The 3 Stages to Creating an Awesome D&D Adventure

so you're ready to create your first adventure you've been watching the videos on this uh channel and you're like yeah yeah yeah i like this idea of oh gas and npcai and and the world running itself and all that kind of stuff but how do we actually then create an adventure if we're not supposed to plan anything i'm confused help me okay this is how you do it hello and welcome to this week's episode of how to be a great gm you've been following this series now for a couple of weeks exploring this notion of really really looking at gmming from a totally different perspective and i think it's been an absolute awesome journey for yourselves and i know certainly for myself as i become more aware of the things that i'm doing i now start to put those into action and it really has been helping my game so i hope it's been helping your game now this video is in three parts all in one video yes we're not breaking it up don't panic it's going to be a slightly longer video so settle yourselves down but i wanted it to be something that you could use you watch it once or twice then you kind of go to the chapter you need to go to and then you are done so it's in three phases so bear that in mind you kind of need to watch each face to understand how to create an adventure in totality now we're going to be using dungeons and dragons as our basic operating system in terms of rules because it's important for us to have a con com club cup because it's important for us to have a common frame of reference and so we'll be using dungeons and dragons before we go any further however if you are a fan of this channel i have to talk to you about my kickstarter the practical guide to becoming a great gm now folks because of the insane response to this book and to the kickstarter we've actually now got to the point where we will be adding a second book to the kickstarter which is a complete reworking of my first book which was called a complete guide to creating epic campaigns that book it's got new it's new artwork new layout and most important of all is the content has been updated to now include all of the thoughts that are in this book plus all of these thoughts that are on this youtube channel now about oh gas and so on and so on making it basically a brand new book so that kickstarter two books effectively in one kickstarter so if you haven't backed it yet link down below show some love and even if you don't have the financial resources because finance security before gaming is always important even if you don't just share the kickstarter and everyone can know about it and hopefully get it to its last and final uh point where uh everyone is then benefiting from that now into designing an adventure in dungeons and dragons using the methods that i have been speaking about in terms of all these videos all right part one there is no plot there is only a plan i myself have to get away from using the word plot it is a bad naughty naughty word this is not in our vocabulary anymore plot is now gone it is dead say it with me plot is dead because plot gives us the implication that someone has planned out all of this already and that we will be following along those steps so we are now going to be planners only we plan things we don't plot things so plan plan plan what is your plan for your campaign is a lot more useful just from a psychological perspective than what is your plot again because it implies that you are actually controlling something i've got a lot of notes on my screens here so you're going to have to just forgive me because i want to make sure that you get exactly what i was in my head blah blah blah okay i needed a method to just kind of suck this out and just spread it to everybody okay right right right so plan plan plan whose plan is it there are three things that can have a plan within your world space one is the villain the nemesis the henchmen whatever you want to call them they will have a plan two the players the players will have a plan and three the universe it doesn't have a plan but it has certain things that it does that kind of follow along the same path every single time and so you could argue are effectively plans even though there is no ascensions behind it we still have to treat it like a plan just accept it okay except that those are the three things that can have plans we're going to look at the moment in this video just on the villain plans it's important that our villains have a plan they will always have a plan so how do you come up with that plan well the first thing that you need to identify is what is their ultimate goal remember that great big thing called the sentence well we still have that that is still fundamental to how we design our adventures someone wants something badly by a specific time and is having difficulty getting it using certain components because something is resisting or preventing them from achieving their goal it's a long sentence but you need to have that sentence and i have done videos on how to create that sentence ten thousand times but it doesn't it that's not what we're gonna be talking about in today's video what we are talking about is once you have that sentence you figure out that sentence conjure up a villain any villain that you like so let's say an orc an orc wants to invade a village and plunder and pillage it for the glory of his tribe but he's having difficulty doing so because the village is surrounded by a strong defense of palisade walls and ditches and he has no idea how to get over those the problem is is that the big orc mute where they all gather is going to be happening in the next oh let's say three weeks and if he doesn't have some kind of loot or plunder from this little village he is going to be seen as being an outcast and will be thrown out of the village that's the example i have just come up with and i was making it up as i was talking to you working out the sentence as i was going along i hope that made sense to you i hope it was a good example for you to be able to follow along with okay so now we then have to say we have to break it down what are the things that this orc is going to need in order to enact his plan so we say okay well we need to get stuff now this is also old old ideology from the early days of this channel but it's relevant today and much more so than it ever was before so the orc needs to get some stuff so the orc needs to get a warband the orc needs to get war dogs the orc needs to get something to get into that village now this is where you can be entirely creative and say okay well the orc the orc um well the orc needs to get something to get into the village once the orc is in the village the orc then needs to find stuff of value they need to find the golden torque that they can hang around their neck or the chieftain's crown or the statue in the middle of the field of in the middle of the village you have to figure out what that could be based on what is the most interesting what is the most exciting what is the most devious what is the the most random it's entirely up to you and remember your orc has a goal to get something that will prove that they are of value okay once they've got once they've figured out what they need to get or where they need to get it from they then need to actually escape and get away from that village and then they need to present it at the at the moot right so those are the four things that needs to happen and where did those four things come from that was just me thinking through the plan we got to get in there we got to get the thing then we got to get out of there and then we have to actually present it to gain our honor all from that sentence so you need to break it down i like to go for four steps four or five steps you know me i like to go for four or five steps but generally speaking it's just logically thinking through the plan what do you need to do in order to get from point a to point e or d depending you then take that and then you work out what resources does this villain or henchman or whatever have at their disposal are they limited or are they unlimited if they are limited resources this is a single solitary young orc who wants to break into this village they're not going to be able to hire an entire army of cobbles who can dig a tunnel underneath the palisade come up in the village and claim that object they can't do that they don't have the resources for that but they might be able to gather together a small amount of coin to hire an airship that's controlled by gnomes to fly over the village so that he can climb down a rope and get into the middle of the village maybe he could do that or if his resources are completely unlimited then he can do all of those things at the same time he can have a diversion which gets the villagers to leave the village and then he can get in there maybe that's actually his route is that he doesn't have unlimited resources he sets the wooden palisade on fire on one side of the camp because that's fairly cheap and easy to do and then he tries to break in from the other side so we could do that we then go next step and say okay well then he now needs to find this thing that he's after so he's going to need information on where that comes from that means that perhaps he could abduct a villager who's out in the forest to then ask them questions where is the statue in the middle of the village hang on it could be something along those lines figure it out this is where you are coming in in terms of creating your plan but how do we know how the particular individual is going to come up with their plan we owe gas them we owe gas them and we we need to do that because that allows us to understand exactly what's going to happen so when we look at our ork we say well we've got all of these different options floating around in our heads we haven't decided on any of them yet by the way but we have all of these options floating around in our heads time to now oh gas so this ogre his occupation perhaps is scout because that's more interesting than if it was something else now we know he's trying to get his coming of age um object item whatever it is so perhaps he's a junior scout who forages around maybe a bit of a hunter something along those lines or he could be a young warrior it's entirely up to us to choose which of those gives us the most interesting combination so once we've chosen his occupation we know what his goal is that is his sentence we know what his attitude is could he be angry could he be frustrated could he be rushing he might be rushing he's trying to definitely get it over and done with as fast as he can before the mood happens so perhaps he's a little bit uh hasty perhaps he's careless something along those lines we then need to say okay cool what are what is at stake well at stake is his entire reputation within the clan if he fails that's it tickets for him thank you very much for playing he now lives on his own is an outcast and will probably die that's a pretty high stake which means he's willing to do almost anything so now we take that and we go haha excellent we now have an orc who is going to try and break into this village he's going to try and break into the village by setting a giant fire on one side of the village distracting everybody to then get them to that side of the village so he can then sneak in through the main gates and then get to the object but in order to get to the object he has to take one of the villagers hostage first and interrogate them as to where is the sacred idol being kept in which hut so he can go straight to that hut once he is inside the village and he has this object he then needs to escape his plan to escape is that he has some rope with him and he is going to go to the far wall on the far side of the um ring fence palisade words fail me of the palisade he's going to throw the rope over he's going to climb over that rope and on the other side he has got some camouflage gear which he has now put into place beforehand so he will then dress into that and then he can disappear into the forest and no one will know that he's there do you see what i'm doing i'm breaking down each of his steps into something that makes logical sense for this particular individual he is going to a have some rope he's going to take a villager hostage he's going to leave some camouflage gear on the other side of the wall is this too much thinking for an orc i don't think so because he's a scout scouts know all about hunting animals leaving little bits of bait here and there ploy pulling uh animals to a specific spot having things loaded up in certain places building traps all that kind of stuff i think that is absolutely fine for anything with an average intelligence or even a lower intelligence but something that has as their occupation a standard thing that they would be doing on a regular basis i have never met a hunter who is not in tune with the way of hunting animals so that is his plan we now get to step number two unlink your plot points now so now we're going okay well we we we have this this orc and we've got this kind of stuff going on um and we've said that we are planning on putting the the camouflage clothing on the west side of the um fortress of the palisade wall i can't remember that word on the west side of the palisade wall and we're going to have the fire on the east side of the palisade wall and we're going to have this hunter this this individual is gonna be abducted by the orc um on a tuesday and so we've got all of our plans together your players then wander into the village and they go huh nice statue in the middle of the village um maybe that's risky leaving it out there for everybody to see don't you think maybe kind of well maybe we should just liberate that the players are going to be having their own plans they're going to be running their own things so what that means is by unhinging or removing your plot points from the locations you plan them to be in the murder weapon the crime the thing that's going to be taking place you can then drop them wherever you like and you can present them to your players in any way you like because none of your plan your plan is the gm by the way is zero you have no plan none of your orcs plan is yet in motion so the orc can change his mind in a split second and move stuff to different locations dip and and just have different it might not even be an orc now suddenly you change it to someone who's within the village who's trying to steal the statue and they realize hang on a moment i don't have to set fire to this thing i just need to encourage the pcs to steal the statue and then i'll steal it from them do you see how suddenly you still have an npc who is trying to steal that statue but now they're just going to let the pcs do it first because they've started to hear rumors that the pcs are interested in it or they go and try and hire the pcs to steal it for them the fundamental thing hasn't changed someone wants that statue badly and has by a specific time which is sooner rather than later and is going to be using the pcs to get it for them now so you are very dynamic in terms of how this adventure is now going to play out the orc though let's say for example he abducts the villager this could be a plot hook that you give to your players well guess what my oh welcome great player our huntsman hasn't come back for the last three days we're worried wouldn't you go into that forest and have a look for him we'd be we'd be doing it ourselves but um there's been some orcs gathering in the valley on three miles distant we're a bit nervous the pieces garden to the forest and of course they will find the hunter the hunter's been bound gag beaten and abused and that sort of thing and the hunter might say oh um i have been abducted by an orc who wanted to know where something was he left about half an hour ago except because you are a dynamic gm you are going hang on a moment my orc might have actually thought that someone will come looking for this hunter so maybe the hunter is a trap and so if the pcs just walk up to the hunter suddenly a net grabs the pcs pulls them up into the air and now they're stuck in this net and they've got to go through a skill challenge or use acrobatics or whatever skill you you want them to use to try and get out of this net which delays them so then they have to rush to get back to the orc camp again look at what your npc who has the plan look at what they're going to be doing they're going to be trying to slow people down if they get to the hunter would he kill the hunter nothing in his his oh gas says that he will kill people necessarily he is very desperate so he might kill people but maybe not necessarily do you see now how this adventure which we didn't really have any as gm any control over just by keeping those questions rolling in our head what would i do if i was the hunter i've got these skills i've got those skills suddenly the adventure starts to change and take take effect and to take place so generally speaking what i will do is when i have this plan obviously and i i don't feel like i need to say this but i'm going to say it anyway obviously if you have npcs that have plans and the pcs do not come across any evidence of that plan if they have no way of influencing that plan if they have nothing giddy up horsey i'm on a roll if they have no way of interacting with that plan the plan is completely meaningless and you have wasted your life and your time go away you've missed the point the pcs must interact with the plan if you are going to follow that plan through otherwise leave the plan abandon the plan and run with another plan because if they can't interfere with the plan then the plan will go ahead because otherwise it's your npc's stopping other npcs which means you're playing with yourself and we know that that is not part of a role-playing game unless you're playing a solo game in which case then slightly except you get the point so the players have to be able to get involved in that quest somehow the way that you give your plot hooks your hooks again look at that plot hook that word has come back between plan your plan the way you give out your plan is come up with random things around the village and see how they could link to the main plot the pcs oh we've got a hunter who got lost in the forest we're very worried about him would you go and look no we don't want to go and look at that we're going to go and investigate something else over there i like to to to just see where the pcs are interested in going what are they interacting with what are they looking like they go to the tavern the tavern keeper is there davin keeper says oh yeah well um the business has been slow you know with the orcs moving through it's pretty tough um but they'll be gone in a couple weeks time once their moot happens it happens every year it's usually they don't usually give us any trouble you start to feed into the bigger picture that you have created around this npc you're just dropping it in now isn't that violating the npc's ai it isn't because remember you are using that npc to deliver information that belongs to the gm and to the bigger role-playing game but they are still delivering it in a way that makes sense to them so that's why the bar keeper was upset that there was not a lot of business because everyone was keeping away why were they keeping away because of the awk moot so it kind of makes sense that he would be talking about it nonetheless so you plant as many npcs as you like and every time a pc interacts with an npc just give them a little taste of something that might lead them there now it could also be that they get to the trapper and the trapper goes well the huntsman hasn't come back yet but if you want to go and get me 12 beaver skins i'll give you a gold per beaver skin that might get the players more interested because now they can go hunting and they can get easy money as opposed to going on the plot meanwhile of course they're going to go out into that forest and they're going to go and find the hunter and the trap that the orc is in and bingo you have now launched the game now again if the pcs go oh there's not going to go and rob something from the village oh well we're going to go and hunt those beavers when they come back the entire village has burnt to the ground right because the pcs have now had opportunities to interact with those plot lines they haven't necessarily followed them not that you are saying that they must follow them by the way this is not the point they have chosen not to follow them because they're going on another plot which they feel is more interesting which is their prerogative and which means we now go on that journey with them and we look at the difficulties that they're gonna have in terms of hunting beavers because it's no longer an npc plot now a plan plan plan it's no longer an npc plan now it is a nature plan the beavers will have done stuff especially if one of them is a giant mutant beaver and has built a dam trap which is now going to entrap our pcs as they try to hunt beaver pelt which is why it's worth a gold piece in the first place that's now an adventure on its own when the pcs get back the village burnt down because they interacted with the npc plot plan they interacted with the npc plan the npc plan then continued to go even though they weren't interfering with it which now now it brings me to part three is where we now say okay cool we have now got we've got a lot of stuff going on here none of it we know is going to happen for certain we don't know about the beavers because that was made up on the fly we don't know about any other stuff but we do have our central orkish story do you see what battle maps we now have to create the battle maps we have to create are the village most likely a forest area most likely and perhaps a river stretch of river that's it so in planning for our first adventure we know we have a village we know we have a forest we know we have a river now if we design those maps to be dual purpose so that each map has got two areas on it that could be used for any kind of contingency we so like well then that's absolutely fine do we spend hours meticulously working out the trap of the uh the orc around the hunter person because i kind of like that so i think that's part of his plan we don't we don't we don't at all we can just say well that's probably where it will be because remember we've unhinged all those points so even if the pcs decide they're not going to go into the forest they're going to go into the planes they will find the hunter in the plains because who says the orc didn't take him there maybe the orc didn't want to go anywhere near the other orcs in case they saw what he was doing and tried to steal his thunder so he's taken this guy out onto the planes that's entirely entirely feasible and no player will ever know that that isn't true so in a sense what you are doing is you have got these plans for your npcs and for your first adventure you don't need to have anything other than a first starting plan but what you do need to realize is that everything else in that village everybody else in that village should have goals because it's ogas and so anybody that the pcs talk to will be able to give them adventures we'll be able to give them options we'll go hunt the beavers okay great but how do we then create all of those maps and things how do we plan the stats how do we come up with all of those encounters well that is where we then step back and we say okay well we know are three maps we need the village because a lot of stuff might be happening in the village we need a forest section because we know whatever happens within the village will be linked to that forest and then maybe let's have a river section or let's have a plane section create a generic kind of space like i said dual purpose maps will help you and i'm going to be doing a video on deal purpose maps next week so come back for that one if you're not sure and what i mean by that we have that we then say okay let's look at the monsters that the pcs might encounter well we know we're going to have to have statistics potentially for our orc scout our our hero npc if you like we're going to have some statistics for woodland creatures things that they might encounter in the forest we're not going to have a thousand stats what we might do and this is what i do as i go well there might be some bears in the forest i might use some spiders i might use some pixies i look at the level of the characters i also look at what my players are like what is their game preference do they like mystery do they like combat do they like this do like that if they like combat then i might have some wolves that are hunting or that have been deranged and gone mad by a weird druid where the hell did that come from well no i just have a druid out in the forest whose ogas is to protect nature and believes that all of civilization should be wiped out so they're breeding a whole bunch of wolves that are going to go and start hunting down all the outlying villages until eventually they can build up bigger forces and then take on the cities don't you have druids in your forests who've got goals you should have because you're playing in dungeons and dragons so we know druids are everywhere so anything that happens suddenly spawns a whole bunch of new adventures which come out of nowhere that is in a long shell not in a nutshell how i then start going about my adventures i will design those maps i will have those stats for the npcs available and then i will have that singular plan in action and then i sit back and i say right players engage and they will start they'll burn that village down they will cut down the forest they'll damn that river they'll skin the beavers they'll slay the orc and it doesn't matter because all of that has just taken place within that space and i'm just reacting to it and as we go on now suddenly players start to discover other things etc etc for a campaign you are doing this on a gigantic scale not on a macro scale so for a campaign your villain will have an even bigger plan not a simple little plan and they will have broken it down into a series of little steps that they need to take and get to and we'll talk about that another video if you really want me to um but basically doing an adventure or doing a campaign it's just a matter of scale and then delivering it and keeping it going in in that way that's it from me um i can't see anything more because this video has really gone back to the old length of the old videos i suggest watching at 1.5 times speed it might make it go a bit faster anyway a reminder of practical guide to becoming a great gm has all of this information in it with exercises with examples um there are tasks for you to do the kickstarter has unlocked an entire workbook which will now go with this a print-on-demand workbook that you can print and fill in as you're going will help you create your campaigns whether you use pre-made uh systems or whether you make your own homebrew world systems this book will help you as well as the complete guide to epic campaigns which has now been added to this amazing amazing book making a bundle so there we go and of course a massive thank you to all of you for watching all the way through to the end and for putting up with my shenanigans in today's video and to all of these wonderful people who support the channel on a monthly basis those patrons i absolutely adore you and until we meet again next week i wish you the very happiest of gaming

Channel: How to be a Great GM

Views: 53,533

Keywords: creating the campaign, campaign creator, how to be a great game master, how to gm, great gm, campaign creation, dnd campaign, dnd campaign design, dnd campaign ideas, rpg campaign design, rpg campaign ideas, rpg campaign, role playing campaign, campaign design, fantasy campaign, running the game, game master guide, dungeon master guide, gm tips, dm tips, epic guide to creating campaigns, rpg adventure, roleplaying campaign, ttrpg adventure, dnd adventure

Id: 8PuV4ZFjkpI

Length: 27min 59sec (1679 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 25 2021