Module Format

[Piperdog]

I have been noticing over the years that adventure modules have appeared in many different formats. You ever notice how some have shaded text to read out loud and some don't? Some are presented in ordered encounters, and others are more like a wikipedia database? I find I can appreciate the different ways the authors can present an adventure and have liked some ways over others. For example, while I never played much of 4e at all, I bought the adventure Keep on the Shadowfell when 4e came out. I never played or ran it (like half my bookshelf of rpg stuff!) but really liked how it was layed out.

Anyone have any preferences for adventure formats? Just curious.

[serleran]

Format should assist the module. For ones with linear "plots" ordered events are fine. Those which are exploratory, acting more like a setting than a module, should be more open. I personally do not like "read aloud" boxes -- I feel competent enough, thanks. (That is not necessarily why they're there but it often reads that way and is usually dry and boring to boot.) I like an appendix of monsters and magic, especially if it can be ripped away or included as a small book of its own.

[Buttmonkey]

From a formatting perspective, the best module I've ever seen is The Hidden Tomb of Slaggoth the Necromancer. You can download it for free here (link is on the left side of the page): http://www.paperspencils.com/

Every room description includes a summary block that makes it much easier to run the adventure. I love this format. I am surprised you don't see it all over the place.

[alcyone]

I don't like the 4e spread-per-encounter format. It does work well for 4e, where the isolated encounter is actually a unit of progress. In my adventures, I find it useful to think of the dungeon as a whole, and I sometimes make notes on the map showing who can hear whom for example; the occupants move around the dungeon and work together or against one another and that isn't encouraged by the per-encounter format. That style also usually prescribes positioning and tactics to an excessive degree.

The One Page Dungeon contest has yielded some excellent results, with clever artists accomplishing much visually.

One feature I love in modules is a roster of foes I can cross off or modify and has the XP values right there. I like an informative map too. Boxes with numbers work, but maps can be so much more than that.

I appreciate mind-maps or flowcharts to show relationships between NPCs and events instead of having to flip around and make my own. Especially when the module has lots of little quests that can't be found except through NPC interaction.

I don't mind read-aloud text, as long as it's short. I don't always use it, and when I do, it sometimes conflicts with the actual description of the room, because of how I've ruled something or because the order of events have altered things. Long speeches don't work in my experience, so I feel like the module writer throws those things in without trying them.

I like pictures I can easily show to players. So much art is wasted on the DM. If the art is for the DM though, make it accurately reflect something in the module so it can replace read-aloud text or help the DM describe things.

Aside from that, just knowing how to use headers, columns, and general graphic design/layout savvy is nice to see. Cute fonts and shaded backgrounds rarely work, and the players don't see them, so they don't lend any feel to the adventure anyway, they are just shelf candy and serve to confuse the DM.

[Snoring Rock]

I like the old 3.5 DCC format. A summary the plat hooks, the DM notes and the list of all encounters in the front.

[alcyone]

I like the old 3.5 DCC format. A summary the plat hooks, the DM notes and the list of all encounters in the front.

Yes, those are very well done. Arcana Creations modules also have these features.

[Relaxo]

I really dig the formatting in this module:
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/1 ... arons-Gold

[Captain_K]

Folks, rather than like or dislike and wish, who has a GOOD word document format of a module that can be used as a basis for future modules? I have asked Steve for a format in which to write things up. Not only must we like it for our use in the end, but it must aid the publishers too, in a format and style etc that makes publishing easy.

So, who has the best staring point that can be edited and updated and improved for all our future use be it to publish or simply to use for your own personal game?

Thanks, Capt

[seskis281]

I, too, am a fan of the DCC 3rd edition mod formats - the most recent module I've run basically as is (just converted on the fly for stats) was DCC #34 Cage of Delerium for a good gothic horror run, setting the Asylum just south of Baldur's Gate for my current FR campaign...

I do really miss the shrinkwrapped days of early TSR, where the main maps were on the disconnected inside covers and the booklet already separated, but then again it was hard to peruse these to see if I liked - with DCC mods I just remove the staples, take the covers with their maps off, and restaple the booklet myself.

I don't mind either boxed or italicized descriptive text - it helps having when I might be a bit off or tired and not as sharp in my own descriptions (and I can always adjust or use only what I want). I also like DCC for the player's handouts and images to show for each, which TLG really only ever did with Upper Works (and they were fantastic). Lotta work, but very cool.

[seskis281]

I should add that I am trying, finally, to coalesce three adventures I've run at varying cons over the years that haven't gone into Crusader yet (A Nightmare Before Dying from the last Lake Geneva con years ago, Lost Tomb of Alydar from Troll Con in Little Rock a couple of years back, and the Ziggurat of Zon that I ran as part of my own campaigns and as a demo at Fire & Ice Convention locally about 3 years ago), putting these three into a 3-part module set that I am calling the "Raenthorne Trilogy," able to use "Danovar's Desire" from Crusader 12 as a setup. My intention is to actually finish these and literally submit them to Steve's hands in person at Gamehole con in Nov.

[tylermo]

Sounds great. You're going to put this in Stephen's hands?? It'll be on his desk next to an open can of Dr. Pepper (that can that always appears in every Stephen and Davis video), and oooops...

[seskis281]

Sounds great. You're going to put this in Stephen's hands?? It'll be on his desk next to an open can of Dr. Pepper (that can that always appears in every Stephen and Davis video), and oooops...

Hee hee - I'll also submit by email and by hand to Tim Burns as well

[alcyone]

Folks, rather than like or dislike and wish, who has a GOOD word document format of a module that can be used as a basis for future modules? I have asked Steve for a format in which to write things up. Not only must we like it for our use in the end, but it must aid the publishers too, in a format and style etc that makes publishing easy.

So, who has the best staring point that can be edited and updated and improved for all our future use be it to publish or simply to use for your own personal game?

Thanks, Capt

Someone else can correct me, but I think a publisher doesn't want submissions to be formatted at all, aside from paragraphs, as they will need to put it all into their layout engine anyway. They just want clean, well-edited plain text.

Some people do self-publishing with a word processor, but I think most publishers of note use some kind of publishing software, like InDesign or PagePlus for example.

[Captain_K]

That's good to know Aergraith, can we get a troll lord to comment and let us know.. even saying simple and plain text, a word document? Sectioned? Etc?

[Relaxo]

Grain of salt, I'm not 100% sure but, having inquired with TLG about submitting a manuscript, they do generally want an unformatted document such as a txt file, but they can take a word file. just hard returns to separate things.

they have to put it into their software where (Peter, I think) formats it, adds art, etc so if it's got as little formattng as possible, they have less invisible stuff to remove. (have you ever tried to edit a word file that someone else made badly, with spaces instead of tabs, or 6 returns instead of inserting a page break?)

[serleran]

When I used to provide material, as it was a lot of tabular things, they (and I mean Peter, by my understanding) hated getting it formatted in a table. It caused all sorts of extra work as he would have to strip the format, reformat, and then play around to get it to work.

At one point, there was a 'submission guideline' which had things like "magic items and spell names should be italicized" but that was intended for The Crusader, and seemingly only while Jim Ward was editor; the applicability of it to other TLG things is unknown to me.

[Captain_K]

Key to word formatting is turning on the paragraph symbol or icon in the "top right corner of the "paragraph" pane in the "home" tab. Then you can see all those little nasties.

I edit and write for technical journals and they have pretty strict rules and preformatted templates that I work within. I'm hoping TLG has, or can share, their preferred document writer format in a template that we can fill in. This should not be too hard or too expensive for us. What is their document writing software if not word?

[Relaxo]

Key to word formatting is turning on the paragraph symbol or icon in the "top right corner of the "paragraph" pane in the "home" tab. Then you can see all those little nasties.

Great tip!

[alcyone]

Key to word formatting is turning on the paragraph symbol or icon in the "top right corner of the "paragraph" pane in the "home" tab. Then you can see all those little nasties.

I edit and write for technical journals and they have pretty strict rules and preformatted templates that I work within. I'm hoping TLG has, or can share, their preferred document writer format in a template that we can fill in. This should not be too hard or too expensive for us. What is their document writing software if not word?

Yeah, that's a different thing. Technical, medical, peer-reviewed journals, they have strict standards and you either try to meet them using a template or you make your life easier by letting something like LaTeX do the work while you mostly just write text and create charts to insert. I guess that is just so everything is uniform across journals and so that whoever compiles them isn't spending their time doing layout, they can just bind them and be done with it.

In stuff for commercial publication where every project has a different look, the person doing layout and "typesetting" as it were makes all of those decisions and needs maximum flexibility, so they want plaintext and run it through their layout/typesetting/desktop publishing software.

As for writing your stuff, you can use anything, just make sure you export as plain text or if you save as a word document, limit yourself to one font, and just simple bold/italic or whatever your beleaguered layout guy wants. This isn't the big deal it probably was before Office became the standard, in the old days some people used Word Perfect or other software and the actual file format was more important.

The idea of typesetting your own work as you go is sort of the curse of word processors.

Anyway, we should get Peter in here.