ENWorld Adventure Path: A Modest Proposal

[JDragon]

This sounds like a great idea and I would love to get involved. Of coarse I have that problem of getting to many irons in the fire and run out of time.

So for now I want to throw my support behind the idea and would love to be part of the brain storming part, and hopefully if my schedule looks clear actually contribute something of more substance at some point.

 

[ThirdWizard]

I would enjoy doing something like this.

I've never played Star Wars d20, and don't have the books for it, so I could only be of limited help in that area, though I am a geek after all (and so have uselses Star Wars knowlege floating around all inside my brain). Also just finished KOTOR 2. Mmm KOTOR... *drool*

I can sit around for hours mulling over dungeons and NPCs and plot lines, making notes and statting things out. A little focus would probably be a good thing for me. Since I only get to actually play every 2 weeks, I usually make much much more than I could possibly need.

I've only read through one published module, though. I suppose that's a good thing and a bad thing. On the bad side, I don't have a whole lot of knowlege about what published modules look like. On the good side, I don't have a lot of preconceved notions on what a published module should look like.

I did a room for the Coop Dungeon 1, actually. Not happy with how it turned out, though. Ah well, live and learn.

 

[pogre]

Good Luck!

 

[Steel_Wind]

*nods* Like I said, I didn't want to get locked in or fixated on a setting yet.

There is plenty of D&D fantasy to explore, or variants thereof.

Anyone had a chance to read the Black Company Campaign Setting yet? It is exceptionally cool.

What about Greyhawk? The Sword of Kas & Hand and Eye of Vecna as a plot hook? Sort of a Rod of Seven Parts/ Axe of the Dwarvish Lords artifact centric story arc?

Mud Sorceror's Tomb spin off? There is an entire campaign buried in the backstory to that classic Dungeon module.

 

[Gez]

The only way for this to work is by having each collaborator work on one part of the campaign.

There's brainstorming to determine the overall plot, bad guys, mcguffins, etc. Those could be made by polls -- first a thread to ask people for ideas, then after a while, a poll with a dozen of choices from the ideas that seemed the best. That's how the Creatures By Poll worked at the CC board.

Then, once the plot is chosen, brainstorming between collaborator to decide on the episodes. E.g.
►Introduction adventure: level 1-2, town under attack by bandits. Unrelated to the main plot, except the bandit leader's second-in-command works at the behest of the main BBEG and organized this attack as a distraction.
►Reprisal raid: level 2-4, PCs must find back something valuable that disappeared during the attack. First hints that there may have been something fishy behind the bandits. PCs enquire and eventually find out mcguffin was taken on a ship.
►Nautical adventure: level 3-5, PCs try to catch the mcguffin's ship and get annoyed by pirates and other sea hazards.

And so on.

Then once the layout of the campaign is made, episodes are given to individual members, who start developping them. To avoid railroading too much, several plot hooks must be used, each allowing to move on to the next adventure.

Every time someone is finished with his adventure scenario, then everybody reads it, comment on it, make suggestions, etc. A few continuity guys look for plot holes with other adventures. More plot hooks can be added for easier transition between modules. Once the scenario is agreed upon, stat-block guys prepare/proofread the NPCs. If some have volunteered, art guys can start making illos of NPCs and maps of locations.

Once everything's finished, layout guys turn it into a full-blown PDF.

People will be doing that in their free time, so you can't expect them to do as much work on their own as a professional writer. You need to cut it into tiny chunks so that everybody can do that easily in his spare time. Since it's collaborative effort, it's not a problem -- instead of one writer, one editor, one artist and one mapmaker, you'll have dozens of each.

 

[Timeboxer]

Then, once the plot is chosen, brainstorming between collaborator to decide on the episodes.

I am oddly tempted to suggest that perhaps it might be nice to do something like Tales from the Infinite Staircase -- a series of adventures that, while part of an overarching plot, can still be mix-and-matchable and scaled up and down, and for which events in one part can influence the other. Though perhaps this is possibly too difficult and breaks the metaphor of the adventure "path," but...

 

[Gospog]

Jedi master?

Hey Everyone,

Steel Wind, I have run quite a bit of Star Wars D20 in the past few years. (and ran D6 Star Wars for years before that)

I ran a very successful campaign set in the era of Episode I that lasted for about two years.

I played in a few SW D20 games set in the Rebellion era. (and so have player experience as well)

I am currently wrapping up a 3-part story arc set in the Rebellion Era. In fact, part 3 is tommorrow.

If you are moving towards setting your adventure path in the Star Wars Universe, then I offer my assistance.

On a related note, I write all of my scenarios as if somone else will need to run them. In fact, for this 3-part arc, I even used an editor on my plot notes before running the game. So not only am I used to working in a format that you may find useful, but I have a lot of examples already completed.

Ok, enough stroking my own Wookie. I would also be interested in helping with a D&D project set somewhere that really interests me, like Eberron. I will be watching the career of this thread with great interest...

-Tom

 

[IronWolf]

I also think this is great idea. Organized by the right person the result could be really good. (and it looks like the person starting this thread has some experience managing projects across the Internet). I would love to throw my name in, but realistically I would end up with too many irons in the fire as another put it and I would end up on the plenty of joiners but little doing list.

Good luck! I think this has the potential to be something quite interesting!

 

[Davelozzi]

If we're going to release this as a .PDF, won't we have to avoid Star Wars, GH, FR, Eberron and anything else that is someone's protected IP?

 

[Steel_Wind]

*sigh* the IP Police ride in.

IF you like, I can say a few things about that:

1 - I am in IP lawyer in my day job ~ it's what I do.

2 - A project of this kind is not assisted by focussing on the technical view of the legal rights of the copyright holders, but on their legal interests. They are not the same.

I would suggest that we not focus on this aspect at this time - but the members of the project can discuss it at a more appropriate time in a less public forum.