D&D 5E I don't want to homebrew anymore...

[Ranes]

Remember, that other DM's AP was written on top of a setting developed by several people, so not only does the DM have much less work to do than you, even the AP's author had less work to do than you.

You shouldn't be disappointed by the realisation that the players enjoy the AP game as much as your own. Players don't factor the number of a campaign's designers into their evaluation of how much they enjoy it. In fact, given the demands of creating a campaign from scratch, you should give yourself a serious pat on the back for the fact that the players seem to enjoy both games equally.

After this campaign, take a break from world building for a while. Take a year or three. The work you've put into your previous campaigns will still be there if you decide to return to it at some point in the future. Meanwhile, take it easier on yourself and find something someone else has had to work hard at, so that you can just concentrate on running it.

 

[Psikerlord#]

I've been playing D&D for 20+ years. I've run a half-dozen campaigns and homebrewed my own world. I have a hard-drive full of house-rules and custom material for nearly every edition since 2e (save much for 4e, I didn't stay with it long). And 5e is legitimately the easiest version of D&D to houserule and homebrew for.

Then why don't I want to do it?

Seriously, I can't get inspired. I had a nagging feeling of this during my last game, but that was high-level Pathfinder with all the bells and whistles, so I figured it was math and system lag that sapped me. I'm currently playing 5e through the first few levels using PHB only*, which is the antithesis of my last game, but the odd fatigue remains...

* I have no real desire to create home-made materials, from races or subclasses to spells and monsters. I mean, I have a dozen things that exist in my world that don't have 5e equivalents yet (rakasta/cat folk as an example) but no real urge to complete them or try to balance them.

* I'm having a hard time creating interesting new storylines: I had an idea playing on the cliche of the evil wizard who controls a kingdom, but for some reason, its not gelling like I thought it would. I'm not sure where to take the story next, and its partially hurt by the idea the group decided to make PCs that aren't native to the area, giving them less of a "fight for your homeland" element and more "take out the evil wizard because he's evil" motivation. As of this game, they will be finishing up my version of Reavers of Harkenwold, and I have no idea where to take the plot next.

Honestly, for the first time in my gaming career, I think I would be happier running Forgotten Realms with an AP like Princes or Hoard doing the heavy lifting. I'm still having fun AT table, but even with 5e lightening my prep load significantly, I'm still feeling burned out.

So right now, I'm looking for advice as to what can recharge the batteries a bit and breathe some life into this DM. Because I love 5e and enjoy DMing, but right now I can't seem to get motivated.

Thanks

Dude it's time you PLAYED for 6 months. Get one of your players to DM for a bit (or cycle DMs).

 

[The Myopic Sniper]

I will just say this here... I think that they could easily do an extra Adventure Path or two a year without overwhelming their customer base particularly if they don't bloat up those with a lot of character building options and spells. I am not sure how that would interact with Adventurer's League, but if it wasn't tied to that at all and was simply for home games it might actually be a way to get out of the Realms without losing their primary focus. I think a lot of DM's are in the same boat as the OP. Even if you have the inspiration to homebrew adventures and settings, most DMs don't have the kind of time that we did 15 or 30 years ago.

 

[Rhenny]

Periodically I hit the same creative wall.

One thing I tried once was teleporting the players in my campaign from a fantasy setting into a post apocalyptic Earth setting (stealing from Darwin's World and Gamma World). It gave me a fresh look and took a lot of creative pressure off me because the players were interested in exploring the simple abandoned and ruined military complex I placed them near. Because the world was so ruined and the players had less expectations it actually made it easier for me to improvise. After about 5 or 6 sessions in this world, I was able to bring them back to their fantasy world and we were all more energized and creative. Special note: my players were all NASA scientists so they really geeked out in the post apocalyptic world.

Another way I handle creative burn out is to run pre-written adventures and adventure paths. Even using pre-written stuff, I modify or add elements and usually find that even if I follow the path for a while, a good idea springs to mind at some point and then I roll with it.

Good luck.

 

[Mistwell]

I've been playing D&D for 20+ years. I've run a half-dozen campaigns and homebrewed my own world. I have a hard-drive full of house-rules and custom material for nearly every edition since 2e (save much for 4e, I didn't stay with it long). And 5e is legitimately the easiest version of D&D to houserule and homebrew for.

Then why don't I want to do it?

Re-math-ilis doesn't want to re-math-it anymore?

 

[bedir than]

I took a 20 year detour away from the game. Don't do that. It's not as much fun.

But I DM/GMd 80% of the time back then. I did it because even if the players didn't want to play, I wanted to create. So, I created. Now, with ways to share my creations, even if the PCs don't use them, I find it a lot more satisfying than back in 1987 staring at notebooks and graphpaper maps that I only I saw.

Much of the thrill of homebrewing isn't the 4-12 hours of play a week, but the dozens of hours spent answering "what if" about things that might be 30 seconds of play.

Find a way to share that via short stories, the homebrew section of EN World or your own blog (or blog-like thing). That should keep the joy of creation alive for you.

Then again, I'm the person who made 100s of PCs that never got to roll for initiative.

 

[Rune]

Thank you all for your suggestions.

I'm currently also playing in a game (another DM and I alternate weekends) and we share 50% of a group (I have 3 players he doesn't, he has three player I don't). Right now, we're starting OotA in his game (in the Realms, no less) and we're having a blast.

Perhaps though, that's the thing that has me spirits down; I put a lot of effort into crafting a (somewhat) unique world and stories, and we have just as much fun doing that as we do in the other guy's AP + canned setting, and he has much less prepwork. He spends an hour or two reading the next chapter and adding details, I spend 4+ hours crafting dungeons and plotlines. The players enjoy both equally. Seems like a lot of work for diminishing returns.

I'm not against running campaign settings (I ran Eberron once a long time ago, I'd kill for a 5e Eberron book) either, if fact it was a very nice change of pace from my fairly standard D&D world. I kinda wish 5e had more settings (and yes, I know about Primeval Thule, its cool but not my cup of tea) or a few more AP choices, but alas.

That said, I'll look into a few options. I don't want to end this campaign yet (for a few reasons), so I'll look and see what else I can add to keep the juices flowing...

Maybe you should check out a low-prep style of homebrew.

 

[fba827]

I would suggest one of three things ....


1) use an AP but don't look at it as such a negative option ( or at least do it seems by the way you wrote what you wrote)

2) don't use your existing home brew world! Your fatigue could very easily be system independent but more because you've gone through your world so much that you aren't inspired anymore... As much as you love it, let it rest on your hard drive and just think of a new world. Heck that new world doesn't need to races, just think of new spins on cultures for existing races and how those communities would evolve, etc

3) break from dming while you recharge and let someone else in the group try even if just for a 3-4 session thing

Anyway those would be my suggestions (and if it were me, I would personally go with #2)

 

[77IM]

Run a campaign of Apocalypse World. Read the MC's guide, twice, and do exactly everything it says. Get buy-in from your players and everybody dive deep into the insane, hard-core AW experience. Then take what you've learned, bring it back to D&D, and use it to craft settings and adventures that are totally awesome, in a fraction of the time you used to spend on game prep.

 

[Li Shenron]

Can't be much of a help here, since I am a homebrewer too, but like most homebrewers, my homebrew is still pretty much generic ale

* I have no real desire to create home-made materials, from races or subclasses to spells and monsters. I mean, I have a dozen things that exist in my world that don't have 5e equivalents yet (rakasta/cat folk as an example) but no real urge to complete them or try to balance them.

Nothing wrong with that. The obvious suggestion is to try out a published setting that you haven't played before. Unfortunately we don't really have campaign settings for 5e yet, and even SCAG won't really be a campaign setting sourcebook but rather a smallish starting point. Since you mention that you haven't played FR before, you can pick SCAG up and expand later with some older-edition FR book. Personally I would just use the 3e FRCS and just learn to live with 5e core options + UA articles.

If you dare trying something more different, consider a significantly different genre, something that deviates from classic fantasy.

* I'm having a hard time creating interesting new storylines: I had an idea playing on the cliche of the evil wizard who controls a kingdom, but for some reason, its not gelling like I thought it would. I'm not sure where to take the story next, and its partially hurt by the idea the group decided to make PCs that aren't native to the area, giving them less of a "fight for your homeland" element and more "take out the evil wizard because he's evil" motivation. As of this game, they will be finishing up my version of Reavers of Harkenwold, and I have no idea where to take the plot next.

Here I would not be very optimistic about published products. Very rarely they are less cliche' than homebrew storylines. Most of the time they are the usual "rush against BBEG/cult/organization that wants to destroy the world using a special ritual/mcguffin".

One way to challenge the cliche' could be first of all to consciously avoid any "threat from above". No single event, villain, spell, cataclysm, artifact etc. that threatens the world on a large scale and can be stopped with one fight. Try having a world where the cr*p rises from below: regional plagues, local crime and corruption, wars between 2 kingdoms only, famine/drought/natural disaster in a specific area, long-term spread of evil religions... you know, basically creating problems that aren't solvable by killing the responsible because there are way too many responsibles, pretty much like in the real world. No chains of single threats but a rather 'organic' web of threats that keeps regrowing, and within this mess the PCs become heroes if they manage to rise so high in the world that they can control the web (from within or outside) significantly for the good of the many.

I know it's difficult, it's basically asking to change the vision of the PCs final achievement, from becoming Rambos/Supermans/Chuck Norrises to becoming Washingtons/MLKs/Mandelas