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The Adventure Comes to Life
Craft (Adventures) #3


The first two installments of this column described how to set a proper length for your adventure ("Two Hundred Minutes and the Bonus Encounter"), as well as how to build a framework of encounter levels in order to create proper pacing ("The Adventure Framework"). In this month’s column, we breathe life into that skeletal framework by learning how to choose a theme and select encounters for your adventure.

Choosing a Theme

The theme of your adventure provides you, the writer, with a guiding light to follow when selecting and writing encounters. A theme isn’t the same as a plot or a character goal; rather, it is a word or short statement that captures the core element, around which your framework of encounters is set. Most, if not all, of your encounters should reflect that theme in one manner or another.

Deciding on a theme for your adventure can prove tricky. Many adventure writers want to craft tales of epic proportions, full of complex characters with convoluted motivations and dark, secret pasts. What these writers forget is that they’re not novelists, or even short-story writers. They are adventure designers whose task is to craft a scenario for a group of players to adventure in for about three and a half hours. Epic, long-running storylines are great for home campaigns where the players have months or even years to explore all the intricacies of the DM’s creation.

However, for an RPGA adventure, an epic is the last thing in the world that the writer should hand the DM. Not only is he unlikely to be able to properly interpret all of your delicate nuances of story and character, but there is little chance that the players have the time, or interest, to appreciate such complexities.

An adventure isn’t a story or even a plotline; it’s a depiction of a time and place for characters to experience. It’s populated by various challenges for the characters to face and (hopefully) overcome, including ferocious monsters, deadly traps, mindbending puzzles, and tense interactions. In short, an adventure is for playing, not for reading. Any part of the adventure that doesn’t serve that goal, or that doesn’t directly contribute to the play experience, isn’t pulling its weight.

In choosing a theme, pick something that is relatively straightforward, something that the players are able to appreciate as they play through the adventure. “Demonic” is a theme, and such an adventure would probably feature demons, half-fiends, fiendish creatures, and other denizens of the Abyss, or their allies. “The great outdoors” is another theme, pitting the characters against animals, vermin, fey, and even the environment itself. An adventure with the theme of “deception” probably includes a variety of encounters that aren’t what they seem at first glance, from a meeting with a doppelganger to a fight with would-be allies who first appear as opponents.

The theme doesn’t have to encompass everything you write in the adventure, and it should allow enough leeway for you to provide a good variety of encounters. Picking a theme of “pit traps” probably isn’t general enough for a fun adventure. Similarly, just because your theme is “chaos” doesn’t mean that every monster in the adventure has to be chaotic. A one-note adventure quickly becomes predictable, even boring, for both the players and the DM.

Continuing the sample adventure framework from the last column, I choose “aberrant” as a theme. Already, I’m starting to think about the various aberrations or other strange, twisted encounters I can include, which is a good sign. It doesn’t do any good to pick a theme that doesn’t interest you. After all, you have to write the adventure.

Brainstorming Challenges

Once you have picked your theme, the next step is to put together your list of encounters. Start by brainstorming concepts that fit with the theme. At this point, the concepts can be specific or general, but each one should fit your theme. For now, don’t worry too much about concepts that don’t fit your theme, though if you think of a good idea that doesn’t fit, write it down for later. You’re brainstorming, so try not to judge any of your ideas just yet. If it sounds interesting, note it.

Here are some ways to come up with interesting concepts for your adventure.

  • Flip through the Monster Manual. No matter how many hours I spend playing D&D, the rulebooks always seem to hold surprises for me, and the Monster Manual seems to hold the greatest number of these. Just leafing through the Monster Manual, or any other tome of monsters, is a great way to find a collection of potential encounters for your adventure. For now, write down any monsters that pique your interest, even if their Challenge Ratings don’t match the levels you’ve chosen for your adventure. Also, think about strange monster team-ups that might fit your theme.
  • Review the classes in the Player’s Handbook and the prestige classes in the Dungeon Master’s Guide. Look for combinations that you haven’t tried before, such as the bard who becomes an arcane archer, the multiclass gnome paladin/rogue, or the monk/dwarven defender. While some of these strange combos might not be ideal for player characters, an NPC can often get away with a sub-par mix of race and classes if the designer puts him in the right encounter.
  • Examine Chapter 11: Spells in the Player's Handbook and Chapter 7: Magic Items in the Dungeon Masters Guide. Pay close attention to those spells and magic items that don’t see everyday use and ask, “Why not?” Maybe a spell needs a specific situation to work effectively. As the writer, you have the power to create exactly that situation.
  • Remember your favorite scenes from other forms of entertainment. If you’re a movie buff, think back to the most exciting or compelling parts of the last few films you’ve seen, scenes where the protagonists were really challenged by events, even if they weren’t in the fantasy genre. What made those scenes thrilling to watch? Was it the opponent, the environment, the price of failure? See if you can reproduce some of those concepts without simply duplicating the scenes themselves.
  • Last but not least, look back over your gaming experiences. Assuming you don’t exclusively use published adventures, chances are you’ve run or played in some pretty thrilling encounters. Examine why those encounters worked well and try to recreate that excitement. Unlike reproducing a movie thrill, it is probably okay to copy the scene a bit more faithfully, assuming that it is okay with the original author of the scene in question.

When you’re done brainstorming, you should have a list of encounter ideas at least twice as long as what you have determined you need for your adventure. If your adventure is slated for six encounters, don’t stop when you come up with your sixth idea. The goal of this step of the process is to have more than what you need, ensuring that only your best ideas end up in the adventure.

Here is my list of brainstormed ideas for our sample "aberrant-themed" adventure: gibbering mouther, mind flayers, chuul, oozes, phantom fungus, phasm, krenshar, allip, and vargouille; a secretive order of druidic assassins; shadow magic and other illusions; awakened animals leading uprisings against their humanoid oppressors; figurines of wondrous power, Nolzur’s marvelous pigments, and the bag of tricks; nightmares (the dream, not the monster). That’s only fifteen ideas for an adventure with eight or nine encounters, so I throw in a few more: animal companions, familiars, and mounts turning against their masters; lost time; enslaved fey; a unicorn voluntarily cutting off its own horn to turn its back on the sylvan world; and books of forbidden knowledge. Now I’m up to twenty ideas, so that is a good place to stop. I can always add more ideas later if I think of them.

Winnowing Down the List

Now you have a list of encounter ideas. It probably includes several monsters or monster combinations, a character class or two for NPCs, perhaps a spell or magic item that you want to explore in more depth, and maybe just a couple of basic scene ideas, such as a fight on a cliff, or alongside a rushing river. At this point, though, the list doesn’t have any structure. If you’re lucky, all the ideas have some connection to your theme, but they don’t necessarily have any connection to each other.

Look at your list. See if you spot any ideas that might work well together. Chances are that even during brainstorming, you started to see a pattern in your thinking. Take advantage of that pattern to create a linked set of encounter concepts.

Using my brainstorm list as an example, you can see what I’m talking about. Even though I started by listing a bunch of interesting aberrations from the Monster Manual, the list took on a decidedly quasi-natural slant along the way, from druid-assassins to traitorous animal companions to enslaved fey. That’s an interesting thread running through the list, so I pull those ideas together to see what I have.

  • A secretive order of druidic assassins. Maybe these are the antagonists of the adventure, and/or the masters behind whatever is going on.
  • Awakened animals leading uprisings against their humanoid oppressors. That sounds like an interesting way to kick off the adventure. Maybe the secretive order has been awakening animals only to instill hateful thoughts in them.
  • The bag of tricks. This underutilized magic item conjures up animals to fight for the owner in combat. What if these bags are linked somehow to the aberrant animal behavior in the adventure?
  • Animal companions, familiars, and mounts turning against their masters. A lot of characters depend heavily on animals (or magical versions thereof) that tag along with them. What if they could no longer depend on such allies? Again, this fits in with the animal uprisings idea.
  • Enslaved fey. If the evil druid-assassins are behind all this, it stands to reason that they might have to deal with those pesky sylvan creatures that might otherwise stand in their way. The idea of a slave camp filled with pixies, satyrs, dryads, and the like seems nicely chilling.
  • A unicorn cutting off its own horn. Perhaps the ultimate in aberrant behavior, a beautiful creature defiling itself. What might cause such behavior? Is it related to the animal uprisings, or is the unicorn itself behind the evil goings-on? Perhaps it is an ally of the secret order, or even their secret master.

That’s a pretty good set of linked concepts. My theme has gone in a little different direction than I thought, but I like where it’s headed, so I look back at the list to see how many other ideas might be able to fit in with what we have so far.

Some of the other monsters I listed don’t match the idea of “aberrant nature” too well. Mind flayers don’t seem to fit alongside druid-assassins, and the gibbering mouther’s really more of a dank-dungeon kind of encounter. I don’t know what place an ooze might have in this thread, and the vargouille seems a little too “out there” at first glance. Chuuls, phasms, krenshars, and phantom fungus all work reasonably well in this aberrant-nature theme. An allip can appear just about anywhere, and it also meshes with the “nightmare” idea. Maybe it is a secondary plot thread. Now I’m rethinking my exclusion of the vargouille. If anything says “nightmare” it’s a flying shrieking head. Druids aren’t much for illusion magic, so that’s out for now, though again, it might fit with a nightmare plot thread. Maybe figurines of wondrous power are demonstrating problems with their behavior just like regular animals? I don’t know what role Nolzur’s marvelous pigments might play in this adventure. “Lost time?” Maybe I’ve been watching too much X-Files. Books of forbidden knowledge might be the root of all these horrible aberrant behaviors, or the nightmares.

Looking at my shortened list, I see a basic plot starting to develop. Evil druids are twisting the natural world into aberrant nightmares and using them against innocent bystanders. That seems pretty solid, so I’m ready to move on.

Turning Ideas into Encounters

At this point, it’s time to start transforming your raw ideas into encounters. You’re not writing stat blocks yet, just shaping the clay into something that looks like an encounter, including a potential Encounter Level that you can use later to slot the encounters into your adventure framework. Combine ideas as needed to create interesting encounters. For instance, now is the time to figure out which NPC is casting that spell you picked out.

It can be worthwhile at this point to remind yourself of the ELs you’re aiming for. Review your adventure framework, as it shows the target ELs that you decided on earlier. Try to create encounters that roughly match these ELs. As you go, try slotting encounters into specific points in the adventure framework. When possible, try to stick to your framework rather than shifting it all around, but if you have to, you can go back a step and rearrange the framework.

I’ll use my brainstorm list to show you how you might tackle this task. Below, I’ve reproduced my sample adventure framework for reference.

Encounter 1: EL 3 (get their attention)
Encounter 2: EL 1 (breather)
Encounter 3: EL 2
Encounter 4: EL 3 (first climax)
[rest]
Encounter 5: EL 2
Encounter 6: EL 1 (combine with encounter 5?)
Encounter 7: EL 2
[bonus encounter here?]
Encounter 8: EL 4 (finale)

Right off the bat I realize that I cannot possibly include an encounter with a druid/assassin, as none of the ELs I’ve chosen are high enough to allow for a prestige-class NPC. Nor can I include an encounter with whoever has been awakening these animals. That’s okay, it just means that the PCs won’t necessarily face off against the ultimate cause of the trouble. They can still put the whammy on whatever is going on in their specific area, even if the big badguy isn’t around any more. Hey, maybe that is a good way to include those books of forbidden knowledge, or maybe a lone evil druid stumbled across a lost ritual to awaken animals, but twisted it to taint them with hatred. That seems like a good way to save one of my core concepts without wrecking the EL structure I’ve created.

Back to work. The chuul’s a CR 7 monster, so I set him aside as too tough for this adventure. Same with the phasm. On the bright side, I may have the seeds of a higher-level adventure right there. At CR 1, the krenshar fits just fine, as does the vargouille at CR 2. The CR 3 phantom fungus is a bit on the tough side, but still in the ballpark. The allip and (hornless) unicorn are also CR 3, which suggests that I may have too many tough monsters. I decide to drop the phantom fungus. Assuming I stick to forest critters, awakened animals could be anywhere from CR 1/10 (for bats or toads) to CR 4 (for brown bears). However, since awakening them (via the awaken spell) cranks up their HD, I’ll probably use some lesser version of the effect. Maybe they are only marginally smarter, but with no extra HD. I decide to stay on the low side, using under-CR 1 animals such as badgers, dogs, hawks, owls, rats, snakes, and weasels, plus maybe a couple of tougher animals (such as a wolf or wolverine). An encounter with a group of individually weak animals could nevertheless prove challenging to low-level characters.

Out of curiosity, I try to place a few of these encounters in my structure. I wanted to get the players’ attention with a tough encounter right out of the gate, so I put the CR 3 allip there. Maybe it is the restless spirit of the original author of the books of forbidden knowledge, driven mad by the words it wrote in life, and now that those words have been re-discovered, he is cursed to walk the land in perpetual madness.

Next is a “breather” encounter, designed to let the characters down just a bit. Here I decide to cross up the PCs by including a potential ally that looks more like an enemy. A lone krenshar has been expelled from its lair by newly intelligent animals. It is smart enough to know that something is wrong, but can’t figure out what to do. It approaches the PCs out of curiosity, and if they manage to communicate with it, they might learn valuable clues for later on in the adventure. Of course, they may just choose to attack, in which case the krenshar tries to scare them off and flee.

Thinking more about that encounter, I decide I’m not entirely pleased with it. At these levels, the characters aren’t likely to have an easy method of communicating with the krenshar. Instead, I replace it with a nixie that has managed to escape from the evil druid’s clutches. It begs the characters to solve the mystery of the new threat facing the forest, though it is perhaps a bit too exhausted and incoherent to make much sense at first.

Following this encounter is a combat with a pack of quasi-awakened, and angry, animals: a badger, a hawk, two dogs, and three weasels. They have banded together in shared hatred of all other intelligent creatures. The simple fact that these disparate animals are working together should clue the characters in, that something very strange is happening.

That suspicion is confirmed when, investigating deeper into the forest, the PCs are attacked by the hornless unicorn. As it attacks the characters, it curses them for meddling in forces beyond their understanding. Thanks to its greater teleport ability, it probably escapes the battle, but I have a feeling it’ll be back later.

That’s enough for one day’s worth of adventure, so I’ll let the PCs rest here. This should give them some time to go over what they have learned so far, and figure out a plan for the next day’s activities.

The day starts off with a bang as they’re attacked by a vargouille. Maybe it comes upon their campsite, or if they’re back in town, they hear it shrieking out in the street, creating chaos among innocent bystanders. The vargouille is another result of the discovery of the book of forbidden knowledge, which has somehow let loose the nasty thing from the Outer Planes.

This is a good place to start “infecting” the PCs’ friendly animal allies with whatever “awakening-sickness” is affecting local wildlife. It could even kick in during the fight with the vargouille, maybe it’s spreading the infection. Since there is no guarantee that the party has such an animal, I’ll include a note to infect a horse or mule in town if that’s necessary.

At this point, I’ll have to make sure the heroes have enough to track down the source of all this nastiness. A couple skill checks, such as Gather Information among local hunters, or Survival to check out aberrant animal behavior in the forest, can help out. Regardless, the heroes find themselves at the “flashpoint” of this horrible infection -- maybe some dark, secluded grove, forsaken by the druids a century ago. Of course, now it is guarded by a couple more aberrant animals: a pair of awakened wolves who put their newfound intelligence to good tactical use.

If needed, this is where the bonus encounter goes. Another couple of vargouilles, returning after a long night’s work spreading “awakening sickness” would work well. Alternatively, the hornless unicorn could make a return appearance. That’s almost certainly more fulfilling for the characters.

Inevitably, the heroes must face off against the evil druid responsible for the nightmare gripping the forest. Strangely, the druid’s animal companion is unaffected by the taint, which may provide a clue for how to cure it in other creatures. I set the druid at 3rd level, and add a tainted swarm of bats as an additional ally to get the total EL up to 4.

With that, I’ve finished slotting encounters. Each encounter in my framework has a challenge associated with it, and I have the rudiments of a timeline as well. Don’t feel bad if your adventure doesn’t fit together in your first pass. Despite your best efforts, you may decide to go back one or more steps, in order to add or subtract from your brainstorm list, alter your framework, or even re-evaluate your character level assumptions. Try to keep your changes small unless totally convinced that you’ve reached a dead end. It’s usually easier to nudge an idea a little bit, than rip it out and start over.

Still, this is hardly an adventure. We haven’t statted up any of our monsters or NPCs, and we haven’t determined exactly where all the encounters take place. Next time, I’ll show you how to polish your rough encounter list into a sparkling adventure, while simultaneously adding those important bits of texture that can make it truly memorable.

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