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PTOLUS
 An
Introduction
Ptolus is the name of a city with extremely ancient
origins and a long, convoluted past. It's also the
name of the campaign that I have set there. Ptolus
is a "sequel" to my previous campaign called Praemal.
Praemal, which you can read about in a Celebrity Game
Table feature on the official
D&D website, was a campaign set in the very first
years of a world's existence.
Ptolus is that same world -- 20,000 years later. But
before I get too much into the specifics of the setting,
let me discuss one of the more interesting aspects
of the campaign. (Or should I say "campaigns"?) I
run Ptolus twice a week, on Mondays and Thursdays.
Two different groups of characters and (with a few
exceptions) two different groups of players. But they
all exist in the same world -- in fact, they both
stay around the same city -- at the same time. Thus,
each group has its own adventures, but deals with
many of the same NPCs and situations as the other
group. Occasionally, plotlines overlap (particularly
since one player runs twin brothers -- one on Mondays,
one on Thursdays).
For
example, the Monday night group has run afoul of a
new breed of monster called the kython. You'll see
kython -- perhaps with the named changed, since it
is so much like kyton -- in an upcoming D&D product
next near, but for now suffice it to say that they
are a "race" of demon-crafted creatures. Anyway, after
the Monday group ran up against these creatures a
few times, the Thursday night players (who call themselves
the Company of the Black Lantern) ran into them. The
characters had heard about the kython from the other
group, but had never seen them face to face. Nevertheless,
hearing about them from other PCs gave the encounter
a strong sense of verisimilitude for the Black Lantern
players.
So,
in the next installment, I'll start providing some
of the actual details of the world and the background
and whatnot. Eventually, I'll get to telling you about
the characters and the adventures they're having.
Today, I thought I'd just start with the concept of
the concurrent campaign idea. Here's a portion of
the handout on this very subject that I gave my players
at the beginning of the campaign:
Concurrent
Campaigns
It's long been a goal of mine to actually run two
campaigns, both set in the same place, both happening
concurrently. Before you think too much about how
crazy insane it is for me to do this, consider the
general up-sides:
1.
Indirect interaction that makes the campaign twice
as vivid. ("The bartender tells you about another
group of adventurers that really tore the bar up
last night, and that they'll never be welcome in
here again.") Or say your PC has friends in the
other group and they keep you up to date with what
they're doing -- you hear somebody else's gaming
stories, but suddenly, they're also providing you
with in-game info that you can use. Plus, it'll
just be fun to trade stories. ("You went down in
there? We avoided that place big time.")
2. Direct interaction that makes the campaign
dynamic. Say you can't make it to your regular session
for the next two weeks, but you can make it to the
other one. You can leave your regular group for
a while and join the other guys for an adventure!
Or go back and forth for fun, just to get a different
experience in a different group for a while. As
for me and my sanity, well, I've run two campaigns
concurrently before, and that was arguably more
work since it was two different worlds in two different
game systems. Plus, as I said, I was planning to
do this anyway. It's something I've wanted to do
for 20 years.
The
campaign's easily got more than two very different
paths it could take anyway. (As an aside, the biggest
headache will actually be coordinating the time flow
between both groups--if one group gets months ahead
of the other, that will be hard to deal with.) So,
if at any time you want to switch groups or play in
both (permanently, for a while, or even for one session),
just let me know. I'll do my best to work it out.
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