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 | Survive Environment |
| The characters could end up in a hostile environment which they must cross -- a desert, a jungle, or other hostile setting. In the course of the adventure they'll need to find food and water, resist the elements, and perhaps fight off attacks of the natives. | |
| Story Hook | Pressing Buttons |
| As a general story-hook approach, think about the player-character -- his personal goals and his personal dislikes. If the hero is pursuing a specific goal, you have one of the minor villains, as a side-effect of the villain's master plan, thwart the hero's latest step towards that goal. Alternatively, if there's something the hero truly hates to see, have it happen -- and have the villains be responsible. | |
| 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 | On the Road |
| Most of the adventure takes place on the road, as the heroes are travelling from place to place. This is especially good for adventures where heroes are investigating a wide-ranging mystery, are part of a caravan, or are being pursued by loathesome villains. | |
| Specific Setting I | Demi-human Community |
| In wilderness areas, this will be a large community of demi-humans -- elves, dwarves, halflings, whatever -- or intelligent nonhumans such as orcs. If your action is taking place in a city, this could be a hidden community (such as a secret underground dwarf community) or a section of the city inhabited mostly by demi-humans. | |
| Specific Setting II | Palace of the King |
| The heroes could be here for many, many different reasons: Trying to get a favor from the ruler, part of some nobleman's retinue, members of the palace guard, sneaking in to save the ruler from assassins, sneaking in to assassinate the ruler, thrown into the dungeon for crimes they did or didn't commit, etc. | |
| Master Villain | Lovable Rogue |
| This Master Villain isn't really evil -- he's just chaotic and fun. Cheerful bandits in the forest who rob from the rich and give to the poor, singing and rope-swinging pirate kings, and romantic, sophisticated duellists all belong to the category of the Lovable Rogue. Often, the Rogue will not be behind the nastiness the heroes are encountering; he may be in competition with them for the prize they're seeking. Often the heroes and the Rogue (and his minions) will have to team up to succeed at their task. Just as often, the Rogue will try to get away with the whole treasure. | |
| Minor Villain I | Inquisitor |
| This villain is the one who interrogates the heroes and NPCs captured by the villains. He accompanies the other Minor Villain out into the field and works on anyone captured; he enjoys inflicting pain and suffering. | |
| Minor Villain II | 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. | |
| Ally/Neutral | Villain Ally |
| For some reason, the heroes find themselves in the company of a villain. Perhaps he's a minion of this adventure's master villain; he may be guiding the heroes to wherever they must leave a ransom, or, if the master villain is forcing the heroes to perform some mission, this villain ally is along to make sure they do it right. Whatever the reason, he's competent, unpredictable, and out for himself. | |
| 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 | Mean Drunk |
| The Mean Drunk works much like the Belligerent Soldier except that he's not as tough, is of course drunk, and is usually accompanied by other Mean Drunks. | |
| 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 | Endurance |
| The Endurance Chase is not some sort of climactic chase -- it's a rugged, tiring, persistent pursuit that tests the characters to their limits. In this chase, the heroes and villains are pursuing one another across a lot of territory and they're not catching up with one another very fast. This may be a horseback pursuit across a hundred miles of savannah, a camel chase across several days' worth of desert, or a chase across arctic tundra. | |
| Omen/Prophesy | Hero Fulfills Prophecy |
| This is the most useful sort of prophecy. In the early part of the adventure, one of the heroes discovers that he fulfills some ancient prophecy. | |
| 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 | No Hurting the Villain |
| For some reason, the heroes cannot afford to fight the villain directly. For instance, what if a demon possesses the body of the child of one of the characters, or a very important child spoken of in prophecy, one without whom the world will perish? | |
| Moral Quandry | Ally Quandry |
| You set up the situation so that the heroes have a good chance at defeating the Master Villain if they get the aid of two specific individuals, probably experts in fields relating to the villains' activities. But the two experts hate one another and refuse to work together, even if it costs them their world. | |
| Red Herring | False Path to the Artifact |
| Once again, if the heroes have had too easy a time finding the artifact capable of destroying the villain, give them trouble this way: When they get to the place where the artifact is supposed to be contained, they find the coffer or chamber or whatever empty, obviously looted by robbers, who have scrawled such remarks as "Kelrog was here!" upon the walls. | |
| 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.