Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Keeping urban campaigns simple
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Rel" data-source="post: 4667559" data-attributes="member: 99"><p>Celebrim's post #9 up there is a very good starting point. Urban adventures don't need to be terribly different from dungeon adventures. They are just not in dungeons.</p><p></p><p>What I mean is you can still design your encounter areas and just sort of pretend that they are connected by longer, invisible corridors. The other tricky bit is that all these corridors start at "secret doors" that you need to somehow let the players find by way of some kind of clue. There are lots of ways of doing that and the ways you pick will depend on the exact nature of the adventure you are running.</p><p></p><p>But my other main bit of advice is two-fold. First, one thing that tends to happen a lot in urban settings is that the players find it easy to go outside the confines of the invisible dungeon you've set up. That's fine that they want to do that. I don't think you should tell them that they can't. But you need to constrain it so you can make it work for you rather than against you. The best way to do this in my opinion is to handle a lot of detail stuff like that out of session.</p><p></p><p>For example a PC might say, "Hey, this city has a large temple for my deity. I want to go there, pray, make a donation and see if there is anything going on. Maybe introduce myself to the Bishop." That's great. Some cool character-building potential there. What I tell the player is, "Excellent. I'll send you something about that later this week." Then you can swap a few e-mails with them at a later time telling them what they found at the temple.</p><p></p><p>This helps you in a few ways during the session. First it keeps the player from starting a tangent to the adventure that only he is interested in while the rest of the group sits there bored. Second it lets you deal with the subject in greater depth if you like in the e-mail. Third, it gives you time to think about the details when you've got more time and aren't distracted by running the rest of the game and are coming up with stuff on the fly.</p><p></p><p>The other aspect of my advice here is that this always works best when you have a clear understanding with the players. Discuss with them the fact that, in an urban setting, there are plenty of options. But that if they change direction on you every five minutes to go see if the apothecary has any new potions or to look up the Fighter's sister who supposedly lives in town, it makes it hard to run the game. So you are willing to give these side treks the attention they deserve if the group can agree to handle a lot of that out of session.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Rel, post: 4667559, member: 99"] Celebrim's post #9 up there is a very good starting point. Urban adventures don't need to be terribly different from dungeon adventures. They are just not in dungeons. What I mean is you can still design your encounter areas and just sort of pretend that they are connected by longer, invisible corridors. The other tricky bit is that all these corridors start at "secret doors" that you need to somehow let the players find by way of some kind of clue. There are lots of ways of doing that and the ways you pick will depend on the exact nature of the adventure you are running. But my other main bit of advice is two-fold. First, one thing that tends to happen a lot in urban settings is that the players find it easy to go outside the confines of the invisible dungeon you've set up. That's fine that they want to do that. I don't think you should tell them that they can't. But you need to constrain it so you can make it work for you rather than against you. The best way to do this in my opinion is to handle a lot of detail stuff like that out of session. For example a PC might say, "Hey, this city has a large temple for my deity. I want to go there, pray, make a donation and see if there is anything going on. Maybe introduce myself to the Bishop." That's great. Some cool character-building potential there. What I tell the player is, "Excellent. I'll send you something about that later this week." Then you can swap a few e-mails with them at a later time telling them what they found at the temple. This helps you in a few ways during the session. First it keeps the player from starting a tangent to the adventure that only he is interested in while the rest of the group sits there bored. Second it lets you deal with the subject in greater depth if you like in the e-mail. Third, it gives you time to think about the details when you've got more time and aren't distracted by running the rest of the game and are coming up with stuff on the fly. The other aspect of my advice here is that this always works best when you have a clear understanding with the players. Discuss with them the fact that, in an urban setting, there are plenty of options. But that if they change direction on you every five minutes to go see if the apothecary has any new potions or to look up the Fighter's sister who supposedly lives in town, it makes it hard to run the game. So you are willing to give these side treks the attention they deserve if the group can agree to handle a lot of that out of session. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Keeping urban campaigns simple
Top