Great Adventure Layout: The Fall of Silverpine Watch

Scott "The Angry GM" Rehm has written an introductory D&D adventure as supplement to his book Game Angry: How to RPG the Angry Way. Scott describes it as thus on his website:

The Fall of Silverpine Watch is an introductory D&D adventure module for three to five players and one GM. It’s specifically designed to help inexperienced GMs hone the skills they learned in Game Angry: How to RPG the Angry Way. It’s also a great way for experienced GMs to introduce new players to role-playing games and even experienced groups can enjoy this standalone adventure.

I have run the module several times and highly recommend it:

• as a really well-designed adventure that is a lot of fun for you and your players
• as an excellent introduction to D&D both for players and a newbie GM
• as a masterclass of how to organize the layout of a module

The Angry GM has a whole article with his thoughts on module presentation, but since it is very verbose (as is the Angry GM's style), let me put on of the salient feature of his design in a nutshell: Hierarchical Encounter Layout.

Here is a page of The Fall of Silverpine Watch (I have turned most of the text into unreadable runes, since the whole thing is Scott's work -- go and download it for yourself!!!)

(UPDATE January 2022: due to Wizards' of the Coast decision to de-authorize the OGL1.0a, unfortunately for the time being, Scott has removed The Fall of Silverpine Watch from his webpage. Let us hope that once the dust has settled, he will make it available again!)

Let me count the ways in which this layout is fantastic:

1. The encounter starts with a brief overview of everything that is important to know.

2. Bold-face words in the overview alert the GM to topics for which additional information is available. They serve as pointers to ...

3. ... sub-sections within the encounter description that provide the GM with that information.

4. Each encounter starts with a section "Set the Scene" which provides a description of the location in a series of bullet points that are quick to parse and digest for the GM.

5. Checks are consistently highlighted and presented in a standardized way that informs in a concise way not only about the DC but also

   • whether the check is active or passive
   • whether proficiency is required
   • whether there are obvious ways in which advantage can be granted or disadvantage should be imposed

6. A section "Call for Action" briefly outlines the main purpose of this encounter what is the problem, the characters are confronted with?

7. A final section "Move On" describes where the players can go from here

8. Map locations are consistently highlighted

9. Sidebars present the GM with advice on how to run the encounter.

The layout makes it really easy to run the adventure (which is quite extensive) with a reasonable amount of preparation. I wish, more adventures were layed out like "The Fall of Silverpine Watch"!