09-23-2026, 08:43 PM
Quote:Lastly on the prep and reading side. I would be very interested to hear from people what modules they have read that can be run without prep.
So at my open table campaign I've been running for the past few months, I run exclusively prewritten adventures connected only very loosely. Other than reading and taking a few notes, the only prep that I've done has been to draw a little overworld pointcrawl map connecting each adventure, and then stick 1–3 magic blue coins into each adventure, usually just in the biggest already-extant loot pile. The reading takes time, definitely, but otherwise my prep is effectively zero, like <10 minutes per adventure.
Here are the adventures that have gone well for us, where I felt like I was on top of things for 95%+ of gametime without doing significant improv or spending forever looking something up:
- Aberrant Reflections
- The Black Manse
- Beneath Harlowe House
- The Waking of Willowby Hall
While we haven't gotten to them yet (Black Manse is taking a while), here are some others I am pretty confident will also run more or less fine out of the box, all of which I've run before in one campaign or another:
- Secret of the Black Crag
- The Isle
- Kidnap the Arch-priest
- A Familiar Tower
- Mike's Dungeons
All of these are, obviously, very standard dungeon-y adventures: pretty tight enclosed spaces, limited opportunities and items, mostly devoid of complex social dynamics. Everybody knows how to run and play these, and while we definitely have had some very fun and memorable moments, it's true that they are, for the most part, basically just standard dungeon dragon affairs. But you can run them by doing basically nothing more than reading!
The big challenge from here, in my mind, is trying to apply this same level of thorough-preparation in an environment that is less familiar and constrained: mysteries, maybe, or navigating big social hierarchies, or going on long road trips, or whatever. Something that's still just as prepped and ready for play, but new and fresh.