D&D 5E Down to six pages of prep work

Grainger said:

There's clearly a happy medium of prep time to play time. Unless you railroad the players, there's always the chance that your prep goes out the window anyway, so you probably shouldn't do too much (e.g. my players recently choose not to meet two major NPCs for whom I'd done tons of prep, and for whom I was sure I'd dangled enough hooks; fair enough, but frustrating for me). Really, the trick is to think about the game world so that you have a sense of the sorts of things that might happen, whatever (reasonable) path the players will take.

That said, as a player I wouldn't enjoy playing in a game where the DM did little to no prep - I'm pretty sure I would detect it, and it would feel like the world wasn't sufficiently real - (unless the DM knew the world inside-out, either because it was a long-established setting, or because he/she did a great deal of thinking about the world between sessions; for me this counts as prep, even if nothing is written down specifically for that session).

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I had recently done a whole lot of prep work in creating a segue to an underdark adventure featuring Return to White Plume Mountain. I had NPCs, a map, the plot hooks, really everything the characters would NEED to follow the path, but the idea of going back underground after such a hard slog through Wave Echo Cave frankly scared them, so they opted for another solution to the problem they had (a cursed character). So ultimately i had to throw all of my prep work out the window and accommodate them instead of forcing them down a path. The NEW path they followed featured a whole adventure into a sewer with vampires, and after prepping that quite a bit, it frankly frightened them to the point that they feared for their lives and opted for another resolution. And i followed their in-game queues and adjusted the story on the fly. Yes, it meant that a lot of my notes and a really nice map were not used.

And this was all done after careful consideration after what i thought they would do, guessing their actions, anticipating possible outcomes, and they still went down a unique path. I'm not complaining, it worked out fine in the end, but it's a good lesson that if you really want the story to evolve organically you have to be ready to adapt and flow with the players decisions.

Hum. Well I currently have a campaign that's sort of sandbox/hecrawlish going that I prepped for over the weekend....about 5 hours writing generated 19 pages of location descriptions and a detailed map with 5 miles to the hex/square (about 250X300 or thereabouts). Listed about three dozen locations, then added detailed encounter charts for swamps, mountains, forests and roads in the area, worked up three overarching plot themes and then called it quits. The first night on Saturday had everyone explore roughly 1/3rd of a page of what I had prepped but they had a blast, so I think the content I have ready now ought to last about 10-15 sessions before the well starts to run dry.

OTOH I've been gaming for 35 years now and I never throw anything away that I can't recycle....but lately I've been relying on new stuff just for fun. So while it is easy to just dig into the old archives and do some quick conversion to 5E, I'm enjoying a chance to generate lots of new stuff for the settings.

Agamon said:

Have you considered a magnetic whiteboard? I've used one to track initiative and conditions since the early 3e days. I use a handheld-sized one that came with magnetic strips that hold cardboard tags you can write on. So each PC gets a tag, then I have "Enemy 1," "Enemy 2," etc, for foes, as well as colored magnets for conditions. I let one of the players do the tracking (less work for me) and just mark in my notes which baddie is which number. Works great with no up front work.

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Up until this thread I had not. Now that I've thought about it though, it's a great idea. I just don't know whether or not I'll have time to grab one before our session but it's definitely something I can manage before our second one.

Agamon said:

Have you considered a magnetic whiteboard? I've used one to track initiative and conditions since the early 3e days. I use a handheld-sized one that came with magnetic strips that hold cardboard tags you can write on. So each PC gets a tag, then I have "Enemy 1," "Enemy 2," etc, for foes, as well as colored magnets for conditions. I let one of the players do the tracking (less work for me) and just mark in my notes which baddie is which number. Works great with no up front work.

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You can also use the count-down method. 25, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20... the player will interrupt you when it's his turn to move (resolve ties normally), narrate his turn, and then resume counting on your behalf. 19, 18...

emdw45 said:

You can also use the count-down method. 25, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20... the player will interrupt you when it's his turn to move (resolve ties normally), narrate his turn, and then resume counting on your behalf. 19, 18...

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We used that method until last week. Last week I got notecards, one per character and one for mobs, I think had everyone roll initiative and then just ordered the cards in initiative order. It went much faster. It also had the added benefit of making it easy when someone delays an action, you just move their card in the stack.

AriochQ said:

We used that method until last week. Last week I got notecards, one per character and one for mobs, I think had everyone roll initiative and then just ordered the cards in initiative order. It went much faster. It also had the added benefit of making it easy when someone delays an action, you just move their card in the stack.

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5e doesn't have a delay action, and ready doesn't move your position. Though it would be an easy house rule to implement, I suppose.

I used index cards for a while, and the magnetic whiteboard also has the benefit easy order change. Butt also allows everyone to see who's turn is coming, outsources the initiative tracking job to the players, lets everyone see what conditions anyone is afflicted by without setting things beside or under minis, and is reusable without having to throw anything away. It does have a higher up front cost, though.

The white board would be nice for tracking conditions, but we rotate our game from house to house and I am thinking it is just one more thing I would need to carry! lol

I already have a big back of books, notes, dungeon tiles, and dice, two cases of mini's and a couple 20"x30" maps that we printed out at Sam's club photo desk for $10 each (quite a bargain IMHO, just put it on a flash drive but make sure it is scaled in a 2 to 3 ratio).

AriochQ said:

The white board would be nice for tracking conditions, but we rotate our game from house to house and I am thinking it is just one more thing I would need to carry! lol

I already have a big back of books, notes, dungeon tiles, and dice, two cases of mini's and a couple 20"x30" maps that we printed out at Sam's club photo desk for $10 each (quite a bargain IMHO, just put it on a flash drive but make sure it is scaled in a 2 to 3 ratio).

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Fair enough. Sorry, didn't mean to make it sound like I was pushing my way on you, just meant to note some of the benefits of the whiteboard.

And I totally get that. I run my D&D game at home, so nothing needs to be hauled anywhere. But my Savage Worlds game isn't at home, and this is one of the reasons it's mini-less.

I enjoy game prep so I don't mind spending a little time on it. I do prefer to spend more time on the interesting parts and minimize stat block and mechanics stuff. I also like making maps. Miniature painting is also part of prep for me and that is also really fun.

Making up cool stuff that is happening in the game world and interesting NPC personalities is what I like to spend the most prep time on. Stat blocks for many NPCs will often be very similar so they can use templates. I like to prepare template stat blocks for generic character types that can be used to run a whole slew of NPCs. First I generate a list based on what is needed. For example:

Commoner
Town guard
Guard officer
street thief
typical mercenary
exceptional mercenary

Much like the blocks already in the MM. As I create these templates they are saved because many can be tweaked and recycled as something else. Once a decent supply of templates are generated I can make plenty of interesting NPC personalities and just note the differences between the template chosen and the individual. I may use the commoner template for a barmaid but note that this particular character is exceptionally clever and has a 14 INT.

The same technique is used for custom monsters. Quite often a typical or custom monster is used as the base for a new custom monster. The more of these that I prep at the beginning, the less time it takes to get ready for each session.

So...interestingly enough my players started tracking initiative in an extremely low-tech way, but I must admit that it was effective.

We typically use a medium-sized double-sided battle mat (made by Crystal Caste I believe) and just wrote it down on an unused section of the mat for each encounter. I basically let them run with it since they were willing to track for me, but I am still looking for ways to streamline my preparation for each session.

Any more ideas?