The party meets in a tavern

>you're in prison together
"the good new is theres a way to commute your death sentences"
"the bad news? well...ever heard of Acererak?
oh no reason...."

>hired hands for an archaeology expedition/wizards unwitting test subjects/caravan guards/etc
>in prison for various reasons, in a town that's being invaded by pirates yes, pirates of the caribbean
>backstories crafted where they have some familiarity with each other and can craft something by themselves while i sit on my ass and rub my nipples with dollar-store vibrators

A big fancy ball is another good one although it's sort of Tavern 2.0. You can give every character a reason to be there. Warrior invited for saving the prince, bard is entertainment, rogue hoping to use the crowd as cover for a robbery. Work it out with your players.

Then some plot shenanigans happen and they're thrown in the deep end together. The king is murdered, BBEG bursts through the roof. Whatever's convinient.

gotta agree with this. even though I love bringing PCs together in a creative and believable way, last time was so much pain i sort of decided never ever doing that again

They meet during a break from the now mandatory "sensitivity training" required to get their adventurer's licence...

One of the best ways I ever put PCs together was that I just started the first session saying they were part of a group of mercenaries, and got hired to do a mission. A few details about it:

> The group technically had more members. The reason the PCs were the one called was because they were the ones available at the moment (his was helpful because sometimes new players would join for one session, or regular players would miss one session)
> Being a "mercenary" wasn't a bad thing - where they lived, being a mercenary just meant being a hired dude, and not necessary meant doing evil shit. For instance, their first mission was to investigate a potential case of corruption in the government
> It was easy because that implied they all knew each other at least a bit, and already gave a reasonable reason for why all of them were on the same mission

>The PCs meet on a tavern
>The PCs meet under a tavern
>The PCs meet in a whorehouse
>The PCs meet in a whore
>The PCs meet in a whore the size of a tavern
>The PCs are scavengers and meet while eating the remains of a dragon
>The PCs meet on the playground
>The PCs meet as jury members
>The PCs are the Three Stooges plus Laurel and Hardy
>The PCs beat their meat

>The PCs meet a whore on the playground
>The PCs beat their meat on the playground

If we are talking a group of randoms with no other connection, then having a scenario that quickly puts the group in jeaprody is a good idea, since it will force co-operation in a semi-realistic fashion. The next question is how good your party members are at role-playing, and how many prefer introverted characters. With extroverts they should get to know eachother well enough over time, otherwise it would be good to hold their hands a bit and have some inciting incidents that call back to their backstories. A good call to action can work wonders.

But, yeah. Avoiding random groups is a good thing since I have been involved in multiple such groups and no one cares about eachother beyond their utility. If you want a good game, people should know their characters and know eachothers characters. Even knowing each others backstories OOC could lead to some IC discoveries by the very heroic theme of destined coincidence.

This is my strategy as well, parties that already have established ties are the best way to do it. In the future I may even incorporate something like suggests to help them feel out each others' characters better.

Personal favorite from Curse of Strahd

Entire party is whisked away from wherever they are and deposited together in a far away land

>You all awaken in a dark, dank prison cell.
>You slowly rise from your rest, and stumble a bit as the cart buckles on the road. You've been travelling on the caravan for days now, and haven't yet met the rest of your counterparts...
>With a crashing roar, fire fills the sky above your head. Your vision is blurry and your hearing dulled! A crowd is rushing by you, and you instinctively grab hold of some well-equipped persons n the fray. Together. you rush to safety under the nearest building's awning...

I mean, not that the tavern is bad (i.e. The Yawning Portal), but it is a little 'tired'. Mind you, it's all in the delivery.

It is obviously harder and requires good, or at least decent roleplaying, but I like to introduce my players to each other in a action situation. Or at least some of them.

In Delta Green, one was being held in a government black site and the two came via chopper posing as officials to get him out. Before they could do that, 'things' started happening.

In Dark Crusade, two ware being accused by an Inquisitor for crimes they didn't commit, and a third was a would-be executioner that saw the holes in all of it, then the whole place blows up.

You know, like in the shitty 90's action movies.

The PCs wake up in hell together.

They're all, for one reason or another, in the same dungeon, each on a separate individual quest.

>It's four in the morning and you all just got thrown out of the same tavern
>Your characters each tried to go to the tavern but it's closed for rennovations
>You're all trying to get in to the tavern but the bouncer isn't letting you through
>Your characters own and operate the tavern and your customers are complaining about a group of mid-level adventurers who are getting rowdy
>You're at the cabaret but the entertainment hasn't shown up and the customers are starting to get impatient; somehow, you've been convinced to fill in
>You're at the opera but the diva you were hoping to see isn't performing tonight and her replacement is completely off-pitch
>The home team just won the Superbowl. You're trying to get home, but the riots have already started

Nice trips

I overlooked this post last night. This actually sound like a great idea.

>You all meet in a city currently under siege

State the players already know each other, and they get to decide exactly how that occured.

The party in my current campaign met like this
>Arrive in a new city
>hear of a grand game type event being held
>exact nature of the game is kept secret even to contestants, but it is said to be dangerous and have a grand prize for the winners
>players sign up, some for money, some for glory
>"random" selection happens and they all end up in a team together
>turns out to be a battle royale type event, last team standing wins
>now have to work together to survive the game
It was a bit silly but we had fun

You all meet in a Bathhouse.

You meet him at the Opium den.

> 1. Someone reasonably refusing you something is not an excuse for a murder rampage.

Look at that chink's face lmao

One I always wanted to dry (as DM):
> "Player 1, you wake up somewhere so dark you can't see a thing. First thing you notice is that you are feeling VERY cold, and that you are naked."
> Player 1 moves around the place, trying to figure out what happened. Eventually, he touch something that seems like a corpse.
> "Player 2, you wake up with someone touch your "
> Fast forward, all the players wake up in the same place, all feeling cold and being naked.
> Everyone is actually now an undead.
> When all of them get up, someone come in. The NPC is also an undead, and explain that all of them had died in different situations, but their corpses were found and resurrected by this awesome princess.
> Princess is a spirit that lives in a haunted castle, the only other sentient undead servant (besides the PCs) is the guy who greeted them.
> Players start to do quest for the princess, she's a very nice leader.
> Eventually find out she was actually the one that killed each one of them.
> But she she actually did it because she felt lonely, and needed extra help to save her from people that want to destroy her spirit merely because she an undead spirit.
> Explain that their undead lives are connected to her, if someone destroy her spirit, she dies.

From that, players can either keep working for her, just say "fuck you" and leave, try to destroy her (which is sort of suicidal), or perhaps even try to find a way to get free of the bound with her.

I think this is interesting, because its a bit more original than just "you wake up in a prison" (even though is the same idea, basically), and also might fuck up with clerics and paladins if there's any in the group (because now they are undead and have mixed feelings about everything).

>You all meet in an outhouse.

> if someone destroy her spirit, THEY die.
shit i'm bad at writing

>Plot twist: she's lying

I had them meeting on a ship on route to the campaign setting. The ship was then attacked by pirates.

That sorta reminds me I once started a campain where the entire party woke up in a swamp after being abducted cultists as an ill thought out sacrifice for some froggy kinda people.

>2. You can't murder someone just because "Uh i guess his shirt is kinda bad taste ?"

The party meets standing in the remains of their mutual friend, john tavern. Their job is now to find and avenge tavern.

>>The home team just won the Superbowl. You're trying to get home, but the riots have already started
That was actually the start of one of mine. Ended with us all joining in and finding out half the riot was made out of zombies.

I do this, and I also usually add some sort of pre-existing goals or authority figures ordering the PCs around until they gain enough reputation and knowledge to start making decisions. Like if the group is part of a guild, they might have standing instructions to accomplish XYZ as an intro quest. It lets me start things off super simple without a lore dump.

>12 angry PCs
>"when does the adventure start? This is stupid let's just call him guilty"

That's got some potential, actually.

Storytime?

Tfw an opium fiend shits himself before he dies

You all met in a tavern.

Like you should. You fucking work in this place, remember mister "my debt list is too long to be swallowed up by the Tarrasque" and miss "oh, this is gonna be such a great plan to get incriminating details on the baron"?
Better not screw it up AGAIN. And bard, that dwarf merchant is feeling up your ass again, what do you do?

Shoulda gone with
> The PCs meet while eating dragon meat

The standard in-universe meeting is at a tavern they arranged to meet at after completing their apprenticeships in 4 different fields chosen so they could go adventuring together in adulthood.