Lazy DMing

[Jack_McSnatch]

Okay the title is bad and seems like it should be on another forum, but bear with me on this one.

My players talk about my games every so often. About a twist I've pulled, or a challenging encounter I've run. They liked my Dread Soldier undead thing I posted in another thread, and they liked when I made their quest giver the bbeg. It makes me a little proud of myself, but the soldier was just a unque monster, and the questgiver going rogue was something I pulled out of my ass at the last second because a player had called my entire plot.

What I'm getting at is I've never been satisfied with my stories. I get a big idea for a story and how I want my players to fit into it, and they take it apart with an idea I hadn't thought of... Or worse, one I thought of, but dismissed as the most unlikely. They rarely or never bite at custom stuff, regardless of its fluff or mechanics, and sometimes they do **** to screw with me, like the time they went to literally the other side of the world to avoid the plot.

Anyway, this time, I'm saying screw it. Screw actually putting work into a custom world when the players act like outside entities, and screw writing my own story. I'm pulling everything from D&D books. I don't mean that in a bad way (entirely). I've found some cool stuff in D&D books. Organizatons, interesting weapons, and most importantly... Adventure hooks. I'm gonna let the published material do the writing for me. I don't mean modules. I've never had luck with those in this group, playing or running. The time they ran from the plot was during my attempt at the Jade Reagent pathfinder campaign. Though to be fair, it was the third or fourth time our group tried that one.

The idea here is I'm just gonna tie together a whole bunch of adventure hooks, cities, and organizations from the non setting specific books. I'll probably use some things from the other settings too, like spellfire from Forgotten Realms, the OA stuff, and Warforged from Eberron. The first one I've really hooked onto was one in the Kobold chapter of rotd. Dwarves have ancient kobold history that may or may not provide information on both the beginning of time, and Kurtulmak's treasure filled mine.

Tl;dr tell me about the most interesting adventure hooks you've found while scouring those obscure books, or about a time unspecific D&d fluff worked well in your groups.

[Crake]

Honestly, if you think your players tear apart your work, they will rip published material a whole new one, and it will be MUCH harder for you to adapt if you don't know the module like the back of your hand and using published material does nothing to stop them from actively just walking away from the hook.

Perhaps your players simply want to forge their own story? Maybe just plop them in a town and isntead of instantly having a hook, just look them dead in the eye and say "You're in the middle of a bustling town, what do you do?" and let them seek out adventure on their own. They will make plans, seek out things they want, build strongholds, or just generally do whatever. Once they've settled into the world, that's when you get to start screwing with them. Rivals, thieves guilds, cultists, unimpressed mages guilds could all find plenty of reason to go after the players at that point, and now they're the center of the plot, so running away won't help them at all, because people will hunt them down.

As for planning what will happen in each circumstance, the NPCs can't see into the future any more than you can, but if you have their goals and motivations set you can react to anything the players would do just as the NPCs would.

[Swaoeaeieu]

This also reminds of a story i read about once. A dm told their players at the start of the campaign, or after the first few sessions or something. That a powerfull lich was gathering power in a neighboring country. Basically, the plot was to go on a quest to stop the baddy. Instead the players went off somewhere else, wanting to do their own thing, be pirates, do their own thing.

They all had a fun campaign, until one day, a dark army of badness conquered the world and was basically unstopable by the players. the DM wasnt that suprised because he gave them fair warning of coming trouble, but the last hope for the world wanted to go do other stuff.

moral is, as a dm you make a world and a story, and usually the players agree to react and play with what you have prepared for the story. Moving to the other side of the world to avoid a plot is bad form for players, could also mean your story wasnt that interesting to them, the issue can be on two sides. Maybe talk to the players befor the next campaign to figure out what kind of plot everyone wants, so everyone can have fun with something you actually prepared for.

[Crake]

This also reminds of a story i read about once. A dm told their players at the start of the campaign, or after the first few sessions or something. That a powerfull lich was gathering power in a neighboring country. Basically, the plot was to go on a quest to stop the baddy. Instead the players went off somewhere else, wanting to do their own thing, be pirates, do their own thing.

They all had a fun campaign, until one day, a dark army of badness conquered the world and was basically unstopable by the players. the DM wasnt that suprised because he gave them fair warning of coming trouble, but the last hope for the world wanted to go do other stuff.

moral is, as a dm you make a world and a story, and usually the players agree to react and play with what you have prepared for the story. Moving to the other side of the world to avoid a plot is bad form for players, could also mean your story wasnt that interesting to them, the issue can be on two sides. Maybe talk to the players befor the next campaign to figure out what kind of plot everyone wants, so everyone can have fun with something you actually prepared for.

Regarding that story, honestly, I'm not a fan of putting that kind of pressure on the players. Assuming they were level 1 at the start, they would have been FAR from the world's last hope, and it just really doesn't make sense that they would do anything other than go to the nearest magical authority and say "Hey, we have this information on a lich nearby, thought we should let you guys know" then go back to their business. If the lich was capable of taking over the world, then what chance did the players really have to begin with if the epic level characters of the campaign couldn't even hold their own against him?