Adventure Design

[Cor Azer]

Generally speaking (assuming this could even be generally spoken about), how many encounters should go into a 4E adventure? The rules say that roughly 8-9 encounters of the "standard" difficult distribution should lead to a new level.

So, should a single adventure lead to a new level (and thus be roughly 8-9 encounters + a major quest)? In some ways 8-9 encounters seems to few for a "proper" adventure, which would imply that an adventure should span multiple levels. On the other hand, the first few adventures I've homebrewed for my group seem like they're working at just 8-9 encounters. At our current pace, it's taking about 3 sessions per adventure, which seems not too slow or too fast.

My current campaign is mapped out over the heroic tier, with 10 adventures each expected to lead to gaining a level. Now, they're not deeply complex adventures, but I'd like to think they're not trivially linear either, and I do have some plot arcs moving through several adventures even if they're not the main focus.

I'm curious about other people's adventure design "procedures". I'm curious because, for example, the WotC adventures appear to be intended to carry characters over 3 levels. Now, I haven't read the WotC adventures (I've flipped through a few of the Dungeon ones on DDI), so I'm wondering if they're really complex and involved, or just simply long with multiple "mini-adventures" of about 1 levels worth of encounters.

I really don't think there's a right answer for this, I just curious about other people's approach.

 

[EP]

To run a standard adventure matching those published by WotC, you'll be going up two or three levels by the end (after quest rewards and everything else). Not sure if all DDI adventures are the same, but that's how I've been finding their big ones.

It's really up to you and how fast you want them to go up. One thing about the standard adventures is that they're just big dungeon crawls with lots of encounters. Story-based quests will likely have fewer combat encounters, but more non-combat encounters to gain XP from. I personally find standard adventures to be a bit overwhelming at times and like to keep things at two levels per adventure.

 

[MerricB]

With regard to the Wizards adventures: they vary.

Pyramid of Shadows is one big dungeon crawl that gives you about 4 levels once you clear it out.

Meanwhile, Thunderspire Labyrinth has a home base from which you travel to do smaller adventures in different parts of the labyrinth.

There's no rule on how many encounters should be in an adventure; the advice in the DMG (pg 104) is purely for a sample adventure of 9 encounters. The reason for breaking it up that way is merely because doing an adventure "by level" is an easy way of showing progression of encounter difficulty.

In my case, I tend to have quite a few easy encounters of level-1, level-2 or thereabouts in my homebrew adventures, partly because I come from the school that thinks that PCs should be able to show that they're the best, and also because they run quickly and provide moments of variance from the roleplaying and exploration that we're doing. Every so often, I'll throw in more difficult encounters (level, level+1, level+2) which may be major set pieces of the adventure.

How many encounters in an adventure? Well, it depends. I've run a few "1 session" adventures recently, where I put in about 3 combat encounters. My current adventure is a three level (session) dungeon crawl, so that'll get the PCs up a level and have about 9-10 encounters.

Cheers!

 

[Hellzon]

So, should a single adventure lead to a new level (and thus be roughly 8-9 encounters + a major quest)? In some ways 8-9 encounters seems to few for a "proper" adventure, which would imply that an adventure should span multiple levels. On the other hand, the first few adventures I've homebrewed for my group seem like they're working at just 8-9 encounters. At our current pace, it's taking about 3 sessions per adventure, which seems not too slow or too fast.

You know, when you think about it, having to murder more than 8-9 groups of dudes to clear a keep or something is pretty nuts, unless you're actually invading a major city or something*.

(Silly way of saying: "It seems to work for you, so rock on." But yeah, the official ones stretch it out to 3 levels worth of encounters.)

*) Which you are doing in "Vault of the Drow" and similar, but details...

 

[Rechan]

An adventure should have as many encounters as it needs + how many you toss in for variety.

If the adventure is just "Find the kidnapped heir", and the kidnapped heir is just being held by some bandits looking for randsom, there's just not room for 8-9 encounters.

But, you might want to make the "Rescue the Heir" a little more engaging, combat-wise, so the bandits are holed up in the top of a tower that's guarded by some nasty monsters the bandits can bypass, and on the way to the tower, the PCs run across a roaming band of monsters. That's just 3-4 encounters.

However, "Prevent the Kingdom from being invaded by the country over there" might span multiple levels.