Old School 4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons Campaign

I mark my return to the blogosphere discussing my ongoing 4th edition D&D campaign set in Greyhawk.

For various reasons my players (Angie, Brian, David, Edd and Mike) wanted a new campaign and they wanted to "try-out" Essentials. So I decided to give them an old school campaign with the newest D&D rule set available.

My Greyhawk campaign was originally set to be a swashbuckling escapade of high seas adventure, then through conversations with my players, I discovered that they don't really like pirate adventure. I was a bit crestfallen by this unfortunate change. However, I pressed on.

Collectively we have more than 100 years of gaming experience at the table on Sunday evenings. That being said, it is imperative for such a discerning gaming group that a) I do not railroad the story by means of a linear plotline, b) I include plot elements from all the playercharacter's (PC's) backgrounds and c) I keep the challenge level high (we have a mantra at our table: "go hard or go home!") all while offering a good mix of encounter types (skill challenge, combat and roleplaying).

The heroes started at 3rd level and they had already been adventuring together six months of game time. These two pieces together allowed us to sidestep the often painful process of getting PC's to trust eachother in life and death situations when absolute strangers really don't have a real-world (RW) reason to do so.

I'll be using this space to post maps, story ideas and even full encounters as the campaign progresses.