10 Reasons Why Adventures Don't Sell "Well"

[Ed Cha]

My biggest complaint against pre-written adventures is the basic one:

(warning: shouting about to commence)

THEY NEVER FIT MY WORLD

(sorry for the shouting...)

Couple this with the fire-and-forget nature of most adventures (barring Paranoia adventures, which I read over and over again for sheer pleasure!), I see no reason to pick them up.

Anyway, individual worlds require individual adventures.

Just a personal take, YMMV, usw.

There are adventures that are designed to fit into most campaign worlds, but I do agree that many are setting-specific and difficult to transfer into your own world. You should check out the World of Whitethorn series though because it has been described as very generic and easily adaptable by reviewers and readers alike.

Anyhow, I also enjoy reading adventures even though I've only actually run a handful of them. They're just fun to read and good resources for reference purposes, etc. The ones that a lot of people forget to mention are the Role Aids series which they don't produce any more. There were some very adventures in among that series, too (also generic in style).

 

[Ed Cha]

A lot of adventures say something like "this adventures is for 4-6 PCs of levels 3-5". But come on now: that's a ridiculous range of PC party power. Four level 3 PCs are in no way equivalent to six level 5 PCs.

So, what I'd like to see is the adventure telling you the ELs of all the major encounters. Something like: "Wandering monsers in the forest near the temple are EL 2-3. The guardians of the temple are EL 3-4. The boss monster is a CR 5 creature; if its minions are also present, this is an EL 6 encounter." There could also be a chart or table showing ELs by area.

And while I'm whining. Make the setup of your adventure simple. If I have to read more than one page of setup, you've lost me. Because the more setup, the more difficulty I will have adapting your adventure to my campaign world. Furthermore, the lengthy setups just delay the gratification I get from reading keyed encounters. So please: skip the wicked kewl 3,000-year history you came up with for your adventure background and just give me the basics.

The suggested level range for The Village of Oester is 3-5, but some of the side encounters are really for higher levels. I don't write my adventure settings based on the main adventure itself. In other words, I don't custom design every encounter for the intended PCs. I package each piece of the World of Whitethorn into separate products and you can take parts you want to use and save the rest for later or never use them at all.

These are indeed adventure settings because you'll find an encounter with a few skeletons (EL 2), but also deeper in the marsh area a demon-seductress and her minions (EL 12 or higher). It's really "world-building through adventures" rather than just a scripted adventures.

I agree, I don't like the lengthy history pieces either. In fact, in my GM Tips section for The Hamlet of Thumble, I advise against providing lengthy initial handouts in the Starting a New Game section. This is because players should be interested and involved in the setting before having to invest the time to read a long-winded history. Here is an excerpt:

"Provide a good description of the setting in advance, before starting any new game. Players should know the essential basics of your campaign setting and get a feel for the world, before creating their characters. Do not provide them with an overwhelming amount of information.

Whenever you start a new game, especially when you have new players, you should focus on bringing the world to life during your game sessions and not explaining everything about it on an initial handout. Many players will not invest the time to read a lengthy handout that goes into great detail about your world’s history, geography, culture, and politics, before they become interested in the game itself."

When I started my own game, I only gave out a two-page handout covering the brief history of the immediate region. I've also avoided putting anything but essential history in the adventure settings.

 

[Varianor Abroad]

LOL! I never heard about a SJG product called that actually. Anyhow, I didn't intend to do any kind of a parody, but... thanks?

Umm, no, sorry to confuse you, it was on the front page yesterday? They're naming an adventure to go with the Munchkin d20 Screen (IIRC) the Village of Omelet. Sounds like the Village of Oester (eggs) to me, in a classic SJG tongue-in-cheek veiled reference.

 

[Ed Cha]

i have several criteria i use when buying adventures (modules)

1. game system or can i convert it to what i'm using.
2. quality. usually based on previous experience with the company or author. including editing. rehashing of old ideas. read my many rants about ToEE and RttToEE.
3. affordability. G1 Steading of the Hill Giant....i paid $4.50 for when it was released. check out the Story HOur in my sig. i bought Banewarrens, but i think it is too pricey.
4. reuse. b1 and b2 i ran over and over again. the latter part of 2ed i never even ran one of the adventures even though i bought them all.

All good points. I think a lot of readers are starting to focus on products from their favorite companies and/or authors now. That's a good thing, but I also try to keep an eye out for new stuff. The classics are great and I don't know why, but they're still fun to read even though they look primitive compared to the products coming out today. I mean you can't blame them. They were written 25 years ago when there was no real precedents!

 

[mmadsen]

I would never run the same adventure for two different groups; the feeling would be so far different that ultimately it wouldn't even be the same adventure.

Isn't that half the fun, seeing how two groups tackle the same basic situation, and seeing how it all plays out?

 

[Ed Cha]

Umm, no, sorry to confuse you, it was on the front page yesterday? They're naming an adventure to go with the Munchkin d20 Screen (IIRC) the Village of Omelet. Sounds like the Village of Oester (eggs) to me, in a classic SJG tongue-in-cheek veiled reference.

So, is it kinda like Hackmaster? I still need to check out the Hackmaster series. Those adventures seem hard to find at times.

 

[Ed Cha]

Isn't that half the fun, seeing how two groups tackle the same basic situation, and seeing how it all plays out?

Yeah, that can be very fun. It's always surprising to me that when I run The Hamlet of Thumble, the adventurers always fall into the trap, but they each have different ways of getting out. Every time, they also try to burn down the kobold mound which never accomplishes anything.

 

[mmadsen]

i have several criteria i use when buying adventures (modules)

1. game system or can i convert it to what i'm using.
2. quality. usually based on previous experience with the company or author. including editing. rehashing of old ideas. read my many rants about ToEE and RttToEE.
3. affordability. G1 Steading of the Hill Giant....i paid $4.50 for when it was released. check out the Story HOur in my sig. i bought Banewarrens, but i think it is too pricey.
4. reuse. b1 and b2 i ran over and over again. the latter part of 2ed i never even ran one of the adventures even though i bought them all.

Your second point is a bit...open to interpretation. How do you define quality?

On you third point, I'd just like to point out that $4.50 in 1980 dollars is worth about $10.00 in 2003 dollars. (Given the high rate of inflation in the late 1970's, each year matters. That same $4.50 in 1978 would buy as much as $12.75 now -- assuming you're not trying to buy a computer...)

 

[Ed Cha]

Your second point is a bit...open to interpretation. How do you define quality?

On you third point, I'd just like to point out that $4.50 in 1980 dollars is worth about $10.00 in 2003 dollars. (Given the high rate of inflation in the late 1970's, each year matters. That same $4.50 in 1978 would buy as much as $12.75 now -- assuming you're not trying to buy a computer...)

Also, keep in mind that most d20 publishers cannot print and sell as many copies as TSR did in the late 70's and early 80's, so prices have to be higher.

The adventures themselves are generally longer today, too. Adventures now generally range from 32 pages to 128 pages (in some cases, even longer). Back then, there was nary a module longer than 32 pages. Can you believe White Plume Mountain (one of my favorites) was only 16 pages long? It did have GREAT art though! A lot of it by Jeff Dee at that.

Even though many of the modules then used the inside covers for maps, the adventures today generally have better binding and use higher quality paper.

 

[Joshua Randall]

The suggested level range for The Village of Oester is 3-5, but some of the side encounters are really for higher levels. [...] In other words, I don't custom design every encounter for the intended PCs.

I guess what I'm saying is that if the adventure features mostly encounters in the EL 3-5 range, then say so; alternatively if it slowly builds up from that range all the way to EL 12 (and the EL 12 encounter is essential to completing the adventure), then the DM needs to know that going in. That way the DM can insert side treks to help the party level up, if necessary, so that the starting APL 5 PCs don't get utterly slaughtered by EL 12 boss monster(s).

I package each piece of the World of Whitethorn into separate products and you can take parts you want to use and save the rest for later or never use them at all.

That's groovy, but perhaps you could ease up on the self promotion just a wee bit.

I agree, I don't like the lengthy history pieces either. [...] I advise against providing lengthy initial handouts in the Starting a New Game section. This is because players should be interested and involved in the setting before having to invest the time to read a long-winded history. [...] "Many players will not invest the time to read a lengthy handout that goes into great detail about your world’s history, geography, culture, and politics, before they become interested in the game itself."

That's a great point and one that I too often forget. I tend to invest a lot of time detailing my campaign world (at the macro level, certainly). And then I have a natural inclination to provide the players with lengthy handouts about the world. But the truth is, most of them couldn't care less; they just want to adventure.

However there is one thing I will always, always hand out: a large scale map of the region / kingdom / continent. In my experience, players love maps. And there's nothing wrong with letting them know the overall geography. You can also add more detail later (that only you know about) so that when the PCs attempt an easy journey across 2" of map space, they face numerous encounters along the way.

P.S. SJG's Village of Omelet is an obvious parody of the Village of Homlett, no?