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As many DMs have, I have often found myself in a position where
I need to create a modular adventure for an upcoming game, and
I come down with "DM's block." I hate doing stereotypical
quests, I hate stealing good ideas from books (I find it humiliating
when I'm caught at it by a player who knows my source), and I've
sent 1st-level PCs up against kobolds, goblins, and orcs more times
that I can count. So I developed a random adventure generation
tool to help me get over the hurdle. I have to fill in my own details,
but it does a lot of the early work.
Primary Antagonist:
1) Intelligent group
2) Intelligent individual
3) Intelligent master (roll again)
4) Unintelligent group
5) Unintelligent individual
6) Unmotivated/guardians
7) (Demi)human organization
8) (Demi)human individual
Venue:
1) Dungeon (traditional: ruin or cave)
2) Dungeon (nontraditional)
3) City/town
4) Wilderness
5) Hostile territory
6) Outpost
Challenge:
1) Investigation
2) Strategy
3) Rescue/get in and out
4) Puzzle(s) or other inanimate
5) Redemption/reclamation/healing
6-8) Hack 'n' slash
Goal:
1) Wipeout
2) Generic treasure
3) Specific treasure
4) Specific item, no value to party
5) Information
6) Rescue/protection
Complication (optional)
1) Ally- on par with party
2) Ally- to be protected
3) Unexpected mastermind/informant
4) Return of old enemy
5) Curse/limitation/ongoing effect
6) Environmental extreme
7) Mixed alignment NPC group
8) Rivalry toward same goal
Let me give an example. I roll 3, 2, 8, 6, 1 (using d6s and d8s
as appropriate).
A 3 on the first chart gives me an "intelligent master" as
the primary antagonist, with a "roll again" to determine
exactly what it's a master of. I get an 8, for an unusual combination
of an intelligent master of a human or demihuman individual. (I
separate out "intelligent" from "(demi)human" because
sometimes I forget about humans as "monsters," but there
are other monsters [dragons, illithids, etc.] that also make good
intelligent enemies.) This isn't much to go on, so let's move on.
A 2 on the second chart gives me a nontraditional dungeon as the
venue--basically, any "dungeon" but a ruin or cave. That's
pretty wide open as well, but it gives me a start: I'm looking
for something with a lair or hideout.
An 8 in the third chart makes the primary challenge a hack-and-slash.
As you can see from the fact that I put 6 through 8 as hack-and-slash,
I feel that this represents the primary form of challenge in D&D
and is overrepresented accordingly. Since a hack-and-slash game
generally involves more than 2 fights, this means that my "intelligent
(demi)human needs some minions of some sort. Thieves' guilds come
immediately to mind. Religious organizations, such a cults, come
a close second. Any other organization, such as wizards' cabals,
mercenary camps, and so on will also work nicely. Moving on, to
get even more focus:
My fourth roll, a 6, indicates that the party's objective is to
rescue or protect someone. Given the dungeon venue and the humanoid
opponents, rescue seems most likely. Guiding someone to a location
in the ruin is also possible, but rescuing someone from a cult
or thieves' guild works nicely.
The fifth roll is a 1, showing me that the party has an ally whose
strength is on par with theirs. Suddenly a protection mission is
looking a lot better--they can guide their new ally into the ruins
for some reason.
So it looks like I'm going to be helping a powerful ally penetrate
the lair of a thieves' guild or cult with a (demi)human leader
but some sort of mastermind behind the scene. The cult is looking
good for that; I can use an outsider easily enough, manipulating
the high priest. That's a bit trite, though-I'll keep my options
open. My one huge blank is the venue. It's easy enough to say "nontraditional
dungeon" but it's quite another to do it. I could roll again
if I'm really stumped, but then it comes to me: a giant tree.
Now, everything falls into place. The cult sub-leader is now a
druid (blighter maybe), human for lack of a reason not to be. He
has organized a cult around a fictitious god, using his druidic
powers to pretend to be a cleric. He's been telling the cult to
gather riches from the nearby town to sacrifice to his god, who
will appear and reward them all. But he's really currying favor
with his secret master and ally, a green dragon. The PCs' ally
is a former friend of the druid (a scout, ranger, or another druid
work well) who just learned of his evil ways (or, if the PCs use
divinations, they could learn the cult leader's identity and tell
the friend somehow). They need to escort the NPC to the druid,
fighting their way through the cult up through the massive tree
they've carved out for a lair, so they can find out what's really
going on. Maybe the friend, with the PCs' help, can talk the druid
out of his evil ways, but they'll still have the dragon to deal
with!
Sounds good to me. Your mileage may vary, but I've found this
tool to be immensely helpful, and I hope you do too. Let me know
of any successes (or problems) you have with it. |