D&D 5E Length of peoples Campaigns?

[Talmek]

I love the idea of having the effects and consequences of one campaign influence or at least be mentioned and referred to in a subsequent campaign. However, I'm not sure how my players would feel about it - perhaps they are interested in a fresh break, but that would most likely consist of a new setting or even a new rule set.

Ultimately I would use those events and outcomes to help build a more detailed game world. That is, again, player-willing.

 

[Cristian Andreu]

On average, my main campaigns (to differentiate them from the short ones we play to try out new games or which are done for special occasions) last between 2-3 years, and though we use different characters for each (except one time about 12 years ago, when three of my players asked to reutilize their characters from an older campaign), almost all of them are connected in one way or another.

Our current Planescape campaign (it's been going since November 2013) started in 15th level, so the PCs have been travelling a lot around the planes. Thus, they have been able to see first hand the consequenses of past campaigns, and two of their fondest previous characters played a pretty big role earlier in the story; depending on how things develop, they might have to face against another in a few sessions.

There's also a reccuring former PC: Xarthon the Gnome. He was played by a friend who wasn't regular on the group but once every few years would ask to be invited for one session. As luck would have it, the three times he played he ended stranded in a different plane. So now Xarthon appears from time to time in the most unlikely -and most unlucky- locations, only to be invariably stranded somewhere else shorthly thereafter. The guy who ran it stopped roleplaying several years ago, but regularly asks about where Xarthon is currently at in the grand scheme of things.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Such things are highly dependent on preferred style and what you are looking for from the game.

A continuously moving world being the focus of multiple campaigns favors play that is primarily exploration based. No matter what happens or what PCs do, the world moves on and events influence each other. It gives the game world a nice sense of shared history as the players can actually relate to taking part in events that help bring about the current state of affairs.

The advantage of a self contained story campaign is that the world can be treated much like a trash can liner. You can literally lay waste to much of it as the needs of the campaign dictate without worrying how that will affect future campaigning. Basically this is more suited to doing over the top epic stuff in shorter timeframes.

Both types of campaigns have their appealing features.

 

[redrick]

Hiya.

I was perusing a few threads this afternoon and one about campaign settings of old semi-tangent for a few posts with folks commenting about the old 32-page detachable-cover-with-map-on-back 1e modules and how many folks want to see them return. My brain, for some reason, drew that into the whole "D&D is now about story, Story STORY!" post from that brand manager guy at WotC.

Of course, this made me think of campaign length (...er...yeah...crazy brain...*mumble mumble mumble*...).

I'm getting the distinct impression that folks "nowadays" (re: started RPG'ing after, say, 1995'ish) have campaigns that consist solely in a bubble. That is, they roll up new characters and the DM says"For the past several days, you have been traveling a road that winds lazily across the rolling grasslands of the Greenfields. ... ...and so begins the Hoard of the Dragon Queen hardback "adventure campaign story". They play it for the next 6 to 8 months and defeat Tiamat.

Then they all roll up new 1st level characters and start the Prince of the Apocalypse, with no mention or reference to what just happened with the whole Tiamat thing. That is, if the PC's, for whatever reason, go to Greenest (is that what it's called?), it will be perfectly fine. It was never attacked by a dragon and dragon worshipers, and Tiamat never showed up to be defeated. In short, that "campaign" was a "bubble story" with no consequences or lasting effects to continue an ongoing "actual" DM's campaign.

Maybe this is an old grognard thing (re: someone who started playing this RPG thing prior to 1e), but stories generally become part of the campaign narrative history. Not always, for sure, but that is the default assumption and not the exception. So, playing through HotDQ, successfully or not, the events would reverberate throughout the campaign setting. Players creating a new PC after said adventure should, by default, assume that "all that dragons, cultists and Tiamat thing" did happen. Greenrest is still recovering. Cultists are still lurking about trying to find out what went wrong and how to get revenge, etc, etc, etc.

Am I alone in thinking of a "campaign" this way? I haven't always done it like that...but mostly I have. However, I always mention to my players anything that is "world changing/noticing" that didn't happen (ex: Queen of Spiders - the giant incursion, the black bubble over Istivin (?), etc) if I deviate from the default "it's all connected".

My campaigns generally last a few years, each character coming 'after' another (or, at best, concurrently). There are exceptions, but those are just that...exceptions. When we want to do something 'new' we start a new campaign; all "PC histories" are wiped from the collective campaign, we pick a campaign world year to start in and off we go again.

Thoughts?

^_^

Paul L. Ming

I haven't been at this long enough to speak to any trend in the length of my own campaigns. What I can say is that I was at the first session of the new Encounters season (Princes of the Apocalypse) last week, and the various NPC's referenced "those recent problems with Tiamat..." So even with the young tykes (and this dude appears to be young, I'd say in his 20's), some people are trying to create ongoing continuity.

When my current campaign is over, I'll probably hit the reset button and use a different setting. If I were playing in an entirely homebrew setting, I might do it a little differently.

 

[Jester David]

I was perusing a few threads this afternoon and one about campaign settings of old semi-tangent for a few posts with folks commenting about the old 32-page detachable-cover-with-map-on-back 1e modules and how many folks want to see them return. My brain, for some reason, drew that into the whole "D&D is now about story, Story STORY!" post from that brand manager guy at WotC.

Part of this is because big stories allow the D&D team to coordinate events between the RPG and the video game, comics, miniatures, and the like. So they're all doing the same thing at the same time.

That, and it's fairly easy to take the superadventure and remove the story they included and add your own, mining it for NPCs, encounters, monsters, maps, and the like. You can choose to do the extra work. However, the smaller 32-page adventures often had a very limited story, so if you didn't have time to write and plan a story you were out of luck.

A focus on story really goes back to 1e. Dragonlance was the first story-focused module and arguably the first adventure path. So the concept is 30-years old (or so). What WotC is really doing is taking six 32-page modules and releasing them all at once rather than once every month. Which is significantly cheaper, costing $40 instead of the $60 all six modules would run.

I'm getting the distinct impression that folks "nowadays" (re: started RPG'ing after, say, 1995'ish) have campaigns that consist solely in a bubble. That is, they roll up new characters and the DM says"For the past several days, you have been traveling a road that winds lazily across the rolling grasslands of the Greenfields. ... ...and so begins the Hoard of the Dragon Queen hardback "adventure campaign story". They play it for the next 6 to 8 months and defeat Tiamat.

Then they all roll up new 1st level characters and start the Prince of the Apocalypse, with no mention or reference to what just happened with the whole Tiamat thing. That is, if the PC's, for whatever reason, go to Greenest (is that what it's called?), it will be perfectly fine. It was never attacked by a dragon and dragon worshipers, and Tiamat never showed up to be defeated. In short, that "campaign" was a "bubble story" with no consequences or lasting effects to continue an ongoing "actual" DM's campaign.

Maybe this is an old grognard thing (re: someone who started playing this RPG thing prior to 1e), but stories generally become part of the campaign narrative history. Not always, for sure, but that is the default assumption and not the exception. So, playing through HotDQ, successfully or not, the events would reverberate throughout the campaign setting. Players creating a new PC after said adventure should, by default, assume that "all that dragons, cultists and Tiamat thing" did happen. Greenrest is still recovering. Cultists are still lurking about trying to find out what went wrong and how to get revenge, etc, etc, etc.

I want to do the big narrative history campaign. The story where the actions of one group of heroes affects another. But there's so many worlds and games and types of game that I want to play that playing in the same world twice seems... inefficient.
But for people who don't have the bookshelf of APs and campaign settings and game system, they can certainly have the repeated campaigns in the single world. I somewhat envy that dedication.

 

[pogre]

I love the idea of having the effects and consequences of one campaign influence or at least be mentioned and referred to in a subsequent campaign. However, I'm not sure how my players would feel about it - perhaps they are interested in a fresh break, but that would most likely consist of a new setting or even a new rule set.

Ultimately I would use those events and outcomes to help build a more detailed game world. That is, again, player-willing.

That's a great point - we usually change rules systems between campaigns. My last few campaigns have been 3.5, wfrp 3, 4th ed, pathfinder, wfrp 2, 5th edition. We like 5th edition - so hopefully we can stick with one rules set for multiple campaigns.

 

[Agamon]

I hop around different games, let alone campaign settings. But even during the years I primarily ran D&D, it was my homebrew, then Greyhawk, then FR, then Ravenloft, then back to Greyhawk, but earlier in the timeline than before, then back to the homebrew, hundreds of years later, then back to FR...you get the picture.

So while it is an interesting idea to just play for 30 years in one setting and have each campaign daisy-chain with each other, it doesn't happen in my groups.

 

[TerraDave]

Its bubbles, sometimes big ones, often connected:

I think some DMs plan small for a campaign, then have the good fortune of watching it grow into something bigger, including something that may interconnect with other campaigns. Unfortunately, I think a lot of DMs start with grand plans, only to watch their bubble pop all too soon.

 

[keterys]

We're a mix. We tend to play characters for a single coherent campaign, then start another, but there are often references. Like the Inn started by the previous group will show up, or have become a chain of Inns. A character might be a descendant of a previous character, or even worship one.

That is to say, you won't go to Greenest and nothing has happened. But we no longer play the same characters for more than a couple years, across a myriad of adventures. That is how we used to play about 20 years ago, but no longer.

 

[Bupp]

While not as much of a grognard (started in the 80s), I remember those days well. I noticed that the trend changed during 2E, not only because of the emergence of many more campaign settings, but because DMs started running "epic" campaigns that pretty much ruined the setting for future use (see the Prism Pentad for a great example). The idea that each campaign took place on the same world, thus keeping continuity and letting players see the results of their actions, eventually faded away to a reset/reboot mentality.

Not all have changed however. Many DMs who enjoy one particular setting (FR, Greyhawk, etc.) often incorporate aspects of previous games into their campaign. I played in a 3E FR game where the DM introduced some NPCs that were the PCs in his 2E FR game (one of the players was from that game). Our actions impacted his 3.5 FR game, which (slightly) impacted his 4E campaign. Now in his 5E game, I highly suspect that some of those old references may impact our current events. His FR is HIS FR, where we've affected the world, if only small parts of it.

I have not DMed continuously over the years, and have only recently rebooted my Greyhawk campaign. I plan to continue this tradition, and when we're done, my next campaign will have the events of the previous campaign impact it. I considered incorporating what I remember from my 1E campaign, but the details are fuzzy, and I've decided to take a more Gygaxian approach this time around. I may drop an NPC or two, but that's about it.

The 3 campaigns I ran in Greyhawk in my younger years were all part of the same timeline. They were 3 distinct groups, 1 in high school and two while in the army, with completely different groups of players each time, but they followed along a timeline. Characters from previous groups occasionally appeared as NPCs in later games. I figured it saved me making all new NPCs up as well.