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Darokar
2017-11-06, 08:11 PM
So I decided a few months ago that I was going to design an adventure to play with my friends, and I have no idea what to do. I've considered tons of different villains and motives and campaign settings and I can't stick with one at all. I've been trying to design a villain and motive so I can build the foundation around that, but I can't choose an interesting villain or one that I think the players will get behind. Please help!

Honest Tiefling
2017-11-06, 08:22 PM
Don't ask us. Be extremely lazy and ask your players. Not only does it save on work, it gives you brownie points!

So I'd brainstorm some ideas to throw at them:

Zombie apocalypse, always good for the starting DM
Demon-smiting adventures
Pirate game (should probably agree on alignment before this one, admittedly)
Dungeon Crawl (Hey, it's a classic!)
Survival/Wilderness crawl

I'd make a huge list of any ideas you feel comfortable playing. Have the potential players vote on two, and then smash them together. So you might end up with a Zombie Pirate game, which could be fun with the right zombie type.

Darokar
2017-11-06, 08:38 PM
Don't ask us. Be extremely lazy and ask your players. Not only does it save on work, it gives you brownie points!

So I'd brainstorm some ideas to throw at them:

Zombie apocalypse, always good for the starting DM
Demon-smiting adventures
Pirate game (should probably agree on alignment before this one, admittedly)
Dungeon Crawl (Hey, it's a classic!)
Survival/Wilderness crawl

I'd make a huge list of any ideas you feel comfortable playing. Have the potential players vote on two, and then smash them together. So you might end up with a Zombie Pirate game, which could be fun with the right zombie type.

That sounds good! My only problem is, I can't stick with an idea. I'll get a cool idea, I'll work on it for a week or two, and then I'll move on to another idea because I don't like where its going. I'll definitely try this though. Thank you!

Honest Tiefling
2017-11-06, 08:40 PM
That sounds good! My only problem is, I can't stick with an idea. I'll get a cool idea, I'll work on it for a week or two, and then I'll move on to another idea because I don't like where its going. I'll definitely try this though. Thank you!

Hrm. This can be a problem! What sort of issues do you run into? Do you lost interest? Do you just get yourself into a corner? Do you not see hooks for the players?

Darokar
2017-11-06, 08:52 PM
Hrm. This can be a problem! What sort of issues do you run into? Do you lost interest? Do you just get yourself into a corner? Do you not see hooks for the players?

I generally make campaigns that are too long and arduous for me and my players to stick with. Then eventually I lose interest in the concepts I have and want to do something else. One idea I had was there is this magical weapon that can grant the wielder complete control over the arcane, so they could create spells and do pretty much anything. It belonged to a wizard who went mad with power, so his apprentice shattered the dagger into three pieces and hid each one. The campaign would involve a group of hobgoblins and goblins attempting to get all the pieces and rebuild the weapon. First off, I don't think my idea makes much sense or may be cliche (idk I haven't played many campaigns). Secondly, I would start thinking of dumb things and would try to shoehorn them in. For a while I considered having the goblins revolt against the hobgoblins, so then a goblin wizard would take the dagger and would go mad with power. At one point I wanted to give him a dragon, at another I wanted to make him use the dagger as a phylactery to become a lich. I just can't stick with an idea for more than two minutes. Sorry about being so long winded btw. There's also probably a lot of spelling mistakes, I'm typing this really fast because my laptop is dying.

Kane0
2017-11-06, 09:49 PM
Try running a one shot, you won't hit that problem.

If that goes well, try a three-parter next. It's really just a one shot that lasts three sessions.

Then if you're still good do chapter one of your grand adventure. I say chapter one since it leaves you with a stopping point if you or the players hit a block and allows you to plan one thing at a time rather than trying to do plans and notes for everything all at once.

Honest Tiefling
2017-11-06, 11:02 PM
I generally make campaigns that are too long and arduous for me and my players to stick with.

I think many new DMs have this issue.


Try running a one shot, you won't hit that problem.

Annnnd I think this is the solution. I think your issue is that you seem pretty creative and want to explore big ideas, but those are hard to do. Very often, it takes a few tries to handle something that large.

But I also think you'd benefit from a bit of writing advice, via Pixar. "Finish your story, let go even if it's not perfect. In an ideal world you have both, but move on. Do better next time." Don't worry about the campaign being perfect, you will eventually hit a lull or things didn't go how you expect. Learn to keep getting back to that campaign, even if you are worried about it. And the only way to learn is to try. Do warn your players ahead of time, that's just polite. They might also be able to help if you ask for feedback and learn how to do better and what they hope to accomplish.

My advice is to write a simple Zombie Apocalypse campaign. The idea being that a small town has been overrun by zombies. You have a limit on locations, cultures, and characters. It can become something larger, but it is often a good starting scenario for many groups, and can last for a single session or longer depending on how you feel about it.

redwizard007
2017-11-07, 05:20 AM
Absolutely everything posted above is great advice. I'd like to add a bit more that I hope will save you some of the heartache that I went through.

1. And this is the most important thing you will learn as a DM. (Well, it's one of the top 10 anyway.) Don't over plan. Really. I mean it. You want to run a huge story arc about a magic dagger that will span years? That's great. Put together a rough outline or some bullet points, but never plan out more than the next couple gaming sessions. I mean it. What if your players get swept up suppressing the goblin revolt and ignore the dagger? What if they decide to work for the crazy goblin wizard? Did you plan for that? I'm guessing not.

The key to being able to deal with the agents of chaos (PCs) sitting across the table from you is not to plan for everything that they can do. It is to have an option regardless of what they do. If you stat out a few humans that can pass for guards, soldiers, brigands, pirates, and thugs then you are well on your way. If goblins and hobgoblins feature heavily into your plans then stat a few of them up as well. If there are any other local power players, then you will want to have at least one member of each group statted out as well. Now you have actors ready in the wings wherever your players want to go.

2. This is another biggy, and is directly related to #1. If you stat it, it can be killed. What I mean is, don't fall in love with your villans. If you introduce your big bad early, and you may want to, he could die. Now there are a handful of options when this happens and most are pretty cliche. You could wave a magic wand and save his ass, spring some "extra" surprise to save his ass, or you can let him die and pretend he was just working for some REALLY bad guy... How appealing are those choices?

Now, what if we have a minion take over for the dead BBEG? Crazy, right? Not really. You know that evil organization that just had it's leadership gutted because the PCs surprised you... Now you can still use it. One of the minibosses can easily step up and consolidate power. This may change the organization's direction slightly, but it will still be recognizable. You also have the possibility for splinter groups. I'll let you mull that over on your own.

3. When planning adventures, it is most important to know your NPCs. Instead of thinking, "how does X affect my adventure," think "what would Y and Z do about this." We are going to avoid railroading your PCs. Trust me, they will appreciate it.

That problem where you lose interest quickly will be gone because you aren't planning that far out. It's late, so I probably missed something, but I'll re read in the am.

Darokar
2017-11-07, 12:45 PM
Try running a one shot, you won't hit that problem.

If that goes well, try a three-parter next. It's really just a one shot that lasts three sessions.

Then if you're still good do chapter one of your grand adventure. I say chapter one since it leaves you with a stopping point if you or the players hit a block and allows you to plan one thing at a time rather than trying to do plans and notes for everything all at once.

I’ll definetly do that. I might start out with a short dungeon crawl or something, thank you for the advice!

Kaptin Keen
2017-11-07, 01:13 PM
I'll tell you the secret of the best games I've made: Go small.

Forget about saving the world. Save the village, of the fishing charter of the old seamen's guild, steal not-a-king's-ransom, defend the farmstead against common thugs. It's so much easier, and you can create villains with simple, human, reasonable ambitions.

Not here to end the world, just to ruin everyone's day and get rich doing it.

Darokar
2017-11-07, 04:53 PM
I'll tell you the secret of the best games I've made: Go small.

Going small is definitely something I need to do. Most ideas I get are super convoluted, and every campaign I've played is also super complicated and high stakes, so I think it will be a breath of fresh air to do something simple, for me and my friends.

Darokar
2017-11-07, 05:12 PM
Absolutely everything posted above is great advice. I'd like to add a bit more that I hope will save you some of the heartache that I went through.

1. And this is the most important thing you will learn as a DM. (Well, it's one of the top 10 anyway.) Don't over plan. Really. I mean it. You want to run a huge story arc about a magic dagger that will span years? That's great. Put together a rough outline or some bullet points, but never plan out more than the next couple gaming sessions. I mean it. What if your players get swept up suppressing the goblin revolt and ignore the dagger? What if they decide to work for the crazy goblin wizard? Did you plan for that? I'm guessing not.

The key to being able to deal with the agents of chaos (PCs) sitting across the table from you is not to plan for everything that they can do. It is to have an option regardless of what they do. If you stat out a few humans that can pass for guards, soldiers, brigands, pirates, and thugs then you are well on your way. If goblins and hobgoblins feature heavily into your plans then stat a few of them up as well. If there are any other local power players, then you will want to have at least one member of each group statted out as well. Now you have actors ready in the wings wherever your players want to go.

2. This is another biggy, and is directly related to #1. If you stat it, it can be killed. What I mean is, don't fall in love with your villans. If you introduce your big bad early, and you may want to, he could die. Now there are a handful of options when this happens and most are pretty cliche. You could wave a magic wand and save his ass, spring some "extra" surprise to save his ass, or you can let him die and pretend he was just working for some REALLY bad guy... How appealing are those choices?

Now, what if we have a minion take over for the dead BBEG? Crazy, right? Not really. You know that evil organization that just had it's leadership gutted because the PCs surprised you... Now you can still use it. One of the minibosses can easily step up and consolidate power. This may change the organization's direction slightly, but it will still be recognizable. You also have the possibility for splinter groups. I'll let you mull that over on your own.

3. When planning adventures, it is most important to know your NPCs. Instead of thinking, "how does X affect my adventure," think "what would Y and Z do about this." We are going to avoid railroading your PCs. Trust me, they will appreciate it.

That problem where you lose interest quickly will be gone because you aren't planning that far out. It's late, so I probably missed something, but I'll re read in the am.

Thank you for all the advice! All of that is definitely going to help, because now that I apply all that information, I realize a lot of my ideas and things I've written and ultimately ditched are really linear and not well planned at all.

Jay R
2017-11-07, 06:15 PM
Don't try to plan the whole thing from the start. I had a simple "escort the goods to market" scenario that got them involved in a border war, which has since grown into a Dark Lord trying to break into this world danger, with a complication of all animals chased out of the haunted forest.

Serials are often written that way. Dumas wrote and sold the Three Musketeers a chapter at a time, and while some things were planned from the start, others (in Tolkien's words) "grew in the telling".

All you need are two-three sessions worth of encounters, some of which are semi-connected with an open-ended cause. Then listen to the players' speculations. Then their guesses inform which way the story grows, your job is easier, and they feel really clever when they realize that they "figured it out".

Darokar
2017-11-08, 07:47 AM
I think many new DMs have this issue.



Annnnd I think this is the solution. I think your issue is that you seem pretty creative and want to explore big ideas, but those are hard to do. Very often, it takes a few tries to handle something that large.

But I also think you'd benefit from a bit of writing advice, via Pixar. "Finish your story, let go even if it's not perfect. In an ideal world you have both, but move on. Do better next time." Don't worry about the campaign being perfect, you will eventually hit a lull or things didn't go how you expect. Learn to keep getting back to that campaign, even if you are worried about it. And the only way to learn is to try. Do warn your players ahead of time, that's just polite. They might also be able to help if you ask for feedback and learn how to do better and what they hope to accomplish.

My advice is to write a simple Zombie Apocalypse campaign. The idea being that a small town has been overrun by zombies. You have a limit on locations, cultures, and characters. It can become something larger, but it is often a good starting scenario for many groups, and can last for a single session or longer depending on how you feel about it.

Yeah, I need to stick with things. I'm not sure about the zombie apocalypse bit though, my friends aren't really into that kind of thing, but I will start small, maybe with something like deliver a letter to a nearby farmer and there will be a toll road set up by goblins or a mud mephit hidden in the path. Thank you for the advice!

Darokar
2017-11-08, 07:49 AM
Don't try to plan the whole thing from the start. I had a simple "escort the goods to market" scenario that got them involved in a border war, which has since grown into a Dark Lord trying to break into this world danger, with a complication of all animals chased out of the haunted forest.

Serials are often written that way. Dumas wrote and sold the Three Musketeers a chapter at a time, and while some things were planned from the start, others (in Tolkien's words) "grew in the telling".

All you need are two-three sessions worth of encounters, some of which are semi-connected with an open-ended cause. Then listen to the players' speculations. Then their guesses inform which way the story grows, your job is easier, and they feel really clever when they realize that they "figured it out".

Writing as I go sounds like a very good solution to my problem of losing interest, so I'll definitely do that. Thank you for the advice!

Jay R
2017-11-08, 11:48 AM
Writing as I go sounds like a very good solution to my problem of losing interest, so I'll definitely do that. Thank you for the advice!

You're welcome.

But I also recommend that you have some backup plans. Have a few unconnected encounters or short episode plots written up so that if you reach the end of what you're written for the main plot you still have some adventures for them.

[And the players may come up with some clever theory that ties these to the main plot, which you can then work in.]