Thank you for your interest in contributing to Pathstrayer! Below you will find a detailed instruction for writing a quest. Please note; if you have an idea that diverts from the current format; or you feel inspired to add to the site in other ways, just let us know.
- Last updated: June 21, 2023
Main Proposition of Pathstrayer
Pathstrayer.com is a service aimed at DM’s worldwide. We offer ready-to-play quests written by D&D enthousiasts. Our quests require minimal (to no) preparation and can be played on the fly. They can be played as ‘one-shots’, or they can be incorporated into an existing campaign.
Terminology
It can be confusing to talk about D&D related content. To be on the same page, here are some definitions used by Pathstrayer:
- Adventure: an unusual or exciting challenge or experience
- Story: an account of Adventure(s) with a certain setting, cast, story arch, etc.
- Quest: a Story, related to a Campaign, told through a collection of Adventures
- Campaign (a.k.a. Main Quest): a Story told through a collection of Quests
- Side Quest: a Story, unrelated to any Campaign, told through a collection of Adventures
- One-shot: a Side Quest that can be played in one session
Instruction
- Write a One-Shot (see Terminology) according to the format used on Pathstrayer (see Format).
- Aim for a play time of 1 hour, but note it can be anything between 15m – 4hrs, depending on your idea.
- Ideally, a tricky dilemma, a surprising twist or thought-provoking consequences are central to the story.
- Include the following parts (see Format), indicated by headings:
- Introduction
- Tagline
- Plot Summary
- Story
- Use a different color to indicate prose (see Format > Story).
- Other than headings and “prose-blocks”, keep styling to a minimum.
- Stat Blocks (for homebrew content)
- Meta Data
- Author: your (real) first and last name.
- Type: choose one (or more) options from the list (see Format > Meta Data)
- CR: Use this calculator to determine the CR, based on a party of 5 level 5 players.
- Play time: time it takes to finish the quest.
- Deliver your work.
- Provide your work as a docx or googleDocs document (no pdf).
Format
The quests on Pathstrayer follow a particular format. If you haven’t already, please take a look at some of the quests here.
Introduction
Each quest starts off with an introduction. This is meant for both DM’s and players, so it must not contain spoilers. This text should arouse interest in the story. The introduction is between 80-120 words.
Tagline
The tagline is used to promote the quest with a single sentence, for instance in listings. This is meant for both DM’s and players, so it must not contain spoilers. It should be a strong sentence that arouses interest. The tagline is between 30-70 characters.
Plot Summary
The plot summary is intended for DM’s only, to quickly get a full understanding of the story. It contains all spoilers, and should be concise and informative. The plot summary is between 40-80 words.
Story
The story is told in two types of paragraphs:
There are paragraphs of prose, that look like this. These are meant to be read aloud to the players. They set the stage by giving detailed descriptions of surroundings, emotions, etc.
And then there are regular paragraphs like this one. These hold information that is for the DM only, for instance that a door is boobytrapped. And what will happen based the on players’ actions.
The length of the stories varies, but on average is about 1200 words. Depending on your contribution and our requirements, target lengths of a story can be 500, 1000, 1500, 2500 or 3000 words.
Stat blocks
The last section shows statistics (‘stat-blocks’) for items, non-player characters and/or monsters, both official and ‘homebrew’.
Meta Data
The quest pages show the following metadata:
- Author: the original author of the quest (real first/last name)
- Type: the type of quest. This is one (or a combination) of the following options: Boss, Collect, Combat, Defence, Deliver, Destroy, Escort, Inspect, Pursuit, Puzzle, Race, Relax, Rescue, Search, Time.
- CR: The Challenge Rating of the toughest encounter in the Quest.
- Play time: the estimated time it will take a group of 5 level 5 players to play the quest, rounded off to 15 minutes.