Jürgen Hubert
First Post
I always start out with the villain - not with his stats, but his motivations, his resources (including henchmen), and his Nefarious Plan.
Then I try to figure out how the PCs can stumble over this plan. Given a few clues, the PCs will likely start to investigate on their own - and thus you can throw new scenarios at them. Of course, the villain might retaliate after a few incident like this and sends someone after them to shoot them with a crossbow or something - which keeps everything tense and dynamic.
A good idea is to leave at least some things mysterious until the very end. When the PCs don't understand something, they will develop various theories among themselves. As the GM, you should pay a lot of attention at this time - the players will often come up with absolutely brilliant ideas that you will want to steal. It eases your work, and increases player satisfaction when they are "proven right"...
While I do have certain long term goals for most campaigns I run, I rarely plan more than one or two sessions ahead in detail - because the PCs tend to have a tendency to run off in a completely different direction, and because I often come up with new ideas I want to use...
Then I try to figure out how the PCs can stumble over this plan. Given a few clues, the PCs will likely start to investigate on their own - and thus you can throw new scenarios at them. Of course, the villain might retaliate after a few incident like this and sends someone after them to shoot them with a crossbow or something - which keeps everything tense and dynamic.
A good idea is to leave at least some things mysterious until the very end. When the PCs don't understand something, they will develop various theories among themselves. As the GM, you should pay a lot of attention at this time - the players will often come up with absolutely brilliant ideas that you will want to steal. It eases your work, and increases player satisfaction when they are "proven right"...
While I do have certain long term goals for most campaigns I run, I rarely plan more than one or two sessions ahead in detail - because the PCs tend to have a tendency to run off in a completely different direction, and because I often come up with new ideas I want to use...
