Campaign Spin-Up X - Back of the Envelope Campaign Planning

I wrote about "rebooting a campaign with 2d20 Conan" - spinning up a new campaign in the Scaled Lands.

In the grand tradition of getting going by making promises and getting yourself deadlines I poked a list of players and then was committed to at least running something. Shortly after I had a flight for work so that was me stuck in a place with nothing else to do so I worked up the guts of what I needed on the back of an envelope.

Altogether this serves as a nice illustration of constraint breeding creativity. This world had been the campaign where I 'applied the OSR' after discovering all the blogs and wisdom, I had put a lot of thought into it pre-pandemic, including using it for NaNoWriMo, but I had none of that with me when I did this.

First I blocked out things I felt I needed to prep, to declutter my brain and help corral my thoughts into some kind of order. Up in a corner I stuck a to-do list of tasks as I thought of them, again to note and refocus.

Then I started properly thinking of the immediate recent history - the ramp-in to the start. I thought of the forces at play to give factions kicking around, recalled those that I remembered from before, gave names to some that had just existed as 'the infernal fire cult' before.

I thought through what stuff I wanted to see, what were the various secrets for the players to find and what kind of big interesting things could they get up to.

With Yaksha's hexfill method recently in mind, I wrote a d10/d4 encounter table - 10 factions likely to be found out and about and four examples for each.

One of the key reasons I wanted to return to the Scaled Lands is that I hand some wonderful art for the place commissioned from Evlyn Moreau and I never got to use even half of it before the old campaign collapsed. I had a think through how to use that art for best fun.

Lastly I had a thought of the kick-off adventure, something fairly straight-forward that was half an intro to the setting but mostly a stress test for the system, both for me and the players.

Even this amount of constrained scribblings has provided a useful focal point, with the encounter table, factions and secrets proving to be immediately useful.

Post script

A few games in, I have found the encounter table to be the touch-stone I keep coming back to so reproduce it below for ease of reference. I wanted to capture the 'lots of moving parts, situation uncertain' aspect of the place and I feel it has done that serviceably.

Also, strictly since I tore it open, this is a 'both sides of the envelope' campaign plan.

d10/d4 Encounters in the Scaled Lands
1. Wizard Kingdom Expeditionary Force (1. Couriers, 2. Outland Mercenaries, 3. Spies, 4. Local Auxilliaries)
2. Lizard Imperials (1. Tribune, 2. Taxmen, 3. Magistrate, 4. Regiment)
3. Local Militia (1. Posse, 2. Patrol, 3. Monster Hunters, 4. Garrison)
4. Merchants (1. Blue Dragon Cultists, 2. Shattered City Trading Coster, 3. Local Traders, 4. Imperial Procurers)
5. Adventurers (1. Locals, 2. Imperials (official scalyfolk), 3. Deep Basin Wanderers (private scalyfolk), 4. Extra-planetary Explorers)
6. Nearby Dwellers (1. Farmers, 2. Foresters, 3. Fishers, 4. Herders)
7. Lurkers (1. Small God Cultists, 2. Site Keepers, 3. Minions of an absent master, 4. Lost villagers)
8. Roaming Monsters (1. Shambling Mound, 2. Giant Pitcher Plant, 3. Strangler Vines, 4. Displacer Beast)
9. Beasties (1. Migrating Herd, 2. Roosting Flock, 3. Cubs + Parents, 4. Territorial Titan)
10. Factioneers (1. Red Dragon glory-seekers, 2. Adherents of the Devouring Sun, 3. Followers of the Nourishing Sun, 4. Templars of the Great Fire Beyond)