Why do so many campaigns never finish? Genuinely curious what others think

GrimCo · 2026-03-09T08:49:34+0000

TwoSix said:
And even 40 sessions felt way too long! 12-18 sessions is around what I feel is the sweet spot to tell your story and then get out and onto the next game.

That's in line with what we disscussed about tv shows. Some people like limited series (myself included). Some people, like my mom or my grandma, they like turkish and mexican telenovelas, with 150-200 episodes. As someone who grew up on "Televisa presenta" mexican telenovelas, i can see the appeal, but it's not everyones cup of tea. Same with games, some people like long campaigns with multiple characters, multiple parallel story arcs that intertwine etc. Or just plain old loosely based series of short adventures.

aramis erak · 2026-03-09T10:03:07+0000

GrimCo said:
Wow. TBH, i'm a bit jealous. Last time i played in 6h long session was back in university days. On the other hand, 6-8h in front of a screen, after spending 30+ hours a week staring at screen for work, sounds like torture. I always viewed TTRPGs as screen detox hobby. That's beauty of these boards, each of us has it's own views and preferences.

2016 for me...

Thomas Shey · 2026-03-09T20:14:08+0000

TwoSix said:
I know lots of people do it, I just don’t get how you don’t get bored.

Sometimes I start to a bit toward the end of a long run like that, but I'm very much a completist and have a non-trivial dose of OCD, so...

FrozenNorth · 2026-03-09T20:28:11+0000

From my perspective, having a decently high number of campaigns that fizzle out isn’t a bad thing.

As I DM, I try to improve my craft by trying different approaches, different genres and different rulesets. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t and there is no shame in recognizing that, doing a post-mortem and moving on.

Thomas Shey · 2026-03-09T20:32:19+0000

FrozenNorth said:
From my perspective, having a decently high number of campaigns that fizzle out isn’t a bad thing.

As I DM, I try to improve my craft by trying different approaches, different genres and different rulesets. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t and there is no shame in recognizing that, doing a post-mortem and moving on.

I think recognizing experiments inevitably are going to fail sometimes is one thing, but its another when you have a campaign setup you have every reason to believe will have good lifespan and it--doesn't. Basically, going in expecting a potential failure and--not--are kind of different beasts.

Ancoulainn · 2026-03-09T20:53:35+0000

There have been two reasons why a campaign I was in ended early:

1) And that happened only once, we were in a campaign and just got to the point where nobody was feeling it. Nobody was invested. We just got to the point where pretty much everybody decided that playing a different campaign would be much better, so that's what we did the next week. Funny enough, it was also very close to the end of the campaign, so it was literally a group of people who played through all the buildup and then decided they didn't need to know how it ends. As if you're watching A New Hope and just when Luke gets into the X-Wing everyone decides that they've seen enough.

2) Scheduling issues. Many people I play with are in the medical field where it is quite difficult to ensure to have the same time off every week and sometimes things happen when their schedule just changes and by the time we figured out how to get back together, people just want to start over with something else.

FrozenNorth · 2026-03-09T21:07:21+0000

Thomas Shey said:
I think recognizing experiments inevitably are going to fail sometimes is one thing, but its another when you have a campaign setup you have every reason to believe will have good lifespan and it--doesn't. Basically, going in expecting a potential failure and--not--are kind of different beasts.

Pretty every campaign I start does something different though. And it’s pretty rare that the something is minor.

Most recently, I tried GMing a sandbox campaign. It fizzled due to lack of interest from both my players and me.

Lanefan · 2026-03-09T21:25:32+0000

FrozenNorth said:
Pretty every campaign I start does something different though. And it’s pretty rare that the something is minor.

Most recently, I tried GMing a sandbox campaign. It fizzled due to lack of interest from both my players and me.

If you-as-GM weren't interested in it then it never had a chance.

GM disinterest very quickly becomes all too obvious to the players, followed inevitably by feelings of "if the GM doesn't care, why should I?"; and down the drain the campaign goes.

payn · 2026-03-09T21:27:25+0000

Lanefan said:
If you-as-GM weren't interested in it then it never had a chance.

GM disinterest very quickly becomes all too obvious to the players, followed inevitably by feelings of "if the GM doesn't care, why should I?"; and down the drain the campaign goes.

That is for certain. I know GMs on occasion sign up for something they think they want, but find out they really dont. I know ive mentioned players eagerly signing up only to fold, but this can happen to GMs as well.

GrimCo · 2026-03-09T23:47:34+0000

Sandboxes are fickle beasts. They massively depend on players being pro active, more than any other type of games. If you pair it with very casual approach to character creation, campaign can get stuck very fast. In sandbox game, DM is one that reacts to player actions. If players don't have clear ideas what to do, it can become boring for DM also.