I really appreciate the value of a store brought premade adventure. They are great for learning the game and for filling in when you need a break from adventure writing. However I much prefer to write my own adventures. By writing your own adventure you can custom made the story for the characters you have, and piece each adventure into a larger meta-plot which gives the entire campaign a more epic scale and feel. Yet writing your own adventure can at first seem very daunting, so here’s a few tips on how I make best use of the option.
Inspiration
Every good adventure begins with good inspiration. Honestly, this part is both the easiest and hardest part for me. It’s very easy to come up with a wealth of ideas for a story, but filling those ideas out enough for a full adventure can be very difficult. As a result, I now take a more organic approach and fill my game sessions with lots of little subplots which each offer a small story hook. It allows for an entire subplot to fit into a single evenings gaming while all building towards larger things.
While I regularly take inspiration from other sources, I strive to draw a clear line between inspiration and plagiarism. I know, it is the modern way to just copy, but I simply don’t like it. No matter how obscure you think your source is, copying can lead to your entire plot being undone. Remember, your players have access to the internet as well. Being inspired means taking a single idea and expanding it in a totally new way, beyond just changing the names.
One tip I really recommend for inspiration is to record ideas when they come to you. I keep a note book near where I watch tv, and another near the computer. Actually I have notebooks stashed everywhere in the house. Incarnica even has a waterproof notebook she can use in the shower as that’s where she has good ideas. No matter if the idea is good or bad record it. Oh, and every now and again collate all those note in one place, preferably somewhere near where you write your adventures.
Work with Characters
Your players and their characters should be the greatest source of inspiration for you, and it’s doubly rewarding because players will feel more invested in your games if their characters receive time as the centre of attention. Make sure you hand that attention around as well; it’s very tempting to keep building stories around the character of the more imaginative and active player, but everyone deserves their time to shine.
Work with background stories and remember, not every adventure inspired by a character background has to be a tragedy. In fact, the more you use a character background in a positive way, the greater the impact it will have when tragedy does strike. There is a reason most players start a background story with how they were orphaned, it’s because they are afraid to put family into the GM’s hands as a tool to be used against them. Instead, allow a character’s family to be supportive and do those things a good family are meant to do for each other.
Plan both Story and Plot
Plot is the events that take place in the story, while story is the emotional journey of the characters. I find that most adventures are big on plot but low on story, and what story there is involves NPCs within the adventure, not the actual player characters. Ideally you want that story to bind the player characters into the weave of the adventure.
Action is easy; a monster here and skill test there, it’s all very basic stuff. Story is where it’s really at and creating a good story is to me the hallmark of a good GM. I know one GM who prides himself on making players cry in his games. I would too, it’s a great sign that players are emotionally invested in the game.
So how do you make a good story? That really depends upon your players, however there are some excellent tips you can gain by studying writing. There really are countless ways to create story; from the subconscious use of archetypes, through to direct manipulation such as killing a love one (in game love one please). I do find the more subtle the method, the less resistant players are to it. Kill the character’s lover it’s all very ho-hum, and unless done well it just leaves the player angry that they trusted you enough to take a lover in game. Yet build something over a long time using subtle cues and you can break a heart with a single trigger word.
The scope of this subject deserves a whole article, many articles in fact, but here’s some starters:
- Create meaningful NPCs (see below)
- Attach events onto people and things the player cares about
- Use character backgrounds in a constructive manner.
- Make sure to include positive as well as negative emotional situations
- Avoid stereotypes for situations where you want emotional attachment
- Embrace archetypes where they don’t violate the above tip.
- Create and use story themes in a subtle way.
I am likely to revisit this subject as a full article at a later date, but do some research of your own before I try to fill your head with my way of doing things J
Create good NPCs
The non-player characters you use really define the world. They provide an example of how people in your world should or do behave, so players actually look to these individuals for their own cues on how to behave in your world. Therefore, if an NPC is going to play much of a role for your characters, it is worth investing time. Here is where I will plagiarise a little more than usual, because life and art both provide countless interesting characters worthy of a place in your world.
Many people believe a character is defined by their achievements, but in classical writing achievements are more about the past, and they have little to do with a character in the now. Instead, characters should be defined more by their faults. People empathise with faults, and certain faults allow the players (and thus their characters) to feel at ease with the NPC. The faults might be noticeable, such as a limp or deformity, but I prefer the emotional or behavioural faults, such as grumpy, naive, or terminally optimistic.
Most important of all is to allow PCs and NPCs time to interact on a regular basis. This allows you to roleplay as well, because as GM you get to play the role of every single NPC. This is one of the reasons I enjoy GMing, because I get to play lots of roles, not just one. If you think of key NPCs as your own characters, taking the time to develop goals and personality for each one, then players will be able to clearly view each NPC as their own individual person, not just as sign posts to the next thing to kill. Just try not to get attached to the NPC, if players see you playing favourites with NPCs the game starts looking like it’s them vs you, and that’s not what you want.
Important NPCs should also have a history and goals. That is, they should know where they came from and where they want to go in life. Again, this gives players something to attach to and it builds the world for them. I have found spur of the moment background stories for previously unimportant NPCs to be really good for players and the world at large. Things like a barmaid confessing to a wish to join the monastery when questioned by a PC, only to feel her sordid past makes her feel unworthy. It’s the little details that PCs can suddenly attach to which can have very unforeseen circumstances. So if your players suddenly corner an unimportant NPC don’t respond with “She’s not important, there’s nothing written in the adventure about her.” Every single NPC is important if the PCs take an interest in them.
Have a hook
Players should feel there is some reason their characters are laying their lives on the line. The hook can simply be a reward offered or a directive from some commander the characters answer to. Simple is perfectly fine there just has to be something. Though the more meaningful the hook the better, especially if the PCs can be emotionally involved.
Never have an adventure hook dependant on an open dice roll or on character altruism. A dice role might fail, so if you need a roll to succeed then make the roll yourself and cheat. As for Altruism, it only suits certain types of characters. If your party is led by those types of characters then fine, altruism works, but if not then players might feel obliged to take the adventure, yet have no heart for it. They might ignore it entirely, resisting any effort you make to enforce it.
Pacing
Use action as a tool, not a crutch. If every encounter starts with kicking in a door and ends with blood then your game becomes stale. Pop in just one or two scenes a session that slows the pace and gives characters a chance to interact and the next combat encounter will give a better dose of dopamine and adrenaline. Likewise, an adventure based around a senate debate might have good pacing to some players actively involved, but bore the hell out of other players, so be mindful of all the players.
Ultimately any story needs an escalating series of highs and lows in the action, with the final encounter usually following a period of reflection and forming the most exciting part of any adventure. Done well the final encounter doesn’t need to be with the biggest strongest monster in the dungeon, just the smartest.
Rewards
Beware the Monty Haul game, it will end a campaign faster than any other fault. However you also need to give the players something along the way that both justifies the danger of adventuring, as well as giving them a sense of accomplishment. What many GMs forget is that rewards are not limited to XP, gold and magic items.
Acknowledgement can be a real boost for players. Not just meaningless titles bestowed by grateful rulers, but real in the streets acknowledgements. When the characters walk into the bar the barman might acknowledge their efforts for the town and grant them free drinks. A merchant saved might give characters a substantial discount. There are countless ways in which characters can be acknowledged for their achievements. The great thing about this sort of reward is that when the characters are framed for something vile which they didn’t do, the vitriol from the common people will wound them all the more deeply.
Favours also provide players with a sense of leverage and can be reward enough in the right campaign. Having some penniless noble owe a debt might seem pointless at first, but when woven into a good story it might allow the players and their characters to feel it was a reward well achieved.
A gift of land or a house is a way of tying a character to an area and giving them a vested interest in the realm. The Grand Duchy of Karameikos from the classic D&D game world of Mystara makes full use of this idea by tying as many adventurers to the realm as they can, recognising that the average adventuring party makes for a formidable force for defence. In Karameikos, adventurers even get special tax breaks to encourage them to clear the surrounding lands for habitation. Giving the characters an estate vacated by the events of an adventure ties up loose ends and makes for a wise investment by the ruler.
Each game world will have their own idiosyncratic rewards which you can harness. If each adventure only results in XP, gold and items then it grows stale and does nothing to build upon the world itself. Other methods of reward create depth to the backdrop, creating story and future adventure potentials.
Balance
Game balance only really comes from experience. You will screw things up, take that as a given so you are both more vigilant in looking for potential issues and less disappointed when you discover the balance is off kilter. The important thing is to do your best and if things to go wrong, be prepared to fix what you can and embrace what you cannot.
As you evaluate the events of each adventure ask yourself at each point; “What would happen now?” for everyone involved. As part of a larger world one small change can have a domino effect with dire consequences. This often leads to other adventure potentials and they should be recorded in your note book for inspirations. Many potentials for imbalance can be corrected before they even make it into play just by thinking things through to a natural conclusion.
Be prepared to adjust dice roles on the sly if needed for game balance. I know I’ve put in monsters which I didn’t realise how powerful they were until I started using them. In a situation like this I made the error as a GM so I might adjust a die roll here and there to avoid a party wiping for my mistake. Be prepared to remove items if they become burdensome. You might have legitimately rolled that +5 Holy Avenger as treasure, but if it makes a character way too powerful for that level you should reroll it or just choose something lower in power. If you let it into the game and realise the imbalance too late, then a sword like that would fetch the kind of price which might attract a talented thief. Weave it into the story, have the thief steal the item, but when the character’s level is appropriate for the sword let them recover it in some creative manner.
Some mistakes cannot be undone. In this case you have two opportunities. One option is to roll with it and make it a part of the game experience. The other option is to talk to the players out of game and just say, “I stuffed up and I need to fix it.” While this is easy with a rule foul, the same method can apply to anything. I find that amongst a mature group of players they will often agree when something is out of balance and they are happy to allow you to correct it. If they are not, then a little civil discourse can negotiate a fix most people in the group are happy with. If you do not take any steps to fix an imbalance I warn you, you will likely lose enjoyment in running a campaign you know is broken.
Final Word
I have a tendency to weave very complex game worlds. I have so many plots and subplots going on at one time that some players can feel overwhelmed, while others thrive. It’s because I don’t aim to make static adventures, I aim to make a world, and for the adventures within that world be chosen by players because the adventure hooks play directly into the desires of their character. It is my hope that players feel the world is alive and that they are making real choices for their characters. Of course the reality is they are making choices which are sort of predestined in a way, but the illusion is important.
I’m far from being a great GM, I lack certain skills which would really help. Yet I am regularly complimented on the depth of my worlds and how each race and even each NPC has an individual identity. As I’ve said in a previous article, find what you are good at and embrace that aspect of yourself in your game crafting. If you run great action then build adventures around action, just recognise that adding in a few less intense action pieces will help the pacing and make the final encounter more rewarding and exciting.
As GM you are unlikely to receive much more than the obligatory thank you for a session, if you even get that. If you are complimented it feels really good and you can trust that you earned it. Otherwise your best reward comes from listening to players discuss your session. I gain a real sense of achievement when my game is mentioned in other social situations. One guy even retells my stories and his characters adventures to his little girl as bedtime stories, edited for content of course, but it’s really nice to think I am weaving tales worth retelling in any format.
That’s my reward as a gm, and it comes from understanding that a roleplay adventure is not just about generating numbers to kill other numbers. You are not just facilitating people with a dice rolling addiction, you are crafting art. Give your skills times to develop and keep at it. Like art, your rewards are found in seeing others appreciate and be emotionally affected by your work.