How to prep an RPG session in an hour
The Talehaven team6 min read
The session is on Thursday and your free hour is today. The classic trap is to start writing descriptions, spend three paragraphs on tavern architecture and arrive at the table with no idea what the players are supposed to do.
Session prep is not novel writing. It is arranging a few pieces so they can react to what the players decide.
Short answer
In an hour you can prepare: one opening scene, three to five things the players can interact with (a person, a place, an object, a threat), and a list of open questions. Do not plan scenes that have not happened yet, and do not write dialogue.
The one-hour plan
10 minutes: read what the last session left behind
Your notes from last time will tell you more than a new idea. Write down promises made to players, threads left half-open and anything the party said they would do next.
10 minutes: decide the session question
Not a plot, a question: "will the party warn the settlement in time?", "who is behind the disappearances?". A session is ready when you know what it answers.
20 minutes: prepare pieces, not scenes
Three to five things that exist regardless of what the players do: a character with a goal, a place with a problem, an object with a history, a threat with a deadline. These will fill the evening.
10 minutes: prepare the opening scene
The only scene worth scripting. It should put the players in front of a decision within five minutes, not ease them in with a weather report.
10 minutes: prepare the thing you will show
A map, a handout, an illustration, a fragment of a letter. One object you can put on the table or share on screen does more than a paragraph of description.
What that looks like in Alpendorf
Session question: what is actually singing in the stone under the settlement?
The pieces: a mine foreman who knows more than he says. The entrance to an old shaft, sealed three winters ago. An amulet found on a body. An approaching blizzard that will cut the road to the valley.
Opening scene: the party returns to the settlement and sees a cart outside the inn that was not there before.
The rest happens at the table. Four pieces plus a deadline are enough for a whole evening.
Common challenges
- Writing scenes that assume specific player decisions. They will do something else and an hour of work goes in the bin.
- Preparing the world instead of the session. The ruling house’s genealogy will not help if the party is sitting in a tavern with nothing to push against.
- Notes you cannot return to mid-game. A wall of text is useless when you need one fact in ten seconds.
- No deadline. A piece with no time pressure never enters play, because it can always wait.
Prep your next session in one place
Your plan, NPCs, map and notes belong to the campaign, so you never start by searching.