D&D General How long has your Current Group gamed together?

[Hussar]

Wow. 2/3rds are at 5 years or more. Yeah, this does go a LOOOONG way to explaining why I'm out of step with a lot of posters here.

 

[TheSword]

Our main group has been fixed for about 6 years. Though all but one player has been together for 14 years+

My Canterbury group has been running for 3 years in its current incarnation.

My Leicester Group has been running for about 4 years. It’s lost a few people slowly over that time but the core is the same and it started as a big group.

 

[ECMO3]

Just a poll to see. I'm actually curious what the half life of a D&D group is. I suspect that most groups shift their members every 2-3 years. That, over the course of 10 years, the length of the current edition, most groups have fallen apart and reformed with new players. So, the question is, how old is your group. And to define terms:

Age of Group= the length of time that the SHORTEST term member has been a member of your group. So, if four of you have gamed together for ten years, but, you got a new player last week, then your group is one week old.

Yeah, unfair, biased, poor polling terms, whatever. It's my poll and that's my definition.

It really varies and I am playing 4 games right now and individual members come and go:

Monday game (player in group of 4 +DM): The DM, myself and one of the players have been together 3 years, another player has been with us 2 years, last player is less than 1 year.

Tuesday game (player in group of 6+DM): The DM, myself and one player have been together for 4 years, the other 4 players less than 1 year.

Wednesday Game (player in group of 4+DM): The DM and I have been together 3 years, 2 other players have been with us 2 years, the final player is new.

Friday/Saturday Game (DM in a group with 3 players): Myself and 2 of the players have been together for 14 years. The other player is new.

So I guess by your definition that is less than 1 year????

 

[Maxperson]

Can we start a new poll asking "Who else is feeling very old?"

The only time I feel old is when I mention a band like Oingo Boingo and some teenager responds with, "Who's that?"

 

[The Soloist]

All my groups would have lasted longer if:
1) I didn’t move to the big city.
2) A majority of players quit because they had babies.
3) In two different groups, real life player couples divorced.

Current group seems very stable. Crossing my fingers.

 

[CleverNickName]

I still play with my very first gaming group from middle school: we've been gaming together for about 43 years. We live in different time zones now, but we still meet online every month or two, to play some old-school BECM-rules D&D on Roll20.

My current gaming group has been playing together for 13 years. We play 5E D&D, and we take turns being the DM. It's currently my turn in the chair, so we're running my homebrew campaign setting over Roll20.

My spouse's gaming group is my third (and newest) D&D gaming group. We've been playing 5E D&D (also a homebrew D&D setting) in person since early 2018.

 

[SableWyvern]

P.S.: Sorry, I saw too late that you posted this in the D&D section. None of the groups is currently playing D&D. Pre-existing members of group 2 played D&D5 in the past, though (we wrapped up our campaign last year).

I voted 5+, but my group is a roleplaying group, not a "D&D" group. We have played 1e, 3e and 4e D&D, as well as ACKS (a B/X derivative) and some other d20-era games, but lots of non-D&D games as well. (Edit: oh, and we're playing Dark Sun at the moment, which might half count, but we're not using a D&D system for it.)

We did have a new player join within the last five years, but they didn't enjoy the style of game I was running at the time, so they moved on after a few sessions. All members of the current group have been with us for at least five years.

The group has a whole has existed in a stable form, with occasional additions and departures (and returning members), since the late 90s.

I think, although this is just my gut feeling, that one of the primary reasons why people have such differing views on the game has so much to do with this sort of thing - group stability, length of campaign, single dm groups vs rotating DMs. That sort of thing.

I regularly see things that people posit as table problems, and I'm honestly flummoxed at the idea people allow these kinds of things to occur. Pretty much anything involving lack of trust, mismatched expectations, enduring unfun games or people, is utterly alien to my experience. I am also completely immune to any issues caused by D&D dominating the market, have no problems running any game that takes my fancy, and do not in any way rely on WotC, D&D, the industry or the wider community to provide me any kind of gateway for new blood.

I have become aware that all this is basically because I game with friends, and turn friends into gamers as required, rather than go looking for gamers I can turn into friends. I would not have it any other way.

 

[Lidgar]

The only time I feel old is when I mention a band like Oingo Boingo and some teenager responds with, "Who's that?"

Then you say, “You know, the guy who does all those awesome soundtracks for Tim Burton.”

At which they again respond “Who’s that?”

 

[Remathilis]

My current group is a mixture of old friends and new. A quick breakdown:

Mi: 30 years
Br: 29 years
Ma: 23 years
Se: 11 years
Bl: 9 years
Jo: 28 years, but that was in two large chunks in the beginning (5 years) and rejoined later (11 years) after a large gap of time away.

 

[Hussar]

I would also like to say goddamn but you guys game a LOT. Three, four, five groups? Holy crap. I'm playing in two, for the first time in a VERY long time. 99% of the time I gamed, it was only one game a week.

But, yeah, I do think that this is something that needs to be put on the table up front when people start talking about "the game". I mean, if you've got a stable group that you've played with for a decade, then, sure, it's probably guaranteed that you all share (mostly) playstyles and approaches to the game.

Can I also say how incredibly jealous I am?