Drop in Sessions for New Players

[ekendra]

We're starting an offline gaming club here at the school I teach at. I'll probably lead a few D&D 5e sessions to get things started and I thought it might be a good idea to get some input from experienced DMs/players here. I played D&D back in the 1980s but I've not DMd before and am just catching up to 5e rules and how the game has evolved.

My ideas on how to run these sessions so far:


instead of a long campaign, run sessions that can be concluded in a single 3-4 hour sitting
they need to be scaleable sessions that will stay balanced regardless of how many people show up
sessions need to be accessible to anyone who rocks up out of curiosity and interesting enough for people with some experience with the RPG format
sessions should include combat, role playing, character development, opportunities to use the proficiencies of each class so that players can learn how the game works
sessions should serve as an introduction to the game to entice students to run their own campaigns


I want the sessions to work as I've described, but I'm not sure how to achieve this.

Essentially, I'd be developing a drop-in experiential advertisement for D&D 5e. I want them to be so engaging that participants would forego their online gaming addiction and opt into social skill building RPG.

[TheMightyPotato]

Well that is one hard thing to do.

I have in my experience found that you need to do about 10 things in a 3 to 4 our session but because of player choices there will probably be more so prepare about 6-8 "things". (with a "thing" I mean a conversation or small fight)

For scale-abel encounters i would make a list of more monsters. so instead of one big bad you have 4 lesser evils and then you can just add or remove monsters to balance it. (I would make a list with in it the encounter for every size)

Doing these points will be more hard. I would just include one of each of them in the "things" I mentioned earlier.

If you get all the mentioned aspects as rolleplay etc in there and then it will be a pretty good introduction to the game. If they are all new players i would advise beginning at first lvl just to keep it simpler.

It will be tough but if they like the game you might just get them addicted to the most social nerdy game :smallbiggrin:
good luck

[Sir cryosin]

Check out a d&d youtube campaign called " the northern winds " it is a west Marched game were he has players pop in and out of the campaign. I don't know to much about west Marched games but it seam like something your looking for.

P.S don't be as hard on your player as he is.

[coredump]

Check out DMGuild for Adventurers League modules. They have 1,2,4,8 hour adventures.

[Falcon X]

Sounds like you are thinking along the right paths. Let me tell you what I've done in the past and you can ask if you want more details into things. I still have most of my documents for these if you want any.

3-4 hour setting: It's always hard to gauge time-frame. The published adventures are often set up to be about this long if you with to use them. Some other ideas:
- Get involved in Adventurer's League (http://dnd.wizards.com/playevents/organized-play). It's set up to do what you are doing
- Study up on the 5-room dungeon (http://roleplayingtips.com/readissue.php?number=156) format. Google search it for lots of examples.
Scaleable sessions:
- Not my strength. If you have a big bad, have minions ready to throw into the fight or be ready to gimp his stats on the fly. If it's a group of enemies, just add or subtract from their number.
Accessibility: This is my strong point
- Make sure every single adventure forces roleplaying on people. Have someone talk to the players.
- Give them a clear goal from the beginning: clear out the mine, escape from the city, chase and defeat the bad guy. Don't do character introductions. Your introduction should be something that sets them on track.
- Be conscious of things experiences players will be the only ones who will think about. I once had a kid who I gave a magical sword to, but he never learned it's benefits. Bad move. This kid needed to wield the power to have fun and finish the adventure.
- Always have an intro to the rules speech ready, but don't let it go in depth. I teach how die rolls work in 5e (Ability Score Mod + Proficiency + d20), how advantage/disavantage work, and how rounds work in combat. I then gloss over individual actions in combat (dodging, movement, etc.) and teach those as they are asked about. Takes about 5 minutes.
Enticing them to run their own games:
- If it's fun, they will be enticed.
- Even if it's not fun, they might see the potential.
- Create a sense of wonder in everything. They need to know that the possibilities are limitless.
Other general advice:
- It's okay if they don't finish the adventure. Their mind will be hungry for more this way. Heck, give enough so they could see this as the start of a campaign.
- Drop interesting magical items. Who cares if something is overpowered if it will only last one game session. Drop the Eye of Vecna for someone. Give them a sword of lich-slaying and pit them against a council of liches. Give them the secret orb of fire, promising that there are 3-4 more orbs in the world for the other elements (japanophiles will love this).
- Use pre-made characters. Some people hate this and you can offer to let them come with their own. But spending your time doing this in the game session will bog everything down.
- Do as much visual as you can. Use miniatures on a board. I set up a screen or projector with a map on it and slowly reveal locations using layers.

At my Library:
I am a librarian who enjoys introducing people to D&D. However, I can do this, at-most, once per month. Therefore, I cannot expect consistent players and I have freedom for the games to be completely unconnected to each other.
- I used pre-made characters. I only have three hours to play the game and can't use that on character construction. I spent time making very unique characters with a basic backstory, quirky mixes of class features, and put together in a simple to read format.
- On teaching the game, I mostly focus on: How die rolls work in 5e (Ability Score Mod + Proficiency + d20), how advantage/disavantage work, and how rounds work in combat. I then gloss over individual actions in combat (dodging, movement, etc.) and teach those as they are asked about.
- Adventures I ran:
Hoard of the Dragon Queen Episode 6: Castle Naerytar: I did this as a preview for the Tyranny of Dragons published adventures. It has a dragon, sneaking into a castle, alliances, battles, and intrigue, all wrapped up in a 2-4 hour package.
Out of the Abyss Episode 1: Gracklestugh: A preview for Out of the Abyss. I haven't done this one yet either, but it has all the great elements of a 1-shot in it. In lieu of this, I could do Episode 1 where they escape from prison.
The Dwarven Mines: A scenario I created and have run about 4 times. It usually takes longer than I expect, but there are easy ways to stream-line it. It is a basic dungeon crawler. A bunch of goblinoids have taken over a 3-story dwarven mine, and you are the heroes to figure out what's going on. Danger: there is also an owlbear loose in the caves (frankensteined Flesh Golem Owlbear at higher levels).
The heroes can find and interrogate leadership in the mine's undergroud pub or barracks. If they kill everything, they can also find where a cave in has trapped some dwarves who have overheard the goblinoids talking. They point you towards an encampment where a Dark Man has been rallying support and has plans for overrunning the Dwarven city. If there is time to assassinate the Dark Man, great! Otherwise, I have a 5-part adventure that this can be the beginning of.

[ekendra]

Wow. This was the kind of support I was hoping for.

I'll check out the suggested resources over the weekend.

Muchos gracias!