DMs If you had to choose...

[Inez Hull]

My confidence as a GM is definitely linked with the level of preparation I've put in. I don't mind ad-libbing but don't feel confident doing so unless I've had the chance to flesh out ideas and directions that things may take. I find true seat of the pants GM'ing very hard. I always have lists of names prepared - both people and places and find this really helps.

Individual adventures aren't (usually) too much trouble to find inspiration for, but I do struggle with finding a campaign direction that doesn't railroad the players. Part of this stems from the fact that when I have set up things very player focused they respond well and take control during adventures but don't really push the direction the longer term campaign takes.

 

[Ace]

...what the most difficult aspect of designing a campaign/adventure, what would it be?

Creature and Treasure Escalation

I am used to "fixed hp" systems like GURPS and BRP. Because of that I have always found it difficult to fit high level encounters monsters and treasure into a game.

The "Monsters with Classes" help a bit but I still have troublew cementing it together

 

[Psion]

My confidence as a GM is definitely linked with the level of preparation I've put in. I don't mind ad-libbing but don't feel confident doing so unless I've had the chance to flesh out ideas and directions that things may take. I find true seat of the pants GM'ing very hard.

I don't find it so hard. I try to prepare adventures, because when I can get little details down about the situation, I have had some truly fantastic games. But most of my "seat of the pants" games work out pretty well.

Just last week, my players were surprised, at the conclusion of the session, to that I ad-hoced it. I had prepared the adventure assuming the players would go one way and they went another. (Typical, eh?) I already had an idea of where I wanted to go, I just had to put my ideas into play a little less fleshed out that I would have liked. I grabbed a castle floorplan from "Keeps & Castles", took the chance to try out a few new creatures from the MMII (Runic Guardians work pretty well!), and used the "stock" NPC stat blocks in the DMG and PsiHB. One NPC ally I had to totally ad hoc without stats because he was an odd class combination ( a rogue/ fighter/ ghostwalker/ shadowdancer).


Anyway, the the question. Other than the hammering the details down, I find the hardest part of making a new adventure to be:

a) Come up with a plot that "breaks out of the mold"
b) Coming up with interesting non-combat encounters to keep the game from being a hack-fest. Combat encounters are easy to come up with, but I like a bit more depth in my adventures.

 

[Celebrim]

There are four things that I find equally challenging in running a campaign.

1) Finding a good set of players who are able and willing to meet regularly, who get along well, who aren't too rulish bookish and gamish, who aren't so Asperger that they can't participate socially, and who can RP.

2) Finding the time to write something that players like that will appreciate.

3) Thinking up good hooks to get a story going. Thinking up plots are pretty easy. Thinking up the beginnings of plots are pretty easy. What is really difficult is convincing a decent RPer that they really should involve themselves in something that really isn't obviously their affair (especially at low levels). Answering a PC's 'Why?' is often really difficult when that PC is constructed with a reasonable ammount of depth. Ultimately this problem became such a problem that I had to institute the 'You can't just create a deep character, you have to create a deep hero' rule. Even so, its still hard to introduce an adventure in some sort of natural manner. Coming up with a valid reason to go poking your head in some dark dangerous place that no one would really want to poke thier head into is tough.

4) Coming up with a twist in the plot that a set of highly intelligent, imaginative, intuitive, experienced, players won't see through immediately and will actually think of as fairly imaginitive and witty on my part.

 

[incognito]

two big problems

1) Making NPCs with believable personalities/desires/goals - which in turn become plot development - and getting the players to buy into it. My players want a good amount of choice in thier adventuring - no railorading. I end up setting up political factions, or competing trade houses, and let them choose sides, if any.

2) Striking a balance between giving the players the feats, treasure, and new spells they are constantly bring bomnbarded with in splatbooks and in turn ask about. Yet still inspiring awe ro fear in the players when finding treasure, or fighting NPC adversaries (feats like greater spell focus and + skill items can really nerf a game if it goes unchecked.

 

[KnowTheToe]

I just started DMing, and all I have is a vague idea, and some stats. Thats it. The only idea is that the party will be blackmailed by thier employer, a noble who sends them to kill things for him, "protecting the realm." Whether they actually earn the right to be called protectors, well...

Anyway, all I have is that idea, the idea of making them kill goblins, and a whole BUNCH of stats I outright stole from the goblin-a-day thread. Oh, and I helped them all develop backgrounds that are really easilly abusable adventure hooks. (WHAT? My evil father isn't dead? WHAT? My grandfather's quest item is this little ball of fluff? WHAT? That goblin tribe that kileld my family was taken over by the ranger's evil father?)

Thats it.

I've already run a few sessions, with maybe an hour of prep time each. It works pretty well, because since me and my players are all immature highschoolers, I can just throw something wacky at them (like nameing two of the goblins Jay and Bob, or a psudonatural goblin who sucks in her own skin (think that mirror scene in the matrix, but sort of funky)), and they take care of everything themselves. I only facilitate thier... "fun."

This style gaming is the best you will ever have. Once you get bored of it, and eventually you will, you will have to become more creative, subtle and complex.

Why do we do this? So we can continue to try and create a game that is as much fun as the loose wacky adventures you are describing.



M@

 

[Danzilla]

For me, the most difficult aspect is streamlining. Too often I try to work out all the possibilities, which causes me to overwork a scenario. I don't like railroading my players, which causes me too many hours of writing up adventures.

Sometimes railroading is the only thing you can do...I missed a game once and when I came back we were planting the plastic explosives to blow up the childrens hospital...took some serious Railroading by the GM to get that campaign back on track...I should have learned my lesson from missing that one time, but no, the nest game I missed they put me in the turret of an APC and it was hit by a rocket...talk about having your character turned into the redshirt while you weren't looking...

Danzilla

 

[pogre]

These days it's the rules. I started running 3E a couple of years ago and I cannot get into the "crunchy bits".

When I get into grappling or grabbing or disarming or bullrush - I would rather just make a snap ruling and go with it. None of these rules are intuitive for me. Unfortunately, I have played 3E long enough with a group that has read the book and knows there is a "right" way to do it - so they always want to look it up.

I started writing my own stuff a year or so ago and I still hate the stat blocks for D&D. The upside is I have started to learn the spells and other rules better as I continue to refer to them in writing adventures.

I think the rules were well written for the most part given the constraints of maintaining a D&D flavor. I just wish I knew everything off the top of my head. Yes, I have GM'ed in games where that was the norm.

 

[ced1106]

One thing with 3rd edition is having an NPC ready on the fly. Someone needs to put out a book of nothing but NPC stat blocks arranged by character level and class with very brief descriptions of them so they can be easily dropped into a game. They should range from characters with NPC classes to NPC's with prestige classes.

* Citzen Game's "1000 Faces" books: Many colorful NPCs to use as major and minor NPCs. $20.

* Ambient's "Everyone Else" PDF: Scalable extras for minor city roles. Under $10.

* RPGObject's "NPC Essentials" PDF: NPC design by John Fourr, of Roleplayingtips.com. Under $10.

Good stuff.


Cedric.
aka. Washu! ^O^

 

[teitan]

I would have to agree with the poster who said time. One of my players resents that I use canned adventures but I work a full time job and also at breaking in to the comic book field and have maybe an hour to work on my adventures a week. He just has high school to worry about and three periods of that are study hall with the rest being art classes.

I like running pre made adventures because I can more easily improv if they go off the beaten path, but most of my adventures are a page or two of notes and maybe a key NPC or two. I get a lot of use out of Dungeon Magazine though, and I really enjoy some of the adventures contained in it's pages.

Jason