There are three ways a DM and players decide to start an adventure, and in some ways, that comes down to how picky the players are.
There’s a point to all this that both players and DM’scan learn from, and I’m going to begin the explanation by using a cooking analogy.
Many table-top role-playing games, whether you are using a sandbox approach or have a more scripted idea, are a bit like being a home chef. You’ve got company coming over, but you have no idea what they’ll want to eat. In this analogy, you are the DM and your dinner guests are the players.
Are you with me so far?
So, you stock your pantry, freezer, and refrigerator with a fairly broad selection of foods. You make sure you can handle most dishes, but don’t waste much time or money getting obscure ingredients or esoteric cooking gear.
Your guests arrive and ask, “What’s for dinner?”
That’s kind of like what beginning a D&D campaign can be like. So, let’s end the food metaphor and get into some gaming perspective that can make your job easier.
Three Ways to Start and Adventure
Most table-top roleplaying games like D&D fall into one of three categories:
I call these: DM’s Choice, The Menu, and The Picky Eater.
So let’s talk about the first category of adventure starts, DM’schoice.
DM’s Choice
In my experience, the type of player who says, “Run whatever adventure you think is best,” falls into one of two categories:
First, the player is a complete newbie, which means they’ve never played the game before and have no clue where to start or even what they can do. So they rely on you as the game master to show them a good time based on your best judgment. You might ask them some questions to get a sense for what their preferences are, such as “Do you want a sneaking type of adventure, where stealth matters more than combat or social interaction?” or maybe “Do you want to bash skulls and not even bother taking names?”
The other type of the “DM’s choice” category of player is someone showing up for a one-shot. Maybe they’ve played before, but have never been a player at your table, so they kind of leave it up to you to “give it your best shot.” Again, you might ask some leading questions to get a sense for the type of adventure they’ll enjoy most, but in the end, they leave it up to you to decide what to run.
Picky and Specific
The opposite end of the adventure starts spectrum is players who request a very specific type of adventure, or an adventure with very specific elements.
They might have a character with a cool backstory and they really want to run them through an adventure where that backstory plays center stage.
Or they saw something on YouTube or read about a particular adventure scenario that sounds really cool, and they want the group to run through that.
I’ve had another variation back in the late 80s when one of my players purchased a copy of a published module and wanted me to run it for the group. It was Ghost Tower of Inverness, by the way. The player assured me they only read the blurb on the back and didn’t read any of the key details inside, but if they did, I couldn’t tell.
And sometimes, if you’re a DM getting paid to run a game, the players hiring you will make a specific request, but it’s usually a bit more general around one of the three pillars, like “We want a session that entails a lot of social interaction.” I’ve never run a paid campaign before, but I have run one-shots for groups on request where the players were pretty specific about what they wanted.
I also ran a game for a teen player whose parents asked me to run a bespoke D&D game for them and their friends as a kind of birthday present. It was entirely up to me to decide what to run. As you can guess, I made sure the birthday boy was the focus of the adventure, and they had a total blast.
Choose From a Menu
The largest group by volume, which sits right in the middle of the bell curve, is the one who are happy to express their preference but want to choose from a set of options that you present. A lot of campaigns start this way. Here’s an example:
The party starts out in a town and they meet up in a tavern. After a bunch of ale and hearing about each other’s background, you as the DM present some quest hooks. One might be that a brawl takes place in the tavern and the party gets hauled off to the local keep to spend a night in jail. While inside, one of the other inmates tells them of a possible treasure hoard in the ruins a few miles away, and asks if the party will go along for protection and a share of the loot.
Or maybe the innkeeper tells them a rumor of a haunted mine nearby. Some local children went missing and they suspect they went exploring in the mine looking for ghosts and got lost or injured.
The classic is that the party looks at a bulletin board posted somewhere in town and it contains a half dozen adventure ideas, such as being hired to find a prized pig, being asked to escort a VIP, or being quested by the local lord to find a rare item, that sort of thing.
I have learned that most players tend to prefer the ‘pick from a menu’ option. They don’t know what they don’t know, and it’s often easier for most people to pick from a selection of choices than it is to truly make a request off the top of their head.
It’s like that old saying, ‘it’s easier to edit than to create.’ And picking from a menu is easier than describing a dish from scratch. I know I promised to stop using food analogies, but that one really applied.
This concept is true even in a pure sandbox campaign where the party can literally go anywhere and do anything. They still need to know what’s in the area so they can choose their destination. Having a map of the area and a short list of prominent NPCs can really help.
Preferences
It’s not uncommon for experienced DMs and experienced players to run through all three of these types of adventure starts. It really depends on the situation, of course, but I’ve found that newbie players tend to need a bit more handholding for their first few adventures before they really get the hang of the game.
Of the three types, DM’s choice, choose from a menu of options, or totally spec’d out adventure, which do you prefer? Are you a player, DM, or both? Some lucky DMs get to come out from behind the DM screen once in a blue moon and actually participate as a player.
