My D&D-Inspired Fantasy Novels Are Available Now

Readers! Over the last several years, I’ve written a series of novels. At various times, parts of those novels have appeared here on this site. That’s because these books in some sense belong here–they are writing about D&D in that the main character of these books is my most recent D&D character, Asp. I’ve posted elsewhere on this site about the process of discovering and writing about this character, and after writing over 600k words in the series, I’m finally ready to try self-publishing. So if you’re intrigued by how Asp came to be, check out that little guide to her creation and the writing process. If you want to check out the novels and read the series, you can check out this page for the whole series. 

Beyond that, I think that what really remains to be said is in the pages of Asp’s novels. She’s a crafty, clever, kind at times, smooth overthinker who loves getting in over her head, or at least, constantly does. I hope you enjoy spending some time with her as I have.

 

 

 

One More Chance Saga (the entire series)

Book 1. Nobody Knows Me

Book 2. Two Different Things Can Just Be Different

Book 3. You Changed Too

Book 4: I Wanna Do It Right

 

Why Open Writing Functions Better Than Closed Writing

A few themes come up again and again on this site--the value of player agency, creativity's importance in tabletop games, and how much fun it is to get to shape a world as you see fit as both player and GM are some of the most prevalent. And all of those are key components in what I want to talk about here. Open versus closed writing accomplishes all of those, while closed writing often creates impediments to them. When I say open versus closed writing, I'm talking about how open-ended the structure of a game is. A closed-writing game says "here's a situation, and here are the one or two things that can be done to resolve that situation." An open-writing game instead says, "here's a situation--use your best judgment as a GM to determine whether your players' actions resolve the situation." In a lot of gaming writing, particularly modules, the open or closed writing feature can make or break a player's experience. The advantages of closed writing are clear--you can set defined parameters on what player actions "win" a scenario and which do not "win" or even "lose" a situation, which cuts down on the hard GM work of deciding what works and what doesn't. Some closed writing works reasonably well--combat encounters either end with the enemies vanquished or the players dead, and that's fair. But when roleplaying and creative problem-solving are at play, closed writing is often frustrating and confusing--the players have to think exactly like the writer of the game, which is a lot more like video game gameplay than tabletop gameplay at its best. So I'd like to make an argument for why open writing is the superior option, whether you're writing a module or just notes to guide a homebrew session. 

What got me thinking about this was a module I played with my wife earlier today. I've been DMing a campaign with her as a character for several months--she plays Aurora in my Of Gods and Dragons campaign. And she knows that as much as I adore GMing and managing campaigns, I also get a big kick out of being a player when I can, so she offered to run a short module from a game manual she really enjoys. (I won't name the game manual since most of what I have to say about it is critical.) We'd actually been planning to play the module for several months, but life got crazy--as it does--and it kept getting pushed back. But we finally found the time today, and I was eager to jump in. The module calls for a three-person party as a minimum, and I had created a group of three adventurers I was to control throughout the module. I created an academic bard deadset on discovering a topic worth writing about to gain professorship at her academy, a shifty warlock with a criminal past trying to take advantage of helping the bard search for her work, and a stoic druid who'd escaped military life and tries to support nature while using her one nonviolent skill--being intimidating--to avoid more outright bloodshed while protecting the group. Eager to get started, we dove in. 

It was fairly fun, but again and again, my wife would listen to my choices and shake her head, staring at the module pages. "I didn't expect you to make that choice. There's nothing in here about what to do if you do that." The first time she said this, I laughed--I had gravitated towards a question to help a lonely animated figurehead of a building, and I could see where ignoring some of the weightier quests offered in the manual might be something of a wrench in the cogs. But as we kept playing and I kept hearing that my choices went beyond the module's writing, I started to get frustrated. It seemed that the module only allowed for one solution for each situation, and none of the solutions required (not suggested, but required) were very obvious to me. This was compounded by the fact that I had been told this was a roleplaying-heavy module, and I was handling every scenario by roleplaying as my excitable academic, my smooth-talking guide, and my weary druid guard. We really ran into a dead-end when my guide was fast-talking a troublesome NPC who he did get the better of, but the NPC was written to immediately wipe my memory if I did so. I was very soured on the experience immediately. 

Let's really delve into this situation. I had a charisma-based character who used his interpersonal skills to investigate one of the module's quests and who managed to figure out something notable that would advance that quest. But the module did not intend for me to resolve the situation in this way, and so it instructed my DM to undo my progress. This is to say, I came up with a way to use the game mechanics within the spirit of the mechanics themselves to advance a questline, and the module told my DM to make it as though I had never done that in the first place. I felt defeated. I was roleplaying, I was thinking strategically, I was pursuing the quest, and yet that wasn't enough for the module. I had to do it all in specifically the way that module wanted me to. That's not the tabletop game world I know and love. That's a puzzle. And a single-solution puzzle with hundreds if not thousands of decoy pieces that don't help even if they do fit the puzzle at that. I was unhappy with that particular moment, but we carried on, and I hoped to come up with a different way to solve the puzzle that would be more in line with the module's required solution. 

But again and again, we encountered moments like this one. I would encounter a situation and do what seemed obvious to me, but it would vex my DM because it violated what the module wanted. At one point, I obtained a quest item and thought that the NPC who was infatuated with the other NPC who'd lost the quest item was the obvious solution; I gave it to the infatuated NPC to give to the questgiver to make them both happy. This brought the game screeching to a halt. In fact, I had done something that invoked three different quests and resolved none of them as desired, meaning that I closed out half the module's quests in one action, bringing all three questlines to less than ideal outcomes while closing them to further actions, and one of those questlines was the overall story arc of the module, meaning I essentially failed the overall module, and all because I hadn't asked the right question of the right NPC at the right time so I could know not to do that. And I had obtained the quest item by luring the NPC who'd stolen it into a desolate cave to kill him (he had been scamming and hurting the whole setting for years, and I reasoned that killing him would prevent him from going off to do the same to some other location); it turned out he was a god in disguise, and my DM had to nerf his hit points to a third of the intended level so as not to enact a certain party wipe. (As it was, even with the reduction, I barely survived the encounter at all.) In other words, a random NPC was secretly a god, and the only way to have known this was to break into his private room, find a well-hidden journal, decode it from a secret language, compare it to another hidden text, and speak to the correct NPC about it in order to discern he couldn't be messed with and had to be revealed to the module's population, and even then, I see no reason why a god would simply admit defeat rather than push down harder on the location to maintain his position of power, making killing him the better option anyway. And what's more, the module was designated for levels six through eight, and even four eighth-level adventurers would stand no chance of killing him as written, meaning that the module had a secret condition that the NPC couldn't be defeated except for solving this elaborate and counter-intuitive puzzle. 

To zoom in again, I botched the win condition for half the module by doing something that seemed pretty clearly indicated by the writing, and I should have lost (and would have if not for my DM's quick adjustments and kind heart) because I attacked a lone NPC who was secretly a god unless I made several assumptions that didn't make sense to make. In other words, I unwitting failed the main quest and two other storylines and committed to a suicide mission despite thoroughly investigating the location and the NPCs in it because I didn't divine the exact methods I was supposed to use as determined by the module. To put it bluntly, I was dissatisfied with this adventure. I had a great time roleplaying with my wife, and she made a lot of the failures of the module less frustrating through adjustment--this is true. But the whole point of closed writing in a tabletop game is that the GM is supposed to trust that the module is well-written and well-considered and shouldn't have to make constant adjustments nor improvise hundreds of pieces of new dialogue and reactions from the world when a player does something that makes sense on paper. 

[You may be saying to yourself, but this site has a collection of one-shots. Are you claiming that all of them are one-hundred percent open writing? Not precisely--several of the one-shots I've published here do occasionally push things in concrete, sometimes binary directions that might mean a lot of improvising on the part of the GM. But all of the one-shots that do this are based on movies, and they require some adherence to the movie's plot (and my reinterpretations) to maintain a resemblance to the movie itself. I'm not saying they're perfect--all of them are as much experiments in adaptation as they are genuinely finished tabletop RPGs. But in nine cases out of ten, I'm making them open writing in the sense that anything that the GM decides works, works. The module I'm criticizing here explicitly states that there's only one way to resolve these situations, and that's the bone I'm picking--they're purely closed writing.]

So how could this module have been improved by open writing? Well, briefly put, by trusting the GM to interpret and make choices. I have, in my career as a tabletop game player and GM and game designer, bought relatively few actual TTRPGs. When I do purchase one, it generally tends to be something with a lot of open interpretation. I've never purchased, downloaded, or played a one-shot or campaign written by someone else. Too often, that content features closed writing like the module I'm talking about here. What I opt for are radically open writing games. The manuals for these games are traditionally pretty slim--there's a few pages devoted to simple rules, a few pages about ways to define your character, and a few pages on the lore that impacts the world. These kinds of manuals are traditionally heavily filled with illustrations and have less than thirty pages. It's literally just enough to define the rules and the setting and then grant the rest of the game to the GM. This is an extreme example of granting the GM trust to guide things. But there are also modules that can grant this trust, though they tend to be pretty rare. Some of D&D's earlier modules from the late 1970s and 1980s so this--"here's a situation and who's involved--figure the rest out yourself" tends to be the approach. And before Wizards of the Coast took ownership of Dungeons & Dragons, this was actually the industry standard. I'd go so far as to say that most non-D&D game materials tend towards open writing in that they are more designed to inspire GMs than prescribe to GMs. That's a generalizations which isn't universally true--some D&D materials are more open and some non-D&D materials are more closed--but the generalization is largely true in my experience. 

So what leads game materials to be written in a closed fashion? I'd argue that it's not easier to write a closed adventure--that makes considerably more time and effort than open writing where you can just tell the GM to figure it out themselves. It's also not necessarily from demand--there are countless closed writing game materials out there, and it can feel like more work to find open writing materials a lot of the time. I think the answer is that the core belief of closed writing is that the developer of the materials can come up with something more interesting, compelling, and complex than what a GM can do on their own. And I don't like this position, which I doubt regular readers will be surprised to learn. The strength of closed writing is to say, "here's a situation you won't think of and how to make it satisfying for your players." The parallel strength of open writing is to say, "here's a new way to think of gaming, and I think you should explore that on your own." What this means is, a closed module capitalizes on an established game (hence the popularity of modules for D&D), while open modules are meant to push the boundaries and promote creativity from GMs (hence the popularity of open writing in original games). But even that is a generalization, and it's not the thing that I want to take away from all this.

Open writing promises an opportunity to explore a game as you see fit as the GM; closed writing promises a way to rely on something that's finished without having to do all the work yourself. And that's the hidden secret failure of closed writing. The module I played earlier with my wife was very closed--each quest had one hidden solution with infinitely more "incorrect" approaches than the single "correct" approach, the extreme of closed writing. And if the goal is to provide something that's interesting, compelling, and complex like I mentioned above, we've failed. It's not interesting to play as a game would could just as easily be a novel. It's not compelling to be forced into one way of thinking. And it's not complex to have just one right answer. Closed writing wants you to think that it's giving you a shortcut to good GMing. But it can't do that. The only way for a closed module to be rewarding for players is to have a GM who heavily edits and improvises, and at that point, they're forcing the closed writing to be open writing by ignoring vast chunks of it to reach the players. 

So why not just go with open writing to begin with? I find again and again that players of tabletop games would be great GMs if they tried, even when they're unwilling to make the leap and try it out. The skills are basically the same--creativity, improvisation, imagination. I argue that the difference between an intermediate tabletop game player and a good novice GM is the willingness to try it out. And the difference between a novice GM and a strong intermediate GM is just experience. So, basically, an intermediate player and an intermediate GM is basically just some moxie and a few game sessions apart. 

One of the refrains of this site is the value of homebrew. I preach the extreme of it--craft a world and NPCs and missions and everything else. But I also advocate for a piecemeal approach--take the established things you like, add your own ideas, and go wild. My first games as a DM were in nameless, faceless places with undeveloped NPCs and only a vague idea for quests. What I was good at was responding to the players. And if you can bring an interesting idea--more than I brought to my early games--and bounce off your players, you'll be figuring it out and almost certainly bringing some joy to your players. The worst that can happen is you realize you don't like GMing, at which point--at least you tried and you know now. But the potential rewards are enormous--you could be well on your way to a point where open writing is a welcome invitation to your own creativity and closed writing is something you can adjust and fix with ease. 

That's all for now.

That's all for now. Coming soon: alternate methods to understanding your character's philosophy beyond alignment and guides to clans amongst the Faninites and dwarves. Until next time, happy gaming!

Public Views on the Last Major Historical Event (The Magic Wars) by City

A while ago, I wrote about a world-defining historical event that takes place in the relatively recent past in my homebrew setting. The profile on that event largely focused on what happened and the immediate results. But because it is so recent an event, the fallout from it would still be happening at the current time, only 27 years later. So to understand how the Magic War, a series of battles fought over the freedom of magic use, impacts the world of today, let's consider how each major city in my main homebrew setting feels about the conflict and its ramifications. 

Mishara:

Mishara, the elven capital, was one of the chief forces for free magic use during the war, and magic has become an even more ingrained part of culture and society in Mishara since the Magic War concluded. The already considerable entrenchment of magic in Misharan culture, where many industries such as healthcare, construction, and the arts utilize magic heavily, has dug even deeper into magic use after the confirmation that magic's free use was appropriate for society. This deepening of magic's place in society had led to advancements in several fields--for instance, the use of magic in astronomy has led to the discovery of several new planets and other heavenly bodies which can explain astronomical phenomena such as previously unknown gravitational forces that had vexed earlier generations. Thus, the practice of magic is largely considered to be a social benefit by Misharans, and Mishara's defense of free magic in the Magic Wars has been speculated to have directly led to a more open and appreciative perception of magic in and around the city. 

 

In terms of the Wars themselves, Misharans still feel a fierce connection to the free magic cause. Many homes and businesses still bear banners of the pro-magic side in the conflict. It is not uncommon for magic supporters to greet or bid farewell to other known magic supporters by invoking the battle cry of the pro-magic forces, "All the power you can make good use of." Very few Misharans advocated for regulated magic, and practically no Misharans supported the abolition of magic use; openly stating support for these causes is essentially social suicide in Mishara. Unbeknownst to most Misharans, there remain small underground societies of those who opposed free magic, but these groups are incredibly private and secretive to the point that even worshippers of Gruumsh feel more free to share their beliefs than anti-magic Misharans do. Support for free magic remains so popular in Mishara that many of its inhabitants vocalize support of free magic whether they genuinely believe in it or not (though support of free magic is sincerely supported by the vast majority of Misharans, so these trend-followers are relatively rare).

 

The city is considered a bastion for spellcasters of considerable power, though Mishara can still be difficult for outsiders (meaning non-elves), but it has been observed that a pro-magic non-elf can have an easier time in society than an anti-magic elf; the elven tendency to prize ideas over individual identity is largely responsible for this dynamic. By extension, elves with magic abilities tend to be the most socially prominent, and the most respected magical academies in Evanoch can be found in Mishara, most notably the Mishara Academy of Arcane Studies, which is considered almost universally to be the most significant school of magic in the known world. Considering all of this, Mishara is the city most aligned with free magic use in all of Evanoch, and many pro-magic refugees from anti-magic communities fled to Mishara during and after the Magic Wars, which further established Mishara as the heart of magic use in Evanoch.

Finiel: 

The city of Finiel has a complicated relationship with the Magic War cause for several reasons. Firstly, a great number of Finiel's population are elves and half-elves, two groups which broadly supported free magic use. Further, Finiel has a rather laissez-faire approach to social and economic issues; people are allowed and even encouraged to do as they please. At the same time, the government of Finiel opted to officially support the cause of magic regulation--like most of Evanoch's larger government bodies, Finiel saw the Magic Wars as an opportunity to develop revenue by taxing magic use. Behind closed doors, Finiel's leaders did little to actually enact policies supporting pro-regulation forces; they vocally supported regulation but never committed troops or financial backing to the cause. Many political scholars today with the benefit of hindsight have speculated that Finiel's government was afraid to oppose the will of its citizens in action, but wanted the ability to profit from regulation if the Wars went that way. 

As a result of all this, Finiel's citizens widely came to be more skeptical of their government's proclamations and policies. Political scholars have noted that prior to the Magic Wars, Finiel's people and their government enjoyed a rather peaceable and supportive dynamic--for instance, Finiel passed a number of laws in the decades leading up to the Wars that were both driven by and supported by public wishes. This included immigration laws which eased the process of foreigners becoming a part of Finiel (an extension of half-elven support of social egalitarianism) and social support systems including the construction and maintenance of public housing for underprivileged people in the city. However, since the Magic Wars, there has been a more oppositional relationship between Finiel's people and government, as witnessed by the rise of protests and even riots in the decades since the Wars. These protests have centered on public policy, most notably the public opposition to Finiel's government's increase on export taxes (Finiel's populace rejects the contemporary government's isolationist aims) and attempts to segregate housing districts by race (which has been opposed by all but the most xenophobic citizens, which tends to be the more aged elves in the city). By and large, Finiel's government has been greatly weakened by its loss of public support, and there is a growing movement in the city to replace as many public officials as possible with more radically-minded candidates. 

These new political radicals have used the Magic Wars as something of a rallying cry. Identifying oneself as a supporter of pro-magic forces (oftentimes achieved by referring to specific battles in the Magic Wars in speeches) has become a powerful way to gain public support in Finiel. At this time, remaining silent about the Magic Wars has come to be interpreted by more radical circles as an attempt to erase the history of the Wars, and some politicians have begun to mention pro-magic forces as a way to retain public support. Magic itself is regarded as something of a social currency in Finiel; while Misharans value the utility of magic use, the people of Finiel tend to see it as a social issue, and as a result, most people in Finiel have taken to learning a few basic spells of rudimentary value more out of a desire to be able to publicly demonstrate appreciation of magic than an attempt to actual master the arcane arts. Magic use is common in Finiel, and many people there regard magic as indicative of positive traits such as worldliness, cunning, and practicality (whether or not the magic use itself is actually practical).

Curagon:

The halfling capital is, in many ways, an exception to most rules in Evanoch. Curagon has no formal government, as the city is an anarchist collective, and so unlike the other cities in Evanoch's Big Nine, the city had no official position on the Magic Wars. That said, it population was mostly in support of the free use of magic; its anarchist politics practically demand a lack of regulation over any aspect of life, and this includes magic. It is, however, worth noting that there did exist pockets of the city that supported the abolition of magic for the reason that magic use creates a power dynamic where magic users have power over non-magic users; by this logic, true anarchy would demand greater equality in society, making magic an inherently unfair system. Because of this, Curagon was perhaps the only place in Evanoch that considered the Magic Wars from a purely principle-driven perspective (whereas most every other city took the practical realities of magic use into greater consideration than theoretical politics). Due to this intellectualized perspective on the Magic Wars, Curagon became deeply invested in political theory during the Magic Wars, and this has informed a great deal of the city's character since the Wars concluded. 

Before the Magic Wars, the only real political issue that Curagon spent public time discussing was maintaining its position as an anarchist collective despite pressure from the outside world to conform to more regulated politics; the politics of Curagon's people was defined by an identity as nonconformists compared to Evanoch at large, and this meant that Curagon was mostly united against the outside world. Since the Magic Wars, that has changed. The Magic Wars caused a major divide in terms of interpretation of what anarchy truly means, and that led to a more divided conception of what Curagon citizens actually believed. Rather than being united against an outside world, the people of Curagon have come to see themselves even more as individuals, placing the emphasis more on the anarchy and less on the collectivism aspect of things. Here too, the interpretation of this change has been divided. Some people mourn the loss of community unity before the Wars; others celebrate the fact that there has never been more freedom to define oneself and their beliefs. In general, though, the people of Curagon agree that the city has never been more committed to the political identity of their city, regardless of how that identity is interpreted and acted upon. And by and large, the city of Curagon has tried to move on from the Magic Wars moreso than any other city in the Big Nine. Mentioning the Magic Wars is frowned upon, as it brings up the most divisive issue in the history of the city (but even this is regarded as a difference of opinion rather than an offensive gesture). 

In terms of magic use itself, Curagon citizens have come to regard it in much the same way they regard most everything: it is intensely personal, and therefore practiced only in private circumstances unless in cases of emergency. It is a custom to indicate through signage whether a business utilizes magic use in its products and services so that potential customers can make an informed decision. It has also become popular to ask for consent from nearby people before casting spells or using magic items. While Curagon has no formal laws, there is considerable social pressure from the community to respect the beliefs of one's neighbors and associates, and as a result, magic users in Curagon tend to handle magic either privately or in openly-communicated ways. There is no real stigma against magic use itself; only the social element of it is treated as a delicate issue. Curagon's political scholars have classically written more about the social dynamics of the Magic Wars than the actual conflict itself. Of all of the cities in the Big Nine, Curagon's society has been changed the least by the Magic Wars; its people largely moved on from the conflict before the dust had even settled in most other cities. 

Underhar:

The dwarven capital was in many ways the seat of support for the pro-regulation movement, and Underhar is very much still in the throes of that perspective. During the Magic Wars, Underhar's government was the first to take a direct position on the conflict, and it was actually one of the most nuanced approaches to the issue. Murphy Cavedweller, who became the public face of the regulation movement, was the head of one of Underhar's oldest and most prominent families, and his public statement about the position of his clan was quickly adopted by the Dronith of Underhar. Cavedweller argued in essence that there were different types of magic, and their practical uses were rather different from one another. For instance, the use of divine magic by good-aligned churches was considered by Cavedweller to be unambiguously positive; on the other hand, magic aligned with more evil and even neutral churches was to be feared and opposed. And even further, the use of arcane magic was, in his opinion, too varied to be able to made a blanket statement about. Therefore, he reasoned, the only appropriate measure was to consider magic use by individual instance. His proposal was to support regulation as a way of enabling "appropriate" uses of magic (largely that of clerics of Moradin) while preventing the use of "inappropriate" magics (those that did not align with the morals of the established dwarven order). This approach proved too complex to be adopted at large outside of dwarven society, but Cavedweller's full-throated support for regulation in the days of brewing conflict very much set the tone for the regulation movement across Evanoch. 

More than any of the Big Nine's governments, Underhar invested resources and effort into their cause. Underhar's government, led especially by Cavedweller, placed a great deal of power and support in the church of Moradin, and because of this, the majority of magic-wielding combatants on the regulation side were dwarven clerics. Dwarven culture at large was, prior to the Magic Wars, considered by many non-dwarves as fairly confounding; that perception was quite deepened by the regulation position. Pro-magic forces considered the dwarven clerics to be traitors to their own best interest (why fight against the freedom of use of your own power?), and magic abolition forces considered the dwarven clerics to be as offensive to their cause as the pro-magic spellcasters they most directly opposed. Even most regulation supporters outside of Underhar were confused by the dwarven position--the concept of using unregulated magic on the battlefield ran counter to their entire belief system. As a result, dwarves at large and Underhar citizens in particular were ideologically isolated by the war, and this in turn made dwarven society (which was already fiercely insulated in Evanoch) even more divided from the rest of the continent's peoples. In the time since the Magic Wars, Underhar has entered a period of intense isolationism. 

This isolationism has in turn created something of a generational divide in the dwarven capital. Underhar's oldest generations remain strongly pro-regulation, following Cavedweller's dictum that certain magics are acceptable while others are not. Underhar's government empowers the oldest and most established of its citizens, and so the official position of Underhar remains consistent with the Cavedweller approach. The youngest citizens of Underhar, which were too young to have any real involvement or even memory of the Magic Wars, are more radical, calling for a broad abolition of all magic that does not function in a religious of medical capacity. Thus, there is a developing part of Underhar's youth culture that rejects magic use and instead focused on the utilization of mundane knowledge and practical education. And at the same time, those who were old enough to have actually fought in the Magic Wars (but not old enough to have escaped military service due to holding a seat in the government) remember that the most valuable powers on the battlefield during the Magic Wars were the clerics of Moradin who fought alongside them. Due to this legacy, veterans of the Wars and their families tend to lean towards more free use of magic, as a considerable portion of these veterans saw hundreds if not thousands of lives saved through the use of magic. All of this means that dwarven culture has left the unity of the Magic Wars' era and has become far more divided. But dwarven social customs make it broadly unacceptable to openly discuss division, so this tension simmers below the surface in Underhar. Some modern political scholars in Underhar speculate that division about magic use is stronger in the dwarven capital than anywhere else in Evanoch. 

Torga:

This port city's government has been the most turbulent of Evanoch's Big Nine in the modern era, and the Magic War only exacerbated that. In the days when the conflict about magic use was only developing, public support was largely behind free use of magic; the diverse population of Torga had long benefitted from the industries created and supported by magic users of all types. During this period, the Torgan government made no official position but seemed to support public sentiment. When the Wars actually began in earnest, Torga was the site of an early and bloody battle that claimed the lives of many citizens in the poorer districts, which pushed public support toward the side of abolition of magic use. The Torgan government, however, adopted an official stance of regulation for the same reason that most of the Big Nine's governments did--to profit from a widely-used practice which it believed would never truly go away. When the Wars ended and free magic use became the de facto law of the land, the people of Torga tended to believe in a regulation approach because they acknowledged the balance of benefits and dangers of magic; the Torgan government itself adopted laws that straddled the regulation of magic and its outright abolition in certain circumstances. This complicated history of ideologies has made it difficult to concisely describe the role of magic use in the city, and it underlines the fact that there has never been true unity in terms of Torga's position. 

For average citizens since the Wars, magic remains a divisive issue. The three dominant cultures in Torga (orcish, Daltoner, and dwarven) tend to insist on insular religious cultures, and each has sought to control the others' use of magic while boosting their own. Simultaneously, industry is one of the driving forces in Torga, and there is a divide between artisans and professionals who utilize magic in their trades and those who do not (magic users insist on keeping their livelihoods possible while non-magic craftspeople argue for equality in terms of economic stability). And after the Magic Wars, the city of Torga saw a boom in immigration from the western half of Evanoch, which almost uniformly supported free magic use; this influx of pro-magic supporters and magic users themselves has pushed the city's balance towards free magic use, which has deepened anti-magic sentiment among Torga's existing community. All of these factors mean that Torga has never had a direct or distinct unified feeling about magic users or the Magic Wars; aside from a small portion of the community that was directly involved in or affected by the conflict, the issue of magic use is neither a part of the public consciousness nor an important matter to the city of Torga. 

This matter--Torga's lack of public interest in the Magic Wars or their legacy--has puzzled a number of outsiders from more passionate communities. However, scholars in Torga point to the fact that the city has been home to a number of other, more directly pertinent matters during this time period. In the last fifty years (the time period leading up to and following the conflict), Torga has faced intense governmental corruption, massive infighting among the dominant groups, environmental disasters, and rapid growth--Torga only became large enough to join the Big Nine in the last century, making it one of the youngest cities to achieve such size and prominence. The Magic Wars are not necessarily considered irrelevant; they simply are one of many turbulent happenings in the city's recent history. There is still public discussion about magic's use in Torga, most of which is centered around economic matters, but these conversations very rarely include any of the ideology or rhetoric of the Magic Wars. Instead, Torga views magic use in the city as intensely idiosyncratic to the port city individually. Actual mentions of the Magic Wars tend to focus on the loss of citizens in the battle at Torga's northern edge, and regardless of which faction the person discussing it supports, the Wars are considered tragic and a matter of the past which has little bearing on the current consideration of magic use. 

New Dalton:

The capital city of the Daltoners on Evanoch, New Dalton adhered closely to directives sent from the Daltoner homeland on the small island across the ocean to the east. In the early days of the conflict, New Dalton's government privately developed a response to the conflict; this initial response was quite explicitly pro-abolition. The leadership of New Dalton reasoned that arcane magic and divine magic alike were unpredictable and were largely the tools of its many enemies across Evanoch--they rightly observed that Daltoners used magic in much smaller numbers than Evanoch's other groups. But when word from the home island of Dalton arrived, New Dalton's leadership was surprised to learn that the homeland supported regulation. This decision was based on exceptions for the Dalton Church of Pelor's magic use and for the common reason that taxing magic was a lucrative possibility. As a result, New Dalton formally adopted the position that regulation was its aim, but behind closed doors, New Dalton's leadership stoked the fire of abolitionist circles and quietly donated resources and even mercenary crews to abolition forces. Thus, New Dalton attempted to control the Magic Wars from any angle from which it could profit, which in some ways weakened its ability to make a concerted effort in any direction. 

When the Magic Wars ended with neither of New Dalton's interests coming out ahead, New Dalton adopted the strategy of painting itself as the victim of a continent-wide campaign specifically against the humans of their massive city. This was a quite expected move for New Dalton; their propaganda machine had carefully made Daltoners out to be the scapegoats and victims of Evanine efforts since their arrival on the continent less than a thousand years ago. The specific rhetoric employed by New Dalton's leadership described the Magic Wars as a way for the elites of judgmental groups, particularly the elves, to attack the Daltoner way of life. New Dalton had struggled during the Magic Wars to cooperate meaningfully with other groups (in part because New Dalton insists on xenophobia and independence and in part because no other government meaningfully worked towards abolition), so it was easy for New Dalton's leadership to define the conflict as one in which it had been a lone morally correct underdog in the wake of the Wars. In order to save face, New Dalton's government's enacted a series of policies to adopt laws that reflected its position during the Wars, which were mostly a collection of bans on public magic use in most contexts and a tax and monitoring of sanctioned magic use, including on its own temples. 

In practice, these policies have a complicated history of implementation. It has proved impossible to monitor or prevent private magic use without the use of even stronger magic to detect the private use; this infrastructure would be legally impossible given the existing laws. At the same time, Daltoners have been taught a cultural rejection of arcane magic use at large and a hatred of non-Dalton Church of Pelor divine magic, so there is essentially no actual magic use to ban or tax outside of official church business. Further, non-Daltoner inhabitation of New Dalton is outlawed in the case of elves and half-elves, and it is so inconvenient in practical terms for other groups that the entire population of New Dalton already has a cultural objection to magic use to begin with. This means that the laws accomplish very little in reality aside from giving New Dalton an even more negative reputation in the rest of Evanoch. To this day, the Magic Wars only real cultural legacy in New Dalton is a deepening of the mythos of Daltoners as persecuted martyrs on the continent, but even then, the earlier military prevention of New Dalton's expansion across Evanoch is a greater rallying cry. The great practical legacy of the Magic Wars in New Dalton is the considerable loss of lives of Daltoners fighting for the regulation and especially abolition causes. 

Ringsdale:

The highly industrial city of Ringsdale's position on the Magic Wars came as a surprise to the outside world but not to the citizens of Ringsdale. Outside of Ringsdale, people believed that the city would unite behind the abolition cause because the vast majority of the city's populace were non-magic users with relatively low economic standing; outsiders reasoned that self-interest would dictate that this would mean support for abolishing the right to use magic. However, the population and especially the governmental makeup of Ringsdale is and essentially always has been united by the principle that anyone and everyone has the right to support themselves so long as it benefits the larger community. As a result, a sizable portion of the population supported free magic use, but most citizens and the majority of the government felt that regulation fit the city's philosophy best. Ringsdale's government was one of the most outspoken about supporting regulation, but unlike the other cities that opted for this more moderate approach, Ringsdale's position did not include taxing magic use. Instead, Ringsdale supported granting cheaply-obtained licenses to practice magic--these licenses were proposed to be granted to magic users only after passing a test about the safe and responsible use of magic. In time, even the city's magic users came to support this proposed policy, and before the end of the Wars, Ringsdale had already begun implementing these license tests to measured success. 

After the war, Ringsdale publicly debated retaining these magic licenses despite the military victory of the free magic cause. The Magic Wars concluded in 4693 (27 years before the present day), and Ringsdale stuck with magic licenses until late 4695, though enforcement of the licenses was spotty at best. It was only after pressure from the other Big Nine governments to conform to the more standardized approach of free magic use that Ringsdale's government ruled against the license policy. But despite the city's policy of free magic use, Ringsdale's citizens largely believed that their form of regulation was still the best option for everyone, and this perspective led to the development of a new social custom: asking permission before casting spells, with the exception of healing magic cast in life-and-death scenarios. This was never formal policy but rather a social expectation. Magic users in Ringsdale could either practice magic in private in ways that did not affect others or obtain consent from anyone in the immediate vicinity before using magic in any way. Very few magic users took serious objection to this custom, and there was a small but notable emigration of dissatisfied magic users from Ringsdale in the years following the Wars. But most magic users in Ringsdale simply accepted this custom as commonsense and considerate, and this led to a quite distinctive attitude toward magic use in the city. 

Today, the relations between magic users and non-magic users in Ringsdale are perhaps the most peaceful and agreeable of any dynamic in the Big Nine. Unlike in other communities, magic use is neither idolized nor feared; instead, magic is seen as a way of life equally valid and useful as any other way of life. While the poor and powerless of larger cities across Evanoch often avoid magic use except in cases of emergencies, the lowest of Ringsdale's economy regard magic as an important and unique way to solve problems. At the same time, the communities of magic users and social elites in many major cities regard magic use as strategically valuable, leading them to attempt to manipulate magic users for their advantage, but in Ringsdale, magic use is treated with respect and consideration for the caster. As a result, Ringsdale is an attrative destination for magic users who intend to live simple lives and make a living from their craft without the social complications of magic-idolizing societies. Just as the government and economics of Ringsdale are practical and egalitarian, magic use too is given an attempt at fairness and freedom. This complex relationship with magic use is difficult for outsiders to understand, and many who visit Ringsdale are surprised by the public attitude toward spellcasters and their work. 

Vestry:

The gnomish capital's approach to the Magic Wars was idiosyncratic, as the city's approach to most things are. In the years before the Wars, Vestry had experimented with collaboration between magic users on public projects; this was considered an extension of the creation of the city, which utilized the collective efforts of thousands of spellcasters to create the physically largest city in the known world in a shockingly short span of time. In the immediately pre-Wars period, Vestry was employing a large team of magic users to create sustainable food and energy sources for its growing population--these efforts were growing more and more successful by the day. The Magic Wars diverted that attention. Vestry's government viewed the Magic Wars as a threat to its continued efforts to improve the quality of life in the city and threw its full force, both magically and governmentally, into support of the pro-magic cause. This was a tenuous position for Vestry, as it was the only city in the Big Nine to support the pro-magic agenda in the eastern half of Evanoch. The gnomish capital was effectively surrounded by regulation and abolition forces, and it accordingly mobilized the largest military contribution to the Magic Wars for the cause of free magic. It was commonly held by Vestry citizens that they were the main defenders of magic on Evanoch, and that was at least formally speaking true. More gnomes died for the pro-magic cause during the Wars than any other group. 

This created a complicated and sometimes tense situation for Vestry and its people. Magic was a common and accepted part of life in Vestry, though magic was not practiced by a majority of its citizens. However, because magic use had done so much for the development of the city, the public of Vestry almost unanimously supported the pro-magic cause. Mishara's government may have been the most outspoken about free magic use, but Vestry's government contributed more practical support to the military campaigns than any other group. This led to a feeling of isolation among Vestry's people, and the rhetoric of both the government and the common person reflected this. Some of Vestry's people came to resent Mishara for its privilege of vocally supporting the cause without committing combatants; others adopted a humbler approach and chose to speak with actions rather than words. This was a significant change for Vestry's population. Classically, gnomish culture promotes outspokenness and a carefree attitude, but the Magic Wars tempered that by making Vestry's people more staid and solemn. This is not to say that the people of the gnomish capital became truly quiet and serious--to outsiders, gnomish culture remained whimsical and free-spirited. But to the people of Vestry, there was a noticeable shift towards duty, especially to the public, which was a departure from the more independent streak that had characterized gnomish society. 

In the years after the Magic Wars, spellcasters returned to public projects, and the social norms of Vestry began to shift back towards the whimsy and free-spiritedness of earlier, simpler times. But the legacy of the Wars left a mark. Many of Vestry's citizens and even gnomes living abroad lost friends and family members to the Wars, and there was and remains a certain heaviness associated with magic use. It has become not uncommon for spellcasters to dedicate their work with magic to the sacrifices Vestry made for the victory of free magic use, sometimes in words but often silently to oneself. The work done by spellcasters on public development projects is treated less as it was before--as a service to the community--and more as something deeply important: a commitment to self-sacrifice for the common good. In the 27 years since the end of the Magic Wars, there has been a huge surge in the number of students of magic in Vestry, and the construction of a new Academy of Magic Arts in the city has led many Evanines to acknowledge that Vestry's contributions to magic are on equal footing with Mishara's. In fact, spellcasters who intend to use their magic for practical and selfless reasons have flocked to Vestry in ever-increasing numbers, and Vestry's people have accepted outsiders into their society in ways they never did before the Magic Wars. Of all of the cities in the Big Nine, Vestry has been the most transformed by the conflict, though this is not discussed in polite society--the Magic Wars are rarely referred to in the gnomish capital, and then only as a reminder to pursue magic humbly and with a pure heart. 

Talon Gorge:

The youngest city in the Big Nine, Talon Gorge largely attempted to stay out of the Magic Wars as much as it could. The government of the city, the last monarchy among Evanoch's largest cities, did not take a formal position until nearly halfway through the Wars, and many speculated that it would never officially adopt a policy at all. It was only after it became clear that the Magic Wars were bloodier than Talon Gorge had hoped that it followed the example of most of the Big Nine's government and stated that it supported regulation. This declaration was met with almost no public response at all. Very few magic users called Talon Gorge home, as there were no organizations supporting magic use or spellcasters in the city, nor was the highly stratified society of the city made up of spellcasters. It would not be accurate to say Talon Gorge was opposed to magic use; it would be closer to the truth to say that the city was simply indifferent to it. And even this statement of support for regulation was not as straightforward as other cities' declarations--Talon Gorge had no actual policy regarding regulation. The truth of the matter was that Talon Gorge's royal family took a position for the sake of not sticking out, and unenforced regulation was the easiest way to blend in. 

In the years following the Magic Wars, magic use was largely ignored as an issue as it had been before and during the conflict. It was only in 4708 (12 years before the current day) that magic use became part of the public consciousness when a duel between two spellcasters in an open air market claimed the lives of a few bystanders before one spellcaster killed the other. The reality of the ending of this event was that the surviving spellcaster cast healing spells on a few other bystanders who had been injured in the fracas, and that the fallen spellcaster had been the only one to harm the bystanders. But the public understanding of this episode was derived from rumors and hearsay. Two competing views emerged. Some believed that the incident illustrated the dangers of magic, as the two spellcasters were said to have both harmed innocent onlookers; these retellings of the event largely omitted the healing performed by the surviving spellcaster. Other Talon Gorge citizens painted the surviving spellcaster as a hero and defender of the people against a dastardly villain. These polarized accounts resulted in division on the issue of magic use. Despite the division among the people, the royal government neither took a stance nor even acknowledged the incident in any formal way. Within a few years, the public feelings about the duel had receded in the city's collective memory--what remained was the sense on both sides of the issue that the government was unresponsive to their concerns. Ironically, Talon Gorge's government's tendency to not take a stance for the sake of keeping the peace resulted in no one being particularly satisfied with the government. 

In this way, magic use has remained a non-issue for most of the public in Talon Gorge. But the public sense that the government was unresponsive and detached, which was seen in its starkest colors in the spellcasters' duel, did become the legacy of Talon Gorge. This led to increasing public unrest, which although unspoken for the most part, did lead to the political atmosphere that surrounded the city before its very recent overthrow of the royal government. While those in the know are aware that the issue of magic was not what led to the fall of the royal family, the public has come to associate the awareness of public dissatisfaction with the government with the issue of magic use. In many ways, Talon Gorge is the most divided on the issue of magic use today--there are notable factions of pro-magic, pro-regulation, and pro-abolition causes in Talon Gorge moreso than in any other city. The new council-run government of Talon Gorge leans towards free magic use, but it does not have an official position. Talon Gorge remains relatively low in terms of spellcasting population, but this is in large part because the cities nearest to it tend to be more welcoming of spellcasters, and the magic using population of northeast Evanoch tends to be better served by moving to nearby Vestry or Ringsdale or making the relatively short journey west to Finiel and Mishara. But this is not to say that Talon Gorge is devoid of magic users; it is neither a hotspot for spellcasters nor a place to be avoided. Talon Gorge is the only government to take a more neutral stance on magic use, for better or for worse. 

How to Write a One-Shot

The art of the one-shot can be complex, but it can also be simplified. To design a campaign requires different skills altogether--while a campaign required sustained, connected effort, a one-shot requires focus and a different kind of perspective. In the past, I've addressed specific needs for one-shots: how to write a one-shot about a murder mystery, for instance, or how to write a one-shot based on a movie. But thinking about a general one-shot is important, too, so let's consider the steps to take when writing a one-shot for a general purpose. 

[Remember to check the top of the homepage for a catalog of one-shots based on movies, original systems, and D&D.]

In this guide, I'm going to provide two approaches to developing a one-shot: one for planner GMs and one for improv GMs. They're functionally very similar, but the level and type of preparation is different. Both follow the same basic formula: 

opening scene + intermediate step + escalating incident + intermediate step + finale

Let's address the formula first, and then we'll get into how to develop the parts of it. The opening scene establishes the one-shot's stakes and setting. It's here that you'll deliver the quest, so to speak, that will define the one-shot. Because of the nature of a one-shot (it's contained and short), you'll really only be concerned with one primary goal, and this is the quest. You should also spend some time developing the setting by describing the environment, the NPCs, and the other things that may be relevant. By the end of the opening scene, the players will be on their way. 

Then, there will be an intermediate step. For planner GMs, this will mean establishing a small step between the beginning and the escalating incident. This could be a complication or a distraction, or perhaps some time for characterizing the player characters. For improv GMs, this will be an exploration sequence. The players will be allowed to freely investigate and interact with the world while they move forward in their quest. For combat-oriented one-shots, this is often a small-scale fight. 

Next is the escalating incident. This is the midpoint in the story, and it will raise the stakes of the adventure. There are several ways to do this: you can give the players a glimpse of their foe, perhaps in a short fight which doesn't end in the foe's death; you can reveal that someone is working against them, and they are now racing the clock to succeed; you may add an obstacle that complicates their progress. The vital thing here is that the story pick up momentum as it heads into its second half. For combat games, this should be a major battle.

Then, there is another intermediate step. For planner GMs, this will be another complication or distraction, or more characterizing time if your players wish. The complications shouldn't rise above the level of the escalating incident, but you can make things more dire and frustrating. For improv GMs, this can be more exploration, especially to see what the players do about more threats to their success. For combat games, another small-scale fight. 

Finally, we move into the finale. In the finale, you resolve the story and try to offer a dramatic conclusion. For planner GMs, you will want to devise consequences for a few of the overarching ways that the one-shot might end. For improv GMs, you'll be focusing on offering a satisfying ending off the top of your head. For combat games, this is the big battle with the big bad that everything has been building towards. There should be some meaningful challenge overcome here. 

This is how the formula works: introduce the tension of the opening scene, lessen it slightly with the intermediate step, heighten it again with the escalating incident, lessen it slightly again (but still at a higher level than the last intermediate step), and bring it to a head with the finale. This up and down effect with the momentum keeps things dynamic and allows the players to really get into the story with the allowance of some breathing room. So let's talk about how to write these parts of the formula. 

1. Opening Scene

Start with the quest. What is this adventure about? You need a hook or a concept to begin with. Look for inspiration and try to determine what the most distilled experience you're going for is. If it's a combat game, what do you want the players to get out of the fights? If it's a roleplay game, what do you want the players to emotionally experience? If it's a shenanigans game, where do the laughs come from? Once you know the central element in your game, it's time to really get started.

With your idea in mind, how do you present it as a story? If you have combat in mind, who is the enemy, and why is fighting them important? If it's a storytelling one-shot, what are the key scenes in the story? If you're playing for hijinks, what story will accommodate your laughs? Keep in mind that this doesn't have to be original or elegant. If you want to do a one-shot about evil lemonade that makes people into zombies, you don't need to reinvent storytelling to do it. What kind of story would easily be a home for that? A classic zombie story with the twist of the evil lemonade would serve perfectly well. Feel free to keep things simple in a one-shot--there just isn't time to really get carried away with the details. 

That said, there are details you need to prepare for, no matter how much you improvise. The setting is contained within the opening scene, and it's important to spend some time thinking about this in advance. How does the setting affect the story? How does the story affect the setting? With the evil zombie-causing lemonade example, if the outbreak has been going for a while, the setting will feature destroyed or abandoned buildings and lots of danger, whereas if the outbreak happens during the opening scene, the setting should be more normal. The way NPCs think, speak, and act should be changed by things like this. 

But even beyond this conceptual information, you need to know about the places in the one-shot. You don't need full detailed maps of everything, but you should know the layout of the areas, what is in them, and how the area functions both logistically and socially. These details come up in-game incredibly quickly, and establishing the setting means being able to furnish information about the world with little time. Even good improv doesn't match good preparation, so be familiar with the spatial details of your one-shot before you get going. 

The actual offering of the quest itself is also important. I cannot tell you how many times I have offered the quest in a one-shot and had resistance from the players over accepting it. This is partially due to the fact that I have played with a lot of shenanigans-type gamers, and they tend to be the ones who resist a fairly offered quest. But we cannot assume as GMs that the party will accept the quest. In the confined context of a one-shot, the quest is basically everything. So either offer a reward so sweet that the party would be fools to turn it down (and don't just go for lots of money--really offer something that you know your party in particular would want), or announce a hefty penalty for not complying (death can be a good option here). You could do both if so inclined. But the quest offer must be clearly considered beforehand, because the one-shot cannot start in earnest until it is accepted. (Note: if you are instead opting for a rescue mission, make sure to be very clear about how important kidnapped NPC is to the party.)

With the concept defined, the quest written, and the setting considered, the actual playing out of the opening scene is fairly simple. To be honest, I find this part of a one-shot quite boring. We all know that the one-shot requires compliance with the quest, but there are so many logistical details to attend to (the ones named above). Nevertheless, you shouldn't speed through the opening scene. Deliver the information, get the quest started, and get the party on their way so the one-shot can truly begin. 

2. Intermediate Step

There are a few approaches to the intermediate step. You can keep things thematically consistent and introduce a side element of the quest's story here. You might also choose to present your world as larger than the story and throw in a moment that is consistent with the tone of the story but involves separate dramatic stakes. Let's consider the benefits and drawbacks of both of these approaches. 

Keeping things thematically consistent is attractive for fairly obvious reasons: you get to keep your one-shot consistent narratively and tell a deeper story by saying more about the main story you have chosen to focus on. Let's imagine this using the evil zombie lemonade example. In the opening scene, you establish that evil lemonade caused an outbreak, and the party must follow certain steps to end the outbreak or cure people or both or establish a safe place to live away from the zombies. So in the consistent story, you present a small piece of information about the outbreak. You could reveal a lab where the evil lemonade was developed; you might have a person who is transforming into a zombie in front of the players; you could encounter a store which is totally ransacked except for dozens of bottles of evil lemonade. These keep the players' attention on the overall story. 

On the other hand, a scene with separate dramatic stakes can expand the scope of the one-shot. Rather than sticking with only zombie-related scenes, you could include a slice of life that steps outside of the overall story. So as the GM, you might have the players stumble on a family that doesn't seem to have noticed the outbreak. You could have a bandit raid happen on the settlement where the one-shot is set, only for the bandits to realize there's really no plunder to be had. You might even have a meteorite crash down just beyond the city--to respect the one-shot's story, that meteor shouldn't have many larger story implications, but the sense of impending doom would contribute to the atmosphere of the story. 

For planner GMs, these intermediate steps are things that should be planned out in less meticulous detail than the opening scene, the escalating incident, and the finale. Even if you aren't an improv GM, you should allow your players at least a bit of freedom here. Without a bit of reined freedom, the players will feel like the entire one-shot is already decided, and many players will lose interest. So I suggest writing a simple framework and filling in the spaces in between as the players explore. They don't need complete freedom, but just enough to explore a space and talk to someone in-game is good enough to keep the game moving while giving them a sense that the story includes them. 

For improv GMs, these intermediate steps are spaces to finesse the direction of the story. In the first intermediate step, you can help to make sure that the party follows the quest well enough. If they're hesitant in this step, offer them some incentive to continue (increased threats of danger can work) or show them the dramatic stakes in another way (the way the scene suggestions above demonstrate the direness of the situation). You want to guide the momentum of this section just slightly down from the excitement of the opening scene and then rise into the escalating incident. 

For combat games, these fights should be short and somewhat simple. I would recommend making the fights in the intermediate steps be about half the length and difficulty of the fights in the other sections. The goal here is not to overwhelm the party; we want to challenge the party a bit, but these moments are not the star of the show. The more substantial fights surrounding them should be the star here. 

3. Escalating Incident 

The escalating incident is where we raise the stakes, and so it should be something that intensifies the need to complete the quest or a complication that requires the party to complete the quest in a specific way. One strategy here is to allow the party to pursue an easy and simple strategy for the quest in the first two parts of the one-shot and then reveal in the escalating incident that something has occurred which renders that plan useless. (An antidote to the zombie lemonade has been proven to kill the patient the following day.) Alternatively, you can just apply more pressure. In combat games, this is where the big bad hires more foot soldiers or takes on a stronger form (or something to that effect). 

For planner GMs, this scene is relatively simple. You need to get your party from the previous intermediate step to the next, and you need to show a way that things have gotten more dire. This should be as simple as creating a transition from the previous intermediate step, developing the escalating incident itself, and creating another transition to the next intermediate step. Be sure that if you have an NPC appear in this part of the one-shot who you want to appear in the finale, you have taken precautions to make sure that they survive this scene. 

For improv GMs, the escalating incident can be delicate. You want to up the stakes, but still leave room for the finale to be the star of the show. You need to create a memorable scene that anchors the middle of the one-shot, but you can't steal the show in the middle scene and disappoint in the end. I recommend just a bit of planning so that you can calibrate the intensity just right, but that's really the only part of the escalating incident that's important to plan if you improvise. 

It's important when actually deploying your escalating incident to use appropriate dramatic pacing. I think that having the escalating incident revolve around a surprise is a really helpful strategy. The opening scene and the intermediate incident will likely follow a traditional and familiar series of beats, and that's perfectly fine--they're serving important purposes. But the escalating incident can buck that pattern and make the one-shot more memorable. So try to go with something that really inspires the players. For our evil lemonade example, let's say that the players defeat a horde of zombies only to discover that the zombies have lemonade-inspired telepathy and can communicate across the area. This then leads to more zombies appearing during any combat. The strength of this example is in how it escalates the stakes and also pushes the players towards a shocking moment. 

Once you've delivered your escalating incident, it's important to offer some indication of what the way forward is. You can make it obvious (an NPC directly tells the party how to move on, for instance) or subtle (there's a faint trail of glowing blood that leads to the next area, possibly). But a sign of what to do is pretty important. Remember that you've just confounded your players, so they'll be stuck in consideration mode until they can figure out what to do. You can offer a slight hint and get moving to the next part of the story. 

4. Intermediate Step

The function here is the same as last time: connect the escalating incident to the finale and provide some variation in tone and momentum. This intermediate step should be slightly to moderately more exciting than the last one. It should also include some foreboding omen of the struggle to come in the finale. For the zombie lemonade example, this might mean a massive horde of zombies in the distance, the death of an ally, or the appearance of a more powerful type of zombie. 

In general, you should follow the same steps and considerations here as before. Allow a bit more freedom than the major parts of the one-shot, slightly lessen the tension compared to the surrounding sections, and be conscious of how you are pacing things; you want a gradual dip after the escalating incident and a rise into the energy of the finale. 

5. Finale

The finale is the part of the one-shot which is hardest to write. This is for a number of reasons. Firstly, a good ending allows the players to make a meaningful choice. But if they have a choice, there are infinite possible choices they could make, and no one could ever meaningfully prepare for that. So writing an ending that directly responds to players is fundamentally impossible. Secondly, that leave us with preparing an ending ahead of time, which I personally detest. But a simple binary choice isn't exactly rewarding for players. So we are left with preparing a number of likely options and having to improvise based on actual player input. But this is big picture talk; let's consider the actual details of writing and playing your finale. 

In a one-shot, actually seeing the final conflict through is vital. Some players resist conflicts that make them nervous; if you have one or more of those in your group, be sure that there is some mechanism that forces the party to commit to the conflict. If you're playing a system that has magic or magic-like forces in it, you can use those rules to confine players to the conflict. 

I want to add here as a disclaimer that I despise railroading. I think that taking choices away from players spoils the entire purpose of tabletop gaming. That said, one-shots are different. A one-shot is meant to be played in one setting and moved on from. But some players' natural tendencies tell them to not commit aggressively to much of anything, and allowing that as a GM would genuinely mean less enjoyment for everyone at the table, including the player who hesitates. Think about how much fun people have when games pointlessly drag on and on. Or how much fun players really have just sitting around and doing literally nothing. It pains me to say, but in the case of the one-shot, you do actually need to push your players around a bit more to be able to offer the experience they're looking for. 

So, you've gotten your party into the final conflict. There are many ways to play tabletop games. Maybe your players are trying to kill a big bad; maybe they're having a charged discussion with an NPC; maybe they're cracking one-liners at their foes. Whatever energy your players give you, run with it. The end of the one-shot is the most vital place for improvising. Use your best skills to match the players and manage the pacing. Build up the energy as much as you can without exhausting or overwhelming your players, and then allow the conflict to be resolved at just the right moment. [Check out this guide on managing a boss fight for more details if you're doing combat for a finale.]

The most delicate part of the entire one-shot is the final moment. After your party has emerged victorious (or not, depending on your type of game), you need to leave them with something that resolves the one-shot. This can be prepared if you can discern what your players will do ahead of time. More than likely, though, you will need to either improvise this moment or adjust something you've pre-written. The goal of this final moment is to close up the story of the one-shot and offer a glimpse at some consequence of the party's actions. 

Actually doing this is more complication than just saying as much. Let's consider for one last time the zombie lemonade example. The players discovered the zombie outbreak, made it past obstacles, discovered the problem was worse than they thought, braved even more obstacles, and fought to save humanity. How do we end this? If they did really save everyone, we paint a picture of a recovering city: destroyed buildings being rebuilt, people recovering in sick wards across the city, a ban on lemons entering city limits, families once again peaceful and safe in their homes. (For a fun twist, after this idyllic ending, we can also briefly mention a lone bottle of lemonade that went unnoticed until a young child found it, too thirsty to resist.) If they failed, we describe a ruined countryside, swarms of zombies devouring wildlife in the woods beyond town, plants overtaking the now-abandoned city. And after a while, the zombies pass on to other places, and settlers arrive in the forgotten town to forge a new life. (Again, we can twist this and add that they, unsuspecting, discover the lemonade and are grateful for a sweet drink.) You'll notice that both endings provide a tonally consistent resolution to the story, and the twists serve to make the one-shot feel like there's something more--but the adventure is over. The players are left wanting more and yet feeling satisfied at the same time. This is the ideal outcome for the finale. 

These five scenes together will take most parties between an hour and a half to three hours, depending on how much combat is involved, how much players investigate the world, and how much time the group is allotting to playing. With hijinks players, things take less time; with combat players, things take more time; roleplay players are somewhere in the middle. You can add or subtract more intermediate steps if you see fit for your party's needs. If you're having a hard time getting the game to follow the momentum you want, try this guide on how to pace your game. 

And while there is more to writing and GMing a one-shot than this formula, most everything else falls into place when you've done a bit of good planning and preparing for your players. Thinking of a one-shot as one continuous hours-long experience makes them seem daunting to write. But if you think of it as just being five short scenes, it's much more approachable. So give it a shot--a one-shot! (Sorry.)

That's all for now. Coming soon: public views of a historical event in my homebrew setting, transportation in my homebrew setting, and a time loop adventure set on a space station. Until next time, happy gaming!

How to Connect to Your Characters

Most of what I discuss here on this site revolves around how to be a successful Dungeon Master, but I also think that playing the game is an important thing to address. A while back, I wrote about how to go about creating a player character, which serves as a guide for developing the base ideas that help create the foundation of a character. But that's not the end of the process. Once you have the basics of your character, there is still more work to be done if you want to get everything possible out of your gaming experience. With that in mind, the following is a guide on connecting with your characters. 

In order to illustrate the steps I suggest for connecting with your character, I'm going to use my most recent character, who also happens to be the character I have developed the most (and also the one I feel most attached to). So to start, let's talk about the foundation I created before taking this step--connecting with the character. 

Many years ago, I developed an idea for a character who was a Charisma-based rogue: a con artist with a stubborn streak and the skills to back it up. It was a long time before I had the right campaign to put her in, so I spent a lot of that time imagining who she was and what she was like. Eventually, I had solidified this character into a young woman who had fallen in with a gang but chafed under the unequal weight she pulled compared to her colleagues. My character sheet's space for backstory included this as well as the detail that she had left the gang amid turbulence in order to start over on her own. I liked this idea and thought it was pretty complete even though I hadn't taken all of the steps I suggest in the article linked above. 

I was wrong. 

As soon as we started playing, I realized a few things about my character. 1: Without a more detailed backstory, I had little conception of what motivated my character--Asp, named for the snake whose bite is so pleasurable that the serpents were once used as a form of "humane" execution--beyond greed and ego. 2: Asp's independent streak made it hard for her to work with the party in the campaign; in an early session, she bothered everyone else in the group by pulling a quick con for essentially no reason. 3: An extension of this was that our mission was a good-aligned one, and Asp's independence and Neutral alignment complicated this. And finally, 4: I wasn't getting the experience I had created Asp for--getting to con people; our main quest involves diplomacy, but diplomacy among elves who don't trust halflings like Asp. All of these issues meant I needed to readjust. I needed to connect with Asp (and quickly) or risk messing up the campaign for everyone. (This is part of collaborative storytelling: you need to compromise with the rest of the group.)

So I set about connecting with Asp. The first thing I did, and the first thing I think most any player should do with a new character, is imagine what they look like. If you're artistic and want to draw them, you absolutely should. But many of us are not artistically inclined, nor do we have disposable income to pay an artist to draw our characters. Fortunately, there are ways around this. I personally recommend the site Hero Forge, where you can design custom miniatures and potentially pay for them to be manufactured. I used the miniature-making software to create distinct appearances for Asp--each of the personas she uses while running cons. You can see each of these images on this short profile on her. Because I developed such an attachment to Asp over the course of trying to connect with her, I ended up buying a mini for each of her personas (it's really cool to see all her identities side by side on my gaming bookcase), but even just having images to share with your party is the most important thing. In fact, after I shared my images of Asp's identities with my group, our DM requested that everyone do the same for their characters. It's helpful for having a picture in your mind and sharing that with your group. 

But it's not just about having an image. Designing every detail of your character's appearance gives you time and space to consider who they really are. One such example: the Hero Forge system gives you the ability to add various items to spots on the character's body--for instance, what will you character place at their sides or on their back? You can place weapons and other items in those places. The value of this is that you are essentially being asked, "What kinds of things would this character find useful/regularly important?" This helped me imagine how she portrays her various identities: her reporter character carries writing tools and hides her hair in a cap; her diplomat character wears fancy jewelry to appear more upper class and highlights her long hair; her inventor character has practical tools and tied-up hair that makes her look male. I had imagined the personas before along the lines of what role they served (each persona has different benefits and drawbacks), but I hadn't really thought about how she would differentiate these appearances to keep from being caught. Making these character portraits allowed me to really get into the practical reality of her life in a way that I hadn't considered until I put thought into it. You never know what you'll learn about your character when you add details to them, and appearances are no different. 

I treat appearances as the first step because it's usually one of the more basic parts of a character. Having a good, accurate image of your character is a great start. But it won't give you everything you need to really connect with your character. For that, you'll need to get into their head. I'm going to address two ways of going about this--they're more complementary than interchangeable, but you should do whatever will work for you. These two methods are writing about your character and imagining hypothetical scenarios for your character. Writing is more intensive and requires patience, but it gives you more tangible and helpful results; imagining hypotheticals is easier and less intense, and it helps you stay on top of your character as they continue to develop. I recommend beginning with writing (you need a solid understanding to get started in the game) and staying fresh by imagining hypotheticals. Here's why:

Writing is labor-intensive and can be intimidating to a lot of people. But here's the thing: it doesn't have to be good. It's really just for you (unless you want to share it like I do). Try to forget any anxiety you have about writing. If you have that anxiety, it's probably because the circumstances in which you've written before were forced and about something you didn't care about. (I say this as an English teacher.) This won't be like that. Here's my challenge to you: write one short story about your character. It doesn't have to be good. But it will allow you this huge benefit: session one won't be about figuring out who your character really is--it will be about sinking into the world, the campaign, and the group. That's a huge advantage. 

Before I address how you can start writing about your character, I want to show how writing about Asp helped me solve all four of the problems I mentioned above. Problem 1: I didn't know what motivated Asp. After writing about her, I had an incredibly clear picture of what motivates her. I wouldn't have known it until writing about her, but her stubbornness comes from a combination of insecurity and having to live completely on her own for a long time. This in turn allowed me to play up the wavering between recklessly bold and anxiously insecure moments, and it also helped me understand how she would fit in with a group. I discovered as I wrote that her old gang were people she also struggled to fit in with at first, and that helped me to figure out how to connect to the party. 

Problem 2: Asp was too independent to work well in a group. After I had written about her, it became clear that she actually was very good at working in a group, but only when she understood the expectations of the group. In her old gang, she became one of the most beloved parts of the outfit after some initial growing pains. She also struggled with the leader of the gang--she didn't always listen to the consensus, but learned to over time. This helped me to make her more inclined to work with the party. After the moment where she pulled a con unnecessarily, she apologized for disrupting and upsetting the group and vowed to not act criminally as long as they were together. In the party, she was cast as group leader, meaning that she suddenly had a new perspective on working as a team. These ideas allowed me to help Asp become a key element of the party rather than repeating her previous mistakes (which wouldn't have really existed had I not written about her). 

Problem 3: Asp was true Neutral in a good-aligned campaign. This was a really key problem to fix. Our mission in the campaign is to defuse a mounting war between the elves and orcs of my DM's homebrew setting is an important action which requires constant and pure motivation to do the right thing, no matter the cost. Given the character backstory I initially imagined, this would give Asp little incentive to participate in the main quest. Her independence and amorality were not good fits for the story. So I adjusted. As you know if you read the above-linked profile on Asp, I ended up writing two novels' worth of material about her life leading up to the campaign. At the beginning of the novel that leads into the campaign, Asp really is a true Neutral person whose only interest is herself and her (few) loved ones. But as she worked with the gang, she began to learn to appreciate and trust people. She had a meaningful romantic relationship. She began to enjoy the warmth of positive interactions and began to feel guided to do good things. After some very rocky times at the end of the novel, she gets to the land of the elves and orcs and quickly gets cast as a diplomatic savior of the orcs. She went back to the independence and amorality for a while on her own, but getting placed in the group quickly strengthened all her desire to be a better person. She is now the most outspoken force for goodness in the group and has even become a Cleric of Light. This wasn't the goal I had in mind when I developed Asp, but both my imagining of her life and the campaign itself demanded that she become more good-hearted. And beyond the mechanical necessities of her being less amoral, it's also been a lovely experience as a player to watch my broken little liar become someone who primarily cares about the wellbeing of those around her. 

Problem 4: I wasn't getting to con people like I wanted. This was difficult for me at first. I had so badly wanted to use the D&D system to run various cons on NPCs--I've always been fascinated by con artists, and I brought my desire to portray one to the early sessions. After the first job she pulled with the group, she recognized the offense to the party and promised to not do it anymore. But I still had the itch to see her pulling the wool over peoples' eyes. So in writing about her, I scratched that itch. The novels and short stories I've written about Asp are largely developments of relationships she's had with NPCs (a much more important detail than many players recognize since those relationships inform the ones formed in-game) or about her pulling off incredible cons. In one such story, she plays both parts of a two-person con in order to prove a point. This was so much fun to write, which is its own reward, but I also got to get the con artist stuff out of my system. The campaign we're in clearly has no room for a self-interested criminal, so I cut the cons from the game. I wrote about them instead, and now my imagined version of Asp is rich with a history of diverse and exciting cons. This is a problem I really couldn't have solved without writing about her. 

So writing helps us in a variety of ways--but how do you start? With Asp, I started with a conflict. I knew that she had broken off relations with her family and that her stubborn streak meant she'd probably be slow to join a gang like her backstory called for. So I made one conflict lead to the other: her mother sold her out to the guards, and she had to run to a gang that could help me stay safe. So I wrote a short story (only about three pages) that depicted her clashing with her mom, pulling a con, getting sold out, and meeting the head of the gang. That might sound a little crazy--covering all of that in just a few pages means lots of action in a small space. But it's really all you have to do to get great results. From that short story, I learned so many things about her. 

One such discovery was that Asp was a lot more vulnerable than I thought. I envisioned her as being someone who was very closed off in general, but writing about her changed that. In that first short story alone (which ended up becoming the first chapter of a novel), I realized that Asp cared deeply about her cat, who she loses in that chapter. She had enough of a tie to her mother that her mother could threaten her safety. As much as she wanted to do everything on her own, she needed a gang to help her start over after getting burned. I very suddenly realized that I had been thinking of her being a con artist as a powerful strength, but it's also a weakness--she's susceptible to all kinds of threats. I wouldn't have figured this out without writing about her, or at least, I wouldn't have figured it out until I'd been playing her for a while, and that's too late to know in my opinion. 

Another discovery was that the cons are actually difficult to write about. In order for things to be exciting, there has to be risk and tension. That means that at least some of her cons have to just barely work in order to be engaging. That meant having to find the sweet spot between being in control of the situation and dealing with realistic dangers. Finding this delicate place between these ideas was difficult at first. The con Asp pulls in the first chapter goes off entirely without a hitch, which I used to establish her skill as a con artist, but I had to add complications to later cons to keep them exciting. And this meant realizing that Asp is something of an adrenaline junkie. In one passage later in the novel, I wrote about the way she thinks about this danger inherent in conning people: she both dreads the uncertainty of it and revels in the thrill of it. She's wary of getting caught, but lying to a person's face and being believed is pure excitement. This revealed a new element of her behavior. Now, when I play Asp, I make her a bit more reckless than I originally imagined her. This makes the game more exciting, obviously, but also serves just who she is as a person. 

The short story is a great way to get your head around the big pictures. Continuing to write is where you get even more out of the situation. When I finished that first story, I was overwhelmed with how much I had learned about Asp. So I kept going. I wanted to know what life was like with her gang. It turned out to be very rocky. But I knew that she would become one of the crew before too long, so I wrote more. Soon, she was beloved in the gang and operating like a real member of a team. I needed this dynamic worked out in my head so I could know how she works with the party. And with all that momentum picked up, I pushed into how she ended up leaving the gang. It ended up being a complete revision of my initial backstory. She ended up not leaving the gang because she thought she was above the rest of the gang, but instead because she was (due to complicated circumstances) forced out of the gang and had to move on. This was--and I can't stress this enough--a vital realization. Knowing that she was coming into the campaign with a feeling of loss changed everything. It informed the decisions she made and the relationships she formed. 

Now, obviously the writing I'm talking about is more work than most folks will put into this process. That's okay. I know that I got fairly carried away with myself--you don't need 1,100 pages of writing to understand your character. In the "creating a character" article I linked above, I suggested writing general notes about character history (I again went overboard with the amount of this writing, but the point still stands). If you are 100% opposed to trying to write short fiction, I recommend the notes method. Good questions to ask yourself include:

• What important and defining events have occurred in the character's life? 
• How did they feel about these experiences? 
• What are common experiences that the character has often? 
• How do they feel when they experience those things? 
• What are things they enjoy doing? 
• Why do they enjoy these things? 
• What kinds of relationships (good and bad) has your character had? 
• How have these relationships affected them? 
• What does your character want? 
• How does your character plan to go about realizing these goals? 

Don't just think about the surface level things or the life-changing events--think about your character's internal world. What they think and feel is just as (if not more) important as the events themselves. Once you have answered these questions, revisit the idea of writing a bit of short fiction. Putting these ideas into an actual scene will undoubtedly show you dimensions you hadn't considered. 

Whatever writing you decide to do, you will have given yourself an advantage in knowing who your character is at the beginning of a campaign. But the campaign continues long after that. To stay on top of your character as they grow and change (or even to just stay in touch with your character), begin to imagine hypothetical scenarios involving your character. Many players do this unconsciously--it's fun to imagine what your character would do in various situations. But it goes beyond fun; you can also learn things about your character. Let's talk about what kinds of situations to think about, and then I'll illustrate some of the benefits using hypotheticals that I have used with Asp. 

A good place to start is by looking ahead in your campaign. What sorts of moments are likely to occur? How do you envision the conflicts ahead happening? What do you want to happen? These situations shouldn't just be considered in a descriptive way--you should try to imagine them as though you're really playing the game and your imagination is the DM. As you imagine the scene, roleplay it like you would a moment in the game--what comes naturally? Pay attention to what you feel about how it's happening. This is actually how I realized that I needed to make Asp stop conning people. I ran one small job in front of the party, and they voiced their displeasure at it. I kept daydreaming about the con element of her character, though. I would try to imagine situations where she could use her skills, but I always felt bad about it because I knew it would rub the group the wrong way. That's where I got the idea to write about her doing those things instead. So it can be a really productive place to begin imagining your character in hypotheticals. 

From there, you can branch out into less campaign-based thinking. Unless you've chosen to play someone with literally no attachments, there will be people in your character's life who evoke strong feelings from them. Family and friends are great for this, as are respected competitors. Try to imagine what your character would say to them if they ran into them. What kinds of feelings would meeting again bring up? Does your character have any new desires or plans after meeting with them? Does anything change about your character's feelings about this person? These are all deep mines of inspiration and discovery. With Asp, so many big ideas have come from imagining scenes like this--not to mention genuine enjoyment. As I wrote more and more about her story, she formed a lot of complicated relationships, especially the one with her partner. I have spent a lot of time thinking about what she would say to her ex if she got to see her again, and it all started with my DM dropping a character from her backstory into the campaign for just a moment. I thought, naturally, that Asp would ask about her ex. Learning where she was now was something I noted but didn't think much of at the time. But later, as I imagined their next meeting, I noticed how much affection Asp still had for her ex. As I kept imagining what she had to say, I began to see that she truly intends to track down her ex and talk things over, and that's put a completely different perspective on how Asp feels in the campaign. Her mindset is now, "I have to do this important and dangerous thing, and then I'm getting out of the game." It's added something tangible for me, and it came from just thinking about Asp talking to people. 

One last recommendation I'll make for hypotheticals is consciously seeking out a particular thing you find interesting, meaningful, or just confusing about your character. This is also especially helpful as a tool when you feel like something isn't working completely at the table; this exercise will help you diagnose the problem. What I mean by thinking about this particular detail of your character is to try to describe what this detail is. It might be something like, "I feel like I'm not expressing my character correctly," or "I really like how my character wants to stand up to people." These are big picture issues that many of us face. So devise a situation that would challenge or stress that detail. For the player who's afraid they're not expressing their character right, imagining a similar scenario to one that challenged them can be a great way to reevaluate what's going on. It also gives you the chance to think about these things in advance and come to the table more familiar with their character. Or for the player whose character is so willing to stand up to people, flip the tables on them: how would the character react if they couldn't stand up to somebody? What do you learn about your character when the strength that defines them is taken away? 

This is actually a scenario I've put Asp through a number of times. At various points in my writing about her, she gets very close to getting caught (and closer still in the book about the earlier years). But part of her character is that she's cool, confident, and in control of any situation she's in. So even in those moments, I didn't really get a sense of who she was when things really went sour. That's about when our DM introduced our main quest: bring an end to the coming war between the elves and the orcs. Our "final boss" (diplomatically speaking, of course) is the High Queen of the Elves, who seems fairly predisposed to war. When Asp first met the Queen, she panicked a little. I was really curious why that was, so I started to imagine her having other conversations with the Queen as well as other situations in which she had dealt with important people. Something I noticed was that she tended to get more anxious the more powerful a person was. I realized as I thought about this that she knows the consequences of getting caught grow exponentially with the status of the person you're conning (and yes, she does kind of view diplomacy as con artistry). So her anxiety was natural, and I didn't necessarily need to change that about my performance with her. But without noticing all of this, I never would have realized that I would need her to get more comfortable with the royals if she intended to succeed in her mission. And that's why I've roleplayed her as getting slowly more comfortable around royalty, which I think reflects that she grows and learns quickly, so increased exposure to dealing with royals is making her less anxious. And being aware of this change--even guiding it--allowed me to really enjoy it as an element of the story. I have easily a dozen more examples of ways that I've used these hypotheticals to explore characters, even before I consciously realized what I was doing (and how it helped me). 

Here's my last word: you read this far because you wanted to be able to connect with your characters. As a lifelong gamer whose first character was made for me and whose second character featured customizations in every possible way, I really do understand the drive to connect to these products of our minds. And if you feel the same way, I want you to know how rich and rewarding it is. It does take time and work, but you're here, seeking it out. I know (again as an English teacher) that not everyone loves to write. But at a certain point, it's worth the work to really familiarize yourself with who they are. 

Oh, and as a bonus suggestion, I suggest writing a journal of the campaign and doing so in the first person as your character's actual thoughts. Not only does it keep you engaged with the character throughout the session, but rereading your notes from the previous session before starting a new one is an excellent way to get back into the right frame of mind. 

That's all for now. Coming soon: clothing by culture in my homebrew setting, how to figure out your style as a GM, and lessons from 15 years of my GM notebooks. Until next time, happy gaming!