How do you guys normally start your campaigns? Classic tavern, or something unique each time?
I’ve been thinking of starting my next one with a surprise DMPC.
He’ll be mid-high level and over the top, inducting the players into his party because despite his power, the contract he has specifies it must be accepted by a party. He’ll want them to do nothing but stay out of his way. I’m thinking the contract will either be a bounty or goblin clearing task. The target either way will be in a small fort with only a rope bridge for access. He’ll tell them to stay with the horses, go off on his own and promptly have the bridge cut out from under him, dieing to the fall.
If the party want the payout, they’ll have to both get the contract from his corpse and then complete it on their own.
I like to start with some kind of action that also gives the group a reason to work together. Eg the inquisition drags you all out of your beds in the night and chains you together, or (in the game where everyone was a werewolf) you’re out in the woods hunting and this deer can run faster than you, how do you work together to take it down, or you’ve all been pressganged to work on some evil bastard’s ship, what do you do about it. That kind of thing.