- Wait, sorry. - This is where he gives me a kiss before- oh, nope. Aw, thank you.
I love you! - Hello friends, Ginny Di here. And I'm here today with one of my DMs, Jesse Jerdak, who you may know from his own YouTube channel or from some of the videos on my channel.
He was in Jester's Mom, but he was painted green. So, you might not recognize him. ♪ Jester's mom has got it going on ♪ One of the reasons why we're doing this specifically today, is that Jesse actually wrote the one-shot adventure that's included with my 2022 calendar, Natural 22.
The adventure is called Bard Behind Bars. If you wanna play or read or in any way experience that one-shot, you can get it with a deluxe edition of my Natural '22 calendar. Or you can purchase the one-shot adventure as a PDF on my website.
And I'll put the link in the description and it's great. So, I asked on Twitter for your most pressing questions about how to create one-shot adventures. And today we are going to try to answer them.
(upbeat music) What do you think are the most important things to include in a one-shot adventure? - I start with an emotion that I want to evoke with the entire arc. So, is it gonna be whimsical and fun, and quirky, and cute?
Or is it gonna be sad? - Spoiler! Both for Jesse.
- Or is it, is it a scary thing that is also whimsical and sad? (Jesse and Ginny laughing) - Some of those things are non-negotiable. Practically speaking, do you think that a one-shot has to, or should include combat or puzzles, or like a mystery?
- I like to include literally all of those elements in every one-shot I release. Even if I can't guarantee that the players are going to engage in those individual elements, I want them to be there, for people that enjoy them. - One of the things that I really liked about the way that you wrote Bard Behind Bars is that you have what is one of my favorite puzzles that I've ever seen.
You include ways that that puzzle can be incorporated into the story even if the players aren't interested in sitting down and working out a logic puzzle. - If a player is not great at figuring out puzzles, their character might be. You know, that's the great thing about those D20s is they can solve a lot of problems.
- Let's dive into the stuff that Twitter was asking about. I saw basically two questions come up over and over and over in the Twitter thread. The main one, the one that came up the most was how do you manage time and predict how long a one-shot is gonna take and prevent it from turning into a two-shot or a three-shot or like.
. . a five-shot, which I think happens to a lot of people.
- Yeah. Typically, combat, you're talking a minimum of 45 minutes, every combat. So, if you throw three combats in there, you're looking at about a three-hour adventure no matter what you do.
And as far as pacing the rest of it, RP-ers gonna RP. - Yes (laughs) - I like to add like, little notes. Hey, here's a good point for RP but maybe you don't have five hours to dedicate to this.
So, you know, here's an NPC that can help move things along just in case. - When I was working on the mermaid one-shot adventure with my other DM Harlen, one of the things that I ran into when I was running that adventure was my players really got into the roleplay at the very beginning. And it was to the point where I was like, oh man!
We really gotta get them into the ocean to engage with the mermaids. The decision that I made, which was made very easy by the way that Harlen had put that adventure together, was to just nix one of the NPCs completely. There were three different NPCs you could interact with.
And each of them had a few pieces of the puzzle that would be helpful. And you didn't have to see all of them in order to put together those pieces. If they hit a point where they're like, we got it, we've figured it out, they can move forward and they're not missing anything by skipping all those NPCs.
- I did that with Valestone, actually. Since I ran it for you the first time, I've run it like three times since. Every group skips a different NPC.
It's really wild. It's great to have optional content that isn't, you know, mandatory for your players to progress. And, also so you can keep things snappy.
- It sounds like it's crucial that putting together the pieces, that take you to the final encounter, not necessarily be linear. Because if it's linear then it's harder to skip something. Would you agree with that?
- Yeah. I mean, linear is, it's a two-edged sword because also it gives your players a clear path of progression. So, as long as they know what's next, they can go to that.
But it is important that they stumble over exactly what they need to stumble over. - Let's say your players miss something really important or they skip something really important. How do you stay on your toes and make sure that they can still get the information they need to complete the one-shot.
- I like to say this: no matter what they're looking for, everywhere they're looking, that's where it is. If it's a note, a secret note with the key to the puzzle on it. They're not looking where you think it should be.
But maybe they're like, I want to rummage through the kitchen drawers. Turns out it's there. You know, I want to look in the couch cushions.
Oh, there's a note in there. - I like that. Because then, you're not pushing the players to do something specific.
They don't have to feel railroaded. But they do sort of get the satisfaction of being like, 'ah yes, I had a good idea. And I did indeed find the clue.
' And that question of railroading came up a lot in relation to this question. Basically like, how do you keep players on track with still allowing them to feel like, they're the ones making the choices? 'Cause one of the things I've noticed in your one-shots is that you do a good job of picking a setting for the one-shot that is pretty contained.
- Constraining the setting is like, mandatory. You have to. Because if you throw too much at folks, then they're going to explore in a lot of different directions and that's where your time goes.
And if you don't mind making a one-shot a three-shot, that's also okay. - The second most commonly asked question in this thread was how do you get players or even just their characters, involved or invested in the arc of the one-shot when you've just dropped them right into it? - If you present a problem.
, they're gonna wanna solve it. Because other than that, they can take their dice and. .
. I don't know. What do you do at that point?
We're here to play D&D, friends. - When we all collect at the table to play D&D, we are entering a good faith agreement, as a group, that we all are here to play a game together and that we wanna have fun with it. So, I also think it's okay as a DM to just be like, listen, your characters care about this because like, that's the barrier to entry.
- But if you present like, somebody that's clearly in distress or that there's a clear reward, or that there's a clear problem that just you can't avoid. - A sub part of this question is like, how do you get the adventure hook sort of on the table and out there quickly enough to get everybody moving? 'Cause you don't really wanna spend the first 30 minutes of what could maybe be only a three or four hour one-shot trying to convince people to participate.
- You get to frame this. You get to set the stakes right out the gate. Like, you're in, you as the author are in control of this.
You don't have to be like, you meet in your favorite tavern discussing drinks. - Well, and I think that's one thing that makes one-shots special in comparison to a campaign. You don't have to have the lead up if you don't want to.
When I was writing an adventure for Steamforged Games and I submitted my first draft to my contact, he suggested to me that I cut, basically like, the first three paragraphs that I had written and was like, you wanna throw people in, in the action so that they are immediately engaged. And I ended up cutting a bunch off the front end and starting the adventure with a combat. When I read it back, I was like, oh, this is so much more interesting.
Like you jump right in and there's pressure on you and there's time constraints. And like, things are happening. How much combat should it even have?
Like, how do you decide on a combat to roleplay balance? - Depends on what kind of adventure you wanna run. It can be just all combat.
Some people love that. You know, bring your weirdest, most powerful, most wildly min-maxed character to this. And let's just fight tough bad guys.
Like, if that's the kind of one shot you wanna make, let's do that. That's great. - And tell people if it's gonna be that kind of one-shot.
'Cause I've definitely played in some stuff where I show up with like a dramatic backstory and like a roleplay-focused character, and then we just fight the whole time. And then I'm like, but she has a troubled relationship with her sister, everyone! - That's actually a great point.
Set the stage before the session. When you're like saying, hey, do you wanna do a one-shot? It's all about fighting.
- I think you should err on the side of telling people more rather than less about the one-shot because it's so easy for someone to build a character that's not suited to it. And then you just end up with, sort of like, a frustrating game. I also think it's a good idea that you know what kind of balance you want.
And you think about that when you're piecing together all the different sections. Because I do think it can be easy to end up with a combat-heavy or roleplay-heavy encounter by accident. - I always set up- And you, and Laura, am I allowed to gesture to Laura over there?
- No, it's against the law. Police! - .
. . have heard me say, I use the Rule of Threes.
I like to have 30% combat, 30% RP and 30% problem-solving. So, pretty much anything that I write is going to have that 30, 30, 30. And I guess it's 33%.
- Yeah. What's the other 10%, Jesse? Someone asked us and I'm glad they did.
'Cause I wanted to ask it also, which is how do you conclude a one-shot in a way that feels meaningful when you know that these characters aren't gonna come back or be used for anything else. - I think what you need to do is give them the carrot that they're efforting towards, right? What is the carrot?
Is the carrot the story? Is it the adve- is it the friends we made along the way? - Oh, it is.
(Jesse laughs) - You know, this is an interesting thing to hear you say, because I think with Valestone, without spoiling anything, a lot of the way that that adventure arc moves, just naturally, is towards an ending that's gonna be very bittersweet for people. - That comes back to one of my very favorite pieces of D&D advice. And it's that you don't write the story.
You write the story that will happen if the players don't involve themselves. - I like that thought process too. The idea of you know what will happen if the players don't do anything.
And then, whenever the players do make a decision, all you have to do is determine how that's gonna impact the existing arc. One of the things that threw me is at the very end of- so I keep talking about the mermaid one-shot. It's the most recent one-shot I ran.
- That's okay. Let's talk about it. So, at the end of the mermaid one-shot, my players were looking for loot.
And I was like, we're about to be done. Like, I don't know what to do with this. Should I give you a loot?
Does it matter? How do you use loot in a one-shot if you do? - You want your loot to be functional.
So, if you give it to them in the middle of the adventure, then they can play with it. - Last question that I wanna address here, which I think is not gonna be relevant to everyone, but let's assume that you're writing a one-shot for other DMs to run, not just for yourself to run. - Yeah.
- How do you do that? How do you write something that other DMs are gonna know enough about it to run it, but not so much that you're unloading a ton of information on them that may overwhelm? - This is a great one for us, I think specifically, because you've seen my writing style.
It's like a lot. It's like, I write, like a love letter to the DM. And then you help me edit some stuff down and you're like, none of that was necessary.
(Ginny and Jesse laughing) - But in a loving way. - Yeah! - I think this really speaks to the kind of DM that you are too personally, which is that you're an over-preparer.
That's just like who you are. - Yeah. - And I think you can see that in the way that you write one-shots and a lot of DMs might really love that.
They might really love that you give them a lot of information. I think you can also easily go the other direction and not give DMs enough information. And that can also be really hard to run a one-shot from.
- Or easy, because then they have a lot of creative control. I don't know. I think I try to over-manage other DMs.
- Well, this is something that, I mean, this is something you and I talked about with the Bard Behind Bars adventure. Because I. .
. I did cut a lot of what you wrote for that adventure! - Which is good, by the way.
- But I think that made us a really good duo for that adventure. Because I think you came to the table with a ton of really creative ideas and a really clear image of how you wanted each, sort of like, scene or interaction to feel. And I was able to pare it down in a way that allowed DMs to create that same feeling without necessarily using all the same dialogue.
So for me, what I found helpful when editing down Bard Behind Bars was to ask what's the goal of all of this text, you know? - Yes. - And how can we communicate that same information in a way that allows more freedom for the DM who's reading it.
- You know, I think maybe less is more. So, I actually really appreciated Ginny's edits on Bard Behind Bars. And you should definitely look at it 'cause I'm very proud of the material within.
- What other people can take away from this, this interaction we had over Bard Behind Bars is that, hey, If you're writing for other DMs, it might be a good idea to have someone read it over and edit it. Somebody who has strengths that are different from your strengths. Big thanks to Jesse for talking with me about this.
If you are interested in the Bard Behind Bars adventure that Jesse wrote, and then I deleted 15% of, you can find it as a bonus printed booklet with the deluxe edition of the Natural '22 calendar. Or you can get it as a PDF on my website and I'll put those links in the description. Also, if you want to play Jesse's one-shots, Eve of Fall or Valestone, I will link those too.
- So I'm working on a whole gaming system with maybe like, also a self-contained one-shot called Capybattle in which everyone plays a sapient capybara. - The world's largest rodent! If you don't know.
- They are the world's largest rodent It's got its own system, its own combat rules. And it's hilarious. I think it's very funny.
I will be tweeting about it a lot. We are going to stream a capybattle game here very, very soon. - I wanna be a capybard.
- You're gonna be a capybard? - Can I be? Is someone already a capybard?
- Not yet. - Okay, it's me. Dibs.
Ummmm. . .
. great. - I think we made a good video.
- I think that's it. - I think we did it. Yeah.
- That was fun.
