Average length of campaigns?

[Bards R Us]

Being relatively new to the hobby, I was just wondering if anyone knew what the average length for most campaigns are nowadays? One of my groups will last roughly half a year (but could continue much longer if group wants to). I remember reading in Computer Games magazine where Gary Gygax stated that the average lasted 2 years. Does that seem right?

 

[Plane Sailing]

My current campaign started when 3e was launched. When was that? 2000? So it is 3yrs+ now.

In the group I play with campaigns have never actually ended, they have just been put on hold for a while when something else takes over. There is one campaign (which I don't play in myself) which has been going on for about 18 years now!

Cheers

 

[MerakSpielman]

Depends on how often you play (and how long you play when you meet). If you meet once a week, a one-year campaign would last around 50 sessions. My campaign is running every third week, so if it's going to be 50 session, it'll take three years. Piratecat's campaign has been running for 11 years (or so). My Play-by-Post campaign has been running for almost a year and they've only gotten to the second level of the dungeon.

 

[der_kluge]

My group tends to get tired after 1.5 years. 3e came out in 2000, and we started a game (@ 3rd level), finished it up at 12th level (playing every other week) in the fall of '01. We started a new game then with a different DM, at 1st level, and finished in September of this year. So, while that campaign lasted about two years, we were quite tired of it after a year and a half.

We've started on our third - my campaign, starting at 9th level, and we'll finish at 20th. I imagine that we'll finish sometime at the beginning of '05.

 

[diaglo]

i refereed an OD&D (1974) campaign:

3-4hr per session; 5 sessions per week; 50 weeks per year; 10+ years




in the last 3+ years as a player of the newest ed i've gone thru 6 campaigns.

meeting roughly once a fortnight for 6 hr sessions.

 

[Vlos]

Seems to be getting shorter

My first "true" campaign lasted 7+ years meeting every week. I then moved to the boston area, and since then I haven't been in the same group for over 2 years, and the campaigns last even less.

It seems to be getting shorter and shorter. I definitly prefer the longer running campaigns.

 

[barsoomcore]

Barsoom is approaching episode #100, after three and a half years on the air.

My "big" campaign was jointly run with another DM, weekly for eight years -- which makes for something on the order of four hundred sessions.

And then I've run any number that barely lasted ONE session.

 

[Davelozzi]

I think that when WotC released all that marketing info a few years back they said that the average campaign lasted roughly six months with 3-4 hour sessions once a week.

My experiences have been mostly with campaigns that run roughly monthly for either 3-4 or 6-8 hour sessions. The two campaigns I ran in college lasted about 6 months, due to the high turnover in a school where people kept dropping out (UMass). But the campaigns that I've run at home have generally ran pretty strong for roughly 3-5 years and then gone more or less on hiatus with an occasional reprise.

 

[hunter1828]

I was once involved in a Star Wars (d6) campaign, first as a player but I took over as GM eventually, that ran from 1989 to 1995, with a connected one shot played in December 1997 and 1999.

My current D&D 3e/3.5e began in June 2000 and is still going strong with no signs of ending soon.

hunter1828

 

[astralpwka]

Our core campaign game is becoming more and more sporadic now that we have epic level characters, but it began with 3.0's release as well, so 3+ years. However we have started several mini campaigns (either in the homebrew or Forgotten Realms) and most last about 3 months.