Help creating story for the campaign.

[Invisible Pink Unicorn]

Hi, i've been making a campaign recently and hit a wall.
My campaign is centered around clearing various dungeons with a team of 5 heroes.
Most of the dungeonss aren't really connected to one another story wise and there is a lot of freedom regarding the order in which they are done.
(Kind of the same way how clearing different dungeons in vanilla wow didn't have any continuous narrative to it besides "Go into the instance cause there are bad guys inside who need to die because they are bad")
And what i'm struggling with is how to begin the tutorial level of the campaign.

I could either try to make some sort of story setting at the beginning which explains why the player has to clear the dungeons in the first place. But then have it be the only real part with cinematics and a story which could feel kind of out of place compared to the rest of the levels in which the Heroes you control remain completely silent throughout the dungeon.

Or i could just put the player on the map and introduce the player to the map mechanics through Tutorial chat messages and give up on worldbuilding.

So which approach should i go for?

Or is there maybe a better approavh which skipped my mind altogether?

Thx for all advice in advance.

Edit: Thx for all responses up till this point i am actually done with the story but am putting the rest of the project on hold indefinitely. (Don't like the changes blizzard made to the World Editor with the reforged update. Both those regarding the changed terms of use and map copyright as well as the new WE not having a campaign editor)

 

[cleavinghammer]

So basically there's no plot beyond "kill monsters, take their stuff", and the heroes don't even talk to each other?

If there's no real plot or characterization to the heroes, you can go with instructions instead of trying to do it in-universe.

 

[Power107]

Sorry for being late. I think the best idea to start a story is to show some kind of disequilibrium; which is when something abnormal happens and this forces the characters to take action. All Blizzard cinematic trailers do this, for example, WoW Wrath trailer shows the rise of the LK which changes the lives of many and wc3 cinematic trailer shows demons falling from the sky which is also a disequilibrium.
Just like Blizzard, you can also use Todorov's narrative structure: disequilibrium -> restored equilibrium
Restored equilibrium is when everything becomes stable after disequilibrium ends--in Wc3 restored equilibrium takes place when Archimonde dies.
If you have any other questions then feel free to ask

 

[Richard V Castle]

Hey there, no story is absolutely necessary for every game.

However, if you want to add something, please message me with more details on how the game goes as well as screenshots. I want to get some experience with game writing.

 

[Krolan]

Hello, you massive s***! Welcome to my game. So you wanna play, or you wanna read s***? If it is the latter, well here you go. (Massive Textdump to the Log-File). Somewhere there it'll tell you how to click s***. (actually included, the entire script of Twilight, with Instructions on how to click s*** written somewhere in the middle). Yeah, so this is a game that didn't have a story, but now it does, because Blizzard wanted to own some s***, and I said, well, let them have this s***.

So, the reason why you are here, as in motivation, the reason for the moron you will be playing to enter a friggin' dungeon and endager himself is to find some poorly defined riches with some none-defined purpose for said riches. The reason why there are no story-cutscenes between the levels is that this game takes place in a world, where instant teleportation is normal. It's just like [insert popular movie or series character that can teleport here], just everybody can do it. Well, everybody except the stuff you gonna kill, which is the reason, why you kill them. You see, all people who can instantly teleport, which is the majority, in this game are massive racists against people who can't, so it has been decreed that it is totally acceptable to kill them if the loot you hope to retrieve from it is worth more than a log of s***. It's like living in Hong Kong and being Chinese, you see.

Have fun, and if you actually find yourself confused about how to click s***, check the log-file.

[This post is a joke, I hope it is within the boundries of the acceptable, despite it not being april fools ^^'']

 

[Cheshire]

hey,

this goes along the lines of what Power107 said, but more elaborate. you could use something similar to what l lot of old video games had - where you just see some short cutscene with no text, like - the see main character with a girlfriend and then see the main bad guy come and knock him out and kidnap (possible to animate in warcraft?)/kill her. than you cut to him waking up, picking up a weapon and chasing after them. this whole cinematic doesn't have to be longer than a minute or two - and no talking is required - it's all visual, so you stick with the theme. all the dungeons could be main bad guy's lackeys, and if you really want to run with it he could be interrogating them to find him ("where is francis?") and either save or avenge his lady.

good luck!

 

[MrRious]

You could settle on the silent worldbuilding.

The setting could tell a powerful story. For example, an empty throne room tells that the dungeon used to be a fortress of some sort and that it's old civilisation is dead. Now the player will ask: "What happened here?" which you can answer later, while keeping the player in suspense.