Round robin gaming group -- almost a reality!

[EricNoah]

I'm *this close* to having something I've wanted for years -- a small group of skilled player/DMs (multiclassed of course ) who meet about once a month to play one-shots or mini campaigns. I've got two guys on board and will be putting out feelers for a couple more. I'm so excited I'm practically skipping around the room.

Anyone have good advice for one-shots or mini-campaigns? What makes a one-shot work? How do you feel about being handed a character (or a choice of a couple of characters) vs. being able to make your own? How do you make sure you have just the right amount of material for X amount of time (let's say 4-5 hours)?

And likewise, if you were going to do this, what would be some of the one-shots or mini-campaigns you'd like to play? I'm thinking of running parts of World's Largest Dungeon; Tomb of Abysthor; making up some Dark Sun stuff (or maybe convert some old stuff); some of Goodman Games' pdf modules; Dungeon Magazine modules loosely connected; finding some old school module conversions; etc. I'm hoping to get some sci fi or modern action from my co-DMs (I can't run it worth a darn but I think I could play it!). Send some inspiration my way and I'll pass it on to my group. Thanks!

 

[Psion]

I don't know about Round Robin, but the thought of meeting once a month and playing a game over gourmet hamburgers at Red Robin sounds pretty nice...

(Now I'm hungry...)

 

[EricNoah]

You know, Psion, you're the one I most hoped would respond to this thread. I seem to recall you doing (or planning) something called River of Worlds -- something that would "link" different campaign settings? I wonder if we could do that somehow. Kind of an "eternal champions" thing.... Or would it even be helpful/necessary? Hmm...

 

[Psion]

You know, Psion, you're the one I most hoped would respond to this thread. I seem to recall you doing (or planning) something called River of Worlds -- something that would "link" different campaign settings? I wonder if we could do that somehow. Kind of an "eternal champions" thing.... Or would it even be helpful/necessary? Hmm...

Teach me to post when thinking about hamburgers...

Well, I can remember a few collaborative efforts I have had. One worked out pretty good. One less so. One started out good and then went rapidly downhill due to different expectations of power levels.

River of Worlds (or a similar planar setup -- you're an old PS hand -- or even a well-divided common world) could be a grand way to run a co-DM situation where you want to give each GM a free hand to make a separate setting. The question you might ask, I would think, is do you want common characters. If you don't want a common pool of characters and want to have a chance to try a lot of new characters, too, you might ask youself if a combined campaign is really a good idea. What would you really get out of a "shared setting" otherwise.

If you do have a common group of PCs, I think it's imperative that you lay down the ground rules on what is okay to come into the game (character options, treasure, rate of advancement, etc.) before you start. Ironing out the mass AFTER you let your co-DMs know that characters with jeeps and automatic rifles for PCs is not cool with you is a bad way to do it.

Another thing that would be nice in such a situation is an already-in-place reason for rotating campaigns.

You know what else would be a fun spin on the planar setting with rotating campaign worlds if you want regular rotations? In the Book of Planes, they have an inn called the Inn of the Happy Toad God, but it's not a new idea. Basically, the inn travels from plane to plane on a regular and predictable schedule. That would be a nice baseline for a party to start at. Of course, you could mix it up with misadventures in which the PCs have to scramble across planes when things don't go as planned.

 

[Flyspeck23]

Anyone have good advice for one-shots or mini-campaigns? What makes a one-shot work? How do you feel about being handed a character (or a choice of a couple of characters) vs. being able to make your own? How do you make sure you have just the right amount of material for X amount of time (let's say 4-5 hours)?

Much (too much perhaps?) of an ongoing campaign depends on character development - how the PCs became what they are, getting to know one another and so on - and that'll be nearly impossible to pull off in one-shots if you're not using the same character over and over again.

IMHO a one-shot is best when it's exiting, and the players get into the mood not because their favorite character is in jeopardy but because the plot is interesting - a subtle difference. Make the players care for the set-up (but really, there ain't an easy answer...).

There's nothing wrong with pre-made characters for that kind of game (IMHO of course).

OTOH, if you're following Psion's advice (and always use a certain pool of characters), forget all I said

As for the amount of material... that is a tough question, and largely depends on the GM's and players' style.

 

[Haltherrion]

Anyone have good advice for one-shots or mini-campaigns?

Have you given any thought to round-robin gaming in the same campaign with the same PCs? It can work fairly well with some care and might feel better than yanking the PCs from setting to setting as you seem to be considering. You could use a prepared setting although with a little work, that isn't necessary.

We've been doing it for about 8 years or so. It started as a compromise because we had several who wanted to ref and not enough game time to manage multiple simultaneous games well. But it has evolved into a quite workable system.

We've tried several schemes but the best seems to letting a ref ref for a "while" (6 to 8 months), long enough to carry a story arc through to completion. You could also let another ref interrupt the story arc for one-shots from time to time to give a ref a break. Our ref pool consists of two who like to do longer arcs and one who likes to do one-shots so we let the latter give the former a break.

You asked a few questions about player reactions to this. As a player, I guess I like the appeal of multiple refs and playing styles. I don't care for the idea of not getting to develop a character over many sessions. That is one of the prime sources of enjoyment for me in D&D (and I suspect many others) so getting a new PC each time the ref switches is most unappealing personally.

As to whether players would like ref generated characters, I think this works if there is lots to choose from but if there are N players and N PCs, some of which are odd-ball, then I think it might cause some friction. still, if it is just for a one-shot session, that might not be a big deal.

 

[cybertalus]

Eric, the RPGA's module writing guidelines may help you on the timing issue. RPGA modules are written to be played in a specific amount of time (4 hours I think), and I distinctly remember their guidelines including a firm number of encounters that could be played during that time. They also have some advice on things that are needed specifically in a one-shot adventure that often aren't needed in a campaign.

When my schedule permits, I'm a participant in a local gaming club. The club meets once a week for three hours. New games start at the first meeting of every month. You're on a schedule with more time constraints, but hopefully some of this will help you anyway.

From the games I've been in at the gaming club it usually takes about three hours for a group to make even low level characters. The two biggest factors in that seem to be lack of enough copies of the books for everyone to use, and lack of familiarity with the rules on the part of the players and sometimes the DM. Once someone has a book in front of them and has enough of an understanding of the rules to proceed, equipping and spell selection tend to be the part of character creation which take the most time. Equipping in particular seems to take exponentially more time as the starting level of the PCs increases.

I've never seen a DM in the gaming club hand out pre-made characters, but I'm tempted to try it sometime to see what kind of response I get. I certainly wouldn't mind pre-gens as a player, if they were well done and there were more characters than players so that no one got "stuck" playing a character they absolutely didn't want to play.

The DM I gamed with at the D&D International Gameday made pre-gens, but left the details such as name, gender, and appearance up to the players. He had worked out all of the mechanical stuff and gave each PC enough of a background to make things work and give us a base to role-play from. I thought it worked out well.

I hope you pull if off. If you do, I guarantee it'll be fun. Unless you recruit lousy DMs.

 

[EricNoah]

I think I personally am going to avoid doing the same character each time; part of my motivation here is that I want to try out a lot of different characters -- and settings -- and genres. If another player wanted to drag around a favorite character to each game that would be fine by me but there would be no guarantee that DM #1 is running a 1st level adventure, DM #2 is running a 2nd level adventure, etc.

Maybe instead of a pool of characters it might be a pool of incorporeal beings who then travel to different worlds, possess some heroes, and have adventures. But that may be a bit of a stretch for no real reason.

Thanks for the tip on the writers guidelines, I'll see if I can find them.

I'm thinking the first module of the recent Dungeon adventure path might make a good 2-session dungeon crawl. Also recently purchased Aerie of the Crow God and the Sunless Garden -- plus with years of Dungeon I really have no shortage of short-medium adventures.

 

[Zappo]

I would love to play a bunch of mini-campaigns. After several years of being creative in the sense of finding new stuff to do in my campaigns, I have transitioned to a state in which I keep thinking up neat new campaigns. I think I'd rather enjoy playing a lot of short campaigns, to try out all these new concepts. New characters every time, and possibly new rules as well.

 

[WanderingMonster]

Eric, if you'd like me to be involved, count me as interested. This is one of my unspoken fantasies as well. Of course, I 'd also like to get in on the other side of the screen as the robin turns 'round.

We're doing Eberron now (as you may have heard), but I could do Mutants & Masterminds, Star Wars, or any number of esoteric games that currently call my bookshelf home.