Techniques for spicing up aventures! By: Everyone?!

[Renfield]

I've been lightly involved in a discussion about what edition of D&D is better than the other and while reading some posts I realized I was getting sick of thinking and focusing on mechanics and wanted to discuss and bring up ideas about how to enhance the thing that got me into DMing to begin with: Storytelling. This is primarily a post for DM's naturally but those who play more often than not likely have a tale or two about how their DM really made their experience come alive! So: Message boarders and long time EnWorlders, let's see if we can't make a nice long constructive thread to help those DM's that need to add a little more flavor to how their adventures pan out. I shall begin with a few techniques that my group uses that seem to always get the PC's leaning over the table with bated pizza breath.

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These techniques are good ways to begin an evening of D&D, it might be best to try these with groups that have been gaming together for awhile, and some of these might simply not work for some people but they have worked for me and mine numerous times. Naturally it is best not to over do these as it can become predictable and in some situations can be seen as railroading so use in moderation.

Starting the session with a combat.

Starting the adventure/campaign in the middle of a situation.

Getting those pesky PC's to party up: Combat!

Now, the first one Starting the session with a combat. has been useful to liven up games that have been growing stagnant and to start off the session that might have otherwise been another boring downtime day in town. Perhaps a brawl broke out in the tavern the PC's frequent, or maybe they're traveling overland through peaceful country and rather than begin the next day/session with them riding through a hilly countryside they're in the forest of their destination and are suddenly fighting bandits.

Naturally the placement of this technique must be thought out. The bandit scenario might not work with a new group who has never dealt with the 'adventuring party being waylaid by bandits in the woods' scenario, but one who has done such a scenario in past campaigns might like this interesting change of pace. It would also be a good idea that you play to what you know of the PC's, especially if it was a combat they saw coming, PC's don't like constantly having the lower hand so they might like it if such a situation had the bandits being detected before hand and the archer ranger already hidden in a tree when the combat begins.

This technique isn't perfect of course and should be carefully thought through. If you have players who complain about the slightest bit of railroading or dm influence over their characters than this is naturally not for you.

Starting the adventure/campaign in the middle of a situation is a good way to start a campaign or adventure path. It is also a nice change of pace technique and usually involves combat and then rewinding a bit. This should be used in moderation because it can easily be seen as railroading.

The example I have is this: Rather than starting in the tavern the other PC's and my own character were on a ship being rocked by stormy seas. The DM offered no explanation only smiled and said 'you'll see' seeing as we've all been gaming with one another for a time we naturally went along with it trusting the DM. One character I think even spent his time being sick over the side of the railing while the rest of us hurriedly helped out the other sailors. Suddenly creatures seemed to leap over the railing and attack! When the trecherous battle aboard the slippery rocking deck was over we effectively rewound to meeting in a Tavern. It took a few game sessions to lead up to the ship scene but it worked out. We leveled during this time but the storytelling was done well so we ignored that little lack of continuity. Other groups might not do so, for them it's likely best to catch up to that scene fairly quickly.

Now while this can involve a bit of railroading it doesn't have to. The above scenario would be easy to lead to especially for low level characters. A little creativity can get the PC's on that ship without them feeling like they were dragged there by the skin of their teeth. Perhaps the PC's accept a mission from someone but the destination is too far to travel over land and their patron bought them passage on a ship. Or perhaps the PC's got done with an adventure and need a place to go, one of them is eager to use his recently gained gold to improve or enchant an item and they heard a wizard specializing in such things exists in a relatively nearby island city. It doesn't take much.

Getting those pesky PC's to party up: Combat!
Now this is simply something I've had a hard time with on occasion. PC's are in a tavern something and I'm having a hard time giving them a reason to choose to group up, or the new character (be it a new player or someone who's character died last session) is having a hard time connecting with the other PC's. The answer? Toss in a combat. There was a situation listed in the 3.0 DMG I believe of a portal opening and kobolds streaming forth and attacking people. This could not only be a way to unite the PC's as noticeable combatants aside from the ex-adventurer tavern keeper but could also be the beginning of an adventure. While this isn't 100% effective for everyone I've found it working more often then not.

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So those are my little ideas on how to add a little spice to an adventure/campaign/session. Feel free to post your own.

 

[Mark CMG]

Keep a list of adjectives and adverbs pinned to the inside of the DM screen. Change it each game session.

 

[GoodKingJayIII]

Cool. I like this thread.

When I introduced my players to Arcana Unearthed, we started at 1st level. As part of the gathering, I asked that all the PCs incorporate an invitation to a special "Truename Retreat" where the new characters would officially learn their truenames. It worked pretty well because it allowed me an opportunity to bring their different backgrounds together, play some atmospheric music, and just evoke a scene I thought would be appropriate for the new world. After the retreat, everyone went back to an inn for a huge party. That's when the vargouilles attacked.

I would say create characters together. Provide one or two plot points that you'd like players to incorporate into their backgrounds and give the PCs a reason to all be in the same place at the same time.

 

[Agent Oracle]

nonviolent events that test their skills

Early in my campaign, i started up a list of little unusual things that the players could encounter pretty well anywhere. My first one was "A wagon, long abandoned, and half-buried in the mud."

The players spent half an hour exploring it... seriously, because the mud that the wagon was stuck in was a radius of about 20' around it, they wound up using grappling hooks, tightrope walking, and multiple crafting checks. They wound up taking so much time i gave them a magic item at first level for their trouble.

Since then, i've kept a list of about 20 of these things, drag&drop them anywhere. None more than a sentence in length, the players and i cooperate to create the majority of the content in those encounter,s (though they don't know it).

 

[Lord Zardoz]

A few suggestions

Use The Entire ruleset:
This may be a bit more towards the mechancial end of the game than you intend, but it is still a valid suggestion. There are plenty of rules in the D&D book that simply do not often get used. The rules cover all sorts of situations that dont always come up in your games. So why not flip open the DMG or PHB to a part of the book you dont often use. Design an encounter around using Balance and Swim checks. Plan a combat to take place in a hip deep swamp, pulling out the rules for difficult terrain. Run a game where the entire dungeon they want to enter is perpetually on fire. The rules do cover these situations. Go ahead and use them.

Once in a while, do something very unexpected:
If the current adventure your running is turning out to be not that interesting, why not interrupt it with a better adventure. So lets say that trying to find an assassin in a large city is just taking too damn long, and no one is enjoying it. Sometimes when your looking for your lost car keys, you instead find that DVD you rented last year and lost. So when looking for that assassin, how about they instead find a sleeping dragon in a cavern below the city and accidently wake it up? Or walk in on some apocalyptic cult that is in the process of calling forth a demonic army with which to conquer the city.

And now, some non standard places / ways to introduce the party to one another.
- Start the players off in jail and facing banishment from some city. Tell each player that they must come up with a reason for them to be in lockup. Also, an impending hanging will give the party reason to work together to escape.

- All the players are traveling to the same city, and they are all aboard the same ship. The ship then starts to sink / gets attacked by pirates. You can either start them off on ship trying not to die, or start them off shipwrecked.

- The players meet during the equivalent of a 4th of July festival in their own town. Whether or not something bad happens is up to you.

- The players meet when they discover that they all share the same father, and meet at his funeral. This works best with parties consiting of all the same race, or of Humans + Half Elves + Half Orcs. Things get even more interesting when daddy gets up out of his coffin.

- A diety appears before the players and commands them to undertake some quest or task. It can be pretty difficult to turn down a god.

END COMMUNICATION

 

[Renfield]

Since then, i've kept a list of about 20 of these things, drag&drop them anywhere.

Wow, that sounds pretty interesting, think you might post such a list as a sample?

 

[bento]

Here's somethings I've done to liven things up:

Make the players take two traits (from the Unearthed Arcana Book) right before playing their first game and giving them XP for how well they do.

Using Scratch Factory's Swashbuckling Cards in your game every once in a while. These little cards let the players do an extra-ordinary thing during the game.

Give out five tokens to each player which they use to vote on other players during the game for great playing. Award XP at the end of the night for the player with the most votes.

 

[Henry]

This one is often forgotten:

COOL FIGHT LOCATIONS

Anyone remember the climax of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom? Or the climax of Drunken Master? Or The final chase scenes in Terminator 2? Evocative locations with lots of things to play with make for great eye-candy, and sometimes spur players to inventive solutions to problems. A river of lava cut through the room in the ultimate encounter of my Eberron game, and while the players avoided it and used it to hamper the enemy with battelfield control, they could have as easily used it to advantage in battle, coming up with a creative plan involving immersing their foes. As it was, one PC came DAMNED close to getting dropped while flying INTO the lava! A rope bridge, a warehouse, a factory of some sort, a room with flying boulders, coming up with cool scenery to interact with in combats can turn a plain "trading whacks" combat into a lively event.

 

[Renfield]

Hmmmm, a rope bridge and a bunch of stirges! Or other flying creatures. One group I played in were almost taken out by stirges, surprisingly effective creatures those oversized mosquitos, even my character who typically manages to avoid getting hit (he's an assassin in a Castles and Crusades campaign and has no Con bonus to HP *shudder* naturally he finds himself skulking and using the bow and arrow) came dangerously close to biting the big one.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Read Wolfgang Baur's adventure builder articles on the WOTC site, which are great.

How about:

Make treasures unique. Not only use special items instead of gold & jewels (an ancient tapestry, a family heirloom, a bottle of 100-year old wine, etc). Pick items and given them distinguishing marks and history, which can be used for later adventure hooks. It isn't a +1 battle axe, it's Orcslayer, the blade of the dwarven battle leader Wulf Ratbane, forged by the legendary smith Durgeddin (see the mark here on the haft!) that was so used that orc blood stained the blade black. It was last rumored to have been buried with his body along with the wealth of the Orc warlord Raltsiger who Wulf killed in single combat ...

Easy memorable NPCs. Put a list of names and character traits (greedy, shifty, lisps, outrageous accent) in your screen/notebook. When the PCs interact with someone new, pick some traits, and make a note for the futrue -- so it isn't "Commoner #10" that they are interacting with. RThey those NPCs can become recurring characters.