We're still in the thick of Mines of Phandelver but this campaign won't last forever and we're all very keen on seeing what our DM will do with a character. Therefore I have started working on my own campaign/adventure and will be trying my hand at DMing for the first time.
Is there a rule of thumb for working out how long an adventure will last? It'll be fairly simple but also include the possibility of an expansion should it/I prove popular with my fellow adventurers.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and brace yourself for many more queries once my campaign starts to take shape.
Encounters and story move more quickly than past editions (most notably 4e), but it really depends on the group and DM. If the pcs are just exploring and fighting, you can chew up a lot (especially easy and moderate encounters) in a 3 hour session.
Interactions that require or use roleplaying rather than fighting, will be what take time if the players get into it.
In one session I ran, the 8th level pcs met, traveled to a frozen mountain, fought wolves and winter wolves, climbed the mountain, fought 4 hill giants, navigated an ice maze fighting some ice trolls in the maze. Then they encountered some frost Giants. They decided to interact with them and had a great story telling, song singing, deception that got the Giants to partake in a lot of wine. Then the pcs ran to an ice slide that got them to the frost giant chief's lair. They fought the chief, his winter wolf and then they encountered a white dragon who was really the cause of all of the problems they were investigating.
The party slew the dragon and ended the threat.
This whole adventure took about 2 sessions (5 or 6 hours total). The funny thing was that all the players remarked how the story telling and songs interaction with the frost Giants took much more time than if they would have just fought the Giants. The fight withe the dragon in its lair took about 45 minutes (it went on for about 8 or 9 rounds).
As a first-timer, just set a simple problem and offer 3-4 different ways to fix it.
Ex: alligator is in sewer, eating people.
Town Hall meeting has been called to discuss what to do.
1) Fight it until dead.
2) Lure it out of town to natural lair - nearby swamp
3) Poison it
4) Use a scroll of Blast of Freezing-Cold Air on it until it goes torpid, then carry it away
Each option is championed by an NPC the group can meet. Have all four give a brief speech.
Ask the PCs "What do you want to do?" (Presumably their answer will begin with "Talk to ...")
You need combat stats for the alligator, and a two-sentence description of the NPCs' motivation / personality.
Is there a rule of thumb for working out how long an adventure will last?Is there a rule of thumb for working out how long an adventure will last?
Noon wrote:
In my current campaign, our sessions last about 3 hours. We've only had four so far. Thinking back, it's always been about one major encounter and one secondary encounter, plus rollplaying for setups, plot, etc.
1st was one simple encounter plus a "sneak & steal". Plus getting familiar with 5E rules & Roll20 interface.
2nd had one fairly large, complicated encounter and one simpler one.
3rd session had one long, running encounter as they raided a crypt room-by-room.
4th one had a mystery (which meant more RP as the players had to ask a lot of questions) and two moderate encounters.
That's the "cheap formula" I'll be using for my planning: one major & one secondary encounter per 3 hours. Note an encounter can include puzzles, trapped rooms, or other non-comnat stuff. Those can either go quickly OR eat up tons of time, I've seen it go either way.
I think that 'cheap' is good as I'm basically just getting my footing at the moment.
As the current DM was nice enought to point out... 'First adventure not from the Starter Set, first home-written module, first time DMing... no pressure.'
Ha!