DMs: How Much of Your Prep Work Never Gets Used??

[Crothian]

How about yours?

My current group always go where I expect them to.

 

[DonTadow]

Here's a related question, too: how quickly does your party go compared to what you expect? In other words, I wrote what I expected to be a night's adventure. The pcs only got half way through it. Typically, the party seems to either go much faster or much slower than I expect. (Hard to gauge why....)

How about yours?

With interaction stuff and mysteries the party usually goes faster than I expect because there are some pretty smart cookies in the party. Dungeon wise the party usually goes slower than I expect. Mostly because they play out rests and camping in dungeons. I also have heavy percentages for night fighting. So a dungeon crawl usually winds up being longer than expected.

 

[Thia Halmades]

Eh... dammit. You know, probably 30% of the material is used as I expected. Another 30% or so has to be revised (expounded on, rebuilt, modified, have HP added or taken away, etc.) on the fly. There's at least 30% of it that was pure background information, and I didn't realize it at the time, but it makes the whole thing much deeper and richer, so while it doesn't get used (for example: character histories for dead people) it makes learning about the dead people, and other NPCs memories of those people, far more in depth.

Then there's the 10% I just have to toss, because it wasn't Scottish.

 

[amethal]

I'm such an underprepared DM that I'd say the amount of prepaeration that is wasted is greatly outnumbered by the amount of stuff I've made up on the spot.

I wish my players would show the initiative more, and stop worrying about what they are "supposed" to be doing. After all, since I'm making a lot of this stuff up as I go along anyway, they might as well take advantage of it.

 

[Desdichado]

Not used initially: very small percentage; 10-20% tops. And only about 10-20% of that subset doesn't get reworked and used shortly.

 

[Scribe Ineti]

So all you other gms, how about you? How much of your advance prep never gets used?

Maybe 5 percent? If I don't use something in a given session, the material goes back into the hopper and gets used somewhere down the line in the game, sometimes reworked, and sometimes as is without the players being any the wiser.

 

[Hjorimir]

I'd say that about 2/3rds of my prep gets tossed away. I really run very open campaigns, which forces me to prepare in many different directions. This is something that I'm actually working to change by forcing a tighter focus on my players as they transition from one plot to another.

 

[Eloi]

I use the four lines approach - one arrow for the PCs to follow if they are feeling heroic, which they can follow and feel quite good about. Second arrow is the cowcatcher: event that sweeps up the players even if they aren't seeking trouble. Third arrow is the plot taking place behind the scenes, which the players who are haring off in their own direction foul themselves up on. Fourth is "apropos of nothing", the goings-on which are only percieved if characters unintentionally fail their rolls to notice what's going on - and discover something that gives them greater insight as to the workings of the Universe. (You could call this Serendipity.)

One: A young lass needs an enchanted needle back, which she lost somehere in the hayfield.

Two (provided no one takes action): Criers announce a reward for the enchanted needle, somewhere in Farmer Fiveleaves' hayfields.

Three: The Trolls want to attack the town, but this strange increase in light and sound in the fields is disheartening them. Perhaps they will wait for someone to leave town, and eat them.

Four: Looked for a needle in a haystack, totally failed to find anything, picked a haystack to sleep against, and found the farmer's youngest daughter, asleep, with an ensorcelled needle in her hand.