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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ForceUser" data-source="post: 204403" data-attributes="member: 2785">I've been planning a new campaign for almost a month, and the first session is next weekend. Based on the experiences from my last campaign, my prep this time around has been more comprehensive in some ways and frugal in others.Mostly, I think about my campaign. I jot down notes detailing specific plots or encounters I intend to present. A few  specific NPCs. A lot of adventure hooks. These notes, by and large, are not meant to be comprehensive; they are simply there to remind me of a thing I've put a lot of thought into and want to present in a certain way. Some notes are a sentence fragment, some are a whole page. Some are short lists of related items. In addition to thinking up the major plots and taking notes on what I've thought up, I've done some research on the internet. When I come to a concept I want to flesh out or something that NEEDS defining in an unambiguous way, I hit google.com and find what I need and download it or print it. I'm running an OA campaign, so most of my background material is right there on the net - religion, philosophy, history, maps, etc.My experience has been that I am a better DM when I am not trying to flip through notes or books in the middle of a game to find specific details that I've written in novel format. Instead, I use fast, find-at-a-glance bullets that allow me to keep the pace of the campaign where I like it to be. My forte as a DM is improvisation, not research, so I tend to be heavy on mood, ambiance, and drama, and light on concrete, specific, details. So my prep has been more comprehensive this time around because I have given serious thought to the fundamentals of exactly what is going on in the world around the PCs, and what the ramifications of X and Y will be in the long run. That's a new area of focus for me; I tend to run linear adventures and I want to change that. But my prep has also been more frugal because I am not spending hours detailing maps and NPCs, and writing adventures out in exquisite detail (which I would then have to flip through later during a session..bleh). So basically, I've laid the plot down, solidified some key NPCs, jotted down some adventures notes, and I'm ready to see where the PCs decide to take me through this world I've created. I've got a good feeling about this campaign.</blockquote>

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