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Message: <blockquote data-quote="buzz" data-source="post: 3057316" data-attributes="member: 6777">Right. What you call "the font half," I call "situation." You present the players with a setup that is pregnant with crisis: a Big Bad looming in the background, a cult working behind the scenes, a barbarian horde en route, a prophecy dangling in front of those eager to exploit/thwart/ensure it, etc. Then you drop the players in, stand back, and wait for things to explode.Granted, D&D (and, IMO, True20, C&C, HackMaster, HARP, etc, etc.) lives or dies by the encounter, and good encounters pretty much require prep. Ergo, why dungeons are such a good vehicle for D&D (& etc) play; players are free to act, but within some defined parameters.So, I reccomend starting PCs at a point where there are clear goals and decisions, and the "plot" is already in motion. E.g.:The royal family of BlackKeep is dying; a mystical disease is causing them to slowly die and then rise as ghouls. There are suspicions that the disease is a curse, as though the family is beloved by the people, they have many enemies. Should the line die out, the land will collapse into anarchy, leaving the West open to attack from the gnoll hordes, and the people of BlackKeep prey to the now-ghoulish family.The court senechal suspects the curse is the work of the notorious blackguard, Revas Thulin, and his undead army. The high priest's divinations point to long-thought-dead magics that the lich Shatar-Khan was said to practice. The commander of the guard has traced the start of the infection to a poisoned goblet known to be the calling card of the Rogue's Underguild of BlackKeep.The players: a pladin who is the fourth son of the king, and who will eventually succumb to the disease, despite his faith, if a cure is not found; the apprentice spymaster (rogue) of the guard, who has more ties to the Underguild than he's let on; the court wizard, servant of the senechal, new to the court and desperately in need of his master's apprioval if gold is to be pried from the king's coffers for an expanded library; and the novice templar (cleric), sworn to obey the high priest and purge the land of Shatar-Khan's blasphemies.Ideally, you and the players helped come up with those concepts.Anyway, you've got a clear problem and goal, but with a couple of obvious directions in which to go (and which you can prep in advance), as well as some interesting conflicts of interest. They key is to let go of the reins at this point, and let the players drive where the campaign goes next.</blockquote>

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