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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Blue" data-source="post: 7125584" data-attributes="member: 20564">I can imagine your pain with adventure paths.  I never run them.  I run homebrew worlds (often with players helping to flesh out) and only my own adventures.  The players helping flesh out the world really leads to a lot of buy-in, where they see things come up because of what they have described.My current campaign is about 2.5 years in (13th Age, similar to 5e).  The previous two campaigns I ran (3.0 and 3.5), based in the same world with 80 years separating them so what the players did in the first could really impact the second, lasted for 12 years total.It's work not to let it get stale.  I throw lots of plots and things to follow at the players and they take on what they want, so they have a lot of direction.  That D&D 3.0 campaign got completely player-directed when they found vampires trying to recover an artifact from a dragon's horde that could cause a constant eclipse.  Suddenly the whole campaign spun around how to keep this safe, and the allies who wouldn't be corrupted by the vampires over generations, and where could such a thing be destroyed.  Never envisioned at campaign start, which was much more around orc horsemen tribes in the steppes and a living forest guarded by a druid's circle.I also do campaign arcs to spotlight each of the characters, something that wouldn't be in an adventure path.  For plot arc, I try to keep where they need to keep details clear for 4-6 months if not less, and send out recaps when old arcs resurface.And anything that has not yet come up in the world is subject to rewrite to match player interests, including - nay, especially my big plots.  Where we are right now plot-wise I never could have imagined at the campaign start because so much of it is based on how my PCs have interacted and changed the world.  This is very different then following an adventure path and keeps it focused and relevant for them.I guess the best way to describe it is I'm pseudo-sand-boxy.  I come with ideas based on what the players and characters seem interested in and do, and they are free to pursue those or something else.  But stuff they don't pursue doesn't just drop unless the players aren't interested - it grows and that helps keep the world dynamic.  I had one campaign where I was asked to have a definitive beginning, middle and end before the start and even with rewriting that wasn't as much fun for me to write.  I'd rather throw out huge amounts of foreshadowing that I have no idea what it means, and then tie it in three months later as things become clearer.</blockquote>

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