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What Makes a Good Urban Adventure?
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<blockquote data-quote="Charles Rampant" data-source="post: 7146086" data-attributes="member: 32659"><p>Yeah! My name is Charles Rampant, and I endorse this product or service. </p><p></p><p>One thing that I think Urban adventures offer - and almost demand - is the opportunity to let the social differences between the characters shine. If Bob is playing an Outlander Barbarian (such as an Uthgart), then his character is going to feel comfortable in a very different part of town than the socialite Arcane Trickster played by Gillian. Let them each get that; have the Barbarian's favourite tavern be closed down due to a murder, and not opened until the culprit is found! Then the Barbarian can be the party face for a time, taking them to all his mates in the dodgy dock district. Maybe the next adventure features a new arcane library opening, and the Arcane Trickster is invited with a plus one; but when arriving, she spots signs of possession in the eyes of the host. </p><p></p><p>In a dungeon, everyone is basically in it together, against the world; heroes surrounded by darkness. In a city, the party's differences are likely to be much more noticeable. After all, the party Wizard might find himself much more interested in the thoughts and opinions of Maskar Wands, head of a wizard school and important local practitioner of magic, than in the stifling ideology espoused by the party Paladin. So try to have that matter in your adventure writing. Let Wizards and Clerics and Rogues and Fighters take centre place in your plot by means of their social worlds becoming the plot for a time. It ensures that you don't just have everyone following the Bard around all day, just like a riddle or a trap in a dungeon takes the spotlight off the Fighter and puts it onto the Rogue.</p><p></p><p>Of course, it can be hard to do this until you know what kind of party you have. So you might need to wait until character creation to really get the texture of your campaign worked out; it's pointless to write up loads of plot around the bardic college if nobody in your party wants to interact with it! (You could ask the party to have at least one bard, but you know what I mean.) </p><p></p><p>As to dungeons, I think that there is a good reason that three out of the four premier D&D cities - Greyhawk, Waterdeep, Sharn, Sigil - have crypts and ruined cities and suchlike below them, while Sigil uses portals to other planes for the same purpose. It's a game of killing things and taking their stuff, after all, so letting the party leave the city and do some stabbing, but still keeping them in the same location, is very helpful for pacing. So make sure your city has some kind of a 'dungeon escape valve'; something that the players, at a time of their own choosing, can turn to get back into a combat zone. You will find though that the party takes a different view to things; when you can always pop back to the tavern from the dungeon, you don't worry so much about trail rations or suchlike!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Charles Rampant, post: 7146086, member: 32659"] Yeah! My name is Charles Rampant, and I endorse this product or service. One thing that I think Urban adventures offer - and almost demand - is the opportunity to let the social differences between the characters shine. If Bob is playing an Outlander Barbarian (such as an Uthgart), then his character is going to feel comfortable in a very different part of town than the socialite Arcane Trickster played by Gillian. Let them each get that; have the Barbarian's favourite tavern be closed down due to a murder, and not opened until the culprit is found! Then the Barbarian can be the party face for a time, taking them to all his mates in the dodgy dock district. Maybe the next adventure features a new arcane library opening, and the Arcane Trickster is invited with a plus one; but when arriving, she spots signs of possession in the eyes of the host. In a dungeon, everyone is basically in it together, against the world; heroes surrounded by darkness. In a city, the party's differences are likely to be much more noticeable. After all, the party Wizard might find himself much more interested in the thoughts and opinions of Maskar Wands, head of a wizard school and important local practitioner of magic, than in the stifling ideology espoused by the party Paladin. So try to have that matter in your adventure writing. Let Wizards and Clerics and Rogues and Fighters take centre place in your plot by means of their social worlds becoming the plot for a time. It ensures that you don't just have everyone following the Bard around all day, just like a riddle or a trap in a dungeon takes the spotlight off the Fighter and puts it onto the Rogue. Of course, it can be hard to do this until you know what kind of party you have. So you might need to wait until character creation to really get the texture of your campaign worked out; it's pointless to write up loads of plot around the bardic college if nobody in your party wants to interact with it! (You could ask the party to have at least one bard, but you know what I mean.) As to dungeons, I think that there is a good reason that three out of the four premier D&D cities - Greyhawk, Waterdeep, Sharn, Sigil - have crypts and ruined cities and suchlike below them, while Sigil uses portals to other planes for the same purpose. It's a game of killing things and taking their stuff, after all, so letting the party leave the city and do some stabbing, but still keeping them in the same location, is very helpful for pacing. So make sure your city has some kind of a 'dungeon escape valve'; something that the players, at a time of their own choosing, can turn to get back into a combat zone. You will find though that the party takes a different view to things; when you can always pop back to the tavern from the dungeon, you don't worry so much about trail rations or suchlike! [/QUOTE]
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