D&D 5E Read-along, zero preparation adventures: do they exist?

[Li Shenron]

As I wade through my collection of adventures from various edition, I sigh at the fact that even the shortest ones require at least hours of preparation. At the minimum, the DM is expected to read everything in advance, cover to cover. Sadly for me, even a few hours are often enough to force me to say 'no' to running a game of D&D. Believe it or not, between work, family, house and a myriad of time-wasting duties, I cannot find 2-3 hours to decently prepare even a one-shot adventure unless people tell me at the very least one week in advance.

But does it really have to be always so? Is it really impossible to write a short adventure with a fairly straight-forward story (I wouldn't expect it to be an Agatha Christie's level of intrigue!), and design it in a format that requires ZERO preparation? Has there ever been an attempt at presenting an adventure that the DM could just crack it open and start reading it aloud to the players at the table, hearing the story herself for the first time? What is really the reason preventing such design?

 

[volanin]

Take a look at this article, it might change the way you look at one-shot zero-prep adventures. While it was written for Dungeon World, it changed my style of playing Dungeons & Dragons blindly, on the fly. And some of my most memorable games were convention one-shots I got to DM!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/...Y/edit?hl=en&forcehl=1#heading=h.t8tfotiv4mt1

Of course, your style might be completely different than the one proposed here... in which case I recommend you to read The Lazy Dungeon Master by Michael Shea on amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/Lazy-Dungeon-Master-Michael-Shea-ebook/dp/B00ADV2H8O

 

[aco175]

I find time to read the modules while I'm sitting doing other business.

I think your idea can work to a decent extent. Kind of like in LMoP opening where your read the intro text and there is a fight with goblins. The next part when in town most likely cannot work without reading first. There may also be a lot of looking through while the players are asking questions and your trying to read the encounter and run it as the same time. Most likely not ideal.

 

[Croesus]

I'd suggest that such "modules" exist, but only in games such as Hero Quest, Descent, possibly Pathfinder Card Game. Such games are very restricted in what players can do and have a specific goal - rescue the captive, kill the BBEG, find the McGuffin. Within that design space, they can work well, but aren't really RPG's.

I think one could write such an RPG module, but it would be so limited compared to what's possible. Such a module would have no hooks to the specific characters being run (unless the players don't even get to run their own characters). No hooks to the GM's specific world. Basically, very vanilla. Seems to me such modules would quickly grow stale, unless the GM puts in the time to customize them.

edit: Now that I think about it, there was a line of very short adventures (8 pages?) published in the 3.x era. They could be run with zero prep. However, they only really shined when the GM added some flair and customization. So yes, such modules can be written. I just think a good experience at the table requires more effort from the GM.

 

[neobolts]

The 4e product Dungeon Delve did a pretty excellent job of having no prep, 2 to 3 encounter mini-dungeons that told a simple story. I used them if my own prep plans got interrupted, or if the party went off the rails to somewhere not related to any prep/plot.

 

[TwoSix]

The Scenario Packs for Beyond the Wall (a sorta-OSR style game) are designed to be run by the DM on the fly. You actually randomly determine large parts of the adventure based on what the PCs roll during their (random) character creation from playbooks.

 

[robus]

I agree it doesn't seem like it should be that hard?

The adventure would have to have a 1 page "What the DM needs to know" summary of the key facets of the adventure so that the DM is not surprised by something on page X. Basically the summary would have the outline of the adventure: objective(s), key NPCs (including their motivations) and key features of the dungeon(s) or whatever. All the stat blocks for monsters would need to be included as you go and, of course, any spells that the monsters/NPCs have to hand (in an appendix I suppose).

But with that I think it would be quite doable?

 

[Xaelvaen]

http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...k--A-Tale-of-Bentaven-the-Bard-The-First-Tale

This is a pretty guide-by-wires adventure path of Bentaven the Bard.


http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/185277/One-Page-Dungeon-Compendium-2016-Edition

They are called "One Page Dungeons" and typically pretty straight forward with only minimal preparation. You can get them individually or in compendiums.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Some of the old Judges Guild dungeoncrawl modules would be close to that.

 

[RichGreen]

Hi there,

Monte Cook has tried to tackle this very problem with his Weird Discoveries book for Numenera. There is also a similar book called Strange Revelations for The Strange. Each adventure is six pages and is designed to be run with only a few minutes prep. I’ve not run any of the adventures but the way they are presented is very cool. Pretty sure you can download a preview that demonstrates the format.

Cheers


Rich


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