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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rechan" data-source="post: 5057720" data-attributes="member: 54846">Finally got around to reading/replying to this thread. Apologies for the lateness. I still say that you have to sit on some of your coolness/plots, simply due to time restraints. TO give you an example: Let's say I have 3 cool scenes with pirates, two cool scenes with hags, three with frost giants, one with a dragon, two with kobolds, one with a mini-beholder, two with shadar-kai, and three with gnolls. Each has its own corresponding plot.I can't throw all of those at the players at the same time. Purely because there are only x number of hours per session, each encounter takes y hours to do. So they all can't be done literally at the same time (fighting 12 fights simultaneously), and back to back, there would be no CONSISTENCY. ("Ok, you just beat the pirates, you're standing on the ship... Now, frost giants spring out of the water and you're all standing on a mountain!") It would just be a montage, instead of anything resembling a narrative. Which can be fun occasionally, but it's even less sensical. The cool stuff at least needs to be led up to. Otherwise it's random and hard to follow. Besides. Some cool stuff doesn't work. If I have a Cool Thing that involves high level monsters, I can spring that on a 1st level group and get a TPK, I can de-level the monsters to the point that it's unsatisfying and rather jarring ("So were 1st level and we just slew frost titans? What?"), or I can wait until it's balanced. The same can be said with plots. If you have at least 6 or7 campaign-spanning plots, you can't do them all simultaneously. Because then the party will be confusd that Step 1 of Plot 3 isn't related to Step 2 of plot 5, and get things mixed up, not to mention time related (again, can't cram 12 things in the same session simultaneously when they all take time) as well as narratively unrelated ("Step 2 of Plot 5 involves the desert, Step 3 of Plot 4 involves the Frozen North", so the two don't really interact because they are so far apart geographically and in-game time wise, it's difficult to simultaneously run it.)Throwing a lot of stuff at a wall and seeing what sticks, as far as plot hooks, is a fine method but I don't think that's how I want to run the entire game.Thanks, that is more in line with what I was looking for (albeit a little more involved!). I started this thread to ask how to mesh/peter out long campaigns. Initially I thought you were saying "Here's a plot, take this plot" but then I see it's just an example. I like the suggestion you give about the Eladrin's primal (or more likely, "wicked" nature being sated by the Hunt). I want help with outlining (perhaps a more organic method than <a href="http://www.critical-hits.com/2009/06/02/the-5x5-method/" target="_blank">the 5x5 method</a> but not by much).But, part of your point (PC choices shaping the direction), I certainly do that. To give an example, this recently came up in my game. The PCs needed to face a dragon, and do so in a time crunch. There were three ways they could find the dragon's lair on time:1) Rumor has it a man 2 days away claims he stole from the dragon. He's come into some wealth.2) A witch can lead you to the dragon, but she expects some personal sacrifices.3) A mythical beast, when slain, will answer one question both truthfully and in depth. The PCs dismissed 1 because the thief likely wasn't reliable. They argued over 2 and 3 (Half wanted to slay the beast because it was the simplest/most trustworthy, the other half wanted to save the One Question Answered for a more important, world-shaking question that's pertinent to their personal quests). So they finally went to the Witch; a PC sacrificed his ability to show happiness, another sacrificed his ability to feel love, affection, joy, and see beauty. Further, I started the campaign by detailing the different regions and asked, "Where do you want to start?" And the PCs picked the location of the game's beginning. Each region has its own meta-plot, that may or may not factor into the campaign's plot. Either way, their choices mean the direction the game takes. Yes, online. I'd say 5/6ths of any RPG I've played has been online. I've lived in places where it's HARD to find players (Read: reliable players that I like who are interested in games I'm interested in). Take my current situation, where everyone I want to play with are 30something professionals who can barely find time for a once-a-month game in systems I'm not interested in playing/running. Besides. I'll be leaving my current location in a year and a half, and then only staying in the next location for two years. I also lack the ability to drive. So, my situation does not lend itself to being with very reliable and consistent people.Two things. First, I've rarely been in a game that survives. When the GM has lost interest, or the players have, or 2/5ths repeatedly don't show up, etc, the game just dies. Second, I'd rather scrap a game than cycle through so many players, not having the players you started with. I like to begin campaigns that hinge very strongly on the PCs. If for instance the Campaign is about character A and Character B's background, or written for their motivations, and they leave - but I now have player C, D and E, I'd rather just scrap it and make something about C, D, and E rather than continue the campaign about characters who are not even part of the game anymore.</blockquote>

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