Are your games continuous or episodic?

[Asmor]

Just something I thought about...

In general, are your games continuous (i.e. you always pick up at the beginning of a session where you left off at the last session) or episodic (i.e. adventures are self-contained, with a definite beginning and ending, and the ending of the last does not necessarily lead directly into the beginning of the next)?

There are of course always exceptions, but I'm asking for the general way your games go. If you're a DM primarily, answer for the games you run, and if you're a player primarily, answer for those you play in.

As an example of episodic play, the only example that I really have, take the Xen'drik Expeditions RPGA campaign. You might finish a session immediately after completing your goal (whether returning a stone tablet to some sahuagin or destroying the beetle god), and at the beginning of the next session you're immediately given the hook for the game.

This is as opposed to a continuous campaign, where you'd play through (or at least mention) the intervening portion where you go back to town, rest up, re-equip, etc.

Just to clarify, episodic does not mean that adventures don't tie together at all, just that you don't play through every single moment between them. It's entirely possible to have an episodic campaign with a continuing, over-arching story, like most TV shows.

 

[Nonlethal Force]

Continuous for the most part. However, we do handwave some things ... like buying new equipment if it is fairly mundane. In other words, we often say "I'm buying X,Y, and Z for G gold" and the DM responds with "Okay, sounds fair." Not always, but the more mundane the equipment, the more likely a handwave is in order.

We occasionally hit a point where we say, "It's winter, so our party spends time focusing on hunting and gathering wood so the families can stay alive." Then we flash forward to something like spring.

But outside of those examples, continuous.

 

[The_Gneech]

They tend to be continuous, because the players always want to know every little detail about what happens every day between scenarios.

Personally, I'd rather they were a lot more episodic. I'd rather be doing a series of short stories, than one loooooooong novel (to use a literary analogy).

-The Gneech

 

[Glyfair]

Continuous, but episodic has a lot of attraction for me.

One of these days I'm going to run a Pendragon-like D&D game, maybe with a bit of Birthright mixed in. Each year the PCs have one adventure that takes one session. Any other issues take place between sessions over the internet (getting married, starting a family, building a castle, running a business, etc). Family will be important because when you die then your heir will take over.

 

[shilsen]

Continuous, with a few clear breaks between certain episodes. My current Eberron game has spanned 6-7 months of in-game time and we've generally played out (even if sometimes in just a few minutes) almost every day of those months at the table. But in a couple of cases, usually involving the PCs taking out a seriously BBEG or completing a major mission/job they signed on for, we have a clear point of demarcation and I may start the next session with "A week later...."

 

[maddman75]

Episodic. It makes each game satisfying, and while you can use an overarching plot you still have each night's game as a self-contained story. There might be the occasional to be continued, but most times when we end we are truly at an ending.

 

[Aus_Snow]

Continuous, the vast majority of the time. And it's been that way for, well, ever.

Occasionally, episodic.

 

[blargney the second]

In theory episodic, in reality continuous because we never seem to end sessions where the episode would finish.

 

[blargney the second]

Come to think of it, it's more like the old campy Batman show: episodic with flurries of continuity/cliffhanger.

 

[Murder of Crows]

Ours are always continuous. Even when we switch DMs for a while- the new DM's character drops out of the party, and the old DM's character gets brought in.