This weekend I vow to put down stanfield and work on some maps. I think I'm going to start with the dungeonish maps and save the overworld to later

#PretenderToTheFlame #TTRPG #AdventureDesign

Daily check in on #PretenderToTheFlame I've planned out the stat blocks I need to make, maps I need to draw, and mechanical bits I need to figure out. Anyone have good inspirational maps for me?

I've failed at planning and have no way to play test between the first and second drafts like I normally do. This adventure is more than one sessions worth, I need to have time to plan and run another game near Halloween. Its not the end of the world, just unfortunate.

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign #WWN

I've written around 500 words today in #PretenderToTheFlame and completed the main body of the first draft. Before I move on to the second, I need to make firm decision on how to name and refer to certain groups and rough in some mechanical bits (creature stats, some weather effects, etc).

Considering I set the deadline for this as 9/15 I'm pretty ahead of schedule here. Hopefully I can stay that way.

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign #WWN

Wrote just over 1000 words for #PretenderToTheFlame I have one more location left and then some little catch up tasks before I'm finished with the first draft.

Its at this point where I question how a very badly written draft of 6k words has taken me so long to do. I'm not sure I'm giving the GM everything they need here, everything might need another detail pass, I dunno.

I have firmly hit the writing doldrums and I hate it.

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign

I wrote a grand total of 300 words in #PretenderToTheFlame today. (tagging so people can mute)

I'm slowly realizing that everything I've written so far is entirely system agnostic. I've not touched the actual mechanical bits of any of the antagonists or hazards mentioned yet.

I also realized I'm going to have to go back to older sections and add description to make everything match, which is unfortunate. I guess this is what first drafts are for.

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign #WWN

And yeah, I know most of the posts about #HTTRPG #AdventureDesign are irrelevant to most #TTRPG interests here ... but, this is my grotto into which I shout for the pleasure of the echo, and it's my sincere hope that someday, when I find my counterparts (I haven't given up), having this record of thoughts will amuse. 😅

There are a lot of paths "in" to a given piece of #TTRPG #AdventureDesign. None of them right or wrong. Whatever works.

If you're designing for #HTTRPG it can sometimes be useful to take a very abstract, high-level path, and recognize two kinds of problem: something unwanted is _imminent,_ or something unwanted is _happening right now._

If you know what _stakes_ the PCs will groove on, that's often enough to spin the whole process into motion, because that gives you the shapes of "unwanted."

Just read an adventure by a designer I've come to appreciate overall, but ugh. It's just "the PCs arrive at a place where there's a mindless monster they will fight."

There's also a warmup monster. 🙄

If I'm feeling generous, that's scraping the bottom of the trust barrel. If I'm feeling frank, it was grossly dishonest for the publlisher to call it an "adventure" at all.

Ah well. We all design stinkies now and then, I suppose. But stuff like this casts a pall. 😥

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign

A related design principle that I've written about a few times before: part of my adventure-design process is "stress-testing" the design across multiple genres (especially those with very different levels of naturalism vs magic vs superpowers etc). I don't like to publish an adventure that crumbles if you port if from the wild west to a space station, or from cold war espionage to superheroes.

#TTRPG #TTRPGdesign #AdventureDesign

Night before last I wrote a little one-page piece on problem chaining (one of my long-standing hobby horses/dead horses/dead-hobby horses) and now my head is all #AdventureDesign all the time tonight 😅

#TTRPG #MixedMetaphor

You can tell I aim for clarity, because my basic standard for centrality in problem design is that, for a problem to qualify as "central," I must be able to enumerate, prior to playtest, 12 comparably-viable approaches to solving it.

Naturally, I call this the Half-Dozen Rule.

Clarity. Is me. 😂

I mean, those who read my last blog post know WHY I call it the Half-Dozen Rule, but that doesn't make it any less dumb that I do.

#HTTRPG #AdventureDesign #TTRPG

I had set the goal to finish the detail outline by the end of the long weekend, but a last minute water leak and the draw of a new Fallout New Vegas game has prevented much progress.

I only got about halfway through the Exploration Location's Section. We're up to almost 2700 words.

The truly sad part is, the Exploration Locations are going to need a second pass on the outline just to get them more fleshy, they don't match the level of detail on the rest of the document

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign

The detail outline still grows, I've gotten through the factions and forces section and increased the count by almost 1400 words.

Theres probably gonna have to be cuts this is getting a bit long to say its just an outline, but we shall see.

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign

Most of the adventures I'm working on right now are, probably unsurprisingly, built around my favorite (and most-potentially-trusty) "adventure verbs." The one built around "redirect" is one I'm excited to playtest first. "Redirect" is a verb that doesn't get enough love 😊

It's also got a quasi-cartographic theme (though properly speaking it's about itineraries rather than maps) so that's just fan-service from me to me 🙄 #SelfIndulgence #AdventureDesign #TTRPG #HTTRPG

Very frustrating: reading an adventure that _begins_ in a high-trust mode but _constricts_ as it goes, ultimately funneling the PCs to a prefab end. 😓😬

It's not the low trust that frustrates. I'm well used to that. It's the _tease._ Like "I thought you and I would be PALS, adventure! Then you do me this way?" #AdventureDesign #HTTRPG #TTRPG

I'm struggling a bit with how to organize/what to write for an adventure idea I've got. The idea itself is a bit larger than I've been writing recently.

The core of the idea is that a parasitic organism has wormed its way into a powerful host. The parasite is using their new host to try and make the area better for themselves, but that endeavor is causing chaos across the region.

How do you write a useful book that has factions and sites spread across a region?

#AdventureDesign #TTRPG

(1/?)

Speaking of time-travel. My biggest disaster as a GM was probably a time-travel run, ages ago. The PCs were historical figures plucked from the timeline. The premise was fun, the PCs were great.

I didn't run into the _usual_ time-travel issues (our rules of travel and causality were excellent for gameplay; no problems) I just did some of my worst #AdventureDesign _ever_ for the opening scenario and was so horrified I canned it. 😮

Canceling was an overreaction, but I was young. #GMing #TTRPG

Two hazy maybe-trends I notice in the older adventures.

1) Adventures tend to go high-trust more often in games interested in modal/tonal stuff ... so, higher in horror, comedy, 'cinematic,' etc.
2) Adventures tend to go higher when the scope of the adventure expands. Some designers who were very good at high-trust adventures meant for 5-10 sessions seem to clamp that trust DOWN for a one-shot.

These are very broad-brushy with _many_ exceptions.

#HTTRPG #TTRPG #AdventureDesign

I've been revisiting The Morrow Project lately, and it's been interesting.

It has more of a "military hardware: fun!" vibe than I _personally_ dig, but the game's design sensibilities live in a special zone that's mostly a well-blended Medium-Trust. Lots of high-view macro-design but leaving the details to the PCs. Occasionally it dips a bit sandboxy and my eyes glaze, but overall its engaging stuff with smart, fairly humanistic sci-fi thinking and lots of elbow grease.

#TTRPG #AdventureDesign

The old ICE adventure library's been a reliable source of HTT adventures; it seems every ICE collection has at LEAST one that lands high-trust, and often two or three or more.

But that doesn't make 'em all likeable. 😮 Last night's read was League of Merchants, and: yikes. Sometimes high-trust, but 100% bleakly amoral, with every adventure rooted in purely selfish motives. On top of that, there's a running thread of "gotcha" cynical hose-job design. 😞 #TTRPG #HTTRPG #AdventureDesign