GMs: When Is Enough Enough?

Theory of Games · 2025-06-07T01:39:50+0100

Distracted DM said:
The long-term years-long campaign is an idealized romantic notion perpetuated by media (stuff like CritRole) and ads (this canned adventure will last many, many levels- think of all the fun times you'll have going from 1-12, or 1-20!).

It certainly exists, I've had a few campaigns that went the distance and they were cool, but more often than not they weren't planned to go for years and honestly it probably would've been just as fun having a series of shorter games that we knew beforehand would be finite.

It can be difficult to keep interest in a campaign that's been going for a year or more. At that point I'm probably running on the fumes of player enthusiasm and wanting to put a bow on it rather than let it fizzle out.

I think the longest interest I kept in a campaign was a West Marches game, where I was running 2/week for 2 years... I was able to be very creative there and the hundred or so adventure locales that I had sprinkled throughout the land (almost all Michael Prescott Trilemma Adventures) were pretty interesting and all had their own little things going on.
Not to mention that in that game, the players were the ones deciding what was important to them... there were some events happening in the background, but they were sharing the load.

See you've had a pretty good road as a GM: playing what you like with active players. You've never ran into a problem that caused you to rethink the system or setting and that's great

MGibster said:
That happened to my group when I ran Fantasy Flight's version of Rogue Trader way back in 2010-11. In this particular case, after a few sessions, the players and I (DM) had a little chat about how much we disliked the system. We ended up deciding to play something else.

Been there so many times. I sucked when I had to stop, but it's also a relief because usually my dislike of the system is driving me nuts.

MGibster said:
Right now I'm running D&D 5E (2024) set in Greyhawk and I'm not really feeling the game system all that much. However, I've got a group of players who enthusiastically participate, which, in turn, means I'm willing to overlook my problems with the rules. If I were simply miserable running the game, I would just tell them and we'd play something else.

I ran 5e twice and determined I liked playing it more than running. But I can play almost anything (except FATE)

MGibster said:
I was running a Cthulhu campaign and the PCs were all students at Miskatonic University. Out of five players, only two of them were interested in playing. One player would just have his character do stupid, disruptive things when he was bored. Another player would deliberately ignore plot hooks. They just weren't interested in playing, so I don't know why they agreed to the game. The situation was untenable, so I ended the campaign early, and we ended up dissolving as a group. Three of those players left and I got four new players in return. Much happier now.

That's a GM horror story

I wouldn't have lasted a session with that group. Shame though because CoC is pretty easy to run and enjoy.

aco175 · 2025-06-07T01:42:47+0100

Jd Smith1 · 2025-06-07T02:15:56+0100

I choose the setting and the system, and put in plenty of prep work before the campaign starts, so I never have that problem.

I have started and realized: this specific player has to go.

bloodtide · 2025-06-07T02:40:56+0100

I only run what I really, really like. And up front I will lay out a large number of generic system-less house rules. If players don't agree, I won't run the game.

I don't really run short games often. I'm not a "wow lets try this new game" for a couple weeks kind of DM. I stick to "so you agree to play this game every week for 3-5 years at a minimum." type of DM.

And should a player do something I don't like, I'm fine with "rocks fall on your character and they die. Leave my house and get lost".

Theory of Games · 2025-06-07T02:47:25+0100

Jd Smith1 said:
I choose the setting and the system, and put in plenty of prep work before the campaign starts, so I never have that problem.

I have started and realized: this specific player has to go.

I don't know. I think sometimes you can prep everything perfect but, you never really know how a game plays until you actually play it.

I always wanted to run Delta Green (the newest edition) but when I got a chance SHEESH what a trash boring system that was.

Now it was the opposite with Champions Complete: I thought it would be brain damage but, I actually enjoyed it a lot more than I imagined.

Players ..... I'm so immune to bad players at this point. I've played with dice-cheats and rules lawyers and the Casual Gamers® who can't be troubled to know what's on their sheets. I low-key like bad players now

Distracted DM · 2025-06-07T03:40:54+0100

Theory of Games said:
See you've had a pretty good road as a GM: playing what you like with active players. You've never ran into a problem that caused you to rethink the system or setting and that's great

Not exactly- I'd prefer to be running DCC, but DnD5e is what my players prefer and I like my players enough to keep running DnD5e.

Jd Smith1 · 2025-06-07T03:53:24+0100

Theory of Games said:
I don't know. I think sometimes you can prep everything perfect but, you never really know how a game plays until you actually play it.

I always wanted to run Delta Green (the newest edition) but when I got a chance SHEESH what a trash boring system that was.

Now it was the opposite with Champions Complete: I thought it would be brain damage but, I actually enjoyed it a lot more than I imagined.

Players ..... I'm so immune to bad players at this point. I've played with dice-cheats and rules lawyers and the Casual Gamers® who can't be troubled to know what's on their sheets. I low-key like bad players now

Not that sort of prep. I create what I call a loose-weave campaign: I put PCs in situations, and cover the likeliest outcomes, but stay ready for surprises.

As a GM, I generally have no agenda other than to see it play out. Wearing the hat of the villains, I have a clear goal and imposed personality traits/resource boundaries.

I try not to change systems much. Its not always possible, though.

sevenbastard · 2025-06-07T04:01:02+0100

I love running a long sandbox campaign and see where it goes. I react to the players and let them drive. It's my world, but i let them pick if they want to help the rebels or the crown and not knowing where it will go keeps it fresh and exciting.

Like other said above pick what you want to run and how you want to run it and don't worry about the players. Im not letting a dragonborn in my campaign so if that's a deal breaker sorry.

ThrorII · 2025-06-07T04:09:54+0100

So my buddy and I switch off being DM. He likes long-running campaigns (our current B/X-OSE game is on session 52), but every 6-8 months either real life gets in the way for him or he gets burned out, then I jump in. I prefer shorter campaigns (8-12 sessions, but I've run 20-22 sessions as well) and I like to try out new systems or genres.

When I run a new game, we initially just do one session first, and then discuss if it is working for us. If we like it, we generally commit.

MGibster · 2025-06-07T05:04:46+0100

Theory of Games said:
I don't know. I think sometimes you can prep everything perfect but, you never really know how a game plays until you actually play it.

Bingo. For my Rogue Trader game, we loved the setting, we thought the premise sounded really fun, but once we started playing it we came to dislike the rules. More recently, I tried running Cyberpunk Red for my group and we quickly came to dislike the system. Not just the system, but the setting itself. Sometimes you don't know until you try.

GMs: When Is Enough Enough?

Theory of Games

Storied Gamist

aco175

Legend

Jd Smith1

Hero

bloodtide

Legend

Theory of Games

Storied Gamist

Distracted DM

Distracted DM

Jd Smith1

Hero

sevenbastard

Legend

ThrorII

Adventurer

MGibster

Legend

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