D&D 5E Designing scenario's / episodes that can be finished in 4-hour sessions

[Fellentos]

Hey guys,

So I got lots of tips already in a previous thread about the problem I have with my gaming group: We only have about 10 sessions (4 hours each) a year to play D&D together. About one session each month.

One of the recommendations I received is to go for more episodes / self-contained adventures each session, because it will be hard to have an overarching campaign when you can only meet once a month.

My question is do you have any advice on how to design these dungeons / adventures / episodes so they can start and finish in 4 hours?
- How long does an encounter take generally?
- How many encounters for one sessions?
- Balancing exploration, combat and social interaction (I think this is very dependent on what my players like to do)
- Any examples online?

By the way I have the Lost Mines of Phandelver adventure, so I'm planning to work with that and try to cut it into session pieces.

 

[Nailen]

Take a look at this:
http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/198501/Complete-Adventures-of-MT-Black-Vol-I
$10 for a load of adventures that cover at least up to fifth level if not higher.
I've played a few of them and they are pretty good.

If you have Phandelver, I would say save yourself the effort of writing something and just use it. It's really good!

I know you've said you're group will meet monthly - I'd suggest writing up a journal after the session to cover the main plot points. And at the end of your session, maybe get your players to spend 10 min planning what they want to do next session and note that down.
Then, a couple of days before session 2, share the journal and the plans again and they should come to the table fresh and ready to play.

 

[Burnside]

10 4-hour sessions is the perfect amount of time for a comprehensive run-through of Lost Mines of Phandelver, hitting all the side quests. The plot is simple enough that monthly sessions are fine. It's a great adventure and your players will love it.

I suggest breaking down your sessions like this:

Session 1 - Wagon ambush through most of Cragmaw Hideout

Session 2 - Finish Cragmaw Hideout, arrive in Phandalin. Explore town, meet NPCs, end with bar fight

Session 3 - Redbrand Hideout

3 sessions - Chapter 3 side quests. Can happen in pretty much any order and at any time, including after the main quest is complete. Thundertree is easily a full session on its own.

Session 7 - Cragmaw Castle

Sessions 8 & 9 - Wave Echo Cave

Extra session - because stuff always takes longer than you expect, and this way you won't have to rush and will have space to add some of your own ideas and characters. Also, do you need a session zero? This is that.

I think this would be more enjoyable than trying to cram 20 levels into 40 hours. Your players wouldn't have time to master their new abilities before they have to learn even newer ones. And tier 4 encounters are really complex and can take a long time to play out.

 

[Imaculata]

Designing such an adventure is kind of like writing a short episode for a tv show, in my opinion. (not that I have ever done so, but you get my point)

You have one location in which the adventure takes place, with hopefully by the end of it a reason to move somewhere else for your next session. The adventure is entirely self contained; all the characters are in the same location, and also the enemies. You set up a simple conflict that involves a little bit of everything, with a cliffhanger ending for the next episode.

For example: The players are trapped on a prison boat, along with other npc's. They need to find a way to escape (ability checks and a bit of puzzling) and optionally form an alliance with their fellow prisoners (social). But mid-escape there is a complication: The prison ship is attacked by an unknown force, and starts sinking while the players are making their escape. The ship is now a small underwater dungeon, where they possibly fight some of the guards, and a shark or two. The session ends when they escape, and come face to face with the force that sank the ship. And there's your cliffhanger.

Various elements in this example are easy to control for time length. You can steer how long the social interactions last, by having an unpleasant prison guard show up at any time to interrupt the conversation. And the ship starts sinking when you say so. You determine when the sharks show up, and how many guards they have to fight along the way. The players will probably try to find their belongings too, which can be as difficult and time consuming as you want it to be. Heck, maybe they find their stuff right away. Or maybe part of the ship has collapsed and they have to push debris out of the way. Any simple obstacle you throw in their way, adds a little bit of extra time to the adventure.

 

[Chuck Ocenasek]

Look at Adventure League adventures they are 4 or 2 hour mods. You can either use them or rip ideas/structure.

 

[Charlaquin]

The key to running a successful single-session adventure (regardless of how long that session is) is to be very flexible with your planned material. The most important thing is to make sure your adventure has a satisfying ending. That means keeping actively aware of the time, paying close attention to how long your players are spending on a given story beat, and being ready to re-arrange your scenes on the fly so that one way or another, you get to the end of the adventure by the end of the session. Know what scenes are essential and what scenes you can skip if you don’t have time for them, and be ready to skip some of those scenes, because you will almost certainly need to. If you can only expect to get together once a month, you want to make sure every session is satisfying, and that means every session needs a strong ending.

 

[Quickleaf]

Hey guys,

So I got lots of tips already in a previous thread about the problem I have with my gaming group: We only have about 10 sessions (4 hours each) a year to play D&D together. About one session each month.

One of the recommendations I received is to go for more episodes / self-contained adventures each session, because it will be hard to have an overarching campaign when you can only meet once a month.

My question is do you have any advice on how to design these dungeons / adventures / episodes so they can start and finish in 4 hours?
- How long does an encounter take generally?
- How many encounters for one sessions?
- Balancing exploration, combat and social interaction (I think this is very dependent on what my players like to do)
- Any examples online?

By the way I have the Lost Mines of Phandelver adventure, so I'm planning to work with that and try to cut it into session pieces.

How long does an encounter take generally?
With a group of 4-5 players & 1 DM who are fairly conversant in the rules, not distracted by children/cell phones/side talk, facing a "medium" difficulty encounter without major crippling conditions (e.g. fighting in darkness) and not engaging in protracted guerilla-style conflicts, and assuming there's no "short cut" taken to resolve the encounter prematurely so it plays out "until all monsters are dead"?

About 30 minutes.

My tongue-in-cheek provisos are intended to make you aware that there are a lot of "what ifs" to this question that are going to vary from table to table.

How many encounters for one session?
That varies. I plan for ~5 "encounters" for a 4-hour session, and by that I don't mean combats but encounters where there's something at stake, where there's conflict, and which the players are likely going to spend some time with.

However, be prepared to run fewer encounters (or ad lib entirely) because the players are an unknown quantity. They're going to surprise you, they're going to break your structure. It will happen. And that's fine. Doesn't mean you're a bad DM. On the contrary.

Any examples online?

There are TONS. Look at most recent Chris Perkins session at PAX Unplugged: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-xsA-xK-D8 You'll notice he nips "rules debating" in the butt fast and without compromise. That's very important for a time-slotted game, especially if you have any older D&D players used to longer-term campaigning with lots of side talk & rules lawyering & navel pontificating. Nothing wrong with that style, but for a time-slotted game you can't waste time on getting into a debate about line of sight rules, or whatever. Embrace "rulings not rules."