Quests as Campaign Structure

Let's say you want to start a new campaign. It's about, I dunno, kids in a monster hunter academy. 

To make sure it's about what you want, and to give yourself and players some direction and focus, set out 1-3 campaign/default quests. Like:

* graduate from monster hunter school

* make and maintain friendships

* find and maintain romance

Say, "these are the default quests. You never can lose them. As long as you're following a quest, you're playing the game right. This is what the game is about."

Say, "You can and should write down other quests for your character before and during play. When you're following those, you're also playing the game."

The objective of the game is to see what happens when you follow one or more of these quests, to see why you do what you do, and to see what comes of it. 

When you as the the GM or you as the player don't know what to do next, follow a quest, present obstacles for quests, ask why someone is or is not following a quest, challenge that, or wrote and follow a new quest. .  

City Procedure

I love procedures. I need them. I like to look at a list and see the next thing I need to do. Do it enough, and it's internalized.

I've got dungeons. I know exactly how to run them, as does practically everyone else. 

I've more recently acquired hexcrawl competence, and now I want to expand that to settlements (not that lacking that competence stopped me from muddling my way through a city campaign). 

So here is a first stab at a city procedure, together with a sketch of a city to be passed through in Hoard of the Dragon Queen. There's not enough there to use for a whole campaign, but cities in HDQ are just meant to be stopped in briefly. 

The elements of the city (look, encounters, taverns, etc) have generative procedures, but I'm not going into that now. What I'm trying to hammer out here is the procedure for actually linking up the elements of the city into a smooth, gameable thing. 

You know how it's no sweat to run a dungeon, and you're not fumbling for what to do next?

The idea is to reproduce that in the city. 

CITY PROCEDURE

1. Begin turn. 
2. Ask the players what they want to do, and tell them options if they don't have something in mind. 
   1. Tavern: here they can find rumors, bards, and rest. 
   2. Shop: shopping. 
   3. Contact: if they know of someone or a group (like a faction of which they're a member), let them know that they can get in touch with a bit of asking around
   4. Explore: if you have points of interest or random encounter tables, you can present this as an option. 
   5. Special: any special features of the district that are obvious, like if you've made a coliseum where they can participate in gladiatorial matches for cash. 
   6. Objective: anything else they want to do falls under this category. 
3. Once they've told you what they want to do, check for random encounters, if you're going to. 
4. Determine the turn length. This is how long it takes to get something done (like getting rumors from a tavern), and it's the schedule random encounters are checked on. 6 hours is fine, but scale up or down as feels right, from hours or minutes to months. 
5. If a random encounter is indicated, interrupt their action with it and resolve it. 
6. If they wish to change their action because of the encounter, accommodate it. 
7. If the action involves entering a new district (including the first time they enter a city), narrate a transition. 
   1. If it's a boring village or district, or a place you don't intend to be a play hub, then it's either "average village", or "unremarkable district"
   2. If it's not boring, take a moment to think about what makes it unique and describe one or two of those things (pink gulls, towering walls, skull-lined gates) and how the people look, if interesting (pirates, metal, bird costumes)
   3. If it's not boring, do an encounter as part of the transition from wilderness/district to district. This is part of its intro cutscene, so to speak. Examples: a rowdy duel between outlandish personalities, a market where all are masked and selling items hidden beneath velvet drapes, mounted bullfighting.


If they would encounter a special feature of the area (you've found the blue palace!), handle it as a random encounter. 
8. Cut to the interesting part of  their chosen action and resolve it. 
9. End of turn. 


Baldur's Gate
• People are aggressively insecure
• Cracked wood white sails, salt and trade, casual violence
• Pirate haven, founded by pirates, rum in everything, argh me mateys


The Sugar (rowdy market on harbor)
•  mostly sellers of sugar from all over, in all colors, for consumption and display
• +1% XP to next level if you become enthralled with a piece of sugar jewelry and simply must have and wear it (1d20 gp, random color and shape)
• Kurtz (desperate female Clint Eastwood, wants to buy a stilt-house and sell jewelry, ah, that's the life), sugar merchant (specialty: magenta, with chartreuse particles in the crystals, from an island called The Croaks where giant frogs grow legs on their backs and are essentially reversible), extorted by cult; you see two thugs demanding money and threatening her, then leaving. She'll tell you about them and will try to kill them if you don't. She'll succeed 50/50. She'll team up and join party if prospects for cash look better.
• Broadsides: buy a share in a cheaply made boat rigged with cannons. Make it a QTE game or push your luck game with death saves. Generate a captain; or, if you're trained, you can captain your own and get double the payout. 

Macro Game for Hoard of the Dragon Queen Sandbox

If you're running a sandbox version of Hoard of the Dragon Queen, you really want there to be a possibility of failure should the players not do well. Accordingly, you want their efforts to translate into success if they play well. Also, we want to ensure that the cult isn't just standing still. If the players waste time, the cult is going to summon Tiamat.

To that end, let's use a victory point system, where VP = XP.

• Start the cult with 90,000 XP and two dragon masks (red and black)
• Each dawn:
• has the cult leader Severin been slain? 
• if yes, have 3/5 half-dragons (white, red, black, blue, green) been slain? 
• if yes, endgame condition the time has not arrived
• else, continue
• else, have all 5 half-dragons been slain?
• if yes, endgame condition the time has not arrived
• else, continue
• subtract from the cult the XP that the PCs have earned during the day
• if this brings the cult's XP to 0 or less, this triggers endgame condition the time has not arrived
• else, proceed down the list
• award the cult XP:
• 100 for the income of miscellaneous hauls
• 10 for each compromised minor city (begin with 30, for 300 XP)
• 100 for each compromised major city (begin with 6, for 600 XP) 
• if this brings the cult to 100,000 XP or more, this triggers endgame condition the hoard is ready, which persists as long as the cult maintains 100,000 XP. 
• else, continue
• does the cult have all five dragon masks? 
• if yes, endgame condition the masks are assembled
• else, continue
• The cult gets XP when:
• a PC dies (XP = the PC's current XP)
• the dawn arrives (as above)
• The cult recovers another dragon mask from a dungeon when:
• 15 days pass
• of course, if PCs recover a dargon mask, the cult attempts to re-recover it from them with assassins and armies and whatever other methods they can bring to bear
• there is no obvious way to destroy a dragon mask
• Endgame conditions:
• time time has not arrived (player victory): the cult ceases its raids and waits for generations to strike again.
• the hoard is ready (cultist victory 1/2): a sufficient hoard has been assembled at the Well of Dragons to placate Tiamat upon her arrival, but the masks must be merged to summon her.
• the masks are assembled (cultist victory 1/2): the masks have merged, but a sufficient hoard must be assembled to placate her upon arrival, or else the summoning is pointless.

All the cities are compromised by the cult: tax money is being sent to support it. More details on this coming up, but a big portion on the sandbox can be done in cities, ferreting out cultists and those compromised by the cult. 

These numbers may be terrible! I don't know! And, since I don't think there's a summary of who has all the dragon masks (I only know about Rezmir having one; maybe there's another mentioned somewhere in there), I'm just assuming they've got 2/5, Rezmir and Severin having one each. 

Fractal Game Structure

Here's how I'm running my game. 

We know how things work in a dungeon: go in turns; when the players do certain things (like go in rooms), certain things happen (like they see what's in the room, have an encounter); and as the turns proceed, there's a time-pressure chance of badness: wandering monster checks. 

This works really well. It's easy and clear. 

So let's pull it back and toss it over the whole game. 

I'm running a thieves guild game. When not in a dungeon or whatever, the game goes in turns. I ask Player 1, what do you do? We resolve it: maybe he wanted to go shop for some gear. Then I ask Player 2 what he wants to do. Etc. Eventually, on say Player 4's turn, they agree to head for the dungeon. 

Here's the thing: at the start of each turn, I'm rolling the macro equivalent of wandering monsters checks. (It's a 1 on a d10 at start of each turn.)

What's the translation? In a dungeon, the time pressure threat is monsters. 

In the macro game, you'll need to customize it to your campaign. 

In my campaign, the always-on threat is war between the thieves guilds and pressure from the law. Specific characters have their own threats too. Others might pop up. 

I call these "looming crises" instead of wandering monsters, but they work exactly the same way and are just as easy to work.

You can have multiple checks if you want: a general one, a specific one to represent the hot war going on with the River Rats, another one to represent the ongoing murder investigation against one of the PCs, another to represent the spread of the abyssal plague, etc. 

And optionally step up/down the check die as things get hotter/colder. 

Make yourself some tables, roll on them, and interrupt with the badness. 

Conquest

This is a fractal, system-agnostic structure for making the control of territory a gameable thing at your table.

Example: a thieves guild struggling for control of the city's criminal underworld. 

Example: a lord's war to suppress the forces of chaos in his domain. 

Example: two armies fighting a civil war. 

Example: a cult enforcing orthodoxy in its parishes.

Why Is It

You want something like this if you want domain-level play. Or if you want your dudes to be hustling to control territory (or whatever idiom you may be employing). And you want this kind of thing to drive play or at least be an optional focus of play.

Me? It's the point of the campaign I'm currently running. It's about a thieves guild trying to take over one particular city, pushing out all the competing criminal interests, and trying to insulate themselves from the law.

To incentivize, you could give XP for each territory held per cycle, or you could just say (as I'm doing), "The object of the game is to control the city."

How It Works

I'm going to give boring but informative bullet points. But, before that, examples:

Example: taking Helmsfordshire will leave the rebels powerless.

Example: the Krayeerb Krew just burned down Sandercot Provisions, and now their drug dealers are everywhere.

Example: well, since we assassinated the vicar, we're running the charity BBQ this year, and that'll give us enough good will to get away with it.

Example: I just accepted my childhood trauma yadda yadda.

In general, players will see: oh, these people control this area, and we control this area, and these other people control that area. Seems like we should make a move here. They make a move. It either goes well or it doesn't. Maybe they drive the other gang out with a bloodbath at a birthday party, or they suffer heavy casualties in situ. They then either control that area or they don't, and maybe they lost an area in the process. 

(OPTIONAL: When the cycle (of whatever length: day/week/hour/extended rest) comes up, you get the resources or suffer the vulnerabilities of the flags you hold. So, if the alchemist you're "protecting" comes up vulnerable this cycle, he's got nothing for you, and the explosion in his lab injures one of your low level gang members, but at least you still exert control the alchemist's neighborhood.)

1. Determine a realm of conflict:
1. universe
2. globe
3. kingdom
4. city
5. street
6. family
7. self
8. whatever
2. Divide that realm into control points generically called flags.
• Call flags something more suited to your realm if you want.
• The more flags, the longer things will take.
• You will begin with a certain number of flags per realm. More may or may not be added, depending on the kind of thing you're doing. 
• Some flags may contribute more or less to dominance (q.v.)
3. Generate the particular flags in prep or in play. 
1. give it a name
2. give it a concept
3. (optionally) give it resources and vulnerabilities (q.v. in a bit)
4. A realm is fractal. You can detail as many sub/super realms as you wish.
5. A realm is considered conquered by a faction when that faction holds a number of flags sufficient to meet that realm's dominance level.
6. Determine the dominance level of the realm in question. You can make the dominance level whatever: plurality, majority, 80%, all, etc.
7. What it means to hold a flag is a necessary subsystem.
8. Any mechanical effects of holding a flag (beyond contributing to dominance) is an optional subsystem.

That's About It

The above is actually the hardest part. It's the skeleton that moves this whole thing. However you do the subsystems, it should still work. Nevertheless, more detail and examples:

Holding Flags

• To hold a flag you must either take it or start with it:
• a gang might start with Lowden Street as a flag they hold
• however, Brockton Street, just one block away, is run by the Krayeerb Krew
• to hold that flag, they've got to take it
• what taking it means will depend to some degree on the actual game you're playing
• in D&D 4E, maybe you have to win an encounter of a certain difficulty to take a flag
• you could play cards for it, I dunno
• if you're doing a Pokemon game or whatever, do a Pokemon fight!
• in other words, use whatever procedures your system provides explicitly or implicitly to make this happen
• me, I'd just say, "You head over to Brockton Street. [clatter clatter] 6 KKs are getting high on the stoop in front of the alchemist's shop. What do you do?" Then they do something that either:
• establishes their taking of the flag
• establishes their non-taking of the flag
• establishes, whatever the above, that the current holders of the flag know what's up and may instigate gang war / retaliation against the party's institution
• etc
• so do the above
• then: repeat

Example: the party sees 6 Krayeerb Krew toughs getting high on the stoop outside the alchemist's (I'll name that shop in the moment, Phil's Philters or something). The party immediately goes medieval on them and stakes their heads up outside the block. The party's gang now has taken the flag and holds it for now.

Reconquest

Presumably you can come up with some procedure for challenging the the dominance of the party. 

• treat days as dungeon turns; roll % for random encounters, where the encounter is: they try to retake their flag, or they do in fact retake their flag; what do you do about it? 
• treat days/weeks/mechanical events (like 4E extended rests) as hard moves or encounters, and challenge their dominance then
• do a kind of Fortunes/Wealth move inspired by Apocalypse World: at the start of some cycle (session, day, week, rest), have some character make a check that determines how bad things have gotten among the flags/realms they hold. 

Resources

• Resources are optional
• Read Apocalypse World; it's like the Hardholder's Wealth move
• Briefly: assign each flag (either individually or by tagging it with a general resource) a resource it provides when things are going okay (like, +10gp, a potion off the common magic item list, whatever), and the party just has access to that without discussion; it's not something you have to worry about in the fiction. However, if things are not going okay ("going okay" determined per "Reconquest" heading above), you do not get its resources, and you instead have to deal (if you want its resources again) with its vulnerabilities, like "shipment intercepted by gang," "dealer arrested," "too neurotic to help right now; in sanitarium". Then the players can either say "whatever" or "let's bust him out!"

This Is Actually All You Need

You can fill out the rest from here. I'm going to do so for my own campaign. I'll post it when it's all gussied up as an example, but it's basically all busy work from here:

• deciding how many levels deep you want to go (how many realms?) 
• deciding dominance level per realm
• generating the flags in prep or creating your tables for doing so in play (or just improvising)
• determining your reward/vulnerability cycle, if any

What NPCs Want from PCs

In my game right now, there are player-facing action categories that function as hooks for me to hang GMly procedures upon. 

That's a really boring way of saying it. 

In any case, there are specific times that I'm supposed to introduce NPC interaction if I can. 

But I'm already thinking of a hundred things at the table; so not having to be creative and thematically consistent off the top of my head is great.

Hence this procedure. 

What the NPC wants is your agenda for the scene. It's tricky: the player initiated the scene, but it's not really about the PC; it's really just a way to get you to get them to interact with NPCs in a way that actually has a point and might be interesting. 

Use reaction rolls¡ to determine how NPC will react if you don't know. Will a heated situation escalate? Reaction roll. Again, only use when you legitimately are at a loss. On a "wary" result (see below), CUT. When it's clear the NPC will or won't get what he wants, CUT. 

The object of the game for you in these scenes is to play the NPC realistically trying to get what she wants. 

Advanced technique: instead of using an NPC, have another player perform the same function with his PC. 

Also: this is actually a lower-order process. You don't just randomly have random NPCs wanting random things from the PCs. This tech should be used as part of a Plot, which I'll have to write up later. 

FRAME THE SCENE

For each, have a default available. Don't waste time getting it just so. Ask the question, and, if the player doesn't know or care, go with your default. 

* ask where PC is

* ask what PC is doing

* ask who else if anyone is there

* (optional) ask what PC is thinking about

INTRODUCE THE PC

* was there the whole time somehow

* enters/stays without permission

* requests permission to enter/stay

WHAT THE NPC WANTS RIGHT NOW

"You" = the PC(s)

* agreement about something (religion, philosophy, ethical judgment of something someone did)

* get you to agree to come to service/rally/concert/lunch/date

* get you to actually come to event ("Well? You ready to head out?")

* affection 

* what you really think

* apology

* attention/notice 

* a favor

* approval 

* forgiveness

* get you to ask them about/for/to do something 

* provoke you to anger/jealousy/lust/vengeance

HOW TO GO ABOUT GETTING IT

* just straight up, explicitly

* talking in circles around it

* using euphemisms and code

* easing into the topic with small talk or a decoy topic 

* fast talk, assuming one way or the other

* suddenly switching to the point at issue

HOW TO END IT

* display of affection

* walk away bleeding

* on the floor

* storming/skipping/slinking/fading out 

* remaining quietly, stewing/enjoying

* insults and throwing things

* threatening consequences 

* promising something nice

¡ For reaction rolls, I do a Cha check (no 1/2 level bonuses if you're playing 4e). For stat ranges of -3 to +3 (like Moldvay), use 2d6 (6- negative / 7-9 wary / 10+ positive). For -5 to +5 ranges, I use 1d20 (9- negative / 10-17 wary / 18+ positive).

How to Make a Religion

Also works for a philosophy or some weird kick or politico-cultural faction. 

The key is to make the thing violate some element of "humanity" considered "normal" by you and/or your players as actual people. 

Here's an example, and then you get to make your own!

Example: Tormundrism

* English, an NPC thief a PC has been crushing on, says, "Hey, you heard about those Tormundrs or whatever? I heard they only eat butter and only drink cocktails! [not true!] You wanna go with me to one of their rallies? Sounds like a blast."

* At the rally, a priest with a candle-hat and a body like a twig executes an entire sermon in hums while the crowd just sways and hums back. "What? You're not feeling it? Oh, that's because you've eaten today." 

* Say, hey, PC, you remember that rally for the Tormundrs you went to? How they fast all the time? I'll give you 25XP if you don't eat until sunrise."

* Later that day, have someone offer him his favorite enchilada. If he says no, have NPC try to figure out why. If he eats it, have English see him, be disappointed that he's not into Tormundrism like she is. 

* After a fight, English faints. She's gaunt. Hasn't eaten in days. 

* more pressure, etc. 

* Unless PC intervenes, English becomes super hardcore, nearly starving, and, at the moment of greatest tension, either starves to death or is somehow vindicated—becoming instantly grossly corpulent and euphoric maybe for days until she shrinks back to normal with an extra-extra spring in her step and twinkle in her eye, or maybe being able to turn the stones around her into bread. Or miserable. Or maybe just happier or better-adjusted. 

Name it

1 [noun]ianity/ism

2 [x]ness/sophy/logy

3 [noun] [participle]

4 nonsense

5 [adjective] noun

6 [personal name]ism/ianity

Introduce It

1 a familiar NPC is reading some of their weird literature (written backward / on strange material / in all caps or with only so 10 syllables per line / overwritten thrice at particular angles), says here man, read this, really interesting stuff. Leaves you with it. 

2 a hopeless eyed man hands PC said literature, says something cryptic, won't stop hugging you if you linger

3 familiar NPC says hey your heard about [religion]? I heard they [something wildly untrue or absolutely precise], wanna go with me to a service?

4 street preacher vomits atop crate, carries on like nothing happened, has change of clothes for just such an occasion, changes on spot, after a turn longer, crowd wordlessly disperses/riots 

Make It Real

1 an NPC they care about adopts one of its behaviors

2 offer player metagame reward (XP, +1 tokens, reroll tokens) for adopting and its behaviors

Show Its Behaviors (customize to make them suit you and your group)

1 celibacy

2 harm/destruction of "redundant" or "duplicative" organs

3 charity to the point of impoverishment

4 abandonment of marriage, parenthood, filial duty

5 sweating in public is taboo

6 public nudity

7 free love

8 lying literally constantly about literally everything

9 abandonment of inconvenient infants/children (i.e., all of them)

10 abandonment of the infirm

11 absolute silence among outsiders

12 refusal to make anything excellent

13 fasting/gluttony

14 concerted thievery to benefit a particular outsider group

15 assassinations/lynchings/beatings of particular group

16 extreme dietary restrictions; must therefore eat separately 

17 cannot say certain words / express certain thoughts/feelings

18 treats members of particular group far too intimately

19 takes absurd risks (not packing water for journeys / not treating wounds)

20 suicide as moral duty under certain circumstances

Explain Its Behaviors

Just make up weird stuff. Make some of it consistent. To get the real story, track down the holy texts or magisterial body. But they may speak in code or lie as matter of principle/convenience

Develop It

1 more people the PCs care about adopt its behaviors

2 offer greater rewards for PC adoption of behaviors

3 have (non)adherents act out / make demands to modify behavior 

4 have behaviors become more extreme 

5 reveal terrible/wonderful things about the religion

6 have the behaviors produce wonders / horrors for the PCs and those they care about

15 Minute Adventuring Day: A Solution

Across all editions, people have complained about the 15 minute adventuring day: the party goes nova on the first encounter, then heads back to the town to rest. Repeat.

This is smart play. 

Dungeon restocking/tactics adjustment helps but maybe is not The Total Solution (TM). 

Here's something I'm doing. It's for a 4e game but should be broadly applicable:

WHEN THEY REGAIN THEIR DAILY RESOURCES, MAKE A HARD MOVE.

A "hard move" is a term from Apocalypse World. It refers to the dreaded and irrevocable consequence of an explicit or implicit threat. 

In combat, a hard move is injury/death. 

In addiction narratives, a hard move is relapse. 

In relationship narratives, a hard move is they're seeing someone else. 

In a thieves guild game, a hard move is a raid on your HQ or the arrest of one of your members. 

So find out what your hard moves might look like and tell the players that this metastructure is in effect. 

If they care about the consequences of your hard moves, the problem is resolved. 

Sure, they can nova and drop the mic, but then their significant other gets kidnapped. 

Upside: something interesting is always happening, and things get more complicated. 

So, if the 15 minute day is a problem for you, here you go. 

This has the side benefit of addressing an issue in 4e: by default, it doesn't matter how well the party fights as long as they win. 

With this rule in effect, though, fighting well means you lose fewer hp, which means your surges will last longer, which means you can go longer between extended rests, which means you limit the GM's hard moves.