Buy Me a CoffeeRandom Adventure Generator
| Theme | Action/Adventure |
| This is the most common and straightforward sort of adventure there is. In the Action/Adventure scenario, you present your characters with a task and then confront them with obstacles to overcome in order to accomplish the task successfully. | |
| Goal | Thwart Monstrous Plan |
| This is a classic fantasy-adventure plot: The characters learn of some horrible plan made by a monstrous enemy, and must thwart it before the kingdom is lost or the world is destroyed. This is an epic goal, and usually requires that the characters go to all sorts of places, rounding up allies and artifacts, before being strong enough to face their enemy. | |
| Story Hook | Mystery Woman |
| Create an NPC "mystery woman" sure to be fascinating to your hero and have her keep appearing inexplicably in his life. As he becomes interested and investigates her, he keeps stumbling across the villain's plans and becomes inextricably mired in the plot. (For female player-characters, the Mystery Man is just as useful.) | |
| Plot | Accumulation of Elements |
| In this sort of plot, the heroes have to go from place to place -- perhaps covering very little area like a city, perhaps roaming the known world -- and accumulate elements to be used against the Master Villain. These elements may be clues, pieces of an artifact, evidence, or allies. | |
| Climax | Throne Room Duel |
| This is set up much like the Scattered Duels, except that you don't separate the heroes. It's harder to control whom fights who in this situation... but if it doesn't matter who has the final duel with the Master Villain, this is a classic climax choice. | |
| General Setting | Alternate Plane |
| Most of the story takes place in an alternate dimension; this implies that either the PCs or the villains, or both, have magic powerful enough to bridge the dimensional barrier, or that the PCs stumble across some dimensional portal. | |
| Specific Setting I | Caves of Magical Folk |
| These can be either beautiful, glittering homes of gorgeous magical peoples, or the dank and terrifying lairs of horrible monsters. | |
| Specific Setting II | Mansion of a Lord |
| This can be the home of a villain -- the characters may have to break in and rescue someone or steal evidence, or break out if they've been captured -- or of a heroic ally, in which case it may be used as the headquarters for the heroes' plans and activities. | |
| Master Villain | Conqueror |
| This character is moving his army in to take over; that's what he lives for. He's been the enemy of your characters' nation's ruler, and has launched a full-scale invasion of your characters' favorite nation. The heroes have to beat their way through or elude his hordes of soldiers in order to get at him; better yet, they might lead their own nation's troops against his and outthink him in military fashion. | |
| Minor Villain I | Hard-Eyed Advisor |
| This is the sort of villain whom the heroes see in the Master Villain's throne room. He's hard-eyed and scary; life means nothing to him and he enjoys killing. He's also a good advisor to his master. | |
| Minor Villain II | 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. | |
| Ally/Neutral | Merry Minstrel |
| This character follows the heroes in order that he might find inspiration for his song and storytelling. He can't be shut up; he sings all the day long and into the night, is a showoff before crowds, and is far too noisy for a party trying to remain unobserved. | |
| Monster Encounter | Stampede |
| Should the heroes ever cross plains or prairies, their villainous enemies may wish to stampede a herd of large animals at them. Alternatively, beasts in the forest may be stampeded by fires set by the villains; in this case, it will not be one sort of animal charging through, but a mixture of terrified forest animals, from the smallest fox-cub to the largest bear. | |
| Character Encounter | Bureaucrat |
| Some time in their adventure, the heroes must deal with the local government and run into that most horrible of nuisance monsters, the bureaucrat and his red-tape dispenser. The heroes don't have the right forms. When they have the right forms, they forgot to fill them out in triplicate. And so on. | |
| Deathtrap | Mutually Assured Destruction |
| In this very nasty deathtrap, the heroes are bound up in such a manner that any one of them may get free of his bonds -- but when he does, all his friends perish. Obviously, the heroes' task is to find some way for everyone to get out alive. Perhaps an intricate series of cooperative rope-cutting will defuse the trap; perhaps a coordinated maneuver will get everyone free as the trap is being sprung. | |
| 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 | Comet's Progress |
| Events during the adventure may be enlivened by a large and menacing comet which appears in the night sky for several days during the scenario; the locals take it for an omen of doom. The comet may be the result of magic being used by the Master Villain, or the comet's appearance can pertain to an old legend involving the Master Villain. | |
| Secret Weakness | Holy Symbol |
| The villain may have the traditional weakness to a specific holy symbol -- but don't choose just an ordinary one. It may be a holly symbol no longer used by the church, or may be some forgotten variation of the current symbol. (For instance, the cross may not work, but a variation -- such as the Roman cross -- might; alternatively, it might have to be a holy symbol which has undergone some unfamiliar ritual.) | |
| Special Condition | Coping with a Curse |
| The curse might be making the hero progressively uglier, might be draining out his life-force (he's losing experience which will be retruned if he succeeds), or might be making him progressively insane. Each day, as he sees his reflection in a mirror or pond or fountain, he'll know himself to be less than he used to be. | |
| Moral Quandry | Honor Quandry |
| You want to use this on the character with the most strongly developed sense of personal honor -- someone who has lived all his life by a strict code. Toward the end of the adventure, this character realizes that the best way to defeat the Master Villain is a violation of that code. For instance, the character might be a paladin, who discovers that the only possible way for the heroes to defeat the Master Villain is to sneak up on him and stab him in the back. | |
| 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 | Mission is a Ruse |
| In the course of their adventuring, the heroes discover they have been tricked into performing a mission which helps the Master Villain. |
Based upon tables from the Dungeon Master's Design Kit by TSR, Inc.