Playing the same character since 1985? Gwah?

[theredrobedwizard]

I came across something which I percieved as peculiar and thought I should ask the gaming community at large about it.

A coworker and I often talk about RPGs in our downtime. I regale him with stories of my weekly Pathfinder and L5R games, he tells me tales of his AD&D group. I had been operating under the assumption that these were tales of a bygone age and he'd been a lapsed gamer for some time. You can imagine my slight shock, then, when he invited me to play with his group last week. I, of course, jumped at the opportunity to see a real-live group playing AD&D 1E.

Upon my arrival, I got to talk to some of the other players. That's when the real shock set in. They hadn't just been playing the same version of D&D with the same group since 1985, 3 out of the 6 players were still playing with the same *characters*. Not the original characters' descendents, not reimaginings or rehashes, the actual original characters. (The newest player had joined in 1999 and was still playing his original character as well.)

To say that I was incredulous is a bit of an understatement. I asked what level they were. The highest level character was level 15. I asked how many times he'd been resurrected. Twice. I asked if they only played every few months. Once a week since 1998, barring a few weeks when people had been sick or on a family vacation. Prior to 1998, they played twice per week.

I commend them for their tenacity and dedication to one setting and one character, but admited that I really didn't understand how it was possible to play a character for that long without them permanently dying or players moving away or everyone just getting bored. They just shrugged and said that's how it'd always been.

Every week since 1985, they lugged three bookbags worth of books per player over to the DM's house. Every week, they've played the same character. 2000+ sessions of the same character.

I guess my question is this: What's the longest you've ever played one character?

My longest played character was about 14 months, playing once per week. The fact that she lasted that long without me getting bored and making a new character was (I thought) an amazing feat.

-TRRW

 

[Desdichado]

My longest played character was about 14 months, playing once per week. The fact that she lasted that long without me getting bored and making a new character was (I thought) an amazing feat.

Mine's probably about that too. The longest single campaign I was ever in was Age of Worms, 3.5 edition, 1st through 22nd or so level. At right about the midpoint--10th level--I retired my current character and built a new one. It wasn't so much that I was tired of him as it was that it just wasn't working out the way I'd hoped in terms of how the character interacted with the campaign. We played that campaign for about two to two and a half years, but we didn't play every week. I'd estimate that I played the two characters I had in that setting for a little over a year each.

 

[Henry]

Usually, a couple of years in my teen years -- these days, my longest was from 1st to 12th level, when a TPK killed him off -- about 10 months.

I can see a group playing the same character that long and still only be 15th level, especially if they use the by the book XP system, and level draining system, etc. and if people start out at 1st level only with new characters. Keep in mind that over 11th level, characters take HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of XP to level each level, so you could be going up one level every couple of years at that rate. I remember one rant Gary Gygax had many years ago about people with 30th level characters running around, and saying that in his home game, the longest running D&D game around, his people had only hit 14th level or so.

Me, I can't conceive of staying focused and invested enough in one character for thirty years!

 

[Janx]

I remember Gary complaining about too fast of advancement in The Strategic Review (the pre-cursor to Dragon Magazine)

This group is like they were dropped into a Time Capsule canister and just uncorked by the OP, still playing Gary's Way...

At least they are having fun, right?

 

[Lord Mhoram]

As this is in General, I'll go over different games - because that can make a huge impact.

D&D - probably about 9 years - Obsidian - a Drow raised by Dwarves. I DMed and ran the wife through 36 levels in about 15 years.

In champions I have one character* (My avatar incidentally) whom I started playing in 1986, and still play. She got weekly play for over a decade - these days it's about once a month or so. Her story is nowhere near done - I could play her for another 20 years and not be done.

Median length is 5 or 7 years.

We tend to play campaigns for a decade or so. D&D is usually shorter (5 years maybe a bit more) and Hero longer.

I like to get into the personality and background of characters, and explore their lives - as the characters develop so do opportunities for more exploration.


* It's funny that she sorta followed 4E tiers. She started as a regular Superhero in a city team - then was a member of the Avengers/JLA type team for the world; moving into the tactician and combat trainer for said team, then got recruited as an agent for an inter-dimensional agency. So three distinct styles of play.

 

[Piratecat]

My last D&D campaign started in 1992 (2e) and finished in 2008 (3.5e; we'd converted to 3e while playtesting in 1999). We averaged a game every other week for 16 years. Same characters (with no player turnover for the last eight years or so), finished at lvl 23, and a few permanent deaths. Incredible amounts of fun, and I don't think anyone got bored with their character.

In Sagiro's last campaign, we played just shy of 16 years. Almost completely no player turnover, same characters, a game on average every 3 weeks, and we finished at 21st level. From start to finish it was a joy. I'd go back to playing that same character in a heartbeat; he wasn't close to played out.

I'm currently running two 4e campaigns, each planned to last six years. We're 3 years in on both, with no player turnover (but a couple of permanent PC death.)

 

[Spatula]

I, of course, jumped at the opportunity to see a real-live group playing AD&D 1E.

Every week since 1985, they lugged three bookbags worth of books per player over to the DM's house.

Bizarre and cool story, but I'm curious what all those books are if they're playing 1e...

 

[Serendipity]

That's dedication. I have a few characters lingering from the long ago, but they are all updates or analogs of the originals in some form or fashion. And they really don't get played, it's just something I do with new editions or whatnot.
I suspect this sort of thing is a bit more common than the internet might think, however.

 

[billd91]

I've got characters surviving since 1982. Haven't played them since about 1999, though. That said, I don't have any problem with revisiting that campaign for more play. I'd play them in heartbeat.

One thing about some of the old style campaigns - we often played more than one character in them. We'd play one for a while then get the itch to play lower level PCs again and roll up some new ones, play a few adventures, then go back to playing the higher level characters again for a quest or two, then back to the lower level PCs, and so on. Sometimes these PC groups would cross paths too or intermix forming new groupings. Great fun.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I'm in a group that, much like the one mentioned in the original post, has npbeen active since about 1985 or so.

Here is where we most probably differ:

1. While many of the original PCs are still active, we each have multiple PCs within the campaign world, covering a broad spectrum of levels from 1st to beyond 20th
2. We have actually updated the campaign across editions, so that the most commonly played PCs- which started in 1Ed- have been 2Ed and now 3.5Ed PCs.