Dragon Heist Remix - Addendum: Timelines & Starting the Campaign
Added 2020-04-17 06:41:11 +0000 UTCI apparently forgot to post the link to this one on Patreon!
Comments
This is tremendously helpful, Justin. Thanks very much for taking the time. That distinction between the gold and 'Neverember's Engima' as some vague conspiracy term helps me a lot.
Josh
2020-04-24 16:28:58 +0000 UTCThe fact that Neverember embezzled a bunch of money is public knowledge, but the working assumption is that the money is gone; he took it and is probably spending it (or has already spent it) in Neverwinter. My head canon is that a whole bunch of scandals from the Neverember era have been getting unearthed and this is just one among many. In Part 1B of the Remix, I mention that Laeral is working to recover the gold, but she's also working under the false assumption that it's in Neverwinter. Neverember's Enigma is this other thing; one of those scandals or a conspiracy theory or whatever. It's not well known to the public, but people who know things know this. The connection between the Enigma and the missing gold is something really only known (or suspected) by those in the Grand Game. For character creation, I gave the players one instruction: The first scene of the campaign will have you arriving at the Yawning Portal looking for a paying gig. Whatever character you create, you need to explain why you're there. The results were: - My mother is being held ransom by pirates and I need to raise money to save her. - I am one of those pirates, but resent the tyrannical captain who mutinied and killed my mento and former captain. I've befriended the first PC and am trying to help him. - I am someone with connections to underground fight rings in Waterdeep. The second PC thought they could make money in the illegal fight rings and they sought me out... but when I heard how much money they needed, I knew I couldn't help them. So I took them to meet... - A secret Harper who's well-connected and knows someone who knows someone who can pay well. - An elf who the first and second PC ran into on the road to Waterdeep and somehow ended up agreeing to help them. Hijinks ensue. But, honestly, you could end up with almost anything. Once one or two players figure out how they're connected to the functional hook, the table will generally start collaboratively building on that framework. At the end of character creation I showed them the portraits on p. 221 of the book and said, "Which one of these people are you meeting with?" Whichever one it is, their function is to introduce them to Volothamp Geddarm. (But that initial contact will also tend to shape how things go: For example, my players picked Yagra. Which ended up being important in them forging an alliance with the Doom Raiders: https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/43782/roleplaying-games/running-the-campaign-dragon-heist-the-manshoon-heists)
Justin Alexander
2020-04-24 07:35:11 +0000 UTC
