SPOILER WARNING!

If you click the image above, you will see the entire scenario structure for the Severn Valley scenario I designed for the Alexandrian Remix of the Eternal Lies campaign. If you do not wish to be spoiled on this scenario, DO NOT CLICK THE IMAGE. Its specific content is not essential for understanding the rest of this essay, and this essay contains no other spoilers for the Severn Valley scenario or the Eternal Lies campaign.

But I did want to show an example of an actual scenario structure that’s been used in actual play, and not just some deliberately over-the-top example.

What this image is specifically showing is a visual representation of the node structure of the Severn Valley scenario. If you’ve read Node-Based Scenario Design, you may recall that the essay features a number of explanatory diagrams that look like this:

This has, for better or worse, created the misapprehension that I design scenarios using this visual motif. This is, almost without exception, not the case. (I do occasionally, during the outline stage for certain scenarios, sketch out a high-level organization to clarify the location of funnels.) And the primary reason I don’t bother with visual node diagramming is, in fact, overloaded diagrams like the one at the top of this post: That’s the structure of what I would consider a medium-complexity scenario, and the visual diagram for it is just noise… I can’t really process any meaningful data out of it and I’m the one who wrote it.

So how do I organize these scenarios?

Text-based revelation lists.

I discuss revelation lists in the Three Clue Rule: For each conclusion that you want the PCs to make, list the clues you’re including in the scenario for it. This functions as a checklist which allows you to track their progress and (importantly!) a diagnostic tool during actual play to make sure they’re on track.

In my scenarios, they look like this:

SCENE 1: ELVEN CORPSES

– The Duke’s Map (Scenario Hook)
– Encountering Mutilated Corpses (Adventure 3:The Old Forest)
– Reports of Mutilated Corpses (Adventure 2 – Scene 4)

SCENE 2: THE BLACK TREE

– Tracking Drow Scouts (Proactive 1: Drow Scouts / Scene 1)
– Map to the Black Tree (Scene 3: The Drow Camp)
– Elven Retaliation Scrolls (Proactive 2: Elven Retaliation Squad)

SCENE 3: THE DROW CAMP

– Tracking Drow Scouts (Proactive 1: Drow Scouts)
– Elven Retaliation Scrolls (Proactive 2: Elven Retaliation Squad)
– Map of the Old Forest (Scene 4: Drow Citadel)
– Questioning Prisoners (Scene 2: The Black Tree)

SCENE 4: DROW CITADEL

– Questioning Prisoners (Scene 2: The Black Tree)
– Subverting the Crystal Ball (Scene 3: The Drow Camp)
– Following the Slave Train (Scene 3: The Drow Camp)

CLUE LIST vs. REVELATION LIST

There’s basically two ways to organize lists like this: You can list all the clues a node contains or you can list all the clues that point to the node. For the sake of clearer discussion, I’m going to refer to the latter as a revelation list (like the sample above) and to the former as a clue list.

I’ll often use a clue list when outlining or developing a scenario. After coming up with the “big concept” for a scenario, my design process generally consists of writing down cool ideas for various nodes. Then I’ll think about what kind of information a node might naturally contain to point at the other nodes. For example, I might jot down:

SCENE 2: THE BLACK TREE

– Questioning Prisoners (to the Drow Citadel)
– Questioning Prisoners (to the Drow Camp)
– Drow Scouts might show up here (track to Scene 1 or Scene 3)

Once I’ve done that for all the nodes, I’ll do a quick audit for each node to make sure I’ve included three clues. If I haven’t, I’ll get proactive figuring out how I can creatively include more clues. As I actually write up the full version of each node, however, I’ll assemble the revelation list: Each clue I include in the full write-up gets listed in the revelation list under the node it’s pointing to (with a cross-reference back to where it’s found).

This allows me to double-check my design process to make sure I’ve got all the clues I need. But it’s also important because, when it comes time to actually run the scenario, it’s the revelation list that’s essential. (I’ll have long since thrown out the clue list.)

(1) I generally don’t care if the PCs have missed the clues in their current location, but I do care intensely about whether or not they’ve missed all the clues that would enable them to find a particular node. That’s what I need to track during actual game play, and it’s also the information that’s more difficult to glean on-the-fly without a properly organized list because…

(2) The information about which clues exist in a given node is already encoded in the text. The clues are listed in the description of the node, right? Because that’s where they are.

In terms of grokking how a particular scenario “works”, though, the revelation list can feel confusing if you’re not familiar with it. For some people, it’s simply more intuitive to look at the list of clues a node contains and then follow where they lead. (This is, after all, how the PCs will conceptually work their way through the scenario.) This is one reason why, when developing the design standard for Infinity scenarios of this type, I included the requirement for both a Revelation List and an Operational Summary (which would explain the sort of “guiding principle” of how the scenario was supposed to function in play).

You don’t necessarily need the Operational Summary, though. You can get the same basic effect from a revelation list: You just need to work backwards.

Look at a node and ask, “How would the PCs get there?” In other words, follow one of the clues on the revelation list back to its source node. Then repeat the process there.

For example, how would the PCs get to the Drow Citadel in the scenario above? Well, let’s pick a random clue: Following the Slave Train from Scene 3: The Drow Camp. So we look at Scene 3 and pick a random node there: Tracking Drow Scouts from their proactive scene. Since that’s a proactive scene, it’s essentially a scenario origin point. It’s the trail head, so to speak, and from the trail we’ve followed we can see that “tracking bad guys through the Old Forest” is one approach to the scenario.

Do it again: You can also get to the Drow Citadel by questioning prisoners from Scene 2: The Black Tree. You can get to the Black Tree by talking to (or stealing intelligence from) the Elven retaliation squads operating in the area. So here we have a path that follows a trail of demihuman misery.

Do this two or three times (or more for more complex scenarios) and you’ll get a pretty good feel for the contours of the scenario structure.

So you’re a GM who wants to run a new gaming system. Maybe you’re a little intimidated because it’s more complex than anything you’ve run before. Maybe it’s your first time prepping to run a game you haven’t previously played. Maybe it’s just something new.

In any case, you want the process to go smoothly. And you want to make as few mistakes as possible. (Although Step #0 is really accepting that mistakes will happen, and that’s okay. That’s part of the process.)

Step #1: Read the Rulebook. Cover to cover. I’m afraid there’s no cheating around this and no shortcuts. If you’re lucky, the RPG you’ve chosen will have a well-organized rulebook, but the process of mentally “touching” every page of the book will not only prevent you from missing a rule entirely, it will also begin constructing a mental map of the rulebook which will allow you to look up information inside it more quickly.

Step #2: Cheat Sheets. Make a cheat sheet. It’s real easy to fake mastery of a rule system when you have it all laid out six inches in front of your face. The act of creating a cheat sheet also enhances your own learning process: It involves “touching” every part of the system a second time, and also requires you to mentally engage with that system and really understand what makes it tick. (A lot of RPGs are also terrible when it comes to technical writing, and the act of boiling a messy text down into a clear cheat sheet will also result in you pre-resolving difficult cruxes that would otherwise booby trap you during play.) The cheat sheet will also often suss out those weird rules that RPG manuals leave lying about in dank corners.

Step #3: Run a One-Shot. If I’m interested in running a long-term campaign in a given system, I’ll virtually never start by jumping directly into that campaign. I’ll run a one-shot (usually with pregens). It allows both me and the players to work out the kinks, and the players gain a lot of valuable context when it comes time for creating their long-term characters.

Step #4: Co-Opt Player Expertise. Do so in every way you can. That includes, “Bob, can you look up the rule for pugilating people?” It also includes defaulting to, “Anybody know the rules for pugilating people?” (instead of defaulting to looking it up yourself). There’s sneakier stuff, too, like, “I can’t figure out how to beat the PCs when they use ability X. So I’m going to design a bunch of bad guys who use ability X, and I’ll see how the players deal with it.”

Step #5: Rules Highlight Sessions. This is something I originally discussed in Random GM Tips: Running the Combat, but for any game with a lot of specialized sub-systems, I’ll very specifically design sessions which highlight a particular sub-system so that we can, as a group, get a lot of focused repetition using it. Often groups struggle with these sub-systems because they only come up once every four or five sessions, which means every time they come up you’ve forgotten the last time you muddle through them and you end up muddling through them again. Having problems with grappling? A whole scenario based around grasping gorillas and their pet pythons will usually lock those rules in for the group. You’ll have increased expertise across the entire group.

Step #6: Set a Reference Time Limit. If you find yourself getting frequently bogged down in the new rules, set a time limit. If you can’t find the answer you’re looking for in 30 seconds (or 60 seconds or whatever feels right to you), make an arbitrary ruling and move on. Be open and clear about what you’re doing with the players, and make a note to review those rules after the session. Then, before the next session, review the correct rules with the group.

Step #7: Identify Your Hierarchy of Reference. This is something I originally discussed in the Art of the Key, but you should try to prep your scenario notes so that everything you personally need is on the page. (This can tie in well with #5.) Where the system cheat sheet gives you the core rules at your fingertips, this technique puts the relevant class abilities, superpowers, creature features, and similar character-specific abilities that are pertinent to the current situation at your fingertips. Over time, recognize when you’ve mastered certain material so that you can refocus your notes on just the stuff that you need now (i.e., “I now know what the Spring Attack feat does, so I can stop copy-pasting that into the NPC stat blocks.”)

A common form of mapping for RPG cities is the block map. For example, here’s the city of Kintargo from the Hell’s Rebels adventure path:

A common mistake when looking at such a map is to interpret each individual outline as being a single building. For example, when I posted a behind-the-scenes peek at how I developed the map for the city of Anyoc years ago, a number of people told me I’d screwed up by leaving too much space between the buildings. Except the map didn’t actually depict any individual buildings: Each outline was a separate block, made up of several different buildings.

When people look at a block map and interpret it as depicting individual buildings, how far off is their vision of the city?

Well, we can actually see this exemplified in a few cases where artists have (in my opinion) misinterpreted block maps. Blades in the Dark, for example, has a block map for the city of Duskwall. Below you can see a sample of that block map (on the left) next to a block map of a section of Paris (on the right).

If it was not self-evident, the interpretation of the Duskwall map as a block map is supported by this description of the city from the rulebook:

The city is densely packed inside the ring of immense lightning towers that protect it from the murderous ghosts of the blighted deathlands beyond. Every square foot is covered in human construction of some kind — piled one atop another with looming towers, sprawling manors, and stacked row houses; dissected by canals and narrow twisting alleys; connected by a spiderweb of roads, bridges, and elevated walkways.

You can see that if you interpret Duskwall’s map as detailing individual buildings, the layout of the city actually becomes far more organized and well-regulated than seems intended by the text. This is, in fact, a common problem when GMs misinterpret block maps: Their vision of the city, and the resulting descriptions are heavily simplified.

For example, when Ryan Dunleavy decided to develop a large version of the Duskwall map, he interpreted each block on the map as being an individual building (or, occasionally, two). Compare the resulting illustration of a single block in Duskwall (on the left) to what a single block in Paris (on the right) actually looks like:

(Please don’t interpret this as some sort of massive indictment of the artist here. Ryan Dunleavy’s cartography is gorgeous, and I recommend backing his Patreon for more of it.)

You can see another example of this with Green Ronin’s Freeport. When first revealed to the world in 2000’s Death in Freeport module, the city was depicted using a rough block map:

In 2002, for the original City of Freeport, this was redone with most of the blocks being represented as individual buildings:

The map was redone again for The Pirate’s Guide to Freeport, this time reinterpreting the original outlines as a block map:

I pull out this example primarily to point out that sometimes a block map outline IS, in fact, a single building. Because some buildings are really big. Or, in other cases, they might represent walled estates, as shown here with the estates along the western edge of the map.

And here’s a real world example of this from Paris with both the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais:

(click for larger size)

The north-south cross section of the Grand Palais is fairly comparable to the Parisian block shown above.

CONCLUSION

My point with all this basically boils down to don’t mistake the map for the territory. One of the great advantages of the block map approach to city mapping is that it leaves so much to the imagination, allowing both you and your players to lay in immense amounts of fractal complexity onto a simple geometric shape.

(Which is not to say that block maps are the be-all or end-all of utility at the gaming table. You can take my copy of Ed Bourelle’s Ptolus map when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.)

And when you miss that opportunity — when your mental image of the block map reduces each geometric shape to a single building — you’re robbing the city of its grandeur, its complexity, and its flexibility.

Take a moment to go back and look at the map of Kintargo, for example. Imagine what that city would look like if each block were, in fact, a single building. What you’ll probably end up with is a modest city still possessed of some good degree of size. But what you should actually end up with in your mind’s eye is this:

This article is a patron request from Robert Rendell. Help support the Alexandrian by visiting my Patreon.

This isn’t the first time I’ve talked about stealth here at the Alexandrian. Much of what I’ve written about is how to adjudicate stealth in a way which makes it a viable strategy for the PCs to pursue: Far too many GMs resolve stealth by having every PC in the group make a Stealth check opposed by the Notice check of every single NPC who could possibly see them. (In some systems it’s even worse, with GMs requiring every PC to make multiple checks opposed by every single NPC that could possibly see them.)

One way of dealing with this is to just have the PCs’ skill at stealth completely outclass the NPCs around them. Even in systems where the PCs are allowed to achieve supreme levels of power, however, this is usually doesn’t happen: The game world too often levels up with them, and because it seems that game designers are generally terribly paranoid about their bad guys NOT noticing the PCs, virtually every single NPC has their Notice checks cranked up through the roof. Even if this was generally true, however, I wouldn’t be entirely satisfied with the results. My goal isn’t to make Stealth automatically successful; it’s to make it viable. I don’t want to take the consequences of failing a Stealth check off the table (they can be interesting); I just don’t want that to be the de facto outcome every time Stealth is attempted (because, in short order, nobody will attempt Stealth any more).

So I generally suggest two broad paradigms when resolving Stealth attempts.

First, reduce the number of required rolls. When you call for a separate check against every single NPC, you’re usually rolling to failure. Avoid that by using let it ride techniques, resolving entire Stealth approaches in a single mechanical resolution. (For an example of how effective this can be in practice, check out Let it Ride on the Death Star.)

Second, reduce the number of people rolling. You’ll note that this also reduces the number of rolls required. If you have seven PCs roll to resolve a Stealth attempt whereas normally only one PC needs to roll a skill in order to accomplish an objective (like opening a locked door, for example), you’ve created a situation very analogous to rolling to failure and with the same unappealing probability curve; you’re just doing it all at once.

Generally speaking, you want to get the Stealth resolution boiled down to a single mechanical check (just like 99% of all other resolution checks you make in the game). One way to do that is to specify that the character with the lowest Stealth skill in the group makes the check. This makes sense because they’re the one pulling the rest of the group down, right? Personally, though, I’m not a fan of this approach. It penalizes the Stealth specialist in a way that other specialists are NOT punished, robbing the Stealth specialist of their well-deserved spotlight. I also think it’s more reasonable to assume that a character skilled in stealth can help their companions sneak into situations that they wouldn’t normally be able to sneak into.

Instead, I like to institute some form of piggybacking. This often requires a little bit of mechanical finagling in the system of your choice, but it’s worth the effort because once you have the mechanical structure you’ll find it coming in useful time and time again. For more discussion on this, check out Group Checks.

A PARADIGM FOR STEALTH

When designing the Infinity Roleplaying Game, I designed a new game structure for resolving stealth. I think it provides a clear paradigm for GMs to use in making rulings about stealth, and I also think you’ll find it easy to adapt to most any game system.

STEALTH STATES: Characters exist in one of three stealth states.

• Revealed characters are visible to their enemies and their precise location is known.
• Detected characters cannot currently be seen by their enemies, but their presence and approximate location are known. (“I heard something in the bushes over there.” or “The shot came from that apartment building!”)
• Hidden characters cannot currently be seen, heard, or otherwise perceived by the enemies. Although an enemy may be aware of their presence, their actual location is not known. (“Someone broke a lock on Entrance 3A. Sweep the building.”)

The states of “detected” and “hidden” are referred to as “stealthy states”.

STEALTH STATE TESTS: When a character in a stealthy state takes an action, they may need to make a stealth state check. Opponents can also take action to force characters in a stealthy state make a stealth state test. (“I’m going to check the warehouse again.”) The exact mechanic you use to resolve a stealth state check will obviously depend on what game you’re using.

STEALTHY ACTIONS: Becoming hidden is an action which requires a stealth state test. Once a character is in a stealthy state, they remain in that state until either they or an opponent takes an action which threatens that state. In general, these actions are not specifically classified. This is not a laundry list; it’s a paradigm that GMs can use to make their rulings.

• A silent action does not change the stealth state of the character performing it.
• A sneaky action requires a stealth state test, which is performed as part of the same action. If the test fails, the character’s stealth state is reduced by one step.
• A noisy action allows opponents to automatically make some form of Observation test (with a difficulty determined by exactly how noisy the action is) in order to detect the character, reducing their stealth state by one step.

Design Note: You’ll probably also want some mechanism by which the reaction to a noisy action can be escalated to a two step reduction: Margin of success or possibly an additional action of some type. In Infinity the Observation test was made at difficulty 0 (making it essentially automatic unless the environment, special equipment, or special training applied a difficulty modifier to the Observation test), and success allowed for an immediate Reaction to force an opposed stealth state test to escalate to a two step loss (immediately revealing a previously Hidden character).

You may also want some mechanism by which stealthy characters can reduce the severity of a stealthy action by one or two steps. In Infinity, for example, you can spend 2 Momentum to reduce a noisy action to a sneaky action or a sneaky action to a silent action. But there are any number of options beyond bennie spends.

COMMON SENSE PREVAILS: Many actions that directly affect a target (like shooting them) will automatically result in a stealthy character becoming detected by the target (even if they perform the attack in perfect silence from a state of impenetrable invisibility). Characters can also choose to simply stop being stealthy, either deliberately or as an obvious consequence to their actions. (“I’m going to walk out into the well-lit parking lot with my hands on my head and shout out my surrender.”)

MANY FORMS OF STEALTH: The Infinity Roleplaying Game takes this paradigm one step further by applying the same core structure to stealthy actions in other contexts (such as the hacking sequences of Infowar scenes and the social confrontations of Psywar scenes). This is part of a wider design methodology I used in Infinity to unify mechanical paradigms and structures in order to keep the system easy to learn and use even though it needed to cover the vast panoply of structures found in a full-blown space opera. (This, however, is a topic for another time.)

STEALTH AND ENHANCED PERCEPTIONS

Something that I think can be a struggle for GMs in general are characters who possess some form of enhanced perception: You’re already trying to keep a consistent picture of the campaign world in your head using the five senses you’re familiar with, and now you suddenly need to also try to imagine that setting through totally alien eyes. There’s a wider discussion to be had about enhanced perceptions in RPGs, but they also clearly have an impact on the rulings you make about stealth specifically.

For example, Eclipse Phase is a game where a truly dizzying array of enhanced perceptions are virtually commonplace. They include (just counting perception of the physical world):

• IR
• UV
• T-Ray
• Radar
• Enhanced Smell
• Electrical Sensitivity
• Magnetic Sensitivity
• Radiation Sense
• Zoom Vision

And this doesn’t even include the more esoteric examples, like the completely bizarre array of senses available to the suryas (space whales).

Often the best way to get a grip on this sort of thing is to take your cue from the resolution: Note that a character has, for example, infrared vision. If they successfully spot someone trying to sneak past them, think about how their infrared vision could have helped them do that and frame your description of what happens accordingly. Conversely, if they fail to spot someone trying to sneak past them, think about how that person could have thwarted their infrared vision (finding a hot background to hide against, for example) and describe accordingly. In doing so you’ll not only be teaching yourself to think about the world in terms of these enhanced perceptions, you’ll also be slowly introducing these concepts to the players. As both you and the players gain expertise over time, these enhanced senses will become integrated into your vision of the game world and you’ll likely begin preemptively taking them into account.

For example, your players might start saying before the check that they’re going to choose an approach that will let them mask their heat signature. When that happens, remember that player expertise can trump character expertise and rule accordingly.

Something else to keep in mind, however, is that enhanced perceptions may not be strictly beneficial; they can also have drawbacks. (Think of the guy in night vision goggles who suddenly gets blinded when the lights get flipped on.) In an e-mail to me, Robert Rendell pointed out the interesting consequences of this:

For creatures who can see fine in the dark (such as most monsters who inhabit unlit areas of dungeons), a nearby light source might not be anywhere near as obvious. If you have darkvision and can already see your surroundings perfectly well, someone bringing a light source near you won’t make much of a difference [i.e., it won’t allow them to see anything they couldn’t already see; it would be like carrying a candle into an already lit room… you might notice, but you might not]. You might start noticing colours, but that’s nowhere near as stark as going from blind to not blind.

Obviously, since darkvision has a fixed range, someone with a light source beyond that range would still tend to stand out. Intelligent creatures with darkvision might take advantage of that, attempting to have guard stations which have more than 60′ of clear sight along straight approaches to their lairs so approaching light sources are more obvious. They could also take other precautions: Having bright colours near their guard stations which will leap out when light is brought near, or even writing “Intruders!” in coloured paint on the wall to alert them when light is nearby.

This is obviously dependent on exactly how you choose to metaphysically interpret “darkvision” (and that might vary from one type of darkvision to another). But it’s a really cool idea, and highlights a way in which you can make this panoply of perceptions in fantastical worlds really come alive, creating a truly unique world with experiences you could never have in the here and now.

Another way to think about this within our wider paradigm for stealth is that actions might be classified differently depending on the senses which are perceiving them: For example, walking through a dark dungeon with a candle in your hand might qualify as a noisy action if someone with normal vision is trying to spot you. But the light might be totally irrelevant to a creature who can perceive the world only through radar, effectively rendering the candle-carrying a silent action vs. those creatures. Whether used in various gradations or as hard binaries, this can give some concrete mechanical oomph to the unique properties of these different types of perception.

Discussions about using published material in your RPG campaign – settings, scenarios, etc. – tend to break down into two camps: Those who eschew it as heresy and those who argue that it’s a necessary time-saving device for many GMs. Where people fall on this spectrum will often vary depending on the type of material being discussed: Many of those who declare all GMs who use published scenarios as unconscionable hacks would nevertheless be completely baffled by someone suggesting that their use of published Monster Manuals betrays their creative weakness and incompetence.

(As you can tell, these are often “fun” discussions.)

I tend to take a third position in this debate: When used properly, high quality material isn’t just a time-saving device or a compromise. It will improve your game and give a result better than what could have been achieved without the third-party material. (Which is not to say that every campaign can or should include published material, because there are other creative agendas to consider.)

I draw an analogy to theater: Yes, it is possible for a theater company to perform nothing but material developed by the people performing it. But the reason theater companies choose to mount productions of Hamlet is that (a) the creative input of the playwright spurs creativity from the other participants that wouldn’t exist without that input; (b) the act of creative interpretation is unique, rewarding, and distinct from blank slate creation; and (c) the specific interpretation of a particular production creates a communal dialogue and shared experience with other productions, which can enhance both the short-term and long-term rewards of the production.

Similarly, when one runs the Tomb of Horrors it’s not just that the module can create experiences the group would not have created on its own: The group can also benefit from the experiences others have had with the module, and the shared experience (for example, being able to swap tales about what happened in your version of the Tomb) can create long-term enjoyment that wouldn’t exist with bespoke material.

More than merely the shared experience, though, I feel that using pre-existing material can have a positive impact on your campaign that extends far beyond the immediate utility of the material itself. One of the primary ways this is true is through the use of reincorporation when adapting the material to your campaign.

CREATING ELEMENTS

Before delving into that, let’s take a moment to discuss what reincorporation is. For any creative element in roleplaying there are three moments of instantiation:

• Creation
• Repetition
• Reincorporation

Creation is the moment at which the element is first conceived. Repetition is when that element is used again. Reincorporation is when the repetition of an element reveals it to have connections to other pre-existing elements.

For example, you create a bounty hunter named Nafassk. Repetition happens when Nafassk shows up again hunting another bounty. Reincorporation happens when you reveal that Nafassk is working for the PCs’ old patron, Prelate Cadal; it happens again when it turns out Nafassk frequents the same tavern the PCs do; it happens again when Nafassk is hired to kill the PCs; and so forth.

(The distinction between “repetition” and “reincorporation” can be a little hard to grok, but notice that repetition of Nafassk only serves to add additional details about Nafassk. When Nafassk is reincorporated into the narrative, on the other hand, it’s not only our understanding of Nafassk which is deepened; we also learn more about Prelate Cadal, the social scene of the tavern is enriched, and so forth.)

Due to the unusual nature of roleplaying games, it should be also noted that the creation-repetition/reincorporation sequence may not match the sequence of how that material is encountered during actual play. One example of this is foreshadowing, in which the GM creates an element for inclusion at Point X in the campaign, and then includes repetitions and/or reincorporations of the material before the players reach Point X as a herald of what’s to come.

Creative personalities often worship in the Cult of the New, and GMs are no exception. It can feel far more exciting to create something shiny and new rather than reincorporating existing material. But reincorporation builds meaning; it builds relationships; it builds significance. Sometimes the joke is funnier when you bring it back than it was the first time.

(This is usually less true of simple repetition, which is why just quoting Monty Python isn’t as funny as when Monty Python throws a wooden rabbit at you.)

Superhero comics understand the balancing act between novelty and reincorporation: It would get boring if Batman faced off against the Joker in every single issue. But the Joker also becomes a richer and more interesting character as a result of his history with Batman.

ADAPTATION THROUGH REINCORPORATION

How does this relate to the use of published material?

For the moment, I’m going to look at this through the lens of published scenarios, although the same advice can apply to the use of other published material. Generally speaking, published scenarios are generic: Their content is obviously self-contained. Every creative element that the published scenario introduces is, by necessity, new to your campaign.

(In many of my published works, including the core style guides for Infinity scenarios, I make a point of including suggestions on how the material in the scenario can be seeded into your campaign before the scenario started – what I call “Groundwork” – and also how elements of the scenario can be carried forward into future scenarios of your campaign. But that’s more the exception than the rule, and it’s still limited to being a one-way transaction.)

What I’m suggesting is that one of the first things you should do when adapting published material to your campaign is to look for ways to reincorporate existing elements of your campaign instead of simply using the new elements introduced by the published material. Does the new scenario feature a vampire villain? Can you use that vampire lord the PCs encountered a couple months ago? Or maybe this new vampire was sired by the vampire lord? Or could you adapt the scenario to feature the lich who’s the primary recurring antagonist instead?

This approach can seem counterintuitive for those who think of published material as primarily being a timesaver, since you’re often ripping out perfectly good material simply to create more work for yourself in tweaking existing elements of the campaign world.

The obvious reason for doing this is that, by reincorporating elements into the scenario, you enrich the scenario: You make it more personal for the PCs. You create deeper meaning. You give the events greater significance.

What may be less obvious is that this works both ways: The pre-existing context of your campaign flows into the published material, but the context of the published material also flows out into your pre-existing material, resulting in long-term value that can last long after the scenario has been completed.

For example, I made the decision early on when developing the Western Lands setting I’ve used for most of my D&D campaigns since 2000 that there would only be one pantheon of gods. And, moreover, that pantheon would consist of exactly nine gods and I knew who all of them were.

This creates a significant limitation for me when adapting pre-existing scenarios which feature religious edifices and institutions. Which, this being D&D, is practically all of them. Often, like Roman cult-looters, I can simply equate the scenario writer’s god with one my own: God of the harvest to my goddess of the harvest, warrior god to my warrior god, and so forth. But each time I do this, my gods and goddesses tend to accrue additional details. It was thus that Vehthyl, the God of Magic, also became the Clockmaker. And Crissa, the Mother, gained the aspect of the Defender, in which form she is often depicted with the Sword of Justice and the Shield of Truth. (And this, in turn, also began to give new light to her relationship with her son, Itor, the God of War.)

When I adapted Rappan Athuk and The Tomb of Abysthor from Necromancer Games to form the heart of another campaign in the setting, I realized it would be useful to have smaller religious cults. This led to the creation of the Saint Cults, which venerated their chosen god through the Saints who had become living conduits of their god’s will. This concept would grow to become so central to the campaign setting that in my Ptolus campaign one of the characters actually became a living saint.

As you can see, this actually works great with cultural aspects of your campaign world. Fictional cultures are often very flat and one-dimensional. Reincorporation through adaptation tends to force the kinds of messy compromises and weird regional variations that you see in real world cultures. And it doesn’t have to be limited to the big, mythological elements: Instead of moving to the new town described in the next adventure module you’re using, add the NPCs and locations in the new material to the PCs’ existing community (and figure out their relationships to the existing community).

The bridges that you can cross with these techniques can be quite large. For example, I once ran a (sadly abortive) campaign mixing the Freeport Trilogy from Green Ronin games with Greg Stolze’s City of Lies for Legend of the Five Rings. Blending the byzantine Eastern politics and Opium Wars of City of Lies added incredible depeth to the Mythos-infused pirate town of Freeport.

And it’s really those surprises – those unexpected juxtapositions and compromises out of which immense creativity erupts – that makes this technique so incredibly rewarding.