A single session: How long does it take?

[Stormborn]

Those of you who are used to running one-shots or playing with tight time constraints please help me with the following:

I am currently working on a one-shot to run with some firends as their first intrtoduction to noncomputer gaming. We have set aside about 5 hours to play. They cannot play on any kind of regular basis and thats not going to change. So if we play again it might be months away.I typically DM for an ongoing group that plays almost every week and am not used to trying to run a "done in one" scenario. If we don't get to everything I planned we just start back up next time, I can't do that with this group.

Given that we will have 2 completly new players (and 3 that have more experiance to help guide them) and the time limits I have been trying to develop an intresting introduction that feels complete and allows for:

- 1 or 2 brief roleplaying situations
- both wilderness and dungeon encounters, including traps
- 3-4 combats with both single creatures and at least one band of foes

So, when you are designing an adventure for 4-5 players that you want to take 4-5 hours, how many encounters do you include and of what types? Any other advice will be apprettiated. I have GMd for a while now, but this is my first time with completly new players and such a limited time table.

Oh, and I am not beign too specific here because at least one of the players frequents these boards.

 

[Piratecat]

Make sure you already have characters ready to hand them. In addition, I'd make two combats intrinsic and two combats optional, so that you can skip the less important ones with no problem if you're running behind on time.

I tend to include more roleplaying situations that you are planning, but that really depends on the group.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

Stormborn,

I regularly GM Living Greyhawk events at conventions and gamedays. These are all designed to fit within a four hour timeblock and have most of the criteria that you've described. While I don't recommend using Living Greyhawk to introduce players to the game (it is very time consuming to get started in the campaign as a GM and some of the adventures are designed for intermediate or advanced players), I do think that joining the RPGA and perhaps requesting a classic adventure from them could be fun.

Anyway, that is what I would suggest. Try to find someone in your area who is an RPGA member or if not, go to http://www.wizards.com/rpga and read up. Overall it is a great thing for groups who can't meet regularly and can only allocate a few hours each time. Also, the adventure wraps up nicely so there's no problems with wondering what happened.

 

[Stormborn]

Make sure you already have characters ready to hand them. In addition, I'd make two combats intrinsic and two combats optional, so that you can skip the less important ones with no problem if you're running behind on time.

I tend to include more roleplaying situations that you are planning, but that really depends on the group.

Thanks Piratecat, and Feyd Rautha also. I have already been able to help the new players make their own characters, a rouge and a cleric. From my experiance, even with typical gamers, players understand what they can do better when they have created the character. The intrinsic and optional combats is certainly a good idea, and right now as I have designed it one is purely optional and the another can be resolved through roleplay rather than combat, but must be resolved. Of the remaining three one can be solved creatively, the other itwo are pretty neccesary. But, I will consider how the story line might be altered.

I tend to include more roleplaying normally too, with my regular group it seems that many sessions thats all there is. I am inclduing so little this time because I am afraid they are too uncertain about the whole experiance, and I want to give them a chance to employ as many of their class features, feats, and skills as possible.

The RPGA suggestion is interesting, probablly not an option for this time around, but I will look into it if it looks like we may be doing this on a semiregular basis in the future.

 

[teitan]

Many of the free adventures on the WOTC website are very quick and easy to run, about 4-6 hours of goodness packed in a few pages, maybe you should try one of those?

Jason