Define the term "campaign"

[coyote6]

Break out the Ouija board!

 

[LostSoul]

Something else: The struggles of the players to master the setting.

 

[Starfox]

TWERPS defined adventure as "a series of connected fights". In a like manner, you can define campaign as a series of linked adventures. A campaign setting is a larger set still, you can have several campaigns in the same setting - linked or not.

 

[Lanefan]

TWERPS defined adventure as "a series of connected fights". In a like manner, you can define campaign as a series of linked adventures. A campaign setting is a larger set still, you can have several campaigns in the same setting - linked or not.

Close, but not quite.

Campaign as a series of linked adventures, yes. (the argument comes over what defines 'linked' but that's another issue)

But the term "campaign setting" muddies things up. A setting is not a campaign, and vice versa.

Thus you *can* have several campaigns in the same setting. But if those campaigns are linked then you're back to the problem of defining 'linked', and whether those supposedly-different campaigns are linked enough to instead just be one great big campaign. This is what Hussar and I have been booting around in the other thread; he seems to think my Riveria game (used as an example) is a series of campaigns - I can only assume because he does not see them as linked enough - where I see it as one big campaign because it *is* all linked at the adventure-to-adventure level.

So define linked, and the campaign definition falls into place.

Lan-"the missing link"-efan

 

[Desdichado]

Well, you'll have to take that up with Gary, I guess.

Huh? Why? What does that have to do with what you responded to?

 

[Desdichado]

The campaign is the set of activities, not the place in which the activities are undertaken - so, it isn't the world setting. We could quibble on how much we want to hold to the "some specific purpose", or we could say that's the player's purpose of having entertainment, and everyone might be satisfied.

Even in the case of the Gygax usage that is bizarrely used to conflate the terms setting and campaign, that would be true. When Gary talks about the Blackmoor or the Greyhawk campaign, there's no reason to believe he's talking about the setting itself. It's shorthand for the campaign set in that setting.

 

[Ariosto]

Huh? Why? What does that have to do with what you responded to?

It was I who quoted Gary's words here, but it was not my purpose in that post to define them my way. Whatever Gary meant when he wrote "campaign", that meaning and intent was in his own mind, not in mine.

So, whence the requisite, post-by-post disclaimer that "'campaign' in this post means the following..."?

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

It was I who quoted Gary's words here, but it was not my purpose in that post to define them my way. Whatever Gary meant when he wrote "campaign", that meaning and intent was in his own mind, not in mine.

So, whence the requisite, post-by-post disclaimer that "'campaign' in this post means the following..."?

Ah, I think I understand the point now. And frankly it's an exaggeration to claim that anyone is asking for a requirement that people explicitly define their terminology in each and every post. That's just silly.

Since the response was to a cleverly cherry-picked sentence, here are my words in full:

It's up to those who use it in its more dated mode to be clear what they mean if it truly poses an obstacle to understanding-- especially in a forum like this where there is a wide variation in age, culture and experience.

That part in bold is the important bit. Generally there's no need for explicit definitions-- unless someone is misunderstanding something. Most people learn this, what, by age 5 or so?

In the Gygax quote, the meaning of the word "campaign" is clear, and anyway its precise meaning isn't terribly critical to understanding what he's talking about. Of course no one would expect him to explicitly define it up front.

And now it's time to move on to more important things, like arguing about what a "hit point" is.

 

[Ariosto]

In the Gygax quote, the meaning of the word "campaign" is clear

A meaning is clear to you, then. The meaning is in fact not stipulated in the text, and must be provided from some external source. Someone with a different external source may see a different meaning.

I took your post in the context of what had come before, seeing it as an affirmation of Bullgrit's proposed rule. The closer it approaches common sense (IMO), the closer it approaches negation of Bullgrit's rule.

Common sense suggests that someone might be puzzled about something, and ask about it. I am glad to answer questions, and I think that holds for most folks when it comes to their hobbies.

As you say,

Generally there's no need for explicit definitions-- unless someone is misunderstanding something. Most people learn this, what, by age 5 or so?

 

[diaglo]

campaigns are undertakings which can be short or long in duration depending on the desired outcome or goal.

political ones usually involve getting elected and maybe but not always what to do after you are elected.

military campaigns have expected criteria for victory. since some of them never end.

for roleplaying games it can be even more diverse and neverending.