Okay, two warnings: if you have no interest in role-playing games, you'll probably have no interest in this post. Also, this is probably going to be quite a long one. I say probably because I'll be doing quite a lot of the work as I go, so even I don't know yet just what's going to be here...
Right, for anyone who's left who isn't familiar with the concept, a role-playing game is essentially a structured form of improvised storytelling. You have a bunch of players and a single Game Master (GM). The GM will devise situations and challenges and explain them to the players. Each player controls a single character (PC) in the scenario as laid out, and will describe what their character attempts to do. Dice are used to resolve conflicts and provide uncertainty.
In general, a group doesn't sit down for a role-playing game, play for an hour or so, and that's the end. Rather, the game tends to be played in a longer format, of longer sessions (generally 4-6 hours in my case), with any number of sessions being run in sequence to build up an ongoing story, or campaign. A good analogy here is of a TV show - you have a weekly episode (session), with an ongoing storyline that runs across several episodes in a season (campaign).
Preparing an RPG campaign, then, is a process of laying out the framework for the situations and stories that are going to be played out in the campaign. In some ways, it is similar to writing a novel or TV series. However, because of the input of the players, it isn't possible to fix most events, and so only a general framework can be assembled at the outset.
Another analogy: consider the creation of a new soap opera. You probably have a series creator, or perhaps a small team. This person will decide on a setting (Ramsay Street), the characters (Grant and Phil Mitchell) and some of the macro events that will occur (a plane hits the village). However, the creator then turns the series over to a stable of individual script-writers, who will fill in the details of exactly who says what, when and to whom. Even the creator cannot fill these details in at the outset. (But, again, the analogy breaks down somewhat. Imagine if, instead of a scriptwriter doing all the characters for an episode, each scriptwriter has complete control over a single character in every episode. Yes, it would be a mess, which is why they don't do TV like that, but it works rather well for the game.)
So, that rather lengthy introduction done, let us proceed to the preparation of a new Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (WFRP) campaign.
The Basics
WFRP is a roleplaying game set in a fantasy world very similar to Europe around a thousand years ago. The setting is dominated by The Empire (much like the Holy Roman Empire of history), which is threatened on all sides by menaces such as Orcs, Skaven (ratmen), heretical Chaos cultists, Undead, and so forth. It is a grim, dark game which on the face of it looks like a cheerful D&D clone of heroic heroes searching for fortune and glory, but is actually the playground of dark antiheroes on a path to insanity and death.
Two things have been said about WFRP: "It's the game where you start of thinking you're playing D&D, but find you're actually playing Call of Cthulhu", and "if your character ends the adventure better off than he started, you're doing something wrong."
So, why play if your character is likely to be maimed, driven insane, and eventually killed? The answer to that is the same reason people watch slasher films: it's fun to see how these things happen.
Some Practicalities
This campaign is intended to run through the winter, starting at the start of October and running to the end of April. It would be nice to say we would gather every week, but that's extremely unlikely. Instead, I'm going to estimate the campaign will run for 20 sessions. (This may well be wishful thinking.) Each session will be split into two parts, each of roughly two and a half hours.
My plan, therefore, is to split the campaign into five adventure 'blocks', each of eight 2.5 hour units of time. Each adventure needs to be scheduled such that it can drop at least one session and still work (mostly).
Ideally, I also want characters to just finish their third career by the end of the campaign. (This is to do with character advancement.) To that end, characters should probably finish their first career after the first adventure, their second after the third adventure, and thus be just finishing up their third career as the campaign ends.
(Unlike the Star Wars game, I have no intention of revisiting this campaign once it is done. It should therefore be mostly self-contained.)
It is also my intent to run this campaign by-the-book with no House Rules. This includes things like the encumberance, scarcity and subsistence rules, which go a long way to aiding play balance in this game. They also go some way to enforcing the 'low fantasy' feel of WFRP, making it distinctly different from D&D.
Theme and Concept
The concept of the campaign is that all of the PCs are members of a down-on-their-luck mercenary company, the Company of the Black Hand, who after a long lean summer have been invited to winter in Walkenberg at the behest of the ruling lady. Unfortunately, large numbers of desperate mercenaries descending on an unprepared town leads to trouble...
The theme of this particular campaign is going to be "abuses of power". The PCs will spend a lot of their time dealing with various people in power - the local Lady, their mercenary captain, the watch captain, and various crime bosses. Along the way, they'll see most of these figures abuse the powers that they have, gradually dragging everyone and everything in the campaign down into horror and Chaos. At least, that is if they aren't stopped.
Mood
The intended mood is one of growing horror. The campaign will start off reasonably cheery, with the party arriving in Walkenberg, settling in and meeting the locals, and perhaps even improving the town somewhat. But things will start to go wrong, as a madness starts to inflict everyone in the band. Gradually, order will break down, and the PCs will find themselves the only sane people in a world gone mad. Or, perhaps, the only insane people in a world that isn't.
On Secrets
When preparing an RPG campaign, it is a good idea to fill the setting with secrets for the PCs to discover and influence. Ideally, every major campaign element (character, location, piece of history...) should have at least one associated secret. Some of these are laid out here, although the resolutions are not present (just in case...).
Setting
The specific setting of this campaign will be the town of Walkenberg, in the Eastern provice of Stirland within the Empire. It is a town of some 1,200 souls, rather too close to the borders of the Empire for comfort. It exists within three days travel of the World's Edge Mountains and the Orc hordes who make their homes there, and a mere day from the province of Sylvania, domain of the Vampire Counts.
Walkenberg is also a day's travel from the next town over, it's great trading rival of Denberg. This will probably become important later in the campaign.
The major areas of Walkenberg are as follows:
The Outlying Regions
Stirland is the breadbasket of the Empire, and Walkenberg is a town therefore built on farming produce. For miles around the town, there are extensive fields of crops. The population of the town swells during market times, and also during the periodic attacks by Orcish hordes. By the same token, the defense of the outlying regions is taken extremely seriously in Walkenberg, which depends on the harvest for its very life.
A mile to the south-east of Walkenberg lies a thick and tangled woodland. This is home to a vicious and secretive band of Wood Elves who turn away any who venture near, and are not afraid to enforce this edict with their bows. The townsfolk hate the elves (truly), but are too scared to do anything about them.
Secret: What are the Elves hiding, and why?
Note: no PCs, even Elf PCs should be from this band of Elves.
The Walls
Despite this, Walkenberg is entirely encircled by a thick curtain wall, sufficient to repel a light horde. In times of crisis, every man of the town is required to take up arms for the defense of his home. In peacetime, however, the walls are generally manned by only a few men - generally those whose injuries prevent them working a farm, but whose eyesight and valour is undiminished.
Secret: If Walkenberg has sufficient defense in the form of the militia and the levy, why has Lady Felicia brought the Band of the Black Hand here?
The Manors
Walkenberg is officially ruled by a diumverate of two noble houses, two great rivals for power, the Larsteins and the Aums. Each of these two families maintains a great manor house in the centre of the town, simultanously looking down over the rest of the townsfolk and glaring angrily at the other.
At present, the Larstein house is almost empty, playing host to the infant heir of that family and also two distant cousins. Due to an arrange marriage and then a set of deaths of varying levels of mystery (one from old age, one in childbirth, and then several in a fire), Lady Felicia Aum is the legal ward of her grandson, the infant Timeon Larstein. This renders the Larstein family entirely impotent, much to the ire of Timeon's cousins.
Secret: Were all those deaths really innocent?
Temples
Walkenberg has two temples of any size. The town has a small but grand cathedral to Sigmar, patron deity of the Empire, run by an old, fat and querulous priest. Other than the need to show willing, there will probably be little need for the PCs to visit the cathedral.
Additionally, the town has a dark, and usually ignored, temple to Morr, god of the dead. This temple is run by two priests who dress only in black, never show their faces, and speak only when they must. Their primary job is in the interment of the dead, and the maintainance of the graveyards. However, they do also know of one really skilled surgeon in the town...
Secret: Why do the priests of Morr never show their faces?
The Graveyard
Large and overcrowded, the graveyard is also regularly patrolled to deter grave-robbers. That said, it seems that the guards have recently been caught drinking on the job, and someone has been looting tombs.
Secret: The question of who is the tomb raider will form the basis of that first adventure.
The Tunnels
What sets Walkenberg apart from most Imperial towns, and every other town in Stirland, is the presence of a number of tunnels under the town. These are a combination of natural and man-made caverns, which have been used by the populace in the past as a refuge against rampaging Orcs. Nobody knows just how extensive these tunnels are, or how deep they go, and nobody really ventures down there except when they must.
Secret: Someone has been killing townsfolk, and dragging them into the tunnels. There is no sign of them ever coming out, alive or dead. Could this be the dread Skaven at work?
Galvan's House for the Dangerously Insane
Finally, Walkenberg plays host to an ayslum for the mad. Here, the children of Dr Galvan, Rudiger and Rangar, treat some dozen patients of various forms of dementia. Of course, few who are committed ever come out, and they are seldom quite the same.
Secret: Rumour has it that there is a lost Larstein heir committed in the asylum. Is this true?
More to come...
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