Confession...It's good for the soul.

[Scotley]

While I recommended a shorter game as a solution to a particular issue and I may run such a game myself in the future as a 'test out 4e' run, I am very much in favor of long term games. I have two games running of the multi-year multi-thousand post variety and a third heading that way. I lack the hubris to say they are 'good' or 'important', but they have been fun for me. I can certainly vouch for the quality of one of Rhun's long running games. I have played in other successful and high quality games here as well. Anyway, my point is that shorter games may be appropriate at times, I was in no way rejecting the longer 'campaign' style of game.

 

[s@squ@tch]

@Mal/YeOldeAlbatross: I still haven't killed Alessin off, he is still with the group, although he has been joined by Rhun's elven rogue as well (who has no social skills to speak of )

That one I'm not that worried about. It was the dropping of Conquest Vale that made me sad -- the group had some very interesting dynamics going on....

 

[Rhun]

@Mal/YeOldeAlbatross: I still haven't killed Alessin off, he is still with the group, although he has been joined by Rhun's elven rogue as well (who has no social skills to speak of )

Hey now...he can hide and tumble like it ain't no thing, though! Other than that, our PCs are very similar mechanically.

 

[Creamsteak]

I think it is certainly emblematic of one of the main problems with PbP gaming here at ENWorld in that every game that is created is defined as a "campaign".

Why do we continue to do that to ourselves? We all know that most of these things will last only maybe a month to six months max... so we should just be honest with ourselves when we create these games that we DM.

We would all be doing ourselves a favor by just deciding as a community that if we decide to DM a PbP here at ENWorld, we should just say we're DMing an "adventure". Make it easy on ourselves. Start with a single adventure that might be a quick module or something... something that might only take three months to complete. We will still get plenty of people who will sign up to play it, because even simple adventures are fun. And THEN... if the party is able to complete the adventure and the DM is still going strong with the adventure, maybe the group as a whole can decide "you know what? Let's continue the game into a second part." And then the group can move onto a next part with the knowledge that they are not beholden to "two more years of this" or whatever stupid ideas we put into our own heads.

Let's make a collective decision to stop putting ourselves under the undo pressure of thinking that our "campaign" game is going to span three years and thousands upon thousands of posts. Because except in rarest situations, that NEVER happens. And it makes us feel guilty enough to do what Malvoisin has done, which is disappear for a time and then re-emerge under a different screen name.

Our collective need to make the games we DM seem "epic" or "important" is killing our desire to actually play them. Small does not mean "bad", just like huge does not mean "good". Let us stick with small... and when our success rate at finishing "small" games reaches 75%... then we can start becoming "huge" again.

Adventure and Campaign are about as useful of a measurement as Session, in that it could mean widely different things. An adventure might span continents and take characters from 1st to 10th level. A Campaign may only involve a few "adventures" all related to a single small town. A session could be a few hours, or (in days past for me) a whole weekend.

However, because of the lack of long running games, that's why I'm a proponent of the Living games here. They somewhat solve that problem by allowing characters to continue, even if a game seems to die out. Hell, that was one of the primary reasons that LEW was originally put together: to let the characters keep going. And, from my perspective, it was pretty successful.

 

[Malvoisin]

@Mal/YeOldeAlbatross: I still haven't killed Alessin off, he is still with the group, although he has been joined by Rhun's elven rogue as well (who has no social skills to speak of )

That one I'm not that worried about. It was the dropping of Conquest Vale that made me sad -- the group had some very interesting dynamics going on....

Hi, s@squ@tch!

I think you did a great job DMing Cult of the Reptile God, please don't take my disappearance at the time as a reflection on you!

As for Bloodsworn Vale, you're right. There were some terrific characters there. It's just one of many really great games that I was fortunate enough to be a part of. Thanks for that.

 

[FreeXenon]

Bloodsworn Roxored!

 

[Malvoisin]

Bloodsworn Roxored!

You're too kind.

 

[Branding Opportunity]

I know where you're coming from, Malvosian. I'm on my second name as well, having started posting here as Blue Genie. Even under Branding Opportunity I haven't been around for a long time. I've done the cowardly thing and run away on a few games, all of which I thoroughly enjoyed. As you've already mentioned, one of them was your Age of Worms game, which I even picked up at least eight months after dropping it and then dropped again!

All were great games that I was enjoying greatly. The reason I quit was that I set the bar too high, and then felt guilty when I couldn't live up to my own expectations. Disappointment would lead to self-recrimination would lead to more guilt, until I didn't even want to log in to EN World. I would also try to GM too many games, or put way too much time into the combat map graphics or tweaking the descriptions of what a spell effect would sound, feel and look like. Then when life would get busy or complicated everything would come falling down and I'd run away like a scared kid.

So this is for all the folks I left wondering what the heck happened: I'm sorry, you didn't deserve it.

BrOp

 

[Malvoisin]

I know where you're coming from, Malvosian. I'm on my second name as well, having started posting here as Blue Genie. Even under Branding Opportunity I haven't been around for a long time. I've done the cowardly thing and run away on a few games, all of which I thoroughly enjoyed. As you've already mentioned, one of them was your Age of Worms game, which I even picked up at least eight months after dropping it and then dropped again!

All were great games that I was enjoying greatly. The reason I quit was that I set the bar too high, and then felt guilty when I couldn't live up to my own expectations. Disappointment would lead to self-recrimination would lead to more guilt, until I didn't even want to log in to EN World. I would also try to GM too many games, or put way too much time into the combat map graphics or tweaking the descriptions of what a spell effect would sound, feel and look like. Then when life would get busy or complicated everything would come falling down and I'd run away like a scared kid.

So this is for all the folks I left wondering what the heck happened: I'm sorry, you didn't deserve it.

BrOp

BrandingOpp, welcome! You were a good DM, I enjoyed lurking in your games...AoW and Greyhawk Reconquista come to mind immediately.

What you describe above sounds really similar to some of the things I've gone through as well. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that this sort of thing is the reason why a lot of players and DMs just up and vanish without a word. That doesn't make it the right thing to do by any stretch, but at least it's a reason.

In any case, I've found it liberating to step forward here and come clean. Hopefully, the same will be the case for you.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I think you're all missing my point. I'm not saying that long games aren't possible... of course they are. I'm DMing one and am playing in two right now. But what I'm saying is that we have cultivated this mentality here at ENWorld that any game a DM puts together is expected to be thousands of posts and run for years on end. They decide they want to run a game and have set it up in their mind that it's going to be this long-term thing either by stating outright their own rules on things like prestige classes (even when their game is starting at Level 1), or choosing daunting tasks like trying to run Return To the Temple of Elemental Evil, Age of Worms, or other huge modules.

As Malvoisin himself said "I guess my eyes are often bigger than my stomach, to use a metaphor from the culinary world." And this is true for probably 95% of every single game that gets started here. Only 1 out of 20 games will ever actually reach probably a year of posting... it's just a fact of life here on ENWorld. Would it be nice if every game that was started and advertised as a multiple-leveling big module campaign actually went the distance? Of course! But the fact is that it (mostly) DOES NOT HAPPEN.

What exactly is wrong with trying to cultivate a culture here that tells potential DMs that it's okay to run a small adventure that shouldn't probably last more than one to three months? Because it is a much easier bite to swallow... both the players and the DMs know they only have to last a short while so that if the game isn't going well on either side, they can at least see their actual end-point and make a decision to possible stick it out to the end... and if- *IF*- that first game finishes just as the DM advertised and everyone was happy, the decision could be made THEN to continue. And the players all get the satisfaction of knowing that they actually finished at least one game they've ever played in.

But you cannot tell me that DMs advertising most of their games on ENWorld as long-term events only to see them die out within a month because the players and/or the DM flaked out is a good thing. Because it isn't. It sucks. And it's all because we keep setting unrealisitic goals for ourselves and people end up feeling guilty and bolting when they cannot reach them.

So please, for the love of God and to whomever is reading this (especially players who have never DM'd a PbP game here before)... just because a few games here on ENWorld are a thousand posts long, it does not mean that your HAS to do that too. Don't bite off more than you can chew. Start small. Find out if DMing is really your speed on a short adventure that is only meant to least maybe lasts a couple months. Find out if the players you chose for your adventure are mature enough to keep posting and not disappear. Find out if you can actual finish something you start. And then if/when that happens... THEN decide to pull Return To Undermountain off your shelf to run for five years here. And if you're lucky, you'll maybe reach the end of Year One before it also dies a slow, painful death.