Make Your Own Adventure + DnD = ??
I may be shooting myself in the foot by putting this idea out there, due to my general lack of the ability to finish anything. Someone will probably take this idea and have it out on RPGNow within a week. If anyone is interested in helping me out with this, let me know.
Now that I’ve built it up, here’s my idea: Write a make your own adventure for people to run solo games for their characters.
Now, I understand this is not an original idea. In the old Star Wars Adventure Journals, it gave you a character to use, rolling abilities as you encountered different enemies and obstacles. The same with some old Marvel Superheroes supplements, designed specifically for certain heroes in mind (one for Captain America, one for Spider-Man, etc.)
What I’m talking about, though, is a Make Your Own Adventure book that would say, “for a 4-6th level Striker.” You would then tailor an adventure around the role.
When a hero would encounter an enemy, the monster’s stats would be in that section, allowing the hero to fight it. They would roll back and forth, the player rolling for the monster’s attacks. They would be scripted out (for example, it would suggest using the monster’s encounter power first, followed by at-wills.)
It’s possible that this could all be too broad, and it should instead suggest a level and specific class. I think, at that point, though, you might as well give the player a pre-made character. I’d prefer they were able to make their own.
How well would all this work? Who knows. It could turn out to be a horrible idea. But I think it’s something worth exploring.
What do you all think? anyone interested in helping out?
You could do it; take the random dungeon generator from 1e (or the cleaned-up OSRIC version), swap out the traps, treasure, and encounter tables with whatever system/edition your using, and presto! Instant adventure. Add the Mythic Game Master Emulator for some plot to your adventure and the possibilities are endless.
Been thinking about this since the dawn of the internet (as I’m sure tons of people have before us.) If you were to make this a PDF product, you would have to make each choice its own hyperlink to the results (and also include page numbers for those who wish to print it out old-school.) The real kicker would be to design an adventure path so that you could use the same character over several levels. You might go so far as to make events from previous adventures have ramifications (i.e. “If you played ‘the silver princess’ module and saved the princess, you may ask the princess for advice: turn to page 25.”)
.-= DeadGod´s last blog ..Burning Brightly Part 2: Setting Detail =-.
I had a similar idea a while back. My thought was to do it as a pdf (the same as DeadGod idea above), but to also incorporate a stat tracker and dice roller into the pdf (using javascript). On the first page of the “book” you would enter in the important stats of your character, and the challenges in the book would adjust based on those stats. Plus, the last page/ending page of the book would have an “updated” character sheet, that included the experience awarded, treasure found, damage taken, etc.
I love the Star Wars Adventure Journal solo adventures. They were my first introduction to role playing. My uncle gave me a copy of Adventure Journal #4 for Christmas one year. Imagine trying to decipher an entire role playing game when all you have is a single supplement and no idea what a role playing game even is. To this day I have vivid memories of reading the cover off that book and dreaming of all the adventures I could make.
.-= PK Sullivan´s last blog ..Beethoven’s Last Night in Concert =-.
This is a fine idea for a 4E offshoot. Back in the day, TSR did some similar things. I remember reading the choose-your-own-adventure-style books they put out, but apparently there was a series that included a dice mechanic.
Sadly, the wiki for that series is not very informative: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Dungeons_%26_Dragons_Adventure_Gamebooks
The one for the series without the dice actually has better info on it than the link above: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endless_Quest
Personally, I’m holding out for something of that nature for computers, wherein an adventure may be designed by someone and then “run” like a program for a solo player. Nothing I’ve seen game developers make so far is like that which I see in my head, though. I may end up having to make that game myself.
.-= Eabod´s last blog ..Fallcrest Follies, Session Two =-.
This is very easily done for a dungeon crawl, especially in 4e where characters are more resilient and can self heal outside of combat.
In fact, you’re in luck! Check out the 4e DMG.
Pg 190-192 Creating a Random Dungeon
Pg 193 Creating Random Encounters
Pg 194-195 Encounter Decks and Playing without a DM
.-= Cedric´s last blog ..Perceptificating =-.
If I’m not mistaken there was a recent issue of Dungeon or Dragon magazine that had that — a short adventure that can be run by a player without a DM. It involved far more setup than I’d like, but still, nice to know that WoTC recognizes the value of that type of game.
.-= Matthew Arcilla´s last blog ..Devil in the Details: Lessons on Imagination, Mechanics and Fluff from Shadowrun =-.