I’ve been looking through some older D&D materials. I know I’ve seen something in at least one of them about non-linear adventure design, but haven’t been able to put my hands (or eyes) on the one I want. I remember a section in a book that talks about trying to track down a wizard, and how there were a number of sites to look in. I seem to recall a diagram showing relationships between the various places to look (a two-dimensional array of houses or towns or some other such symbols).
So far I have checked (in no particular order)
- AD&D 1st Edition Dungeon Master’s Design Kit (I thought this was the one I wanted, but evidently not)
- AD&D 2nd Edition DMGR1 Campaign Sourcebook and Catacomb Guide (does have a paragraph or so on ‘matrix-based scenarios’)
- AD&D 2nd Edition DMGR5 Creative Campaigning (does have a paragraph or so on ‘matrix-based scenarios’, the sample adventures suggest that there is a likely path through the encounters but that there could be some variance)
- AD&D 2nd Edition Dungeon Builder’s Guidebook (didn’t see anything)
- AD&D 2nd Edition World Builder’s Guidebook (didn’t see anything)
If anyone knows what I’m looking for and can find it, I’d welcome the information.
Also, I seem to recall seeing a Dragon Magazine article that talked about relationships between NPCs and groups of NPCs that was represented as a directed graph. Nodes were NPCs or groups, edges indicated a relationship and identified the general type of relationship: ‘fears’, ‘follows’, ‘commands’, and so on. If anyone has an idea what issue this was in, I’d welcome that information also.