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Session Padding |  |
This Treasure Tables post puts me in mind of a session I ran way back when. I think it might have actually been the first 3rd Edition session I ever ran. It was a somewhat short-lived solo campaign, myself in the DM’s seat and my friend Mike playing a human fighter, accompanied by a roster of NPCs. Among these NPCs was a rogue named Japhed (the first time I ever used this name, which I use all the time now), who was the best friend of Mike’s character. At any rate, they went into a dungeon infested with kobolds and started hacking their way through it (there wasn’t actually that much setup, as I recall, just a simple dungeon crawl to start things off). About halfway through, they ran into a kobold sorcerer who really gave the party a run for their money. This was where I first discovered the joys of mage armor. The kobold had a 19 AC, difficult for a group of 2nd-level characters, to be sure. They won, but not before the kobold summoned a viper which managed to actually kill poor Japhed. I think that’s probably why the name sticks with me, after all this time. He became a much beloved character in that campaign, and returned in various pseudo-dream sequences.
Anyway, the kobold sorcerer was considerably tougher than I had originally intended, and this was exacerbated by the fact that the (higher level) human cleric that I had created as the ‘end boss’ of the dungeon was killed in two or three rounds, despite his use of a potion of invisibility and more than one cure spell.
Now, I realize that, at best, this probably only qualifies as unintentional session padding; that kobold fight lasted a lot longer than I thought it would. And I guess it was sort of canceled out by the rather quick (and anticlimactic) final battle. However, this was what first sprang to my mind when I read the aforementioned post.
As to session padding in general, I’m for it and against it. The term carries some negative connotations with it, but it’s not necessarily a bad thing all the time. There’s something to be said for not having everything planned out in advance, and if you go into a session figuring that you’ll have to pad it a little, you can use what the PCs are saying and doing to generate some really great role-playing situations based, in whole or in part, on their own personal goals and agendas. What I’m against is throwing in monsters for the sake of drawing out the session, or because the party isn’t beat up enough, or because they’re not getting enough XP. I think that doing that can give your session a more generic and arbitrary feel, and it’s definitely something your players will notice.
[Edit: fixed title.]
