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Arcs, Chapters and Scenes

Three levels for structuring your story, with increasing granularity.

Arc​

An arc is a large narrative arch. Available fields:

  • Name and synopsis — the arc's pitch
  • Structure — Linear (chapters in sequence) or Hub (quests freely accessible from a central point)
  • Themes — recurring motifs (e.g. "betrayal", "descent into hell")
  • Stakes — what is at stake for the PCs
  • GM notes — secrets, twists, info not to reveal to the players
  • Rewards — XP, items, contacts gained
  • Resolution — the expected ending (to be adjusted based on actual play)
  • Linked Lore pages — cross-context references to the Lore (factions, locations)
  • Illustrations — mood images

Chapter​

A subdivision of a linear arc. Same linking mechanics to the Lore. Specific fields:

  • GM notes — preparation, transitions
  • Player objectives — what the PCs must accomplish / discover
  • Narrative stakes — what may tip over in this chapter
Conditional unlocking lives on quests

Unlock conditions (an activated fact, a completed quest, a session count reached) are now defined on quests, not on chapters.

Scene​

The playable unit. This is what the AI draws on the most when you ask it to generate narrative content. Specific fields:

  • Location and timing (day/night/season)
  • Atmosphere — sensory descriptions, tone
  • Narration to players — text to read out/improvise to set the scene
  • Secret GM notes — only displayed to you
  • Choices and consequences — possible alternatives
  • Combat difficulty and enemies — free note, and/or enemies linked from the bestiary
  • Illustrations — gallery of mood images
  • Battlemaps — the scene's combat maps (see below)
  • Branches — narrative exits toward other scenes (see Narrative branches)
Explorable location (dungeon mode)

A scene can contain rooms: as soon as it has at least one, it switches to a dungeon rendering — each room has its own enemies, loot, traps, floor, and branches between rooms.

An AI Assistant (✨ button) is available on the scene to generate atmosphere, narration, or plot twists.

Battlemaps​

A scene can carry several labeled battlemaps — the variants of a single place: the label is free text ("Day", "Night", "Floor 1"…). Each map has a source of your choice:

  • Dungeon Alchemist (image/video + JSON) — the map's media, plus the .json file from Dungeon Alchemist's "Foundry VTT" export (walls, doors, lights);
  • DungeonDraft (.dd2vtt) — a single Universal VTT file: the embedded image is extracted automatically on upload, walls and lights are kept.

Battlemaps are not displayed in the app: they are carried over to the Foundry export — one Foundry Scene per map — and rendered with their caption in the PDF booklet.

note

A .dd2vtt without an embedded image is accepted, but the exported map will have no background — a warning shows at upload time.

Best practices​

  • Prepare by arc, play by scene. Define the big picture once, then add scenes as your sessions progress.
  • Don't wait for everything to be "complete". A scene with just a location + atmosphere + a short piece of narration is playable — the "Next steps" panel tells you what's actually missing.
  • GM notes vs. player narration. Keep them clearly separated — the AI can generate the narration without revealing the secrets if you pass it the right fields.