How do you stop a DM from starting NEW campaigns all the time?

[BlackSilver]

Talk to your GM about this problem, tell him what you wish to do.

If he continues then I suggest making up a character and naming him- "Alie's Fighter #6," (feel free to use your own name of course). Make him quite disposable, and talk about your next character before the new campaign starts, do not take notes and do not make any effort to recall campaign details.

I used this on one of my first GMs. Within a month and three characters he told me that it bothered him I had no character in my characters. I informed him why I was doing it and he changed. It was a gradual change, but well worth it in the end.

To those of you that like to make characters- volunteer your characters to be hit with the surprise Sneak Attack, and GMs do not jump from campaign to campaign to accommodate these Players.

 

[S'mon]

Everything worked until around 8th level. I DM for five characters. Suddenly, one would quit the campaign if his character had to work with House Tharashk anymore and he wanted to go off on a mad quest. Another wants to just make magic items. Another just wants to power attack and kill all evil. Another started as a member of House Tharashk but is now lost.

I put so much effort into this game...

I had a similar problem too, and we never really got a satisfactory solution. I'm of the opinion now that campaigns predicated on service to a particular noble house (or other entity) necessarily have a limited life. Players value freedom of action too highly. They don't like feeling constrained by those above them. I suspect the "band of free adventurers" model is actually more durable.

 

[Henry]

Everything worked until around 8th level. I DM for five characters. Suddenly, one would quit the campaign if his character had to work with House Tharashk anymore and he wanted to go off on a mad quest. Another wants to just make magic items. Another just wants to power attack and kill all evil. Another started as a member of House Tharashk but is now lost.

I put so much effort into this game. I wrote every adventure myself. I worked hard to keep the group together logically. My players, however, seem to be me, me, me. All of which surprises me because they are good guys and work well together at low levels.

Small suggestion, don't know if you've tried it:

--Advance the campaign a few months, after the PCs have "broken up." This one's on said "mad quest," that one is doing his thing after separating from House Tharashk. (invite the player to tell you what his character's goals would be the next few months, and create some off-camera history.) The artificer has been making magic items and has made some lucrative money, the Power-attacker has been hunting demons in the Demon Wastes, etc.

THEN, have an overarcing idea that brings them all back together. The Demon-hunter finds a prophecy obelisk that specifically names the Magic-maker. The Tharashk Rogue starts getting hunted by assassins - who are using magics made with the mark of the Magic-maker. Perhaps the magic-maker has heard rumors of a powerful reagent that can only be found in the Demon Wastes, and he needs someone who knows the territory...

THEN, hit them with an overpowering evil (a rakshasa, a daelkyr-spawn, a mad noble seeking power, a Dragon cult, etc.) that only they can stop. If they don't, then something they value and prize (like their lives) is forfeit.

 

[S'mon]

BlackSilver - way to go on the passive-aggressive!

I guess I'd probably drop a player who did this to me, mind you.

 

[Henry]

With regard to the problem (GM's who switch campaigns faster than their TV channels), there isn't an easy answer, but it could indeed be it's time for the GM to take a break. I'm not sure how you "fire" a GM, since it's a voluntary position and ideally you're gaming with friends anyway, but it's more than easy to suggest that you rotate GMs, and even EASIER if it's YOU PERSONALLY with the drive to run a long-lasting campaign. That way, the GM can get a break, and he/she can see what it's like to run a longer campaign and how players can better get into their characters and more invested in said characters if they're not hopping into different skins every 6 games.

Alternately, maybe your group just isn't suited for long-running games. It might be best to set up a defined beginning/middle/end for each campaign, as it gives players a good idea how long they plan to play a given character, and gives them what motivations to shoot for and how to pace development of characters. If your GM can't agree to a multi-year campaign, then maybe you can get him to agree to let you know roughly how long the campaign will be, and his having target events to hit can aid this.

 

[Steel_Wind]

With regard to the problem (GM's who switch campaigns faster than their TV channels), there isn't an easy answer, but it could indeed be it's time for the GM to take a break.

I agree with this completely.

A GM who is doing this is suffering from burnout - even if he /she does not know it. He needs time to recharge his creative batteries and let his yearning for "that great campaign" ferment a while.

How much time varies GM to GM. A few months is ok for some - 6-18 months for others.

Whatever the case, its time to give this GM a break and let him play for a while one of you takes over the GM's chair.

 

[Davelozzi]

There's been a fair bit of good advice (and some not as good) in this thread already. Ultimately, it's a matter of preference. Running a game is hard work, and if the GM isn't into it, it's not going to work out well. But the players need to be into it too. Sometimes, compromise is the best solution, but in other situations, it might be wise to look for another group. I'm not advocating "firing the GM". I'm simply saying that the players and the GM need to have some common expectations in order for things to work out. If the GM is interested in trying something new every few months, that can be a lot of fun, but you'll have to accept the trade off as you lose out on the long-term character development. Likewise, long, ongoing campaigns can be very rewarding, but if the GM is not engaged himself, it will be next to impossible for him to run a game that engages the players.

Traditionally, as a DM, I have always prefered long-term campaigns. However, in the past few years, ENWorld and d20 have exposed me to a much wider variety of genres, games, gamers, and styles, and as a result my interests have become more varied. Still, I don't want to abandon my long term campaign.

For me, the ideal compromise has been to keep running the ongoing D&D game with my regular group on a monthly basis, and to play shorter games (one shots or story arcs) with others as I can. For example, I got to play in a couple of one-shots at last month's EN World gameday, and with friends made through previous gamedays, I'm now involved in a Star Wars story arc running through the winter months. It's been great.

 

[James Heard]

Since players fail on the norm in their ability or desire to communicate what they want to play in I don't find it so surprising that I find myself investing large amounts of my time into manufacturing games that cycle rapidly to run for them. I have plenty of ideas, plenty of ability to run long campaigns; but I don't have the time to waste on running games just to run games - I want the players to all be having fun. Even if some percentage of the players are having a blast sometimes it's not really obvious how to change things after the fact when a player decides that the whole setting isn't to their liking (or worse, the whole game system).

I've also gone through cycling when everyone wants to GM. There are only so many hours in the week for gaming, if one of my players is running a great game then I want to play in it too and to heck with all the hard work of GMing! Then there are the "let's all take a break", after four weeks of not playing and running a lot of times I'm just past the point where I want to go back to running the game. I might have decided that there's a television show on that night and I want to change the night (and can't with the current group of players) or something. Along comes the new campaign again.

 

[Janx]

I think it might help to know more about Dead's campaign. Such as what level are they, how long has the campaign been playing. Precisely how high does he want to go (I think he said Epic, which I take to be 20+).

It's also a factor to know if there are viable plot hooks still dangling, or if the party has consumed everything obvious.

Are the players actively suggesting long term goals for their PCs to the GM?

It's easy for a player to say "I want to be 20th level" but that doesn't help the GM get inspired. Saying, "I'd like to build a fort out of that old dungeon we found at 2nd level, and then begin caravan raiding operations" is a bit more proactive and may get the GM's juices going.

With that in mind, much like the example of House of Tharask(sp), it's a great idea to start a campaign with the PCs working for somebody else. At low levels, the PC's have few fleshed out motivations and are pretty clueless and wimpy. Having a boss send them on errands introduces them to the world and its characters. After awhile though, those PCs will want to be their own boss, so you've got to prepare for that. A GM who isn't could simply drop the ball and want to reset.

Personally, I'm running a campaign that I expect to take about 3 years. That's pretty long term, but I don't expect the players to reach epic levels. And when its done, I will stop running that campaign world. I'll make something new. To sustain the current world, I've got a pretty big outline of what's going to happen. There's lots of blanks where I have to map it to the party, and potentially revise things. But there will be an end. I could do sequels, but that's not the point.

I also run my games serially. I may have time lapse between sessions, but each game hooks into what has happened before, or introduces things that haven't been seen yet.

Basically, the cure is communication. Ask the GM why he wants to start a new game. Say why you want to continue the current one, list things you were actively interested in. Discussion and ideas usually fuel a campaign. Firing the DM or trying to make a point with stupid PCs is negative behavior and will simply worsen the situation.

Janx

 

[Aristotle]

A lot of posts here assume something is wrong with the DM in question. What if the DM just likes to run low level campaigns? I've run campaigns that are finished at 5th or 10th level. I don't always want to run campaigns that are extremely long or campaigns that start with the same characters as the last one left off with.

I like change every so often. It isn't that I'm burnt out, unnable to handle high level play, or even bored. I've simply designed a campaign that ends "here". When players hit me with "not enough time to develop my character" I generally hit them back with "not enough time to run all of the campaigns I want to run".

I do let my players know ahead of time about how long I intend a given campaign to take and where it should end on their character sheets. Sometimes this works out, but other times it does not.