How many ENWorld pbp games make it longer than three months?

[stonegod]

Another problem of course, and one that will destroy a game nice and early, is the insistance of playing PbP the same exact way you would play around the table. Which really, really suchs, because the d20 rules in PbP are a PAIN IN THE BUTT!!! Many GMs get so caught up in the rules of the game that they take all the joy out of playing it by requiring every roll to be documented using Invisible Castle, every combat has to be officially drawn out using proper grids, every ability has to be used right down the middle using only official rules etc. etc. But the problem is... getting that wound up in "playing by the rules" when in a PbP game just slooooooowwwwwsss tttthhhhiiiiiiinnnnnngggssss dooooooooooowwwwwnnnnn.

DON'T start a module that is so long that there's no way to ever finish it. DON'T require players to learn 75 of your house rules because you don't like d20 combat. DON'T put players in a location where it's impossible to restock the party should some players quit. DON'T be a rules nazi, because most PbP players just care about writing interesting stuff - not rolling a bunch of computerized dice. DON'T start a game with less than six players, because invariably at least two will quit within two weeks and you'll end up at the four players you originally wanted to DM for in the first place.

I agree with DEFCON's assessment for the most part, especially with streamlining the rules. Sometimes visual aids are necessary, but they do have significant overhead. And the "take 10" rule would be something I would generally take as a given in an PBP.

I disagree a bit on the long module part, as I believe there are some significant advantages to them (in terms of saving time with all the design mechanics). However, the number of Adventure Paths or mega-modules that have successfully concluded here is vanishingly small to my knowledge. However, wouldn't stop me from trying to run something like Ravenloft.

I think the main thing that folks need to realize is that there is a sort of contract that you enter into when you agree to run and or be in a game. RL happens, and needs to take precedence, but that does not mean you cannot give folks the courtesy of letting them know you cannot run/play a game. Just don't fall off the face of the earth.

 

[Rybaer]

I've GM'd exactly two games on the boards. The first was a Arcana Unearthed game that ran almost two years. The second is a M&M game that is still plugging along at about 2.5 years. I guess that's a good enough record to qualify me to offer some insight.

A few things I've found (as both GM and player) that are necessary for a game to stay alive:

1. GM must provide substantial and vivid detail with each post. Too often, as a player, I've looked at a GM's post and said "huh?" Lack of detail can create a conflict between the player and the GM in what each thinks is going on. This leads to players reluctant to post, conflicts between interpretation of the scene, and all around failure to draw in the player.

2. GM has to make things move along with each post. Know the characters well enough that you can roleplay them through the more mundane bits and leave them at the end of each post at a point where a clear decision has to be made. Sometimes dialogue back and forth is important, but it can also bog things down. This is especially true when the players get going back and forth with planning. A little of this is okay, but the GM must know when to jump in and turn words into action.

3. There has to be a give and take trust between the players and GM. Players need to know that the GM isn't out to screw them over - that the GM will ultimately turn actions, even negative ones, into a moving and interesting plotline. GM's, meanwhile, must understand that they have to allow enough flexibility for the players to do unanticipated things with their characters.

4. Don't let threads idle too long without at least a token post. And don't be afraid to use OOC comments to let give players "knowledge" that their characters lack but that will help them play their way into the GM's storyline.



Personally, I prefer things as rules lite as possible. I think rules heavy can work, but it requires a bit more care. Interstingly, for the 3rd chapter of my M&M game I tried something unusual - no rolling whatsoever. As the GM, I merely "decided" the outcome of every single action for the length of the chapter. My players seemed to like it well enough - the focus on the storylines was much deeper and things moved along more quickly. I wouldn't recommend trying this with a new game, but for established characters/players with a built-up trust, it worked as a nice change of pace.

And one last thing. As a personal preference, I try to keep my plotlines as vague as possible until I have to fill in the details. That way, I don't have to concoct ways to keep the players on the "proper path." I just follow their lead, let them take their own actions, and nudge them once in a while to keep things moving toward the next clue, set-piece, or conflict.

Hope this helps future DM/GM's a little...and maybe some players too.

 

[drothgery]

I'll plead guilty to the busy GM bailing on a game, and, in a game that lasted far longer, the 'not wanting to recruit new players yet again' thing. Haven't skipped out as a player, though. I was pretty sad to see a lot of games I've been in over the years fade out (or, in one current case, apparently fail to launch); I've created some interesting characters that I wanted to see what they'd become a few levels down the road.

I'd say the big thing for GM's to do is keep interesting things happening, and realize what does and doesn't work in a PBP. Puzzles and complicated dungeons are, I think, very difficult to pull off; the social interplay and OOC chatter that solves puzzles at the tabletop doesn't work as well in PBP, and the handwaving-of-a-search pattern for a large dugneon usually doesn't go over too well either. But, contrary to some expectations, combat is just as important in PBP as at the tabletop; it's a rare player that's bored by a combat scene.

 

[Bobitron]

Three of the four PbP's here I'm involved in have all run over one year.

Star Wars - Out of the Frying Pan, run by shadowbloodmoon, first post 05/18/05

Wing and Sword, run by The Shaman, first post 01/06/05

Midnight: A Lost Faith's Shadow, run by Hrothgar, first post 08/24/05

Long games do exist. All three have had ups and downs in terms of post rate and interest, but they all continue on!

Please don't be discouraged by dead games. I know it can be disheartening to lose a game, especially one with a character you really like. But view the games as entertainment and know that a part of PbP is the lack of the same reliability that exists in your face-to-face games.

 

[Dire Lemming]

Well put, DEFCON 1. For my own part, I don't view myself as attempting to GM because I'm frustrated as a player, but rather the fact that it is "the undiscovered country".

I've made one half-hearted attempt at GMing tabletop, but never had anything plotted out and it sputtered out after three sessions -- my own fault for not having any sort of long-term plans in mind. For PbP... my Corporate Defiance game is my first attempt at PbP GMing. It's long and detailed (just ask the poor souls like Rhun who read through some, if not all, of my opening post), and there are so many things I can do with it -- and even more things I can do courtesy of player backgrounds.

I hope and pray it will last longer than three months, but only time will tell. For now, I plan to sit back and take it one day at a time, once the game begins. My goal: have fun, and try to make sure the players have fun, too. I can't ask for anything more than that.

I thought the reading was very interesting, but I'm a detail fanatic. I personally hate making characters compaired to actually playing. Course all my characters seem to come across as pacifists.

 

[Endur]

I currently play in only one game on this board, run by Endur, who is a exceptionally driven, dependable & capable DM.

Thanks Manzanita.

I'm in the process of GMing my third game on En World. I've also played in a few.

My current game, Endur's Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, started in February 2005, so its been running for about a year and a half. Characters started at 1st level and now range between level 10-15. Should be finished in under six months, possibly sooner.

My second game lasted under two months. Party didn't click. The first game I ran, House Millithor in the City of Spider Queen, lasted 1-2 years.

A lot of good advice in this thread.

My own style is to try to post at least once a day. Posting every day makes it possible to maintain continuity. During combat, I try to resolve a round of combat per day (sometimes more or less, depending on complexity).

Keeping a game going depends a lot on interactions from player to GM, from gm to player, and from player to player. The more enjoyment everyone gets out of the game, the more people aren't likely to drop out.

I do think you can do pbp with super modules and adventure paths. You just have to realize that you are talking about a game that will take two years to finish (and that's if you have a gm on a fast schedule, with a slow schedule it will take more than two years).

Players quitting? Well, it happens. You just have to hope it won't happen to your game. Hopefully, you'll only lose one person at a time. And you can recruit another person to replace the person that left.

GM quits? You can try to recruit a new GM to replace the old one, but that is very hard. Even if you find the new GM and a new module, picking up with old characters is very difficult. It just doesn't feel the same.

 

[Bront]

I only halfway agree with DEFCON on this:



I think the rules can be used as normal in PbP just fine. I've done just that successfully without a problem. I do agree with him that making grids and maps is anathema. Players always ask me for them and I never want to make them because it wastes so much of my time.

The specific problems with your games is that many times there are so many different things going on, and you tend to throw in very (read TOO) subtle hints durring combat (and out of it too) that it is hard to follow sometimes. I'm often not sure how many of what creatures are standing, where they are, where my friends are, or even what my status is as far as HP is concerned. Some of this is my own problem admittedly, but I know I am not the only one. (And I have discussed some of this with you before, so it shouldn't be a suprise.)

Things that are easy to catch live (Cold damage breath weapons, or someone shutting a door for example), are easy to miss in a sea of text.

However, for the most part, you can use most of the rules as written, though being flexable helps quite a bit.

 

[Rystil Arden]

The specific problems with your games is that many times there are so many different things going on, and you tend to throw in very (read TOO) subtle hints durring combat (and out of it too) that it is hard to follow sometimes. I'm often not sure how many of what creatures are standing, where they are, where my friends are, or even what my status is as far as HP is concerned. Some of this is my own problem admittedly, but I know I am not the only one. (And I have discussed some of this with you before, so it shouldn't be a suprise.)

Things that are easy to catch live (Cold damage breath weapons, or someone shutting a door for example), are easy to miss in a sea of text.

However, for the most part, you can use most of the rules as written, though being flexable helps quite a bit.

For HP, you might consider tracking your HP as a title to your posts in combat like unleashed, Keia, and a few others do, if that helps. For the others--even non-subtle hitns can be lost amidst a sea of text. However, better to have them lost than to have a little section at the bottom labeled HINTS in red, right?

 

[Bront]

For HP, you might consider tracking your HP as a title to your posts in combat like unleashed, Keia, and a few others do, if that helps. For the others--even non-subtle hitns can be lost amidst a sea of text. However, better to have them lost than to have a little section at the bottom labeled HINTS in red, right?

True, but you could be a bit less subtle about them, (For example, the breath weapon, you could have mentioned in the combat text below that players took cold damage. It took me 3 rereads after you mentioned it to find the hint the first time).

 

[Endur]

I just noticed a bunch of pbp games I didn't get into are dead, which means that I missed out on, realistically, three or four encounters tops, out of megamodules or complete adventure paths.

One of the questions above isn't on game length, but is instead on encounter speed. i.e. if you missed out on three encounters in three months, then you are figuring on one encounter per month of play by post.

I'm not sure what my average encounter speed is, but it is faster than that. Maybe 3-6 encounters per month. It also depends on how you define encounter. Its fairly common in dungeons for a fight to include opponents from multiple nearby rooms (i.e. they hear the sounds of battle and come running).