Iteration is one of the most useful campaign planning tools I can think of. This article demonstrates the technique and why it should be your favorite, too.

To create this image, I blended a Recursion Icon by mcmurryjulie with a mandelbrot image by AlexN20, both from Pixabay.

I made the time-out logo from two images in combination: The relaxing man photo is by Frauke Riether and the clock face (which was used as inspiration for the text rendering) Image was provided by OpenClipart-Vectors, both sourced from Pixabay.

It’s been a while since I wrote about iteration and how to use it – in fact, the last time it was the focus of attention was, (I think), Adding Stealth Dynamics To Sandboxes back in 2024 (but that was about adventures).

There was 2019’s Into Each Plot, A Little Chaos Must Fall which is about randomness and translating layers of plotlines into plot sequences within adventures – again, not quite the same thing, though it touches on the subject.

There was a similar theme to the 2017 article, Tying Plot Threads Together: Concepts to Executable Plot.

And the tool was described as a problem-solver in Fire Fighting, Systems Analysis, and RPG Problem Solving Part 2 of 3: Prioritization – which is closer to the mark, but still not squarely hitting the target.

No, to really find something about campaign development and iteration as a tool for that development, you need to go all the way back to Top-Down Design, Domino Theory, and Iteration: The Magic Bullets of Creation, written in January 2014. For one of my favorite tools, that’s almost scandalous.

Basics

In the case of this article, I want readers to focus less on the actual outcome (the generated campaign concept) and more on the process that I’m demonstrating.

Iteration is the process of performing the same simple steps over and over to accumulate a complex outcome.

The process in this case is:

1. Ask a question or add an idea seed.
2. Identify the ramifications for the campaign world.
3. Identify the intersection point with the PCs.
4. If a new idea seed was just added, ask “why and where” and proceed back to step 2.
5. If not, return to step 1 unless satisfied with your overall world building.

This loop repeats endlessly until the test condition in step 5 is satisfied.

It’s possible to refine it further by inserting a step 3a:

3a. Have all the consequences and ramifications been explored? If not, go back to step 2.

The power of the system comes from the systematic integration of new ideas into a broader tapestry. You can start with the same initial premise multiple times and end up with a completely different campaign.

Of course, you don’t want to do that per se; instead, you want to leverage that to make your campaign different from any others that have the same central premise as their foundation.

Basic assumptions

I’m going to assume that there will be a session 0 for character creation, and therefore that I don’t yet know who’s going to be in the party and what their character classes are.

1. Central Premise

This is your initial starting point. This may end up being a prominent feature of the campaign or it may get buried into the background, lurking as a campaign-level plot twist until the PCs are powerful enough to deal with the situation.

A note about nomenclature

I’m going to inset actual campaign creation content. Each step will be in a sub-section by itself and the title of those subsections will be preceded by the step number of the process. That’s what the “1” is doing there in the section title preceding this subsection.

Key building blocks will be in Bold Italics. This makes them leap off the page and reminds you that they need expansion.

A note about genres

It must be pointed out that while the specific example is for some form of D&D / Pathfinder, the same techniques work in any genre / game system.

A note about established campaign backgrounds

This can be both good and bad. Good, in that there are all kinds of resources and ideas out there already for you to build on; bad in that those can constrain you, if you let them, and can be a little daunting, again, if you let them be that way. Good, in that players will have some idea of the kinds of adventures – the “style” of the campaign – to expect, bad in that the GM then has to deliver on that implied promise.

1. Central Premise: The Banning Of Magic

King Theovold of the kingdom of Astrangier has just issued a proclamation banning the use of Sorcery and Spellcasting throughout the kingdom, with the penalty being immediate death without trial.

A strong opening, with lots of room to grow, but it’s been done before. I’ll need to work on making this version distinctly different from the others that have appeared, and especially from my Fumanor campaign where this was a historic event long before the PCs were even born.

2. Ramifications

A grace period of 14 days is allowed for mages and other professional practitioners to relocate from the Kingdom. During this grace period, the use of magic will still be interdicted by the Scarlet Legion, a force of 1,000 elite warriors sworn to the King’s direct service. They function as his central military defense and strong right arm. It is rumored that they are actually a double-legion, with a secret sub-organization known as the Black Shadows who are spies and secret police.

I’m getting a strong whiff of a very repressive society here. In old-school alignment terms, it sounds very Lawful Evil or – at best – Lawful Neutral.

What are the consequences likely to be of such a mandate?

Anyone who practices Magic or Sorcery will have to sell everything they can’t take with them and flee. The markets will be awash with furniture and possessions, and there will be a flood of real estate on the market. Over-saturation means that people will be able to buy up their lifestyle on the cheap – someone‘s going to make a lot of money in the long term. The losers will be those practitioners, who will have to settle for pennies on the pound, getting no more than about 5% of what their belongings are actually worth.

Higher level practitioners might have the resources to take almost everything, but lower- and mid-level practitioners won’t have that option. And I note that nothing has been said about where the banned can find refuge – perhaps this proclamation has come out of the blue and no-one’s had a chance to react yet.

So markets will be in turmoil, and the economy is going on a roller-coaster ride. The makers of furniture are going to find their prices undercut massively by the flood of used goods onto the market.

In any modern society, 14 days is NOT enough time to actually sell things like real estate. But this is a simpler time, so it’s just plausible that a sale can be completed that quickly – leaving the former owners rushing off at the last minute, trying to get away before the Scarlet Legion, guided by the Black Shadows, come looking for them.

There’s been nothing said yet about Public Reactions to the ban. There’s nothing about Clerics and the reactions of the Temples / Churches, or any other recognized organizations.

Notice that we aren’t really building out on any of these elements yet – we’re still working on the main premise and simply listing all the other things that need to be detailed.

It can be useful to maintain a running list of such things, because it’s easy to overlook them if you don’t. So here’s our world-building checklist so far:

• King Theovold
• Astrangier (Kingdom)
• immediate death without trial – is this normal? What else is punishable this way?
• The Scarlet Legion
• The Black Shadows (secret police)
• Someone’s going to profit
• Economic Turmoil (I missed highlighting this one!)
• Neighboring Kingdoms for Mages to flee to
• Public Reactions
• Clerics & Temples / Churches – Permitted? Banned? Reactions?
• Other Recognized Organizations & reactions

I find that’s also a good practice to jot down any preliminary ideas on such a list, so that you can interrupt your world-building and resume it a day or two (or a week or two) later:

• King Theovold

  Reputation as an enlightened monarch, making this action all the more remarkable.

• Astrangier (Kingdom)
• immediate death without trial – is this normal? What else is punishable this way?

  ‘High Justice’ – can anyone other than the King’s Scarlet Legion dispense it? Princes? Dukes? Barons? Counts? Sheriffs? Other Officials? The general public?

• The Scarlet Legion

  Name comes from Scarlet tunics worn over armor. Outside the control of any other nobility – which means they can target that Nobility. Connect with questions of High Justice, above.

• The Black Shadows (secret police)

  Name comes from secrecy. More spies than police force. Maintain trustworthiness of the Scarlet Legion, probably fairly small in numbers – but no-one knows.

• Someone’s going to profit

  Could be the crown, could be upper nobility, could be wealthy private citizens, most probably all three to differing extents. Will impact public opinion over time.

• Neighboring Kingdoms for Mages to flee to

  How many days of travel will it take to get there? If a mage can fly or teleport, they have time on their side – but if they can’t, two weeks might demand leaving right now!

• Economic Turmoil

  Short term, there will be bargains. Medium term, there will be price rises. Anything that used to be made more efficiently with magic will show the steepest increases.

• Public Reactions
• Clerics & Temples / Churches – Permitted? Banned? Reactions?

  I’ve used the Clerics vs Mages trope before, so prefer another path. Menaces best confronted by Mages – Clerics etc have to pick up the slack. A large temple might offer to act as sales agents on behalf of those having trouble selling property – for 5% of the take. All this suggests a ‘soft opposition’ to the policy, overall, but some will no doubt take a harder line – which ones?

• Other Recognized Organizations & reactions
  • Merchant’s Guild – opposed because of the economic impacts.
  • Bandits – lots of money moving around the countryside in the pockets of mages.
  • Thieves Guilds – generally stronger in cities and larger towns, which is where there is suddenly less money but more property to pilfer. Largely neutral on the subject.

3. Intersection Points

This is tricky, without knowing who’s in the party. We need to list the possible situations and permutations and have ideas ready to go, but focus on the most probable one.

I can think of four major alternatives.

A. No mage in the party.
B. A mage in the party goes into exile and the party splits.
C. A mage in the party goes into exile accompanied by the party.
D. A mage in the party ‘goes underground’ in defiance of the law.

I rate A and B as least likely, C and D as more likely. If they are low-level, and unlikely to be able to impact the situation (yet), C is the most likely; if they are mid-to-high level when all this goes down, D becomes the more likely.

I also note that there will be NPCs taking options B, C, and D, regardless of what the PCs choose.

Intersection Points: No mage in the party

If they weren’t aware of the threat immediately (higher INT, remember), it won’t take long for mages on the move with lots of cash to become aware of the Bandit threat. They will look to hire PCs for escort duty if they can – as a general rule, Mage level = total levels in the party that they can afford to hire. Focus of an adventure.

Party will be routinely interrogated by Scarlet Legion – ‘seen any mages lately?’ Legion will take names, so any ‘passive resistance’ by offering false leads will cause a party to acquire a reputation and eventually create interest by the Black Shadows. Assumption: It’s against the law to lie to the Scarlet Legion. Punishments initially minor but ramping up with repeat offenses.

If the party are inclined in the Murder Hobo direction, they may become bandits themselves, leading to a Chicago-style gang war through the early campaign! If they lose that war, that can be enough to push them into exile or the underground.

Intersection Points: Party splits

Party may or may not escort the mage to safety. This splits the campaign in two at least temporarily; if that is unacceptable, then reasons need to be found to rule this option out. Perhaps the best option: it becomes publicly known BEFORE the law is announced that there is a mage in the party. When they contemplate splitting, they discover that the Black Shadows are targeting them as potential violators of the law. Persecution to be real, however unofficial and unjustified.

Intersection Points: Party go into exile

I need somewhere for them to go. I need adventures to happen there. Eventually, I need some trigger event to pull them back into the plotline.

Somewhere for them to go: The Elven Kingdom of Lethorial welcomes exiled human mages. So does the Human Kingdom of Sandival. Let the PCs choose.

Adventures to happen there: set this question aside for later.

Trigger events – Elvish Kingdom: The former mentor / master of the party mage reaches out to the PC to recruit him (and his friends) into the underground, bringing the plotline back to the forefront.

Trigger events – Kingdom Of Sandival: King Theovold becomes convinced that the civil unrest perpetuated by the Underground are acting with the covert support of Sandival. He mounts an invasion / crusade to “Kill All The Mages”. Makes this plotline front and center.

Intersection Points: Party join underground resistance

If the PCs are low-level, they will be assigned low-level tasks without explanation. Assuming intelligent leaders, some of these will be tests, and some will have significant impact – but only afterwards will the PCs be able to connect the dots as they see consequences of their actions. Multiple adventures possible.

If the PCs are mid-level, they will be assigned tasks without specific instructions on how to proceed. Some of these will be tests, but most will be targeted at outlying districts. At least one should be aimed at generating / disseminating propaganda to shift public opinion further against King Theovold. At least one should be an attempt to rescue a mage. At least one should be an attempt to recruit a high-level mage who has resisted out of distrust for the secretive heads of the underground. And at least one should be a diplomatic mission to somewhere, probably neither Sandival nor the Elves. Dwarves are the most likely option but that doesn’t seem to be a great ‘fit’ – needs further thought.

Okay, so it doesn’t matter what classes the PCs choose, the event is still going to impact them, as something of this magnitude should. Time to move on.

3a. Further consequences and ramifications

What we’ve got at the moment is pretty good in terms of the short term impact. We still haven’t really dug into the medium and long term. So it’s back to step 2.

2. Medium-term Impact

Certain magic items should be banned, confiscated by the State. Other magic items should attract a ‘Licensing Fee’ from the owners. Specific inheritance taxes should penalize the generational passing of such items. Finding / looting of such items should also attract a one-off tax.

All this aims at restricting and controlling the spread of magic through the broader community, especially any magic that can ‘replace’ having a Mage on hand. This is a logical extension of the initial proclamation.

It will impoverish the lower-middle class and lower classes, and enrich the throne and the upper social echelons. It will mean that Banditry remains an ongoing problem.

The Black Shadows are certain to have identified the existence of the underground by now, and will be actively operating to uncover their identities and turn the Scarlet Legion loose on suspects.

Expect a law to be passed making it a capital offense to harbor a known mage. That won’t make a lot of difference to anything, but it is a clear escalation and sharpens the dividing lines within society.

For some within the Scarlet Legion, this may be a bridge too far. Expect a Black Shadows -led purge of the ranks. This is likely to harden public opinions further – some in favor, some opposed. Being a fence-sitter will simply get you targeted by both sides.

3. PC Intersections

There are all sorts of ways the PCs and their adventures can intersect with these developments. In some cases, depending on their initial choices of response, these will be the focal points of adventures; in others, they will be background events. There are too many combinations possible to do much advance planning until that initial decision is made.

In general, tension and hostility will ramp up, and this element of the campaign will become more dominant, either in the form of encounters or as elements of adventures.

2. and 3. Long-term Impact

Eventually, the ban-on-magic plotline will come to a head and be resolved, one way or another. This may involve the deposing of the king and elevating someone else in his place, or not. Either way, there will be short-term chaos within the society of Astrangier.

This might seem to be the big finish for the campaign, but one further escalation is possible into a big finish. Remember the warning of the Churches / Temples, that there were menaces out there that are best addressed by Magic and that others (themselves included) would have to pick up the slack? That should have manifested in at least one such adventure in the medium term, where the PCs find themselves at the focal point of dealing with just such a threat.

As the big finish, though, an even bigger such threat should manifest, attempting to take advantage of the combination of the chaos and the moment of greatest vulnerability. What form this ‘ultimate menace’ should take is not yet clear. I also made a point of signifying that at least one set of Temples / faiths should support the ban on magic. Their motivations for this agreement should be reasonable and rooted in the gain of power and authority in general – opportunistic, in other words, but in keeping with their general theology. But I can’t help but think that this might be just a cover for their real motivations, which derive from the behind-the-scenes string-pulling of the ultimate big-bad.

Okay, so that finally lets us escape the clutches of step 3a and progress to step 4.

4. The Why and Where

The ‘where’ is the easiest to dispense with, so let’s tackle that first.

4. Where?

The Kingdom of Astrangier is going to have a capital city, still unnamed.

That capital city will contain a Castle, where the King lives, and where the various government functions are headquartered. That’s obviously ‘where’ the critical events are going to begin.

At the moment, the PCs are not going to be moving in such lofty circles, so we don’t need any real details of the Castle – just some general description. At some point, that will change and we will need to supply more specifics.

Whether or not the same is true of the Capital City is another question – it depends on where the campaign is going to be initially based.

I can see arguments both for and against starting things off in the capital.

For: It puts the PCs closer to the heart of the action, and amplifies the challenge posed by the initial proclamation. It keeps D alive as an option. A major population center is more likely to have mages around, so it’s more sensible for any PC mage to be based there.

Against: It doesn’t force the PCs to engage directly in the plotline before they are ready to do so, enhancing campaign viability. It lets the campaign start in a more ‘traditional’ fashion, easing players into events, and increasing the shock value when the proclamation gives the campaign an early plot twist. It makes the more likely early options, A, B, and C, more viable. And, it defers the detailing of the capital until you have more time to lavish on it.

Ultimately, though, this decision should not be made arbitrarily by the GM; it should be a consequence of the planned Session 0, and the character classes chosen by the players for their PCs.

I would rank each of the PC classes from -2 (strongly urban) to +2 (strongly rural) in terms of their preferred operating environment.

Clerics are everywhere, but there would be a slight concentration in the capital, so -0.25. Rogues would also be everywhere, but there would be an even stronger concentration on the urban setting, so -0.75. Mages can be either urban or rural, so either -0.5 or +0.25. Fighters are everywhere, so +0. Druids are strongly rural, so +1.5, and Rangers are even more rural, so +2. And so on. I would make these assessments as each character gets generated, not in advance. Add them all up, and you will get a total. To accommodate groups of differing size, divide the total by the number of PCs to get an average.

• -2 to -0.5: Strongly Urban. Start in the capital or another major city.
• -0.5 to 0: Weakly Urban. Start in a large city other than the capital or a large town.
• 0 to +0.5: Weakly Rural. Start in a moderately large town 2/3 of the way from the borders to the capital, on the fringes of the Inner Kingdom.
• +0.5 to +2: Strongly Rural. Start in a small town or village not too far from a larger town, located 1/3 of the way from the borders to the capital at most.

This preserves a semblance of urban civilization for those classes that need it, or a connection to a rural culture for those classes that need it, while placing most PCs in a workable environment. There may be some element of specific individuals being slightly ‘fish out of water’ necessary, which the player should incorporate into his character.

Remember, too, that the relative likelihoods of C and D are contingent on the degree of “urban” to the initial setting. Strongly Urban makes D more likely to eventuate, anything else makes B or C more likely. A can happen equally in either setting. This should inform your choices for adventure prep. Obviously, the longer you can put off doing something major like generating a city, the more you can invest in the necessary prep, so if in doubt, swing rural.

The worst possible outcome: Strongly Urban, so much so that the capital is the only realistic option – and for the party to then choose options B or C (if applicable), so that all the prep invested goes to waste, at least in the mid-to-short-term.

4. Why?

We’ve decided already on the principle agent of the proclamation: King Theovold. Our notes suggest that he had a reputation as a kind and progressive King, so this harsh action is noticeably out of character – and that makes the ultimate ‘why’ of critical importance.

You can expect the players to speculate endlessly, and every possibility that they come up with (and more besides) will probably circulate as rumors. Come up with as many half-baked theories of your own to add to the mix.

There are several obvious options. The King has been replaced (a twin, or a doppelganger). The King is being influenced by an outsider (either mentally or criminally or by magic).

Both are entirely too predictable, I think. So let’s complicate the why with two causes: a Proximate Cause to initially justify the harsh laws, and a True Cause to give the PCs something to overcome in the penultimate climax of the campaign.

4. Why? Proximate Cause

The Wizard’s Guild have been agitating against other groups for a while now, in particular disliking the Merchant’s Guild’s ability to constrain rates charged for services and some of the Temples for their ability to override what the Wizards deem acceptable. When their level of frustration grew too much, they attempted a coup of sorts, seeking to dominate the King’s thoughts with Magic. It’s not clear whether this was a separate sect within the Guild or if the entire leadership was in on it, but their efforts were thwarted somehow and the King declared them the equivalent of a terrorist organization (he would probably have used the term ‘subversive’ but that’s what he would have meant).

That gives a real, concrete reason for a draconian response. If you don’t know who to trust, you can’t trust anybody. The slightest hint that the Wizards are generally prone to being seduced by the practice of their arts, overriding their consciences and any wisdom they possess, and their fate would be sealed. The forces that the Guild had been agitating against would have been only to happy to put the boot in, amplifying the perceived threat and disloyalty shown.

Was this conspiracy real, or just an excuse? The entire Guild Leadership were publicly hanged while bound and gagged. There was no trial – they were guilty because the King said they were guilty.

Let’s consider the possibilities:

4. Why – If The Conspiracy Wasn’t Real?

Then the Wizard’s guild were fall guys, removed from the picture because the ultimate big bad is vulnerable to magic. It’s neat and tidy but seems too simple a picture. You also find that the ultimate “Why?”” has become more of a “How?” – remembering that the King would have been protected against anything and everything that could be thought of.

This doesn’t exclude the possibility that the King has genuinely fallen into Madness, but there isn’t a whole lot that the PCs can be expected to do about that, so I don’t regard this option favorably.

4. Why – If The Conspiracy WAS Real?

Then the Wizard’s Guild really were the bad guys, and the ban was justified – though a possible over-reaction. Maybe the King is prone to that in cases of Dishonor or Betrayal or threats to his family.

I like this option because it’s not going to be expected – “the plot twist is that there IS no plot twist!” – but it’s likely to put the nose of any Mage-player out of joint.

This only shifts the subject of the “Why” from the King to the Guild, but that innately gives us more options, some of which can assuage the anger of any Mage-player by recasting the Guild as victims, not criminals.

A while back, I took part in an online conversation speculating wildly about better choices for a Lich’s phylactery. Amongst the more interesting options suggested were,

• An ordinary copper coin released into general circulation, indistinguishable from any other;
• A single facet of an incredibly valuable gemstone, so that not only would there be resistance to breaking it, doing so would not actually destroy the phylactery.;
• An Iron Golem;
• The Heart of Bahamet;
• A magical ring that bestowed great powers upon any who wear it (the One Ring kinda fits this description);
• The City Of Brass;
• A Relic or Artifact.

Let’s take that last one. If such a relic or artifact were uncovered by an adventuring group, and it was clearly inherently evil, it might be turned over to the Wizard’s Guild who would search for ways to unmake it. If they did not suspect the Lich‘s presence within the relic, they might not take adequate precautions, and so could prove vulnerable to subtle but growing manipulation.

Petty complaints and general disagreements would initially become fiery and escalate. Feelings of persecution would begin to grow as the other parties to those complaints and disagreements argued against the mages, any wins being minimized and any losses amplified in the mage’s perceptions. Over time, they would be increasingly corrupted – until the conspiracy came into being.

The conspiracy was real, and the victims – the guild – were also the villains that they were accused of being.

Now that’s got some texture to it. It’s not as simple as the alternative, it contains nuance and leaves a lurking menace at the center of the Kingdom – that’s great for what will initially appear to be the climax of the campaign. And, in the form of the adventuring group who initially recovered and turned the relic over to the guild, but who have not put two and two together, it creates a group who knows at least part of the story-behind-the-story, and who can be encountered by the PCs at some future point.

The Lich has not been simply waiting around for his machinations to unfold; he may well recognize his slight vulnerability to the secrets known to those adventurers and would seek to influence others to get rid of them. The Secretive Head of the Black Shadows would be a particularly compelling target because of the very secrecy surrounding him, and his ability to covertly act.

Better and better – this adds a direct confrontation with agents of the Black Shadows to the adventure in which the PCs start to learn the truth! What’s more, even if the Black Shadows complete their assignment of assassinating the last member of that old adventuring party, who has seen his comrades cut down one by one no matter where and how they hid, it has to be assumed that he may have lived long enough to pass on his secret – so it’s now the PCs who have infinite knives at their backs. What they do about that is up to them – but self-preservation should incline them to get involved in the real plotline at this point. It’s no matter an abstract good-vs-evil story that they can take or leave, it’s a direct threat against them.

4. Is the Lich, the Ultimate Big Bad?

If just any Lich could use a relic as a phylactery., they’d all be doing it. But if we assume that this ability is an unusual choice not normally available, then we create room for a real ultimate big bad to have facilitated this, making the Lich a lieutenant at worst and an Agent at best.

This reasoning demands that the ultimate big bad be something more akin to a Morgoth or a Sauron, a manipulator capable of making Artifacts of great power and evil, who conceived of this plan and manipulated the circumstances to make it possible. Someone who has been lurking in the shadows even less suspected of involvement than the Lich has been.

All that is needed to initiate the ultimate climax of the campaign is for the PCs – already weakened and exhausted, one hopes, by their battle with the Lich – is for them to spot the shadowy hand of this hidden evil, causing it to fully reveal itself for one epic final battle within the campaign.

5: Are You Satisfied with the worldbuilding?

So let’s take stock for a moment.

The fundamental premise of the campaign has carried it from its earliest in-play beginnings all the way through to plot twists and an ultimate menace, with significant heightening of tension and drama in the end.

The last four or maybe five adventures in the campaign show this escalation quite clearly:

• F-4: Learn of the relic, direct confrontation with Black Shadow assassins.
• F-3: Learn more about the artifact and the leadership of the Black Shadow assassin while realizing that they are now the targets of the Black Shadows.
• F-2: Travel to the Capital City of Astrangier, confront the head of the Black Shadows, discover the hidden Lich.
• F-1: Confront the Lich without time to recover from the fight with the head of the Black Shadows and his bodyguards. Defeat the Lich and discover / confront the Ultimate Big Bad.
• Final Adventure: Confront the ultimate big bad in an epic conclusion.

Insofar as outlining the campaign, then yes, I would be happy with this. However, there are a great many elements that have been name-dropped along the way and need further development before this campaign would be ready to play. The last time I listed them, there were ten of them, most with some initial thoughts, but some not even with that much done. And there have been more added since then.

Which means that it’s back to step 1 to work on the first item on the list, King Theovold. And when he’s done, the whole process will repeat for Astrangier, the Kingdom, and so on.

I think it worth a time check at this point.

Coming up with the ideas presented in this example took me about 20 minutes to go from an empty page to everything listed above. Writing them down (typing them up) in this case took another 20 minutes or so, maybe 30.

I started writing this at 1:37 PM and it’s now 6:52 PM – so that means that explaining the process has consumed 4 hrs 25 minutes. The real number to pay attention to is that 50 minutes. In fact, I’ll be generous and bump it up to an even hour.

With about 14 items left on the list to develop, if I spend just as much time on them as I have the initial construction of the campaign, I end up with a total of about 15 hours from blank page to fully-playable campaign.

The reality is, though, that part of the development process so far has been deciding the framework and campaign structure. That’s a lot of detail that doesn’t have to happen a second time, and so it would not surprise me if the time needed to generate and document concepts for the remaining items were halved or even quartered.

That’s either 8 1/2 or 4 3/4 hours. A solid day’s work, and my mind (these days) would probably be fairly fried at the end of it – but in days gone by, I could manage that in a day and be ready to run by evening. If I’m more willing to improvise and come up with details when I need them, that additional development time gets slashed again, probably to another hour, especially if I could dip into my library of resources for appropriate city maps and the like.

A note about additional plotlines

No campaign should ever rely solely on one single plotline. Instead, I would designate this as the Wizard Plot Arc and generate other plot arcs for the different character classes. These would not be as detailed as this one, which lies at the heart of the campaign; but they should be there ready for any PC who chooses that particular character class.

I’d probably spend 20-30 minutes on each possible plot arc outside of this one. That would mean that each and every PC had their own plotline through the campaign, so that this main plotline could fade into the background most of the time.

With unused plotlines, you have several options to consider.

1. They can describe background events, sources of news and rumors, keeping those relevant beyond the mere gossip that would be 80% of such content.
2. One of the PCs can be cast as “a fish out of water” and flung headlong into some other classes’ character arc instead of their own. This choice works especially well if the player shows no interest in what you had initially planned.
3. You can save them for a future campaign.

In none of those cases is the development work that has been done, a wasted effort. Only if you simply throw them away is that the case.

Having a plotline squarely aimed at making their PC the center of attention, and progressing from one plotline to another, with foreshadowing and the other tricks of the trade making the transitions more seamless, is the best way that I know to create player investment in both their characters and the campaign.

And, ultimately, this is yet another set of iterations of the iterative process. Simple steps accumulating to a rich and complex amalgam. That’s the power of iteration, and why it remains my number one campaign planning and development tool.