced, to give me time. I'm still working on bringing the PCs together (I had about a 50% casualty rate among players, which wasn't surprising). I think I have a main villain created, that can be compartmentalized into several chunks, but I don't yet have one of the PC's linked into the story.
I don't have a specific question, but I am open to any advice anyone has to offer for this situation. Just tips or tricks to make things better/easier.
Master TMO I guess it’s too late now but for next time it’s easier if the party starts already together. You can have them incorporate each other into their characters’ backstories. One good piece of advice I heard is to ask each one to give you a reason why they would die for another member of the party-or something along those lines, it could be anything like just a good memory or adventure they had together. That keeps the party together for practical reasons (it’s way harder to run a game when the party is split up) and it enriches their history. And as for plot/railroading, it might be helpful to have a couple of preplanned encounters that can be easily adapted for wherever they players decide to go. So even if they don’t “follow the plot” it’s easier to get them back on track, or at least give them something to do when they get to wherever they decided to go
The separate starting was a side-effect of making anything they wanted with any backstory. And I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to get a little practice with the system and GMing before I had to juggle all the players in a single situation. I didn't really think it would take this long to get them together, or realize that it meant I would effectively be running 4 separate games at the same time. Live and learn, I suppose!
idk if anyone else thought of this. but the idea is have two different d&d groups that run in the same world at the time period. the events of on campaign effect the other and vice versa. your thoughts?
I'm doing this right now.It's tricky. The thing I found most helpful is keeping a calendar not of the sessions, but of the actual in-game days. This allows me to know what effects group A based off of what group B has done and vice versa.
For Example: Group A stopped an assassination of a king from some nasty drow. Group B was then charged by the drow queen to carry out the same assassination since her initial attempt was thwarted (by group A). One thing leads to another and by the time Group A got back to the city the king is married to the drow queen. And the group's mind was blown.
I even have a players' ghost who died in one group haunting the other.
It has been really fun and I enjoy the balancing act, but I do also send them on very different quests so they dont get tempted to kill the other party.
@@sethd.coulter1875 i am actually planing to do the same thing with my group, if you dont mind could you email me a pic of the calendar so i can get a clear picture of what you mean?
I like this guy's voice
I want to make a campaign if where the adventurers are stuck in the Hawkins asylum in stranger things, any tips?
I see everyone talking about getting to dm but i can't find a group just to play with please tell me your secrets
Episode I, II, and III of Star Wars were not the original three movies. They were made as a backstory or a prequel for the actual three original movies which are now titled episodes IV, V, and VI.
Neat
We first started play games like can you survive games like dan plan does it ended when my friend took the infinite hat and put the whole universe in the hat and now “hat universe” had begun
Im just gonna try to make the half minute hero (PSP) missions into little campagins beacause i'm doing this in school
I am the 3000th subscriber.