When using published adventures...

[diaglo]

Do you tell your players which adventure you are going to run or do you keep it secret? Why?

i tell them i am using all of the ones i have in my collection.

which is all of them.

 

[eris404]

One DM in group does tell us. For example, he bought the WLD, showed it to us and said, "Let's play through this!" During the days of 2E, he announced he was running RttToEE and most recently, in his last campaign he ran G1-3 for nostalgia. All of us had played through G1-3 at some point, so it was a great time reminiscing about past characters/campaigns and remembering how wonky some of the old adventures were.

As a player, I sort of enjoy knowing what adventure playing. I don't look for spoilers (in fact, I've been avoiding the WLD threads just in case), but there's something fun about knowing you're going to at some point visit The Temple of Elemental Evil or whatever, even if you don't know the details. I guess it's the rumor and reputation of these adventures that causes a kind of anticipation in me.

But other DMs don't tell us, even after the fact, which is cool, too. I'm a-OK with mystery.

 

[eris404]

When we hit the part that's depicted on the cover, I tend to work the title into a corny and overdramatic expostulation coupled with a slow reveal of the cover from behind the DM screen.

Yeah I know, I wish there was a help group.

That's hilarious! I actually like that.

 

[Ashrum the Black]

Hmm, somtimes I tell them sometimes I don't. When I ran them through my modified version of the Tomb of Horrors I let them know. It was only fair I thought.

But when I ran them through any number of dungeon adventrures or even some of the other published ones I own I never let them know. Never really saw the need since I modfiy them all so much they never resemble the original much anyway. At least in terms of NPC motivation and placement.

-Ashrum

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Do you tell your players which adventure you are going to run or do you keep it secret? Why?

I keep it a secret. I use Dungeon Adventures from time to time, and I'll even go to the lengths of photocopying them so that its not clear I'm using Dungeon.

Why? Largely two reasons: I dont want the players to make metagame inferences about what's going on depending on whether I'm going through a notebook or a module; and two, even if they've never seen or read the module, they may still know what its about from reviews, etc. The Module cover may also give away some important information (Hello, Witchfire Trilogy!)

If I'm thinking of running a module, I'll touch base with my players to make sure they don't own it, and haven't played in it, but otherwise, its a "need-to-know" basis.

 

[howandwhy99]

i tell them i am using all of the ones i have in my collection.

which is all of them.

I for one prefer not knowing during play. I have read in the past several adventures, but prefer not to know even the slightest hint of what might happen even if the module has been reworked.

Now after the group has entered and taken 3 lefts, well...

 

[Pandion]

I tell my players usually before or during the adventure. BUT, they're pretty laid back so they don't go out and read it after I tell them. That's just not cool.

It's good to talk to other gamers and compare war stories about published modules when things are all done. Nice sense of community.

 

[DragonLancer]

I don't tell them before hand but they will learn when I set up for the game. Besides none of it means a thing to them anyway. They just curse when I show up with the latest Necromacer Games module.

 

[DarrenGMiller]

Do you tell your players which adventure you are going to run or do you keep it secret? Why?

Well, since I have a player that absolutely hates published adventures, even if he has had three sessions of it and is having a great time, then finds out it is published, he automatically starts disliking it and it affects game play, yes, I try to keep it secret as long as possible, though I actually usually run published adventures with my current work schedule.

DM

 

[Maliki]

I usually don't tell them, but the module is with my stack of books and notes so if they want to know they usually do. If I wandt to keep it secret I'll use another module as a cover, sometimes something too high level for them, just to make them worry a bit.