Help! I lost interest in my campaign... again!

[XCorvis]

...
I want player input into my game. I want them to build castles or buy an inn. I want them to supprise me. They usually do nothing like that. They are like ultimate consumers. (This difference in style originates in me having had a totaly different group of players for years, before moving out of my home town to go to university.)
...

Have you asked them for input? Players, not characters. Not "where do you go now that you killed the BBEG" but "Hey guys, I'd like you to drive the story for a while. What kind of thing do you want to do next?" They may not realize it's OK to ask.

 

[Arkhandus]

Your problem is that you're playing with the wrong group, and you're hard to please as a DM (rather, you seem to need constant change and a fluid campaign, and can't focus on one plot or general plan; you're, um, A Xaositect? ).

You want a more proactive, dynamic, character-driven group, but you're playing with a more typical D&D group that just wants a plot to follow, some monsters to beat up, and stuff to loot.

I think, since you probably cannot just get a different group where you are, your best solution is just to ask someone else to DM for a while, putting your current campaign on hiatus. Then look around online at play-by-posts or virtual tabletops (OpenRPG, WebRPG, Fantasy Grounds IIRC, and others; I can't remember all of them right now) to form a group suited to the kind of campaigns you really want to run, though you'll have to run them online. Maybe later you can return to running your old campaign and not get burnt out before it concludes.

 

[Vrecknidj]

Sometimes, when I get to the point that I don't feel like doing my campaign anymore, I try to do something else. Sometimes I'll have my players make up some new characters and just go through a dungeon or something, or we'll play d20 Modern or Star Wars.

Sometimes a diversion is all I need.

Dave

 

[SiderisAnon]

I finally realized that I'm getting burned out because I've already told the story to myself and I'm just dragging the players along (occasionally, kicking and screaming) with me.

This is a trap I've fallen into as well. I've had campaigns where I became completely bored because I knew what was going to happen in the next four adventures, which might be months of play, and I was basically just trading water waiting for the players to get through the stuff.

Part of the reason for this is that I've gamed with the same people so long, I can generally predict how they're going to react to something. Even when they're heading off "into left field", I could usually know ahead of time they'd do something like that. (Not always what they'd come up with, but knowing that they'd do something unconventional in reaction to a situation.)

In a way, laying out too much of the campaign is like buying a TV show on DVD where you saw the first half of the season, but not the rest. However, before you can get to the new episodes, you have to watch your way through all the early ones you've already seen.

It's boring.

To change this, I've adopted two tactics. The first is that I simply don't plan ahead. I try to come up with the next session and that is it. (I tend to be an off-the-cuff DM anyway, so this is mostly about making myself not plan out the sessions.) I get some notions of bigger plots I want to introduce and just find places to drop in the elements as I come up with new ideas.

[As an example of this, in my most recent session, I had the players hired to go hunt down some creatures that were living in an abandoned manor and eating local farm animals. We hadn't done a land adventure in a while and I'd seen a picture of a monster I liked, so I used it. I also dropped a plot element into things, though the characters don't know this yet because they've only got one data point on that graph. I didn't design the adventure as anything more than, "Hey, this would be a find change." I just used the idea I came up with as a holding point for a plot element.]

The other tactic is that I've shuffled out some of my play group and brought in some new people. I also brought back a player I've gamed with for years but whose play style has really changed as he's matured a lot lately. (Settling down does that to some people.) This has resulted in a play group that I can no longer predict. It keeps things more interesting for me because while I have some idea of their typical battle tactics, they are taking some very unexpected tacts when dealing with NPCs, with mysteries, and with the world around them.



One other thing that I believe is normal, though, is sometimes wanting to try a new idea in the middle of an existing idea. Good DMs are creative people, generally speaking. Creative people don't always keep their ideas in a specific track. In the middle of a D&D game, I can suddenly have ideas of a super hero game I'm unlikely to have time to run for at least a year. I make notes, write up some material, and basically let it out of my head, but I recognize that it's just extra creativity and not a reason to end my current game. (Which I already put a lot of time and creativity into.)

 

[Mercule]

One other thing that I believe is normal, though, is sometimes wanting to try a new idea in the middle of an existing idea. Good DMs are creative people, generally speaking. Creative people don't always keep their ideas in a specific track. In the middle of a D&D game, I can suddenly have ideas of a super hero game I'm unlikely to have time to run for at least a year. I make notes, write up some material, and basically let it out of my head, but I recognize that it's just extra creativity and not a reason to end my current game. (Which I already put a lot of time and creativity into.)

Amen. This is one reason why I'm inclined to keep future campaigns as relatively finite arcs. If everything goes well, we may do a "sequel", but I want to try to keep the game in the "sweet spot" as much as possible.

In a similar vein, when I get the chance to run Expedition to Ravenloft, I plan on having the PCs created at sixth level rather than at first level and work their way to 6th to really start the game.

That's what happened when we did Return to Temple of Elemental Evil (which is starting level of only 4, IIRC). The first few levels were run in Greyhawk city and we all got pretty good at urban tactics and the group really rocked. Then we switched to a dungeon setting and got our butts handed to use every. single. session. This was at least partially due to character builds that just sucked for the delve. We spent -- I kid you not -- a year suffering in the Earth temple because we'd already invested so much into the characters that no one was willing to give them up.

 

[Obergnom]

We spent -- I kid you not -- a year suffering in the Earth temple because we'd already invested so much into the characters that no one was willing to give them up.

Now thats a horror story... shudder. You're right, changing the tone of a campaign did not ever serve me well with D&D 3rd. Once you hit upper levels, characters are highly specialized. (For example, one day I want to play "Return to the Tomb of Horrors" ... but I have aparty built to fight drow and demons, not the undead.)