So this is cross-posted with my blog. I'm pondering ideas about the development of the RPG adventure. This is something that isn't explicit in character creation and action resolution rules, but is an absolutely vital part of the game. i.e. How does the GM prepare and run a game? What do characters do?

Here is my list of adventure models:

Location Crawl
Not necessarily in a dungeon, this technique is having a keyed map where each marked location on the map has a static description. According to the plan, whenever the players go to location #17, they will find what is in the key for location #17. This is the approach of original D&D/AD&D for both dungeons and towns. Note that the players control the pacing here.

Battlegrounding
This technique usually uses a mapped location, but there is little description or detail (i.e. the location is not interesting in itself). Instead, a set of NPCs are described and given objectives. This is used in some Traveller (1977) adventures but most notably in Champions (1981). Here control of pacing can go either way, depending which side is the aggressor. Champions is very character-centric. The guide for an adventure is the set of NPC villain character sheets, not a map.

Timetabling
This technique has a mapped location, but rather than static descriptions, what the players find at the locations depends on a timetable of what the NPCs will do. The problem here is that NPC behavior after the PCs interfere with them is unclear. This is used in several Top Secret (1980) adventures and Thieves Guild (1984) adventures. Here the GM has more control over the pacing, though the players still have a fair amount.

Trailblazing
This is a technique of having a series of disconnected locations, where each location has an encounter as well as clues which lead to the next location. The players are free to wander but there is nothing of interest prepared outside of the trail. This is to some degree extremely linear. However, the players can engage in diversions and subplots of their own devising between locations. This is used in certain outdoor adventures such as Gamma World (1978). This lacks the direction-choosing of a location crawl, but shares the player control of pacing.

Hybrid
It is worth noting that there have been a number of adventures which use a mix of mobile NPCs and static encounters. Notable is the seminal adventure for AD&D, Ravenloft (1983). This combines the Champions approach of having a mobile master villain (the vampire Strahd) with many lesser location-based encounters. It added in randomized fortunes within the landscape. James Bond 007 adventures tend to combine the trailblazing and timetabling approaches -- i.e. a mostly linear sequence of locations along with a villain timetable.

Illusionism
This is a technique of trying to bring GM-controlled pacing into Trailblazing, often intended for more cinematic feel. This is also prepared as a series of encounters, but the GM is encouraged to use a variety of techniques to quickly bring the PCs to the next encounter. One is "Schroedinger's NPC" -- which means preparing an encounter with indeterminate location, so that wherever the PCs choose to go, that's where the next encounter is. Another is "Waiting in the Wings" -- which is where something happens as soon as the PCs show up. This is used explicitly in Torg (1990), Feng Shui (1996), Deadlands (1996), and many other games.

Branching
This is a variant of trailblazing where a number of different paths are prepared. A good example is Millenium's End (1992), which explicitly presents the Clue Trees as a technique and uses it in adventures.

Relationship Mapping
This is a technique where locations are not particularly detailed, but instead NPCs are. The characters then move between one character encounter and another, collecting information and interactions. This was first attempted in Vampire: The Masquerade (1991) -- notably the sample adventure in first edition was a social gathering where the characters were all described but the house was not. Some later adventures had graphical relationship maps of NPCs showing relationships. This was developed more explicitly in the "Sorcerer's Soul" supplement for Sorcerer (2001) and Dogs in the Vineyard (2004). It is aided by rules which allow either the GM or the players to skip to declaring that the PC or PCs encounter a particular character, regardless of location (i.e. Scene Framing).

Randomized Events
This is a set of techniques which can be added to any of the above. It tends to add interest and boost pacing, but can interfere with controlled pacing and plot development. The simplest is D&D's random rolls for wandering monsters. On a more sophisticated level, the original two Ravenloft modules also incorporated random fortune telling and card draws into the plot.

Bangs
This is a technique of the GM (or possibly players) throwing in defined events into the adventure structure. I would trace this back to Ars Magica's Whimsy Cards. It explicitly appears as a GM technique in Sorcerer (1998).

There are a number of questions in my mind about developments here, since there are an awful lot of modules which I haven't seen. For example, I can see from Ravenloft adventures how the hybrid approaches of the original Ravenloft and Ravenloft II turned into more Illusionist adventures of later Ravenloft in AD&D2. But there are probably lots of development bits that I'm missing here.

Comments?

Where does a structure like that of Dogs in the Vineyard come in?

There aren't specific Bangs for the players, but there is a situation to which they address themselves, and that situation has a structure that is topologically complex, so that considering its permutations (through the act of judgment) is an enjoyable pastime in and of itself.

Sounds like what John labled "Battlegrounding".

a set of NPCs are described and given objectives.

TonyLB wrote: Where does a structure like that of Dogs in the Vineyard come in?

There aren't specific Bangs for the players, but there is a situation to which they address themselves, and that situation has a structure that is topologically complex, so that considering its permutations (through the act of judgment) is an enjoyable pastime in and of itself.

Yeah. Dogs' towns are just plain relationship maps.

-Vincent

What about winging it? Is that just an extension of Bangs?

yrs--
--Ben

Wow, sorry... Dogs is even listed and everything. Somehow my eyes and/or brain skipped right over it. Gotcha.

Heya,

I might add this one:

Experiementing
PCs are scientists and/or magi who are locked in their laboratories searching out the secrets of esoteric phenomonon. Play largely revolves around resource gathering, experimentation, and research. Conflict can come from the dangers of going insane, negotiating for rare resources, experiments going awry, or a rival scientist/magus sabotaging the PCs. I think Ars Magica is an example of how this game might work. I know it can also be done with Rolemaster.

Peace,

-Troy

Is this intended as an exhaustive list, or just a set of some of the most common structures? Because, if so, I can't see where InSpecres, Universalis, Capes, or Breaking the Ice would fit in.

Ben Lehman wrote: What about winging it? Is that just an extension of Bangs?

Troy_Costisick wrote: Experiementing
PCs are scientists and/or magi who are locked in their laboratories searching out the secrets of esoteric phenomonon. Play largely revolves around resource gathering, experimentation, and research. Conflict can come from the dangers of going insane, negotiating for rare resources, experiments going awry, or a rival scientist/magus sabotaging the PCs. I think Ars Magica is an example of how this game might work. I know it can also be done with Rolemaster.

Andrew Morris wrote: Is this intended as an exhaustive list, or just a set of some of the most common structures? Because, if so, I can't see where InSpecres, Universalis, Capes, or Breaking the Ice would fit in.

John Kim wrote: It's not intended as exhaustive

I think that Soap, Pantheon, most of Prime Time Adventures, and Universalis could probably fit into a separate category.

"Communal" - All players take turns introducing scenes, events, or NPCs (where 'take turns' could be determined by round robin, spending of resources, or other means) and then playing them out.

The case of InSpectres is partway between this and Trailblazing (at least the way I've played it). The basic structure of an adventure is the Trailblaze, but the clue-glue that holds scenes together is introduced on the fly, usually by one of the players, leading clearly to the next scene.

You say that any of these styles can be winged. My question is, does it matter to the structure of the adventure whether the events/triggers are set in advance by the GM and by and large stuck to or whether GM behind the scenes readjusts, shifts and retrofits these during play?

Or is winging it just another aspect of Illusionism?

Albert of Feh wrote: I think that Soap, Pantheon, most of Prime Time Adventures, and Universalis could probably fit into a separate category [:] "Communal"

Games like Universalis, Capes, and Prime Time Adventures (I don't know anything about Soap or Pantheon) could be categorized as "morphic," for lack of a better term. The adventure structure would be defined simply by its own changeable nature, rather than the communal nature of the game. I have a distaste for defining something by the lack of the definitional characteristic, but that's just me.

I don't see InSpectres or Breaking the Ice fitting into this potential category, though. While they may be communally created, they do have their own structures.

Hm, actually, I'm going to retract my 'communal' idea. If these categories are defined as being agnostic with regards to who's actually introducing the relevant aspects of the scenario structure (which seems to be the case, except for Illusionism and Branching), then many of the games named fit in.

InSpectres fits fairly well into Trailblazing.

Universalis could be any of them, depending on what the group does; I could see a Trailblazing detective story a la InSpectres, an RMap scenario (acting like Legends of Alyria and building the cast before most of direct play starts), or even a location crawl where the location is either defined like the RMap I mentioned or just grown organically as things go along (which would remind me somewhat of Donjon too).

Pantheon's scenaros are pretty straight RMap.

Prime Time Adventures is another one that seems like it could be flexible, even on an episode-by-episode basis, though I can't see it supporting Location Crawl or Timetabling very well.

I don't know enough about Capes to comment.

Maybe Capes is just everyone sitting around and trying to come up with good Bangs to throw at each other? That's not just a function of the distributed GM powers, but also of the the incentive system: Generally, you get more reward for either winning or losing a hard-fought conflict than you do for winning something no other player cared to contest.

If anyone is passionate to dissect Capes in particular, though, we should probably start another thread instead of further hijacking John's.

This is a great summary, John.

I will say that one thing that attracted me to the Forge was that my friend Del was using the relationship map technique by 1985 at the latest, and I never understood what he was doing until he got here. I have an old adventure (which I ran an updated version of two years ago for one of my DitV players) he wrote that counts as evidence, I suppose. I never understood completely what he was doing until I got here. He used to give me character sheets with lists of important NPCs, which I was then supposed to play as his GM. I wish we'd published and thought harder about some of this stuff at the time, given the excitement that similar ideas are generating here now so much later.

I think in general it's going to be hard to peg the absolute origin of a technique outside of published texts, because there was just so much innovation already in the seventies and early eighties (bad rules-texts helped) that people dealt with in their home games in a variety of idiosyncratic ways.