My Four Tips to Story Building
Four Tips to Story Building
“Thank you for the tea,” says the barbarian reaching up for a teacup.
“Of course,” replies the blacksmith with a gentle smile. The man moves around the table, passing out more cups to the rest of the party before taking a seat next to the barbarian. “That task I ask you to do must have been challenging since it took all day.”
“Nonsense, sir,” the sorcerer says with a subsequent hand wave. “We handled it just fine. Don’t worry about use.”
The cleric grunts, rushing to finish a sip of tea. “She’s right, it was nothing. It took us longer to find the place compared to actually getting the item.”
“Speaking of which,” the monk begins rummaging in her pack. When her arm is removed she clutches something wrapped in cloth. “Here’s what you asked for.”
She passes it to the blacksmith who snatches it away. “My greatest thanks. With this, my vision can finally come true. You have no clue how much this means to me. I’ll make sure to remember the sacrifice you made for me. I wish you could be there to see the new world,” —several distinct thuds sound as three bodies slam against the table— “but I can’t take any risks by letting you live.”
One of the most important features in Dungeons & Dragons is the art of storytelling. The Dungeon Master’s job is to set up a creative and fun universe for their friends to explore. A good campaign is full of an adventurous atmosphere they can get lost in for hours on end. The game is built mostly on a mindset of “make-believe” because you’re not only playing fictional characters —like elves, dwarves, orcs, et cetera— you’re building a fantasy world piece by piece as each session continues.
For today, I plan to teach DMs and players the four core attributes that I believe to create a good story. These four ideas are types of setting, storylines, creating tension, and character backstories. These four tips will provide you with the necessary foundation to begin crafting a unique world of your own. I’m sure that by the end, your creativity will be flowing and any questions swimming in your head will be taken care of.
1. Type of Setting
Asking questions about the time period, the rarity of certain races or the main setting of the story brings to life your personal goals for the campaign you’ll be running. The setting is important because the scenery of the characters sets the mood for each encounter. If you can have a small idea of the greater picture of your universe, describing small town hillsides or an old dungeon will be easy.
When you start thinking about what the world will look like, keep in mind the things you find most important to the story. For myself, I always have a basic image of what the landscape looks like, I create key locations most important in my story, and I create a basic form of government. This is what I do, however. Find the key things that will make your story interesting. So spots to get you started are: the time period, does magic exist, the variety of races, more cities or villages, and religion.
2. Storylines
Once you have step one completed, use those ideas as a foundation to build the first session. You need to formulate the reason the player’s you’re DMing forgot together. There’s always a reason for people meeting and this shouldn’t be something that’s overlooked in your story. The first encounter the players will have is what solidifies the rest of their adventure together. This can sound intimidating, but by taking a step back it’s not as overwhelming as you think.
Think of these things while planning the group's motives for becoming adventurers: where are they, what brought them here, and who’s their implorer? You should also use this time to plot what crisis the characters will be facing. You can’t have a protagonist if there is no antagonist and because of this, you need to create the villain. It could be a person, a horrific effect from some action, or some weird, suspicious item. The point is, there needs to be a conflict the characters mutually agree on they’ll work together to fix. Once this has been decided, it's up to you how long this choice plot device will last. It could be the plot of one session or it could take up a whole campaign to resolve. That’s your choice as the Dungeon Master.
3. Create Tension
This is my favorite part, creating the dramatic pieces of the story. What these do to the story is to add little surprises for the players as they journey around your world. You’ll want to get creative with these, personalize them for your party specifically. Imagine these moments being one of your many cards. Once you use it, most likely you won’t be able to play this card again. I do find this also being the most tricky thing about Dungeon Mastering because this is the place you must be the most mastered in.
Here is a time I used to create my plot twists: use your players as reference. What I mean becomes familiar with each of the characters' backstories. You’re going to find that each player has different but personal little features their characters will have. You could have a rogue who grew up not knowing their parents, a bard who ran away to the circus, or a cleric who lost their temple to demonic fire. Those are only a few examples, but within each of those backstories are areas you can dig into to make intense encounters that add to the plot. So try it, look at your own party members and see what things you can exploit from their backstories.
4. Character Backstories
If I could stress anything being them most important on this list, it would be this one. Character backstories are the essence of a Dungeons & Dragons campaign. While the DM gets to come up with every other feature of their world, it’s the player's job to set up their character in the world. To me, it’s observed for the Dungeon Master to take on this responsibility because the game is for both them AND the players. That’s why I strongly encourage every player out there to dig deep into their character. Figure out why the tick, what makes them emotional, why did they take up adventuring in the first place?
When this feature gets applied to the universe, it completely changes the story. Not in a bad way, but in a wonderful and beautiful way. The story suddenly becomes something personal shared between everyone sitting at the table. It makes the characters more unique and special to whoever's playing them. Another thing this does is set the Dungeon Master up to create unique, intense moments that I described above. If this step is ignored, not followed, or altered so the DM does most of the work, this atmosphere of friendship is really hard to achieve. That’s why Dungeon Masters, encourage your players to get creative. If you do this, what your story turns from an idea into pure reality.
These tips are what I suggest and won’t be for everyone. Don’t linger long, worrying about how you can incorporate these ideas into your campaign. If you feel there won’t help or improve your story then that is perfectly okay. Dungeons & Dragons is a unique game in that you can make it what you want. Taking risks and trying something new is what makes the game fun. Trust your inner creativity and yourself to make an awesome world your players will enjoy exploring. I hope these tips were helpful and happy adventuring!
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