It's official. My D&D group has dissolved.

[Desdichado]

I hear ya, Merak. My former group has sorta fallen apart as well. We've done some heavy recruiting; in fact, shadowlight and me organized the Detroit Gameday specifically to find new gamers we could play with. I've got a new campaign I'll be running in a week or so, I'm also now playing a CoC campaign that Quickbeam's running, and shadowlight may start something up as well. In addition, some of our other friends turn out to be old-time D&D players who are now interested in trying it again; I don't know if they're long-term campaign potential, but they'll be good for a few games, at least.

So, for what it's worth, it's working out for me at least.

Don't sell other options short, either; I know shadowlight just started a campaign that he and his wife are both doing together; just the two of them. They both have characters, and they take turns GMing, depending on who has a good idea for the evening. It also has the advantage that they can pick up and play at a moments notice.

 

[Nightchilde-2]

Keep the faith. Over the years, my group(s) has dissolved, reformed, broken down, shattered and been pieced back together many times over.

I now run two groups; one group online and one group face to face. In the online group, I have the pleasure of playing with 5 people that I've played with, off and on, for years, and 3 of those people are in my face to face group. So we just keep rising from the ashes....

 

[diaglo]

...Don't sell other options short, either...

you know, i don't know why i didn't say this before. thanks JD.

Hey Merak,

You should contact your old group and get them to play OD&D. They will never know what hit them.

 

[Graywolf-ELM]

We haven't played since January - and that particular game had itself been the first game in over a month.

People just didn't seem to want to make D&D a priority any more. It's kind of sad, after 3 years together, that it should end so... quietly. We always kept in touch via email - and four of our players (out of eight) hadn't responded to any of the "so are we going to get together this weekend" emails for over a month now.

It really felt like breaking up with a significant other. We had incredible reluctance to take the final step and send out our final email. It felt like we were ending a special phase of our life - even though we were never really close friends with the people in the group.

So my wife and I have started a neophyte group with a close friend of ours, but we're going to need one or two more people to really get a campaign going again. We're going to finish the mod we're working on and then think more seriously about active recruiting.

I find it interesting, though, that my wife and I, when talking about the situation and what we should do, never considered for a moment not playing D&D any more. It wasn't an option. Our choices were a) hold out and hope the group pulls together again or b) s=break up with them and start a new group. There was never another option considered.

Merak,

I live in the 'Querque as well. I had a gaming groups break up here in the 80's when I was here in High School, and again, when personalities got in the way about 4 or 5 years ago. It's always rough to see it happen, I hope you can build a new group up.

We have a good group now, growing it seems, and we play every other Friday night. I was determined this time to keep gaming, if only one, or the whole group showed up to play. Right now, everyone is pretty bummed if they miss even a single session.(Especially since, only 1/2 XP is awarded for non-attending players) And at least 2 of us DM, so that if one can't make it, the other can run a game. it makes the game progression go a little slower, and you have to take pretty good notes, so everyone can remember where you are at each time you sit down, but it has worked pretty well for us(Although I am itching to DM again).

Drop me a line, the next time you open a PbP game, I'd love to give it a try, my work keeps me online on a daily basis. I want to play in a few before I start DMing some of them myself.

GW

 

[dreaded_beast]

Sorry to hear about your group.

At least it wasn't because you couldn't stand the people you played with.

 

[MerakSpielman]

I think part of the problem contributing to my group losing interest in the game was that everybody seemed to want to run a campaign. Near the end we were running 4 campaigns in rotation, with different characters, different DMs, and different homebrew worlds. It was hard to maintain consistancy, remembering what was going on, which character you were playing, etc... Add in the inevitable weekend where we couldn't get together, and we could go more than a month between sessions in any particular campaign. I think everybody was having trouble maintaining interest. Then one couple had to take a month off to fix up their house to sell it - and to shop for a new one - and never expressed interest in starting the games up again. Another couple started to have real bad problems with their kids (each of whom has mental disorders) - they didn't feel like elaborating and I respect their privacy. We were always the outsiders among these 2 couples (and one other person) who all work together. They're good friends with each other, while we just come over to game. There are other issues, too, that I won't go into here.

The member I feel real bad for was our newest - a really smart teenage kid (our minister's son in fact). He just wanted to play D&D, and entered one of the campaigns right before things started falling apart. He only got to play for a few sessions. My wife and I are thinking we'll invite him into our new group. I dunno, it must be weird being 15 and playing with a bunch of over 25 adults.

 

[Graywolf-ELM]

I think part of the problem contributing to my group losing interest in the game was that everybody seemed to want to run a campaign. Near the end we were running 4 campaigns in rotation, with different characters, different DMs, and different homebrew worlds. It was hard to maintain consistancy, remembering what was going on, which character you were playing, etc...

We have managed to keep this from happening so far. We have a primary setting, and then my game is the backup, if Hellstar can't make it, or would rather play than DM at a session. It keeps me itchy to DM and constantly prepared, but I deal with it well. We keep updated with each other on our own message board, but I still have to come here for more active chatter.

 

[Nightfall]

On the plus side Merak, you could always join my online campaign!

 

[KB9JMQ]

Not being able to game sucks.
I hope you are able to get a new group together soon.
I went years without gaming and would hate to do so again.

 

[BSF]

Merak - all is not lost. Email me. Hmm, Graywolf, you emailed me a month or two back right? Maybe we need to get a little more coordinated and start having more players ask us for a game and if one of us is full, we can refer to each other?

I'm kind of lucky in that I have a pretty solid group of 8 players, and I am a player in a 6 person group. But yeah, losing a group is sad.