Free Company

Important - Player Input/Feedback
Before game play can begin I want some player input and a group consensus on several issues. Read everything in this section and provide feedback and/or make choices as appropriate. This is a group game so everything here is open to change.

Discord is the ideal place to share your feedback and ideas. Keep everything campaign specific in the correct channel!

Story Synopsis
The Free Company campaign is based around the idea of playing a group of mercenaries for hire.

More to follow once gameplay tier and number of players is worked out. (See Session Zero below)

Aspects of Gameplay
This campaign differs from a generic/standard D&D game in the following ways:

Adaptable Roster
'Player Character' becomes a broader term. Players will each have one or more private characters that belong to them exclusively. Additionally, there is a pool of public characters that are open for use by any player. At the start of each story arc each player will select which character they're going to control for the duration of that arc.

Broad Difficulty
Encounters and all they entail (Hazards, Traps, Obstacles, Monsters, NPCs, etc) will generally not be tailored towards/against any character or party composition. This means some 'encounters' available for the party to run into may be very difficult or even impossible to overcome during that story arc, and some NPCs/Monsters can be impossibly deadly as combatants. Information gathering, research, and strategic preparation will often be critical to success.

Combat
Almost all combat will be deadly. Blundering into encounters blind or unprepared will easily result in death. Enemy combatants with the ability to do so will employ effective tactics and counter-plans. Punches will not be pulled. There is a reason players can/will be pulling from a pool of playable characters.

Downtime
Resting and recovery (both mundane and magical) are less effective than normal. Damage to characters, both physical and psychological, can have lasting wounds that require significant time to fully recover from. Training to gain skills/proficiencies/spells will require sizable time commitments. Overall, there will be a lot of downtime during which characters are mostly unavailable.

Effects, Elections, and Eventualities
There will be consequences. Player choices and player success/failure will have lasting effects. Even the act of choosing to accept a job or not could effect events in the future and rewrite the narrative of the game's world.

Free Roam
In between story arcs the game will largely be open world and open ended. As a result there will be some adversaries, NPCs, and events that will not necessarily be scaled to the party's level (challenge rating). Raiding the dragon's lair as your first mission is unlikely to work out well, because that dragon is CR 17 and the DM won't stop you from getting yourself into (fiery) trouble.

Game Schedule
The ideal schedule for me is either a shorter (~3 hours max) session on some weeknight, starting anytime after 5pm CST but ending before midnight CST), or a normal 4 hour session on Saturday basically any time of day. Games would be every other week.

Starting Level
Choose between starting at either the 'Local Hero' tier (Level 2) or the start of the 'Heroes of the Realm' tier (Level 5).

Character Creation
Should attributes be rolled? Point buy? How should wealth for new characters be handled?

General Goals
What are 3 things that you (the player) would like to do?

What are 3 interesting things you'd like to have your characters encounter in the campaign?

Art Style
Do you have a preference for art style? Because the game is run entirely online (and mostly on Roll20), art can have a big impact on the tone and immersion.

Player vs Player
This is a cooperative storytelling game. Everyone is playing the game together as a team. All characters available as playable characters, both public and private, must be built and played with the idea of meta-game cooperation in mind.

Character secrets can exist. Most characters will have their own secret agendas, hidden from other characters. Sometimes they will even be secret from other players, but this is not the norm. Character agendas, hidden or public, can run in parallel to what the party is doing, but can not work against the group as a whole. Characters agendas can work somewhat against other character agendas, but these must be public to all players and these should be rare.

If a character comes into direct conflict with another character or the party that character will almost always becomes a non-player character. As the DM I am very likely to work with the player(s) who have run that character previously to flesh out their motives and actions going forward, but the character is likely lost a playable character from that point forward.

Ex: The party takes a job helping a noble family excavate (and exorcise) some old ruins they've discovered on the land they've settled. A character can have a 'hidden' agenda of recovering some specific item or information from the ruins. Two characters can not have hidden agendas to gain exclusive ownership/use of the same item/information. A character can have an agenda involving hiding something from the rest of the party or doing something in secret, but this activity will almost always be revealed to all the players in the game.

Rule Sources
Home brew material is allowed, but everything must be reviewed first. If you find something you want to use just send it to me and we'll work together to bring it into the game.

Resting & Healing - Slow Natural Healing
Long rests no longer recover a character's hit points. Some healing spells (ex: Healing Spirit and Goodberry) have been modified to prevent abuse. Players will have to carefully judge the benefits and drawbacks of combat. Characters might not be afford to engage in too many battles in a row, and all adventuring requires careful planning.

Renown
Characters can gain and lose renown through gameplay. Renown tracks their standing within a particular faction or organization. Having a high renown in an organization will effect the attitude of other members of that faction (and possibly members of other factions) and could grant unique benefits/perks.

Fear, Horror, Sanity and Madness
A custom ruleset combining aspects of the optional rules for Fear, Horror, Sanity and Madness (DMG). WHen characters encounter horrific or otherworldly elements they must fight against fear and struggle to maintain their sanity. Failing these tests of willpower will result in temporary conditions and long term penalties.

Lingering Injuries
Separate from hit points and hit dice, characters who take damage will gain 'lingering injuries'. A character might sustain a lingering injury from receiving massive damage, dropping to 0 hit points, failing a saving throw by more than 10, or failing a death saving throw by more than 5. Healing these lingering injuries is only possible through downtime.

Flanking
If two character are both adjacent to an enemy and they are on opposite sides of that creature they gain a +2 bonus to attacks and checks made against that creature. This works similar to the flanking optional rule in the DMG, but adds a +2 bonus in place of gaining advantage.

Companies
The Free Companies are bands of adventurer-mercenaries open for recruitment by private employers. They act as small independent military organizations with a focus on dealing with threats normally faced by rogue adventurers. They are not subordinate to any nation.

My current plan is for all of the player characters to start as members of the same company (or belong to one of two companies). As the game progresses I expect the idea of the 'Free Company' to be the focal point of the party as an adventuring group and the player characters will likely create their own company or take over an existing one.

These are examples of Free Companies active in the 'New World':

Azure Knights
The Elite

A selective company that draws its ranks largely from ancient and powerful noble families. The second and third sons of noble houses join this company to either make a name for themselves or bring gold and glory to their dynasty.

Fae Stalkers
The Hunters

Eager to test their skills against the wild and powerful creatures of the New World, this company focuses on hunting and slaying the monsters of legend.

First Division
The Reliable

Largely ex-soldiers. This company most resembles a professional group of men-at-arms.

Oathbound
The Loyal

Members of this company are required to swear a binding oath of service to the organization. It values bonds of loyalty and fraternity among its members above all else. Its members have a fanatical devotion to the company and as well as one another.

Radiant Company
The Virtuous

Slaying devils and dragons, scouring dark dungeons, and saving damsels are the order of the day for this company.

Unchained
The Free

More of an unruly horde than a professional mercenary band. This company employs unpredictability and overwhelming numbers as its go-to strategy. It has few rules, little organization, and no traditions.