TEXT: How To Write Adventures That Don’t Suck 
  Goodman Games Gen Con 2007 Seminar 
   
  Moderator: Joseph Goodman 
   
  Agenda: 
  • Panelist introduction 
  • Audience intentions: to be published? to improve home games? 
  • Talking points, in no particular order 
  o Adventure writing process: drafts, playtests, and final manuscripts 
  o Verisimilitude: a realistic sense of fantasy 
  o Using all five senses in the dungeon 
  o Seeing the encounter as a scene in a movie/novel/video game 
  o Keeping adventures fresh: revisiting unused monsters, rules, and 
  environments 
  o Great maps 
  o Quality control: Playtesting! Editing! Know those rules! 
  o The “Things I Look For” document (attached) 
   
  Panelists: 
  Chris Doyle 
  Michael Ferguson 
  Luke Johnson 
  Brendan LaSalle 
  Jason Little 
  Adrian Pommier 
  Harley Stroh 
   
  Things I Look for In An Adventure Submission 
  By Joseph Goodman 
   
  This is a list of things I look for when I get a submission for the Dungeon Crawl Classics 
  line. A good adventure doesn’t need to have all of these items. But most good adventures 
  do have many of them. 
   
  • A sense of the fantastic. Convey this through encounters, descriptions, and most 
  importantly, magic. The fantastic is what makes D&D so much fun, and that has to 
  come across in the adventure. 
  • Memorable encounters. Avoid repetition. Consider all aspects of an encounter: 
  timing, environment, opponents, hazards, battle conditions, and so on. Think about 
  templates, feats, equipment, magic items, and spells as ways to make opponents 
  interesting. Try to come with ideas for rooms that players will still be talking about 20 
  years from now. 
  • Hard work on thinking out great encounters. Dungeons with stirges, darkmantles, 
  chokers, rust monsters, orcs, and other no-brainer monsters strike me as lazy. The job 
  
  of a published author is to produce material that the typical DM at home could not 
  produce. Don’t submit derivative dungeons. 
  • New twists on old classics. Don’t throw in a rust monster. Instead, make it a rust 
  spider that climbs walls. Players will never suspect that the reddish-brown spider 
  attacking them actually has the same stats as a rust monster. Surprise the players! 
  • “Easter eggs” – at least one well-hidden room with a cool treasure of some kind, 
  accessible only to very diligent or very lucky PCs. 
  • Intelligent treasure. Why give gold when you can give art objects? The treasure 
  should match the villains and location. Sometimes the best treasure is information, 
  because information leads to more adventures. The classic example is a treasure map; 
  other options include blackmail lists, diaries and journals, or spell books with new 
  spells requiring rare adventure-worthy components. 
  • A good villain. Not every dungeon crawl needs one, but the best ones often have 
  them. The adventure has to establish a strong emotional framework for the villain, 
  too; it’s not enough for him to just be “another evil necromancer.” 
  • Sequel potential. The DM should be able to continue the plot threads begun in this 
  adventure to create future adventures for his campaign. 
  • Distinctive levels. Each level of the dungeon should feel distinct from the ones before 
  and after it. They shouldn’t blend together. 
  • A strong narrative feel. Usually this is a buildup with a climax in a big encounter at 
  the end, but that formula can be varied. Regardless, focus on an encounter list that 
  forms a storyline that reads like a great adventure novel. 
  • Secret doors. Every dungeon needs at least one secret door, preferably hidden in a 
  place the PCs won’t think to look. Secret doors at the bottom of pit traps, secret trap 
  doors mounted in the ceiling above normal doors... think of ways to fool the players. 
  • Thought requirements. There should be at least one puzzle. That doesn’t necessarily 
  mean a riddle. It could be a room that’s hard to figure out, or a strange new monster 
  that can only be defeated in a special way that’s alluded to elsewhere in the dungeon. 
  • Good pacing. Long, tiresome combats should be followed by quick rooms. Thought-
  provoking puzzles should be followed by bloodbaths. Slow, trap-filled hallways 
  should be followed by a rousing fight. 
  • Group involvement. Meter the action so there’s an even mix of involvement by all 
  character classes. 
  • A twist, preferably at the end. Establish PC expectations through read-aloud text, then 
  use those expectations against them to create plot twists. 
  • Subplots. Subplots vary widely, but the best ones have a few things in common. First, 
  they involve several PCs in an ongoing drama of some kind. Second, they create 
  mystery or intrigue. Third, they lead to potential future adventures.  
  • New monsters. A new monster that throws off the characters is good (as opposed to 
  simply duplicating the role of an existing monster, which is a waste of space). 
  • A “cut to the chase” feeling – start with a bang and get to the action fast. Don’t waste 
  time on empty rooms unless they really add something. 
  • Intelligent ecology. Most monsters need to eat, sleep, and drink. Dungeons should 
  allow for this fact. 
  • Atmosphere. The dungeon should have a strong, cohesive vibe of some kind, whether 
  dangerous, or evil, or disturbing, or reptilian, or whatever. 
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/_GM Books/World Building & Game Design/Game Mastering and Design/How To Write Adventures That Don%3ft Suck.pdf