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Message: <blockquote data-quote="shilsen" data-source="post: 4016408" data-attributes="member: 198">Personally, I handle it with a combination of different things, picking among them and placing emphasis where most appropriate in the given circumstances. If it seems possible and appropriate for the PCs to have a combat encounter, I'll just make one up on the spot. Since I usually DM with a laptop and am online, I can easily pop into the SRD (which I usually keep open at all times for reference purposes) and pick some interesting enemies. Plus I write up my notes for each session (including stat blocks) in a Word document, so I can also pop into one of them and pick out an appropriate encounter. But usually I just find it easier to crunch some numbers in my head really fast and throw together an encounter. I might also throw in a non-combat encounter (or at least a potentially non-combat one), especially one which has the potential to give the PCs more information about the place or situation they're heading for. So while it delays them from getting there, it's not just a meaningless diversion but something which could make a real difference to their future and (presumably) eventual success. Since my games tend to be heavily player/PC-driven and the character backgrounds play a large part in them, I usually also have a number of results of their backgrounds and previous actions which I can throw into the game at a moment's notice. NPCs who are friends or enemies or just acquaintances, plots they are or have been involved with but which still have threads dangling, etc. The above are just examples of things which I can put into the game when I need to deal with a situation I haven't prepped for. I also find it really helpful to practice DMing on the fly, since the more comfortable I get with that the less a "situation I didn't plan on" bothers me. Similarly, I generally avoid making any assumptions about what the PCs will do, and so no choice catches me off-guard, since there isn't a choice I was counting on anyway. Using the above techniques has generally worked very well for me. I've run sessions where everything which occurred was something I planned on and every encounter was totally statted out, and I've run sessions where I've almost completely flown by the seat of my pants, and interestingly enough I've found that my players usually can't even tell the difference.Hope that helped.</blockquote>

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