I run a 4e game where the players are students at a magic university, similar to Hogwarts from Harry Potter. For this adventure, they are new level one students, and going on a one-shot adventure into a land where fairy tales are true, though often a bit warped.

I'd like advice and comment on any aspect of the adventure. Though this is 4e, I am looking for advice both on rules to adapt the concepts, and also ways to play the NPCs, potential challenges, anticipated unexpected moves by the PCs, music, suggested voices, suggested atmosphere, food, and pretty much anything people can think of, even if their perspective is from other games. The more comments, the merrier.

I am adapting some of the Goodman Games 3.5e module "Escape from the Forest of Lanterns" concept (Dungeon Crawl Classic #38), for the start of the adventure. However, I am not using anything actually in that module except for part of the concept - since none of it really fit what I am going for except maybe a small part of the gingerbread cottage.

Here is the synopsis of the concept:

A mysterious magic book has transported the heroes to the Summerlands, a magical demiplane where the fairy tales in the magic book are alive, and taken on lives of their own. To escape, the party must first obtain Jack's Magic Beans to grow a beanstalk up the sky, then climb the beanstalk and win the magic harp from the Giant's castle in the clouds, to open a gateway back.

For background music, I am using tracks from the first two Shrek movies, the movie Enchanted, Pan's Labyrinth, and maybe some Disney stuff and fairy tale animated shows from the 70s.

This is a one-shot, intended to be completed in one session. So, I've made the adventure modular. The party just needs to complete one quest to obtain Jack's Magic Beans, then use the beans to complete the final quest to escape through the giant's castle in the clouds.

The party is given what seems to be a choice among 8 possible Jack's Magic Beans quests to complete. But, to save me time (since they will only need to choose one path), I've actually written it so there are only four quests with minor variation depending on the road they choose to go down. I still waste some time writing up 3 quests they party won't likely pursue, but I wanted to give the group at least some free will to choose paths, rather than a total rail road. Plus, if they complete a quest super fast, or want to go two nights, I can throw a second or third quest at them and I won't be unprepared. And it was fun to write this stuff up, so not really a waste.

Path 1&2: Cinderella & Hansel and Gretel (Both paths lead to Cinderella's Fairy Godmother, who sends party on quest to obtain ritual ingredients she needs so she can turn a pumpkin into coach, mice into horses, rat into coachman, lizard into footmen, and Cinderella into short-term Princess. Ritual Ingredients are owned by the witch who lives at the gingerbread house. On obtaining ingredients, Fairy Godmother gives them Jack's Magic Beans).

Path 3&4: Sleeping Beauty & Snow White (One path leads to 7 dwarfs variant, who offer to give Jack's Magic Beans if the party can rescue Snow White from the enchanted castle and the clutches of the witch. Other path leads party to Prince variant, who will pay party with Jack's Magic Beans if they will rescue Sleeping Beauty from enchanted castle and the clutches of the witch. Both enchanted castles and princesses are the same).

Path 5&6: Goldilocks & 3 Little Pigs (One path leads to Three Little Pigs variant, in their remaining brick house. They offer Jack's Magic Beans to the party if they can convince the Big Bad Wold, the sheriff of Summerland, to not evict them from their house, where they are technically squatters. Other path leads directly to the variant of Sheriff Bigby Wolf (taken from Fables comic books), the big bad wolf, who will either a) agree to not evict three little pigs if they will do a quest for him, or b) agree to give them Jack's Magic Beans in exchange for quest, if they arrived directly on the road to his office variant. Either way, quest is to stake out Three Bears house and catch the thieves who keep breaking into their cottage. Thieves are the Goldilocks Gang, a gang of female goblins).

Path 7&8: Little Red Ridding Hood & Rumpelstiltskin (Both paths lead to Kings castle. King will pay party with Jack's Magic Beans if they will obtain the true name of the evil dwarf, Rumpelstiltskin, before three nights pass and he comes to claim their first born. Dwarf lives up mountain. On way up mountain, party encounters Little Red Ridinghood being attacked by a pack of werewolves at grandma's cottage. She gives them cloaks of invisibility if they rescue her, which will come in handing for the Rumpelstiltskin quest. Party then must obtain Rumpelstiltskin's true name, by stealth or steel).

Final quest of Jack the Giant Slayer is to plant Jack's Magic Beans, climb them, enter the giant's castle in the clouds, and obtain his magic harp which can play a tune to send them back home. They can also find other magic items in the castle if they succeed, including a magic belt, magic boots, magic hat, magic sword, magic trumpet, cloak of invisibility (if they didn't get them from Red Riding Hood), golden eggs, and bag of gold, all taken from various actual fairy tales about Jack the Giant Slayer.

So, any words of wisdom?

I think role playing games are fun for only two reasons: tactical combat or making decisions. It sounds like there isn't much in the way of jack or shit for them to make decisions about, so you need to make sure that the combat is spot on.

Try to make sure that they have at least like, 3 or 4 combats that are difficult enough that they can lose is they make wrong decisions, otherwise its just completely pointless. Make sure that those combats are completely written up and try to think of interesting things (make them fight on spars clouds, or while climbing the stalk, or against the giant, or whatever).

Also, try to put things into the scenario that they have to figure out to win. Like put a glass cannon in a defenseless but hard to get to spot and then try to distract the party with other enemies. They win by targeting the glass cannon. Shit like that.

That's about all I got.

Quote from: Cranewings;393141I think role playing games are fun for only two reasons: tactical combat or making decisions. It sounds like there isn't much in the way of jack or shit for them to make decisions about, so you need to make sure that the combat is spot on.

I'm not sure where you are getting that there are no decisions.  As I said, it's not a rail road, and the players can decide their path, or turn back at any time and choose another one.  Nor is there a mechanism to get through each quest built in.  Diplomacy, stealth, combat, trickery, it's all open to their decisions.  So, again, not sure where you are getting a sense that they have no decisions, but I am open to hearing where you think that is present.

QuoteTry to make sure that they have at least like, 3 or 4 combats that are difficult enough that they can lose is they make wrong decisions, otherwise its just completely pointless. Make sure that those combats are completely written up and try to think of interesting things (make them fight on spars clouds, or while climbing the stalk, or against the giant, or whatever).

Good advice, thanks.

Also, try to put things into the scenario that they have to figure out to win. Like put a glass cannon in a defenseless but hard to get to spot and then try to distract the party with other enemies. They win by targeting the glass cannon. Shit like that.

That's about all I got.[/QUOTE]

Cranewings advice is sound: you must think about the possibility of failure in any or all of the separate quests, and what the resulting outcome would look like, which itself would still provide a significant choice to the PCs. The idea here is to not assume that the PCs with succeed in any or all of the tests, but will engage them with you as a completely neutral referee, with still a potentially fulfilling outcome, even if it ends up in failure.

Second thought: this module sounds cool. I got to get my hands on it, especially since I've been playing with fairy tales in my D&D for a while, including Jack and the Beanstalk (blame Rob Kuntz on that one).

Third. This actually sounds like a set-up which, to me, could work for 4e. The dissociations (don't jump on me for being critical of 4e, bear with me here, please) being what they are with the game, it would actually work great with an "UNrealistic" setup, and yet, a traditional one that appeals to common themes the players could empathize with, recognize, and feel engaged with, like fairy tales. Even the tactical nature of combat could blend with the boundaries of the fae world in the way the armies of the Queen in Wonderlands were Playing Cards. See what I mean? That to me is a great idea in itself. Worth more thought, IMO.

Fourth. This sounds like a LOT of stuff to go through for a one-shot adventure. How long do you have to play the game in the best and worse cases?

Quote from: Benoist;393149Cranewings advice is sound: you must think about the possibility of failure in any or all of the separate quests, and what the resulting outcome would look like, which itself would still provide a significant choice to the PCs. The idea here is to not assume that the PCs with succeed in any or all of the tests, but will engage them with you as a completely neutral referee, with still a potentially fulfilling outcome, even if it ends up in failure.

Good point.

QuoteSecond thought: this module sounds cool. I got to get my hands on it, especially since I've been playing with fairy tales in my D&D for a while, including Jack and the Beanstalk (blame Rob Kuntz on that one).

Except for "goes to fairy tale land where fairy tales are somewhat real", nothing I wrote is in any published module.  The actual DCC is completely different.  It's not bad, just not what I was really looking for.

QuoteThird. This actually sounds like a set-up which, to me, could work for 4e. The dissociations (don't jump on me for being critical of 4e, bear with me here, please) being what they are with the game, it would actually work great with an "UNrealistic" setup, and yet, a traditional one that appeals to common themes the players could empathize with, recognize, and feel engaged with, like fairy tales. Even the tactical nature of combat could blend with the boundaries of the fae world in the way the armies of the Queen in Wonderlands were Playing Cards. See what I mean? That to me is a great idea in itself. Worth more thought, IMO.

Hmm, I'll have to think about that.  My entire game is really just a break from our main game while our DM recovers from some burnout.  The adventures are intended to be light hearted and fun, not particularly serious, and not intensely dramatic.

QuoteFourth. This sounds like a LOT of stuff to go through for a one-shot adventure. How long do you have to play the game in the best and worse cases?

It's only a lot if the players choose to do a lot.  All they need to do is finish one branch, and then ascend to the giant's castle.  My guess is they will pick the path that sounds the most interesting to them (there will be a sign indicating what fairy tale is in which direction), and assuming they get through that path, they will get Jack's Magic Beans and use them to ascend to the Giant's Castle.  

If they run through the first path super quick and want to play more than night before ascending to the castle, I will probably just alter the reward at the end of that path from the Magic Beans to something else, so they can attempt a second path before ascending.  Or maybe they will want to do a second path just for fun.

Anyway, the group is ongoing, so if we don't finish it in a one-shot, they will just come back the next week.  I try and do one-shots or two-shots due to varying player attendance at this time of the year. They players can even choose to play a different student on different weeks if they want to.  It's sort of our testing ground campaign, to try new house rules, new characters, that sort of stuff.

If you like getting ideas from fiction, try the Piers Anthony Xanth series.

I ran a really sucessful fairy-tale game back int eh day but I inverted all the tropes. So the party met with Jack and agreed to help him steal the golden goose, which of course involved killing a cloud ginat , who was the good guy. The party had to fight the seven dwarves who were keeping Snow white as a slave, track and capture the Big Bad Wolf (who was a cursed prince) and the fight against Hansel and Grettle is the stuff of legends.
They missed out on getting captured and eaten by the beast and they never even found the castle where the evil enchantress and her undead hordes had been put into a hundred year sleep ....

Now I love fairy tales and have revisted them on numerous occassions but this was possibly the most successful aproach. It was really open just a forest to explore and it did what Shrek does so well (and the Xanth books as well) which was to play with the party''s expectations and their understanding of the genre.

As an aside you can check out the Fable graphic novels for some interesting ideas.

Is 4th edition a good fit for either Harry Potter or fairy tales?

One of the little minicampaigns I ran using adventure companies in LFR was set in the Majestrix Academy- the PCs had to be students at the school (PCs aged 17 and below) and have an arcane power source.

So here's your first problem, you're doing it as a one-shot. No depth will happen. And no matter what else happens, the entirety of your setting is going to require depth. Nevermind what game system you are using.

The second thing: no matter what you think the story is about, it's really about the PCs and the events that happen during the game.

Here are the aspects that came up through play of the Majestrix campaign (which is still going on by the way, there's just other people DMing it):

The world of students vs the world of adults. This is probably my favorite thing to focus on.
In Majestrix, students (ie, the PCs) have roommates, some of which might be other PCs, some of which might be NPCs. Who your roommate is, is a lot of fun as a roleplaying hook.
The teachers are all quirky and had specializations. The one I used most often was the oily dark arts instructor. There was a satyr who taught bardic music, a pair of pixies who taught "magic of the natural world", The High Astronomer (the school founder), and a bunch of others.  

Adventures: 4E is great because often we would have individual skill challenges and group skill challenges for projects. There was one for a mid-term project. Numerous field trips. A huge amount of adventures revolved around creating a "test" called the Hall of Mirrors that the illusionary Arts Instructor was building- it was meant to be a "challenging simulator" that used illusions and psychic invasion to test the students, but it was cursed and dangerous to the point that the players could get injured.  

Some adventures involved secret plans.One teacher had a secret side job developing arcane weaponry and he would involve the students unwittingly as his test subjects or carry out his missions using school activities as a cover (which the students would always find out about).

There's a gang of bad kids. There always is!

Many adventures involved field trips- to the lake of Steam, to Calimshan, to the Raurin Desert. To the Feywild. You can even have trips that involve time travel or visits to the elemental planes.

Some adventures involved vacation: at one point the students were taken by a chaperone to Shantalar's Lantern, an exclusive oasis resort in Calimshan frequented only by wizards.

Two adventures involved school dances. There were entire skill challenges involved with getting a date for the dance or getting the right outfit or whatever. Soem fo the students were bards. There was a "battle of the bands".
 
The last Majestrix thing I ran was about when school let out for the summer- one of the students had no family to go to, so she got recruited by the dark arts teacher to deliver something to an area that just happened to be where my drow group was located, so we had the first crossover. There's going to be a big crossover event soon.

But you need that kind of serialized play before you reach any depth.

Quote from: Age of Fable;393237Is 4th edition a good fit for either Harry Potter or fairy tales?

If you're a fan of skill challenges it seems like a perfect fit for HP

Pete

Quote from: Abyssal Maw;393260One of the little minicampaigns I ran using adventure companies in LFR was set in the Majestrix Academy- the PCs had to be students at the school (PCs aged 17 and below) and have an arcane power source.

So here's your first problem, you're doing it as a one-shot. No depth will happen. And no matter what else happens, the entirety of your setting is going to require depth. Nevermind what game system you are using.

Ah, I think I failed to mention that the campaign is ongoing, just this adventure is a one-shot.  The campaign is pretty old actually, and has a lot of depth to it.  The campaign goes back to 3.0e.

QuoteThe second thing: no matter what you think the story is about, it's really about the PCs and the events that happen during the game.

Here are the aspects that came up through play of the Majestrix campaign (which is still going on by the way, there's just other people DMing it):

The world of students vs the world of adults. This is probably my favorite thing to focus on.
In Majestrix, students (ie, the PCs) have roommates, some of which might be other PCs, some of which might be NPCs. Who your roommate is, is a lot of fun as a roleplaying hook.
The teachers are all quirky and had specializations. The one I used most often was the oily dark arts instructor. There was a satyr who taught bardic music, a pair of pixies who taught "magic of the natural world", The High Astronomer (the school founder), and a bunch of others.  

Cool stuff, thanks.  I'll add this to my notes of suggestions for future adventures.

QuoteAdventures: 4E is great because often we would have individual skill challenges and group skill challenges for projects. There was one for a mid-term project. Numerous field trips. A huge amount of adventures revolved around creating a "test" called the Hall of Mirrors that the illusionary Arts Instructor was building- it was meant to be a "challenging simulator" that used illusions and psychic invasion to test the students, but it was cursed and dangerous to the point that the players could get injured.  

Oooh another cool one!

Some adventures involved secret plans.One teacher had a secret side job developing arcane weaponry and he would involve the students unwittingly as his test subjects or carry out his missions using school activities as a cover (which the students would always find out about).

There's a gang of bad kids. There always is!

Many adventures involved field trips- to the lake of Steam, to Calimshan, to the Raurin Desert. To the Feywild. You can even have trips that involve time travel or visits to the elemental planes.

Some adventures involved vacation: at one point the students were taken by a chaperone to Shantalar's Lantern, an exclusive oasis resort in Calimshan frequented only by wizards.

Two adventures involved school dances. There were entire skill challenges involved with getting a date for the dance or getting the right outfit or whatever. Soem fo the students were bards. There was a "battle of the bands".
 
The last Majestrix thing I ran was about when school let out for the summer- one of the students had no family to go to, so she got recruited by the dark arts teacher to deliver something to an area that just happened to be where my drow group was located, so we had the first crossover. There's going to be a big crossover event soon.

But you need that kind of serialized play before you reach any depth.[/QUOTE]

Yah, we have that kind of serialized play.  I was just asking about this one-shot adventure...and by one-shot I actually meant one-session adventure.

Quote from: Age of Fable;393237Is 4th edition a good fit for either Harry Potter or fairy tales?

I do not know, yet.  While the campaign is old, this is really the revival of it for 4e.  We ran a bit in 4e, but really this is the first real re-start in 4e.  So, we shall see.  I suspect it will be fine, but I could be wrong.

One thing you can do to help set the mood is to use toys instead of D&D miniatures.

Lego figures work well, and a rubber ducky could be a terrifying opponent with a quack of doom and ferocious web-footed kicks. Those plastic easter eggs draw on with magic markers nicely, too--I used one as Humpty Dumpty, drawing different faces on based on how the characters interacted with him (and putting x's in the eyes when they finally just killed poor Humpty).

In 2003, a book called 'Redhurst Academy of Magic' was produced for D&D 3e. It was more of a 'university' than a 'high school' but had some neat stuff - complete programmes of study, a physical education department, and the entire premises was capable of travelling to other worlds.

Its ISBN is 1-932488-00-6 - well worth a look if you like adventures set in school.

[Damn, think I'm revising what I want to run next now....]

TV inspiration for fairy tales told different - "The 10th Kingdom"... do you fancy the Snow White Memorial Prison, a dog who is really the Prince (and a prince who's a dog in human form), and a bunch of orc hoodlums whose favourite expletive is "Suck an elf!"