A different model of adventure writing?

[Pielorinho]

Re: Re: A different model of adventure writing?

I sort of rely on knowing the villains' motivations and capabilities to serve as a guide to how they react. If I tried to write all that up in a professional format, it seems like it would take REAMS of paper.

Yeah, that's interesting. Part of my process for figuring out the villain's motivations and actions in Speaker in Dreams was to post my questions and solicit opinions on another message board; each time I did so, I ended up typing about a page or two of background before I could possibly get to my question.

Still, though, if an author organized his thoughts, it seems like he might be able to write up a set of motivations, and a timeline, effectively. Hmm. I think I'll track down that drow-based Dungeon adventure tomorrow.

Thanks for the feedback, folks -- I hope to wake up to more!
Daniel

 

[Zerovoid]

too easy for PC's to go wandering off at the wrong time or miss the clues that you thought seemed pretty blatant when you were writing the adventure. The players won't know what happened, other than they failed to stop something that they didn't even know they were supposed to stop.

This is the biggest problem for me. Its not that failure is a problem, its that the failure won't even be meaningful, because the PC's won't know they failed at anything. I ran an adventure once where someone was killing off various nobles in the city. I decided the PC's had about a week to figure out who was behind the murders before the town watch would catch them. The hook was that a noble hired them to keep him safe from this danger. Actually, he was not a target at all, and I was expecting the PC's to investigate the situation to find out more. They just set up camp outside the guy's bedroom window, and in his house, and then they waited... I stuck to my guns, and let the situation be resolved without their help. At the time I was thinking about the Simpsons episode where Bart and Lisa are trying to save Itchy and Scratchy, but Bert and Eliza beat the to it. Anyway, an hour into the game, the PC's get paid for their bodyguard duties and leave. I improvise for 3 hours. So much for static adventures.

Now, obviously I could have used a better hook, but the point is that its very hard to run this kind of adventure, at least with the style of campaigns that people run now days. Its easy with a bid dungeon all full of monsters that shouldn't be there. Its not so easy in most other situations. Usually, I just prepare the minimum, and the PC's will "just happen to run across" whatever I have prepared, whereever they go. They can probably tell what is happening, but I don't know what the solution is. Being a wee lad of 22, I don't have any 1e days to look back on, but I'm guessing that most of these adventures were just dungeon hack fests, with little story. I don't think people want that anymore. I guess the only solutions are to stick to an easily quantified area like a classic dungeon, or else be really good at improvising.

 

[Nareau]

(Don't worry, didn't read the spoilers)

I remember someone talking about an adventure that began with someone (a helpless child?) coming up to the PC's, begging for help. The instructions to the DM go something like, "If the party doesn't agree to help him, close this module, fold your hands, and stare at them blankly."

I think that developing complex motivations that tie the PC's intimately to the plot can be worthwhile. But that's between the DM and his players. The module writers generally can't be involved in this.

That said, I think a different model could be useful to some styles of playing. Some of the best stuff in RttToEE has been totally unrelated to the plot. The locations and NPC's are detailed enough to make it easy to know what would happen given some bizarre PC plans.

Spider

 

[DM with a vengence]

The reason that these adventures don't make sense is that they arn't supposed to from behind the DM screen. It's alot like a play, while everything makes sense when your in the audience, if your backstage you wonder why these people are sitting around waiting for their cues instead of carrying out the action of the play.

The PCs happen to be in the right place at the right time because they are The Hereos. Even at first level the entire universe was basically created for their personal enjoyment. It's no fun if the orcs attack two towns over but the guards there kill them.

Basically, the cultists attack only when the PCs are there because the PCs are the only people who would benefit. It their game, and as long as the facade holds for them then its still good.

 

[LostSoul]

Basically, the cultists attack only when the PCs are there because the PCs are the only people who would benefit. It their game, and as long as the facade holds for them then its still good.

Yeah. You don't want to carry this to the extreme that the PCs don't feel in control of thier own actions. (Actually, that's not true; sometimes the PCs get slapped around by NPCs and such. But that's a different story, because they can do something about it. And if the PCs are feeling like there is nothing they can do, it should be because of things they have done in the past.)

The PCs hear about the "Red Wolf" clan of Orcs that has been attacking the local mine, coming down from the Forsaken Peaks. The PCs think, "Orcs? No treasure. Let's go find something else to do." They leave for parts unknown.

If the same orc clan attacks the PCs (or even if orcs do), the players will feel like nothing they do can keep them from encountering those orcs.

Now maybe if you switch the adventure to feature an ruined monastery and a pack of CR 1 creatures... you're set.

 

[hong]

The reason that these adventures don't make sense is that they arn't supposed to from behind the DM screen. It's alot like a play, while everything makes sense when your in the audience, if your backstage you wonder why these people are sitting around waiting for their cues instead of carrying out the action of the play.

The PCs happen to be in the right place at the right time because they are The Hereos. Even at first level the entire universe was basically created for their personal enjoyment. It's no fun if the orcs attack two towns over but the guards there kill them.

I agree.

Basically, the cultists attack only when the PCs are there because the PCs are the only people who would benefit. It their game, and as long as the facade holds for them then its still good.

... I suppose though the issue is whether the inconsistencies in Speaker in Dreams are enough to break the facade for the PCs.

 

[Scarab]

Timelines can be a dangerous thing sometimes, if you follow them blindly. Stuff like "Bad Guy will assassinate Mayor on day four" is an excellent example.

I only use timelines for things like "messenger leaves city under siege and arrives two days later, reinforcements take four days to gather up and march to the rescue".

As I said in another thread, I have four questions that I write down and answer after every session:

• What goals were accomplished by the various factions?
• What information has the factions gained about other factions?
• What long- and short-term goals were changed due to actions from other factions?
• How will the faction respond?

This is also the way I write adventures -- I try to think of how the factions will respond to different types of actions from other factions. Of course, since players are the pure essence of Chaos Theory, it never happens as I think it will, but at least I get some ideas of the general direction.

 

[Frostmarrow]

The old adventure The Assassin's Knot uses a variant of what you have discussed here. You can get a free download at WotC and right here you can find the 3ed conversion stuff. Sorry, no time to add links.

 

[Berandor]

I use these flowcharts/timelines/whatever, too.
In a major campaign finale, I had the PCs attack the tyrannical mayor of a city who had a controlled beholder as a pet.

I had planned the actions of NPCs, but with leeway to make up for good/bad planning on the PC's side.

It all culminated in the final confrontation, but throuhgout the whole adventure, I had a chart with important events to scratch off once achieved.
Each of these events altered the outcome.

For example, the final fight on the marketplace was between an NPC and the villain (yeah, I know...), surrounded by rebels and guards fighting.

The PCs could better the chances of the rebels by
a) somehow keeping the barracks sending reinforcements
b) inciting locals to help in the rebellion
c) start a distraction

Furthermore, they could
a) free an imprisoned Efreet below the city (they knew about it)
b) sneak into the palace and defeat the villain's right hand (a wizard)
c) destroying the statue used to control the beholder
d) find a guardian hidden by a long-dead dwarf
e) free important prisoners who would be able to help in the fight (a red wizard and a local hero)

Depending on how many goals they achieved, and how good and swift they were - I measured time, too - the chances for victory changed, and the outcome changed.

In this adventure, what could have happened was (abbreviated):
a) NPC and villain fight, NPC is killed, but villain forced to flee
b) NPC and villain fight, Efreet appears, villain flees, NPC survives, town starts burning before Efreet leaves.
c) NPC and villain fight, uncontrolled beholder appears to take revenge at villain; villain is killed, beholder leaves, NPC survives.
d) NPC and villain fight, dwarven guardian appears and helps NPC kill villain
e) NPC and villain fight, Efreet and uncontrolled beholder appear, villain flees, town starts burning, NPC killed as he comes into the fight between Efreet and beholder. Beholder dies, too.
f) NPC and villain fight, Efreet and Guardian appear. Town starts burning, villain is killed.
g) NPC and villain fight, Beholder and Guardian appear, villain flees, beholder dies.
h) NPC and villain fight, all appear, villain is killed, as well as Efreet, town starts burning. NPC is killed by beholder, too. Beholder flees.

This is just the NPC/villain fight.
The villain would flee into his abode in the palace at first.

Depending on other goals, the town would be freed, or not. Either the wizard would take over the city, or the guardians would prevail and some officer would take controll - all possible.

But it was much work to compile this adventure, and I don't do as much work for all adventures.

So yes, I'd love to buy modules such as this.

Berandor

 

[Lord Vangarel]

Event based adventures

For me events are the way to go. If you have a static adventure site with no background motivation for the pcs to explore I find it quickly becomes boring. What I try to do is think of why the pcs would be involved in an adventure.

To do this I use the following check list before the time of the game.

What location is the adventure set in? Do I have enough details about the location, does the location suggest any interesting things I can bring to the player's attention for either the current adventure or future plotlines.

Do any of the player's have existing motivations? If any do and I can cater for them then the player's will have greater interest and therefore more enjoyment. Sometimes player motivations provide the reason for adventure.

Do any of the npcs have motivations that affect the adventure? To have a location but nothing to do isn't my idea of an adventure. If the players don't provide sufficient adventure motivations then I try to make sure that the npcs do. The trick is to then get the pcs involved in the motivations of the npcs.

Plan a sequence of events based on the motivations set in the location. This is often the tricky bit. Events have to be flexible enough to fit in with the pcs, why spend hours designing them if the players never experience them therefore some events are location triggered. Other events can be interesting if time based unless something else happens. What you have to be careful to avoid is building a sequence of time based events where each relies on the others. Pcs have a way of screwing these up and messing up the whole adventure.


As an example in LotR the characters go to Moira. It would probably be a decent adventure to just have them go there looking for dwarven treasure, but it was so much better when driven by plot elements. The party has a motivation, they seek to reach a specific location. They have a choice of which direction to take and are forced to choose an obviously dangerous route by concerns over the actions of the npcs. If this were a module in an ongoing campaign the adventure has a location, the mines, it has player motivations, and the npcs also have motivations. Added into the mix the location introduces new npcs (the Balrog, the orc hordes) and future plot motivations - after the quest to destroy the ring perhaps some of the pcs would return to reclaim Moira or plunder its depths.