Need help with my campaign!

Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar setting, home to the legendary Fafhrd and Gray Mouser, is the first officially licensed setting for the DCC RPG.

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UniversalHead
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Need help with my campaign!

Post by UniversalHead »

Mild spoilers!

Hope there's someone around here that can give me a bit of help. We've been playing a DCC Lankmar campaign for months now, but I've hit a bit of a wall and need some inspiration. The players started with Masks of Lankhmar, then Ganglords, then they left Lankhmar and, after having their ship attacked by a pirate queen, I strung together Tower of the Black Pearl and The Sea Queen Escapes very successfully. An amusing period followed where they were in each other's bodies, until they visited Ningauble and had to remove the relic from the rat temple in Ilthmar to get switched back (Rats of Ilthmar). Leaving Ilthmar, they've arrived in Sarheenmar and I had them thrown into The Madhouse Meet and a wizard using ghouls as a personal militia.

But now ... I'm stuck. I've read pretty much every DCC adventure and I just can't find anything that fits for the next stage of this campaign. Everything's so over the top and involves mad gods and other dimensions and just doesn't feel right. And I don't have the time to make things from scratch.

Anyone have any ideas?
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GnomeBoy
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by GnomeBoy »

Maybe some of the Fifth Edition Fantasy adventures? Less over the top, maybe...

I can't think of any non-over the top DCC adventures, since that's kind of the signature style. Might need to look at adventures for OSR games to convert.
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UniversalHead
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by UniversalHead »

Well, Tower and Sea Queen were perfect, and the Lankhmar ones are great (though there's a surfeit of ones that involve breaking into temples). I'm not looking for D&D style, that's why I play DCC - but I wish they'd pull back on the 'extra dimensional flying chaos monkeys in a mad god's cosmic brain' a bit and make more adventures that are usable in a connected campaign.
UniversalHead
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by UniversalHead »

In fact it's a problem I've found with many RPGs - there's either a pile of unconnected adventures, or a railroady campaign, never that sweet spot between the two.
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GnomeBoy
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by GnomeBoy »

I guess the other option is to re-skin the flying chaos monkeys into being trained ravens or or the like.

But if you haven't already, I'd suggest you look at Moon Slaves of the Cannibal Kingdom, which sketches out ties to 10 or 12 other adventures, perhaps existing within that sought-after area between unconnected adventures and railroady campaign for you...
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Mat Mobile
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by Mat Mobile »

There's Doom of the Savage Kings that is fairly "normal". The hound of Hirot isn't over the top and there's a lot of role-play invoolved. I would recommend that. Maybe have the innkeeper write to somebody in Lankhmar that they know and ask for help with the whole situation in Hirot.

Sailors of the Starless Sea could also work. It's level 0 but if you put more Beast-Men and make sure the Chaos Lord appears it could be an interesting choice. Again, maybe have the village close by ask for help.

The next suggestions will take your campaign in whole different direction but are worth considering.

If your players are into finding treasure, they could hear rumours about the lost cities in the Center of Aereth. It's a complete setting but the craziness builds up gradually. All the monsters are not god-like and there's no other dimension stuff.

Are your players into John Carter of Mars? If yes: Purple Planet!

That's all I have in mind for now. Let us know what you pick.
UniversalHead
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by UniversalHead »

They've done the great Sailors of the Starless Sea at an earlier time, and I plan to do Doom when they get to the Land of the Eight Cities.

I wonder how other people link together DCC adventures, or does everyone play one offs?
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by Mat Mobile »

UniversalHead wrote: Fri Nov 06, 2020 12:30 pm They've done the great Sailors of the Starless Sea at an earlier time, and I plan to do Doom when they get to the Land of the Eight Cities.

I wonder how other people link together DCC adventures, or does everyone play one offs?
Honestly, I like it that the DCC modules can take about 3 to 5 sessions to complete. It allows for lots of variety. It's completely different to the WOTC books that can take 1-2 years for even disciplined groups to complete. But it's also a matter of taste.

Up till now, our group has done the same thing as you. We played different adventures that string together fairly well.

Another suggestion is "Elzemon and the Blood-Drinking Box" from Chaos Rising. A few other of that compliation of adventures might fit in your campaign too.
UniversalHead
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Re: Need help with my campaign!

Post by UniversalHead »

Well, I've managed to start solidly on the next section of the campaign, using a mix of The Madhouse Meet and Erikol Was Framed, so we're good for a few weeks anyway!

One thing I've found very useful are the carousing rules in DCC Lankhmar. I've changed it so the PCs get the luck as a bonus rather than a heal, which makes carousing a far more attractive process to them (and they can still lose it all on a roll of 1 anyway). I get to take a bit of the agency away from them in order to introduce unexpected new story elements; I let the dice roll as they may, and it adds in new characters and situations which I then work into the overall story. For example, the last carousing they did they insulted a wizard. I decided this was the wizard from Emerikol Was Framed and it helped kick off the story of that adventure.

Still worried about what I'm going to do when I run out of 'non-cosmic-god-dimension' adventures though! We need more Lankhmar stuff! :)
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