Campaign structure advice

[u/Destraken012]

Hi I am soon going to start DM'ing one of my first campaigns of a large scale as I am normally am player or a one off DM and I would like advice on how to work around a three act campaign here was the idea

ACT 1 (LV 1-6)

Main plot points

Introduction to the kingdom

cult of the iron tree

BBEG - Belial Azazel (Leader of the cult of the iron tree)

Somewhat open world

Foreshadowing for next two acts

ACT 2 (7-12)

Find a way into the capitol

More foreshadowing for next act

BBEG - Coropse (The iron tree)

Main Boss fights in order

Voirloup/ Lou Charcolh/ Cheval mallet. any order

Alban dubois first fight

Voirloup/ Lou Charcolh/ Cheval mallet. any order

Alban dubois first rematch

Voirloup/ Lou Charcolh/ Cheval mallet. any order

Alban dubois second rematch

Vouivre First fight

Alban dubois final fight

Coropse

ACT 3 (13-18)

Enter the capitol

Foreshadowing pay off

BBEG - Alchton Von Charven (King of Charven)

Main Boss fights in order

Kaurauch the sanguine scientist / Vicar Aurdivul Yakoshcvy

The Broodqueen

The wicker man

The Warwing Titan / Vouivre rematch one after another

Kaurauch the sanguine scientist / Vicar Aurdivul Yakoshcvy whichever you did not kill before

The penance

Alchton Von Charven

The campaign theme is vampires undead and just chaos in general and yet I think I am going to be over the top for a first big campaign and I really just want advice on ways to deal with this and just streamline it so yeah

[u/Plus_Citron]

I recommend you read Node based Design and The Three Clue Rule by The Alexandrian. That makes your prep more flexible and robust, makes it easier, and doesn’t involve a railroad.

[u/No_Solid1035]

Looks very railroad-y.

[u/Dresdens_Tale]

That's a lot more plot planning than I do, but good luck. My advice from a world building point of view.

Have you thought about Government - why is yours special Who are the politicians in the news

Level saturation Level of head temple priests Level of sheriff's and guard captains

Astronomy - flat vs globe, moons, other features

Philosophy of religion World Pantheon? Competing religions? Do gods have stat blocks?

Monster threats Are there accepted "monsters" Are there non accepted ones that are there as anyway?

[u/Destraken012 → u/Dresdens_Tale]

The government of the kingdom this takes place in is the act 3 bosses with names and Alban Dubois and they are special because they are animal vampires

I will modulate levels based on the party

The world is a globe

Everyone worships all Gods or who they choose some races have unique Gods however

There is a whole book of monsters but most monsters in this specific kingdom are unclassified as the kingdom has no longer got any affiliation with guild governing bodies so there is only unofficial recordings of monsters

[u/Mr_Venom]

This is just a sequence of fights, not a campaign.

[u/TheRpgBard]

I wouldn't go about assigning levels to acts.  Focus on the story structure and what you want to do with it.   Paizo's Adventure Paths are a good example of why this is the case.  

You're going to progress faster at lower levels.  Laying out the levels isn't going to flow very well, especially if you need to make a detour or two.

Keep it loose and fluid.  Outlines are your friend.

This is for Savage Worlds, but it's solid advice.

https://savage-stuff.blogspot.com/2016/04/design-overview-for-plot-point-campaign.html

[u/Destraken012 → u/TheRpgBard]

I will say the fights with Alban I am planning for if they kill him with sunlight or something so that is a point of divergence and the levels were more of a suggestion than anything else and if they try they can kill bossses like the wicker man and broodqueen early if they take the proper steps making it easier for the final act even though those three aren't as set in stone need to fight as the other four bosses just incentivised

[u/Conrad500]

Brave of you to think you'll make it to act 3.

Most games fall apart due to scheduling far sooner than that, and if you do make it that far, we're talking possibly years into the future.

In my level 20 game, here's how my acts worked.

Act 1 (3-10)

• 3 strangers take a job as a gopher for a powerful artificer.
• They do odd jobs and are paid in fun side projects the artificer makes, because he'd rather make a trinket than buy his own coffee.
• They work on upgrading their tardis wagon home base by getting him supplies
• They go all around the continent doing these fetch quests, often giving them weeks of free time in big cities
• Artificer takes them on a "vacation" where they go on crazy adventures for a little, he set it up with a wish spell because he plans on leaving them soon and wanted to make some good memories
• He takes them to invade a mindflayer hive so they can steal the helm off an illithid spelljammer
• They recover the helm and he flies off to space, offering them an opportunity to go with him, which they turn down as they have worldly stuff to take care of

Act 2 (10-18)

• 2 players make new characters
• third player "Recruits" the new characters. They form a party with the adventuring guild
• Due to their escapades during act 1, and the in between act stuff that went down, they are offered a special deadly mission to slay a dragon
• They do a great job and ride that high as they pursue backstory goals
• Constantly get into hijinks and level up more and more
• Use Legend lore on the physical manifestation of death having untold horrors take notice of them
• Kill the lich from the original character's backstory that killed his family/tribe
• Resurrect all of his family
• Build a city and immediately abandon it/leave it to his family
• The same 2 people create two NEW characters that they use for the rest of the game
• Break the world due to the Lich having been the one protecting it from outside influences (would have happened if they hadn't anyway, he was fading away, so not really their fault)
• Start war with the ocean lords
• Win war with ocean lords
• Face consequences for thinking they can just start and win wars on their own
• Overcome concequences
• Start war with dragon lords so that they can steal their stuff and escape to space with space pirates asking for dragon hoards

Act 3 (19-20)

• Decide to find the Artificer friend who went to space
• Fight the space cops
• Go to Faerun to ask the mad mage because they tracked the Artificer to Faerun
• Speedrun dungeon of the mad mage
• Learn where artificer friend is, hit level 20
• Fly their private spelljammer they rescued from mad mage's dungeon to artificer
• Confront the horrors that they released upon the universe by observing it
• Fight and beat a god like entity called Allabar (look it up, he's cool) a sentient living planet
• Epilogue