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I’m going to start this article with a bit of tooting of my own horn.

One of the many steps that led to the creation of Campaign Mastery in November 2008 was the publication in early 2007 of a two-part article on “Scenario and Story Arc creation” called “Hipbone’s Connected To The Thighbone”.

These days I’d describe it as “Adventure and Campaign Arc creation”; my nomenclature has evolved, something I might write about in a future post.

Anyway, this was one of the first articles I wrote to make something of a splash – Martin Ralya (now of Gnome Stew, then of Treasure Tables) wrote (with links):

Part one is all about building adventures. It includes some great advice about loosely assigning roles to the PCs: Stimulator, Foil, Detective and Driver. (Even if you skim the article, read this section – it’s excellent).

Part two opens with advice on tying the various elements of your adventure into a unified whole, and then moves into story arcs, finishing with a brief note about extending this technique to campaign creation.

Adventure creation is an area where I can just never get enough help – it’s something I’ve always struggled with as a GM. Even if this is one of your strengths, though, you might find some surprises in these two articles.

Comments on Martin’s heads-up included (selectively quoted):

John Arcadian: So that is really a great article and way to look at it.

V V _GM: I subscribe to Roleplaying Tips, and that is one of the best articles they’ve had in my opinion.

Martin Ralya (post author): If you [meaning me] ever want to write a guest post about adventures for TT, consider this an open invitation …

This was an obvious ego-boost for someone relatively new to the Published-RPG-Writing game. Unfortunately, I never had the opportunity to take Martin up on his offer.

Moving on: Anyone familiar with what I’ve written here at Campaign Mastery who is reading those articles today will see that I haven’t really changed my approach to the task all that much in the thirteen-plus years since, and therefore they still stack up.

Arguably, the first part was the more completely realized at the time; the second part was comparatively short of specifics and details, which is why several articles here at Campaign Mastery have superseded / expanded on what was written back then.

These days, a link to Martin’s post lives in a bookmarks folder marked Idea Sources at the very top, for three reasons:

1. If ever I need a quick boost of enthusiasm, this gives me a quick rev-up;
2. I’ve always had it in the back of my mind that I would one day update it, even though detailed and specific articles here at Campaign Mastery have stolen a lot of that thunder;
3. There’s always more to say on a big subject like this. Which is where today’s article comes in.

Obscured by Distance

Often, you need a plotline to ripen before it becomes a sufficiently-challenging problem for the PCs to solve.

The diagrams above describe what this actually means in campaign terms. This adventure is intended to operate for a total of 12 game sessions – 5 of them before PC involvement (section 1a, pre-plot) and 7 of them as that plot unwinds (1b, PC involvement).

Below that is a triangle the length of the entire adventure which is fattest at the start of the 12-session adventure and almost non-existent at the end, describing the vulnerability of the overall adventure to being derailed by the PCs doing something unexpected.

Combating this, in theory, is PC Focus, which is depicted as a triangle with its fattest end at the end of the 12-session plotline and thinnest point at the start. This indicates that, in theory, the PCs should transition from barely being aware a situation exists to being concerned enough to intervene at the start of the 7-session PC Involvement mark. (Another way to look at this is the scope for the inclusion of subplots and side-plots in an individual game session).

If everything goes according to plan, then, the diagram below shows what is expected to happen:

At the start of the 7-session game arc, there is virtually zero PC involvement in the plotline, growing as the seriousness of the situation becomes apparent (I’ll get to the question of what the PCs ARE supposed to be paying attention to, a little later).

From the end of the third game session, this plotline becomes the dominant focus of the campaign (PC Focus exceeds Plot vulnerability, in other words the PCs start setting the agenda). Or you could say that the problem has “fully matured” into a crisis, if that’s more appropriate to the campaign genre!

Now let’s imagine that one of the PCs becomes sufficiently concerned by the possible consequences that they start investigating the problem early, ignoring whatever the GM wants them to be doing. That’s their prerogative, as a Player Character.

Diagrams 5 and 6, above, show what happens. 5a and 6a show the point at which the PC starts meddling in the GMs plans – yellow for 2 1/2 sessions early, red for almost immediately.

5b and 6b stack the two triangles one atop the other, with the PC involvement truncated to the point of engagement. This is what happens if the GM has prepared for this possibility and his contingency plans work perfectly. In effect, as a result, the adventure still fills out it’s allotted total of 12 game sessions, and the adventure has not succumbed to the vulnerability exposure.

GMs have to cope with this sort of thing all the time. We get really good at coping with it (most of the time). I can count the number of adventures that have gone this seriously astray on one hand (okay, perhaps two) from 40 years behind the game screen.

(I got started early – I offered up the Tomb Of Horrors to a pair of first-level characters, expecting them to discover it to be too tough for them (the adventure is designed for characters of 10th-14th level) and that they would go elsewhere to ‘build themselves up’ to being tough enough to cope with it. Surprisingly, they persisted, stopping to heal as frequently as necessary, and earning enough experience from even partial successes that they were able to cope. One of those players could take the hobby or leave it and played thereafter only for the entertainment of the other, who still remembers those game sessions around the kitchen table fondly – despite officially being way below the target age for the game.

Two 1st-level characters taking on encounters intended to trouble four 10th-14th level characters? You can bet that I was scrambling! But diplomacy and reason work just as well when you’re a novice as when you’re experienced – if you’re smart enough to use them – and they were. Traps intended to be lethal only work if you haven’t punched a hole through a copper piece, and tied a piece of string to it, which you can throw through apertures ahead of your physical entrance – if you can pull the copper piece back, you know it’s safe to proceed, if you can’t….

Unfortunately, sometimes there’s nothing you can do. I’ve been the player in question in other GM’s campaigns (twice, in different incarnations of Ian Mackinder’s Traveler campaigns, for example), as my PCs agenda (or paranoia) completely took over the campaign, to the point that he chose to shut them down before things got out of hand.

5c and 6c show what happens. In 5c, by the time the players are supposed to first become aware of the impending crisis, it is becoming the focus of their attention – and half-way through the 6th game session, the adventure comes to an abrupt end. What should have been 12 game sessions, and the central focus of 7, has lasted only 6 1/2, with the climax only 1 1/2 game sessions long. Almost half the adventure has gone up in smoke.

In 6c, the adventure lasts only 5 game sessions, and is all over at the point the GM intended for the players to start taking it seriously. It was still the focus of attention for about 1 1/2 game sessions, but the problem had so little time to snowball that it was relatively easy to nip it in the bud.

Distracting the players

Ideally, you want to tease the players with breadcrumbs that – if followed – will achieve 5c or 6c, while keeping the players too occupied with higher-priority problems to actually engage in that process. That way, when they get to game session 6 and the crisis unfolds, they will look back and see that you’ve been building up to this adventure for a while.

There are two basic approaches to distracting the players. The first is to occupy them with subplots from their personal lives, with the breadcrumbs hidden in the background.

The alternative is to overlap your adventures, so they are too busy with the climax of Adventure A to prevent Adventure B from manifesting.

This is actually a lot harder than the first technique, and quickly becomes unrealistic; it won’t be too long before your players are demanding some down-time for their characters to rest, recuperate, and resupply (if nothing else). What’s more, without the (relative) calm of such downtime, “campaign fatigue” soon settles in.

For that reason, I tend to leave it until a campaign is approaching its’ epic conclusion and I’m wrapping major plot threads up with every adventure. That way, it feels to the players like they are “clearing the decks” and girding their loins for the impending ultimate battle.

Since this is ultimately what they would want to do at such a time, it comes across as being their own idea, and that you are delivering exactly what they want – in other words, like they have control of the campaign.

Outside of that, “Adventure on Adventure” is a rarity in my campaigns, and it’s always notable when things get unusually busy. Instead, I’ll use the sub-plot model.

I’ve discussed this approach a number of times, here at Campaign Mastery, but never looked so closely at the “why” of such a plot structure.

That’s the omission that this particular post is intended to solve.

I’m deliberately keeping it small so that people will have the chance to go and read those early articles – and so that I have time to think about what I’ll be posting over Christmas, 2020, which is only about 6 weeks away at this point!

So lets’ sum up:

If your plots need time to mature, there are three techniques that you can use to keep the players from prematurely focusing on them:

1. Keep the developments so small and remote that they barely register on the players, creating a crisis that they could not see coming;
2. Distract them, either with personal lives / subplots, or with the dramatic conclusion of another adventure in which they are already involved;
3. Have a ‘Plan B’ ready to go if these should not prove sufficient.

An example

I wasn’t going to provide one, but as I wrote, one came to mind, and I couldn’t resist sharing.

1. Tease without delivering much information, making an event seem trivial:

   “Your clock radio goes off, waking you a little after 6AM. Bleary-eyed from lack of sleep, you fumble for the radio-alarm’s off button, hearing just part of the last item of the news bulletin: ‘Dramatic developments today in the world of chess…’ “

   Unless the character is a chess aficionado, this seems like a splash of color, nothing more.

2. Next game session, “As is your habit, you watch the evening news while eating the delicious meal of TV dinner, soft drink, and something sweet and over-calorific. Tonight, there’s been a threat of war between Nadibia and Rumfordine; the economy is trending down again, and speculation is rising that the property bubble is finally going to burst; Modorolla have released a new model of mobile phone; and a Chess Champion has committed suicide after withdrawing from the World Championships one match short of winning the tournament without explanation. Your phone rings….”

   The critical news is there, and can even be identified by the fact that you’ve referenced the events twice now. The ‘Dramatic Development’ was obviously the withdrawal from the Chess tournament.

   But you’ve distracted beforehand with more substantial news that makes this seem trivial, and distracted immediately afterwards with the phone call, which provides the beginning of a personal plotline.

3. Third game session. An intelligent surmise from what the players know already is that an organized crime syndicate have probably gotten involved in the world of chess and forced the favorite to throw the tournament before the final game – an event so unlikely that they would have gotten very big odds against it happening. So it’s time to shake things up a bit and make them less predictable.

   “An amazing new health regimen, reportedly a closely-guarded private discovery, has enabled Guinevere O’Hara to rejoin the Olympic team-in-training. As viewers may remember, Miss O’Hara suffered a crippling spinal injury while competing six months ago. At the time, she was favorite to take the Gold Medal in a number of skiing events. Medical reports at the time stated that she would never be able to walk again, but today Miss O’Hara dazzled the crowd with a perfect jump before announcing that she was resuming her Olympic campaign. In other news….”

   That’s a lot more attention-getting, but still not really enough to cause more than superficial attention. A little later, though,

   “…On a day of sporting miracles, it is our sad duty to report that Roger Fulward, often described as the voice of boxing, was accidentally killed in his home this evening. Somehow, a connection within his television set shorted out, killing the legend of the sporting and broadcast worlds. Fulward is one of 125 reported accidental electrocutions today, raising the question of whether or not there is an issue with manufacturing standards. Inspector Graves of the [local forensic authority] stated that this was an extremely improbable coincidence if there was no more material explanation. Investigations are proceeding.”

4. Still not a crisis, but there’s clearly something going on. It doesn’t seem connected to the chess stories, though, so the true extent of the situation the GM is setting up won’t be recognized. Which brings us to Game session four.

   “Controversy today as the Doctor who examined Guinevere O’Hara six months ago stated publicly that as her spinal cord had been completely severed in two places, it was quite impossible for her to be walking, let alone competing at an Olympic standard, without the use of artificial supports or implants, which are expressly banned by the IOC. In response to this statement, Miss O’Hara launched legal action for medical malpractice and slander, and undertook a medical scan to prove that technology was not the means of her miraculous recovery.
        Meanwhile, in other news, the spate of electrocutions nationwide has continued to spike alarmingly, with reports 743 people lost their lives today in [local state name]. Authorities report that no pattern can be discerned from the specific circumstances apparently surrounding the deaths. The appliances in question were all different, say investigators, of different vintages, and manufactured by different corporations, all reputable brands. They report that it all appears to be a bizarre coincidence, and warned all users to carefully check cords and outlets for damage and avoid overloading circuits. The government has commissioned an emergency public advice notice, in a move described as a band-aid measure by the leader of the Opposition.”

   A lot to unpack there, and clearly this has moved from the tail end of the serious news to the main headlines.
   .
   Later in the adventure, “The strangeness surrounding electrical deaths took another twist late this afternoon as an Autopsy revealed that Chess Champion Gary Dominic did not in fact commit suicide as first thought, but was killed when his pacemaker malfunctioned. Chess fans took the news with relief, many suggesting that this redeemed his reputation. Dominic joins a list of 1,842 electrocutions or electricity-related deaths that have taken place statewide over the last three days. Urgent inquiries are being made to electrical supply equipment as the one thing that most of these deaths have in common, but no-one has been able to suggest how this could have occurred or how it could be so selective and yet so widespread. There is a growing movement to remove electrical devices from the home as dangerous, and stockpiles of many are beginning to accumulate on curb-sides…”

   Okay, so now I’m hinting darkly at a MUCH larger problem – and the Pacemaker, which doesn’t rely on outside wall current at all, vastly complicates any theories as to what’s responsible. I’ve also connected the two seemingly unrelated events, suggesting that this has been going on unnoticed for quite a bit longer than it seems..

   It’s not clear yet what the PCs can do about it, there has been no “call to action”, but they are certain to be paying close attention, and may even react to the story in some fashion – checking the sanctity of their electrical equipment, or joining in the dumping.

   The other thing that’s happened is that I’ve been positioning these news bulletins closer and closer to the end of the days’ play. That means that even though there’s been an update to the overall story each day of game-play, they seem widely spaced – there’s a discernible time-gap between developments that helps sell the idea that things are getting worse.

5. And so, finally, to Pre-plot part 5, the fifth game session. I’ve set things up to be able to turn the last installment into a cliffhanger ending – that was the intent behind the careful timing mentioned above.

   “The electrical epidemic continued to worsen today, as authorities report 8,655 new cases in the state of [local state]. Investigations have shown the phenomenon has spread to neighboring states as well, who collectively reported almost three thousand cases over the last 24 hours.
        It has also been discovered that this is but one of three such clusters world-wide – one centered on the city of Birmingham in England and one in Tokyo.
        Collectively, more than 46000 people have succumbed to this mysterious malady. Medical experts today stated that in fact these are not cases of electrocution, but something far worse; the victims are, generally still alive but in a comatose state, and almost completely drained of electrical energy. Every few minutes, enough potential builds up to trigger heartbeat, respiration, and other autonomic responses.
        Fortunately, their metabolic demands in this state are so low that they can be sustained by this level of activity. Some have suggested that it’s akin to what happens in deep meditation, or when people survive being frozen – but those are considered hearsay by the broader medical community.
        This means that the individuals who have been autopsied in recent days may well have been vivisected alive, adding to the grief and trauma experienced by both family members and the medical personnel involved. We now go live to Patrick Du—”

   There’s a zzap sound from the other room, where your [NPC Relative] was cooking Dinner, and the lights and TV go off. You call out, but there’s no answer…

The Rest Of The Adventure

Okay, obviously I have something in mind for the rest of the adventure – it’s that Miracle Cure, which repairs physical damage temporarily by stealing “vitality” from others. There’s one case in England, one in Japan, and one in [the local country] – but only one of them has been publicly revealed. The more people they steal from, the more superhuman the “Healed” become – and if any one of them is defeated, that power is transferred to the other two, so they will become successively harder to overcome.

As for the how: An electrical storm in exactly the wrong place at the wrong time released a demon from hell – but he could only escape from his confinement there in electrical form. He divided his presence amongst three different people around the planet because his presence in this form would burn out any single body if that body had not been reinforced and rebuilt to be strong enough. He hadn’t yet figured out which body to ultimately claim, or how he was going to reunite himself – but the PCs will solve that problem for him.

So there it is – an example that quite obviously focuses on the Pre-plot, because that’s what this article is all about.

Until next week, then, stay safe and have as much fun as you can create!