You’ve established the big picture for your world, considered its gods, mapped its lands, populated it with factions, and defined how its magic works. Now, it’s time to weave these elements together into a Campaign – the overarching story arc that will guide your players’ adventures over multiple sessions, potentially spanning months or even years of play. While individual adventures provide immediate challenges and excitement, a well-thought-out campaign provides context, direction, escalating stakes, and a sense of meaningful progression for the characters and the world they inhabit.
Creating a campaign isn’t about writing a novel that the players must follow rigidly. Instead, it’s about establishing a compelling central premise, identifying key conflicts and players, outlining potential developments, and creating a flexible structure that can adapt to the choices and actions of the player characters. Alacrity, with its emphasis on player agency, GM judgment, and narrative momentum, thrives on campaigns that provide a strong framework but leave ample room for improvisation and emergent storytelling.
This section offers guidance on designing your Alacrity campaign, from choosing a style and developing a core concept to outlining potential arcs and integrating player character stories.
Choosing a Campaign Style
Before plotting specifics, consider the overall style of campaign you and your players prefer. Different styles emphasize different aspects of the game:
1. Sandbox Campaign
In a sandbox campaign, the GM presents a detailed region or situation filled with potential opportunities, threats, locations, and factions, but without a single, predetermined overarching plotline. Player characters are free to set their own goals, explore where they wish, and interact with the world’s elements as they see fit. The “story” emerges organically from the players’ choices and the world’s reactions.
- Strengths: High player agency, encourages exploration and self-direction, world feels very responsive.
- Challenges: Requires significant upfront worldbuilding of the “sandbox” area, GM needs to be adept at improvising and reacting to player initiatives, can sometimes lack clear direction if players are indecisive.
- Alacrity Fit: Excellent fit. Alacrity’s flexible skill system and focus on GM rulings allow for easy improvisation of challenges and outcomes based on player actions. The detailed worldbuilding elements (factions, locations) provide the necessary content for players to interact with.
2. Plot-Driven Campaign (Adventure Path Style)
This style features a more defined central plot with a clear beginning, middle, and end. The GM designs a series of interconnected adventures that guide the players along this main storyline, often involving a primary antagonist or a major world-threatening event. While player choices still matter within individual scenes and adventures, the overall direction of the campaign is more guided.
- Strengths: Clear goals and direction, potential for epic storytelling and high stakes, easier for GMs to plan specific encounters and plot points in advance.
- Challenges: Can sometimes feel like a “railroad” if player agency to deviate from the main plot is overly restricted, requires careful design to ensure player choices still feel meaningful within the larger structure.
- Alacrity Fit: Works well, but the GM should leverage Alacrity’s flexibility. Allow players to tackle plot points using varied skills and approaches. Be prepared for them to find unconventional solutions or pursue side quests related to the main plot. The focus should be on achieving the plot’s milestones, not necessarily following a precise sequence of events.
3. Character-Driven Campaign
This style places the player characters’ personal goals, backstories, and motivations at the center of the campaign. The overarching plot emerges directly from the characters’ desires, unresolved pasts, and relationships. Adventures are often tailored to specific character arcs.
- Strengths: High player investment, deeply personal stories, excellent for roleplaying and character development.
- Challenges: Requires significant player input (detailed backstories and goals), GM needs to weave disparate character threads together into a cohesive narrative, can be difficult if characters have conflicting or passive goals.
- Alacrity Fit: Very strong fit. Alacrity’s emphasis on character skills and choices, along with the concept of the Narrative Anchor for magic users, naturally supports character-focused storytelling. The GM can use character backgrounds, skills, and discovered Effects as springboards for personalized adventures.
Hybrid Approaches
Most campaigns blend these styles. A regional sandbox might contain several potential plot arcs the players can discover. A plot-driven campaign should incorporate character backstories and allow for side exploration. A character-driven campaign often develops an overarching plot as character goals intersect or create larger conflicts. Find the blend that best suits your GM style and your players’ preferences. Discussing this during a “Session Zero” can be invaluable.
Developing the Core Concept: The Heart of the Story
Every campaign needs a central idea – the core conflict, mystery, or premise that drives the action. This concept should be engaging, offer opportunities for adventure, and ideally connect to the world’s established tone, themes, and factions.
Brainstorming Ideas:
- A Central Conflict: War between kingdoms, a struggle against a monstrous invasion, a civil war tearing a nation apart, a feud between powerful guilds, the rise of a dark cult challenging the established order.
- A Looming Threat: An ancient evil awakening, a prophecy of doom nearing fulfillment, a magical plague spreading, a natural disaster impending, a planar portal threatening to open.
- A Grand Quest: The search for a legendary artifact, the need to unite scattered factions against a common enemy, a journey to a lost city or forgotten land, the quest to restore a fallen dynasty.
- A Central Mystery: Who murdered the king? What caused the magical blight? Where did the ancient civilization disappear to? What is the secret behind the recurring nightmares plaguing the region?
- A Compelling Situation: The characters are shipwrecked on a mysterious island, trapped in a besieged city, tasked with protecting a vital caravan through dangerous lands, or inherit a cursed property with dark secrets.
Connecting to the World:
Your core concept should feel integrated with the world you’ve built.
- Tone: A world-shattering demonic invasion fits a High Fantasy tone better than a gritty Low Fantasy setting, where a local turf war might be more appropriate.
- Themes: If your theme is “Consequences of Power,” your core concept might involve a powerful artifact falling into the wrong hands or a conflict arising from a ruler’s abuse of authority.
- Factions: Use existing factions as key players in the core concept. Perhaps the central conflict is the war between the Kingdom of Eldoria and the Orc Hordes of the Black Mountains, or the mystery involves uncovering a conspiracy within the Merchant’s Guild.
- History: Root the core concept in the world’s past. Is the looming threat the return of a villain defeated centuries ago? Is the quest related to fulfilling an ancient prophecy?
The “Elevator Pitch”: Try to summarize your core campaign concept in one or two compelling sentences. This helps clarify your focus. Example: “The players are members of a struggling mercenary company hired to protect a border town beset by increasingly organized goblin raids, only to uncover evidence that a forgotten necromantic cult is manipulating the goblins as part of a larger, sinister plan.”
Establishing the Stakes: Why Should They Care?
A compelling campaign needs stakes – reasons for the players (and their characters) to invest in the story and strive for success. What is at risk if they fail?
- Personal Stakes: These relate directly to the characters’ lives, goals, relationships, or backstories.
- Survival: Their own lives or the lives of loved ones are threatened.
- Reputation/Honor: Failure means disgrace or breaking an important oath.
- Wealth/Property: Their fortune, home, or livelihood is at risk.
- Relationships: Failure could harm friends, family, mentors, or romantic interests.
- Personal Goals: The conflict directly prevents them from achieving a key character objective (finding a lost sibling, clearing their name, mastering a skill).
- Local Stakes: The fate of a specific community, town, or small region hangs in the balance.
- Protecting a village from bandits or monsters.
- Saving a town from a plague or famine.
- Resolving a local political crisis that threatens stability.
- Regional/National Stakes: The well-being or future of an entire kingdom, nation, or large geographical area is threatened.
- Preventing or winning a war.
- Stopping a widespread invasion.
- Deposing a tyrannical ruler.
- Averting a magical catastrophe affecting the entire region.
- World/Cosmic Stakes: The fate of the entire world, reality, or the cosmic balance is at risk.
- Stopping a dark god’s return.
- Closing a portal to an evil plane.
- Preventing the activation of a world-ending artifact.
- Dealing with threats that transcend mortal understanding.
Balancing Stakes: Most campaigns benefit from a mix of stakes. While world-ending threats can be epic, purely personal stakes often provide stronger immediate motivation. Ideally, the larger conflict should connect to the characters’ personal lives in some way. The necromantic cult threatening the region might also be linked to the mysterious disappearance of a character’s mentor, or the war between kingdoms might directly impact a character’s homeland.
Make the stakes clear to the players early on, and remind them periodically of what they stand to lose or gain.
Designing the Antagonist(s): Forces of Opposition
Most campaigns need compelling opposition to create conflict and challenge the players. Antagonists can take many forms:
- Individuals: A powerful dark lord, a cunning spymaster, a charismatic cult leader, a ruthless guild master, a vengeful monster, a rival adventurer. Give them clear motivations, resources, methods, and perhaps flaws or weaknesses.
- Organizations/Factions: As discussed previously, entire groups can serve as antagonists (e.g., an invading army, a thieves’ guild, a corrupt church, a monstrous horde). The opposition comes from the faction’s collective resources, agents, and influence.
- Forces of Nature/Environment: Sometimes the primary antagonist is the world itself – a harsh wilderness, a deadly plague, a magical storm, a resource scarcity driving conflict.
- Abstract Concepts: The campaign might revolve around fighting against ignorance, injustice, corruption, despair, or a prophecy of doom. These often manifest through individuals or groups who embody these concepts.
Making Antagonists Compelling:
- Clear Motivations: Why are they doing what they’re doing? Even purely “evil” antagonists often believe they are justified, seeking power, revenge, survival, fulfilling a perceived destiny, or adhering to a twisted ideology. Understanding their motives makes them more believable and potentially allows for non-combat resolutions.
- Resources and Methods: How do they pursue their goals? What assets do they command (wealth, agents, magic, political influence)? What tactics do they employ (direct assault, manipulation, stealth, terror)?
- Connection to the PCs: Does the antagonist have a personal connection to one or more characters (a shared past, a rival, someone who wronged them)? This raises the personal stakes.
- Escalation: Antagonists should rarely reveal their full power or plans immediately. They might start with minor actions, sending low-level agents, testing the waters. As the players interfere, the antagonist escalates their efforts, deploying greater resources and revealing more of their true nature and goals.
- Flaws and Weaknesses: Even powerful antagonists should have vulnerabilities – perhaps a specific magical weakness, a personality flaw (arrogance, paranoia), a reliance on a key lieutenant, or a hidden objective that conflicts with their main goal. These provide opportunities for the players to defeat them.
You might have a single primary antagonist or a web of interconnected opposing forces.
Crafting the Opening: The First Steps
The beginning of the campaign is crucial for setting the tone, introducing the world, establishing the initial situation, and engaging the players.
- Session Zero: Before the first adventure, consider holding a Session Zero. This is where you discuss the campaign’s tone, scope, themes, and any world-specific rules or assumptions with the players. It’s also when players create their characters, ideally collaboratively, establishing initial relationships and discussing how their backgrounds and Narrative Anchors fit into the world. This ensures everyone starts on the same page.
- The Inciting Incident: How do the characters get drawn into the main conflict or quest?
- Direct Hook: They are hired for a specific job related to the core concept.
- Personal Connection: An event directly impacts a character’s backstory, family, or goals.
- Accident/Wrong Place, Wrong Time: They stumble into a situation or witness an event that pulls them in.
- External Force: A natural disaster, an attack on their home, or a command from a superior forces them into action.
- The First Adventure: The initial adventure(s) should:
- Introduce key NPCs (allies or minor antagonists).
- Showcase the campaign’s tone and themes.
- Present a manageable challenge that allows players to learn their characters and Alacrity’s mechanics.
- Provide clues or leads related to the larger core concept.
- Offer meaningful choices and opportunities for different skills to shine.
- End with a clear next step or goal.
Structuring the Campaign Arc (A Loose Outline)
While you shouldn’t write a rigid script, having a loose outline for the campaign’s potential progression can be helpful for planning. Think in terms of acts or major phases:
- Beginning (Introduction & Rising Action):
- Players are introduced to the world and each other.
- The inciting incident occurs, presenting the initial problem or goal.
- Early adventures focus on investigating the initial situation, dealing with immediate threats, gathering allies or resources, and learning more about the core conflict and the main antagonists.
- Stakes are often local or personal initially.
- Middle (Complications & Escalation):
- The scope often expands. Players travel further, interact with more factions, and uncover deeper layers of the plot.
- New challenges and complications arise. The antagonist reveals more of their power or plans. Allies might be threatened or betray the party. Easy solutions prove insufficient.
- Players face tougher opponents and more complex situations, requiring higher skill levels and clever use of resources (including learned Effects).
- Personal character arcs often develop significantly during this phase, potentially tying into the main plot.
- Stakes escalate to regional or even national levels.
- End (Climax & Resolution):
- Players have gathered the knowledge, resources, and power needed to confront the primary antagonist or resolve the core conflict directly.
- This often involves a major confrontation, a final dungeon crawl, a large-scale battle, or a critical diplomatic summit.
- The stakes are at their highest.
- Following the climax, a Denouement wraps up loose ends, shows the immediate aftermath of the players’ actions, and provides a sense of closure for the main story and potentially for character arcs.
Flexibility is Key: This is a potential structure, not a railroad. Player choices should constantly influence the direction. They might ignore certain leads, ally with unexpected factions, fail at key moments, or come up with entirely novel solutions. Be prepared to adapt your outline, modify planned encounters, and introduce new elements based on what happens in play. Alacrity’s emphasis on GM judgment makes this adaptive approach easier than in systems with highly prescriptive rules.
Integrating Player Characters
A campaign feels most engaging when the player characters are central to the story, not just reacting to external events.
- Use Backstories: Mine character backgrounds (Chapter 4) and Narrative Anchors for plot hooks, NPCs, and personal stakes. If a character is a former Guard, perhaps their old captain needs help. If a Cleric follows a specific god, involve that temple or its enemies. If a Rogue has underworld contacts, use them to provide information or complications.
- Character Goals: Ask players about their characters’ short-term and long-term goals. Design adventures or opportunities that allow them to pursue these goals, ideally tying them into the main campaign arc where possible.
- Skill Relevance: Create situations where different characters’ signature skills can shine. Ensure challenges aren’t solely combat-focused; include opportunities for Persuasion, Investigation, Stealth, Crafting, Lore, Navigation, etc.
- Personal Arcs: Allow characters to grow and change over the campaign. Introduce NPCs and situations that challenge their beliefs, force difficult choices, or allow them to confront elements from their past.
Managing Pacing and Progression
A campaign needs a satisfying rhythm.
- Vary the Pace: Alternate between intense action sequences, tense investigations, relaxed social interactions, challenging explorations, and periods of downtime for rest, recovery (HP/SP/MP regain), training (spending XP), or pursuing personal goals.
- XP Awards: Grant Experience Points (XP) consistently, as outlined in Chapter 2. Ensure the rate of advancement feels appropriate for the campaign’s intended length and power level. Achieving major campaign milestones should typically grant larger XP rewards.
- Escalate Challenges: As characters gain skills and Effects, the challenges they face should also increase in difficulty – tougher opponents, more complex traps, higher stakes, more intricate political situations.
Using World Elements
Continuously draw upon the worldbuilding elements you established:
- Factions: Have factions react to player actions and pursue their own agendas, creating new opportunities or threats.
- Locations: Make locations memorable with unique descriptions, inhabitants, challenges, and secrets tied to the world’s history or current events.
- History & Lore: Reveal pieces of the world’s history through ruins, texts, NPC dialogue, or visions, providing context for current conflicts or mysteries.
- Magic System: Showcase the unique aspects of your world’s magic through NPC spellcasters, magical creatures, enchanted locations, and available Effects.
Flexibility and Improvisation
No campaign plan survives contact with the players. Embrace this!
- Listen to Your Players: Pay attention to what they find interesting, which NPCs they engage with, which leads they follow enthusiastically (or ignore completely). Adjust your plans accordingly.
- Embrace Unexpected Outcomes: Alacrity’s percentile system means unexpected successes and failures will happen. Let these moments redirect the story in interesting ways rather than forcing it back onto a predetermined path.
- Use Your Tools: Keep your faction notes, location descriptions, and NPC motivations handy. When players go off-script, you can improvise believable reactions and situations based on these established elements.
- “Yes, and…” or “No, but…”: When players propose creative or unexpected actions, try to build on their ideas (“Yes, and here’s what happens…”) or offer interesting alternatives or complications if the initial idea isn’t feasible (“No, you can’t fly to the moon, but you could seek out the eccentric artificer rumored to have built a flying machine…”).
Ending the Campaign
Plan for a satisfying conclusion.
- Fulfilling the Premise: Does the ending resolve the core conflict or mystery established at the beginning?
- Character Arc Resolution: Do major character goals get addressed? Do characters experience meaningful change?
- Impact on the World: Show the consequences (good or bad) of the players’ actions on the world, region, or factions involved.
- Loose Ends: Decide which minor plot threads to tie up and which might be left open for potential future campaigns or player imagination.
- Epilogue: Consider describing events shortly after the climax, showing where the characters end up and the immediate state of the world they influenced.
Conclusion: Your Campaign Roadmap
Creating a campaign is about building a compelling framework for shared storytelling. By defining the core concept, establishing the stakes, designing engaging opposition, outlining a flexible arc, and integrating the player characters’ stories, you create a roadmap for adventure. Remember that this roadmap should guide, not dictate. Alacrity’s strength lies in its adaptability and its encouragement of GM judgment and player agency. Embrace the unexpected turns, leverage the world elements you’ve created, and focus on facilitating memorable moments and collaborative storytelling. With a solid foundation and a willingness to adapt, your Alacrity campaign can become a truly epic and rewarding experience for everyone at the table.