Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="77IM" data-source="post: 7314580" data-attributes="member: 12377">Great replies so far! Since you sound like an experienced DM, I'll try to approach this from the angle of how 1-shots (or, 2- or 3- shots, in case you run over time) differ from long campaign play.1. Use pregens. Give the pregens strong hooks into the story and a bit of role-playing advice. Lean heavily on stereotypes for this. Personally, I'd emphasize role-playing over mechanics when describing the pregens to the players. E.g., instead of going on about the difference between wizard spellcasting and warlock spellcasting, make the wizard an wizened, inscrutable gnome, and the warlock a flashy young half-elf hotshot. For an experienced group, you can be more flexible about this; maybe build some options into the one-shots, or present each one with several role-playing suggestions.2. Clear goals. Like, bluntly obvious. The party should never be debating what to do, only how to do it. The easiest way is to have a patron send them on an important mission. The second easiest way is to give each pregen their own reason to follow the goal. The third easiest is for you to state the goal and ask the players why each character is following it, but this works better with an experienced group.3. Fluid obstacles. Prepare lots of encounters, NPCs, and puzzles that MIGHT sit between the PCs and victory... but don't decide what's really there until you need to. This gives you lots of flexibility in pacing the session. If the PCs breeze through a mystery, then they get jumped by a combat encounter. If the combat encounter slogs on, then cut out the chase scene.The biggest mistake I've made (repeatedly!) when planning one-shots is to build a linear adventure. The reasoning is sound: remove decision-making by putting the party on rails, and things will speed along! The problem with a linear sequence of encounters is that a) decision-making is fun and b) it makes it harder for the DM to adjust the pace on-the-fly.This is a variation of the classic GM advice, "Do lots of preparation but zero planning." Paradoxically, preparation makes it easier to improv. The downside is that you'll inevitably prep encounters that never see the light of day. Ideally you can steal those for use in later sessions.4. Watch the clock. I know DMs who put a phone alarm to vibrate periodically through the session as a gentle reminder to keep things moving. If you're used to long-form campaigning, then you know how games can stall in various ways (some fun, some not). This can kill a one-shot. There are numerous techniques to get the game moving again, but for me, the hardest part is just being aware of how much time is passing.5. Leave hooks for the next session! Hopefully, the PCs will be victorious, and end the session with a feeling of accomplishment. But, sprinkle in some unanswered questions, mysterious keys, treasure maps, enemies that get away... these leave players feeling like they accomplished something that is part of a larger world; that they accomplished something that might matter even after the curtain drops. And of course, it hopefully leaves them thirsting for more!</blockquote>

Verification