Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Help me make WotC adventures better.
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 5108147" data-attributes="member: 29398"><p>A few thoughts, hopefully good for adventures for any edition:</p><p></p><p>1. Make the adventure itself the star. Don't worry about showcasing the neat new developments (Keep on the Shadowfell was bad for this in 4e, Sunless Citadel ditto in 3e) but instead just come up with a cracking good adventure and let the new developments showcase themselves (Forge of Fury in 3e was quite good in this regard). One test for any new adventure might be to convert and playtest it in each of the other editions...if it plays well in all of them, then it's probably a good adventure.</p><p></p><p>2. Make sure the adventure stands alone. Many (if not most) DMs are not necessarily going to run your adventures one after the other in the order written, but instead are going to drop 'em into their campaign where it makes sense to do so. The less your adventure depends on outside story or other adventures, the more chance it has of being played.</p><p></p><p>In 3e, Forge of Fury again was good for this. In 4e, while I converted KotS to 1e and ran it I did not do the same for H2, as it seemed on reading to be much more dependent on having previously played KotS than I was looking for.</p><p></p><p>3. Layout, layout, layout. Take lessons from 1e in how to lay out an adventure. Put the overall map on a detachable or separate piece of card stock heavy enough to stand on its own and thus pull double duty as a DM screen. Don't get stuck on one page-spread per encounter - some take more to describe fully, some take less; and you can save lots of space by leaving the map out of the encounter description and putting all the detail in the overall map instead. Write in point form if you have to - the information is more important than the syntax - and you don't need 16-point or 20-point headers for "Tactics", "Treasure", etc. in every write-up; simple bolding or use of a different colour will do and this'll save a bunch more space.</p><p></p><p>4. Think like a character, and write accordingly. An example of the sort of thing I'd like to see done better is the last encounter area in Keep on the Shadowfell - the area and opponents are written up well enough (well, except for Kalarel's magic items, but that's not my point here) but after Kalarel dies the DM is given no help at all in the "what comes next" department. The module seems to expect the PCs to simply leave after slaying Kalarel, but most inquisitive PCs aren't going to settle for that; they're going to start poking around, and the DM is left hanging. For example, how can the PCs close the gate? Or conversely, how can they finish opening it? And in both cases, if not, why not? What are the basic stats of the Thing in case the PCs decide to start shooting at it, like mine did? And so on.</p><p></p><p>Either that, or at least put a note in the room's write-up stating that it is left up to the DM to sort these things out as s-he sees fit, so the DM has some warning and guidance.</p><p></p><p>5. Try to avoid battlemat-style maps unless it's all open and visible terrain. While the battlemats are great for minis combat and are far more colourful and detailed than any map I'll ever draw on a chalkboard, they inevitably end up giving away more information to the players than their characters would know...and players sometimes forget this and use said extra information to their advantage.</p><p></p><p>6. In a standard dungeon-style adventure, terconnect the levels and sections more. This allows for an adventure to play differently on repeated use, as the party has more choice in which ways to go and thus might not encounter obstacles and opposition in any predictable order. KotS, for example, has only one possible entrance and only one possible way to get from level 1 down to level 2. A second (secret) entrance from the outdoors and about 3 more connections (stairways, elevators, hidden shafts leading to trap doors, whatever) between levels 1 and 2 would do wonders here! And in a dungeon with more than two underground levels, make sure there's always one staircase that bypasses a level completely. (thus, if there's 4 levels and you enter on level 2, there's at least 2 connections* between each neighbouring pair of levels, along with a set of stairs that goes straight from level 1 to level 3 (with no exit to 2) and maybe another that goes from 2 to 4)</p><p></p><p>I can't think offhand of a published adventure that does this really well.</p><p></p><p>* - then make sure the opposition uses these connections to their advantage! <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /></p><p></p><p>Hope this helps! <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /></p><p></p><p>Lan-"and release the converted version for each edition, too"-efan</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Lanefan, post: 5108147, member: 29398"] A few thoughts, hopefully good for adventures for any edition: 1. Make the adventure itself the star. Don't worry about showcasing the neat new developments (Keep on the Shadowfell was bad for this in 4e, Sunless Citadel ditto in 3e) but instead just come up with a cracking good adventure and let the new developments showcase themselves (Forge of Fury in 3e was quite good in this regard). One test for any new adventure might be to convert and playtest it in each of the other editions...if it plays well in all of them, then it's probably a good adventure. 2. Make sure the adventure stands alone. Many (if not most) DMs are not necessarily going to run your adventures one after the other in the order written, but instead are going to drop 'em into their campaign where it makes sense to do so. The less your adventure depends on outside story or other adventures, the more chance it has of being played. In 3e, Forge of Fury again was good for this. In 4e, while I converted KotS to 1e and ran it I did not do the same for H2, as it seemed on reading to be much more dependent on having previously played KotS than I was looking for. 3. Layout, layout, layout. Take lessons from 1e in how to lay out an adventure. Put the overall map on a detachable or separate piece of card stock heavy enough to stand on its own and thus pull double duty as a DM screen. Don't get stuck on one page-spread per encounter - some take more to describe fully, some take less; and you can save lots of space by leaving the map out of the encounter description and putting all the detail in the overall map instead. Write in point form if you have to - the information is more important than the syntax - and you don't need 16-point or 20-point headers for "Tactics", "Treasure", etc. in every write-up; simple bolding or use of a different colour will do and this'll save a bunch more space. 4. Think like a character, and write accordingly. An example of the sort of thing I'd like to see done better is the last encounter area in Keep on the Shadowfell - the area and opponents are written up well enough (well, except for Kalarel's magic items, but that's not my point here) but after Kalarel dies the DM is given no help at all in the "what comes next" department. The module seems to expect the PCs to simply leave after slaying Kalarel, but most inquisitive PCs aren't going to settle for that; they're going to start poking around, and the DM is left hanging. For example, how can the PCs close the gate? Or conversely, how can they finish opening it? And in both cases, if not, why not? What are the basic stats of the Thing in case the PCs decide to start shooting at it, like mine did? And so on. Either that, or at least put a note in the room's write-up stating that it is left up to the DM to sort these things out as s-he sees fit, so the DM has some warning and guidance. 5. Try to avoid battlemat-style maps unless it's all open and visible terrain. While the battlemats are great for minis combat and are far more colourful and detailed than any map I'll ever draw on a chalkboard, they inevitably end up giving away more information to the players than their characters would know...and players sometimes forget this and use said extra information to their advantage. 6. In a standard dungeon-style adventure, terconnect the levels and sections more. This allows for an adventure to play differently on repeated use, as the party has more choice in which ways to go and thus might not encounter obstacles and opposition in any predictable order. KotS, for example, has only one possible entrance and only one possible way to get from level 1 down to level 2. A second (secret) entrance from the outdoors and about 3 more connections (stairways, elevators, hidden shafts leading to trap doors, whatever) between levels 1 and 2 would do wonders here! And in a dungeon with more than two underground levels, make sure there's always one staircase that bypasses a level completely. (thus, if there's 4 levels and you enter on level 2, there's at least 2 connections* between each neighbouring pair of levels, along with a set of stairs that goes straight from level 1 to level 3 (with no exit to 2) and maybe another that goes from 2 to 4) I can't think offhand of a published adventure that does this really well. * - then make sure the opposition uses these connections to their advantage! :) Hope this helps! :) Lan-"and release the converted version for each edition, too"-efan [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Help me make WotC adventures better.
Top