By Popular Request: Rodney Thompson's Session Prep Examples

WotC's Rodney Thompson spoke the other day about creating a session cheat/prep sheet for a game of D&D. It sparked some lively discussion, and a number of people asked for examples of a prep sheet. Rodney, being that kind of guy, obliged and provided his session prep from a Greyhawk campaign. It's five pages long, and should give you a great idea of what he means.

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[TerraDave]

Agree, way to much prep work. ... I don't think that is either common or good advice for new DM's.

Maybe not a brand new DM, for them, well, there is one adventure in one box set. But for newish DMs, especially in high school or college and with some free time, doing your own adventures is a great way to learn about the game and can be fun.

Even if they don't usually go as planned.

 

[delericho]

Very, very glad to see these.

 

[turkeygiant]

I will write something along these lines for my games at least in terms of size, but when I do it 75% is probably going to reference the campaign in general, with 25% focusing on the immediate session.

The table of happenings in the court is interesting, but I'm not sure why it is a random encounter for a personal game, I would just pick the two most interesting things off that list, not roll to see what happens. I tend to only use random tables to spice up journeys with fights and events, not a individual session.

To me this reads like what I would expect from a published adventure or module, (not surprising considering who wrote it) but it probably does go way above and beyond what the vast majority of DMs are going to have time to do.

 

[speculart]

These are notes for an on going campaign. Not a one off adventure slammed together in 45 minutes.
This prep will be useful whenever the Pcs come back to this particular locale. Rodney has brainstormed and distilled the flavour of The Court of The Fool King and now can easily ad lib within it when ever it is required with minimum fuss.
Great to see how he handles NPCs in this role play heavy session, just the ideals bonds and flaws. With these, interesting and long remembered NPCs can be made.
Thanks for posting.

 

[lkj]

Rodney did note on twitter that some material carried over from prior sessions and you'd expect some of this to carry into the next. So it's not an accurate gauge of how much work per session. Just a snapshot of where his notes are at that time.

AD

 

[turkeygiant]

These are notes for an on going campaign. Not a one off adventure slammed together in 45 minutes.
This prep will be useful whenever the Pcs come back to this particular locale. Rodney has brainstormed and distilled the flavour of The Court of The Fool King and now can easily ad lib within it when ever it is required with minimum fuss.
Great to see how he handles NPCs in this role play heavy session, just the ideals bonds and flaws. With these, interesting and long remembered NPCs can be made.
Thanks for posting.

I read this as being based around the events of one session, but you are right this info could be filed away for later games too.

 

[Curmudjinn]

This is pretty similar to my own prep. You have a few pages of overall lore/prep, and the party only touches on this or that per session. It's more of a snapshot of the current setting for DM use than a play-by-play adventure prep.

 

[TarionzCousin]

Nearly all of my game prep time is spent creating appropriate combats for the PC's. I have stuff like this written down and in my head, but I can think of that whenever I have a few synapses free.

It takes me a few hours to find appropriate monsters, alter them (often), give them magic items to use or loot to guard, and note a few options. I think after this campaign of Pathfinder ends (another 12 or 15 months) I am going to switch to running 5E.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I would not DM if I had to write anywhere near this amount of prep for each session. Even when running pre-written adventures for 3.5E the prep feels overwhelming sometimes.

 

[Wrathamon]

its not too much if he uses it (its his job)

It might be way too much for home game. It's written strange as if it's for someone else to use. I can see using this but doing more shorthand reminders.