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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Barastrondo" data-source="post: 5300482" data-attributes="member: 3820">So, basically I have three physical elements that I rely on for the average D&D adventure: a box of "monster cards" (stat blocks put on index cards that can be easily reskinned), a formal campaign notebook, and my goes-with-me-everywhere notebook where I do a lot of my idle jotting down of ideas over lunches and such. My process frequently begins with jotting down ideas in my go-everywhere notebook. I always start with the question of where the PCs are likely to go next. If at all possible, I ask them between sessions: going to try crossing the bridge, going up the wall, or navigating the sewers? My initial brainstorm of what that might entail goes down in the notebook, usually. Formal prep basically involves transcribing any useful notes into the campaign notebook, flowcharting or mapping a location they might be likely to explore, and making some notes on potential encounters. The last entails going through my deck-o-monsters and assembling different configurations that might be encountered. These may get noted in pencil in the campaign notebook, over in the margins: things like "Mephits: 2 fire mephits, 1 steam mephit, 1 iron mephit". I may write up new index cards as I realize there's more critters I want to include that I don't have on a card yet. Or if singular personae are showing up, they get statted out in the campaign notebook proper. The more certain I am that PCs will have a specific encounter, the more detail I can invest in it — but ultimately, I'm writing notes for myself. What is most likely to be written down are ideas that I don't want to forget (essentially, adventure Cliff notes), be they structural or descriptive, and specific details that I don't trust myself to ad-lib (like the title and events of a play the PCs are watching). Oh yeah, and names. I do try to do names ahead of time because I dread what happens when you ad-lib an NPC's name and fail. The thing I like about this process is that it's essentially staged prep: I'm free to brainstorm whatever I like in my notebook, because it's the first draft. Once I start culling notes and formalizing prep in the campaign notebook, that's the editing of the second draft. The "publication phase", of course, is in-play, and that's where I may wind up using red pens to record what really happened, and where the players diverged from my thinking.That said, I have a reasonably easy time of it because I largely play with friends and co-workers who are accessible whenever I want to ask them "So what are you going to do next?", and who play characters with consistent enough motivations that usually I can anticipate what they're going to do. They make my job a hell of a lot easier.</blockquote>

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