If they’ve just slogged through the Chamber of Eyes (up to their eyeballs in goblinoids) and are on their way to the Horned Hold (where they’ll be up to their eyeballs in duergar) it can be a refreshing chance to stumble on some grells or rust monsters or… you get the idea.

I dunno, I guess I probably over plan and my PCs might be happy with only one path, and sometimes that is fine, but I like to think I make them think about their actions… anywho, sorry to ramble, great posts everyone! thanks!

In my game, I’ve gotten rid of random encounter, I hand wave overland travel and give xp on the assumption that they did have encounters off camera, and really look at fiughts to see if they are completely necessary.

But you are right…

But, as I said, every encounter should have a purpose. The lion’s share should be tied to the current plot, and should be furthering it in some way. A few, though–probably no more that two or three in an adventure with 15 encounters–should not. They can be there to add color to the world, to introduce an enemy faction that you plan to use later, or they could be a form of the spaghetti method: throw a few different encounters at the PCs and see which one “sticks”; that is, which one do they latch on to the most? That’s a plot hook for future use.

(This comment, by the way, is totally going up as a post on my own blog. Don’t worry, NewbieDM; I’ll link back to this post.)

Other than just liking the idea of an epic adventure, my excuse is that I don’t want to railroad the players, but because of how I’ve set up the plot, the players themselves end up only wanting to focus on the narrow parts of the story. In essence, they ended up railroading themselves to fit the story. This could very well be just a statement about my specific story line, but the basic premise remains: don’t worry about the epic-ness of a story, especially if it involves random, non-plot related elements/challenges/battles. Instead, I need to think about how I can make the story better. I’d much rather have a great short adventure than a lengthy boring snoozer.

You can either start them as a drama, or a traditional English mystery book, where you get to know the NPC, and slowly get dragged into the story where things starts to unwrap, or you can start them as a modern action movie, or any James Bond movie, or a modern thriller, you start with a bang or a teaser. In your case, the adventure starts on the way to the town where the wizard will hire the PCs, and the adventure starts with a combat encounter, with those cultists, on the way in, not out.

There is one good reason to start with an action encounter, you will get the adrenaline pumping for your players, getting their full attention directly.

I know that teaser is not possible in every situation, but a healthy warmup never hurts. A teaser can also be an akward and dangerous situation, like being on a sinking ship in a storm, or in a blizzard in a mountain pass where evil lurks, and it should always tie into the adventure with clues.

// Totte