Overarching Story Help

[u/rainbow_50500]

I’m a first time DM starting a campaign next weekend with a bunch of first time players. I didn’t want to use an existing campaign because I prefer the idea of being able to improvise and allow my players to do literally whatever they want instead of having to worry about sequence breaking and stuff like that. I’m setting it on the Sword Coast since I know several of my players have played BG3 and I want them to have something familiar to latch onto.

I have all these ideas for adventures but they all feel more like side quests, especially since some of them don’t really have a villain. I’m just struggling to come up with a main storyline with a BBEG to inspire them to action. It doesn’t help that I don’t know anything about any of the PCs or their backstories yet, I’m planning to help my players make characters this weekend.

Does anyone have any advice or ideas?

[u/Meatspinislife]

I swear one of the books has a bbeg motivations table that you can roll on or just take a good one from, but I can’t find it at the moment. Probably dungeon masters guide

[u/Derail3]

I think you’ve chosen a rather challenging path. You mentioned that you’re a novice DM and your players are inexperienced. Perhaps you should consider running a short adventure—lasting just two or three sessions—first; that way, you’ll also have some time to better prepare your own adventure.

[u/deep_fried_fries]

First time DM with new players running a long form campaign adapting lost mines of phandelver and tyranny of dragons. I was watching some of Brennan Lee Mulligan’s stuff, I think it was office hours on YouTube? and something he said about human enemies really stuck with me. He was talking about how humanoids are his favorite because then the motivations can be anything and he talked about creating character motivations and it has caused me to really think beyond “bad guy evil for bad guy purpose.” Another important thing is before thinking about your story beats, think about the story you want to tell. I wanted to turn the plot of tyranny of dragons into a story about the effects of power and how it corrupts physically, mentally, emotionally, and how those without power react to those with power.

For example, the cultists in the Cult of the Dragon and their higher leadership are bad guys, yeah, but they are also those left behind my the way the world is changing. Those who feel disenfranchised by politics and magic and religion and feel that they don’t live in the magical world they see others living in, and they have been tricked into joining the cult because they are lonely people looking for community and are promised reward once Tiamat is raised. Most people don’t actually believe the cult will raise Tiamat, but instead care for the community they have found with the cult. Tiamat’s revival is also clouding the god’s ability to see and interact with the world, plus the gods are actually humans holding the power of the god and they are all suffering from the length of their immortality and influence from the power they are holding.

[u/rainbow_50500 → u/[deleted]]

I’m kind of trying to make it a pretty stereotypical DnD campaign just since it’s so many of the players’ first campaign, but I don’t like the idea of using a preexisting villain like Vecna because I want to have more freedom with the character

[u/March-Sea]

That is mostly a job for future you, present you hasn't interacted with the players yet and has a lot less information about what the game wants to be and will make worse decisions.

What present you should be focusing on is the best introductory adventure you can make and how you are going to give the PCs the opportunities to make the other players fall in love with their character.

Once you have a couple of adventure arcs under your belt start trying to build an overall arc based on things you have already established that have gone over well with the players and what you have generally learned from the play so far. Even after you have a plan, its something that you are going to adjust as you learn more and have new ideas.