hey guys,
yesterday i designed an adventure for my players (genre: modern times). i wanted to bring a litttle variety into the game, but i realized, that most of my adventures look pretty the same. i tried to come up with some new ideas, but it didn´t work quite well. now i think, that there are only limited types of archetypical adventures. obviously one can come up with some completely new ideas, but i think, most of the adventures just follow a well-known Schema. i don´t think, that it is a pity, however. actually there are People, who say, that there exist only four different types of stories and every new Story is just a modification of one of the four - and hey, we still love to read a new book or watch the latest Blockbuster on tv ;-)
i think it would help me to have a list of common challenges/archetypical adventures. i think it helps to find out, how predictable my adventures are. you really would do me a great favor, if you added common challenges i missed in the following list. Thanks a lot :-)
Here is my list:
1) The rescue Job: someone is in a sort of prison. sometimes the someone is a princess in a high Tower, protected by a Dragon. the Players characters prepare themself for rescuing the Person of interest. most of the time an adventure, where stealth is important. Common Variation: the Person does not want to be rescued or some information the characters have about the prison is wrong.
2) playing detective: a crime or an intrigue occured. the Players characters try to find the Person, who is responsible. the have to find hints and to follow a trace. common Variation: they know who is responsible and try to find proves.
3) breaking-in. a classical stealth Mission - the Players characters try to get into a well protected area to steal something of worth or get information.
4) assassination: the Players characters try to kill a well protected Person.
5) the escort: the Players characters protect a Person that is travelling through a dangerous area. common Variation: in reality the Person just wants to bring the characters to a trap.
6) bad surprise: someone breaks in or trys to assassinate one of the Players characters. most of the time it is just a wild animal that trys to take ist Chance attacking the sleeping Heros.
7) the dungeon: get into a cave or ruin or something else to kill inhabiting Monsters or to do something else in there. Most of the time traps will decorate the way.
8) breaking out: the Players characters are kidnapped and try to escape.
9) the search for a missing Person: a Person that wants to be found is missing. often the people are kidnapped children or other People that should be protected. the Players characters have to talk to People to get information. in the same time they must be careful not to warn the bad guys by being too noticable. Common Variation: The Person doesn´t want to be found. Often the Players characters don´t even know, if this Person is an ally or a foe.
10) The treasure hunt: The Players characters try to get something of worth. Often others too try to get this artefact or whatsoever and the Players characters have to hurry.
11) Collect anything: For some sort of ritual or to make a special potion, the Players characters have to collect different stuff.
12) The battle: The Players characters know that there will be a fight, prepare themselves and fight.
13) an event:The Players characters go to a social Event (for example a concert) to steal something, to intrigue, assassinate someone, to get information, to protect someone unseen, to observe someone unseen, to meet someone or to have fun. Often there is a tournament: a competition (riding, archering, fighting) has to be won. Common Variation: the tournament has to be cancelled because of a crime.
14) The journey: The Players characters have to prepare and carry out a journey. Wild animals, Monsters or bandits try to kill them during the journey.
15) Lost: The Players awake without the Inventar and most of the time without their memories and try to find out, what has happened. Keen plans about the future don´t count anymore, only surviving.
16) A strange game: for some strange reason the Players characters find themselves in a uncommon area and are part of a strange game, similar to "the hunger games". Often a bored magician or hypnosists is responsible for that. The characters have to win or find a way out of the game.
That´s it. I´m sure, that some of you will say, that it is too mean-spirited to say, that there are only a view archetypical adventures. And yes, you are right, for sure. There are other adventures and those are not the worst ones, but they are simply not as common as archetypical adventures. I admitt, that about 90 percent of my adventures look like ones of the adventures I have posted above.
Anyway, it would be great, if you would add other schemas of archetypical adventures! Remember, I don´t look for detailled stories, but for completely different challenges or types of adventures form y players. Thanks a lot!
Greetings,
Nanos
PS:I´m sorry ffor my bad english.
Some more.
"Delivery service" Where the PCs have to get a package from point A to point B. Or a chain of these where they deliver one item and pick up another to deliver along the chain.
"Breakdown" For a travelling group. Their mode of transportation or the road is damaged necassitating them to stop for a time and do something about it. This could lead to exploring the area for resources or looking for a smith, etc.
"Natural Disaster!" Earthquakes, floods, etc.
Both Oriental Adventures and the 5e DMG have tables for all sorts of random events that can build adventures from.
Yes, you are right. Especially "delivery service" is a nice one :-) Thank you, Omega!
I think it is interesting to list these, but I also think that thinking this way can be confining. If you think there are only certain types of adventure, that may limit what you think of, and limit the possibilities for your games.
On the other hand, it could be useful if you use this idea to catch yourself being stuck in certain types of thinking.
As a sandbox GM, I think the whole approach of thinking of games as being about specific adventure plots is very limiting. I want things to happen for logical reasons, not because I have an idea for an adventure plot that I am making happen. While all of the plots you mention can happen, I want them to happen because the situation leads to them happening. As soon as a situation offers some other way for things to go, then the can go in some other way.
Let's take an example:
"The treasure hunt: The Players characters try to get something of worth. Often others too try to get this artefact or whatsoever and the Players characters have to hurry."
What are all the steps of this plot, and what could happen differently at each point? How do they learn about something they might want to take? What else do they learn at the same time? How do they get the idea to take it? Are there other options or considerations? How is it going to possibly change their characters' status to do this, if they get caught or identified as thieves? What will the owners do in response? Is the artifact powerful and useful, and if so, what is it being used for and by whom, and what will happen in the world when they stop having it? Who are these other people who want it, how could the players find out what information about them, and what are the possible interactions between all these people other than following the expected plot about going for the one object? Do they have mutual or conflicting interests? What about the other characters in the setting - are there other interesting things about them that could lead to other situations other than just a contest to have this object? Love stories, people who could be aided or rescued or whose own interests and activities are interesting and can lead to other things? By not just thinking in terms of the one plot, there are thousands of alternative possible plots that could develop and lead the focus in all sorts of other directions. Not only does this make for new stories, but it allows stories to be more authentic, and to be the things that grab the players' attention and interest, and may even be things they invent by themselves, if you let them.
Some do fall into a recognizable pattern.
But a good adventure tends to be more than just one thing.
From the OA example in another thread we had a famine sweep the land that had to be dealt with, followed by plague brought on by the famine, which had the group looking for cures, and then had a visiting diplomat who had to be escourted while dealing with the aftermath of all of the above AND any trouble the diplomat attracted for just being there. This and a few other events over the course of the adventure/campaign.
Or Keep on the Borderlands. Starts off as a relatively simple "clear the dungeon" adventure. But can shift to diplomacy, delivery, stealth, rescue, or escalate to stopping a cult.
Breaking Up: This can be anything from Pinkerton-style strike busting to breaking up a demonstration, riot, etc. It allows the players to try it as infiltrators trying to dismantle from within, as thugs smashing heads together, as spec-ops trying to assassinate the shot caller and hoping the movement collapses without its head.
For sure, you are right. It is dangerous to create an adventure using such a list (the big list of rpg plots of john ross is pretty similar to our list above). If a game master plans an adventure using this plot, it is the GM who decides how the problems have to be solved, not the players. However, the list has helped me to redesign my adventure just a little bit, so it differs from the adventure one predicts. To see, what is typical, helps to come up with something new.
Yes that makes sense and is a useful way to look at it. As long as you're using it to detect limitations and inspire creation, it's constructive. It's just the ideas like "there are only X patterns" that tend to be limiting. As is the whole "this is the story" idea. As in life, where people who think there are only a few possible stories and that they are stuck in one, compared to people who are still curious and looking for new possibilities, and able to see that everyone has their own perspectives, etc.
I'm fairly well in agreement with Skarg, but I'd like to add, the list above mentioned, in one variation or another, has been done to death in numerous "adventure cookbook" type products. Including the AD&D adventure cookbook, or the Adventure Insidae from the Gygaxian fantasy series.
What I was HOPING to find when I clicked into this thread is adventure archetypes that are made up of combinations of multiple elements. A few weeks ago, I was watching some old episodes of Mike Hammer--which as you might guess are primarily "playing detective", but it's more specific than that. There always seems to be a scene where Mike Hammer kicks someone ass, a scene where someone gets the drop of Mike Hammer, and so on. He tends to always make an admirable moral decision. On the other hand, there are other times he plays fast and loose with the rules. These elements seemed to be packed into just about every episode, like there's a very distinct formula to it. I just haven't taken the time to go back and watch while taking notes to get the exact formula down.
Now I'm sure Skarg would probably find that even more horrendous, but I am of the mind (and perhaps he would agree this) that I DO want to think of "story" in the following sense: I look at the game world, I imagine an interesting story or two or three that fits the world, then I go about doing my adventure design by asking "What must be in order for these stories to play out?" Then I set up the game, not to force the story to happen, but to set up the conditions so that it MIGHT happen. So could a lot of other things. Before I go live, though, I do have a "refinement" phase where I look through what I've designed and ask, "How do I break this? What's the worst thing that could happen?" And I add a little more to make sure the most game-breaking thing that could happen won't actually break the game, and the most boring thing that could happen isn't actually boring.
I do put story first. I just find "sandbox" is the BEST method for doing that.
I give you, "The Big List of RPG Plots". PDF attached below.
Sure enough, I was able to find this:
QuoteThe vitality of 21st century television drama has re-interpreted traditional franchises. But that doesn't mean they'll disappear. When I was a beginner freelancing any show that would give me a break, I landed an assignment on Mike Hammer, a network detective series. At my first meeting, the producer handed me two pages of guidelines. The first was titled "Mike Hammer Formulaic Structure." On the second were rules for writing Mike, for example, "Mike speaks only in declarative sentences." To be a strong man, he could never ask questions, you see.
The formula went something like this: At the top of the show, a sympathetic character approaches Mike for help. At the end of Act One, the sympathetic character is found dead. In Act Two, Mike is on the trail of the killer, only to find him dead at the Act break, and yet someone else has been killed (proving there's a different killer). In Act Three, the real bad guy goes after Mike, and at the Act Three break, Mike is in mortal jeopardy. Act Four is entirely resolution, one-to-one, Mike against the killer. And guess who wins. As I started, I thought such a rigid form would be stultifying, but I discovered it was fun. Relieved of certain structure choices, I felt free to be inventive with the guest cast and the kinds of situations that could lead to the turns and twists.
Quote from: Lunamancer;915362...
Now I'm sure Skarg would probably find that even more horrendous, but I am of the mind (and perhaps he would agree this) that I DO want to think of "story" in the following sense: I look at the game world, I imagine an interesting story or two or three that fits the world, then I go about doing my adventure design by asking "What must be in order for these stories to play out?" Then I set up the game, not to force the story to happen, but to set up the conditions so that it MIGHT happen. So could a lot of other things. Before I go live, though, I do have a "refinement" phase where I look through what I've designed and ask, "How do I break this? What's the worst thing that could happen?" And I add a little more to make sure the most game-breaking thing that could happen won't actually break the game, and the most boring thing that could happen isn't actually boring.
I do put story first. I just find "sandbox" is the BEST method for doing that.
Actually, I tend to do sort of the same thing, at least when I'm setting up a limited scope game. In a larger campaign, though, there are many situations that just are already established, and when they end up in certain positions, they generate new likely situations which also have these sort of expected ways they might play out, and then I add details to flesh out what's needed around them.
This and the other recent threads (about forcing outcomes and whether to roll or dictate outcomes) have been interesting. I find myself strongly arguing for not forcing things, but I think perhaps I've been overstating it a little bit, as I DO tend to have some expected flows and come up with ideas for interesting things that could happen - it's just that I almost always roll for odds and stay open and welcoming to things not playing out that way. As for "archetypical adventures", if I notice what's happening just simply boils down to one simple thing, that may be ok if it's going well, but it's also a cue to me to look to add more detail and possibilities. Usually though if there only seems to be one "story" that describes what's happening, then probably the game has some tunnel vision and would be more interesting if at least the GM were tracking other perspectives, NPCs, situations etc at the same time. If the "story" is the fundamental structure that drives the game, then that seems very limited to me unless that's an intentional choice for a good reason. In a campaign, I want it to be more like an actual world, where fundamentally there is a world with all sorts of stuff going on, and a "story" is just one way of looking at some events some people are involved in.
As for Mike Hammer - do you mean the 1980's show? I watched some of that, but found it pretty formulaic and overly dumb, like I find most TV. I've like the genre but there is much more content which I like much more - like reading Dashiell Hammett or seeing the older movies which I find VASTLY more interesting, the Thin Man movies, Bogart films, etc etc. It's not that there IS a genre with conventions, but it's HOW WELL they are done, that makes the difference to me. The dictation of plot into sections that require things to happen, is well over my line into THAT SUCKS territory. The better content in the genre is less predictable and more interesting. Some chains of events may be common, or more common than they should be, but to me what matters is how much do they make sense, how fixed in stone are they, and how logical things are once we pass from the situation setup (which can be pretty forced without bothering me, as long as it's semi-plausible) into the game phase/scope (in which I want things to play out rationally and be free to have whatever results make sense). So, having a hard-boiled bruiser detective and villains and henchmen and victims and elaborate murder case setup is fine if that's the setup, but once in play, I don't want it to be necessary that the client dies, or whatever. And the GOOD ORIGINAL content in that genre is more like that. There are variations, and the stories are generally told in ways that make sense, with cause & effect seeming to be at play (or if they aren't, I tend to judge them as being less good & less interesting). In fact, one of the main things I like about that genre, and a lot of heroic fiction, is that they tend to focus on a conflict between a stubborn, capable, and clever / creative hero, versus a cynical world and people who think one outcome is unavoidable, and then the hero shakes things up by doing unpredictable things, and the villains shake back by doing unpredictable things, etc. If they're forced & canned, that sucks, but when it really seems like the choices and actions matter and lead to results that make sense, or hinge on whether certain risky gambits work or not, that's interesting and the sort of game I'd like to play.
That's why I go on rants about TV & movies that seem like a good set up but then seem not to play out in logical ways. They bait me into thinking its an interesting situation, and even sometimes have some scenes that make a bit of sense, and then they often completely drop the ball and/or violate the rules I'd want to play by, showing fake risks or forced deaths that are transparent to the audience and even sometimes to the characters... and that leave me balking at how what's shown makes little sense and wouldn't happen that way and uuuhhhhhgh.
I'm not sure how much of this is relevant to RPG play. After all, we're both in agreement that all we're doing is setting up the conditions for the story to happen. What actually happens is up to the players. Mike Hammer is a good example precisely because the formula is so transparent. It's easy to lift and outline. It would fit perfectly on a list of archetypes. And you don't have to worry about the formula being transparent in execution. For instance, the formula calls for the sympathetic character to be dead at the end of act I. Of course, players could take measures to prevent this. The consequence could instead be a conflict at the end of act I, or the measures so successfully prevent the death of the sympathetic character that it negates the event entirely (no attempt, or even indication that an attempt would have otherwise been made, on the character's life). Or the character could die despite the PC's actions. When through the course of campaigning any of those things could happen, it's hard to nail down a formula.
Yeah, I just get jumpy when it's expressed as "the client will die in scene 3", instead of "unless circumstances change, the honcho will send a goon to try to kill the client at the client's home on Sunday night," even if that's what's meant... because some GMs seem to take their future plotlines literally, and start bending reality to not have anything happen significantly differently, so I think it's important to express with the expectation of flexible future situations, also because even if the GM is willing to have anything happen, if he's only thought out one specific future, it can limit what's in the situation, and so on.
The list from the OP isn't bad, but any adventure based on a single element from that list is going to be rather simplistic. I'd suggest weaving together several plot lines simultaneously, using multiple elements from the list as complications for each. And it doesn't have to be obvious to the players what's going on... at first.