Why One Piece is a great D&D Campaign | Kraken Week

Kraken Week is a community event organized by ‪@GinnyDi‬ and ‪@pointyhatstudios‬ where TTRPG KZbinrs make videos about the ocean.
Playlist: • Kraken Week '24
In this video, I use a pirate seafaring campaign I have run, that was inspired by One Piece, as an example to talk about how to design an adventure's structure and outline.
Seas of Vodari: www.tribality.com/store/produ...
Get 10% off site-wide until the end of the month, by using the promo code "KRAKENWEEK"!
___
💬 DISCORD: / discord
📘 MY HOMEBREW: trekiros.com
___
PNGTuber avatar by KoffeineYT [ / koffeineyt ]
Music:
The Golden Valley by The Seventh Midnight (theseventhmidnight.com)
Special thanks to ‪@TheDelver‬ for the ocean footage at the start of the video!
___
#dnd #dungeonsanddragons
TIER LIST How to play Dungeons and Dragons Beginners Guide What class to play in dungeons and dragons best class in D&D best subclass most powerful optimised monk build DandD Warlock Bard Dungeon Master, Fighter, Ranger, Artificer, Cleric, Barbarian, Wizard, Sorcerer, Monk, Paladin, Rogue, DnD Shorts D&D Shorts TikTok Dungeons and Dragons XP to level 3 with Davvychappy Jocat Critical Role dnd shorts, sly flourish. Matt colville, MCDM, Kingdoms and Warfare, Strongholds & Followers, Flee Mortals. Unearthed arcana, world anvil, inkarnate, dungeondraft. Dungeon Master GMing advice pro tips. Baldur's Gate 3. OGL OGL 2.0a 2.0 1.1 1.1a 1.0a WotC Wizards of the Coast, Hasbro. Hades II released. Hades 2 released.
00:00 Intro

[@AlexT7916]

Rustage: "Way ahead of you"

[@GLiTcHy-Y]

@@AlexT7916 I was literally coming here to mention rustage lmao

[@EdBurke37]

@@AlexT7916 Who?

[@Trekiros]

​@@EdBurke37 Rustage is a youtuber, usually he makes rap songs inspired by anime but on his second channel he also runs anime-inpired D&D campaign with a bunch of other anime youtubers. He's got two campaigns, one called "One Piece D&D", and the other "Isekai D&D"

[@recklessfireweaver5718]

@@Trekiros yeah, he also now has one piece marines dnd which is basically a sequel to his one piece dnd with new characters but the same players

[@semiawesomatic6064]

IVE GOT A JAR OF SAND

[@blueoysterboi4742]

Every time I see a chest I think of the best pirate line in any movie “We found it! TICKETS TO THE SPONGEBOB MOVIE!!!”

[@Trekiros]

I looked so hard for a clip that would make that joke in the first few seconds work, and this would have been so perfect. How did I only come to learn about this thing's existence now t_t

[@Scalesthelizardwizard]

I'll bet money that's the One Piece

[@rustage]

This video is great!! I've also watched a bunch of your other vids so it's fun to see you talk about a subject i'm familiar with! You are obviously a lot more skilled than I in terms of structuring/world building and other DMing skills, I like to keep things quite player story focused, and so let that dictate a lot of what happens. I think if my campaign was one piece Inspired instead of literally taking place in the one piece world i'd have a little more freedom to do more of what you're talking about Keep up the good work!

[@Trekiros]

Oooh thank you for the kind words! 🙌

[@recklessfireweaver5718]

Ayyy cool to see my favorite dm in the comments of my favorite dnd channel

[@Ty-og5tg]

If you were a more mischievous GM, you could turn the lines of the "X" into rings that circle the globe. Then 3 points no longer give a triangle to search, they give 3 equators. The 4th point gives 6 potential "X" spots in vastly distant but precise parts of the world. This gives your hopefully-high-level end-game PCs a great use for their powerful travel spells 😊

[@Ty-og5tg]

Also: I've been looking forward to your video since Kraken Week started. Did not disappoint!

[@macoppy6571]

A lazy GM would say one d4 points the way 👉🔺️

[@dsargus3]

i love your idea :o thank you Ty-og5tg

[@joshuab3918]

I think an underrated element of One Piece's story structure is how well it foreshadows its arcs. Each arc is geographically tied to its location, so it has that nice division between them, but Oda will also casually mention characters that won't be relevant for hundreds of chapters. Setting the Ponegliff structure aside, I think the One Piece story formula works fantastically for long-running campaigns.

[@commonviewer2488]

One thing that One Piece does is have events that occur in one location affect events in others. It's a good way to have the party feel that they're having an effect on the world.

[@Trekiros]

Yup, absolutely. That is something I kind of forgot to mention in the video but that's also how I use the faction quests. For example, after coming back from the dungeon in the plane of air, my players retrieved the mythallar of a flying city, and were given a choice: use it to build a new flying city, or use it to crash a mountain into the headquarters of their enemies, Age of Ultron style. They chose to create a new flying city, so they got a pretty sick home base, but in exchange those enemies got to show up later in the campaign, in a completely different quest, to cause some more havoc.

[@slimeking1249]

I've been running a one piece d&d campaign for about 1 year. Obviously inspired by rustage, I've been treating every island in an episodic nature where after every island is a level up. It's been my first campaign and we've been having a blast.

[@brentrevello134]

"Grimdamp" = insta-like.

[@ratiuvictor9533]

Rustage's One Piece DnD is so good

[@majinsole8554]

Agreed! I binged and it was amazing! ~_~

[@couchcommander5280]

I seem to have missed the part where you make your players cry when they're boat breaks

[@jadechrysalis8428]

@@couchcommander5280 how dare you 😭

[@couchcommander5280]

@@jadechrysalis8428 I was that person too, comrade 🫡

[@HiopX]

"One Piece with a bit of Atlantis sprinkled in it" Ah so a story one part about adventurers uncovering the hidden history of a world through finding the remnants of a sunken civilization way more technological advanced and one part Atlantis

[@commonviewer2488]

In world, Robin states that you *need* all four. I'm sure there's some trick to it that prevents someone from solving the map marker with math alone.

[@LevTheLurker]

Technically with how the Grand Line and navigation works, even having all four coordinates and knowing the exact lat/long of the treasure wouldn't help you actually reach it, so there's definitely an extra catch waiting for them to actually reach it.

[@ericsilva6787]

Honestly if my players realize they can find the treasure at the edges of the triangle that would be an awesome moment for them. I'd probably reward that.

[@WoWGnomeKiller]

I actually run a Speljammer pirate campaign! They have a “loge pose” type of compass sending them from planet to planet just like One Piece

[@joshphillips5238]

I think this was my favourite video from Kraken week! But then again, you're my favourite dnd KZbinr right now

[@starhalv2427]

Under another Kraken Week video I literally wrote "Hey, One Piece would be a good setting for inspiration when thinking how giant sea monsters and strong seafaring military influence the world"

[@AGSilver935]

I've been looking forward to your videos and Kraken Week in general, and your Kraken Week video was a real treat! Tbh it's probably my favorite of the videos out so far this week. Really excited to toy with the ideas here in my own pirate campaign. Other than this video, my personal highlight of Kraken Week so far is The Grungeon Master's kuo-toa video. The way it delves into psychology and the divinity of gods was unexpected but it enhanced the video into something beyond simple lore

[@Trekiros]

Yesss I'm so glad. Ginny & Antonio didn't know about every youtuber, so I invited a bunch myself like the Grungeon Master and CinderblockSally, because I knew they would make great stuff. And woah did they deliver

[@AGSilver935]

@Trekiros Omg Trekiros my GOAT, you don't miss haha :D

[@starhalv2427]

1:17 Pirate Borg! My friend bought it, can't wait to play it

[@jeramiecooper1913]

Thank you for the video. I had everything setup in my campaign except the Endowed Progress. It's now time to set that up as a secret / clue.

[@edwinbergeron4201]

Would have never found your content without kraken week, but you had the best video by far from all that I saw. Haven't watched or read one piece since ace was still on the crew, thank you for the inspiration!

[@captainfire74]

I really love your content, it goes into a deeper, more scientific, way to approach game design, which is what I'm into :) Seeing a whole campaign as a simple diagram helps a lot ;)

[@VetinariClone]

Your videos are always a treat. Looking forward to the next one!

[@juauke]

This is a very good campaign! I might steal from it in my next pirate campaign!

[@mr_jyggalag]

Great video, once again! I can't believe you combined my two favorite things, DnD and One Piece. I think I know how to implement some of the ideas from the video in my existing campaign, but once again, I am tempted to run a pirate-themed campaign next.

[@MrNickRowe]

You had me at One Piece ❤

[@VerbenaComfrey]

I am so excited to have found you! Im running a very simple Tiny Dungeon game for my son and husband, and am learning so much about game design! Thanks be to Kraken Week, I have a new channel to subscribe to!

[@Aranesque]

YES YES YES!!! I've been watching One Piece since this year and I've been wanting to run something with the same type as their arc structures (Make it a bunch of self-conclussive adventures that connect the world and a bigger story). So happy to see one of my fav D&Dtubers address this!

[@jacktalos7]

This is a brilliant video... Probably the best I've seen about Adventure Structuring. So much so that I hate that this won't pop up when I search for Adventure Structuring.

[@StephaniePlaysGames]

I love this! 😍 I was so excited when you said you wanted to do One Piece as your topic, and now I’m dying because I want to be a player in this campaign SO BAD! 😭💕

[@GA-eh4nl]

A great video! I always appreciate tips and examples of a well-structured adventure, it is so handy for new DMs😊

[@cyzaine]

Oh this was a nice surprise! Great video, i cant wait to crawl through the rest of your videos.

[@ADHDnD13]

I have literally been scratching my head for months on how to layout the skeleton of my pirate campaign and you my sir are a blessing.

[@Draail19]

Wonderful video! Happy Kraken Week!

[@paperwatt]

First time seeing the channel. This sort of campaign building is super interesting!

[@Bartoc1988]

This is actually a very interesting design. I learned quite a bunch, thank you!

[@storytime7408]

I have watched a lot of D&D help videos, but that chart really helps crystalize things. thx

[@a.z.pantera5577]

The Straw Hat Pirates really are a chaotic D&D group. - A young boy with lofty goals and is motivated by either food or fighting who'll be damned if you keep that from him, - a directionally challenged Samurai who was formally a bounty hunter and is oath and honor-bound to follow his captain to the ends of the Earth, - a thieving weather Wizard obsessed with money charged with keeping them on the right course while also pay off debts, - a cowardly pathological liar who is secretly the most skilled person on the crew and son of a legendary pirate, - a problematic simp who cooks the best food and can light his feet on fire for some reason but also has an insanely well-rounded skillset, - a gullible awakened Reindeer with extensive medical knowledge and like 10 different flavors of sicko mode, - a gorgeous woman with a tragic past who will snap someone's neck out of habit who is also very knowledgeable of the world's lore - an undead Bard with the saddest backstory, who hides it behind his deranged antics, musical talent, and competent swordplay - a fish man martial artist and warlord who is a ride or die homie, with connections to old enemies of the party.

[@Chrosteellium]

Rustige would like to agree with you

[@totamelinda9381]

Finally I knew this would come out this week somewhere.

[@andyspillum3588]

So, so far I have only watched your's, Pointy Hat's, Ginny D's, Super Geek's, D&D Shorts' and parts of a few more, and I would have to say that my favorite is a tie between this and Pointy's with Shorts and Super Geek's coming in second

[@derrickjohnson4952]

Always loved things like treasure planet nice blend of sci fi & fantasy.

[@specialkender]

This video is awesome, it put to words so many qualities that I felt were right about one piece. I had a one piece inspired campaign and it was awesomeee. Also the coherence of the world is amazing, like much stronger people are around since the beginning of the story and they gatekeep various key pieces of story. Just noyce.

[@laurableadorable-owo9170]

Ooooooooo I've been looking into running a pirate campaign for a while now and this is exactly what I want to run

[@ryansullivan5854]

This is a great Kraken Week video.

[@user-no6pn7gd2f]

Great suggestion, thanks for this.

[@demonac]

Liked for the endowed progress effect; as soon as you started showing the cards, I got the whole concept... but it's still not something I'd thought about before

[@sspectre8217]

Kraken week has been great, I’ve had a nautical campaign idea cooking in the back of my mind for a while so it’s mighty convenient lol, there’s a whole lot of prep work done suddenly

[@zachbahamutson5477]

Now here's something about one piece, one of the road Poniglyphs is constantly moving, so it might be less that you draw a line between two of them and instead you have to decipher them because their instructions on how to get to Laugh Tale.

[@BuddyRIP]

Ive had a long standing joke/theory that one piece is based off of an ongoing D&D game oda is running. Its purely a joke but it makes me want to make an abridged version that is exactly that. There are too many moments where you can feel the nat 1 or 20. Or just the rolls in general. Like theres so many times where you can see the players going completely off the rails of the campaign too. It makes too much sense

[@ghostmaestro1721]

I've always wanted to run a short high seas/pirate campaign, and after watching the live action One Piece when it came out, it inspired me even more to get an idea going. Though unfortunately I've already got a campaign running, but I've got it stored away for later use.

[@loupe500]

Tbf what you said about having three 3 poneglyphs giving you the answer only applies if we assume the treasure is in the blue sea. If you add the sky islands and underwater stuff (which the world of One Piece do allow it) you could have 3 poneglyphs giving you the location and the last one giving you the altitude. Maybe they are located in one of these 3 sides, but you have 10k meters above and below, meaning it’s not that easy to find out. And the best part is the fact that you don’t even need to tell the players altitude is a factor until they discover it. So they could wander through the boarders of the triangle and never find anything, leading to some cool subplots and a mystery to “why they never found out the treasure”.

[@sensen_jane]

Great explanation!

[@Bookworm159]

So, uh, you have any room in your group for another player? JK, but I loved this video and the plot you described sounds really fun. I like the idea of having several macguffins that can be done in any order with multiple options to acquire each. That just sounds like it would be so much fun to play.

[@Ash.King.Y]

Great explanation. Easy like cake recipe.

[@DOntTouCHmYPaNDa]

This is sooooooooooo goooooooooood! ❤❤❤

[@ajdynon]

Did a short-lived island-hopping campaign, with One Piece being an influence, along with Moana and the RL history of the Majapahit empire... never got far enough along to really develop an overarching plot, but still occasionally contemplate reviving it.

[@RisqueRique]

My friend who is the dm for our pirate campaign mixed one piece with another series (that escapes my thoughts rn) and it is SO much fun. Truly, if you want to have a blast run either a one piece or one piece inspired campaign.

[@ForGitsAndShiggles]

I think the three-points solution only works if the last point of the X (and the center of the X) are on the same plane. If there's an up or down component to it (like Skypeia or Fishman Island) you would still need all 4 Road Poneglyphs to find the center.

[@karlniarb]

You need a fourth road poneglyph if the final location is either up in the air or underwater. That's something that people have speculated as well.

[@Shiftarus]

I run a One Piece 5e campaign, its been going great and the mechanics of the world make running adventures easy

[@Olimar92]

"Spoilers" often I just don't care about spoilers, since I enjoy the context for whatever is going on. This time I am actually someone that already knows.

[@leonenjoyer]

Great video 👍

[@FrumpybutSuperSmart]

I've been wanting to turn the Skies of Arcadia video game into a dnd campaign for a long time. This guide might help with structuring that.

[@marcusc9931]

I'm starting a sea campaign in Exatled 3e. Very fitting for one piece themes

[@Fighterlevel10]

Already running one here. With the captain being a wood elf rogue with three sword style (inspired by zoro) also those blades are meito, minotaur beast barbarian with chop chop fruit, variant human wizard with map map fruit, human cook who is a boxer (NPC), tiefling gunslinger with dragon dragon fruit model: Carnotaurus, a hybrid mink(NPC), an wingless aarakocra with bug bug fruit model: Mothman who is the Doctor of the ship. Started with little hope but throughout the play everyone enjoyed the campaign so we continued this is the longest we played of any campaign. And it is still running. I needed just 7 mechanics which i homebrewed they are: Devil fruits, Haki, Some martial arts(fishman karate, six powers etc), Meito swords, Some sword combat mechanism to create sword clash(inspired by sekiro), the willpower surge which is used to create epic scenes (example: brook standing after big mom's attacks), and races from one piece.

[@mistergoats4380]

I want to run a pirate campaign now!!

[@hewhogoesbymanynames]

Vodari hype!

[@Snags5050]

I started GMing for some acquaintances of mine recently with the idea that we'd have a nice heroic campaign. Unfortunately due to some life shenanigans, we did not get a proper Session Zero, and it turns out they all basically enjoy being criminals 😩 I think if (when?) they TPK, I may come up with a pirate themed campaign, so thanks for the inspiration!

[@jinxtheunluckypony]

I’ve never seen a campaign structured like this before. I wish I could have seen this video back when I had an active gaming group to play with.

[@57dmario30]

You’d be right about using geometry in a normal world but the 4th island may be one that moves or is in the air/ space so the range and capability of tracing the line is way farther and more treacherous than a normal tracing of a triangle

[@keironevans5874]

If anyone's looking for a one piece ttrpg system, there's a Spanish one called Seapunk Unleashed, it's got mechanics for all the established one piece mechanics, just with some numbers scrubbed off

[@maksymovcharov6885]

3:57 Yes, put your theses there!!! One Piece is not long enough!!!

[@paulharkenrider5643]

There’s actually already a campaign on KZbin based on one piece it’s called just roll with it riptide

[@sebastianwarmbrodt6725]

KRAKEN WEEEEK

[@zombiejong9441]

Kraken Week!!

[@cimex7492]

Good thing Ive been running a one piece campaign for 6 months

[@Mastattak]

I would loooove to play in a campaign like this one, it seems simply delightful Not sure if I’d like to dm it tho, I think I would end up overthinking about the possible islands my players would encounter and spiral into feeling overwhelmed 😂

[@Bysthedragon]

I am currently playing in a Pokemon X Digimon D&D campaign. My character is a Salazzle Swashbuckler Rogue named Captain Kaida "The Empress" LaCroix The Future Queen of the Pirates! She grew up reading adventure stories and really latched onto characters inspired by Jack Swellow and Ambi. D Pom, so she has this more Fun Anti-hero outlook on the world. One of the other player's is very much Kaida's Foil. Our Fighter Bishardramon the Bishardramon (He used to be a Bisharp but he has turned himself into a Digimon.) He grew up as a Mercenary and knows all the ins and outs of Criminal business, will take almost any contract he believes is fair business, and has forced Devils and Archfey to sign deals with him!

[@Staklihen]

Can Bishardramon the Bishardramon evolve/digivolve into a Digimon version of Kingambit?

[@Bysthedragon]

@@Staklihen Nah, the player doesn't really like Kingambit but he came up with his own Digimon evolutions of his character.

[@pheralanpathfinder4897]

Kraken Week!!!!

[@Shka_maru]

Dunno how or why KZbin recommended this to me but I'm sooo grateful haha. Great video. And great example. Just curious, could you explain more about that campaign flowchart you made? I'm definitely someone who is more spatial thinking so seeing a story via flowcharts, relationship maps, etc help me grasp information. Do you teach this method of design? How/where can I learn? I have many story ideas and would like to implement this. Thanks!

[@gabsinventions9135]

Not sure, but your is the only one I finished so far 😂

[@huemins]

One Piece + Atlantis is very likely One Piece current - final arc

[@saqwana25]

i will always say i think if i was able to control i would have there be no treasure that blackbeard's treasure was the seas themselves and the adventure with your crew.

[@davidpeacock8276]

Dope

[@FarothFuin]

i always thought of that i think onepiece is just a dnd campaign that oda plays/master and they allow crits on skillchecks on nat20s, even for the dumbest sh1t, and it gets out of hand and maybe they dont play all together but just sometimes, which explain why the party always ends up separated, because they play on different days and what a group does on one day it affects other group and so on And ot get out of hand, maybe they even play on text, maybe some guest player that played as an npc wanted to keep playing as that npc and gets out of hand, like the deception skill of buggy the clown and some nat20s later, he became a sea emperor without having more than level 5 character sheet for the npc And they just keep playing Maybe the dm and other players get searated once for a very long time so they played the shabaody arc and the dm described dramatically how they get separated and the luffy player didnt want ace to die so he runs up on discord with the dm and he keep getting allies and rolling nat20s so it keeps going and going until the dm keeps pulling deux ex machina over and over but the player keeps rolling nat20s and make a mess of the arc until finally the dm just outright kills the npc so they can stop playing for the timeskip that they use to level up and learn new skills i mea, it maes total sense Also: luffy would be a barbarian giant but playing a halfling lightfoot

[@TheLordofMetroids]

Important note about the points given on the poneglyphs, they are NOT where the poneglyph is, they are a completely different location. While you are right that when you know theee locations you have drastically narrowed the location of the one piece down, you are sailing into the unknown to find it, and we have been shown several times that is a REALLY bad Idea in One Piece. Also your geographic formula assumes that both all four given locations are on sea level and that the final location is also on sea level. This may not be the case as we have seen islands both in the clouds and on the ocean floor.

[@StanNotSoSaint]

It's not like Luffy is too dumb to understand that three points give a finite space to search in. I mean, he is, but his crewmembers would figure it out. But I'm willing to bet he will refuse this option on the basis of it being fucking lame

[@Jeffcostarica]

How do you handle ship-to-ship combat? There are books and rules, but I'm wondering if you have any homebrewed rules or just do it as written. Thank you in advance.

[@Trekiros]

I experimented with a bunch of different ways which were not great - the outcome of that experimentation was my video on spelljammer. Thing is the solution I came up with only works if your seafaring campaign is sufficiently wacky - and mine was, since it was inspired by One Piece. If you're shooting for realism, what I talk about in that video probably won't work for you (that's why I ended up framing it as a spelljammer video instead of a general ship combat video)

[@Opportunity_Drive]

praise the algo

[@blakenoir7890]

Hello Trekiros, I was wondering. At 15:29 you mention "all the nerdy things i've talked about" and put up a list. I was wondering if you have videos that take a deeper dive into those mechanics? I looked through your video title cards but couldn't find anything.

[@blakenoir7890]

I'm also subscribed :) so i did my homework lol

[@Trekiros]

Yeah I have to title the videos something else because if I titled the video "orthogonal unit differentiation", for example, then people who already know what it is woyldn't get much value out of the video, and people who would get a lot of value out of the video wouldn't click on it... just youtube things 😅 So from memory: -Orthogonal Unit Differentiation => my video on mass combat -Signposting/Differentiation => my video on FPS maps -Weenies/hub and spokes dungeons => my video on zelda & disneyland -kishōtenketsu => my video on stealth -the fichtean curve => my video on world maps (I think? It could also be zelda) -tree-shaped world maps => my video on world maps (this time for sure) -restrictions breed creativity => my video on megadungeons -mechanics/dynamics/aesthetics => my "big announcements" video from february -endowed progress => my video on One Piece aka this one right here :p -the soren johnson quote, you know the one => next video 😉

[@blakenoir7890]

@@Trekiros YOU DA MAN! (or women, idk lol)... Thank you for this very well detailed and articulated response. I'll be referencing this in the future :) Many thanks

[@brandcolt]

What physical tool do you use to write your notes and make that visio looking page?

[@Trekiros]

No physical tool, just Excalidraw which is a free website

[@vonkug]

Vis-a-vis 6:30 ish, you would only need at most two liths to have two places to look. Ifyou had three you would know 100% where to look.

[@kdavidsmith1]

The Hat sent me.

[@Artist_ash-is5os]

Love the video, but just one small thing as a massive one piece fan, its never stated how the poneglyphs will reveal Laughtale, them coming together to make an x was a visual representation in the manga, thats not how it actually works as far as we know

[@larilaa]

❤

[@Guelxius]

In One piece exist island below suface of ocean like gyojin and in the sky , like skypie arc , so , 2D mark island can be solución with 3 parts . But in a 3d plane you can find the X with 3 parts realy I think . So yeah you dont need to change so much this objective

[@orpheus1138]

It's a bit ironic that my group is running a Sunday One Piece campaign.

[@teicreates]

8:38 This would be true, but we also know there is no world map in One Piece, and who's to say *how close* the 4 islands might be.

[@kevoreilly6557]

Play 7th Seas for pirate fun