Creating a Mini-Campaign For Any TTRPG

So you want to create your own RPG campaign but the task of creating a long, epic campaign feels a little daunting and overwhelming for you? How do you overcome this problem? Well, you create and run a mini-campaign! In this video, I go into the steps to take to start creating your own mini-campaign for your roleplaying games. Whether you enjoy playing D&D, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu or even Bounty Hunter, using these steps will go a long way to help you create and run your own mini-campaign.

Creating a Mini-Campaign for any TTRPG

Mini-Campaigns are 3-7 adventures long. 

Linking a few mini-campaigns would make a single standard open campaign. 

Here’s how to create your own mini campaign – how to plan for it. Ask the following questions when planning your mini-campaign: 

• What is your goal? 
  • Why do you want to make this mini campaign? 
  • Perhaps you want to test your ability to string along a bigger picture scenario, rather than just a short scenario of a single adventure. 
  • Making sure your shorter scenarios string together to form a bigger picture is a different challenge compared to a one-shot. 
  • Maybe you just want to run something that has a little more meat to it – e.g. A battle that takes 5 adventures to play out. A series of adventures rather than one giant adventure. 
  • Thinking about your bigger story and breaking it down into smaller adventures will provide more focused mini wins – your game will be stronger for it.

• What RPG system are you using? 
  • Experiment with other systems. 
  • Adopt something that has a lot of tutorials or information on it. Or go for a system that is simple to grasp and understand.
  • Choose your system based on your campaign type. You must be comfortable with the system you’re playing in. 

• What is your setting? 
  • Pre-made or homemade. 
  • Don’t spend too much time on planning this, as it is a small and self-contained space. 
  • The advantage is that you can really explore. Test some ideas – the game won’t last long, so feel free to try new things. 
  • Pre-made is easy – you can choose a single spot and play within that area. There would be no need to learn the whole setting. 

• Choose a starting location. 
  • Every game starts somewhere. 
  • On the map – location. Forest or nebula etc. 
  • Why choose a specific place – because it looks interesting to you. 
  • Choose an interesting location – any reason is acceptable, so long as it inspires you. 
  • Ask the ‘What if’ question. It will always lead you to your adventures – just ask it! 
  • By choosing a location – you suddenly get adventures for free. 
  • Then ask how or why – the PC’s will have goals or needs, you need to figure out what they will be. 

• Important to note that the first adventure and the last adventure are linked together. It makes a neat circle and contains your mini campaign, preventing it from rambling and losing focus. 
• Use the 5 step method – discover plot, journey to plot, discover not the plot, journey to new plot, showdown. 

Your task – design your own mini campaign.