In an effort to keep word count minimal, it seems that I skipped over and simplified some stuff - draw the rest of the owl. In this addendum I want to go a bit into more detail.

In particular I want to shed some more light onto Step 2 of the campaign seed outline I gave last time. The guiding principle behind this step is this article: Just Three Hexes - Campaign Starters by Micheal “Chgowiz” Shorten. The end goal should provide the players a sense of what they might encounter and for the GM as an anchor for quests and threats.

But does it need to be hexes? No.

The only constraint I have, is to present a region of your world, where the first few sessions will happen. So don't give them the full world map, but just the immediate surroundings of their starting area. Another thing this first region should have is a safe haven, normally a settlement where the characters will meet.

In my Rime of the Frostmaiden example, this would be Ten Towns. Factually this is also what the module is doing in its first two chapters. Let the players go around the area, do some quests and when they are ready they will venture from this area into the Dale.

How do you get to such a region? Well, either you have one already from the module you want to run. I would stick to one at most two settlements when presenting the campaign to the players. Otherwise analysis paralysis will set in. I normally take the biggest settlement, as this will accommodate most needs for equipment and such.

If you don't have a region, well then you can go ahead and come up with one. As mentioned my procedures work well. They should give you an interesting enough area with a settlement or two.

Once you have your region, you should generate something interesting in the vicinity. I create a landmark feature next to each of the settlements, that can be reached within a day - in case of Frostmaiden I would select two settlements not all. Such a landmark could be a ruin, a dungeon entrance, monster lair, ... This should already incite some excitement into the players to go there. And in turn, this also gives the GM the first hints on potential quests and threats they might include.

Lastly you should include two factions into the mix. Someone that is working for or against the player characters. Someone to interact with, maybe get some quests and rewards. This also gives the world a bit more life.

One-Page Campaign Primer

Step 1 and 2 should give you enough material to compile a campaign primer. But what should you put into there? Should you dump all the information from above? Not necessarily. Remember the iceberg and only put enough information in it, to hook your players.

What should definitely go in there is your Core Concept (basically Step 1) in full. But you can just do a simple list. No need to go full prose. From the starting region only include a short descriptor of the starting town and its surrounding (bring into play the landmark here), as well list the factions of the region.

Summary

To summarize the steps

1. Core Concept
   • Game System
   • Frame
     • Theme: Why / What
     • Setting: When / Where
     • Tone: How
     • (optional) Twist or Setting Distinction
   • World Truths
   • (optional) Special Mechanics
   • Inspiration
2. Starting Region
   • Create or select an area of the world that includes a settlement and its surrounding area
   • For each settlement in the area, create or select a landmark in its vicinity
   • Create 2 factions
     • one should be at least Tier III
3. Compile Campaign Primer
   • Keep it short at to one-page

With the Campaign Primer you can then go out and find the players that are interested in playing in that campaign. The next steps will then be how to actually use this preparation effectively to get started and create momentum.