dmscreams

[dmscreams]

Phase: Planning

This is the part where I imagine things will go the way I hope. Since I know plans don’t work out exactly, I’m hoping to lay a good foundation.

GIF by perhapsblues

Recap: I’m a forever DM starting a new campaign with a new group and writing about it. :)

Post One: Planning: Number of Sessions

While I’m still making some decisions, I have already made some. I’m gonna lay them out here, along with my reasoning.

The Adventure

Okay, so we know how many sessions there will be. Now, what are they going to do? Let's discuss the general plan first.

A fantasy adventure

A main story that allows for B, C, and even a D story

A big bad (pretty straight forward villain)

So, the B, C, D, etc. stories will come mostly from the PCs backstories, so we will wait on those.

Instead, let's talk about the setup.

The Setup

A Robin Hood-style adventure: Rob/Defeat the wealthy lord stealing from the people in his land. Free the people from his wicked rule.

The Red Herring: The lord's employed wizard. He IS the one doing the magic, but he is NOT the brains of the operation or the one who benefits.

The starting point (and why there's a red herring): The lord hires our group to uncover what's plaguing his land. This is a way to keep the people from revolting and trying to prove that he's doing something about the problems that people are raising to him. He has, in fact, hired a bunch of people who aren't really the best and the brightest. At Session 0, I plan on asking my players to create characters eager to go on an adventure but not suited to them. They will start at level 3, so they won't be completely squishy. Their experience and abilities come from their regular lives before being "specially recruited for an important project".

The chance to fail or succeed: The scrappy group may not pull it together and need to defeat the powered-up lord after he succeeds at his plan.

Before session 1, this is what I think I need to have in place: 1. Fleshed out details for the Lord, the Wizard, the plan, the spell/powerup, what it's doing to the people, etc.

2. Two main affected villages with a cast of characters they can talk to with specific stories. The characters need backstories, and some of them will include clues, mini-quests with different loot or power-ups for the characters to gain, and possible curses for failures.

3. Several minor combats that I can throw in ad-hoc. I'm not the best at planning combats, so I want to go into this with several combats fleshed out that I can just throw in if/when they come up. Usually, this is something I wing, and it never goes the way I hope. Let's the be the change and plan several combats out.

4. Flow chart. I started doing this because Aabria Iyengar mentioned she uses them. I find them really helpful for campaign mapping.

Reasoning

Why a more obvious villain? I'm playing with several new players and a new group. Removing moral grayness from the major plot can help streamline the experience and get players on the same page. We want them to work together, and this is an easy and obvious way to do so, even if their characters don't like each other.

Why make the lord the starting point? I'm not a big fan of the meet-in-a-tavern without a hook or experienced players. When you've got new players who may be afraid to start conversations with each other and know how to bring a group into alignment, sometimes the best thing is to give them a focus. This way, the whole group can start out by interacting with me and bouncing off of each other while I'm guiding the conversation/scene. Plus, if they believe the lord, it makes for a good reveal later. If they don't, then they can jump into talking with each other about why.

Why this? Truthfully, because it's simple. The adventure is mostly obvious. Find clues. Uncover the plot. Come up with a plan. Execute. Succeed? Sometimes, simplicity is the right framework for a situation, and simpler is better when there is a lot of newness in a group. The more the group plays together, the more you can learn what people like and don't like.

IRL next step: Get a session 0 planned with my group.

[dmscreams]

Phase: Planning

This is the part where I imagine things will go the way I hope. Since I know plans don’t work out exactly, I’m hoping to lay a good foundation.

Recap: I’m a forever DM starting a new campaign with a new group and writing about it. :)

While I’m still making some decisions, I have already made some. I’m gonna lay them out here, along with my reasoning.

Number of Sessions

I decided on a 4-8 session campaign; I am writing for 4, but giving this campaign the kind of detail and room to grow for a slightly longer run.

Reasoning

1. A specific session count/range is something I wanna try. I’ve done a lot of one-shots and a lot of open ended campaigns. I have been thinking about the way Dimension 20 structures the show. They have a certain number of episodes. The campaign fits inside of them, yet there is also a bunch of freedom for improv, exploration, and change. There’s a way to have some guardrails, some story rails, and still leave opportunities for big swings and surprises.

2. The starting number, four, is how many I think it will take to tell a short story that gives everyone a chance to shine a little. The upper limit is to keep things on track. I wanna try new stuff (including different systems), tell lots of stories, and give other folks a chance to try DMing for the group if they want.

3. The all mighty scheduling gods don’t always play fair. If we set a schedule with a fixed number of sessions (8), then it’s in people’s calendars.

4. I’m playing with all new people. The group may also be HUGE. It’s looking like it could be 4-7 people. They’re all new friends so this is also a bonding opportunity, which is why I think we need the room for a short set of sessions to grow a little bit to let the players have a chance to explore and go with the flow. Because…

5. I want to give people a chance to get their hands dirty. These are not totally new players, but they’re not long time players. I want them to have a chance to take a few big swings, and that might not happen in four sessions. I want them to get a little comfy, be silly, try stuff, fail upwards, etc.

6. I’m new to this formatting so maybe I’ll need the extra sessions to land the plane.

7. I like to set expectations. I like to let people know, as best i can, what to expect and what the plan is (in general).

[dmscreams]

It’s that time again.

I am starting to put together a new campaign (a short one) for a new group. I thought it might be fun to write about it.

In addition to this new campaign, I’m getting ready to dust off my guide-new-players hat and put together another “New To D&D” one-shot. I’m thinking of running it at a local coffee shop. I was lucky enough to get to run a bunch of one shots for some folks in a similar setting.

Before I begin…

I dunno if anyone will ever read this, but I’m going to write it to try and be helpful to other DMs, especially newbies.

I’m a disabled, queer, non-binary trans, Person of Global Majority (PoGM). This is important, because if you’re gonna read this, you should know where I’m coming from. I try my best to keep a safe table. I think it’s important to make TTRPG diverse, inclusive, and equitable.

I’ve been playing D&D for almost 20 years; I’ve been DM-ing for about 15. I’ve played a range of things, but I’ve mostly DM’d 4e and 5e. I’m excited to run some kids on bikes stuff, eventually, as well as some other stuff. My partner has a huge collection of cool TTRPG books, so I’m sure I’ll have lots of things to try and sources for inspiration.

I tend to play Barbarians and Fighters, but I’ve been exploring into playing more magic users. I tend to run character and role play based games. I do a lot less heavy combat, dungeon crawl, minmaxing stuff.