Create Situations, Not Plots
Some common advice often given to new DMs is to “create situations, not plots”. Many people in the TTRPG community have written about this, but I want to share my own take on this excellent advice.
In this article, I discuss the way I think about “situations”, and how approaching it from this direction allows the plot to emerge naturally through gameplay.
Writing Plots
I didn’t write plots when I was DM’ing in the 90’s, but I started down that path in 2015 when I began developing 5e adventures for a few different groups. I had come to think that my role as a DM was as a storyteller, and that my adventures needed to be compelling narratives for the players to enjoy. These adventures had complex plots and narrative arcs that deeply involved the characters, their detailed backstories, motivations and goals.
I would sketch out acts and chapters, with numerous pre-planned events and outcomes. It was simply a matter of the players doing the right things, making the right decisions and solving the puzzles that would lead them to these narrative events. I planed in advance how the players would solve the puzzles, and what interesting items they would need to accomplish certain tasks. I balanced encounters so that players would be able to stand up to any foes, albeit with some risk and danger. Unfortunately, the plots involved specific characters, and so I couldn’t truly risk their death because I knew they were needed in a future scene. I had to make sure they survived.
This was a lot of fun at first, and my players didn’t seem to mind at all. However, two problems began to arise from this method of building adventures.
Problem #1 - DM and Player Frustration
Occasionally, my players would make choices that I hadn’t expected, yet these choices made a great deal of sense, and were usually quite clever. Unfortunately, sometimes these choices completely derailed the plot I had so painstakingly created. Suddenly, Event B, which was required for the players to reach Event C, was not going to happen. I would react to this in one of two ways: I would either contrive a reason for why that sensible, clever decision would not work (yuck), or I would have to rewrite the plot. The players would be frustrated when their good idea wasn’t going to work, and I would be frustrated when I had to end the session early because I had to rewrite the sequence of narrative events.
Problem #2 - DM Fatigue
I’m not an experienced writer. I’m more of a fledgling writer. A level 1 Writer with 652 experience points. While my creative energy is flowing, I can write some decent plots and narrative arcs, but eventually that energy ebbs and I just can’t come up with any more. I was able to figure out that the players would need to get from Point D to Point H in some interesting, compelling way, but I just didn’t have the creative energy to come up Points E, F and G. There would be times when we couldn’t play an adventure because I simply wasn’t prepared. It wasn’t that I didn’t have the time, it’s just that I was unable to due to fatigue.
For a while, I ran a 5e campaign based on the Arthurian world. We all had a good time (aside from a few of the above frustrations), but the number one reason why we stopped playing in this world was DM Fatigue. I grew weary of writing and lost the creative energy for that scenario.
Eventually, I grew so tired of writing plots for this setting, that I started running published 5e adventures. In particular, I started with The Hoard of the Dragon Queen, followed by the Rise of Tiamat. I figured it would be much easier to just use someone else’s plots. Unfortunately, this had similar results. Players came up with clever solutions and performed tasks that would break the planned sequence of events outlined in the adventure book. I would have to come up with lame ideas for how to keep the players moving in the right direction. I had to keep them on the rails, so to speak, and this put me right back into the problem I had before, where I just didn’t want to have to rewrite any more plots.
I experienced several frustrating moments because the players were just not doing what they were supposed to (read that again, and cringe), and I had no idea what to do. The book didn’t have any contingencies and I was growing tired of coming up with more. I had two players actually quit this adventure.
This led me to stepping away from DM’ing for a while. One of the other players has been DM’ing longer than I have, and he gladly stepped in with some 2e adventures that gave me a much needed break.
The Solution - Don’t Write Plots
My epiphany came from two sources: the classic Gary Gygax adventure module B2 - The Keep on the Borderlands, and the Youtube Channel Dungeoncraft, where Professor Dungeon Master posts numerous videos on how to be a good DM.
Professor DM has an excellent video called Why Game Masters are not Storytellers. This video really helped me rethink how I plan adventures. Give it a view if you haven’t already.
In Keep on the Borderlands, I saw something entirely different from Hoard of the Dragon Queen. Let’s contrast the two:
- Hoard of the Dragon Queen - 7 sequential chapters detailed over 96 pages, intended to be followed in order. Numerous dungeons, meant to be cleared and moved on from, never to be seen again once the plot advanced beyond them.
- Keep on the Borderlands - in 28 pages, provides the Caves of Chaos dungeon map and description of its rooms and contents, a region map, and a detailed Keep, with some interesting NPCs, shops, rumors and even a few conflicts.
The B2 module had no planned sequence or plot, other than a suggestion that the players be warned that they should start in the lower caves. B2 is simply a setting and environment that players can interact with, be it the NPCs at the Keep, or the monsters in the Caves of Chaos. The players can do some adventuring in the region or the caves, come back to the Keep and resupply and interact with NPCs there.
B2 is a situation, not a plot. There are a number of different adventure hooks and possibilities, some intrigue and deception, and the players may tackle the Caves of Chaos in any order that they wish, even if it is to their peril.
So how can we focus on developing situations instead of plots? For this, I’ll turn to established concepts of literature and writing stories.
The Elements of a Story
You may remember some lessons from your elementary or high school English/Literature classes that discussed the 8 elements of a story. Of those 8, I would like to focus on the 4 primary ones. These elements are:
- Setting - where, when, historical, social and cultural conditions
- Character - largely the NPCs, but later affected by the Player Characters
- Plot - the sequence of events that happen in the story
- Conflict - the challenges, conflicts and problems that provide tension and drama
Situations = Setting + Characters + Conflict
Creating a situation is a matter of focusing time and energy on three of those four Elements of a Story: Setting, Character and Conflict.
Setting
Many DMs love world building, which is essentially another word for creating a setting. The setting can be as small as a single town, dungeon and small region, as in Keep on the Borderlands, to as large as entire worlds and multiverses. Obviously, the larger the scope of the setting, the more work it is, but many DMs find this kind of work very rewarding.
Having a good setting, whether it’s just a small region or an entire cosmos, gives the players places to explore, wonders to discover, and memorable locales. It provides the forgotten secrets, lost treasures and mysteries. A good setting gives players places to visit, obtain information or supplies, perform duties and learn skills. A good setting gives a clear context which can add color to character backgrounds, and adds more meaning to the player’s goals.
Most importantly, a good setting helps the DM respond to player actions. The consequences of player choices are more obvious and easier for the DM to discern and give to the players, making the world feel more alive and immersive.
Characters and Factions
This is an obvious one. It’s nearly impossible to create a Setting without also creating the cultures, societies and individuals who populate it. In RPG adventures, the players will be interacting with NPCs of various stripes, including townsfolk, shop keepers, allies, enemies and monsters. Not all characters have to be fully developed, but the most important ones should be.
Good characters have goals (what they want), motivations (why they want it) and a combination of abilities and ethics (methods and boundaries for what they will do to get what they want).
Factions are not only realistic components of societies, but are terrific tools for creating situations. Factions can take many forms, and don’t have to be formal organizations with emblems, mottos, flags, colors and initiation rituals. Factions may be religious, political, academic, commercial, military or cultural. Factions normally have motivations and goals, just like characteres. Good settings have multiple factions, some of which get along, while others are opposed, with mutually exclusive goals. Player characters may be members of factions, become members during gameplay or simply become embroiled in their conflicts. Good factions have exactly the same features of good characters: goals, motivations, abilities and ethics.
Creating good, developed characters and factions allows the DM to have a much better idea of how those characters or factions will respond to certain events or actions, particularly those of the player characters.
Conflict
And at last, we get to the real action. Without conflict, there can be no story. Conflict is the opposition impeding the characters and factions from reaching their goals, including NPCs, monsters and the PCs themselves. In RPGs, there is a blend of narrative conflict and physical conflict in the form of combat encounters, and of course one of these often leads to others.
As stated by Professor DM in the aforementioned video, the chief goal of a DM is as a Conflict Designer. Combat encounters, social encounters, puzzles and traps, mazes and megadungeons, survival in difficult elements and many others types of conflict are what drive the action, create tension and allow a story to emerge.
Based on the Setting and the goals and motivations of the Characters, the DM will create the existing Conflicts. These Conflicts would exist even if the Players never took action. They are ongoing or imminent in the game world, before the Players even arrive on the scene. In fact, this is really the only Plot that the DM needs to be concerned with. The DM should have an idea of the events and conflicts that would happen if the PCs didn’t get involved. The DM may not even need to know the results of certain conflicts, only that they will occur.
This doesn’t mean that the DM cannot or should not plan anything. Obviously, the DM will have certain conflicts in mind, and scenes that will very likely occur. In some cases, the DM may plan specific events during these scenes, but in other cases, they may forsee multiple possible outcomes. Of course a good DM will have these scenes, events and possible/probable outcomes in mind and be prepared for them.
In a manner of speaking, the DM need only focus on:
- What is - the current Situation
- What would be - what would happen if the Players didn’t intervene
- What could be or will probably be - the likely or possible events and scenes that the players could reach
What I avoid is focusing on what will be. That is Plot, and it is not my place to determine.
With Setting, Characters and Conflicts in place, we have our Situation(s) and the stage is set for gameplay, and the emergence of the Plot.
The Plot Emerges
Now, the PCs arrive on the scene and the adventure begins. The DM presents the Situation to the players, and they begin to interact with it. They make decisions and take actions. Armed with good information, the DM can respond to the actions of the players and determine and divulge the results of their actions. Good characters, factions and conflicts allow the DM to do this rather easily.
As the PCs take actions and make decisions that have larger consequences, the world around them will respond. These actions will usually bring them into direct conflict with the key parts of the adventure, and no matter what they decide to do, the DM will have information they need to respond appropriately.
Actions lead to responses, which lead to more actions, discoveries, more areas of the dungeon, larger conflicts, and more influential adversaries. Through this process, the Players and the DM are cooperatively experiencing a story. The Plot is simply what happens as a result of the Players’ actions, the DM’s responses and the results of the dice. The Plot has emerged naturally as the PCs interact with the game world along with the DM and the dice.
The DM isn’t telling a story. In fact, I would argue that this isn’t even “collaborative story telling”, it is more like story building. It’s what we experience every day in our real lives as we pursue our own goals and experience our own conflicts. The Plot or Story of our own lives is what we tell our friends when they ask how our day was. Similarly, the Plot of an RPG adventure is what the players tell their friends when someone asks what happened at the gaming table, rather than what was determined by the DM.
Conclusion
I find this a much easier and more interesting way to build adventures. I’m relieved of the burden of inventing a compelling story to tell players. It takes less time, especially when using published settings such as Mystara. My players have more freedom because they can interact with the world in all the clever ways they come up with, and it won’t ruin any pre-planned events. Yes, it does mean that some of the prep will go to waste, although it can be saved for other gaming groups. But this is a small sacrifice, in my opinion.
Even better, I find this a lot more fun and satisfying to experience at the table, because I don’t know what to expect. In some ways, the DM is a clairvoyant, but not omniscient narrator. I know many things that the Players do not. I may have a good idea of what players will do, but I’m regularly surprised at how often I’m wrong. I don’t really know how events will transpire, so that creates a welcome element of surprise and discovery for me too.
Having said all that, I know that some DMs love writing Plots, and their players enjoy discovering the threads and solving the problems that advance the plot and reveal the story. It truly is a different playing style that many people enjoy. So I’m not here to say that it’s “The Wrong Way” to play. I think most of us are past such gatekeeping notions.
But this style of play can be intimidating, time consuming, draining and frustrating. Unfortunately, I think that the idea that the DM is a Storyteller is pervasive in TTRPGs. I expect there are many potential DMs that are intimidated by thoughts of having to be a crafter of universes and a great author like Tolkien, Moorcock, Jordan, Martin or Sanderson, when this just isn’t true.
If you’ve ever found yourself burned out, drained or simply exhausted of ideas for plot events and threads, then simply stop worrying about them. If you like the idea of being a DM, but are intimidated by the seemingly unrealistic Storytelling requirements, then I have good news. Create an interesting Situation and let the players create the Plot, with a little help from you, of course.
Oh, and there’s nothing wrong with using published settings and adventures. There’s still plenty of room for creativity, world building and conflict design, even without having to do all the work yourself. More on that in a future post.