Chapter 5: Creating Campaigns - Dungeon Master's Guide (2024)

Chapter 5: Creating Campaigns. The arrival of a mind flayer nautiloid means trouble for any world-and adventure for that world's heroes! If encounters are the building blocks of a D&D adventure, then adventures are the building blocks of a D&D campaign, for a campaign is what you get when you string two or more adventures together. A campaign setting is the world in which those adventures take place-both a backdrop for your adventures and a hotbed of conflicts and personalities that can inspire and drive adventures. Step-by-Step Campaigns Follow these steps to create a campaign: Step 1: Lay Out the Premise. Consider the core conflicts driving the campaign, and choose a setting that reinforces the themes and tone you hope to evoke. Step 2: Draw In the Players. Start your campaign in a memorable way. Determine how the characters get drawn into events and how the characters' goals and ambitions might come into play. Step 3: Plan Adventures. Consider the smaller conflicts that make up the larger conflicts of the campaign, and devise fun quests that help drive the story. Flesh out the antagonists, the important locations, and the elements that link the adventures together. Step 4: Bring It to an End. Think about how the campaign might end and what level you expect the characters to be when the campaign wraps up. You might have noticed that these steps are similar to the "Step-by-Step Adventures" list at the start of chapter 4. In many ways, a campaign is just an adventure writ large. In an ongoing campaign, one adventure flows naturally into the next. Later sections of this chapter offer inspiration and advice for each of these four steps. The chapter concludes with a campaign example. Your Campaign Journal At the start of any campaign, there's a buzz of excitement as you and your players look forward to creating a new world together-one full of adventure and promise. Every game session is a chance for you to show off more of the campaign setting and deepen your playe...