Jaunts: Format/Template?

I'll get MHM to post it....

This is the template I've used thus far for my Jaunts. If Ashy or anyone else has any suggested alterations/additions, they can toss them in as comments so we can all get to a uniform standard.

THE TEMPLATE:
Jaunt Title
Starting Player UP: Where the PCs begin, UP-wise, in this Jaunt (my "normal" amount for con games is 40)
Location: Where the PCs physically begin the Jaunt - a short description is good to help other GMs zero in on the local details and think of how to start "making it their own"
Decks Needed: The decks you'll need to run this game. I try and keep this amount as small as feasible, because obviously you'll want your Jaunt to be available for other GMs to run and the easiest way to make a Jaunt more accessible is to make less decks required to play it.

Lead In: The "quick introduction" to your Jaunt. Assume that both the GM and the Players know basically nothing about the setting world as a whole - even people familiar with part of the game universe can forget some stuff, and this is a great time to remind them so they can riff off things if the Jaunt goes off the beaten path. This is also the time to explain how your Players wound up at the Starting Location and what their motivations/interests are. Lead them from here up to the first major challenge, and then proceed to the next section.

Opening Encounter - ENCOUNTER TYPE:
List of Minion or other Cards relevant to encounter

Detail what this encounter and its conflict is. What is the challenge? You should discuss it, the motivations of NPCs involved, and what sort of tactics they will take - both generally and in response to specific common PC reactions. I list every encounter by a TYPE (such as COMBAT, SOCIAL, CHASE, INVESTIGATION, or so on) to give GMs a general "feel of the moment" prompt, and this also helps me make sure I keep a variety of encounters in every Jaunt. I try to make sure in most encounters to have multiple "options" presented for the PCs to experiment with and utilize to solve the challenge; there should always be several "ways out" for the Party, so they don't feel forced down a single path (even if every way out leads to the same follow-up encounters, they should feel like their choices led to a unique adventure outcome for them). Similarly, I always include ways to make each encounter shorter or easier if the PCs are getting in over their heads - these may not need to be used, especially in a home game, but they help make sure a demo isn't going to end up in a TPK that'll leave everyone bummed out.

This is the format that I use for every encounter in the Jaunt, and I try to have three or four encounters (though only two should really REQUIRE significant time investment - otherwise you'll probably be running longer than your Players' attention spans). Just essentially copy/paste, making sure to vary it up, and my general rule is to ALWAYS have at least one social encounter per Jaunt; this is a role-playing game, after all.

Epilogue:
Once all the encounters have been run through, give your Players their moment of "riding off into the sunset" here. This is where you wrap up the immediate challenges from the Jaunt and hint about wider consequences of this brief adventure.

GM's Secrets - This section contains all the things you don't want to narrate to your Players, but DO want to keep in mind should you have to improvise more information or a different encounter than those detailed above. Basically, this is the "behind the scenes" information about wider world forces and events which intersect with the Jaunt's encounters.

Expanding the Adventure:
If your PCs want to continue from what they've experienced, this tells you how to go about it - other forces associated with the Jaunt's encounters, further exploration of the themes it covered, and so on and so forth.

REWARDS:
Especially in con demo games, you want to present your Players with the option of messing around with cards outside the basic Iconics and seeing what other things they can use in playing this game and overcoming the Jaunt's encounters. This is where you detail WHAT cards can be brought in for use as "treasure" by the PCs and WHERE/WHEN they can get access to them. Obviously these are not the ONLY card options your Players can have access to, but they're useful recommendations on "what sort of makes sense given the encounters they've run into."

Thanks, MHM! +40 UP!

Only question I have: in a Jaunt or con-demo, how many Encounters do you stage? I want to show some variety, including non-combat activities, but also don't want to cram in too much.

Also, at what point does a "Jaunt" become an "Adventure"?

Saw the "3 or 4 encounters", so that answers my first question. There is some similarity here with the basic adventure-outline process used in R. Talsorian's "Dream Park", which I'm also looking at. Mike divided "encounters" into two broad classes -- "Cliffhangers", which are action scenes, and "Discoveries" (I think), which are investigative. They also recommended alternating them in your scenario.

All in all, very very useful. I can certainly write up my con demos as Jaunts and either publish them here or provide them to WMS for their professional use. :)

Still want to know what distinguishes Jaunts from full-on Adventures.

Excellent! We'd love to see them, Bob!!! :D

The difference between a Jaunt and an Adventure is length. Jaunts are meant to be run in one, relatively short session (i.e. one night or less) while Adventures are longer.

Not everyone can see "WIP", so I'm gonna post this out onto the public forums....

Specifically on the "number of encounters" deal, it depends on the type of Jaunt you're writing. If it's one that's meant to run in one group for a single full night's gaming, I'd go three or four. If it's one that's intended to be a con-game, I'd go for three MAXIMUM - or maybe even two, if you think you can tell a decent story of some meaning with only two encounters. I've had some of my con-games never make it past the first encounter due to "creative combat" maneuvering, so in the future it's something I'd plan to be even shorter than my current "short and sweet" Jaunt.

As for how I section out my encounters, I do it pretty much as follows for all my Jaunts:
1.) Combat - You want to drop your Players deep in trouble as soon as you start, because otherwise if they're not an already-associated group they're going to probably rub each other the wrong way and may want to split up (either destroying your game coherency or the suspension of disbelief). Giving them something they MUST work together to overcome right at the start helps them coalesce, as they'll be helping each other out from the start.
2.) Social - I always follow up my combats with a social encounter, as it helps reinforce that there are other options than shooting things. This may be as little as having the Party talk among itself about what to do next, or as much as having them talk themselves out of peril, but talking is an important part of any role-playing game and I like to reinforce that this is not just a card game with tactical elements - it's an RPG.
3.) Whatever You Want - This can be almost anything, from skill-checks to more combat to more talking to whatever else. If I had the time, I'd write up my con-games here to actually have ALL the options as possible "paths" from the second encounter and pick which one follows up from it depending on my perception of the group's likes and dislikes; but that's silly to ask anyone to do, since I don't actually have the time to do that MYSELF, and so I generally say "go with a challenge that emphasizes what you like running."

I agree with MHM 100% here - in a con game, less is more. Give them some fun role-playing and awesome combat, make them the heroes and leave them hanging; they'll want more Untold for sure. :D