D&D General Your Top Tip(s) for Prepping a Published Adventure

[oriaxx77]

• Make it part of your world.
• Review opponent stats
• Add some details that fits the atmosphere e.g to dungeon rooms
• Think about the next module
• Change stupid names, details etc
• Make some colored notes and charts with story element connection details
• Drop the stupid parts
• Develop it with your ideas

 

[R_J_K75]

Yeah, for sure.....you buy as much time as you need. With something minor, a break like that can do the trick. if it's gonna be longer, then letting folks know you need a few minutes is a good idea.

I try not to stop at all, if I can help it. There are a couple of times where a player did something totally unexpected, and we all just ran with it and I abdicated everything on the fly and it became a memorable session.

The key here is how quick can you react to something unexpected without letting the players know that they caught you off guard. The smoother you keep things going the better because you are correct that they can sometimes make for the best encounters that are talked about for years to come. One time I had a player bypass a door by putting a portable hole on the floor so the door was in the middle of it. He just jumped in the one side and came out the other. Technically should I have allowed it, maybe not but it was so creative and unexpected I had nothing, so I just said OK.

 

[hawkeyefan]

The key here is how quick can you react to something unexpected without letting the players know that they caught you off guard. The smoother you keep things going the better because you are correct that they can sometimes make for the best encounters that are talked about for years to come. One time I had a player bypass a door by putting a portable hole on the floor so the door was in the middle of it. He just jumped in the one side and came out the other. Technically should I have allowed it, maybe not but it was so creative and unexpected I had nothing, so I just said OK.

Yeah, that's great....I always try and reward creative thinking like that. Cool ideas are always going to work....or at least, partially work and lead to new interesting things.

As for the players knowing....I don't even mind if they realize they've caught me off guard and I'm now freewheeling. When I home brew adventures (which is most often the case) I do a lot of light prep so that I can go whichever way the session demands. I try not to treat a published adventure differently.

 

[S'mon]

Know the supernatural powers the PCs can wield and try to spot if a challene designed in the published adventure won't be totally circumvented by your group.

Players love this, the occasional easy win, so I wouldn't spoil the fun for them.

I agree about making your own list of module NPCs to refer to. Preferably on one page of A4.

 

[S'mon]

How do you like to get around them? Start with the PCs having already accepted the mission?

For a 'mission' campaign I like to start with a 'mission briefing' scene, like the one at the start of The Orville ep 1 s 1. Players can ask questions while getting into character and getting to know each other.

 

[R_J_K75]

When I home brew adventures (which is most often the case) I do a lot of light prep so that I can go whichever way the session demands.

I definitely think there is a point to over preparation whether its a published adventure or one you write yourself. So I think that theres something to be said for newer DMs being conscious of this and as they get more experience trying to minimize prep and strive for more improv. For me improv consists of having all the tables which a good DM screen will provide, random tables and lists that will allow you to come up with something in a couple seconds with a few dice rolls.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I definitely think there is a point to over preparation whether its a published adventure or one you write yourself. So I think that theres something to be said for newer DMs being conscious of this and as they get more experience trying to minimize prep and strive for more improv. For me improv consists of having all the tables which a good DM screen will provide, random tables and lists that will allow you to come up with something in a couple seconds with a few dice rolls.

In recent years...mostly since 5E came out...I've found that running published adventures is in many ways more challenging for me. The reason is that it's easy for me to edit things I've created or thought up, but doing so for material written by someone else always seems a bigger deal. Like I'm messing with some carefully crafted formula and any change will throw things off in unforeseen ways.

Which of course is not very often the case, but that conflict causes me more thought than it should. That's why a lot of the tips I gave above are about knowing that you can and should change some of the written material.

I think that's a really important thing for DMs to keep in mind, especially newer ones.

 

[LordEntrails]

1. Read it
2. Search online for associated;
   1. Review
   2. Play through
   3. Remix
   4. Resource
   5. Plot map / story map
3. Figure out how/what you are going to incorporate from your characters backgrounds and stories
4. Determine what additional maps you might need (or area descriptions)
5. De-linearize the published plot
   1. Determine faction motivations
   2. Create versatile/flexible response teams for the factions (or random encounter not for random encounters but for repopulating areas and providing on-demand encounters)
6. Outline or mind map the adventure as you think you are going to run it

 

[R_J_K75]

In recent years...mostly since 5E came out...I've found that running published adventures is in many ways more challenging for me. The reason is that it's easy for me to edit things I've created or thought up, but doing so for material written by someone else always seems a bigger deal. Like I'm messing with some carefully crafted formula and any change will throw things off in unforeseen ways.

Which of course is not very often the case, but that conflict causes me more thought than it should. That's why a lot of the tips I gave above are about knowing that you can and should change some of the written material.

I think that's a really important thing for DMs to keep in mind, especially newer ones.

I don't run or convert many pre-written adventures for 5E either. As far as there being a carefully crafted formula I highly doubt there is one. Probably more of a guideline. Since the challenge rating system was introduced I never thought it worked all that well. From what I understood its based on a party of a certain number and you need to adjust up or down from there. My opinion is that even people who write adventures professionally are guessing as well as home DMs, only their guess is more educated. I just throw whatever I think is a good challenge for my players at them with the idea that let common sense prevail if its to easy or too hard.

 

[Li Shenron]

I've never in my life seen a module for which this was true, at least if you insist on the level of detail that I do (which is to say, the equivalent of a published module).

It's true for me... but maybe that's my fault. Large modules (say, more than 100 pages) make me feel like I have to know/remember a lot of stuff in advance, and reading the module once is not enough, and it starts to feel like studying. On the other hand, if I design an adventure myself the details flow naturally to my mind and I never forget them because they were my ideas. The real problem for me is that I am not good at writing good plots, for them I still have to rely on professional authors.