DUNGEON MASTERS: How do you do your session plans!?

[gdmcbride]

I am currently running "Way of the Wicked", a campaign I wrote. So, I prepped for that campaign by working roughly eight to ten hours a day for a year writing, editing and laying out the adventure path. These days, I really need more than an hour or two prep.

And most of that is setting up my dwarven forge layouts for the game.

Gary McBride
Fire Mountain Games
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[Zustiur]

I use Microsoft one note to actually store my notes. I started doing that because of an enworld thread a few years ago.
As as note content its concerned, I break it into two sections, the first is a session summary starting with a recap of the previous session, the second is the actual adventure notes. I'll try to post suitable examples when I get some time near my computer.

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[Connorsrpg]

I have developed over the years a lot of templates that I use for sessions. My favourite is my Realms chart. I use this for everything from a town, to a goblin tribe, to a cult to the kingdom the PCs are in.

I do most of my planning on these. B/c it is the same template I now know exactly where to go to access the right info.

These sheets include example encounters (creatures, places and events) each developed from docs I have put together to develop these.

I also have a DM plastic pocket display book with MANY charts in it (but that is more for use in game).

In planning I use a bunch of documents and often add a lot of random elements from them even to published adventures.

(If interested in the Realms docs they are on my website in sig. I have pasted several examples in my Rise of the Runelords Campaign Playtest right here on Enworld http://www.enworld.org/forum/d-d-pathfinder/328907-campaign-playtest-rise-runelords.html).

For campaign notes, I simply keep a calendar (done in word) for my DM notes. Player stuff is always displayed on a website. We have one for each setting used.

 

[Zustiur]

Second thoughts, I'll make time. This thread is worth it.

I am one of those DMs who has typically created too many notes, and thus not been able to find or recall details during game sessions. It wasn't uncommon for me to spend more time in prep than in play. I got sick of that.
My prep time is fluctuating wildly at the moment, because like Grimstead, I am learning to work with less and improvise more.

It is important to understand that my notes are broken into two main sections. Session and Adventure. A session may involve parts of more than one adventure. An adventure may take many sessions to complete.

I take some in-game notes in the session notes page while playing, but a lot of my in-game notes tend to be hand-written. I can type faster than I can write, but I can write less meaningful sentences when hand-writing, using fewer words, and various pictorial scribbles as required.

Session 13 - Goblin Cave Part 3
• Open spreadsheet, pathfinder rules, plus SRD, print or write out a short section of calendar/weather
• Recap:
○ Last game you continued your trek into the goblin cave - searching for Argryn's family Maulaxe
○ When we finished, you had just decided to push on through the cave
• Other things you heard about but haven't dealt with:
○ None relevant for this session


Camping
1st watch
1 Goblin sneaks up spots party, sneaks away.
+5 stealth
+11 stealth check if party uses same campsite
2nd
1st goblin reports back. Or not - goblins have coordinated, and will know the area if one doesn't return.
3rd
Goblins mass up
4th
Goblins attack
5th
Nothing
8x poorly armed goblins with slings and crude crossbows
3x elite goblins
1x goblin sergeant?
Poorly's run the moment the elites get engaged (unless sole combatant?)

Goal is to injure the party and make them scared, not to kill

12 attacked, 1 got away.

Adventure Notes (70) Grotsnik's Cave
Hooks
News arrives in Thistle that the goblins who killed Argryn's granny are causing trouble again.

The village has been attacked again. Argryn's father was wounded during the defence , and the goblins ran off with his maulaxe.

Goals
Kill Grotsnik and his band
Retrieve Argryn's family maul-axe


Rewards
2 XP for Killing 25 goblins (number to be assumed by feel) (3 XP per for Argyn)
2 XP for killing Grotsnik
2 XP for wiping out the whole cave (or close to)
+1 Char XP for Argryn for retrieving the MW Dwarvern Maulaxe
+X for taking many sessions
+1 for freeing the kobolds instead of killing.
+3? For helping the kobolds to kill the goblins

Standard CR1s = 212/6 = 35.3333 + 10 cr3 + 2cr4 +1cr6 +wolves
So in a normal campaign that would be something like 36*1st level treasure plus the others. Given 'poorness' and subtracting their equipment and other belongings from the total…
4563 cp
1821 sp
120 gp
3 gems (50 GP Jasper, 10 GP obsidian, 1000 GP fire opal)
2 art (55GP Ivory Statuette of <god>, 1750 gp sapphire pendant on a gold chain)
7 mundane. MW small heavy mace, MW Studded Leather, MW small short sword, MW Dwarvern Maul Axe, 3 Tanglefoot bags, 3 thunderstones, MW Greatsword
1 minor. Sovereign Glue

Can be increased if I feel like it. That pile is way below the recommended total, particularly for cash.
Detail
Getting there/Finding it
?? Too late

The Cave itself
3 entrances. 1 can be seen from a distance. It is clearly defended.

Defended Entrance
1 Elite goblin
P Standard goblins
P Poorly armed goblins
1 Elite goblin
1P Standard goblins
1P poorly armed goblins

They prefer to fight within the cave itself. That way they can fight in the dark, and use the choke point.

Left Entrance
The spear traps have been reset!
Very thin passage (squeeze). Not defended. Hard to find (perception DC 22). Tight for 50 feet. Then opens up to 5' passage. 1st square contains a trap. Spear trap. +12 vs AC 1d8 x3. Triggers each time someone steps on that square. Search & Disable DCs 20.
Entered here,
Disabled trap
Headed right
Steep slope, acrobatics DC15
Argryn slipped and took 4 damage. Clay slipped and took2.
Cleared 1 room of 8 goblins
Disabled another spear trap.
The spear traps have been reset!

Right Entrance
Very thin passage (squeeze). Wolf Den. 2 adult wolves, 5 cubs

Corridor Groups - become active after the first Blue gets the alert out
4 poorly armed goblins
Or
1 goblin with sling/crossbow. Shoot once, run.

Rooms
0: done
2 Standard goblins
2P poorly armed goblins
80 cp + 160 cp = 240 cp
10 sp + 40 sp = 50 sp

1: done
P Standard goblins
P Elite goblins
2P poorly armed goblins
1 goblin blue
1 goblin sergeant
160 cp + 320 cp + 160 cp +160 cp = 700 cp
40 sp + 80 sp + 40 sp + 50 sp = 210 sp
1 tanglefoot bag, 1 thunderstone
(10 gp) obsidian

----------
I'll cut off there because the rest is just more room listings with monsters and treasure.
Of course, there is nice formatting and colours etc in the real doc. I'm not going to try re-creating that in forum-code.

I also have a monsters page where I collect 4e style stat blocks (I run pathfinder, but using the 3.5 MM, but I find the original stat blocks horrible to work with). I've recently found that printing out the monster stat blocks makes things run much more smoothly than trying to keep that on screen.

 

[Zustiur]

(If interested in the Realms docs they are on my website in sig.

I went looking with great interest, but while I could find reference to the docs, I couldn't find the docs themselves.

See the attached files at the bottom of the page.

There are no files at the bottom.

 

[Blue]

I am currently running "Way of the Wicked", a campaign I wrote. So, I prepped for that campaign by working roughly eight to ten hours a day for a year writing, editing and laying out the adventure path. These days, I really need more than an hour or two prep.

I love the upfront work of world building, and I throw in at least on secret related to everything, and rough out some things to do with the plot arcs I see at the beginning, but I can tell that a year into a campaign I'm never anyplace I could have seen from the start, and it's usually* better for it by adapting to what the characters do and the players want. And that goes again for the next 12 months, and the next.

I can't picture planning a campaign from day one, just putting in the start and some bones, and fleshing it out as it grows. Maybe it's my DM style - a DM I played with for decades always ran multiple groups in the same world, and there was always more adventures, events, and happenings then one group could cover, and I run the same way (but with a single group). Well over half the adventures, side treks, or directions I throw out there never get covered by the characters because they have a lot of free will and hopefully an abundance of ways to go.

Do you find you have to do a lot of adapting along the way? Or do you have a wide variety of things available that lead back to your main thrusts?

Cheers,
Blue

* Not always - I made a great flub introducing a new player who wanted to play as loner astrologer frost centaur druid a few years into an existing campaign. I set up lots of time in the frozen tundra Frost Centaur lands so they'd have a druidic native guide to the harsh winter and strange customs, but didn't gauge the character well, who shapechanged and pretended to be a big cat in frost centaur "civilization". A good number of sessions exploring things that I had imported into that area, but little integration of the character.

 

[the Jester]

MY PLAYERS, PLEASE DON'T LOOK AT THE ATTACHED NOTES- THERE ARE SPOILERS FOR SECRETS THAT, EVEN A COUPLE YEARS LATER, YOU HAVEN'T LEARNED YET.

***

Here are two sets of notes I developed for my campaign.

The "Tower of Derryndradin" notes ended up covering two sessions IIRC; the "Tscire Nobi" was some time later, after some intervening adventuring including the 4e Tomb of Horrors' Garden of Graves section IIRC.

Basically, I prolly overprep for my best guess as to what the pcs are going to do. I run a pretty sandboxy game, so sometimes I don't use my prep work at all, and sometimes I run off of virtually- or actually- no notes at all.

I also have maps, but no digital copies of the ones in question and no way to conveniently digitize them.

EDIT: Gah, submitted reply before attaching.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

I always start with goals. I create a list of "cool things that I want the players to accomplish."

Then I come up with the steps they'll need to follow to accomplish them. This part tends to cause me to come up with interesting locations, NPCs, and general concepts.

I spend some time thinking about NPC motivations.

And then I jot down bullet lists, which I rarely look at.

When it's time to prep a session, I take some one of these ideas, turn the steps into scenes/encounters, look up the relevant information, and create a bullet list of significant details for the session. Things that need to be remembered. Sometimes I break these up by scene, sometimes I don't.

Then I let my players off the leash and try to adapt my ideas to whatever they're doing.

 

[Connorsrpg]

[MENTION=1544]Zustiur[/MENTION]
RE the Realms Docs I mentioned, the Files link is right down the bottom and is in blue.

I know it doesn't really stand out - I have changed some text on the actual page hopefully making it clearer where to go (but if you have other suggestions, I am open ).

If you take the time to use and get used to these docs I guarantee they will help a heap in play and prep - but it may take a while.

 

[dd.stevenson]

I use onenote as well--though, I only run online campaigns ATM. I imagine that if I were back to running a regular tabletop game I would try accessing the notes over my iPad during game sessions, or perhaps stick to printed notes if the iPad proved impractical for some reason.

Here's a couple year-old screenies of my notes. I was running paizo's carrion crown at the time, so these maybe aren't great representations of how I would format my own adventure notes.

Oh, and I guess I should point out that the notes contain spoilers for that AP...