When designing an adventure we should be trying to avoid our players from saying five simple words: what are we doing again? A lot of ink has been spilled over the subject but one method I have found most effective in my own games is nested goals.

Nested goals is a simple system where you give your players different goals based on how long it will take them in real time to complete. These times are an encounter, this session, within 3 sessions, and by the end of the campaign.

Here’s an example from my latest session:

By the End of the Campaign: Squeak the Fighter is looking to save the travelling circus he grew up in from a terrible disease.
Within 3 Sessions: He needs to get to where his family is.
This Session: He must save a group of druids that may be able to help him have been kidnapped nearby.
An Encounter: He has to get past a trap that the kidnappers have placed at the entrance to their lair.

By having each of these goals work towards one another we can ensure that Squeak’s player is never asking why they are doing something.

Choosing another example at random from my booksheld, the Second Darkness adventure path by Paizo also follows this nested dolls example. Here’s what the nested goals look like at the start o the second book in the series (spoilers for Second Darkness in the next two paragraphs):

By the End of the Campaign: The PCs must stop the drow from bringing down an asteroid which will destroy the elf nation of Kyonin.
Within 3 Sessions: An ally of the PCs wants them to look into rumours that the drow have established a base of operations on a nearby island.
This Session: They need to arrive at the island and begin exploring it.
An Encounter: Saboteurs are setting the PCs ship on fire and must be stopped.

Once again all of these goals are nested allowing us to connect the, ostensibly unrelated, saboteurs hired by a man that fears the PCs are coming to compete in his mining operation to the overarching plot of drows trying to destroy an enemy nation.

So next time your designing an adventure, try using nesting goals and see your players move between encounters in a more organic way.