4th edition and a new game

So I may actually have a new game starting soon. For the last month I have been helping a friend work with an online gaming tool, called itabletop. It basically functions as a digital whiteboard with voice/video conferencing. Basically all you need for an online D&D game. Also now that the 4th edition of D&D is almost out, I'm finally interested in running a new pseudo-medieval fantasy again.

The new game looks like fun with tools to make the DM's life easier. The system also gives PCs more interesting things to do. This is a game that works well with a DM/group that is not too nit-picky and is focused on the story. Which is to say, my kind of game. Reviewing the new write ups of the monsters I see a lot of cool ideas forming. In particular I want to focus on some monsters and themes that I rarely used in my old 2e and 3e games.

So on to creating a world. I've collected a number of world creation guides over the years and sort of come up with my own "system" along the way. Anyway I found an old photocopy (on odd shaped paper) from Dragon magazine #226 (which I have on pdf somewhere I just realized). The author David Clarke (interestingly the same name as a friend I knew in college) breaks the process into three parts. Part 1 is just the basics (amount of detail, default assumptions) so we'll skip it. I like D&D's assumptions and I follow dungeoncraft's first rule of campaign creation: Never create more than you need. Part 2 is more interesting and is really where I think world creation begins, determining the climates and terrain you want to use. This ties into determining a campaigns hook, that is what makes this world different and interesting.

So lets brainstorm some ideas for my new campaign. Like I said earlier I've neglected certain key monsters and ideas over my 17 years of DMing. So lets look at those first. Well there are two terrain types that have gotten little use in any game I've either ran or played in and that is underwater and the underdark. Underwater is not a friendly environment to airbreathers and I had an (sadly) short nautical themed game 2 years ago. The underdark would be interesting so we'll save that idea for the moment.

How about monsters? Well D&D has no shortage of evil humanoids and there are many that I've never used. Of those that are well represented in 4e, we have gnolls (evil demon worshipping hyena-men), drow (dark elves in the underdark!), aboleths (underdark dwelling fish things), and an assortment of fish people who we will discard for obvious reasons (though they might work well as minions of the aboleths). Then there are new monster that excite my interests, like shadar-kai (shadowy ex-fey) and the cyclops (one eyed servants of mad fey giants). Lastly there are monsters I've used but not focused on (despite being obvious foci): dragons and giants. Giants (true giants at least) in the new addition are much higher level (beginning tied to the primordials who created the world) so I'll skip them for the time being.

So now to start putting things together. Well the underdark links drow and aboleths (and I can use the fish people in conjunction with them). These monsters lay in the paragon tier (11-20) in the new system so i suspect the PCs will spend the majority of their time underground for those levels. I'll need to come up with a reason for that. Cyclops and their formian masters are also paragon level monsters that live underground in the Feywild reflection of the underdark. Even better drow are also fey so there is a natural connection between the three.

We need some Heroic tier (1-10) monsters to focus on first however. Gnolls work for the upper end as do the shadar-kai. Well how about dragons? They can fit almost anywhere and are prone to forcing lesser races to serve them. Kobolds and dragons are bit cliche but work. Perhaps the land is being ravaged by a brood of young dragons and dragonspawn, seeded by a much older (and prolific) wyrm that could show up later. Looking over the monster lists I see a monster I overlooked, troglodytes (stinky lizard people) and happen to be near the upper heroic level as well as being natives of the underdark!

So we have an infestation of dragons and dragonkin driving the local monsters as they strive for power as well the need to feed. The PCs might trace this infestation to the underdark where they get wrapped up in the intrigues of the drow and the mad formians as well as a war with the treacherous aboleth led fish people. The rest of the plot can be worked out later. Perhaps the dragon is building a power base on the surface in order to strike at one or the other of these factions or perhaps something more sinister is behind all these problems.

Next: A map and a starting location.