Long ago, and far to the north a tragedy long foretold, a tale of frozen hearts, and murderous intent. Behold the Frozen kingdom long since forgotten.
The Movie Frozen always seemed hopelessly convenient to me. Yes, I am aware it is a children's movie but considering it was based off a rather mature fairy tale by the Legendary Writer Han's Christian Anderson, I think it could have used a little more logic.
So began my quest to shall we say re-imagine the now Classic Disney movie into a legally grey area change of the plot.
However, I am skipping steps.
Today I am going to establish the reason for the adventure and discuss getting player buy in.
One of the most challenging parts of game design is getting the player's to buy in. In my experience a few different approaches work.
1. You've spent time building up relationships and backstories before hand.
2. There is an immediate threat to the life of the characters.
3. Insert likeable Non-player characters that allow the players to fulfill a natural heroic impulse.
The third one is particularly great if you can give the players a connection to them, either directly or indirectly.
In my most successful running of this campain I invented the town of Northcrest.
A sleepy village of a few hundred people resting in the shadow of a massive ring of uncharted mountains to the north, the town subsisted on growing crops, and mining iron from the deposits at the foot of the mountain.
The player characters at this point were introduced as long term resident's of the sleepy town. Conversation in the local pub, The Drunken Goose, revolved around the current dilemma in the town, the weather.
A series of unusually cold winters had left the town dangerously low on supplies and deeply in debt to the cities of the south. About 1/2 the town wanted to abandon their ancestral home, while about half had to stay.
To help spur along player engagement, I did my best to establish the player characters in the town, generously gifting them places of residence, and making them for the most part well liked.
Thus when the mayor of the town gathered the 4 players together in a private booth, these conversations peppering the background, the players had buy in.
While many DM's want to get strait into the action, a bit of tension built up before the ask often can be the difference between a player who is doing another generic quest for the local mayor, and a group of people suddenly worried that Margret the Baker might not be able to feed her kids.
