The group I play with weekly just got done with a semi-regular all day event we call MarcCon (for one of our past members that moved a couple hours away and doesn’t get to play with us on a regular basis). I wanted to run a DnD5e game, but knew that I wouldn’t have enough time to complete work on my GenCon game. So I decided to see what I could create with about 10 days notice – figuring in all the other distractions of family, work, and other outside commitments.

Here is what I came up with over the course of about 10 hours.

The Lower Horn. An adventure for 4-6 second level PCs set in the city of Horn – the most important city in the world.

A cry for help leads to an extermination, a dangerous journey, murder, mayhem and greed.

Step One – know your audience. I had three things to base the adventure around, time, number of players, and system knowledge. We set a time limit of four hours for games so we can have some more variety during the day. I set the number of players originally at 4, but moved up to 6 (creating two extra PCs at the last minute). And, I knew that almost everyone had at least basic knowledge of 5e (and everyone had extensive play time with DnD).

Step Two – don’t create from scratch what you can buy or steal. With my short (for me) prep time, I turned to pre-made adventures, and looked through ENWorld and Drive through RPG for inspiration. I settled on a product called Wanted, a collection of urban encounters at Drive Through RPG. The product had two encounters that could be run one after the other and suggested a third. It also included a sheet of mostly random sewer encounters I could use for an additional encounter.

The overall story:

A pair of lycanthropes (wererat and werewolf) set out to both infect the city with plague and make money off a cure that only they have. The wererat breeds and infects rats to let loose on the city and the werewolf collects the cure to sell at a huge profit. Any further mayhem and murder that happens – just a bonus. The PCs stumble upon the plan when they respond to a cry for help from Mrs O’leary about a rat problem (the wererat was a little too successful with the breeding program) in her basement. Fairly straightforward, and most of the details put together in the encounters PDF I purchased.

Step Three – create the players. I started out thinking I just needed four PCs, so went with the standard “basic” classes – Fighter, Wizard, Cleric, Rogue. Staying at second level meant I didn’t have to walk through too many character choices, but everyone got some personalization. A day or so before play I found out that I needed 2 more PCs, so I added a Paladin and a Bard. Here is the Class, Race, Background breakdown.

• Fighter, Mountain Dwarf, Hermit – Squints (Reginald Hammersmith)
• Cleric, Half-Elf, Urchin – Far
• Rogue, Lightfoot Halfling, Criminal – Tufts (Willy Fogbottom)
• Wizard, Rock Gnome, Sage – Asperger (Former Dr. of Magicology)
• Bard, Tiefling, Charlatan – Strings (Weary Reba)
• Paladin, Half-Orc, Sailor – Hardy

In some cases I used the Wizards forums to pick builds and spells because I wasn’t familiar enough with options. In others I just created what I thought was fun and fit best in the environment and with the story. More important to me was getting them some background details that would hook them in the story and provide each player something to grab onto for role playing (more important for some players than others). A zip file of the character sheets is included at the end of the article (they are a little light on equipment – I added that by hand).

Step Four – maps and plans. The one thing that the Wanted PDF did not have was maps. I needed a basement map, a map of the rat breeding area and a warehouse map for the final battle. Not a problem and the thing that took the shortest amount of time. As I always seem to find out, putting things down on a map for the players always add complexity and more details. I added some more details to Mrs O’Leary. She had massive shelves of preserves in her basement that made for great hazards during a fight. The breeding cave gave me the chance to pre-plan some strategy for the monsters to take care of visitors. And lastly the warehouse added extra guards and security that made the final battle more complex. It also laid out for me what the time line for the evil plan was, and what would happen if the players didn’t want to take part (always an option).

Step Five – Extra Encounters. The only encounter not in the PDF was the warehouse at the end. I needed a big bad (werewolf) and some minions (thugs form the Monster Manual). I added some clerks and that was about it, almost ready to go.

Step Six – Incidentals. The PCs had all the basics, but I needed to add some trinkets and personalized items. I also needed minis for the PCs and the bad guys. One of the players has a vast store of fantasy minis, so I hit him up for the PCs, and then used what I had on-hand for the bad guys.

Step Seven – Game Play. I think the game went well. There was a good amount of tension in the last battle. I dropped two PCs, and resources were so low players were asking if destroying their trinkets would cause damage (absolutely – but it’s a blast radius – insert evil laugh) to the werewolf. Didn’t consider how hard it was to take down a werewolf based on immunities to damage – no magic weapons in the party. Things I would change were some different ways to get the clues/path to the end fight. I was too railroady. Better to have a good tie from the basement through to the breeding ground. It was just a path ahead – possibly kidnap or chase would be better. Some of the PCs background included protecting the city/party members so a motivation was there, just a little week. I was happy with how some of the players jumped into their characters and improved on what I had, especially Asperger and Squints.

Lessons learned for the GenCon adventure. More paths to the end. Tie the PCs together better. I will have more props (love working with LEGOs), and that should increase interest/immersion.

LowerHorn Character sheets and descriptions.