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| Theme | Comedy |
| This adventure is fun for fun's sake. Its basic purpose is to provide humorous entertainment with a minimum of actual danger or tragedy. | |
| Goal | Gain Money |
| The heroes are intent on acquiring a fee or treasure. If it's a fee, you may wish to roll again on this page to learn the patron's goal. If it's a treasure, pay attention to the Settings section, which will dictate where the treasure is, if not who owns it. | |
| Story Hook | Hero Offended |
| Someone greatly offends the hero, so much so that he'll pursue his offender right into the adventure. (Note that this usually means that the offender is a minion of the Master Villain. You'll have to decide whether the minion offended the hero precisely to bring him into the adventure or just as a side-effect of his ordinary villain activities.) | |
| Plot | Event |
| For this plot, choose some sort of event -- a tournament, a holiday, a celebration called by the king, a masked ball, or whatever -- and set the commencement of the Master Villain's plan against that backdrop. | |
| Climax | Scattered Duels |
| In this climax, the heroes have gotten to the end of their quest -- they may have broken into, sneaked into, or escaped from imprisonment within the villain's citadel, or have marched into the little town where the villain is holed up -- and they become separated. You can separate them by having traps and tricks break the party apart, by having them see two or three things they must resolve (such as danger to innocents or the appearance of minion villains) pop up simultaneously; they'll have to run in all directions at the same time or suffer failure. Once the party is broken down into bite-sized chunks, you confront each individual or small group with the enemy or enemies he most deserves to face -- his personal enemy, the monster which defeated him before, etc. -- for a grand series of climactic duels. | |
| General Setting | On the Sea |
| Most of the action occurs on the sea -- the heroes are shipborne for some reason, docking in lots of ports. Again, this is good for adventures where the heroes are investigating clues left all over the map, are part of some trading enterprise, or are being pursued by villains. | |
| Specific Setting I | Catacombs |
| These can be catacombs beneath a living city or a ruined one; they can be long-forgotten or still in use. | |
| Specific Setting II | Tavern/Inn |
| This is a classic fantasy setting, the residence of travelling heroes and the home of the tavern brawl. | |
| Master Villain | Avenger |
| This villain seeks to avenge some wrong he thinks he's suffered. He may be right; he may have suffered a wrong, and this makes him a little more sympathetic than villains who are purely evil. The Avenger uses his organization -- thugs and bribed officials -- to get at the one who wronged him, and will want either to duel (singly) the one who wronged him, or to put the wrongdoer in a deathtrap. | |
| Minor Villain I | Lovable Rogue |
| This character is like the Master Villain of the same name, except that he has no minions of his own and serves at someone else's bidding. However, he's very independent, not always working in his employer's best interests; he often makes fun of the Master Villain's pretensions and may suffer that villain's retaliation because of it. | |
| Minor Villain II | Misguided Moralist |
| This fellow has been convinced that only by helping the villain achieve the Master Plan can he improve the world. He tends to be encountered all through the adventure's plot, usually escaping from the heroes and taunting them for their wrong thinking. Fortunately, he's no more effective as a villain than he is as a thinker. | |
| Ally/Neutral | Grumpy Old Professional |
| Again, the heroes need an expert in a certain field -- this time a craft or art, such as blacksmithing, engineering, horse-training, or whatever. The only or best professional they can find is an aged expert. He's grumpy, cranky, and sharp-tongued; he constantly complains about the food, the weather, his companions, the decline in skill of his co-workers since he was a young man, the road conditions, the rotten pay he's receiving, and so on. | |
| Monster Encounter | Beast Amok |
| Some time when the heroes are in a village or city, an animal, probably an otherwise tame or captured beast, is set loose by the villain's minions or driven mad by the Master Villain. The beast goes berserk in the crowds; if the heroes aren't inclined to capture or kill it, it goes after them. | |
| Character Encounter | Inquisitive Official |
| Some local authority has noticed the characters' presence and it makes her curious. She snoops around asking questions all the time. She may be a city guardsman or special agent of the ruler, but (functionally) she's a police lieutenant, asking the rong questions at the wrong time; the heroes have to work around her, sneaking where normally they'd be able to work in the open. | |
| Deathtrap | Rock and a Hard Place |
| This trap starts out as an Animal Pit, Pit and the Pendulum, or Tomb Deathtrap, but an obvious escape suggests itself very early on. Trouble is, it leads into even worse danger. The hole out of the animal pit may lead to the lair of an even worse animal; it may lead through a succession of dangers (collapsing old catacombs, into an underground river, into a den of zombies) before the heroes reach the light. | |
| Chase | Special Terrain |
| You can make any chase more memorable by having it take place in a setting to which it is utterly unsuited. For instance, horse chases are fine and dramatic when they take place through the forest, out in the open plains, or along a road -- but they become diabolical when they take place inside the Royal Palace or in dangerous, labrynthine, treacherous catacombs. | |
| Omen/Prophesy | Innocent Fulfills Prophecy |
| An innocent could fulfill a prophecy -- one which endangers his/her life. This innocent might, for instance, be the one who is supposed to slay the king, but is not a mighty adventurer able to protect himself from the king; the heroes may find themselves sheltering and helping this poor dupe. | |
| Secret Weakness | Element |
| The Master Villain can be banished, dispelled, killed, or otherwise defeated by some of element or item. The Master Villain tries to get rid of all the examples of this element in his vicinity; he doesn't let his minions carry it or bring it into his presence. But he's not stupid; he doesn't announce to the world what his weakness is. He tries to hide his concern within another command. If he's allergic to red roses, for instance, he orders all "things of beauty" destroyed within miles of his abode. | |
| Special Condition | Time Limit |
| Finally, the most obvious condition to place on an adventure is to give it a time limit. If the Master Villain is going to conclude his evil spell in only three days, and his citadel is three hard days' riding away, then the heroes are going to be on the go all throughout the adventure -- with little time to rest, plan, gather allies, or anything except get to where they're going. | |
| Moral Quandry | Respect Quandry |
| This is much like the Ally Quandry, only at a greater distance. The heroes have been utilizing the aid of two (or more) powerful NPC allies. Now, in the course of the adventure, the heroes come across a task which can be accomplished in one of two ways -- say, through military intervention or by esoteric magic. The problem is, the NPC allies are arguing for different choices, and the one whom the heores choose against will no longer aid them. | |
| Red Herring | Artifact that Doesn't Work |
| Often, epic quests against powerful Master Villains require that the heroes find some legendary artifact, the only object which can defeat the villain. If your heroes have had no trouble getting to the artifact -- they've effortlessly sliced through every obstacle you've put in their path and are confidently advancing on the resting place of the magical item -- you can have it not work. | |
| Cruel Trick | Heroes Must Work with Villain |
| If they have to work for the villain, it's due to some hold he has over them -- probably, he's kidnapped one of their NPCs and will kill this person if his demands aren't met. Put the heroes through the encounter where they have to do something they are loathe to do, such as sack and pillage a temple, before they have the opportunity to retrieve their friend. |
Based upon tables from the Dungeon Master's Design Kit by TSR, Inc.