This weekend I’m running a planar one-shot adventure for my spouse and a group of friends. The adventure is The Celestial Job by Matt and Rob of the DM of None podcast. You can hear them create the adventure here and revise it here. You can get your own copy of the adventure here.

As the name implies, it is a planar adventure. I love D&D Planescape. Back when I was a teenager in the 90s, the 2E Planescape box set utterly captured my imagination. I may write about the updated Planescape setting when it comes out in a few weeks, so I’ll spare you my thoughts and focus on the adventure at hand.

If you’d like to talk Planescape or heist adventures, find me on Mastodon @[email protected]

Adventure Overview

The Celestial Job is a heist adventure in which the players are put on a path to steal a lotus bloom from Mount Celestia, the Lawful Good heaven plane in D&D’s planar cosmology. The flower contains the soul of an enlightened master who gained perfect awareness of the cosmos and thus knows the location of every planar portal. Several planar factions want the lotus to exploit or, as they see it, protect this information. The party is hired by one of these factions and the other factions make themselves known as the adventure progresses.

Cut to the Action

Because The Celestial Job is a one-shot adventure, the players don’t have the same amount of agency that they would in a campaign. My players already know that their characters are going on this adventure. They will face real choices over the course of the adventure, but “do you accept the mysterious offer” is not one of them. So, what does this mean for my prep? As a recent Sly Flourish campaign prep episode stressed, if there’s no choice, cut to the action.

The adventure as written begins with a letter being dropped on the party’s table at a bar, inviting them to talk. It’s a cool conceit, but a false choice. The party has to say yes or else there’s no adventure.

So, let’s start the action in the meeting with the quest-giving NPC. The first real choices the players have is what questions to ask and if they’re willing to antagonize the NPC. We’ll still get the cool letter drop scene, but we’ll handle it in a series of questions.

Questions to Set Tone

After everyone has introduced their characters, I plan to go around the table and ask each player a question to be answered from the character’s perspective. I have four players, so I’ll want four questions. The purpose of the questions it to establish tone. They’re a group of adventurers down on their luck. They’re accepting this offer, but maybe they have reservations. I also want the questions to build towards the first scene so we can cut right to the action.

• What accomplishment brought your adventuring party wealth and fame? Which member of your party deserves the most credit for your success?
• What events transpired to both ruin your reputation and empty your coin purse? Which member of your party deserves the most blame for what went wrong?
• Why is your group still together after the ruin of your fortunes and reputation? Which member of the party most held you all together?
• When you go to meet Ms. Oceanus in the cellar dining room, from which of your companions do you snatch her letter? Why should you lead the negotiations?

Okay, I cheated and doubled up the questions. I’ll let the players know they don’t have to snitch on anyone if they don’t want to! I wrote each question on a 3×5 card. I’ll note to whom I asked each question and their answers on the cards.

Hopefully these questions get the table in the mood for a heist. Once we’ve answered the questions, I’ll narrate them passing through the cellar door and into Sigil. They’ll meet Ms. Oceanus and we’ll be off.

Handouts and a Map

Everyone loves handouts! I sent my players an adventure one-pager, like the one we designed in the last post, that gives some context for the adventure.

The adventure has a few magic items. I thought it would be fun to make cards with artwork for them. The baatazu offering the magic items should be tempting. Offering cards with pretty artwork to my players and then pulling them back slightly with an, “ah, ah, but do we have a deal?” should add to the tempting tone.

The magic item descriptions are from the Dungeon Master’s Guide and the images are all from Magic: The Gathering cards.

Finally, I made a map with dungeon scrawl for the final encounter in the grotto. This encounter has potential to be more tactical than the other combat encounters which can be handled in theatre of the mind. I imported the map image into Affinity Photo and drew in details.

Prepare to Cut

I’ll have a good four hours for the adventure, and I should be able to fit everything in. However, I must be prepared to cut material. I don’t want to rush the climactic ending just because we spent too much time gawking at the sights in Sigil.

To that end, we need to identify the “boring middle” as Mike Shea calls it. If I notice we’re running long, I’ll need a plan for what to cut to move us to the climax.

The first cut will be Scene 4, in which the party gets distracted by the pleasures of heaven. If I need to move it along, I’ll narrate past the scene. This scene doesn’t add much in the way of plot.

The next cut is easily Scene 7, in which the party must solve a puzzle to open a door. Unless the party already knows how to solve it, a puzzle will kill the energy at the table.

Finally, I’ll cut the return to Sigil. Instead of playing it out, I’ll ask the players to narrate their return once they decide what to do with the lotus.

With these cuts in mind, I should be able to make up time if we get bogged down.

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Next time, I’ll reflect on the session and if my prep worked for me. I run this adventure in two days. If you’d like to wish me luck, message me on Mastodon @[email protected]

Feature Image “Nyx Lotus” by Raoul Vitale copyright 2020 Wizards of the Coast