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iop
2007-05-19, 01:01 AM
I have been DMing for a while, but only epic (in the sense of spanning several story archs with roughly one arch per year) campaigns so far that try to balance roll- and role-playing. Now I will meet some old friends and we have talked about sitting down for a one-shot campaign.

How should I plan such a campaign? What will be a good and fun type of adventure? What level should the campaign be?

Prometheus
2007-05-19, 08:51 AM
How should I plan such a campaign?

Well the biggest thing your missing out on is not having the players bond to their PCs, the NPCs, and scenarios. They don't level up, and they can't study patterns or have dramatic call-backs from arlier events.

The advantage, somewhat, is that all the action and role-playing is compacted into one session and you, as a DM, only have to prepare for that one short span of time. Obviously though, you may want to do a marathon or extra long session if you need more time.

The trick is to reduce the bad and excentuate that good. The characaters, scenes and scenarios have to be really vivid, that is, really unique, really described, and realistic to itself. The plot and the action has to be quick - a really "page-turner" with suspense building all the time. The best test I can think of is: "would this make a sweet movie?" (think Pirates of the Carribean)

As another note, you'll want to cut down on as much wasted time as possible. Preroll treasure, even preroll attacks and damage. If you move fast enough, their focus and haste will be maintained without having to ask them.


What will be a good and fun type of adventure?
The best is one that you truly identify with, but here are some basic guidelines:
-No prophecies: propheciess are dramatic, yes, but are meant for adventures in which the sense of fate can be conveyed by pieces coming together or the sense of irony as the forgotten prophecy is brought to full daylight
-Dramatic characters: obsessions, betrayals, dramatic negotitations and power plays- action movies
-Purposeful encounters: This most likely cannot be a travelogue, encounters should not be simply wild beasts attacking. It should always advance the ploy some smidgen.

As for ideas with the setting and plot, it should be different from the traditional campaign. Either different time period, aquatic, post-apocalyptic or my personal favorite apocalyptic. Something world destroying actually occurs (or the world destroyers isn't supposed to be released but doesn't get to do it yet) and the campaign goes into "overtime" to salvage or reverse the damage done or possibely, the big boom has an unforseen effect.


What level should the campaign be?

Mid high, 10-15 level range. Much lower, the characters won't be able to have a meaningful effect on really dramatic events or be able to generate the really fast-paced action. Much higher, they are like power rangers knocking an over-sized monster into a skyscraper - so much happens that it fails to be given meaningful consideration. What I think is most important, is that the plot is good, and the characters are the right level for running through the plot.

adanedhel9
2007-05-19, 09:58 AM
Consider pre-creating the PC's yourself. This way, when you and your buddies get together, you have more time to actually play instead of just thinking about playing. This also lets you create interesting intercharacter relationships without the opportunity to grow into them.

Also think about breaking the game into several mini-sessions. Spend the time between each session eating, relaxing, and potentially leveling the characters - that'll give you more flexibility in your encounters, and (in my experience) the downtime helps keep everyone focused on the game when they are playing.

Corolinth
2007-05-19, 10:27 AM
How should I plan such a campaign?If this is not your existing gaming group, who already have characters of their own, you'll need to pregenerate characters. Making more characters than players may be a good idea to give them some sort of choice as to who they play. Preroll any necessary treasure to save time (but frankly, you ought to do that with most long campaigns, anyway). I wouldn't recommend prerolling damage and attack rolls, though. That cuts out some of the fun. A one-shot session is most likely going to be light on the role-playing, as these are characters they've never seen before and may never see again.

What will be a good and fun type of adventure?Treasure-hunting. Investigating a murder. Attempting a murder. Breaking into a mansion to steal an artifact. Stuck in a giant bag of holding and trying to get out. Whatever the plot, it should be simple and straight-forward.

What level should the campaign be?This doesn't matter in the slightest. Take a d20 and roll it - that's the level of the campaign. That's the easiest way, and a good way to jump-start the planning process. Otherwise you make the characters whatever level is appropriate for what you have planned.

Dan_Hemmens
2007-05-19, 10:38 AM
Isn't "one shot campaign" a contradiction in terms? Something is either a campaign, or it is a one shot. You could have a series of connected one-shots, but that wouldn't be a campaign. You could have a campaign that was designed to last less than a year, but that wouldn't be a one-shot.

So I'm not really sure what you're trying to do here.

iop
2007-05-19, 12:18 PM
Isn't "one shot campaign" a contradiction in terms?
Yep. It should be one-shot adventure.

Thanks to everyone else for your advice!

Driderman
2007-05-19, 12:46 PM
One of my mates DM'ed several one-shots, with a connecting story, over the period of a year.

The first was a zombie-holocaust story where we had pregenerated characters. Those who survived made it to the next part of the story in one way or the other, either as NPC or PC and those who didn't... Well, it was a cinematic zombie one-shot so you're weren't exactly surprised when some of the players died horrible deaths or had epic last stands.

The second story, we already knew what we were getting into so we got to create our own characters, which made for some very memorable PCs. During character creation we were told that our character was looking for specific person and as long as we remembered that we had pretty free hands. My own character was a priest for some nutcase survivalist church who had come to the city to 'save' one of the churchs brethren who had been taken away ( really, her parents had found her and had a de-programmer save her from the crazy brainwashiness of the cult, but that wasn't how I saw it of course :smallbiggrin: ) and two other very memorable PCs were the very Tarantino-esque brothers who were looking for some guy. When we arrive deep in the core of zombie-infested corporate labs hell at the end of the session, turns out the brothers are there to kill him cause they're sure he raped their sister, even though he was judged 'not guilty'. They just couldn't let him die from horrible zombie-death cause then he wouldn't know why he had to die.

Third story saw a return of some of the characters from both the first and second story, where the characters involved finally escaped from the horrible zombie-predicament after fighting some government bad guys trying to 'contain' the situation, which included killing of witnesses and ended up hiding out in the colorado mountains where some nutcase survivalist church had their heavily fortificated compound.

The trick is, as has been mentioned, to consider whether this would be a good movie. Interesting plot-elements and hefty action scenes go a long way and since you shouldn't worry about killing off a PC or two, keeping some NPCs handy for them to take over might be a good idea