Organizations, whether linked to a class, race, political agenda or religious affiliation can be used in many ways to add flavour to a campaign. In this thread I will compile a list of such organizations from the published material.

What are your experiences or ideas for how to use organizations, orders and guilds in campaigns?



-Havard

Organizations can be used:

- as opponents or outright enemies: the activities or the goals of the organization conflit with those of the PCs. I'll add that most rpg module writers tend to be extremely lazy and forget that the disappereance of the leader doesn't always mean the end of the cult. Somebody else, either within or without the cult might take things in his hand.

- as employers for one or several PCs: a religious organization might hire the PCs to recover a relic. The organization might make itself known to the PCs or not.

- as a special group to which one or several PCs belong: a knight might belong to an order, a mage might be a member in good standing of the Wizard's Cabal, a cleric is usually affilitated to a church or a specific religious hierarchy, a thief might belong to a guild. Usually membership provides advantages (access to training, to special facilities, to specific personnel (i.e. a fence, for a thief), but comes with drawbacks or obligations. It becomes funny when the goals of the organization don't see eye to eye with those of the PCs - a conflict of loyalty is often fun.

- as a tool for the PCs. Perhaps, the PCs are the leaders of the organization and call the shots. The RPG follows this approach.