D&D General How do people play so quickly? (# of sessions per adventure?)

[el-remmen]

Today I am going to run the 6th session involving the PCs undertaking the adventure "The Isle of the Abbey" from Ghosts of Saltmarsh. My guess is that it will take 7 or 8 sessions total.

The specific adventure is not so important to what I am posting about (since this while on the high end of average of how many sessions an adventure takes is still typical), but rather that while my sessions for this campaign tend to be significantly shorter than I'd like (3 hours rather than 5 hours for my in-person group) I am still amazed not that it takes so long for my group to get through adventures, but that other groups (based on the anecdotal evidence of these boards and social media) seem to blast through adventures and advance so quickly. I just can't imagine going much faster without losing something of the experience.

Since we only get to play about once a month (sometimes twice) that means we started this adventure in December of 2022 and will probably wrap it up in July or August, or maybe even September!

Anyway, this is not a complaint or a suggestion that anyone else is playing too fast. Nor, am I asking for advice for speeding up. I am just trying to imagine how given the base amount of role-playing, investigation, combat, exploration, NPC interaction, planning, etc that I imagine a D&D adventure having, how folks play through whole campaigns in a few months, even with longer or more frequent sessions.

This campaign has been going since May of 2020 (with a break of a few months when we lost some players and needed to recruit some more) and the PCs have only recently hit 5th level and this adventure on its own will probably not be enough for them to hit 6th. Today is the 37th session.

We even use discord to cover as much between session stuff as we can - esp. logistics that might eat up session time if we didn't.

Wildest of all, these 18 hours of gameplay (including today's forthcoming session) represent two adventuring days of time in-game.

So how long does it take your group to get through adventures (accounting for session length and frequency)? How do you account for that amount of time?

 

[payn]

I tend to both as player and GM soak up the atmosphere and take it slow. Others, like to get right to the action and move along. This recent game I'm in with folks online is ripping at a pace of about level up every 4 hours or session. A pace I'm certainly not used to. In my golden PF1 AP era, it took me about 2 years to run an AP start to finish. That's a 4 hour session twice a month. I know some folks can rip through an AP in 3-6 months easy. Thats a little too fast for me.

 

[ad_hoc]

There is an underappreciated DM skill of being the keeper of the pace.

When I DM I introduce the scene and then ask everyone what they are doing. Then I adjudicate their actions. This creates forward momentum through the scene.

I also narrate through uninteresting scenes. If there are no meaningful decisions to be made from point a to b we skip to b.

Combat also takes some practice. At our table we use a variant where everyone declares their actions at the same time each round then we roll initiative to see what order the resolve in.

Instead of each player taking 1-2 minutes to decide what to do which ends up eating up 5-8 minutes they only take 1-2 minutes total. We also roll damage dice at the same time as the attack.

 

[TwoSix]

The biggest variation, by far, in session time versus adventure "progress" is the amount of emphasis the players put on theatricality and thespianism. That's not a judgment or anything, my groups do plenty of it, but it absolutely makes the overall momentum of the adventure slow down tremendously, like up to an order of magnitude slower.

Lots of in-character banter, strategizing and making decisions in-character, scenes that are entirely about characterization and not about plot, are also time sinks. Beloved time sinks, usually, don't get me wrong (I'm really not denigrating playing in character, I swear! I do it all the time), but they mean the game will go slower.

There are a ton of other factors, of course. Group size matters a lot, large groups invariably go slower. How quick and incisive the players are at manipulating the mechanics factors tremendously into how fast combat goes, or resolving spell uses in exploration/narrative scenes.

Little factors can add up. I've found that sessions can start up sluggishly if the group has just long rested and doesn't have an obvious problem to engage with. So I like to end sessions, if I can, on a bit of a cliffhanger so the next session can start up in medias res, as it were. Quicker recap, and the energy of getting a session of with a bang can carry the momentum forward through a lot of the session.

 

[iserith]

My regular group covers a lot of content in any given 4-hour session. I sometimes play with other groups (or watch actual plays) who seem like they are standing still by comparison. We play weekly, online with a VTT, no more than 6 players and on average 5. We're not playing any modules right now, but when we did play them, I'd notice that actual play groups playing in more or less the same length of session were way behind us, some 50% or more.

Certainly some of the efficiency is everyone being knowledgeable about the game's rules, the VTT, and how to interact in an online game in general. But a lot of time is also saved by players getting on the same page and moving forward quickly ("Yes, and...") and knowing when a scene has run its course and moving on. Instead of long intraparty or no-stakes NPC social interactions that are set apart from, say, combat or exploration challenges, you're more likely to see all those interactions and characterizations happening across all pillars of the game in smaller bits. It adds up to the same or more amount of depth in terms of characters and emergent stories, it's just accomplished as the PCs are Getting Stuff Done versus hanging out in taverns or interviewing quirky, cagey shopkeeps.

 

[Krachek]

What’s happening during sessions is the most important.
if players like talking to npc, and with each other, then so be it.
if the need to progress in the adventure is also important then cut off some elements. reduce the numbers of rooms, fights, secondary plots.
if you play monthly don’t hesitate to make session a self sufficient mini adventure with a beginning and a ending, Otherwise to keep the continuity on a month basis is more difficult.

 

[Cruentus]

I am just trying to imagine how given the base amount of role-playing, investigation, combat, exploration, NPC interaction, planning, etc that I imagine a D&D adventure having, how folks play through whole campaigns in a few months, even with longer or more frequent sessions.

My guess, and what I see in my 5e group, is that they tend to avoid the role-playing, investigation, exploration, NPC interaction, and only focus on combat and planning for said combat to maximize abilities and minimize damage. I wouldn't be surprised if that isn't also the case in other groups. The former group of "experiences" can be sticky from a clear rules and expectations perspective, while combat and (again, for my group) character optimization are very clear states, which also help the game go quickly, as its one set piece battle after the other. I ran a 5e Moonshaes game for 1 calendar year, bi-weekly 3 hour games, sandbox, VTT)

The thing that drew out (while I was playing) the Dragon Queen and STK combined campaigns to about 2 real time years, was 1) travel time, even though we easily acquired the flying castle; and 2) combats would take 90+ minutes to resolve). 2 years real time, 4 hours every other week VTT.

On the opposite side, I'm running a pbem Greyhawk game using a mash up of OSE and Beyond the Wall, and we've been playing since Sept '22 (emails multiple times a week, every other week scheduled time for VTT and combat, if necessary, and the party has managed to travel for about 3 days (in game), and is about 30 miles from their starting village. Now, they've had combats, run from combats, lost all their supplies and cart, picked up rumors about the post-invasion Sterich, are assisting a wizard who is researching ley lines and standing stone circles, and trying to establish themselves as merchants/traders. All while still at level 1, over 9 months. That's the type of game we are enjoying (open world, sandbox, OSE power levels, super flexibility, slow pace for interactions, lore building, etc.) 9 months real time, via email, 1 hour every other week VTT if necessary.

I've also run 5e AL adventures in 2 sessions with brand new middle schoolers, and without getting bogged down in rules (they don't know them all anyway), the game can go at a pace that is natural to them - what they want to ask about, who they talk to, what decisions they make, etc. That can either be fast or slow, but they accomplished the main goals of the adventure pretty quickly.

I would also say that I read online about a lot of in-person games. I feel like the pacing can be much quicker playing in person versus on a VTT. For me as a DM, it would be easier to shift gears or directions in person, since I wouldn't have to have the VTT preloaded with what I 'think' I will need for a session. A dry-erase board/mat to draw up regions, rooms, towns would be easier.

 

[Velderan]

Lots of in-character banter, strategizing and making decisions in-character, scenes that are entirely about characterization and not about plot, are also time sinks. Beloved time sinks, usually, don't get me wrong (I'm really not denigrating playing in character, I swear! I do it all the time), but they mean the game will go slower.

That describes my group pretty well. They like to explore rooms pretty thoroughly, discussing in character what they're doing even if mechanically it doesn't move anything along. With a table of 6 players, I like to keep everyone involved even if someone's character would be disinterested in what's going on and the player describes something random instead of helping with the current challenge. It ends up building more developed characters and we end the campaign with a lot of inside jokes about things the PCs have done, but we also go through material pretty slowly (72 3ish hour sessions for Descent into Avernus). That's clearly not a playstyle for everyone but we enjoy it and have been playing weekly more or less for 4 years now so clearly we're doing something right.

 

[aco175]

My group just started the fire giant part of the Against the Giants adventure. We tend to play each week for 2 hours and it has taken 3 weeks to get from where the frost giants left off to finally get into the fire giant hall. The first week was back in Phandalin and traveling to Triboar. They stopped at Big Al's and received some information from him and negotiated for more allies in Triboar. The next week was in Longsaddle where they found some more information and entered the Statmetal hills where they negotiated with some uthgardt barbarians and located a safe hold for the other NPCs that came along with them. Last week they finally started the actual adventure and got into three rooms before all heck is breaking loose. Next week will likely be just a 2 hour combat.

 

[Quickleaf]

Wildest of all, these 18 hours of gameplay (including today's forthcoming session) represent two adventuring days of time in-game.

So how long does it take your group to get through adventures (accounting for session length and frequency)? How do you account for that amount of time?

I used to have great difficulty with pacing. I would basically follow what the players wanted to do, without any metes and bounds, and that created some drag. Players, despite their best intentions, IME don't usually keep in mind pacing; it's more a subconscious thing from the players' end (as in "I feel it when the pacing is off, but I don't make a direct connection between my actions and the game's pacing").

But when I shifted my GMing style to be a bit more "take charge" and steered the group, the drag definitely reduced and happened less often. For example, I learned to:

• When players seemed unsure or floundering, I would ask a specific player a specific question about their present-tense action.
• When players would ask a barrage of questions that seemed to be leading somewhere but they were being exceptionally opaque, I'd answer one or two questions, then head them off with "what's your intent here?"
• When players were lallygagging or stretching on a scene, I'd interject "this seems like a good transition point?" I'd get nods of consensus, then quickly narrate transition to the next scene.
• When the players wanted time to devise a plan or just roleplay among themselves (anything that I didn't need to be extremely present for), I'd say something "let's give you 30 minutes for this scene", and then I'd do my bio break, snacks, checking phone, rolling behind the screen, etc.
• When they encountered a new scene, I super-focused my framing of most scenes towards the main issue, conflict, or challenge. Basically, increased my clarity & held fewer cards to my chest.
• Prioritized my role as "custodian/referee" watching the clock, tracking PC spotlight time, whether a scene had come to its natural conclusion, etc. Everything else – remembering a NPC's voice, calculating travel time/distance, recalling the important parts of a room description – played second fiddle to that timing/pacing role.

Edit: I should add that as much as these shifts reduced drag in my games, inhabiting that "custodian/referee" role can get tiresome for me. So I'm not in that zone 100% of the time. Sometimes, I'll slip into other styles or just give myself permission in a scene to enjoy the roleplaying or whatever, and not watch the clock.