What ruins a campaign?

[VirgilCaine]

DM (me) wants to create a great roleplaying atmosphere. My job is to create a game so immersive that the players would want to escape back into reality. ("I'm glad I have my real life!"). DM implements ARMS LAW into his Eberron game and shows it to the players; after THEY AGREED TO PLAY IT!

You're gonna have to elaborate on what "Arms Law" is.

 

[hong]

What is absolutely critical is that the DM adheres to his own established in-game precedent...if it's ruled something works a certain way once in his game, then it must always work that way in that game, even if broken.

Bah. You just need to be able to hit the curveball.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Poeple. Every game I've quit or that was ended was because of people.

More specifically, people's utter disregard for other people. They don't feel like roleplaying today? They just don't showup, and won't tell anyone that they're not coming. That was the first group I quit (and which ended afterwards because of complete lack of players).

The second one was similar - we did get notifications, but they were often 1 hour before we were supposed to play - and people would cancel games often (read: most of the time) and for the most trivial things (with two I strongly suspect the real reason was often "I'd rather play WoW").

 

[Li Shenron]

So, in your opinion what ruins a campaign?

Death (of the players).

Earthquake.

Rabies.

Nuclear meltdown.

Switching to 3.5.

...

I must have been very lucky, I've never seen a ruined campaign...

 

[Raven Crowking]

Death (of the players).

What? You refuse to play with zombies?!?

 

[Mark Hope]

You're gonna have to elaborate on what "Arms Law" is.

It's the combat rules for Rolemaster. Nice, if you like your rules complex, with lots of tables. Otherwise, a bit mad, really...

 

[VirgilCaine]

It's the combat rules for Rolemaster. Nice, if you like your rules complex, with lots of tables. Otherwise, a bit mad, really...

I've heard of Rolemaster before, but I had no idea if that was what you meant. That's freakin' crazy.

 

[Sir Elton]

Actually, Dungeons and Dragons has now attained the crown of the Most. Complex. Roleplaying. Game. Evar.

Rolemaster isn't as complex as Dungeons and Dragons, I guarantee it.

 

[Faerl'Elghinn]

DMs who don't know the rules so they wing everything and it seems it is always in the NPC favor.

I find that the reverse is usually just as bad (or worse). When a player/DM refuses to wing anything, needs to keep track of every second of every day in campaign, requires alignment/motivational justification for the act of picking one's nose, etc., the game begins to take on a rather laborious quality. I have a DM/player who is so obsessed with keeping track of every detail and ensuring absolute "realism" (*ummm... magic?!?*) that I often feel more like I'm working than playing a game. Her strict adherence to things like average character wealth and the unwillingness to improvise to provide characters with the opportunity to pursue prestige classes without training for five levels beforehand... when the prestige class wasn't published until yesterday... it makes the game suck. For the sake of realism, the party has a chance of encountering a hostile Great Wyrm Red Dragon during a random night encounter at 15th level... It breathes. We die. There goes a year of gaming... break out 4d6!! A DM/player needs to be able to rewrite the letter of the law a little bit to enhance the gaming experience of everyone involved.

As far as weighting things in favor of the NPCs, I don't have a problem with starting a challenging adventure with a little extra firepower, but when the power level of an NPC party member makes the PCs seem superfluous on a consistent basis thoughout a campaign, there's definitely a problem.

At the other end of the spectrum, I have (had) a DM who consistently responds to good play and planning by breaking out the +10 vorpal Nerf bat. "What? You cast a spell that I expressly approved which kills my BBEG in one round? First of all, it backfires and affects you instead because of divine intervention. Oh, yeah--it also drains all spellcasting ability from your character. You are now a 20th-level wizard with no spells. Permanently." Ugh... Yeah, we all basically shunted that guy off to another dimension. The sad part is that he used to run some of the best games I've ever played in my life. The guy can play 30 different NPCs in a session and you can tell them all apart each and every time you encounter them, describe a scene off the cuff so vividly that you can smell it... What a shame.

Don't get me started on cheating players...

 

[awayfarer]

Actually, Dungeons and Dragons has now attained the crown of the Most. Complex. Roleplaying. Game. Evar.

Rolemaster isn't as complex as Dungeons and Dragons, I guarantee it.

Um, I've been gaming for about two years now. I started with two groups, one playing D&D 3.5 and the other playing RM. The RM group once took 6 hours to get through 7 rounds of combat. I"m sorry but there is NO WAY D&D is more complex than RM.