I'm one of those GM's who likes to have a short adventure in every product (2-3 pages), and a page or 2 or 3 of well fleshed out "seeds"; my personal all time favorite RPG supplement was for Classic Traveller: 76 Patrons.

a hook, an intro, and 6 "Potential Situations", each of which was a different "seed"; players had no clue which of the 6 (often radically different) possible baselines.

an example:

Players: A merchant crew.
Who: A Vulcan merchant captain.
Where: any border port along Romulan space, in the bar or lounge. Preferably near

Intro: The captain, Tepok, walks up to the crew, and adresses the one who looks most in charge. "Would you be a captain with good Romulan papers, willing to take a high-risk venture?" If the crew has such a person, or is willing to run the zone, he will ask them to take a load of Terran liquour to a Romulan border colony, and bring him back half of the payment, which is in Romulan Ale. He can't go because he will not lie and take his employer's ship where he has been prohibited from going.

Situations:
1) Everything is exactly as it seems. Tepok knows he will be asked, and wishes tto maintain his contact despite being prohibited from directly continuing the relationship. Success will bring annual repeats of the trip.
2) Tepok has chosen not to go, rather than being prohibited from so doing, as he faces criminal charges on the other end.
3) Tepok is under orders from GIA to get a spy inserted. The spy will be amidst the cargo.
4) Tepok is a Romulan spy, and is sending reports back in the cargo (Possibly on the labels). Everything will be suspiciously easy.
5) Tepok wants to go along; he's planning to defect to the romulans, and will claim his ship is damaged and awaiting repairs. The return cargo (and hence payment) is non-existant.
6) as 5, but Tepok is actually a returning Romulan spy. The PC's will never return unless they can think fast.

By F. Douglas Wall (Knarf) on Monday, March 29, 2004 - 01:54 pm: Edit

If anyone is still reading this topic, please put together something other than the "paint-by-numbers" adventures that are finding themselves in print.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 29, 2004 - 07:49 pm: Edit

The problem is that adventures do not sell in the market (except for paint by numbers, and then only as part of something much bigger).

By George M. Ebersole (George) on Wednesday, March 31, 2004 - 08:39 pm: Edit

What's the format for one of these Adventure Moduals, and how would a good piece of fiction fit in?

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, April 01, 2004 - 12:41 am: Edit

George; I have never seen one, so I have no clue what they look like. I guess when you finish yours we'll all know.

By Spencer Rathbun (Spencerr) on Saturday, April 02, 2005 - 02:40 pm: Edit

What's paint by numbers?

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Saturday, April 02, 2005 - 03:01 pm: Edit

Paragraph 29. If you kiss the Orion slave girl, go to paragraph 2. If you shoot the Klingon, go to Paragraph 99. If you run out the door, go to Paragraph 47.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Sunday, April 03, 2005 - 12:09 am: Edit

F.D.W.:

I would like to say that paint by numbers is a lot more work because of the number of blind alleies, and any Referee worth his salt can read the adventure through, then read the paragraph during play then read out something different ( more detailed ) and thus tailor the adventure to the players. A non paint by numbers adventure is very hard to simply run through "by the book".


If you want a non paint by numbers adventure I commend you consider writting one. Just looking at my spelling and typos; anyone can do it.

By F. Douglas Wall (Knarf) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 03:12 am: Edit

The main issue I have with the "paint by numbers" adventures is that they read like those "Choose your own adventure" books that were popular when I was a kid. I feel that they are more about making the "right" decision rather than making "in-character" decisions. Not as conducive to roleplay as they could be. True, a GM could help with things like that, but the "paint by numbers" stuff seems designed to be GMless.

I would have no problem submitting adventures for publication if I had any. Unfortunately, I do too much GMing to put that much effort into something I'm not running. When I do run PD, I'll try and put something out there.

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 08:00 am: Edit

MJC. I have to agree with FDW here. As a GM, I always prefered a more open format for "off the shelf" adventures that I run rather than "fixed-linear" or "PBN." Give me descriptions for every area of the adventure and I'll handle how the adventure interacts with the party's actions.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 09:38 am: Edit

I regard paint by numbers adventures as solo affairs, amusing things to do when you're alone. They CAN be used by GMs. While almost every one of them I have ever seen is "you are THIS kind of character so there is only one right way out of this" I would assume that with extra work you can make one where a thief would win this way and a soldier that way and a spy some other way.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 09:40 am: Edit

A note to those writing paint by number adventures.

Number your paragraphs with a number sign (e.g., #4, #204). Do NOT worry about shuffling them. Feel free to have the decision in paragraph #1 take you to paragraph #2 or #3, or to #2 and #102 if you wish. I'll shuffle and renumber at the end.

Second point, you should include a loop of verbally interesting paragraphs which don't connect to the story. We did that in GMPA where the single most interesting picture/paragraph was of a scene you could not reach no matter what you did. Drives players crazy.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 12:36 pm: Edit

Paint by numbers also lends itself to HTML easily, meaning that someone could build a web site around such a story.


Garth L. Getgen

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 01:10 pm: Edit

Which could be kinda kewell as an adjunct to a subscription service like SFBOL.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 08:41 pm: Edit

Each method has it's own benefits and restrictions.

If the option for tap the ruby-red-slippers three times and teleport home isn't listed in the paint-by-numbers rule then you can't do that.
If on the other hand the "cast your detect magic spell and see if you find anything interesting" option comes up then players will tend to realises that that option is availible to them and try that and unless it was a blind alley option will probably find that looking for the uncommon option helps them "win".
These also tend to be shorter as 90 paragraphs of text that only get visited by 20% of selections is only about 18 paragraphs and plays through in about 54 even with all the combat, if you're going slowly.

This then becomes the situation.
Paint by numbers can be jumped into straight away with little or no preparation by the GM.
A map with room numbers and descriptions of the contence of each room, requires more preparation by the GM but also provides more oppertunity for role-playing and flexibility of choice...and greatly increases the chance that the PCs will miss clues because they didn't look for them.
These also tend to take longer as 12 rooms all with contents and descriptions plus moving around on the map to get to each room and the players mapping their movement and searching the walls for secret doors as well as generally searching around, plus combat, plus trying to figure out what greater plot is involved in the adventure, plus talking to other players about what they think is the best idea; will result in a game that lasts about 2 hours, if you're going quickly.

I like maps with room numbers but I also liked choose your own adenture books and wished I had some with random possibilities ( like spotting that someone is going to strike me from behind with a batton, or having a chance to win a fistfight ). I also like SFB solitaire scenarioes.


Just because paint-by-numbers adventures lend themsleves to "problem solving" more than "character expression" doesn't mean that problem solving isn't a legitimate part of a roleplaying game adventure...it simply is.
That being said, choosing the "right" choice that the writer feels is best can often be something of a blind alley especially as the Referee (if any) hasn't read ahead and then given out hints with his subconscious facial expressions.

The Real problem with PD adventures is not that there are too many paint-by-numbers adventures but rather that as yet there just arn't enough adventures PERIOD!

By David Keyser (Riov_Tafv) on Monday, April 04, 2005 - 10:09 pm: Edit

In my experience the paint-by-numbers adventures were used in one of two ways. Either as a solitare adventure or by a new GM learning how to prepare an adventure. Having some of this type is a good thing. MJC said it best though with there just arn't enought adventures period.

By James McCubbin (Novahawk) on Friday, August 26, 2005 - 01:16 pm: Edit

Hey, got a question: I am thinking of writing a module for Gurps Prime directive, and eventually the other races as well.

Here is my premise:

Legend of the Masters.
For many years it has been believed that the Masters were a group of Organians who strayed from their typical peaceful existence to a more corrupt, sadistic society. Recent evidence suggest that this is not actually the case. A traveler returning from the galaxy core, whom by the way was barely coherent, mentioned tales of a chamber which would evolve a person to become almost god-like. While we could get no exact details from him we can tell from his ship logs that he had traveled deep into the galaxy core and that his departure date from civilization was just a few years before the Masters began their escapades.
Unfortunatly the travelers ship, when picked up, was broadcasting on an open channel and we have reason to believe his signals were picked up by several other races, possibly even the Masters know of his broadcast.
We are unable to send a starship into the core as it may alert the other races of our intent to find this place, however we must investigate whether his story is true and if so we must find a way to secure this chamber so that other races do not use it to further their empires.
Your mission is to enter the galaxy core, confirm the existence of an evolution chamber, and then destroy it. If it is possible before destroying it, gather as much information from it's computer so we can use it to reverse the effect of the Masters.
This will be an unofficial mission and if captured you are on your own. We will supply you with a Free Trader, plenty of food supplies, and some non-federation weaponry. We also have the coordinates of the last planet our traveler was in contact.
Good luck and God-speed.


The first module will be Prime Directive from the Federation perspective. The module will also be done from Klingon and Romulan perspective if the first one is well recieved.

Let me know if anyone is interested.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, August 26, 2005 - 02:11 pm: Edit

Quick read....

1. Change the Organians from "the accepted theory which turned out to be wrong" to "one of many theories, none of which were right".

2. No need for separate fed, rom, klingon versions. The module would be mostly about the target, not the team doing the mission. Between the Klingon sourcebook and perhaps a page of notes, you don't need a separate Klingon masters chamber book.

3. Anybody's guess if this would be done with multiple systems or with separate books for each system or with downloadable game system data packs.

4. Still nobody's guess if adventures will sell at all.

By James McCubbin (Novahawk) on Friday, August 26, 2005 - 02:33 pm: Edit

One of the many theories concerning the Masters maintained that they were a group of Organians who strayed from their typical peaceful existence to a more corrupt, sadistic society. Recent evidence has suggested that this theory, along with the many other theories, is wrong.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, August 26, 2005 - 04:13 pm: Edit

works

By Craig Tenhoff (Cktenhoff) on Friday, August 26, 2005 - 05:26 pm: Edit

Unless you're planning on only selling distributing this over the Internet, it would probably be best to do one book for the adventure with the game system data in an appendix (or downloadable from the net).

Main body of the adventure would have something like: "The room is guarded by 4 Brac Thugs", while the game system stats for Brac Thugs would be in the Appendicies (one for GURPS, one for D20, one for D6, etc).

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, August 26, 2005 - 05:52 pm: Edit

I thought I said that. Maybe it wasn't clear. It was kind of obvious that was the best way.

By F. Douglas Wall (Knarf) on Saturday, November 12, 2005 - 12:59 am: Edit

I am thinking of running GPD for a game convention in a few months and am trying to come up with an adventure. If all goes well, I would probably try to get it into a publishable format.

My basic idea so far is this: It's the early Y160's and all the saber rattling leading up to the General War is starting up. In the Neutral Zone between the Klingons and the Federation, the Klingons have begun exploiting an primitive humanoid race (GURPS TL4).

The Federation has taken issue with this because (1) they don't want to let the Klingons have the planet's resources for the upcoming war and (2) the Prime Directive prevents them from exploiting the planet themselves. So they have sent in a Prime Team to covertly try to end the Klingons' influence on the planet.

The two major ways to do this I can think of are: trying to curry favor with the nobility of the planet (or at least the major nation) and get them to ask the Klingons to leave of their own volition or trying to covertly disrupt the Klingons gathering resources.

A few questions: Precisely when and where should I set this adventure? When would tensions be high enough that the Federation would be willing to do something like this? Where should it happen as to not mess with too much with established history and astronomy?

Details on the Organian Treaty would be nice too. I know on Star Trek, in the episode "The Trouble with Tribbles," it was established that planets in the Neutral Zone betweeen the empires were open for development by those who could develop them best. Is this true in the SFU? It makes for an interesting twist that the Klingons are playing 100% by the rules in developing the planet, while the Federation has to break some rules (maybe even the Prime Directive) in order to stop them.

By Richard Wells (Rwwells) on Saturday, November 12, 2005 - 02:09 am: Edit

If you wish to reduce the chance of starship combat, I might suggest Y163. The Klingons are just ending the 4 Powers War plus starting the shortlived Tholian incident while the Feds should be transferring ships to the Romulan front. Pick any neutral zone hex you like; close to Tholian territory has twin advantages in that the Fed don't want to provoke the Tholians but the Tholians might decide to come out to play. (A F&E hex might well have 100,000 stars in it; plenty of room for a relatively unimportant planet.)

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Saturday, November 12, 2005 - 02:54 am: Edit

Not too close to the Tholians as you might have issidents with the TBHS.

When the Klingons invade the Federation they do so into it's south west quadrant so along this area would be fitting.

Remember though, there is no "coming" war in Y163. In fact, attacking the Federation is mainly a necessity towards other goals once the Federation sides with the Kzinti. The General war starts with a war against the Kzinti. The Klingons weren't really trying to start a general war. They wanted to conquer the Kzinti and Hydrans (perhaps more than the Kzinti). To get the Hydrans they needed/wanted Lyran help. To get that help they had to go after the Kzinti first. (The Klingons wanted to clear out the Hydrans first but the Kzinti kill an important Lyran Prince (IIRC) and the Lyrans attack early).

Attacking the Hydrans would have been the better move since interference from the Federation was unlikely and with the Hydran border secured the colition could greatly focus their attacks on the Kzinti. What the Klingons feared most happened. They hit the Kzinti first and the Hydrans attacked, dividing forces and slowing the pace against the Kzinti.

The point is that war with the Federation was not the first choice (but planned on as an eventuality). When the Organians disappeared and the Federation had been siding with the Kzinti to a degree the Klingons saw an opertunity (though less than perfect) they knew would not remain open long. So they attacked the Federation. In Y163 no one saw this coming.

But Y163 is an interesting year for this. In Y164 the Gnasher raids Rita's Planet and massacers Federation Colonists. How might that action have been influenced by your adventure (which happen prior and in the same neutral zone)?