D&D General Campaign Set Ups

[WayOfTheFourElements]

D&D can be played with a single DM running worlds and adventures for a single group, but there are many other ways to play the game. Here are a few that come to mind.

Single Group, Single DM. Y'all know how this works.

Single Group, Rotating DM - Adventure based. As above, except the DM changes after each adventure. This gives the next DM in the rotation plenty of time to prep the adventure and prevents DM burn-out. A great fit when everyone would prefer to play rather than DM.

Single Group, Rotating DM - Geographical. As Single Group, Single DM, except each player designs one section of the world (a kingdom, an island, barony, what have you). When the PCs enter a new kingdom/island/barony/whatever, the player who designed that area takes over DMing. Works well for sandbox games.

Solo Game. A DM runs a game for a single player. Sometimes a character from a larger group undertakes a solo mission. Assassinations work particularly well as solo adventures.

West Marches. Adventures feature a rotating cast of characters of various levels. Sessions begin and end at the same adventure hub. They generally involves episodic location-based adventures.

Living World. One DM runs multiple groups (e.g. Group A - Mondays, Group B, Wednesdays, Group C - every other Thursday). Each group adventures in the same geographical area. The groups' actions affect each other. Groups can work or compete with or against one another for treasure and glory. Crossover events may occur.

Wargame. One DM runs two (or more) directly oppositional groups (e.g. Good vs. Evil, Orcs vs. Humans), typically on alternating sessions with an epic crossover event at the end.

Of all these types, I'm curious why Single Group, Single DM is so much more prevalent than the others. For some reason, nearly all published adventures assume this model and it's hard to find much support for the others. Is there any particular reason why the other campaign set-ups lack the same appeal?

 

[Richards]

Possibly because while it's easy to bring in someone new to the game as a player, it's much more difficult to bring in new DMs. Most DMs already have at least some player experience, but not all players have the desire (or ability, or time) to become a DM. So in many groups with multiple players and only one DM, the DM might be the only one actually willing to fulfill that role.

Johnathan

 

[TheAlkaizer]

I work in video games development and thus I have a ton of people at my work that are already D&D players or are interested to try it.

I've been wanting to try the living world approach for a while. Create a small world, have village be the center hub with some gate that allows to teleport to other parts of the world to allow the players to always come back to the hub. Then just have a game a week with short adventures that anyone playing at my workplace can opt in.

Haven't tried it yet, but to me it suggests a few advantages:

• We don't have to wait after people that get busy with life, someone else can just come in
• The party change, the NPCs grow in history, the world changes. Very dynamic.
• Can make atypical PC parties
• Allows the dynamic of PCs of different levels grouping together, which I've never experienced

 

[R_J_K75]

Possibly because while it's easy to bring in someone new to the game as a player, it's much more difficult to bring in new DMs. Most DMs already have at least some player experience, but not all players have the desire (or ability, or time) to become a DM. So in many groups with multiple players and only one DM, the DM might be the only one actually willing to fulfill that role.

Johnathan

This is pretty much what Ive found. Also DMs can be pretty protective of their campaigns. So usually when we switched DMs we switched campaigns and made new PCs.

I ran a game with a friend of mine in the tail end of 2E and it worked in some ways but not in others. Sometimes we unintentionally undermined what the other has previously as fact. Nothing to major but enough to throw a monkey wrench in things and force some retconning the next session when we switched DMs.

I also ran a campaign where from the start the idea was that everyone would DM, which everyone agreed to but it never really worked. I had the most experience so the majority of the DM duties still fell on me. A few players did try their hand but ultimately the games slowed to a crawl just from their lack of experience and confidence, One player showed up and it was their time to DM and they clearly didnt prepare, didnt take it seriously and actually thought it was funny and assumed he could just wing it. That clearly wasnt the case. I told him that we all took time to come play and he couldn't even give us the common courtesy prep the adventure, I didnt invite them back.

 

[R_J_K75]

I work in video games development and thus I have a ton of people at my work that are already D&D players or are interested to try it.

I've been wanting to try the living world approach for a while. Create a small world, have village be the center hub with some gate that allows to teleport to other parts of the world to allow the players to always come back to the hub. Then just have a game a week with short adventures that anyone playing at my workplace can opt in.

Haven't tried it yet, but to me it suggests a few advantages:

• We don't have to wait after people that get busy with life, someone else can just come in
• The party change, the NPCs grow in history, the world changes. Very dynamic.
• Can make atypical PC parties
• Allows the dynamic of PCs of different levels grouping together, which I've never experienced

I've always wanted to try something like this just to eliminate the problem of revolving players. Ive always had trouble keeping a steady group together for more than a few years. People always came and went for any number of reasons, with a few mainstays that were constant. Generally finding new players isn't easy once a group falls apart, and I suspect that with the global pandemic this is only going to be harder over the next few years. So starting a campaign like this expecting player turn over seems like a good idea if you have enough people interested in playing. One thing I've found over the years is people like to play but don't always want to make steady commitment so allowing them the option to play when they want in this type of game sounds like a good compromise.

 

[Weiley31]

West Marches. Adventures feature a rotating cast of characters of various levels. Sessions begin and end at the same adventure hub. They generally involves episodic location-based adventures.

So THAT'S what people mean when they say they played a "West Marches" game. Never knew that.

Well our group does Campaigns, but a number of players have our "Characters" appear as NPCs in their own Campaigns. So the Barbarian player of my group is a retired NPC version of said Barbarian character in another player's Campaign. Meanwhile, the one Druid pc's brother appeared in our current Campaign as a NPC. Said brother is a pc of the party in the Campaign that I DM when our main DM takes a break.

So our characters are appearing in other Campaigns as nods, shout-outs or even NPCs. That way, if we lose a pc in one Campaign, the other player's Campaign shows that said character "survived" and said "death" was just a VERY near death experience.

So it's kinda Living Worldish in that regards.

 

[plisnithus8]

My son and I have decided to co-DM his 5 friends on Roll20. We're doing a sci-fi 5e campaign (using Ultramodern 5 Redux, Esper Genesis, The Stealth Game, Dark Matter, and Shadowrun).
We both have PCs and planned to switch back and forth geographically (between a magic-infused Esper galaxy and more science-based earth-centric space). But we have realized that since we are sitting next to each other and can mute the other online players we can plan and plot as we go, control multiple factions of NPCs in coordination, bounce ideas for plots off of each other. It has been a lot of fun and very effective so far.

 

[Lanefan]

D&D can be played with a single DM running worlds and adventures for a single group, but there are many other ways to play the game. Here are a few that come to mind.

Single Group, Single DM. Y'all know how this works.

Single Group, Rotating DM - Adventure based. As above, except the DM changes after each adventure. This gives the next DM in the rotation plenty of time to prep the adventure and prevents DM burn-out. A great fit when everyone would prefer to play rather than DM.

Single Group, Rotating DM - Geographical. As Single Group, Single DM, except each player designs one section of the world (a kingdom, an island, barony, what have you). When the PCs enter a new kingdom/island/barony/whatever, the player who designed that area takes over DMing. Works well for sandbox games.

Solo Game. A DM runs a game for a single player. Sometimes a character from a larger group undertakes a solo mission. Assassinations work particularly well as solo adventures.

West Marches. Adventures feature a rotating cast of characters of various levels. Sessions begin and end at the same adventure hub. They generally involves episodic location-based adventures.

Living World. One DM runs multiple groups (e.g. Group A - Mondays, Group B, Wednesdays, Group C - every other Thursday). Each group adventures in the same geographical area. The groups' actions affect each other. Groups can work or compete with or against one another for treasure and glory. Crossover events may occur.

Wargame. One DM runs two (or more) directly oppositional groups (e.g. Good vs. Evil, Orcs vs. Humans), typically on alternating sessions with an epic crossover event at the end.

Of all these types, I'm curious why Single Group, Single DM is so much more prevalent than the others. For some reason, nearly all published adventures assume this model and it's hard to find much support for the others. Is there any particular reason why the other campaign set-ups lack the same appeal?

Single Group, Rotating DM in any form doesn't work if the base setting has any baked-in secrets (e.g. a deity is imprisoned under the souther ocean) and-or long-term plots the players aren't supposed to know about yet.

Now if each DM has a different setting, it's cool.

Solo Game doesn't get much support largely because IME most players aren't very good at playing solo; they need someone else there to bounce ideas off of.

West Marches would be uncommon largely because there's no way of knowing (without some very heavy DM force at times) whether the party will make it back to the hub by session's end.

What we do equates to Living World, though these days instead of running multiple groups per week I run one group for an adventure, then put them on hold while I run another group (same players, different PCs), and so on.

I've never heard of the style you call Wargame. Interesting.

All that said, I think the main reason Single Group, Single DM is most prevalent is because that's how the game is - and has been during the whole WotC era - designed, presented and marketed. The adventures, specially in 5e, are mostly released as start-to-finish APs. Level advance is fast on the assumption that any given campaign will only run for a year or two. And most important, little to no guidance of any kind is given for any other style.

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

Single Group, Rotating DM in any form doesn't work if the base setting has any baked-in secrets (e.g. a deity is imprisoned under the souther ocean) and-or long-term plots the players aren't supposed to know about yet.

I think it's possible, so long as the secret primarily pertain to a specific region. If one DM controls the Southern Ocean and the island inside it, I think the imprisoned deity would work just fine in a rotating DM scenario.

All that said, I think the main reason Single Group, Single DM is most prevalent is because that's how the game is - and has been during the whole WotC era - designed, presented and marketed. The adventures, specially in 5e, are mostly released as start-to-finish APs. Level advance is fast on the assumption that any given campaign will only run for a year or two. And most important, little to no guidance of any kind is given for any other style.

Yes. I suspect that is largely the case. However, with so much D&D happening online nowadays, the time may be ripe for other styles of play to take off.

 

[R_J_K75]

I think it's possible, so long as the secret primarily pertain to a specific region. If one DM controls the Southern Ocean and the island inside it, I think the imprisoned deity would work just fine in a rotating DM scenario.

Or if the secret is in the background until one of the DMs decides to unleash said secret terror. I think it could make for some tension if everyone knows its there but not when or if its ever going to make an appearance.