Session Two Notes and NPC Development

The second session of the game accomplished quite a bit, I'm happy to say. Over the course of the night, the adventurers delved into gathering information pertinent to their personal goals, joined up again, and started to get to know some of the NPCs around them. Obviously, rejoining a split party is a huge benefit for most campaigns. But the other two developments - both indications that they're beginning to immerse themselves into the game world - and I'm even more excited about that. The best lesson on running a game I can offer is to figure out what gets your players engaged and then giving them more of it. Offer small diversions, and when they become interested in the stories that flow out of the diversion (or when they enjoy the style of the story), build more from those. Successful, fun campaigns often evolve out of players obsessing over a side plot as long as the DM is willing to make more out of the side plot.

We're jumping into the deep stuff right away in this post, apparently. Following a summary of the session, I'm going to talk about my method for developing NPCs and how to place them into a campaign without planning ahead. As a side note, the player who controls Gerald wasn't able to join us until midway through the session, so Gerald's having run off on his own was an easy way to deal with his player's absence.

At the end of the previous session, Gerald had run away to be by himself; Ell had gone with Fiskar and Ren the mysterious elf to get dessert and wine; Carric and Dez had returned to Gilly at the Temple of Pelor's Grace. We began with Carric and Dez. Gilly was surprised that another person was interested in the plague, and the group discussed what little information they had. Gilly asked them to obtain a book from the royal library about diseases. Carric cast Detect Poison/Disease on a plague victim and discovered that it registers as positive on a spell detecting disease as well as for magic. Carric and Dez then headed for a prestigious school called the Worley Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Meanwhile, Ell, Fiskar, and Ren arrived at The Purple Stocking and enjoyed fine wines and desserts. The three assassins/bounty hunters/whatever term you choose discussed their shared profession in veiled terms. Ren described Clan Born at Night, a collective he created. The group of bounty hunters he works and lives with are his family, he told them. He then asked to speak with Fiskar alone. Ell went outside and watched their conversation from a covert position, but wasn't able to discern what was said. Fiskar left the bar, and Ell joined up with him. Fiskar tried to describe Ren and then divulged information about the fall of Talon Gorge, a huge city to the north. Fiskar produced an ornate chess piece (the bishop) and gave it to Ell, explaining that he had pilfered it from the palace as parts of the city crumbled. They returned to their motel and went to their respective rooms to sleep.

Back at the academy, Dez and Carric began investigating. Carric interviewed the professor of magic during class, asking if he knew anything about the plague or whether there were any children in the academy he worried about. The professor said that a student of his had gone missing a few months before. Dez talked to a student in time out, Cedric. They discussed his favorite books, his love of fiddling with magic and with glyphs*, and his sister, who had gone missing a few months before. (This probably makes it look like I was railroading them into a storyline. I hope the players didn't take it that way. It just made sense to me that two people in the same small community would both mention something about a big, scary loss.) Together, Dez and Carric spoke with Headmistress Rootblancher - but not without being tricked by Cedric into thinking the Headmistress was a man, causing an awkward laugh from most involved. The Headmistress offered some information on the missing girl, Edwinna. Classes ended for the night, and Dez and Carric left the academy with Cedric to walk him home and gather more information.

*Glyphs are a system of casting magic that I created for my podcasted campaign. The basic idea is that the 200 or so symbols I developed each correspond to a small set of concepts, like "Air/Sky/Wind," "Strong/Powerful/Potent," or "Deception/Lying/Misinformation." Casting a spell involves combining these glyphs to create a customized spell. The difficulty is that the magical energy is less tamed than with traditional casting, so a spell can be "misunderstood," so to speak; the glyphs may not combine in the way the caster thinks, and the results can be disastrous. All this is to say that a seven-year-old boy is not exactly the best candidate for fiddling with this chaotic, unpredictable magic.

A brief illustration of glyph-based casting. 

In Ell's motel room, there was a knock on the door. It was Tenk, who made an offer of employment. He also mentioned that Carric and Dez had visited the academy, though he didn't say how or why he knew. Once Tenk left, Ell went across the hall and knocked on Fiskar's door. Ell asked what Fiskar knew about Tenk, especially whether Fiskar thought it would be a good idea to accept the offer. Fiskar went back to bed, and Ell decided to check on Carric and Dez since Tenk had seemed to think it would benefit her to know about it.

Gerald's player arrived, and he took Gerald right back to The Bleeding Crown for more drinks. He struck up a conversation with the bartender, an orc named Brom. Brom offered advice on making friends, and Gerald tried making friends with the gnome sitting next to him, Spindle. The attempt did not go well, as Gerald scared and frequently insulted Spindle. After talking more about friends, Gerald decided to go try to find Carric, Dez, or Ell.

At a street corner in the northwest corner of the city, Carric, Dez, Cedric, Ell, and Gerald converged. (I will totally admit that this was some lazy railroading. The party was cool with it, though, and they went forward without questioning it.) Updates were exchanged on what had happened since they'd last met, and before too long, Cedric began talking about seeing the dead. Ghosts floated out of the darkness from all around them. They fought the ghosts and kept Cedric protected, destroying the majority of the ghosts and capturing two of them with a magical barrier. They questioned the ghosts a bit before leaving to take Cedric home.

As I said before, I'm happy with this session. I have begun to lay out multiple options for the players to consider, and I've been able to start adding more information and more depth to the areas that they'll already shown interest in. This has all been done on the fly. It becomes easier to be flexible when you haven't planned in advance, so the improvisation has really made it easy to focus on player interest. But how do you add NPCs to a game without coming up with a reason for them to be there? I want to share my process for developing NPCs (or rather, that process in part - I want to dedicate a full post, coming soon, to the information I focus on when developing a character) and getting them into an improvised campaign.

My NPC creation process usually starts with me reading something or hearing a song that seems to crystallize a thought or feeling perfectly. I choose the song as a character theme and then start building a character who is the best approximation of what someone would be like if ruled by the thought or feeling. Details get added (again, more details on this process in a future post), and the character takes shape. Adding them to the campaign requires a little patience.

I'll use as an example here an NPC who has not yet been introduced to the players. The NPC's name is Erys Wynne, and Erys is a talented, self-sufficient treasure hunter. She's cautious - she has a half dozen aliases to keep people from targeting her, for instance. She's smart - her companion is a robotic homunculus she built herself, and she's a fairly expert wizard. She's daring - she's raided some of the most dangerous tombs and best hundreds of foes (even though she never kills those who she fights). Erys is a fun character I salvaged from a campaign that never quite made it past the third session or so. As much as I want her in the mix right now, there's no reason that she would want to contact anyone in the party, nor would she be involved with any of the events that the group has gotten up to. So there are now options available for introducing Erys: one, the group's adventures lead them into something involving treasure hunting, or two, another NPC wants to introduce the group to her. I figure that option one is great if it comes up, but I doubt it will. Even if it did happen, I'd be spoiling the group's attempt to actually raid a tomb and get rewarded for it by including an expert who would either help or thwart them. Option two is the better hope.

A character design fairly similar to Erys. 

When you want to introduce an NPC, I stand by the "I know a person" method. When a player discusses what goals they have with an NPC, figure out if its possible that this NPC they're speaking to knows the NPC you want to bring into the campaign. If the answer is no, that's fine. You want it to make sense that the NPCs know each other. There will be other chances later. But your NPC might come up in conversation as the skilled person who may be useful or as the person who was in the right place at the right time and knows something important. This is exciting to the players - they have a potential lead on an issue they're paying attention to. The NPC you're introducing will have their full attention. Give the new character a bit of an intro (theatrical intros can be a lot of fun), and make sure there are allusions to how this NPC is special, but don't throw in much backstory. People don't meet each other and start swapping life stories in detail right away, and your NPC probably shouldn't either. By offering some tantalizing and incomplete information, you'll pique your players' interests and leave them curious about the NPC.

Remember that you have some leeway when it comes to adding your NPCs. For Erys, I like the idea of a bounty hunter knowing her because of occasional professional overlap, but Erys could just as easily be referred if the players need an obscure academic or magical text to be identified, if they need a guide into dangerous ruins, or if they need to know about secret passages somewhere. Erys is also a musician (a drummer and vocalist), so they could also encounter her at a tavern where she would be performing. When you enter a situation where the NPC could be, it's easy to drop them in and see if they take. If the players don't quite take to the NPC, let them leave that character alone for now and see if a future appearance has better luck. If the players never seem interested in an NPC, don't be afraid to discard them. There may be a better place for them in a future campaign, and forcing them on players doesn't make for a great experience for the players.

That's all for this time. Look out for more about NPC development and document creation in future posts, as well as updates on the third session when that finally happens (five young adult schedules are quite a scheduling obstacle to contend with). Until then, happy gaming!

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City Maps (and Feirmor!)

I shared the campaign map a while ago, along with step-by-step instructions on how to make one like it. City maps are a great deal different from large area maps like that one, however, and I'd like to share a city map and explain the importance of detail in their creation. As a case study, here is the city map of Feirmor, the first city in which the players met and are performing actual gameplay:

Feirmor, the city of Dez's birth and the campaign's true beginning.

When you develop a city for a role-playing game, it's important to build it with close attention paid to how the people in that city live. Other considerations are important, too: the city's history, rulers, and economics. Each of these factors was part of Feirmor's map, and I will explain how to create a map which reflects these ideas.

The first step with this map was creating the outline. Feirmor is a walled city, so I created the wall which protects the city. It is a simple circle with towers placed at fairly regular intervals. In Photoshop, this was as simple as placing circular towers and connecting them with a curved line. The only structures which I knew I had to include at this point were the palace and the large public square at the city's entrance. Then I set to work drawing in buildings.

The process of drawing buildings on the map is straightforward if time-consuming. I draw in boxes of various shapes (mostly squares and rectangles, but including other shapes which I use as indications of special buildings or as a particular race's style of architecture). The focus in drawing these buildings has to consider two factors. First, the size must be appropriate. I don't use a particular scale, but I try to develop a few of the smallest possible buildings for a rough scale example. When drawing larger buildings, I try to make them no larger than the owner of the building would need or be able to afford, treating the smallest buildings as a comparison of what is truly needed to survive. The second part of drawing buildings, and my favorite part of the building addition process, is placing the buildings in a shape that makes sense for roads. I place the buildings in curves and straight lines to create major streets, then fill in the blocks between major roads with smaller, tighter paths leading to buildings nestled off the beaten paths. The result is a system of roads which allows for transportation to any given building and which illustrates which buildings are likelier to have lots of traffic.

I added two large parks to Feirmor. One, the large park to the west, is called Riston Park. It is a mostly open field with a few trees. It is a marker of a higher class area of Feirmor, and the buildings nearby are the homes and businesses of upper class citizens. The other park is Malator Square, a park filled with statues, fountains, and quiet alcoves. It is near the palace and is named for the current monarchs of Feirmor; this indicates that it is a newer addition to the city. As such, it is still in the prime of its life, and it attracts the wealthier of Feirmor's citizens.

Malator Square is filled with serene places like this one. 

With all of Feirmor's land covered in buildings and parks, I began to create a district map of the city. Each of these districts is indicated by a different color scheme on the map. The Mulrennan District, for instance, is denoted by the color yellow. It is largely a commercial district, noted for its lively tavern and inn scene. At the center of the district is a circle of buildings dubbed "Six Bars." These are the most popular of Feirmor's taverns, and the Six Bars name is a reference to the location known as "Six Roads" in the Eastweald region (which you can see in the western area of the campaign map). I tried with each of the districts to choose dividing lines which offered clear borders between each cluster of buildings. Once the districts were divided, I set to work characterizing each one.

To accomplish this defining of each district, I selected one building from each district as noteworthy institutions. For each district, I tried to create a building which would suggest what sort of citizens and businesses make it up. Six Bars was the representation of the Mulrennan District. The Ostergard District in the northeast is home to the Trogan Center for Economics, an organization which caters to trade and development in and out of the city. The district's proximity to the palace and the presence of the financial headquarters of the city illustrate that it is among the most affluent in the city. Meanwhile, the Kearney Distict in the southeast is home to the Fulmora Orphanage, named for and founded by the late King Malator's wife. Along with the temples located in the Kearney District (shrines to Heironeous and St. Cuthbert, deities committed to zeal and caring for one's fellow humanoids), the Fulmora Orphanage suggests that the district is characterized as a tightly-knit community that does its best to help its neighbors. Paired with its relative lack of wealth (noted by its distance from the palace), this indicates a district which persistently helps those in need, of which there are plenty.

Temples were added along with the noteworthy buildings. I added one temple to each district (a few with more, and a few with less). These temples were placed considering what the people of Feirmor care most about and based on where each temple would find its largest audience. Temples of Chauntea and Malar, the deities of farming and the hunt, are in the district nearest the gates. This represents the interests of the farmers and hunter populations, who mostly live at the edge of or outside of the city. To facilitate the worship of these people, the temples are at the closest possible location for them. Other temples include those to Boldrei (deity of community and home), Olladra (deity of good luck and fortune), the Dalton Church of Pelor (an offshoot of the standard Church of Pelor, founded by the leaders of Dalton, a kingdom of imperialist humans from an island to the east), and the Shrine of the Many (with spaces for the non-human racial deities to worship their respective gods). These serve to illustrate that Feirmor is home to people who care deeply about their heritage and the well-being of their city. The temples each have a small icon of the deity worshipped inside its walls.

The imposing Temple of the Hunt, shrine for worshippers of Malar.

Finally, I added docks at the river's edge and a host of farms around the outside edge of the city walls. These show how the city survives, both as a shipping and trading center and as a self-sufficient state. The last step in creating the map was to make a legend in the corner. I used the city's name and population, along with color-coded boxes which show the meanings of each color on the map. For government buildings and temples, the color code was simple. Illustrating the other buildings (the vast majority of the city) was a bit of a challenge. Throughout the districts, I used a brighter, bolder color for all businesses and a lighter shade of the same color for residences. This was difficult to illustrate without words in the key, but I tried to show the lighter and darker variants of the same colors in the key as an indication of that scheme. I'm still not terribly happy with that detail, but I am largely content with the map as a whole.

I mentioned above that it's valuable to consider the way that people live when making the map. To that end, the explanation I've provided above about the locations of roads and buildings, the notable institutions, and the placement of temples answers some of that question. But the other factors I mentioned - the city's history, rulers, and economics - are valuable too.

The city's history and rulers are represented here in several ways. One of the simplest is in the naming of districts and important institutions. Each district is named for a previous ruler, so that citizens live in the domains of their city's past in much the same way that we name schools and streets for those who have marked history. To fill out more in this vein, I created a timeline of rulers for Feirmor, which has become its chronicle of leadership over time. From this roster of kings, I developed a sense of the city's legacy in the Eastweald: Feirmor aggressively expanded, inviting smaller townships nearby to relocate to Feirmor, adding to its wealth and citizenry. Former king Aldo Riston, for whom the large park is named, is commemorated for his pioneering of this policy with the broad expanse of park in the city. At the park is a plaque with his words justifying what many Eastweald residents see as a predatory practice: "There's a baby born in my kingdom every day. These are my people, and I need them to have a tomorrow they can count on. You say I'm ruthless because I compete with other settlements. I say I'm unwilling to let my people go hungry." This sort of detail, which I developed as a thread from the idea that Feirmor expanded in this way, characterizes the city and its aims in the context of the Eastweald.

Economics also come into play with the map. The docks and farms surrounding the city were a late addition; I realized that Feirmor would certainly capitalize on its location at the river's bank and that it would require a good deal of agricultural development to be self-sufficient. The inclusion of the Trogan Center for Economics indicates that the city pays active attention to its financial development, a trait that not all settlements have. Finally, considering all of these advantages and the city's attitude, there is still the matter that it isn't so populous or large as Woodhearth, the Eastweald's largest city. This seems to me to ask the question why Feirmor isn't a bigger competitor to Woodhearth or even bigger cities. The answer, I decided, lies in the walls surrounding Feirmor. It could grow bigger and more prosperous, but the city's growth is restricted by the walls. To underscore this idea, I had an NPC talk to some of the characters about Feirmor's current state; he proudly explained that Feirmor had reached its peak potential in terms of physical growth, confidently saying that it would rival Woodhearth if it were willing to sacrifice the safety afforded by the walls. This idea adds a sense that Feirmor is at an important part of its history. Affected by a plague and filled to capacity, Feirmor is at a crossroads. The characters, of course, will largely determine where Feirmor goes from here.

A crossroads in the Eastweald like any other. Right?

As you can see from the process I've explained here, there is a two-way relationship between creating the map and developing details about the city. Most of the time, you add something to the map because it is a reflection of the settlement's character. Sometimes, though, adding something to the map raises a question that you must answer, and this answer becomes part of the settlement's character. Obviously, I strive for improvisation in this campaign, but I think that making things up on the fly often yields the most entertaining and best results. Don't try to determine too much in advance when you create a city - the process of diagramming its skeleton, guts, and skin will give you every opportunity you need to create something rich in detail and consistent with your vision, whatever it might be.

Thanks for reading, and best of luck in your games. Look out for session two recap notes and more information about creating documents in coming posts. Happy gaming!

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Session One and Document Introduction

It has been quite a while since I've written here or been able to run a session, so I'm going to try to catch up a little bit until the group can find a good time to reassemble. Our first session was a bit turbulent, as is to be expected when trying to get four independent (and strong-willed, for that matter) characters in the same place at the same time and agreeing on enough things to work together.

When the individual intro sessions left off, all four of our adventurers had arrived in the city of Feirmor, all chasing different goals. Dez, a native of the city, was chasing down leads on the plague found throughout Feirmor. Ell had come from Woodhearth and was set to meet a contact to perform an assassination contract. Gerald had been brought from the small town of Splitaxe by his employer and ward, Tenk, on unnamed business. Carric had made the trip from Blackleaf Falls to investigate the plague, as a citizen of Blackleaf Falls had shown signs of infection. At the same time, a traveling circus had come to town and was drawing Feirmor's citizenry to enjoy its spectacles.

The session began with Gerald, who accompanied Tenk to a tavern called the Bleeding Crown, a simple bar near the center of town. While Tenk spoke with an associate privately, Gerald knocked back ale after ale. A young girl approached Gerald and politely asked about his appearance, wondering why he was so large and why his skin looked so strange. Gerald grew uncomfortable with the attention of many of the tavern's customers, loudly demanding that they confront him directly if they had something to say. The bar remained quiet in response. Tenk rejoined Gerald and explained that Gerald would need to "rough up" a man named Maxwell while the circus acts performed.

Meanwhile, Dez visited the temple of Pelor where her gnomish cleric contact on the plague, Gilly, worked. She checked on the young patient on whom she had cast "Protection against Evil," a boy named William. He seemed to be doing better, and regained consciousness for long enough to answer a few of Dez's questions. Gilly informed Dez that a clerk of the royal court, a woman named Violet, had fallen ill, apparently of the plague, and recommended investigating. Dez left the temple and returned to the house where she had met the Silver Flame. After some goading, the Silver Flame appeared. Dez argued with the Silver Flame a bit more about divine powers and what she could expect from her deity. Afterward, she headed to the royal library to research curses and other malignant spells to try to better address the plague. She gathered a wide selection of books about curses.

Carric went with his traveling companion Vincent (the falconer) to an inn called the Royal Gates. After checking in, they made a beeline to the palace, where they intended to search the royal library for information about the plague and about Feirmor. They were stopped at the gates by a palace guard who was unwilling to allow a drow inside the palace. Carric argued with the guard, but found no way inside the palace grounds. Vincent offered to search the library himself while Carric relaxed elsewhere (away from racist guards), so Carric made his way to a tavern: the Bleeding Crown. At the bar, Tenk introduced himself and Gerald to Carric; Tenk deduced from Carric's appearance that he was a noteworthy paladin of the Order of the Path of Light. After a brief exchange, Tenk left the tavern, asking Gerald to remain and enjoy a few more drinks. Gerald and Carric ordered meals and made awkward conversation.

At the entrance to the city, Ell made her way with traveling companion Fiskar to a seedy motel called the Golden Coin. After checking in, Fiskar recommended a tavern for drinks and food: the Bleeding Crown. [Obviously at this point, every character was being somewhat railroaded to meeting at this tavern. As I've made it clear repeatedly that restricting character and player choice is the opposite of my gaming philosophy, I'll explain why I took this route. It is incredibly difficult to guarantee that all of the characters end up in the same place at the same time. It is even harder to give them all a reason to work together. This is even more challenging when I've committed to improvising everything - I am unable to craft some sort of big bad evil guy who will threaten each member of the party and get them to unite. As a result, the workaround was to acknowledge to the player group that we would need to work as a team for a very short time to get everyone to that uniting moment. My players were willing to accept this one intrusion to open choice, and we ended up laughing harder each time the tavern's name came up. This is all to say that this will be the only exception to the rules and philosophy I keep as a Dungeon Master.] When Ell and Fiskar arrived at the Bleeding Crown, they took a seat at the bar. Carric recognized Fiskar from his intro session, and the two struck up a conversation about why they were in Feirmor. Once Ell, Carric, Gerald, and Fiskar had their food and drinks, they intermittently spoke and drank.

Back at the royal library, Dez pored through the available books on curses. She was approached by Vincent, who had several questions about the city and about what Dez was researching. Dez remained fairly tight-lipped, but did share her interest in the plague and a map of Feirmor with Vincent, who created a magical copy of it using a spell. Vincent asked Dez to accompany him to meet a friend who was also looking into the plague. The two traveled the short distance to the Bleeding Crown [cue laughter].

With the party united at the bar, everyone made quick introductions. The circus was in full swing outside, and remembering his job of "roughing up" Maxwell, Gerald ran off to the royal grounds. The rest of the party (plus Fiskar and Vincent) followed suit. As they arrived, a beast tamer began his performance with a displacer beast. The displacer beast was in no mood to be tamed, and grabbed a woman from the audience. The tamer panicked and hid, but the party stepped up to attempt to free the woman and subdue the beast. After a tense fight, the beast was rendered unconscious and the woman was saved. Gerald had entered a rage, and in this state of mind (or lack thereof, perhaps), prepared to finish the displacer beast off. Unwilling to see the creature killed if not necessary, Dez cast a spell to freeze Gerald in place. When Gerald's rage ended, Dez freed him; Gerald slunk off to the side, haunted by the experience of being imprisoned once again as he had been for most of his life. An elf (the same one who had met eyes with Ell in her intro session) stepped to the center of the stage and calmed the crowd, pointing out that everyone was safe and offering a song as the circus' final act. As the crowd began to disperse, Tenk spoke with Gerald, explaining that Maxwell was to be forgotten, and coming clean about his business: he was a contract dealer, connecting assassins and thugs to those willing to pay. Gerald refused to be a part of the violence industry and ran off, trailing colorful flowers in his path (the result of a Wild Surge effect during the combat with the displacer beast).

The party then split up for the night. Gerald returned to the Bleeding Crown, seeking more drinks. Dez and Carric went to speak with Gilly once more, working together on the plague. Ell, Fiskar, and Ren (the elf musician who had ended the night's entertainment) went to a wine and dessert bar called the Purple Stocking. Vincent went to the inn, calling it a night.

- - - - -

With the first group session concluded, it looked unlikely that the party was joined in a meaningful way. In fact, Gerald was uncomfortable with the prospect of working with Dez at all after the magical binding she had performed on him. Gerald had also taken a stance against performing violence for money, which put him in a position counter to Ell's profession, as well as Dez's. But despite the tensions, the characters had all met and accomplished a task together. Carric and Dez had significant reason to work together, at least temporarily. It wasn't much, but it was a start.

One of the important things that the first group session established was a need for several documents. As a DM, I always create a visual representation of any written or illustrated records found or used in the game. For this session, there were several documents needed. First, a map of Feirmor was required by Carric. [My next post will look at this map in detail, examining the needs of a city map.] Dez needed information from several books on curses. I decided that this research would be represented by a list of notes taken by Dez on the important sections of several books and by an entire chapter from a particularly useful book. These would be added to the list of documents for the campaign so far, which also included a letter to Carric from the diviner who had inspected the scarecrow's skull and a pamphlet which Ell found which analyzed the fall of a huge city to the north (this was largely an account of the end of a previous campaign I ran). Each of these documents offer information to the characters and players about the world around them and potentially helpful clues in accomplishing their goals.

As an example of this sort of document, I will provide here the notes which Dez took in the library:

Dez's notes on curses from a range of books at the Feirmor Royal Library.

To create this document, I first created the titles and authors of the books which would be slightly helpful to Dez's interests. These are fairly simple to create; it simply takes a little imagination to come up with what sorts of aims a writer may have when they decide to write about dark magic. From there, I started creating short lists of information to include for each book. I tried to keep the information true to what the author would include, given their focus in each book. I knew that there would be a lot of information included in these notes, so I tried to keep the notes in one of two categories: suggestions of new routes to consider, and negative statements to provide a kind of "process of elimination" in considering other possibilities. Some of the notes are also tangential information which could serve as a red herring if given too much consideration.

I have always enjoyed as a DM the opportunity to create puzzles and mysteries for my players to solve. The plague is a new challenge for me. Where before, I have created small scale mysteries and been able to carefully guard the reveals of each of them, I now cannot prepare that sort of experience in advance. Instead, I will be piecing the mystery of the plague and its source together as the players investigate it. [I admittedly have a few ideas about what might be in store, but it is both very unformed and more of a consideration of the theme the plague mystery will follow than a blueprint.] This inability to plan ahead is reflected in these notes: they are scattered, vague, and generally just confirms a few suspicions that Dez already had. Nevertheless, the many stray details that the notes include allows the players to tug at almost any thread, and I plan to improvise ways for each of these threads to be helpful in some way to figuring out just what the hell is going on. 

A few of the notes are starred, which I thought illustrated that Dez could see which of these ideas was especially relevant to the plague in Feirmor. I had Dez's player choose a font for her handwriting and created the document. The whole thing was placed over a parchment texture. Writing the information took more time than photoshopping it together did. The book circled at the bottom was another of the documents I made after this session. Here is the beginning of the relevant chapter: 

A History of Major Curses: Chapter Fourteen. 

The graphic design process here took about as much time as the writing did. It was still simple, though. I just found a template for an open book, added formatting features like page numbers and the title and author's name in the header, and then pasted in the text I had already written. Part of the fun when it comes to creating documents in a campaign is the ability to write as different characters. The author of this book, Loquim Garin, is a bit of a scholar, but is primarily interested in folk tales of dark magic. [I liken this author to Jan Brunvand, a real-life scholar of urban legends, whose work is a little drier than Garin's.] Garin as an author allowed me to present a "real-life ghost story" rife with drama and fear, but the story was close enough to Feirmor's plague that it could shed some light on what was happening with the King's Curse (as Gilly has come to call the plague). 

From this point, it's clear that the adventure is still very much just beginning. The characters still see themselves more as individuals than part of a group. The goals they pursue are still somewhat formless and vague. But it's from these simple and murky threads that we will fashion something large, detailed, and distinct. Next time, look for city map advice and the notes from the second session. Happy gaming!

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