Having experienced it from both sides of the GM screen, i'd say the Mistaken Identity from The Enemy Within is pretty much perfect. First, a brief squabble with some mutants, and then among the casualties of the Stage Coach the mutants had attacked, the players discover a body that looks just like one of the PC:s - and he has a letter promising a great fortune in a form of inheritance. Especially for players that had never played RPG:s before, it was a great PC-bait.

If the whole group is new to the setting I fall back on an adventure where all the participants were called together whether they know each other or not by an elder or rich merchant, etc.

They are sent on a mission to uncover strange happenings, ie people turning up missing, animals missing, certain type of pest or monster being spotted more often, etc).

It gives the group a chance to meet each other and introduce themselves if they need to, and then it gives them the opportunity to strategize  or mingle with townsfolk investigating. then I always throw in a quick combat which gets them headed in the right direction and gives them an example of what they are up against.

It is always some form of either a Cult, or an intelligent creature that is trying to move in, dominate or just take over the area.

I have used this basic outline in D&D, Pathfinder, Star Wars, Earthdawn, and Shadowrun.

Love Isle of Dread.

The 5e starter set isnt bad for a small sandbox starter.

Isle of Dread is great, as is Night's Dark Terror. The Lost Mines of Phandelver is good too I agree, having just re-read Night's Dark Terror I see its influence on Phandelver with the attempt to create distinct humanoid tribes and a kidnapped NPC Macguffin.

I have the 5e version of the Isle of Dread though I'm not entirely sure how one should run it? I've read through it and it mostly looks like "here's a jungle, survive and explore, and in the meantime find a way off the island." Sort of like Jurassic Park meets Gilligan's Island...

There are factions to play off each other, its sketchy but its there. Similar to Cook's Dwellers of the Forbidden City which could quite easily be dropped into one of the jungles on the Isle. Night's Dark Terror provides a stronger backbone of (gasp!) story for its sandbox and would require less work to run I think.

Setting: TFT's Cidri (i.e. homebrew logical simulationist) or Harn, where it's medieval fantasy but the world has a very detailed and large map and things make sense and the game is about letting players try out living in and exploring a world in various ways that involve learning about it and experiencing logical risks and consequences.

Ideal first adventure: Starts out with the players in their original natural home setting and roles, without anything severe going on, so they can learn about their home setting, relationships, lifestyle, etc., find out what's going on, explore a bit, get into some low-key situations, or whatever they're into.

Reason being that I like PCs to fit into the world, and for the players to have a good sense of who their PCs are and where they come from and so on. Of course it can be done much faster and with more action, but I think my ideal is to start-out low-key to lay a foundation of normal upon which the rest of the campaign can build. Also my settings tend to have a lot to learn about.

Quote from: RPGPundit;965202Pick a system, and/or a setting, then tell me what you think is the ideal first adventure to start off a campaign with it. It can be a published adventure, or just a description of how you think is the best way to start off the campaign.

Dark Sun. After running it a few times, the pack in adventure "A Little Knowledge" is an ideal introduction. Characters start as slaves (Brings up the fact that slavery is a thing on Athas. Puts all the characters in the same "party" that has to work together for a goal.) Escape the slave caravan and go on a survival resource management trek through the desert. (Introduces the concepts of scarcity, weapon breakage, foraging, encountering all the kinds of desert challenges and the value of simple supplies like food and water.)
I don't run it verbatim, and have my own version with a few of my own encounters mixed in with the published ones, but the framework is a solid place to build on.

Quote from: AaronBrown99;965405Didn't the original Dark Sun set have an intro where the characters are slaves in a caravan, freed during a raid or something? I might be thinking of a different set but it was a fun way to get the characters working together.

And it had Brom, so it's got that going for it.

Which is nice.

Yes, I replied to the thread before reading it.

Thanks for describing, in detail, what I only had a vague memory of!

I'm heading to find a pdf of the original DS starter....

Quote from: AaronBrown99;965819Thanks for describing, in detail, what I only had a vague memory of!

I'm heading to find a pdf of the original DS starter....

What I did for my own version, is to make up a list of semi-random encounters by day of desert travel. Mixing in my own encounters and the ones in the module. The module can be run very linear or very sandboxy depending on how the DM wants to run it. I find a middle ground works best. And even when I reduce the amount of supplies the characters can get from encounters, psionics and survival proficiencies make them very resilient. So don't be afraid to turn up the difficulty factor on the survival stuff. The "ending" runs more like a traditional adventure module, but gives it a sense of actual completion.

For me, it was the Caves of Chaos.

Aaron Allston's "Treasure Hunt" isn't bad.

Yeah Treaure Hunt and Under Ilefarn are both great starter adventures. Allston, Perrin and Jaquays did some very good work for TSR that give the lie to notions of a 'Golden,' 'Silver' and 'Bronze' age nonsense.

Quote from: Voros;965784There are factions to play off each other, its sketchy but its there. Similar to Cook's Dwellers of the Forbidden City which could quite easily be dropped into one of the jungles on the Isle. Night's Dark Terror provides a stronger backbone of (gasp!) story for its sandbox and would require less work to run I think.

Wow, you're not joking. That adventure is pretty amazing. Heck I love it for the weather and moon phases charts alone!