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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pming" data-source="post: 6737947" data-attributes="member: 45197">Hiya!  Most of the time I like very short and sweet, with little "absolutes" unless it is one of the key things about the area/encounter/NPC. For major NPC's and areas, I like a bit more wordage, but I still like some things to be open to interpretation.For example, a minor encounter might be:Sometime during the night a small group of Rat-Men try and sneak into the camp. They are mainly interested in theft.That's all I need and want. I don't need to be told the exact number of Rat-Men. I don't need to be told the PC's have to make "Check X" to wake up, or if a PC on watch needs to make some Perception check. I don't need info about what exactly the Rat-Men will do if caught (re: fight, flee, surrender, etc). The general motivations of the core bad guys in the adventure should have been touched on at the beginning of the adventure under "Running the Adventure", where there would be a couple of paragraphs describing the general story backdrop. I, as DM, should have more than enough information to decide what checks need to be made, how many Rat-Men is a "small group", and how they will react if caught.A more prominent NPC should get a bit more...Skeeg, the Rat-Man leader, is confident (for a Rat-Man) and considered very brave by other Rat-Men. He is strong and intelligent, with a devious mind, but this causes him to be rather prideful (if not outright conceited, with a distinct air of superiority in his words). He feels his position as leader is is natural, and reacts negatively and violently against those who question his leadership too much. He sees any failures of his plans as being caused because of others, never his own miscalculations. Skeeg does, however, have a soft spot for animals (especially rats), and this can influence his decisions. [...insert basic stat block...]That should do it. Enough info about his personality so that he can be run as an individual, but not so much background info that he becomes confusing to run. It's easy to gather that "Skeeg; leader, crafty, arrogant, violent, blames others for failures, likes animals". One sentence worth of words that can be jotted down on note paper for when the PC's encounter him. I don't have to have a bookmark to the page with his write up.As for "story" stuff... again, short and sweet is my preference. I'd rather have "The Purple Cabal (evil clerics) are running a kidnapping ring to fuel their sacrificial rites. The mayors son is the high-priest of the cult, and has many followers who hold positions of power and influence in the city"... than have two pages or more about all the details of the Purple Cabal, how the mayors son got involved, a list of every single follower and why they joined, who and how they choose their targets, etc. Too much info that is almost never used.That's not to say I don't like good background info...I do. I just want my background info to be "vague" over "specific". I want "some guys", and not "Philbert, Konrad, Suzaan and Mandy". I'll take "a group of" over "sixteen". And I most definitely want "dank, wet grey stone room with dripping water" over half a page of detailed description with four different ability/skill checks PC's can make if they do "this, that or the other thing".In short, I want an adventure to HELP me DM... I don't want/need an adventure to TELL me how to DM. If that makes any sense...PS: Nigh-perfect adventure format as far as I'm concerned? Check out Dyson's Delve. It's a 'basic D&D' based mini-mega-dungeon (12 small levels). I LOVE how much use I've gotten out of this little gem! All because it didn't hold my hand and tell me what was what...I got to fill in the blanks, shape it, and paint it my way. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> <a href="https://rpgcharacters.wordpress.com/maps/dysons-delve/" target="_blank">https://rpgcharacters.wordpress.com/maps/dysons-delve/</a> ...download the "Dyson's Delve Delux PDF".^_^Paul L. Ming</blockquote>

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