Advice for campaign of one session adventures?

[Elodan]

As a group we decided that because occasionally we end up going a long time between sessions, it would be best if the adventures we run are contained to a single session; our sessions are typically 4 -5 hours. Even with campaign summaries, it was felt those long breaks really killed the flow. It's somewhat of a return to how we used to play in the group's early years. I was purely a player then and am now running in addition to playing.

I was thinking of using something like Pathfinder Society scenarios or Living Forgotten Realms adventures.

I'm looking for any tips/tricks and advice on how to build a campaign using one-shots. I think an occasional adventure that runs two nights would be fine. One specific question I have is how would a 32 page adventure work for this?

Thanks.

 

[Cor_Malek]

You might find one of Goonalan's Story Hours helpful: The Goodman Gang.

It's an entertaining read in and of itself, but there's a neat bonus you might enjoy. The name of the party (and story hour) comes from the fact that the group is using adventures by Goodman Games. So every X posts(end of each adventure), there's a summary, including: score on 10-points scale, as well as play time (from what I recall ~4 hours each) and individual impressions of players. (like so - summary begins about halfway through post).

Even if you won't end up playing those adventures, this should give you a good idea as to how you can connect short stand-alones, and how much you can cram into a session.

From myself: play out your cards, and use those intervals to your adbvantage! The characters can do what they want between the game sessions - which can enrich their creations, give time for crafting, as well as make profession skills more important. And then they get back together and kick some asses.

 

[Klaus]

Structure your campaign as a TV series. The only constant in the adventures are the PCs. One way to handle this is to makethe PCs travelling heroes, moving from one location to the next in each adventure (think Supernatural or Kung-Fu).

 

[Gilladian]

When I ran a very episodic campaign, the PCs were caravan guards on a caravan made up of a whole city evacuating from a disaster. We started with the disaster striking, the PCs being recruited into their roles as guards, scouts, and protectors, and went on from there.

Each week, I had slightly different mix of players and thus PCs. I had created a roster of 20 PCs and each week they selected a party from that group. The sessions were quite short (only 2 hours long) so we did very mini-adventures. I always planned 2-3 encounters, and had 1-2 more little incidents to throw in if needed. We actually spent a LOT of time roleplaying, and often didn't fight - we did a lot of exploration, though, as the caravan moved through war-torn countryside.

Allowing an ever-changing roster of PCs and environment kept the game lively and fresh. Also, each PC had a "secret motivation" that they tried to fulfill over the course of the game; things like 'my brother was a soldier who went missing months ago; I want to search the battlefields for his unit whenever I can', or 'I don't really care about the caravan; if I can find a safe place to stay and hide, I'll defect.'

 

[S'mon]

You can do the traditional Gygaxian Megadungeon or West Marches approach - the available players get together, decide on a goal, tell you, go down the dungeon or into the wilderness, and are back in town at the end of the session. I run my City State of the Invincible Overlord game like this and it works well. However unless you make them decide on a goal in advance of play (the West Marches approach) they may take several hours in town deciding what to do, leaving only a short 'delve' time. I'm fine with this in my CSIO game as I find the in-town roleplay great fun, but if you want a solid 4-5 hours of hacking then either GM or players need to determine mission in advance. The WotC
4e Dungeon Delve product is great for a 3-hour session, you can even run them one after another and level each session if you wanted to fill a very episodic, combat-centric campaign.

 

[Aeolius]

Run the same adventure each time, with pre-made characters. Every session, the players have to choose different characters.

Alternately, go with the "Escape from New York" route. "Your PC will explode in 24 hours, unless they return the Blue Topaz of Salabar to its rightful shrine".

Perhaps the players could have fruit flies for characters: In 24 hours they have to be born, eat, breed, and die. No... just a thought, there.

How about using intelligent magical items as characters... each session begins with their discovery at the hands of new adventurers.

 

[Sir Robilar]

I´d also advise to give the campaign the backbone of a serial. Consider to have the characters be the members of a group, preferably one that travels around a lot by nature. For example, all of the characters could be the players of a music band, each session takes place in a different location where they perform. But before/during/after each gig, something strange happens in town and they have to intervene. Their intervention leads to adventure of course.

Other possible groups would be the members of an assassins guild (each evening a different assassination target), detectives of Greyhawk´s city watch (each session its own murder case), knights traveling a demonic wasteland (each session another well of foul demonic energies), agents of a Mage Guild fighting against viloations of the wizard´s laws et cetera. If that implies a focus too strong for your taste you could go for "members of the Adventurers guild" (the shtick that Pathfinder Society scenarios use). Or maybe the characters have one mysterious but trustable mentor that sends them on errands.

In this kind of campaign each session would take part in a different area of your campaign world, sometimes months or even years after the last session. Buying/selling equipment should be restricted to the time in between the play sessions. You could work with a recurring cast of NPCs (the knight´s squire, other detectives, their mentor) and antagonists. As TV series do, you could slowly develop the personal plot lines of the player characters, maybe by concentrating on one character each session.

As an alternative to the serial approach, you could play a campaign that focuses on exploration. A megadungeon would be a great fit for this, since the overarching plot is not so important in a dungeon environment ("us against them"). A ruined city might also work. Another possibility is a huge geographical area in which they explore a small part each session. For example: At the start of the campaign you give the players a map of a large ocean with dozens of small islands. The characters have their own sailing ship and explore the islands, one in each session.

As to your question, I don´t think the 32 page adventures are a good fit for this kind of campaign. My group recently finished one of them and it took us close to 5 sessions. We do roleplay a lot but I can´t imagine playing a 32 page adventure as a one-shot without sacrificing too much of the content.

Whatever you do, have fun!

 

[Ycore Rixle]

Even when my group plays every week or every other week, I try to have a solid beginning, middle, and end to every session's action. Every group is different, of course, so YMMV as they say. I'm not sure how similar my approach is to your "one-shot" approach. Here are some ideas.

1) Watch the clock. Not obviously, of course. But be aware of how quickly time is passing and start pushing the group when necessary. For a four-hour session, the first hour is the beginning, the second and third hours are the middle (with a surprise at the end of the second hour), and your climactic ending is the last half-hour. That only adds up to 3.5 hours because inevitably you'll run over, add stuff in, miss a player who's putting the baby to sleep, etc.

2) Trash the map. By all means, use a published adventure. But even in the 32-page adventure styles you mentioned, you should delete (many) rooms and scenes as necessary to crunch it in to a single session. Don't worry about "missing" a sense of verisimilitude. Just put in the most interesting rooms (interesting to your players, not to you) and the critical plot points. By far the most likely result is that your players will love the increased pace.

3) Think of pace, scene types, and surprises ahead of time. For example, try to start with a combat (or chase or something action-oriented), then a slower dialogue scene, then a combat scene, then a surprise plot twist that involves one of the characters' backstories, then a puzzle, then a future plot hook that involves one of the characters (maybe a portrait on the wall showing the BBG at the end of this adventure wedding a PC's mom), then a combat, then the climax. But...

4) Don't railroad the PCs. Let them go where they like and do what they want. But what if their actions lead to three of the same scene type in a row? Well, if your PCs just fought a manticore pack, then chose to fight through the black pudding and myconid hatchery, and are now walking down the hall to the door where the adventure says an insane burn-the-world efreeti noble waits with a chainmail bikini blonde in one hand and a monkey-gripped falchion in the other, lusting for combat, you know what? That insane burn-the-world efreeti noble becomes a riddling, puzzle-loving, brass-pince-nez wearing, chess-for-hostages-playing efreeti noble just before the door opens.

5) Run the climax. As you approach your final half hour, run the climax. Bring it to the PCs if necessary: the BBG heard about his dungeon being torn up and he comes to face the PCs. Or, if one of the PCs rolls a natural 20 on any skill roll at the right time, make a huge ZOMG!!!1!! face and reveal something as a result of the roll that leads the party straight to the climax. In other words, seize on something to make the deus ex machina seem more reasonable. A nat 20 on a heal check? The cleric notices that the basilisk's claws have traces of desert sand found only in one particular oasis; that must be where the BBG is! Don't worry about contrivance much; your group has already agreed to play full sessions in 4 or 5 hours so they are going to be willing to overlook a bit of contrivance in the name of that goal.

And like Robilar said, above all, have fun!