- decide what campaign WORLD you are going to use

Many great DnD games start off with the DM sitting down, and completly free-winging the entire thing. They make up EVERYTHING as they go, and use plain hex paper to draw the maps as they go. This CAN be an excellent way to run an adventure. However, this is usually a HORRIBLE way to create an entire campaign world.

There are a couple of major choices here: either make up your own campaign world (can be REALLY time consuming, but very rewarding), or use an existing world. See my DnD Primer page in the menu for links to create your own world. Here are links to FREE campaign settings for you to use in kicking off your own DnD campaigns:

Khoras - another of those complete, detailed fantasy worlds similar to Realms of Adventure, this is my FAVORITE campaign setting, with the most extensive descriptions of a fantasy world I have come across so far...... this world is complete enough to replace Forgotten Realms as a campaign setting, with all the advantages of a fresh, new, unexplored world
Karanblade - a very complete, excellent campaign setting for a world-shattering campaign
Realms of Adventure - another complete, extensive campaign world - I like it better than Karanblade, because it lends itself to a wide variety of adventures
Infernus - umm.... wow.....the best of the 'dark' campaign settings out there, this is a complete, detailed campaign setting if you are looking for something very different for your players..... it is a bunch of .PDF files, very professional...

- start by coming up with an adventure plot - what is going to happen next in the player's world

Example: The players are starting their first adventure in my campaign together, so they are all going on a boat to voyage to a recently discovered continent. Along the way, an enemy of one of the players (make sure your players have good backgrounds) tries to hijack the boat by shapeshifting into a lookalike of Captain Grint. The fake captain declares that the players are sick, and puts them into cells. They secretly put the real captain into a cell. The ultimate goal is to rendevous with another boat to take one PC away for ransom. The plot: Characters are voyaging to a new continent (Da New World) on a boat. The enemy of one player wants to capture the player and take him/her to the enemy stronghold. See, simple plots work best!

- break your plot down into a series of encounters. Try to keep the encounters rather loose. Characters will do what they want to do, so don't try to force them into anything. A good encounter is just a description of an area (called a Player Narration), a map (one map or set of maps can service many encounters), a list of NPCs or monsters, and special GM notes. Triggers are important parts of each encounter - for example, the PCs will encounter a Guardian. If they disburb what the guardian is guarding, it will attack with a fireball first, then try to take out PCs from strongest looking to weakest looking. If they just walk around the guardian, it stands still like a statue. There, we have 2 triggers for the entity that is in the room on the map you just drew. Remember - if you plan too much, your players will throw all your work out the window when they deviate off your beaten path - keep this stuff really loose....

- Linear adventures are constructed so that A leads to B, which leads to C, etc. There are no options on which order to take the encounters. IF you setup the adventure to force the players into A, B, and C, you will probably piss them off (like leading them by the nose). The key to writing good linear adventures is to create the illusion of choice; there could be many choices, but the next encounter is the most logical.
- Situation-based adventures involve encounters that occur when the PCs reach a certain site or time
- Location-based adventures are slightly better, but time-based encounters can be used to very good effect as well
- Matrix adventures: each encounter is interconnected with several others. For example, A leads to B, C, E, or G. C leads to D, F, or back to A. The PCs can take one of several paths, though the adventure usually ends with a climactic encounter. This encounter could have variations depending on how the PCs got there

- make sure to create a sort of adventure outline - so you can keep track of how the general flow of the adventure SHOULD run (it never works that way). Example:

- PCs get on boat
- PCs have meal, meet each other for the first time
- PCs wake up in chains in hold of ship
- PCs try to escape
- PCs hear noises, encounter fake captain
- Combat, Parley, or Run?

A flowcharting program (Proxy Designer is excellent freeware flowchart software) takes about 15-30 minutes to get a flowchart. Click here for a graphic showing the start of a flowchart for the characters first adventure. After you spend the 15-30 minutes, you have a template for the adventure design process. Each point in the flowchart could be one of the 4 basic encounter types (or a variation thereof):

- Combat encounters occur whether they fight other people or creatures or animated swords (i.e. any type of fighting, obviously)
- Negotiation encounters occur when the characters have to talk with other beings (maybe to move to the next part of the adventure). In a negotiation, the characters could be talking to people in a location (bar, restaurant, village square), buying equipment, or questioning a dragon to find a way to get into the underground lair
- Traps, puzzles, and natural disasters: they pit the characters against hostile natural forces or the environment. The stuff is usually not intelligent, and the goal of the characters is to survive the encounter.
- Dilemmas are situations where the characters have to make a choice, with consequences ranging from comical to world-altering. Dilemma encounters also involve elements of the other three types, but take each to a new level of difficulty. In a dilemma, the PCs may have to decide on moral issues, or have to choose between possibly evil consequences (evil being relative, if your PCs are Drow, then good consequences are evil to them). Example: choose between sacrificing a princess or the queen.....

- make MAPS! Probably the most time consuming aspect of DnD GM life, it is one of the most critical. Make maps of potential encounters, and maps of the countryside the players are in... Maps act as your list of locations. If you jot down a list of locations first ("Stormwardens' Castle, Deepingdale, Battledale, Mistledale, Shadowdale, Sembia and the Pirate Isles."), and start making general maps ahead of time, your adventures will be much smoother. If your plots revolove around these areas, you are generally prepared for unusual PC moves.

AutoRealm Map Software
Hex (World Map Making Software) - the site is down, please email me for a copy
Eric's Refuge (Town Generator and Theives' Guild Generator)

- create Player Narrations: a narration is what you initially read to the players so they get an idea of their character's surroundings and/or situation. It is also what you read to them in between major adventure ideas... A good narration includes the following details:

- a good descriptive "view" of their surroundings
- descriptions of the sounds around them (people talking, water dripping, etc...)
- smells and odors around them
- any unusual tactile sensations (you are blindfolded and tied up, lying on rough, damp wood)
- descriptions of creatures/people around them, including
height, weight, hair, eyes, clothing/skin/other appearance, current manerisms, eye patches,
weaponry, smell (some creatures really stink, eh?), and other important details
- descriptions of buildings, including style, material type, apparant age of the building,
condition (decrepit, brand new, fresh paint, etc...)
- other appropriate things. Example: the inn you are at has the following menu: Vegatable
Surprise, Pork Cassarole, Bread Pudding, Mixed Fruit Bake, Dragon Beer, and Dragon Bitters

- make memorable NPCs and Villans!! AS important as maps, NPCs are the world around the players. The innkeep, the weaponsmith, and the evil badguy holding a sword over the innocent, they are all important to your world.
- Get a computer program to generate NPCs quickly and efficiently, so your only goal is to flesh out the personality of the NPC during play.
- Write a couple of quick notes on the expected personality of the NPC, his current (or former) social rank/status, wealth, and physical/mental health.
- Also, get a computer program to generate random character names for you. Trust me, it is MUCH easier than trying to make up names all the time.
- Note any triggers for each NPC, especially villians. When will a villian parley, when will the villian attack, what are his/her motives, etc... This is time consuming, which is another reason to have a NPC generator handy to handle the tedium of rolling STR, CON, etc....
- Start with the NPC's family. Who are his parents, his brothers and sisters, his spouse, his children? Too many characters in roleplaying games seem to spring fully formed from the head of the game master (GM), with no family and no childhood. The more layers your NPCs have, the more interesting they will seem to your players.
- NPC blind spots. Everyone has them. Does your NPC trust a certain type of person implicitly? Does he believe himself invincible, even though he isn't? This may provide the foundation for how your players can blackmail or defeat an NPC.

Heroes Character Generator - http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Vault/1642
GMHelper (random name, treasure, spellbook and monster generator) - http://www.aros.net/~jseeley/
3e NPC Generator - http://rover.byu.edu/jgb3/generators.htm
History Generator - nice program to generate a skeleton character history - email me for a link (the site is gone)

- Use Cliche's and Stereotypes in your adventures. Get extreme with them. This is a FANTASY world, and cliche's help make the fantasy fun for the players!!!!! No need to be PC in fantasy land.

- the GM should get involved in his/her side of the story as often as possible. Example: the PCs decide to order their mercenary band to storm the wooden walls of the fort. You (as GM) go outside the room, and plan what your NPCs will be doing during this timeframe. Come back into the room, and only then do you get your plan of action from the players. This can create some really exciting stories!

- Tables can be important as a way of introducing structured randomness (what????? you'll see) into your campaign world. Simple tables, like random encounter tables, are great for fledgling GMs who want to stick to real random encounters (I never use em, but make up my own as I see fit), but there are more tables than that to think of. Examples would include a Wild Surges table (eeekkk, your Fireball spell went wild! Instead of blowing up, it simply ignited ever torch for 400' around the caster... umm, is someone's backpack smoldering?), or other tables like that.

- Campaign continuity: very hard one to write about. I generally like to start like this with a new set of players:

0. Make up an introductory goal (1-2 sessions usually, designed to get players to meet)
1. Make up a long-term goal (to be realized in 3-4 sessions)
2. Give the players a starting setting and develop details on the spot (e.g adlib)
3. Look and listen for players interests during the introductory sessions
4. Mix these interests with your own ideas to advance to the long-term goal
5. Take notes of what players say or wish during the session without disrupting the playing
6. Slowly make the long-term goal obvious to players (1st-3rd session)
7. Confront them with their archvillain - archproblem (?) (battle or something)
8. Base your next set of sessions (this time 4-9 sessions) on the outcome of the confrontation and on the notes you took during the last few sessions to ...
9. Get the players in a related, but different start setting
10. and start all over again (more complex plot, more NPCs, more surprising changes in plot ..)

You can keep up this kind of pattern for years.

- generic plots: I got this in an email response to a question I posted last year on rec.games.frp.dnd. I asked for some plot help (I was stuck), and I got this anonymous email. It is a comprehensive generic plot list that can get almost anyones creative juices going. Make sure you flesh out your plot well, and this usually leads to your adventure outline, then setting up encounters, making NPCs, maps, etc.....

Supplication - Persecutor, Suppliant, a Power in Authority
Deliverance - Unfortunates, Threatener, Rescuer
Revenge - Avenger, Criminal
Vengeance by Family upon Family - Avenging Kinsman, Guilty Kinsman, Relative
Pursuit - Fugitive from Punishment, Pursuer
Victim of Cruelty or Misfortune - Unfortunates, Master or Unlucky Person
Disaster - Vanquished Power, Victorious Power or Messenger
Revolt - Tyrant, Conspirator(s)
Daring Enterprise - Bold Leader, Goal, Adversary
Abduction - Abductor, Abducted, Guardian
Enigma - Interrogator, Seeker, Problem
Obtaining - Two or more Opposing Parties, Object, maybe an Arbitrator
Familial Hatred - Two Family Members who hate each other
Familial Rivalry - Preferred Kinsman, Rejected Kinsman, Object
Murderous Adultery - Two Adulterers, the Betrayed
Madness - Madman, Victim
Fatal Imprudence - Imprudent person, Victim or lost object
Involuntary Crimes of Love - Lover, Beloved, Revealer
Kinsman Kills Unrecognised Kinsman - Killer, Unrecognised Victim, Revealer
Self Sacrifice for an Ideal - Hero, Ideal, Person or Thing Sacrificed
Self Sacrifice for Kindred - Hero, Kinsman, Person or Thing Sacrificed
All Sacrificed for Passion - Lover, Object of Passion, Person or Thing Sacrificed
Sacrifice of Loved Ones - Hero, Beloved Victim, Need for Sacrifice
Rivalry Between Superior and Inferior - Superior, Inferior, Object
Adultery - Deceived Spouse, Two Adulterers
Crimes of Love - Lover, Beloved, theme of Dissolution
Discovery of Dishonor of a Loved One - Discoverer, Guilty One
Obstacles to Love - Two Lovers, Obstacle
An Enemy Loved - Beloved Enemy, Lover, Hater
Ambition - An Ambitious Person, Coveted Thing, Adversary
Conflict with a God - Mortal, Immortal
Mistaken Jealousy - Jealous One, Object of Jealousy, Supposed Accomplice, Author of Mistake
Faulty Judgement - Mistaken One, Victim of Mistake, Author of Mistake, Guilty Person
Remorse - Culprit, Victim, Interrogator
Recovery of a Lost One - Seeker, One Found
Loss of Loved Ones - Kinsman Slain, Kinsman Witness, Executioner

The background of a plot consists of a number of details. Example: a simple quest in which the PCs must retrieve a holy relic from a derelict church. Who has asked them to perform this quest? What is it that she wants the relic for - or what does she really want, if not the relic? Who is she and what is she up to? Who will the PCs encounter along the way, and will they seek to help or hinder the PCs? Why? Where do the PCs need to go? What do they need to do? How may they fail or succeed?

- make your adventures interesting! Check out the Netbooks site, which hosts a HUGE amount of netbooks, including Adventure Sketches and Ideas, general plot outlines, rules to help make play easier, lists of different traps, riddles, puzzles, and such things that make adventuring FUN! Also, I have compiled some useful netbooks - check out the Adventure Help link in my menu - none of the netbooks I have compiled are mine - I don't know who wrote them (most of them have credit info included).

- adventure writing format - if you are stuck writing out a module or adventure (especially one that you want to play with your PCs, then publish for others to use), an example format could help - check it out at RPGAs website (see the adventure submisssion download)