Advice for a busy (lazy?) DM [Archive] - Wizards Community

Advice for a busy (lazy?) DM [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Snooze
05-07-07, 05:57 PM I'm considering starting a campaign with some newbies. It's been a few years since my last campaign, and although I enjoyed it, I stopped because it was too time consuming. In my younger years I had the time and energy to devote to pen and paper, but these days not so much.

In retrospect I spent most of my time and energy trying to write a good campaign. I'm the first to admit that this is my weakness as a DM. I'm pretty good with rules and "refereeing", but the creative side is where I fail. Thus, it took me a long time to write what I thought was a good, basic plotline with interesting characters. Maybe if I was better at it I'd be able to whip out a session's worth of content in an hour or two, but I just wasn't able to do that.

So anyway, my question is regarding published content for the Eberron setting. I see that there are 5 published modules for the Eberron setting. Are these a good place to start a campaign? How many play sessions would these cover? Are there other options, such as player-generated content? I know the d20 system is OGL, but I guess the Eberron setting itself isn't - does that mean players can't publish their own content?

Thanks in advance for any advice you might have.
Millenia
05-07-07, 09:23 PM Far as I can tell, the first two parts of the Schema arc of modules (the Forgotten Forge in the back of the ECS and Shadows of the Last War) are pretty decent. There are also quite a few in Dungeon magazine; there is a thread detailing Eberron that mentions what adventures are in which magazine.
Rechan
05-08-07, 02:52 AM The Dragon/Dungeon article thread is here (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=832371)

In particular I'm a fan of Chimes of Midnight, and to a lesser degree, Death in Oakbridge. Also Steel Shadows isn't that bad. All three are nice non-dungeon crawls.

Alas, all of those are around 5th level (Steel Shadows is 7th).

If you want to get away from Sharn, I can make a suggestion: pick up "The Speaker of Dreams", the old 3e WotC module. This is easily portable to Eberron. Set it in Passage, make a few adjustments (such as using the Orien guy being manipulated by the agent of the Daelkyr) and BAM, the entire module is practically made for Eberron.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Snooze 05-07-07, 05:57 PM	I'm considering starting a campaign with some newbies. It's been a few years since my last campaign, and although I enjoyed it, I stopped because it was too time consuming. In my younger years I had the time and energy to devote to pen and paper, but these days not so much. In retrospect I spent most of my time and energy trying to write a good campaign. I'm the first to admit that this is my weakness as a DM. I'm pretty good with rules and "refereeing", but the creative side is where I fail. Thus, it took me a long time to write what I thought was a good, basic plotline with interesting characters. Maybe if I was better at it I'd be able to whip out a session's worth of content in an hour or two, but I just wasn't able to do that. So anyway, my question is regarding published content for the Eberron setting. I see that there are 5 published modules for the Eberron setting. Are these a good place to start a campaign? How many play sessions would these cover? Are there other options, such as player-generated content? I know the d20 system is OGL, but I guess the Eberron setting itself isn't - does that mean players can't publish their own content? Thanks in advance for any advice you might have.
Millenia 05-07-07, 09:23 PM	Far as I can tell, the first two parts of the Schema arc of modules (the Forgotten Forge in the back of the ECS and Shadows of the Last War) are pretty decent. There are also quite a few in Dungeon magazine; there is a thread detailing Eberron that mentions what adventures are in which magazine.
Rechan 05-08-07, 02:52 AM	The Dragon/Dungeon article thread is here (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=832371) In particular I'm a fan of Chimes of Midnight, and to a lesser degree, Death in Oakbridge. Also Steel Shadows isn't that bad. All three are nice non-dungeon crawls. Alas, all of those are around 5th level (Steel Shadows is 7th). If you want to get away from Sharn, I can make a suggestion: pick up "The Speaker of Dreams", the old 3e WotC module. This is easily portable to Eberron. Set it in Passage, make a few adjustments (such as using the Orien guy being manipulated by the agent of the Daelkyr) and BAM, the entire module is practically made for Eberron.