Have I written game two or am I still procrastinating? Read on to find out!

To answer that disgusting clickbait, no. I haven’t written game two of the non-campaign campaign that I’ve started running, which consists of a series of linked one-shots. But I have devised a premise and a structure, so I’m almost there…

I’ve spent the past couple of weeks batting ideas around my brain, trying to pin down the one perfect idea that will give me my second game of the (non-campaign) campaign. In some ways, this is my favourite part of the writing process. Everything is possible at this stage, and the game is like a beautiful, distant city of Oz, glowing green with anticipation. I may be mixing some musical theatre metaphors here, so let’s move along.

To recap from my last post, the one-shots are set in and around the Faerûn city of Athkatla, a place of excessive wealth and decadent abandon for the rich, but bare bones poverty for everyone else. It felt like the perfect place to let loose a band of well intentioned adventurers to earn some gold and do some good.

The first game had a somewhat political theme, as the players were tasked with collecting an exposé on a cruel factory owner and delivering it to the local newspaper. I definitely want to lean more into the politics of Athkatla as the games progress, but I also want the games to feel thematically varied, covering a variety of topics rather than having a good-guy-revolutionaries-versus-evil-capitalists narrative for every game.

So for game two I’ve decided to start developing the spiritual side of the world, with DnD being a game of gods, after all. The first game had one long combat session towards the start, so for the second outing I’d like the combat to feel more broken up, and I’m going to try and do that by using the classic dungeon crawl structure, with hopefully some fun roleplaying and problem solving along the way.

This is the story I’ve devised: the party will be sent to a temple to Chauntea, the benevolent deity of life and bounty. This should particularly appeal to the druid and the ranger in the party, as Chauntea is an ‘Earthmother’ deity, associated with nature. They are there to investigate some strange goings-on in the basement of the, from which the guardians of the temple have heard strange noises, smelt odd smells, and generally felt the kind of heebie-jeebies that kick off a spooky storyline. I will probably throw in a missing temple guardian for them to rescue too, someone who went to take a closer look and hasn’t been seen since.

When the party start their own investigations, then will end up falling into a secret chamber, leading to a series of caves dug out from the sewers under Chawntea’s temple. In the ensuing dungeon (sewer?) crawl, I’ll tease the party with some increasingly sinister hints and symbols, before it’s eventually revealed that they have uncovered a secret makeshift temple to the god Cyric, a dark and vengeful god of power and menace.

In the wider narrative arc of the campaign, I’m already planning for Cyric’s followers to feature more prominently, with one of the politically powerful families of Athkatla turning out to be secret Cyric worshippers, who appease their god with human sacrifices. This will be a way of foreshadowing that and revealing some of the lore to my players.

And now I’ll move on to the task of fleshing out all of this into a fully functioning one-shot. I’ll keep you updated but in the meantime, let’s just hope none of my players find this secret blog, because wow that was a lot of spoilers.

Time for me to get back to my dusty notebook (laptop) and flagon of ale (mug of tea). May your Nat 20s be plentiful!