What should a Worldwide D&D Gameday adventure have?

In another thread it was suggested that the 2006 Worldwide D&D Gameday adventure, and characters, were lacking. Clark Petersen of Necromancer Games said he might create an adventure and characters to be used next year. It was also suggested that we an ENWorld should do so.

In your opinion, what should go into an adventure (and maybe the characters) if we were to design an adventure for next year's Worldwide D&D Gameday?

As I said in the other thread, I'm of the opinion that the adventure should showcase the 'iconic' D&D experience. Furthermore, since it would be aimed at people who likely haven't gamed before, it should endeavour to avoid as much of the complexity of the game as possible. Finally, since it's a one-shot deal, the adventure should be playable from start to finish in four hours.

Based on that, my thinking is that the ideal would be a low-level dungeon crawl, featuring (I think) six encounters: three combat, one roleplay, one trap, and one 'special'. I nominate 4th level as the ideal level for the PCs, as at that level the PCs have some cool abilities, and are not so fragile that one hit will take them out of the game, but haven't yet gained access to many of the more complex spells (I think the Fly spell represents the first significant jump in complexity).

Being a time-constrained one-shot, I think it's entirely appropriate for the party to be railroaded into the adventure ("So, you find yourself trapped in the dungeon. What do you do now?"), although beyond that they should be free to make their own decisions.

And, since it's aimed at newcomers, it would be a good idea to have one of those three combat encounters near the start of the game, and to use nice simple opponents for that combat. Both to get the players used to D&D combat, and also to get the blood pumping early.

Some more thoughts:

I'm inclined to think that the adventure should be created first, and the sample characters generated afterwards, with reference to the adventure. There's absolutely no point in creating a sample Sorcerer with only fire-based spells if all the beasties in the adventure are immune to fire, for example.

Each character should be similarly iconic to their class, simple to run, and should be good at one or two things, preferably things that no other character can do, or at least do as well. (So, while it's okay for the Fighter and Paladin to both be good at combat, the Fighter should be better, while the Paladin should have something else going on. But then, that's normal for a class-based system.) Avoid multiclassing, as while it's fun it can also be complex.

Ideally, characters with a PHB class should be generated using Core Rules only. But it's also a good idea to have several characters with classes from other books. In which case, those characters should be created with Core Rules + 1 book (I think).

Sample character sheets should be formatted so that all the game information fits on a single sheet of paper. Even better would be to fit the game information and the background on one side of paper, but I think that might be unrealistic. (Oh, and sample characters should have a background. And make those backgrounds fun. Give the players something to get their teeth into.)

It should go without saying that House Rules need avoided like the plague. In fact, I would recommend that the adventure itself be written assuming a DM of indeterminate skill. Therefore, extensive advice on how one might stage a given encounter would be useful. It should be noted clearly as advice, though, providing reminders of key information and rules, rather than some sort of straight-jacket forcing the DM to run things a particular way (after all, having an actual DM is probably the key benefit of pen-and-paper games over computer RPGs, so let's not throw that away!).

Finally: handouts!

For disposable magic items, item cards are a great thing, especially for a first adventure. Give each player one or two cards to hold and trade in at appropriate times.

Further, if there's a puzzle in the game, some sort of visual aid would be a good thing. (One example: if there's some text for the Wizard to decipher, give the players a sheet with the encoded text on it. If they make the Decipher Script check, give them the cipher key. And, have a backup with the solution on hand, just in case they still struggle.)

A reason for the party to just not run away from the adventure locale.

Four encounters of moderate (but not deadly) difficulty. Of those four, the party should be able to overcome one by stealth and one by diplomacy.

Each class should have a chance to shine - there should be undead for the cleric to turn, favored enemies for the ranger to hit on, hidden evil for the paladin to detect, arcane writings for the wizard to decipher, and so on.

I think the level should be a little higher - say 5ht or 6th. Yes some problematic spells start then, but so do those iconic ones too, that let the wizard be a wizard. Namely - fireball. Really - what wizard doesn't want a fireball.

As for the adventure a couple points.
1. There should be an 'easy' encounter. One where you just mop the floor with the bad guys. It let's you feel heroic, you flex your muscles, and its fun.
2. There should be a final tough encounter - maybe not a single BBEG nessecarily, a pair would work well. But that point where you know - this is where I have to spend everything I got.
3. The big loot pile at the end doesn't work as well as the big loot gets in the middle thus letting you beat the end. The Curse got this right I think (well, at least the way we went through).

So in order:
1. A ECL equal fight
2. A ECL equal fight that can be bypassed by diplomacy (or the other way around).
3. A puzzle behind which lies treasure that helps with BBEG.
A split in the path
4a. A ECL - 2 fight with multiple foes (think - swarm of kobolds or skeletons rushing you)
4b. A ECL -1 fight with a few foes (think a 2 ogres, 3 wights etc)
5. BBEG (or 2). ECL +2.

(ok another fight in there would probably be good.)

That's how I'd see it lay out.
As for books I'd stick with core, the only addition I'd say is PHB2. Other books need more compliments (complete needs 4, races need 3 etc). Unless it is set in say Eberron (which would require details on warforged etc), or there is a new product out next year that is a 1 book stand alone goodness.
-cpd

delericho said:

Ideally, characters with a PHB class should be generated using Core Rules only.

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I would disagree if WotC was creating the characters. For us, however,we have the issue of respecting copyrights balanced with giving enough information for the character to be playable.

I'd say only non-core feats that can be added into a characters stats should actually be used. For example, the Least Dragonmark from Eberron would just add +2 to one skill and have a spell-like ability added to the character, so it would work.

A dungeon... an a dragon.

And then the rest to get those two together is just frosting on the cake.

Well since WotC didn't send my FLGS a retailer kit for this years D&D day (despite siad retailer asking over a month ahead of time) I made up some intro characters and adventures to run for that day.

I used 8th level characters (and had all spells selected before hand so I could weed out the time killer spells like Evard BTs) and the 3 neophyte players I had liked it so much that 2 of them are most likely joining my Friday night gaming group! It was great seeing the guy, who had never played an RPG before in his life, saying "Well I could just smash that lousy orc down but I think my dwarven blood (he was playing a Dwarven Fighter) is up and I have to take down that Ogre!" He really got 'into' it and I had to surpress a smile when I saw that and the 14 yearold who came up with witty quips when he was about to knock down some baddie. It was a simple, straight forward dungeon smash and grab and everyone seemed to love it. I used the Fantastic Location maps for Fields of Ruin as well as D&D painted minis. All of the characters were single classed built only using the PHB. I kept feats to things that added to saves, BAB and skill checks just to ensure it was as simple as I could make it whiel still keeping some of the lure of 3E. There are a few things I would do differently (number one is not getting a virus the night before!) but overall it was a success.

schporto said:

I think the level should be a little higher - say 5ht or 6th. Yes some problematic spells start then, but so do those iconic ones too, that let the wizard be a wizard. Namely - fireball. Really - what wizard doesn't want a fireball.

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On reflection, 5th level has a big advantage - at that level the Wizard gets 3rd level spells, while the Sorcerer only has 2nd level spells. This means there's a genuine choice as to which class to use, whereas at 4th level, for a one-shot, you're virtually guaranteed to be better off taking the Sorcerer.

Plus, just because Fly is a 3rd level spell doesn't mean that this particular 5th level Wizard needs to be able to cast it.

Glyfair said:

I would disagree if WotC was creating the characters. For us, however,we have the issue of respecting copyrights balanced with giving enough information for the character to be playable.

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Ah, yes, the pesky legal stuff

I'm inclined to think that the entire thing should exist as a single pdf (or equivalent) that interested DMs can download, print, and run without significant further preparation. That would indicate that the sample character sheets should be in the form that they'll be handed to players. So, to be safe, we should probably make it d20 compatible, and stick to only materials in the SRD (technically, we could use anything that's open content, but I suspect we don't want to open that floodgate until we've got the punters hooked ).

There's no reason, however, why we couldn't include a blank character sheet. Then, anyone who is particularly inspired could add additional characters, and from whatever source they wished.

Glyfair said:

I'd say only non-core feats that can be added into a characters stats should actually be used. For example, the Least Dragonmark from Eberron would just add +2 to one skill and have a spell-like ability added to the character, so it would work.

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If we're going the d20 route, this is a non-issue. However, in general I don't see the real difference between a Core and a non-Core feat. If the Pregens are designed so they can be run directly from the sheet (and I think they should), we'd need to explain the feats, spells and magic items (in brief) on the sheet anyway. And that would apply regardless of whether they're from the PHB or elsewhere. The only difference would be a notation (Eberron Campaign Setting, p.XX).

Of course, if we feel confident in giving sample characters from any source, but only explaining things from the SRD, then you're right about only using the simplest of the simple game elements.

Woas said:

A dungeon... an a dragon.

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Yeah, featuring a dragon would probably be a good idea. That said, if we're dealing with low-level characters, having a 'real' dragon becomes problematic. If we cap the maximum CR at 7 or so, that limits us to Juvenlie and Young dragons, which probably aren't the most awe-inspiring of opponents.

delericho said:

Yeah, featuring a dragon would probably be a good idea. That said, if we're dealing with low-level characters, having a 'real' dragon becomes problematic. If we cap the maximum CR at 7 or so, that limits us to Juvenlie and Young dragons, which probably aren't the most awe-inspiring of opponents.

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Fighting a dragon is a problem for this sort of game. Make the dragon an NPC (ally or neutral).