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View Full Version : DM Help Solo adventure one-shot...tips or advice on how to run?



The Aboleth
2017-01-25, 09:43 AM
Hello, all!

So, I've only DM'd a couple 5E one-shot adventures but they seemed to go over reasonably well with everyone involved. Now, my girlfriend (who was a player for both those adventures) is interested in doing another one-shot, but as a solo adventure with her character. Considering she had never played D&D before meeting me and now she's invested enough to want to have a little adventure on her own, I consider this a huge opportunity to really get her hooked on the game and I don't want to squander it.

I've read a bit about DMing a solo adventure, but I'd like any advice or tips from others here who have run them. My understanding (please correct me if I'm wrong) is that it's a good idea to have an NPC along for the ride at least part of the way, particularly for combat situations (in this case, she would control both her character and the NPC during combat). The articles I've read state that this is so things won't get stale...having an NPC with her will give her someone to regularly interact with, and the ability to control both characters in combat will allow her to try out another class without having to go through the long process of building a second character only to find out she may or may not like the class. What are your thoughts on this?

Her character is a rock gnome sorceress with an affinity for shiny objects (and is not adverse to "borrowing" said objects if need be). Before I get any "Why didn't she just roll a Rogue?" questions, she wanted to primarily cast spells in combat and liked the concept of the sorcerer better. Anyway, her character's backstory is basically that her village is very poor and so she set out to earn enough money to return one day and help them. As I mentioned before, she's already done a couple adventures with her character and is at Level 4 now.

For the adventure, my thinking is that a noblewoman will hire my girlfriend's character to attempt to steal back a jeweled amulet from a rival noble. The reward will be the amulet itself--the noblewoman doesn't actually care about the amulet, she more just doesn't want her rival to have it (side note--my girlfriend's character has had dealings with nobles in this city before in one of the other one-shots I've run, so she knows them to be petty and constantly squabbling with one another. As such, the reasoning behind the noblewoman being willing to part with the amulet shouldn't raise any red flags--I hope). Of course, this heist will probably require a helping hand, so the gnome sorceress will have to find a criminal contact from the seedy south side of town in order to help her with the job--this is where the probable NPC hire will come into play who can help her with things like lockpicking and other rogue-like stuff.

If she does some more digging, she'll discover that there have been a string of robberies reported to the town guard in the last two weeks, the targets all being the houses of nobility. A lot more digging will reveal that the noble who supposedly stole the amulet from my girlfriend's employer is actually a jewel collector, and that her house was already robbed exactly two weeks ago (but a different item was stolen--the amulet she was hired to procure is still there). Long story short--the noblewoman employer is the jewel thief that had been responsible for the robberies, but the town guard was closing in on her so she hired my girlfriend's character to commit a robbery at the original robbery location in the hopes she'd be caught and thus take the fall for all the robberies that had been committed. Oh, and the jewel thief isn't a noblewoman at all, but had been assuming the identity of one (via illusion magic) who had been deceased for a couple years in order to specifically make my girlfriend's story of being "hired to steal the jewel back" seem implausible to the town guard ("Stop lying! That lady has been dead for years. You're going away for a long time, thief!"). Cue attempts by my girlfriend to then track down the noblewoman/jewel thief who had set her up so that she can deliver some fireball-themed payback!

So, any tips or advice on how to run a solo adventure like this? Does the concept I have outlined sound interesting, or should I re-think the type of adventure I'm trying to put together? Oh, and in case you missed it up top, the system is 5E and the setting is a pretty generic homebrew city. Anyway, thoughts and suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

thirdkingdom
2017-01-25, 10:55 AM
I would check out Scarlet Heroes (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/127180/Scarlet-Heroes?). It's a supplement written for use with Labyrinth Lord, which a clone of the old Basic/Expert versions of D&D. However, 5e is from my understanding pretty backwards compatible with older versions, so you should have no trouble adapting it. Scarlet Heroes is specifically written for solo play, with single characters, and everything that Sine Nomine puts out is top notch.

The Aboleth
2017-01-25, 06:20 PM
I would check out Scarlet Heroes (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/127180/Scarlet-Heroes?). It's a supplement written for use with Labyrinth Lord, which a clone of the old Basic/Expert versions of D&D. However, 5e is from my understanding pretty backwards compatible with older versions, so you should have no trouble adapting it. Scarlet Heroes is specifically written for solo play, with single characters, and everything that Sine Nomine puts out is top notch.

Thanks! I'll definitely check that out.

Has anybody else been part of a solo adventure (either as the player or the DM)? What worked/didn't work about it?

bulbaquil
2017-01-25, 06:44 PM
I've GM'd a solo 5e game before. Things to keep in mind for a solo adventure:

1. If the PC goes down, at all, it's a TPK. Plan accordingly, and err on the side of making enemies weaker than they should be.

2. The game is generally designed around four players + GM, so if you're running true solo (or with 3 or fewer), action economy works against the players in exactly the same way it works on behalf of the players for a 5+ party.

3. What the solo PC can't do, they can't do. Play to the PC's strengths in adventure design.

4. Using NPC allies, particularly ones controlled by the player during combat, may mitigate points 1-3.

Solo adventures, it is worth pointing out, allow for possibilities that are tedious, annoying, or otherwise less desirable in a more conventional game. Stealth missions, for one - a PC rogue can scout out the dungeon ahead of the NPC party and report back to them, possibly already with some loot in tow. Military-style missions where the PC is the clear commander and leads a squadron of NPC subordinates.

Given the plot outline you've described, having a legitimate NPC rogue of level no higher than 4 is probably a good idea, designing encounters as for a full level 2 (or somewhere in between 1 and 2) party but keeping in mind that healing will likely be limited to rests and items.

Sajiri
2017-01-26, 12:20 AM
My husband and I do pretty much exclusively solo games now, and take turns DMing seperate games for the other, except we do looong ones rather than one shots.

We started with 3.5 and pathfinder in groups, and realised pretty quickly it just didnt work so well solo. Im not sure about 5e since I havent played it, but we ended up just making our own homebrew system based loosely off pathfinder that was more suitable to one player. Some things I've learned while doing solo games

1. Roleplaying is usually more important than a group's game, and the player is the main character of the story. You can do whatever you want without having to worry about favortism or making others uncomfortable.

2. Its perfectly fine to fudge rolls in favor of the player. Sometimes when one of us DMs, we realise we've overtuned a fight, so its pretty simple to just start fibbing about outcomes to put things back on track. Unless your player is okay with making multiple characters, or rerolling if she dies, you should try your best not to let her die.

3. Npcs are fine, but check how the player feels about them. You should make encounters based around the player character's skills, not the NPCs, but its helpful to include them. If your player wants to be a sorceress, you can introduce some NPCs to complement that if you want. Typically when Im playing, my DM will include plenty of NPCs, even a DMPC, because he knows I like having them around, but he always makes sure that mine is the one that makes the decisions, and the NPCs are usually just there to support or be an out if I get in over my head.

I love solo games because it becomes almost like a collaborative story. My husband and I talk extensively about scenes or events we'd like to have happen in a game, and we can go pretty deep into the roleplay aspect of it. Its much easier to please just one player than a group, so the campaigns can often change extensively from what we initially thought in whatever direction the player wants.

thirdkingdom
2017-01-26, 07:57 AM
I've GM'd a solo 5e game before. Things to keep in mind for a solo adventure:

1. If the PC goes down, at all, it's a TPK. Plan accordingly, and err on the side of making enemies weaker than they should be.

2. The game is generally designed around four players + GM, so if you're running true solo (or with 3 or fewer), action economy works against the players in exactly the same way it works on behalf of the players for a 5+ party.

3. What the solo PC can't do, they can't do. Play to the PC's strengths in adventure design.

4. Using NPC allies, particularly ones controlled by the player during combat, may mitigate points 1-3.

Solo adventures, it is worth pointing out, allow for possibilities that are tedious, annoying, or otherwise less desirable in a more conventional game. Stealth missions, for one - a PC rogue can scout out the dungeon ahead of the NPC party and report back to them, possibly already with some loot in tow. Military-style missions where the PC is the clear commander and leads a squadron of NPC subordinates.

Given the plot outline you've described, having a legitimate NPC rogue of level no higher than 4 is probably a good idea, designing encounters as for a full level 2 (or somewhere in between 1 and 2) party but keeping in mind that healing will likely be limited to rests and items.

You could always cobble on the henchmen rules from B/X or something onto the framework of 5e and have the solo player control their own party: Primary PC + henchmen.