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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bendris Noulg" data-source="post: 1474092" data-attributes="member: 6398">The GMs pretty much was able to just swing with things.  It's mostly from the "they turned left instead of right" factor; Planning more often leads to winging it anyways because the PCs went in another direction (either adventure or RP wise), so it's better to just have a few basics thought up and roll with the PC's decisions and actions instead of wasted time, effort and paper. At the same time, I (as a GM) use the carrot approach to campaign design (which I learned from another GM); I make it valuable to the players to interact with the world.  Rather than options just being assumed to be available, the options are dispersed throughout the game world environment to be actively sought out by the players.  This usually means that more than half of an adventure revolves around social-based role-play as the PCs gather clues, hints, and the like.  Adventures involve politics, social and religious movements, piecing together clues from not obviously related sources, etc., before ever finding a "dungeon" (with dungeons being more reminescent of the South American ruins from Indiana Jones with a critter or two rather than extensive, miles-long dungeon crawls). That said, I don't think that a GM spending 95% of his time developing his world is the problem; It's the GM that spends 95% of his time developing his world and not making it important for the PCs to interact with it in order to achieve their goals.  If it isn't made important by way of success and gains, than why should the PCs bother? Combats are rarely slow, and when they are it's most often due to the tactical element rather than the rules/numerical elements (ex: two Rogues knife-fighting on slanted, shingled roof-tops during a heavy rain storm, making Balance, Climb and Jump far more important than BAB and AC that night).  Our Mass Combat try-outs have been slow, as we've been testing out a few different systems (we want to use Fields of Blood, but we're still waiting on feedback from Eden concerning the manner in which the Realm Management and Mass Combat System are properly licensed and used [and I'm still debating if I feel such licensing should even be necessary], which may end up with us using Bastion's Arena instead if they don't respond in the near future), but then again, that's mass combat, so it's bound to not be very streamlined (especially if said players and GM are at least half-familiar with Sun Tzu and other military philosophers/strategists, as we tend to push these systems to their extreme capacity and then some during in-house playtesting prior to actual campaign use). Note, I'm not saying that your experiences are wrong (indeed, LightPheonix seems to have had the same issues).  However, in my experience, the primary reason for groups breaking up has been life (new jobs, relocation, kids, etc.) or (in my earlier gaming history) GM's that couldn't think outside the "gray description box" that pre-written adventures used to come with and thus resulting in drab, flavorless games.  (i.e., the GMs I've known to use pre-written adventures didn't take the time to make them "great" the way you describe above.)</blockquote>

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