Are adventures/modules more important than system?

[Libramarian]

There's a peculiar assumption embedded in this thread...that system and adventure don't interact.

There are certainly some aspects of adventure design that are system agnostic, but on the other hand the basic structure of the default adventure is going to be heavily influenced by the system.

For instance, let's consider a few system aspects.

a) XP awarded mostly for treasure vs. vs. XP awarded mostly for combat vs. XP awarded mostly for story goals
b) encounter difficulty and treasure value based on location in the game-world vs. encounter difficulty and treasure value based on character level
c) short, tactically simplistic combat vs. long, tactically rich combat

These things are clearly going to influence adventure design. At least the sort of adventure best supported by the system.

 

[Zaukrie]

No one new gets on board w/o joining an existing group, or using modules.

Great stories are crucial to the commercial success of a story telling based game, imo. Without them, I have no idea how you bring in new DMs and players.

 

[D'karr]

No one new gets on board w/o joining an existing group, or using modules.

Great stories are crucial to the commercial success of a story telling based game, imo. Without them, I have no idea how you bring in new DMs and players.

That's a pretty big generalization. I know it was not true when I started playing a very long time ago. I picked up the DM mantle and ran with it gathering a group along the way. None of us had played before. Eventually I discovered modules but the first few games where adventures based on simple hooks.

 

[Ahnehnois]

No one new gets on board w/o joining an existing group, or using modules.

No one? Really? I would say the archetypical way of starting the game is joining up with an experienced group, but that the second major way is simply picking up the books and improvising away. Particularly if you have a beginner-friendly product (like what Paizo seems to have done).

I struggle to imagine how or why one would start playing by trying to add the complexity of running someone else's adventure on top of learning the rules. I think for beginners, playing D&D is much like small children playing house or running around a playground pointing at each other making gun noises. Improvisation is the natural path and is quite easy. Published adventures are for people who already know how to play and who want either the inspiration or the legwork done for them.

Great stories are crucial to the commercial success of a story telling based game, imo. Without them, I have no idea how you bring in new DMs and players.

Honestly, I think that's backwards. The DMs and players bring in the stories.

 

[KesselZero]

Jumping off what [MENTION=6688858]Libramarian[/MENTION] said, let's not forget how heavily the system influences adventure design. The classic, simple example would be the stereotypical 4e adventure consisting of big tactical combats, perhaps connected by skill challenges (see every Living Forgotten Realms adventure ever)-- tactical combat is what 4e does, so its adventures are structured around combat encounters. Conversely, I love making trap-laden dungeons full of twisting, labyrinthine corridors, but 4e's healing, rest, and passive skill rules make simple traps (a single arrow trap in a corridor, e.g.) almost meaningless, or at least kind of boring. The system informs what kind of adventures can be best supported.

 

[pemerton]

Ideally, WOTC would collectively create a previz of what their ideal adventure module should look like at a given level (or tier) focusing on the "D&D Experience" they are hoping to achieve. Once THAT is locked down they should then go off and build the engine and rules that make that play experience possible. Playtest it with rules in place. Tweak as needed.

Rinse, lather, and repeat building the ruleset as you go.

Thoughts?

I think this is a sensible way to go, but I don't know that it's what they're doing. I think it might be something like what they did for 4e, but that came back to bite them!

Part of the problem for WotC's designers is the fact that (or what seems to be the fact that) for many D&D players, a good chunk of the D&D experience is the mechancis, somewhat divorced from their contribution to any particular story or adventure experience.

Simple example: suppose we think that part of the "D&D experience" is becoming a 5th level wizard who can suddenly fry a room full of bugbears with a fireball. It's very hard to divorce that experience from the mechanics that underpin it - eg the damage mechanics for a fireball spell, and the hit point and saving throw mechanics for bugbears. Heck, I think that for many players it's hard to divorce that part of the "D&D experience" from the technique of rolling 5d6!

 

[pemerton]

I'd guess that most players making the transition in 2008/2009 from 3.5 to 4e probably started by playing KotS.

I'd be curious to know if this is the case or not.

When I GMed my first session of 3E in 2000, I pulled out an old White Dwarf adventure involving a lighthouse half-buried in sand, then transitioned into Castle Amber. I started my 4e campaign using Night's Dark Terror, an old B/X module which features a good gridded map of the homestead for the opening fight with goblins (and hence seemed suitable for 4e!).

I'd be surprised if I'm the only person who approaches the new system in this sort of way - use the story elements you're already familiar with and know can make work, and then see how the new mechanics play out in them.

One interesting thing is how Sunless Citadel occasionally is mentioned as a classic. SC is a pretty decent adventure but nothing out of the ordinary. However, since SC was the first adventure in the 3E line it gets a mention anyway. I think people wish SC was great even though it wasn't (please feel free to disagree).

I want to agree. And go a bit further. I picked up a copy of SC when it was on sale at my local game shop. I had a quick look through it, but have never opened it again - it seemed to me to offer nothing at all.

Whereas I have used a good chunk of Bastion of Broken Souls - there were some good ideas in that module, like the exiled god, the theft of souls, the angel-as-gate, and the night hag in the temple. I didn't use many of the ideas as the module author suggested (as written, it is a combat-heavy railroad) but the ideas themselves were worth $20. At the moment I'm using bits of Speaker in Dreams in my 4e game, and again some of the ideas in that, plus the maps and the basic setting background, have been worth the price of purchase.

The other module I have from that series is Heart of Nightfang Spire, which again I have only skimmed. It looks potentially interesting but hugely grindy as presented. And whereas Basion of Broken Souls was easy to tweak - keep the situations much the same, but change the resolution to remove the combat/railroad - I'm not quite sure how I would go about tweaking a map/setting heavy adventure like Heart of Nightfang spire without rewriting from scratch.

 

[delericho]

I've been thinking about the transition from 4e to Next, as well as a look back at iconic material, and it makes me wonder if the adventures (including materials to use in home-brew adventures) are possibly more important than the system.

No, not even close.

However, adventures are very, very important.

What type of adventures/modules/settings should WotC launch with 5e?

On the same day WotC release the Starter Set and the Core Rules (which really should be the same day), they should also release at least one (preferably two) adventures suitable for 1st-level characters. Each of these should be a fairly simple and iconic dungeon crawl adventure designed to showcase the 'core' D&D experience - whether that is "Orc and Pie", "kill things and take their stuff", "lamentations of their women", or something else.

"Sunless Citadel" is an almost perfect example of what is required, although it could probably use a few more possible routes through the dungeon.

If, however, they're doing two adventures on Day One, these two should be different takes on that some core D&D experience - perhaps one is a mostly linear crawl, while the other is much more sandboxy? (Indeed, perhaps the initial releases should be "Return to the Sunless Citadel" and "Caves of Chaos"?)

(It should go without saying that any adventures released on Day One must be good adventures. Not releasing any adventures would be a really bad thing... but releasing bad adventures would be worse still!)

After Day One, their in-print adventures should probably resemble "Gardmore Abbey" in scope - fairly big stand-alone adventures that contain some sort of component or use some sort of format, that cannot be readily duplicated electronically - perhaps they include the minis required, or have lots of detailed handouts, or include a "Deck of Many Things", or whatever.

But, again, quality is really important. WotC need to build a reputation for doing excellent adventures.

Meanwhile, the majority of adventure support should come online, in eDungeon (or the DDI generally).

Ideally, Dungeon should do at least three adventures every month, gradually settling in to a pattern of one low-level, one mid-level and one high-level adventure each month (or one from each tier, if they retain that paradigm). Obviously, for the first few months, they should skew this lower... but adopting the twin disciplines of "multiple adventures every month" and "covering the entire level range" would be a very good thing.

As with the in-print adventures, eDungeon should initially focus on doing good standalone adventures, building (or rebuilding) a reputation for quality. It's much easier to do good standalone adventures than good Adventure Paths, so do the easy thing first.

After several months of building quality (perhaps as much as a year, or even more), they should consider doing some linked adventures. Here, start with a trilogy, then a mini-series, and only then should they risk an Adventure Path. The bar for adventure paths is now very high, with both Paizo and EN Publishing showing what can be done. There's no reason WotC shouldn't have the people to do this just as well (or better), but...

eDungeon is also the primary place where WotC should provide setting-specific adventures. Sales of in-print adventures are never going to be great, and setting-specific adventures are a niche within that niche, so they're almost certainly not worth doing in-print. But eDungeon is a different proposition - it can afford to take more risks, and it should take more risks. Every 'current' setting should probably get at least one dedicated adventure in eDungeon each year. (Where 'current' means those settings that have been released for the new edition - currently that's "Forgotten Realms", "Eberron" and "Dark Sun".) That doesn't mean other settings shouldn't get support, if a really good adventure is available; only that the current ones absolutely should.

Finally, there's the question of updating the 'classics'. Personally, I would prefer WotC to focus most of their efforts on developing new adventures (with new IP to go with them), rather than getting stuck in a rut of just recycling the old. Still, there's always going to be a demand.

Perhaps the thing to do is to do periodic boxed updates of classic adventures in-print, and also doing occasional updates of others in eDungeon? But don't rush everything out at once - you'll want something for next year's release schedule!

So, that's it:

- One (or, better, two) low-level in-print adventures on Day One
- A couple of big, deluxe, standalone adventures in-print each year
- Three adventures a month in eDungeon, covering the entire level range, handling setting-specific support, and doing trilogies, mini-series and Adventure Paths later
- Occasional updates of the classics, across both in-print and eDungeon formats

Oh, and also: release 5e under the OGL so the 3pp can support the game!

 

[delericho]

I think adventures are pretty useless. Maybe to be gleamed for few ideas, but those can also be "borrowed" from movies, books, other systems, real life, and imagination.

Adventures need to be tailored to your particular players. What they want out of the game, and what they like in a game are different to every individual. Cookie cutter adventures are never as good as adventures tailored for that group of players.

I used to think that. Then I ran "Shackled City", and discovered that my homebrew adventures had been stuck in a creative rut for a very long time. Not only does "Shackled City" stand as one of my four best campaigns, ever, but it also made me better at designing my own adventures.

Some people say they "have no time" to GM. I say that's hogwash. It doesn't take that long to plan an adventure.

Plan, no. But to flesh that out - create maps (especially interesting maps), stat out the bad guys, develop their tactics, and ensure that the plot actually holds up to scrutiny? Yeah, that all takes time.

Those that don't even have an hour a week, well they are either lying or just are not managing their tasks effectively. Who the heck can't find an hour a freaking week?

I would love to be able to prep a game in an hour a week. But it takes me at least that just to prep a pregenerated adventure. Or to draw a couple of half-decent maps. And don't get me started on 3e stat-blocks.

Basically, I aim to do one hour of prep for each hour of gameplay. I'm lucky if I find the time to do all of that, but even if I do I tend to find I am close to being unprepared.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Adventures matter a lot. Maybe not as much as the core system (which you need to play the game in the first place) but they are critical on a number of levels. First they force the company that makes the core system to test their vision of the game in a very public way. I think it is crucial that designers put forward their notion of how the game can play (this is something I work hard on with my own modules). Remember people don't always buy modules to run them, sometimes they buy them to get an idea of how the game is meant to be played. And the effect of this is modules not only shape how thegame is played, they open up the designer's assumptions to criticism.

Modules are important because they breath live into a game line. Back in the height of AD&D, when there were mounds of 1E and 2E modulea at the game store, there was something inspiring about those rows of staple bound booklets. It drew you the game somehow by demonstrating ita breadth.

Modules are a priceless source of material. Most folks I know rarely run full modules (though they do read them and use them for adventure ideas and blueprints). Usually they cannabalize elements of them. One might say just bang out books of npcs, maps, encounters, etc. But the fact that module material exists in a solid context matters in terms of quality. It also means yu can extract connected elements and use them together.

Modules grow the game without breaking it. Modules allow for the game to grow and prosper without the breakage youu get when you release nothing but books of feats, spells, magic items and prestige classes. They are not must have, they are want to have.

Modules cater to the GM. GMs are arguably the most important customer to connect with after the core book release. Happy GMs maintain happy campaigns, which keeps the game going. The hub of most gaming groups is the GM. Without someone running the game, gaming groups easily disintegrate. The big hurdle for any rpg company is sustaining numerous active gaming groups that play your game. To have sales, you need this.