Poll: 3rd Party Adventures

[Tequila Sunrise]

I'm thinking of writing an adventure for the general public's benefit. So here's a few questions for those of you who buy 3rd party adventures:

1. Do you prefer short- (one or two levels worth of adventure), long- (a few levels worth) or epic-runs (levels 1 to 20)?

2. Are you largely attracted to classic dungeon-delve adventures, intrigue-investigative adventures or some other type?

3. How strictly do you expect the adventure's makeup to match standard d&d? For example, would a group of lawful barbarians trouble you? New magic items, assuming they made sense? Unique spells? Non-standard or previously non-published monsters? NPCs with unique abilities?

 

[Firedancer]

This is a hard question to provide a satisfactory answer to.
I would probably buy any length of module, but the key here is my needs at that time. You could have a cracking module, but if my gaming schedule is full I probably will add it to "keeping in mind". I'm signed up for WotBS as it intrigued me, and enworld is a site I visit often, my group is willing to run it, but want a couple of the modules under the belt before we start.

I've brought small adventures to help fill up down time/spark off some of my own stories.

I've been a patron of open design, and am signed up for the next project, hoping it will be the Empire of the Ghouls adventure. Speaking of open design, have a look at that thread/site, as Wolfgang Baur has published essays on various parts of writng modules which could be of assistance, and becoming a patron isn't all that expensive.

I think if you are doing this for your self you should write one up that you feel you can do a good job on. Then once its got some feeback on your ability (story, mechanics, creativity) look more to meeting demand.

As for adventures with an unusual premise; I suspect they would get less use, but I can't see people being put off. Your own monsters, items and spells - why not, most other adventures have this. Just make sure its balanced. And please don't put a monster in with a vulnerability that PCs just so happened to find a potion/item of earlier in the adventure.

 

[The_Gneech]

I generally prefer short things that are easy to plug in to my own storylines. I've done a lot with Dungeon magazine and the Dungeon Crawl Classics line that way.

Megadungeons end up being abandoned after the first or second chapter, either because I'm tired of it, or the players have thrown too many monkeywrenches into the plot and I have to re-write the ending anyway.

-The Gneech

 

[Voadam]

I'm thinking of writing an adventure for the general public's benefit. So here's a few questions for those of you who buy 3rd party adventures:

1. Do you prefer short- (one or two levels worth of adventure), long- (a few levels worth) or epic-runs (levels 1 to 20)?

2. Are you largely attracted to classic dungeon-delve adventures, intrigue-investigative adventures or some other type?

3. How strictly do you expect the adventure's makeup to match standard d&d? For example, would a group of lawful barbarians trouble you? New magic items, assuming they made sense? Unique spells? Non-standard or previously non-published monsters? NPCs with unique abilities?

1 generally longer, things like Goodman Games' Dungeon Interludes (1-12) Though I like them broken up the way Interludes is so I can throw other stuff in if I want. I've bought all three styles of lengths though, 32 page short adventures to mega modules like the 2e dragonlance anniversary one.

2 I like both, but ease of use as a DM is important. I love good stories and intrigue and investigative stuff along CoC/Ravenloft type lines work great for me, but clear synopses of the plots are essential for me as a DM.

3 New magic items, spells, monsters, and unique NPCs are great. Most variants from the rules should be spelled out clearly though as why they are implemented and whether they are campaign assumptions or specific to the individuals. Even though I run a game with no alignments, seeing an unexplained lawful barbarian in a module would just make me question the author's grasp of the rules and lead me to second guess other things in the adventure.

 

[DragonLancer]

I'm thinking of writing an adventure for the general public's benefit. So here's a few questions for those of you who buy 3rd party adventures:

1. Do you prefer short- (one or two levels worth of adventure), long- (a few levels worth) or epic-runs (levels 1 to 20)?

2. Are you largely attracted to classic dungeon-delve adventures, intrigue-investigative adventures or some other type?

3. How strictly do you expect the adventure's makeup to match standard d&d? For example, would a group of lawful barbarians trouble you? New magic items, assuming they made sense? Unique spells? Non-standard or previously non-published monsters? NPCs with unique abilities?

For me the answers are:

1. Short. I prefer modules that are built over a 1 or 2 level spread at best.

2. When it comes to it, I find dungeon crawls and wilderness based modules to work best. What one person thinks makes a good intrique based scenario isn't what another thinks. Best to stick to the basics IMO.

3. No new spells, feats, PrC's, or items. New monsters, yes, bit nothing else. Stick as closely to the rules as you can and let the individual DM's at home modify the scenario for their own worlds/games.

 

[Treebore]

I pretty much like them all. Re-writing/modifying is an expected, and acceptable, given when I buy modules. So even if I don't like how you do it, I'll like it when I get done with it.

So do it however you like.

 

[Technomancer]

1. Do you prefer short- (one or two levels worth of adventure), long- (a few levels worth) or epic-runs (levels 1 to 20)?

Shorter, maybe 1-2 levels. Like The Gneech said, something I can plug into my own campaign/setting without it mucking up the continuity/established canon.

2. Are you largely attracted to classic dungeon-delve adventures, intrigue-investigative adventures or some other type?

Not necessarily dungeon-based, but pretty straightforward misson-based. Like a sidequest in a crpg almost.

I also like location-based modules, sort of mini-settings of a small area where several differetn plot hooks are described and the PCs latch onto whichever one sounds interesting.

3. How strictly do you expect the adventure's makeup to match standard d&d? For example, would a group of lawful barbarians trouble you? New magic items, assuming they made sense? Unique spells? Non-standard or previously non-published monsters? NPCs with unique abilities?

As mentioned in question 1, I don't want anything that would change what has already been established for the campaign, so it's best if it sticks as closely to RAW as possible.

 

[SiderisAnon]

1. Do you prefer short- ...
2. Are you largely attracted to classic dungeon-delve adventures, intrigue-investigative adventures or some other type?
3. How strictly do you expect the adventure's makeup to match standard d&d? ...

1) Short adventures are best. I prefer adventures that are designed to be run in a session or two. Longer adventures tend to lose the players, unfortunately.

If it is a longer adventure, it needs to be one with an overall plot that has the details broken up into reasonable "chapters". I can then run the chapters as a session each, intersperse other things as my players wander off track to things that interest them, but still maintain an overall plot. One of my favorite Shadowrun adventures to run was one where the first three chapters all seemed unconnected, until you got to the fourth chapter and it tied everything together; then you moved on into the fifth chapter to wrap everything up. You were encouraged to run other things between the first three chapters.

2) I like a good intrigue or investigation adventure when I look at a module. If it's a dungeon-delve, it has to have some very interesting or unique bits to attract my attention. I can write dungeons easily; coming up with an intrigue that's good enough to surprise me so I know I can use it to surprise my players, that's the hard part.

3) I prefer an adventure that isn't too strictly attached to core rules. I hate it when an adventure assumes that to finish it (or understand the mystery) you have to have knowledge of or access to certain spells or magic items.

Of course, you don't want to get too far from the core if you're planning on selling the adventure outside of your setting. I've seen adventures designed for a particular setting that were so immersed in that setting that they were basically impossible to run anywhere else and still have them make sense. I can find a way to work a tribe of lawful barbarians in. Trying to shoehorn in an entire country is much harder.



My other comment for adventure writing is that the blurb should be GOOD. I won't bother looking through an adventure unless the blurb catches my attention. (And I won't even consider some of the adventures I've seen that have no blurb at all.) The blurb shouldn't give away the plot or be anything that the player's couldn't see, because they use the same online or FLGS that I do, but it should draw me in. Think of it like the back of a movie box. You want it to grab my attention so I rent/buy the movie without giving away the ending.

The final component for me is pricing. Too many adventures are priced at the point where I look at it and go, "Nah, it's more worthwhile for me to save the money and spend time writing my own adventure." I don't think they should all be $2 or something similar, but I also don't think that paying $15 for a module that will only last one gaming session is cost efficient.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

1. Do you prefer short- (one or two levels worth of adventure), long- (a few levels worth) or epic-runs (levels 1 to 20)?

Shorter ones are easier to adapt for an individual campaign. In addition, it's my personal belief that few people need full Adventure Paths from 1-20, and they certainly don't need more than one or two. The market already has a lot of these now, and I'd hesitate about creating more. (Now, if your adventure sold so well that there was a sequel, and maybe a prequel, and so on, and you wove them together as an adventure path after the fact, that'd be something different.)

2. Are you largely attracted to classic dungeon-delve adventures, intrigue-investigative adventures or some other type?

All of the above, at different times. Best of all, IMO, is a single adventure that mixes site-based stuff with character-driven stuff.

3. How strictly do you expect the adventure's makeup to match standard d&d? For example, would a group of lawful barbarians trouble you? New magic items, assuming they made sense? Unique spells? Non-standard or previously non-published monsters? NPCs with unique abilities?

I like new crunch, assuming it's broken out at the end and presented clearly.

If you have a lawful barbarian, I'd prefer you call him something else.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

1. Yes.

2. Yes.

3. New spells/items/monsters are OK as long as they make sense for the module, follow the rules, are interesting, and are included in the adventure.