Why the tavern is the best place to start a campaign
Almost all of us have done it. It’s a cliché and a convenience. Maybe you didn’t know any better, maybe you just didn’t want to bother with the awkward phase of introduction and plot hook. No matter why, it always starts the same. “You’re a party of adventures drinking together in a tavern a <mysterious man watches you from the dark corner before approaching/damsel in distress runs in the door to the tavern yelling for someone to help her>”. Onward to adventure! It’s been done a million times, but with a bit of polish and these tricks even this old cliché can be new again.
Expy the dragon says:
I personally have burnt down 214 taverns.
All red dragons do it – it’s hot!
Straight into the Action
Normally the tavern job is the most hand-waving and on-to-the-action introduction a campaign can possibly have. I say you can go even farther. What if you introduce your party have a relaxing drink and suddenly realized that the pub is on fire! As they lead the patrons out and find the exits blocked up they become more and more certain that this fire was no accident. But who would want to burn down the pub and why? Before they have finished their first round the characters are already on their first adventure.
From Humble Beginnings
Your characters start in a tavern…working in it. The big fighter type minds the bar and keeps the drunks in line with his cudgel stashed behind the counter. The apprentice wizard sits bored in the corner while her prestidigitation cleans the tables and floors. The bard strums a jolly tune on his lute while the farmers drink themselves blind. This night has some excitement however, when a gang of drunken hoodlums try to wreck up the place. The characters grab some make shift weapons and drive them off. They save the bar and get the idea that they might be bound for greater things if they work together.
A Whole New Meaning to Plot Hook
The characters start off in a tavern and have a jolly old evening out. A group of a friendly sailors pumps drinks into them all night long and seem quite excited about something. All goes well, the characters pass out drunk and happy. Happy straight up until the next morning when they wake up with a splitting headache, a brand new set of chains and a room on a boat that has already taken off out to sea. Do they try and break free and take on these wicked pirates or wait and see what nefarious purpose they have been conscripted for?
The Tavern as Respite
The tavern doesn’t have to just kick off campaigns, it can begin and end each adventure. Every time the players finish off an arc they can return to the familiar place. There they can divide up their loot and then drink the earnings. It can also be a place for the group to look for work and keep track of the gossip and happenings of the region. You can reinforce this idea of the tavern as a rest place by saving up the experience point awards and giving them as a lump sum when they take their break in the tavern. One of the big advantages of the regular tavern is that you can fill it with a cast of colorful characters, who reoccur but also grow and change. These characters are a novel way to show how the characters’ actions can change the world for better or worse. Also, the NPCs can be the spokesman for a problem the PCs need to solve. It will sound much more natural coming from a character they already have a relationship with. Eventually your players and their characters may come to think of that humble tavern as a home.
Do you begin in a tavern, end in one or just stay there all the time? We want to hear it in the comments.
Taverns for us tend to fall into the middle of the story, in the last three adventures our group has had, I have found my character (a dwarven thief without a sense of humor) breaking into 3 different taverns and while restocking the groups supplies helping himself to the ale. We rarely set foot into a tavern as a group. And when we do we usually end up in a fight or some other trouble.
Here’s an idea I’ve been wanting to try with the Tavern intro.
The adventurers all begin meeting in a tavern, not to chit chat, not to plan there next expedition, not to drink the night away but because it’s the safest place in town right now. Earlier that night the town had been invaded by a horde of zombies and the player characters find themselves stuck here hoping to make it through the night.
It’d make for a pretty cool start for an undead campaign.
I’ve burned down a couple of taverns in my day….at least 3 I think. However, after burning the last one down, I was scared of entering another. That and lemons. Lets just say cultists can be everywhere….especially disguised as barmaidens. Kind of similar to the “the tavern is on fire” idea in that my DM had us trapped, afraid for our lives.
I do love barfights…and thinking about it all the best campaigns we’ve had have started in a tavern lol! Best one was where all of us were playing Evil characters, mutants actually (was based on the warhammer universe) and one of our players lost his mind and transformed into a mutant within the bar….there was much bloodshed and beer that day.
When entering a city or even a village my players are asking me for the tavern in four out of five times.
They mostly use them to drink, gather information, find a person they need to meet or to get a bed for the night.
Besides the usual meetings and happenings, I often use the taverns to spread some gossip containing a little or even the complete truth about an old castle, dungeon, dragon etc.
When the PCs are advancing in the campaign, they may discover links to something they heared short or even long ago (be sure they keep a diary ^^).
I think this is a great opportunity to give your players a feeling about the land they are wandering on without having them to visit every spot.
And thanks for sharing your ideas with us Nicholas. I never thaught about burning the tavern the PCs are still in. Hears like something i must give a try. :)
man, you guys have totally lost the plot.. when yax was doing these, he would give us reasons why the tavern is a bad and unorigional campaign starter, complete with several ideas for alternatives…
now you guys are telling us why its good to start in the tavern…
pretty soon im going to stop my subsription to this, its no where near as interesting as it was…
@b0xman: Taverns are a cliche place to start, but my point is that you don’t need to start in a tavern in the same old way. Even tired, old ideas can be new if you put a little twist on them. There’s already been some original tavern ideas in the comments.
Why are taverns the default meeting place and adventure launch pad? Is it a nod to the Fellowship of the Ring, when the hobbits and Aragorn meet? I wonder. Why not a marketplace?
@Jeremy: That’s a good question. I guess they are just thought of as the standard place where people go to socialize.
I tend to find that if I let my characters hang out in or around taverns, they tend to stay there and attempt to develop their own character arcs. Which is fine; I’ll happily roleplay out the leering dwarf’s overexuberant “seduction” of the local barwench, or the nudist gnome’s grumbling outrage about his well-placed blur spell skeeving out the locals – but then they complain that they hardly ever get to kill things. So if we’re just starting an adventure, I usually just summarize how they came to be on the adventure and let them at it. If they happen across a tavern on the way … well, that’s their issue :p
@Jeremy Taverns in the fantasy setting are used, for the most part, as a place that people gather in a town most have rooms for rent so you can come across any number of travelers and merchants. Then there are the shady characters that come to make deals using the noise and low light to hide from the local authorities. Traditionally taverns are also the place where stories and songs of legands are told by bards and old gaffers by the fire. So for and adventuring party it is actually a key spot to gather information and find their next adventure.
Why not the Market place, well that is actually one of the second best places to gather information. though as a meeting place it is rather to busy and crowded with no good place to sit and talk quietly in a corner. But in any good market place there lies a tavern entrance. Though taverns have become a starting point cliche in the game it does not make them a bad place to start, just unoriginal.
Hello Everyone. Here is my 2cp worth.
I have used the tavern setting more times than I can remember. I love the flexibility in the style of tavern (upscale or seedy), its size, the culture and and all the stuff that makes a tavern a tavern. Until…
A few years ago I run a booth in a number of craft markets. Somewhere during this time I discovered that there were more people, more information, more business (lawful and otherwise) and more variety than any tavern I had ever thought up.
Now I use the local ‘market’ which usually meets only twice a week. Everyone who needs something shows up. Skilled crafts people work to build up their stock items and have them ready for display, priests are searching for items for the temple, magic users want components and rituals, people are stocking up on daily items, traders are there with news and unusual items, and NPCs are everywhere. There are always food vendors just like a flea market. Rain or shine they go on. Big tents or open booths, hot or cold, the people come.
The City Guard is out in force to ensure that these events are not interrupted. If anyone casues trouble they are never allowed in the city limits again and no trader or crafts person will ever trade with them. Ever! This mean my players have had to pay very close attention to ther skills and not their weapons or armor. they enver go armed in the market beyond a small concealed weapon. They are still using the taverns but now it is the quiet place they go to do more private, detailed business or to let off steam. A few sp slipped to the owner and they are not disturbed for the night.
Another place that I have used is the public temple setting. Historically these were a center of business and law. Powerful people come here to their business, they send their flunkies to the market. So now if the part wants to meet with someone higher on the social ladder they have to dress the part and go where they are. These settings are naturally more private and generally more intrigue happens, but again the temple guards hold tight control on the situation. These can lead to upscale taverns or even private meeting houses used by the powerful of the community.
Try it and see what you think.
Thanks for reading.
Since most of our DnD nights begin over a beer, taverns seem a pretty natural place to hang out (at least occasionally). It’s some weird pseudo-immersion into the game… uhm… sort of. Plus, you can invade it, brawl it up, chat and meet all sorts of people, and get teleported to some distant, undead eatery stripped of armour and weapons, and wearing a dress, after inadvertently hitting on some hussied-up chick-wizard …
@b0xman: Good storytelling always involves a careful balance between familiarity and novelty. It’s the familiar conventions — iconic people, places, and things — that allow the audience to identify with and care about a story, then it takes the novelty — the unexpected twists and turns — to keep our interest.
There’s a reason Hollywood keeps re-inventing Batman instead of giving us a brand new hero every time they decide the current franchise has run its course.
Usualy my campaigns start off in a tavern for the reasons mentioned above, but i just DMd an evil capaign that began with all of the PC’s in jail. It was pure coincinence that some of them were there as a result of the barroom brawl they incited last night…lol