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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Hjorimir" data-source="post: 4886882" data-attributes="member: 5745">This may sound a little artsy-fartsy, but I start by sitting around with no books and just try to picture a scene that I'd like to setup for the players. It may or may not involve fighting, but it will always strive to be dramatic and impactful on the campaign. Once I have that scene in mind I jot down a quick list of everything I will need to have in place to justify the scene. From there it just takes spit and polish (sometimes more spit, sometimes more polish) to make it luster.In conjunction with this, I select a couple of character sheets from the party for those I think have not been in the limelight much as of late and I try to work in some things that are more relavent to them in particular. Be it anything from insider knowledge they have to an important skill challenge that seems to fit their skills rather well.As an example, I recently started a 4e campaign for a group who had almost no experience with the new version. I started with the simple idea of taking D&D at it's core: A dungeon. A dragon. As I've never been happy with the idea of a dragon sitting in a room waiting to be killed, I thought how I wanted to turn things around, so I did that by having the dragon pursuit the player group through the dungeon.In the end, the PCs found themselves running through water strewn tunnels and down underground rapids and even a couple of waterfalls with a dragon and an army of goblins on their tails. The "scene" evolved into a series of running battles, skill challenges, and sneaking (and swimming) about dark, wet tunnels. Survival D&D, if you will.It ended with a big fight (another scene) with one of the dragon's brood (an elite black dragon wyrmling), some dretch, an amazingly powerful magic sword, and the release of a terrible demon who stole away with most of the sword's power.Comments from players/characters:"Is this a first-level adventure?""I've got no time to bleed...I'm too busy running.""Please, please, please...please say we can rest now.""Can I heal without healing surges?""No time for talking, RUN!""I've been playing for twenty years and that has to be the most exciting and entertaining 1st-level adventure I've ever been on!"So, anyway, I'll stop praddling on about the session and say, I try to build scenes full of exciting elements and make the most of them. If I wouldn't want to read about it in a book or see it in a movie, I keep working on it.</blockquote>

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