Prepping a Campaign: The Quest for Memory

One of the things I want to try to do during lockdown is put together at least the beginnings of another campaign. Depending on how long this lasts, there may be an inkling of running a second weekly session in some format, in which case it is good to be prepared.

Of the three campaign outlines I discussed a few months ago, the one that I have chosen is "The Quest for Memory", mostly because it is the most 'classic' of the three - it features lots of dungeon crawling, lots of quests, fighting monsters and searching for treasure, and all that good stuff.

Due to the limitations of the likely format, my feeling is that this campaign is best presented with several pregenerated characters. Specifically, I am looking at eight such characters - two in each of the four 'roles' (those still exist, although they're much looser in 5e than 4e), numbering one elf, one dwarf, and one halfling amongst their number (the rest being human). My intention, I think, is to create those characters first, and then flesh out the rest of the campaign.

Well, mostly. I also intend the campaign to centre around one big dungeon with two unopenable doors. Thus is will run from 1st to 9th level (approx), with the structure being that levels 1-2 will introduce the PCs to this dungeon, then levels 3-5 will feature several quests, this will open the first door and give a crucible at levels 5-6. Levels 6-8 will then feature more, wider-ranging, quests, before opening the second door and bringing us to the second crucible at levels 8-9. That then sets up the climax of the campaign, targeted for 9th level.

The side dish for the campaign is the search for treasure - in addition to gaining XP for completing encounters and quests, the PCs will gain a minor award for locating any of the unattended treasures found throughout the campaign area. The intention here is that PCs should be encouraged to explore the area, rather than just focusing on their current quest with laser-like precision.

At least, that's the plan. How well it will work... that's another question.