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Well, I've never really written my own adventure before, just ran pre-published ones. I'm starting college in a couple weeks, so I should have no end of potetntial players. I really want to run AOW in my homebrew world so it will take some adjusting. (Not too much though, that's nice).
I was just wondering if I could get some advice on writing your own adventure. Any tips or tricks you guys have would be much appreciated.
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I would take the time to find out what your players want. You can just ask, but I find a better way is to play a bit and them ask them what aspects they liked, what they would like changed.
In terms of an adventure, don't do too much. There were a series of articles in Dragon a few years ago called Dungeoncraft by Ray Winninger (I think that is how you spell it) which contained a lot of good advice, but the key thing is - only do as much as you have to get the adventure to work. It is dispiriting to do a load of work in advance and never use it.
So plan out the first adventure first, and have a vague idea what comes next in terms of a general campaign outline but don't sweat about the details yet - sufficient unto the day.
For the adventure itself, don't try to create a "Dungeon" or "WotC" thing for yourself - i.e. keep the documentation down to a manageable level. You need to stat out the encounters, maybe a bit of descriptive text if you have time (but only if you have time) and have notes about the flow of the adventure. If you haven't done it before, keep it simple - don't try and break the mould on your first attempt, it is about practice and finding what works for you. So a small dungeon with a few nasties in it, for example, not a giant multi-level maze. There is an article by Wolfgang Baur (former Dungeon editor) on aventure design on the WotC website right now which has lots of good advice.
But really, you have to do it, practice to make perfect and develop a style. And make sure that you enjoy it - if it becomes a chore, maybe you should reappraise what you are doing and why.
My two coppers:
First, start with inspiration. Find a story you want to tell, a villain you want to play, a scene (or three) that you have to share with your players. This is the kernel that the rest of your adventure will form around. It might happen that by the time you're done, the rest of the cool stuff you've come up with will have no use for where you started from, in which case you set your initial inspiration aside for a later time. But always start with inspiration.
Next, brainstorm a half dozen challenges. For later adventures, you'll want to do more, but start small. Combat challenges (monsters and NPC fights) are the bread and butter of D&D. Flip to the back of the monster manual for the Monster By Challenge Rating table and pick a few within a CR, plus or minus one, of your party. Maybe three. Other challenge types include environmental challenges (survive the blizzard!), traps, puzzles, exploration challenges (mazes and wilderness mapping. be careful of these. They can be boring if not handled just so), diplomatic challenges (persuade the enemies that are too tought to let you pass, or keep two people who should be allies from killing each other over a dispute, when you need their help), mysteries, and countless other types.
Your challenges should work with the inspiration you started from. So if the inspiration is a haunted tower, then you should be thinking about undead monsters, traps that are triggered by supernatural means, diplomacy (not all ghosts need to be killed. Sometimes you can just find out why they haven't moved on to the next life and set the wrong things right), and anything else that is
a) challenging for your players
b) builds ambiance for the story.
Once you have a handful of challenges, you need to come up with a plot and a map that stitches them together. Again, don't be afraid to discard ideas that don't work once you start seeing the big picture. You'll probably end up with more ideas than you can fit in, so only fit in the parts that are good.
Once you have this outline/map, figure out a motivation for the characters to get involved, and the consequences of going through the adventure after it's done.
There, that's a rough outline of one method for How To Write An Adventure. Like has been said, don't try to write things out to the level of detail of a published module. Just have your skeleton of what you want, and know how it fits together so you can wing it when things go off track. The Dungeon Master's Guide has oodles of further advice, warnings of mistakes not to make, and so on. It's worth reading over as you get the chance, and the sections are tidy enough that you can learn them a piece at a time.
Oh, and when in doubt, put your adventure in an underground setting, such as dungeons or caves. Such adventures are less likely to get derailed, as the players choices are more restricted.
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Here's an anecdote...
I was running a Rifts campaign for like 8 people, and my brain started melting, and I got to a point where I had...nothing. Nada.
I asked if anyone wanted to step up and run it, because I was burnt crispy. This guy who only played rpg's in this campaign for a few months stepped up.
It was total 100% fun city. He's the most naturally talented game master I ever saw. The adventure was just, "this lady comes up to you guys, with 6 desperate waifs in tow, and says her village has been attacked by demons." No over-the-top sophisticated traps or riddles or cunning plots or unique combat options. He was totally running on his innate ability to empathically make you FEEL CONCERNED about the npc's and their problems.
I guess, just take it easy and don't let any of the bullcrap bother you. You don't have to be the dungeon master for all seasons to make a fun game happen.
Excellent advice all around. As mentioned above, limiting the environment to a dungeon or other small, controlled space is key. It makes your life easier and makes decisions simple for players unfamiliar with your world and style of play. All they need to choose is whether to turn left or right at the fork, or take the blue gem or red gem from the eyes of the statue. Keeping it simple and letting the campaign grow organically is the best way to start.
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Kobold Press
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Funny you should mention this.
I just wrote a piece called Writing Your First Adventure for WotC. It's the first of a series on adventure design.
Don't listen to Wolfgang. He has no clue what he's talking about.
Also: Take a look at Amber Scott's Urban Decay in the newest Dungeon. This is a tidy little adventure that illustrates story economy quite well.
Some points:
There are plenty of hooks to get the characters into the story. Once they're involved, each scene leads to the next in turn. Even in a wide open urban setting, the adventure is set up to run like clockwork.
Amber doesn't give the chance for things to go wrong where that would derail the story. During the initial investigation, the PCs are required to roll a gather information check. If they succeed, they get the info. If they fail, they still get the info but they ask the wrong person first, tipping off a combat encounter that they would have otherwise avoided. Either way, the plot advances, and skilled characters are rewarded.
Extraneous details are carefully walled off. Yes, there's a thieves guild that creates some encounters for the party, but it's carefully set aside as something the party won't wrong-headedly go after rather than the alpha plot. Every place the party could interrogate a member, it's set up that the thieves would rather betray their allies (the alpha plot) than their boss, and spill the beans there first.
I'm actually in kind of the same situation after my AoW campaign kind of got us all hungry for a little change. When I started with writing my first adventure in a few years, I was intimidated by how much material I felt I had to create. The most absolutely important thing to do is, as far as I have seen, write up a good thorough outline. Start with the set-up or location and work it down a list of major encounters, filling in the bridges as needed. From there, I usually think up a map and populate it, leaving the mechanical things for last. Start with story and some encounter ideas and then do the crunchy things. Remember that improvisation is a huge aspect of the game, whether running your own material or pre-published stuff. So stay kind of loose and keep where they have to go in mind.
Heck, I've gone through an entire session (for the first time!) without any need for statblocks. I just used the outline, some description and lots of role-playing and plot focus.
Also, always be open to plans the PCs just throw at you in play. I could never imagine some of the plans they decided to try in the last few sessions. My favorite was when the butch female half-orc barbarian tried to weasle a date out of a halfling handyman to figure out if he had ties to a cult of Graz'zt worshippers, and when it could possibly be that he would meet with them. Definitely a plan I did not anticipate, but it really enriched the session. So don't be unbelievably precious with your plots and how you imagined things would have to be done. Sometimes, your PCs will hand you ideas that are just too good to pass up.
I read Wolfgang's tips on the WotC site, and they are (obviously) very good, but I think they give some very specific good tips. Things like using action early, and having different kinds of encounters.
Get DMG II. It has a lot of info on building campaigns and adventures, so you might be able to extract from it some important info, too.
Another tip is to look at Dungeon adventures. Deconstruct them, look at what specific steps they take and why they are good. Also be sure to tailor the game to your group. If your group likes combat, be sure to include big fights, and if the group likes detecitve work, put that in too.
Thanks, baudot! I'm blushing. :)
-Amber S.
I was just wondering if I could get some advice on writing your own adventure. Any tips or tricks you guys have would be much appreciated.
Modifying an existing adventure to a home world and writing an original adventure are two different entities.
I'm currently running Age of Worms in CONAN's world of Hyboria. The modifications have been dumb simple. I just change all the humanoids to human appearance (not changing a single stat) and playing it as is. Wait, I did have to change a couple gods, but that was pretty simple too. Oh, and I'm running it in a desert instead of a swamp (not hard to convert believe it or not).
As for writing an ORIGINAL adventure, I wouldn't waste my time in this day and age for a home group. I'd still consider writing another couple for Living Greyhawk or DUNGEON, but home groups just don't warrant the effort. It's too easy and fun to use one that's pre-made and just modify it to your liking.
Tips on writing an original: Write out ONE-SENTENCE adventure step-by-step summaries until you've got about 10 encounters. DO NOT DO STAT BLOCKS EVER (or at least until the very end ;). Use your step-by-step summaries to fill in the blanks. Lastly, DRAW A COUPLE ROUGH MAPS using a black sharpie marker on a couple sheets of paper.
I've actually done one of these on the "Snakes on a Flying Carpet" post just as an example.
jh
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I generally just kinda make up my adventures as i go along. I have worked on the same self created world for nearly 24 years now and have managed to write out about 2500 years of history. Recently i decided to take a break from this long time world and change settings.
Can anyone Tell me who was the real emporer in Rome at or about 472 AD. I found a history site but it didn't cover what I was looking for.
I generally just kinda make up my adventures as i go along. I have worked on the same self created world for nearly 24 years now and have managed to write out about 2500 years of history. Recently i decided to take a break from this long time world and change settings.
Can anyone Tell me who was the real emporer in Rome at or about 472 AD. I found a history site but it didn't cover what I was looking for.
Procopius ANTHEMIUS: Ruled 467-472 AD. (West) Appointed emperor by Leo I, Anthemius ruled until overthrown by Ricimer. His end came after a 3 month seige of Rome and his capture disguised as a beggar. He was beheaded.
Anicus OLYBRIUS: Ruled 472 AD. Olybrius 472 AD (West) Died of 'dropsey' after a reign of less than one year.
Can anyone Tell me who was the real emporer in Rome at or about 472 AD. I found a history site but it didn't cover what I was looking for.
Seems to me wikipedia has pages dedicated to historical lists of rulers for various states and empires. Try searching rome, emperors or something like that. Otherwise, there is definitely a published reference book with this kind of info for every historically documented state in the world. I can't remember the title, but I'm sure your local reference librarian can find it for you. I know the UC Berkeley library has it, and it's a good bet other university libraries have it too, if there's one near you.
My two cents are as follows:
First, compose a one- or two-sentence story. Something like this:
"A necromancer residing in a secret complex under a tomb in the city graveyard has stolen 13 children from an orphanage to sacrifice in a dark ritual that will let him animate 13 zombies each night every night that he kills a child. A caretaker at the orphanage awoke in the night to find the children gone, followed cries in the night to the graveyard, then lost the track and turned to the PCs for help."
Or this: "During the summer, an unfortunate trespasser accidentally activated long forgotten power in a menhir circle that released gale-force winds and winter temperatures, which are spreading out from the circle at a rate of a mile per day. The local sage in the city only five miles from the circle knows that the only way to stop the new ice age is to enter the caverns beneath the circle and destroy the air elemental imprisoned there."
Second, make an outline of four or five encounters that logically follow this succinct plot. Choose among (1) role-playing encounters (talking to the orphanage caretaker or local sage), (2) combat encounters (at least two or three encounters should be combats), trap encounters, (3) trap encounters, (4) puzzle, riddle, or mystery encounters, and (5) environmental or other hazard encounters (blinding ice storm, quicksand, etc.) Figure out a logical order for these encounters that fits your storyline.
Third, figure out at least two (and preferably three) ways the PCs can decide to advance from one encounter to the next. Consider also links between the encounters if the PCs take them out of order.
Fourth, second guess yourself. Ask what you would do at each step, looking to see likely paths or choices different from the ones you want that the PCs might take. Then think about ways to bring them back to your path.
Fifth, draw a rough map for the climax series of encounters (or any within a “dungeon”). As others have mentioned, below-ground dungeons confine the players to following the route you choose, so favor these at first. Place monsters, traps, and adversarial NPCs first, then treasure second. Use the DMG's suggestions on treasure amounts.
Jot down several descriptive words to spit out when the PCs reach each encounter. For example, when they meet the orphanage caretaker, jot down: "elderly human woman, bone-white hair, palsy in hands, weeps constantly, blames self, cannot maintain train of thought." For a dungeon room, something like, "uncomfortably low ceiling, startlingly frigid air, first breath is so sharp it hurts lungs, skin tingles and tightens with goose bumps, smell of ozone, wavering bluish light casts only shadowy illumination."
Last, find or build stat blocks for the monsters and antagonistic NPC's.
As a post script, consider how this adventure might lead to future adventures you have in mind. Go back and lay seeds for that adventure throughout this one -- things NPC's say in passing; clues that will lead somewhere, but not yet; perhaps even a torn top half of a map.
In sum, my best suggestion is always to start with the story. Great villains and cool locales are fabulous sources of inspiration, but cannot alone drive an adventure. Start with the story, then add the rest.
And above all else, have fun! The players will look to you to set the tone. Make them welcome. Give their ideas a reasonable chance of success. Let them take detours if it makes everyone laugh (but look for ways to steer them back to the main course of your adventure.) Show them the thrill you get from the game. Don't fret a rule you cannot remember, just wing it!
Best of luck!
As for writing an ORIGINAL adventure, I wouldn't waste my time in this day and age for a home group. I'd still consider writing another couple for Living Greyhawk or DUNGEON, but home groups just don't warrant the effort. It's too easy and fun to use one that's pre-made and just modify it to your liking.
I strongly disagree, if you don't write an original adventure for your group then where is the cohesion in the campaign? Using a pre-made adventure is great to start off a campaign but the actions taken in the adventure have consequances that should be explored in further adventures that the DM himself writes.
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There was a great product written by Harold Johnson and Aaron Allston back in 1988. It's called the Dungeon Master's Design Kit and it's really good news for any DM.
It comes in three sections and the last one is called the Adventure Cookbook. You roll dice and it comes up with a series of random plots/villains/hooks/encounters/traps/etc.
As you roll you can discard anything a bit left field and stick with the rest.
With the book and some imagination all kinds of simple and complex adventures can be produced. The best part is that no two scenarios are alike.
In the beginning the bravest part of DM'ing I find is to ask the players what they thought at the end of the session. Constructive criticism will take time and some players are too nice but otherwise you may never know whether you're heading in the right direction as a DM. With time and practice, the party will usually be more forthcoming about the way the campaign is going.
Just to reiterate - the Dungeoncraft series of Ray Winninger is superb for a fledging DM.
Cheers