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02-19-2020, 08:23 AM | #1 |
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Saint Paul, MN
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Quick, self-contained encounters
Tomorrow I'm launching the spring session of the ongoing DFRPG activity at my middle school. (See this or this thread or this Daily Illuminator for background.) We will have about 40 minutes per session (after setup and cleanup). This semester, I may be running a table for some players who are entirely new to RPGs.
It's been a few years since I've run a table at the activity, but my recollection is that the best format was to have each short session feature a single encounter. The encounters might be loosely connected in some sort of hand-wavy story, but we skip over most of the in-between stuff (town, the journey, etc.). I usually select things that will showcase different aspects of the game (social encounters, traps, puzzles, melee combat, ranged combat, magic, etc.). I'm looking for fresh ideas to add to the mix. I'd appreciate it if you'd toss me some gems from your games: self-contained situations that can be resolved in <45 minutes. (Doesn't matter if you used DFRPG for the encounter... conversions are easy; I pull a lot of material from D&D and other RPGs.) Here are a few ideas beyond regular melee combat that I used in the past to give you an idea of the flavor:
I'm also thinking of this as a way of trying out ideas that I might showcase at the summer workshop I'm offering for kids who want to delve more deeply into the art of game mastery. |
02-21-2020, 11:46 PM | #2 | |
Join Date: Feb 2009
Location: Central Texas, north of Austin
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Re: Quick, self-contained encounters
If you haven't seen it already, Steven Marsh posted an interesting little encounter for The Fantasy Trip.
I already posted this about it in the Collaborative Dungeon thread: Quote:
Do you have anything of interest to report from you activity launch? |
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02-22-2020, 12:11 AM | #3 |
Join Date: Apr 2019
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Re: Quick, self-contained encounters
There is a youtube video from Matt Collville where he lays out a simple dungeon encounter, I think its called a 3 room dungeon, or 5 step or something like that.
Its a good simple story, lure the PCs to an old mausoleum where some goblins have taken up shop and have brought the maguffin the PCs seek. Theres a guarded entrance, a room/encounter, a trap, a boss and potential treasure if they find the secret (and another potential encounter if you like). Easier to look at his video, its one of his first in "running the game". Its D&D centric but easily converted to GURPS or DFRPG. I have used it several times in ongoing campaigns just to have a quick side bar or interesting diversion. |
02-24-2020, 01:33 PM | #4 |
Join Date: Jan 2006
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Re: Quick, self-contained encounters
Some of the rooms in the mega-dungeon thread might work.
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02-24-2020, 01:39 PM | #5 |
Join Date: Jul 2016
Location: a flyover state
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Re: Quick, self-contained encounters
I did the old bull in the china shop two weekends ago. Only replace bull with karkadann and replace china shop with alchemist shop.
Everyone wants healing potions or alchemist's fire before they go dungeon crawling right? Connected to alchemist's shop there is a tower with a summoning circle (for spell components maybe?) and a green house (I was using VTT and had a cool green house map available). Outside the green house are children tending the lawn. PCs are shopping. Summoner screws up, ends up with angry karkadann. Kardadann kicks door and is now on scene with PCs. It first strikes a book shelf and over turns that. It then bumps a shelf with bottles of wine - shattered bottles and wine splatter. The idea is that it becomes obvious the karkadann is mad and not too graceful on the wooden floor. If it isn't stopped soon it will hit a shelf or two of potions. That could mean poisonous clouds or fire or frost etc. PCs need to stop it from doing that. If it heads to the green house, PCs might worry about the children outside. I picked karkadann because of hooved feet, one PC had musical ability and one was a swashbuckler. Coincidentally it is worth something to alchemists. Also a third PC had Naturalist. The Swashbuckler engaged with the karkadann before it hit the potions. The naturalist identified the creature and told the others it liked music. The musician sang to it to calm it down. Oh, helps if the karkadann is uplifted a bit so that fencing ability is a little on par with swashbuckler. If you use it - have fun! |
02-24-2020, 08:04 PM | #6 | |||||
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Saint Paul, MN
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Re: Quick, self-contained encounters
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That sounds like a lot of fun. It fits with my current amorphous plan of basing the string of encounters in a city rather than a traditional dungeon. Thank you! |
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02-24-2020, 08:08 PM | #7 |
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Saint Paul, MN
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Re: Quick, self-contained encounters
I just remembered another trap I've used in the past. I think it was from White Plume Mountain originally. It's a stretch of hallway where anything made of metal heats up until it is scorching hot. It basically requires PCs to remove armor or try to sprint through without taking too much damage. Then, of course, there is an ambush at the end of the hall. It's a fun one after the knights have had a few battles to showoff their heavier armor. Now, suddenly, they're in their skivvies.
Heavy-handed traps like this work well for newer players. |
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dfrpg, encounters, school |
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