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[D&D 4E] Planning to write a solo adventure for my wife. Suggestions welcome.
milk ducks
High Mucky MuckBig Tits TownRegistered User regular
High Mucky MuckBig Tits TownRegistered User regular
My wife and I haven't been able to pull together a solid tabletop gaming group for over a year. She wants to play something, and I want to write something, so I figured I'd just run something for her. Now, I've got a lot of experience with 4E, but I've never done a solo adventure before, so I'm not totally sure how to go about it. Here's my premise thus far:
Persian-inspired setting. My wife's always been into Tomb Raider, so I thought it'd be neat if her character's some kind of thief who delves into forgotten / forbidden ruins in search of magical treasures. She thinks that's cool, so that's a bonus. Now, because she'll essentially be playing this game by herself, I don't see any reason why she can't be overpowered as fuck. I'm more interested in story, anyway. So I'm thinking if she rolls up a Rogue (and it's looking like she will), I'll just toss in some powers or features from other classes. Like Shadow Walk from Warlocks. Why the hell not, right? And toss in Eyebite, while you're at it. Sounds cool.
My general idea is that her character will find a gauntlet really early on in her adventure. This is an ancient artifact that contains the fiery spirit of an ancient warrior. In essence, the gauntlet allows her to summon an ally to help her. I'm thinking this ally is a Fighter (since she'll need a defender) with a bit of Dragon Blood Sorcerer thrown in. It's like a fire elemental, basically, or some ancient dragon spirit. Who gives a shit, really? What matters is that she'll have someone she can summon in battle if she needs to. I can play this character in combat for her. I think that's kind of neat, since it allows me to have a character in the game, but it's not a DMNPC or whatever -- it's only there when she wants it around.
Maybe in the future, she can bind other spirits to the Gauntlet? This will allow her to summon different companions (one at a time) for different situations?
That's the premise, anyway. I haven't gotten down to brass tacks yet and really figured out how it's all going to play.
I have some general gameplay tweaks that I always do when running 4E (reduce enemy HP by half and enemy defenses by 10%, increase enemy damage by +5 per tier, everybody gains all the "feat tax" bullshit for free, etc), so I plan to implement all of those. There may be some tricks I haven't thought of yet, though, that may be important in a solo adventure. Like, I don't think it would be much fun to be stunned in a solo game, because you really don't have anybody to cover for you and let's be honest, it's not fun to be stunned even when you do. So maybe reduce Stuns to Dazes, Dazes to Slows, etc?
I'm open to any kind of advice, at this point. And if you have any story suggestions, I'm all ears.
Persian-inspired setting. My wife's always been into Tomb Raider, so I thought it'd be neat if her character's some kind of thief who delves into forgotten / forbidden ruins in search of magical treasures. She thinks that's cool, so that's a bonus. Now, because she'll essentially be playing this game by herself, I don't see any reason why she can't be overpowered as fuck. I'm more interested in story, anyway. So I'm thinking if she rolls up a Rogue (and it's looking like she will), I'll just toss in some powers or features from other classes. Like Shadow Walk from Warlocks. Why the hell not, right? And toss in Eyebite, while you're at it. Sounds cool.
My general idea is that her character will find a gauntlet really early on in her adventure. This is an ancient artifact that contains the fiery spirit of an ancient warrior. In essence, the gauntlet allows her to summon an ally to help her. I'm thinking this ally is a Fighter (since she'll need a defender) with a bit of Dragon Blood Sorcerer thrown in. It's like a fire elemental, basically, or some ancient dragon spirit. Who gives a shit, really? What matters is that she'll have someone she can summon in battle if she needs to. I can play this character in combat for her. I think that's kind of neat, since it allows me to have a character in the game, but it's not a DMNPC or whatever -- it's only there when she wants it around.
Maybe in the future, she can bind other spirits to the Gauntlet? This will allow her to summon different companions (one at a time) for different situations?
That's the premise, anyway. I haven't gotten down to brass tacks yet and really figured out how it's all going to play.
I have some general gameplay tweaks that I always do when running 4E (reduce enemy HP by half and enemy defenses by 10%, increase enemy damage by +5 per tier, everybody gains all the "feat tax" bullshit for free, etc), so I plan to implement all of those. There may be some tricks I haven't thought of yet, though, that may be important in a solo adventure. Like, I don't think it would be much fun to be stunned in a solo game, because you really don't have anybody to cover for you and let's be honest, it's not fun to be stunned even when you do. So maybe reduce Stuns to Dazes, Dazes to Slows, etc?
I'm open to any kind of advice, at this point. And if you have any story suggestions, I'm all ears.
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I would, as much as possible, avoid combat entirely. But then all you've got is 4e's kinda uninteresting skill system. If you do feel the need to invoke the combat rules, remember that more enemies typically equates to more challenge. A single standard monster is going to be an actual threat, especially at low levels, especially with a +5 to damage just because. A striker without a leader to pick her up off the floor is going to be in trouble.
I'd focus on traps and exploration and simple roleplaying, myself. 4e's traps-as-skill-challenges structure should work pretty well, if you adjust it a bit for a single player. For the other bits, figure out your setting in broad strokes, then carve out bits for the player to squeeze in and play and mess things up and fix things and whatever.
You're right that you should drop as many of the You Don't Get To Play status effects as you can stand to, though. But honestly, you should do that even with a full party.
On a 5 hour train journey my brother played as a lone cleric in Dungeon World. We both had fun playing and he spent a lot of time avoiding combat and figuring out traps/puzzles (or casting charm person). Basically you can have alot of the same flavour of D&D (in this case a tomb raider style game would be rad) without having to worry about how the mechanics are going to be affected.