JVisgaitis
Explorer
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What ruins a campaign?
- Thread starter Crothian
- Start date
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
But sooner or later you'll win, and you *won't* die, and you *will* level-bump...and it'll mean something.Elf Witch said:
I'm not saying the PCs should lose every fight, but neither should there be any expectation saying they're automatically going to win.
That said, I don't enjoy playing in parties that work "as a well-oiled machine" all the time; but then, as a player I'm pretty chaotic.
Lanefan
Darth Shoju
First Post
I'd agree with pretty much everything listed above. However, the story of the beginning of the second campaign I'd ever run was a blueprint for disaster.
It was a homebrew world where I had put a fair amount of work into. I decided the main country was a kingdom comprised of 7 powerful clans. Unfortunately my group was very into the card game Legend of the Five Rings at the time. For any of you that aren't familiar with that game, it features seven great clans. However, it is based in a fantasy amalgamation of Japanese and Chinese culture. My campaign was a slightly odd mix of Scottish and Eastern European cultures (don't ask). None the less, comparisons were made from the beginning of the first session. They even wrote "Shadowlands" on an area of the map handout I gave them.
To make things worse, most of my friends had sworn off D&D at this point (this was 1998). Only three of us (myself included) still played D&D and only one of the others was playing in this campaign. The other two players mostly played CCGs or Call of Cthulhu (I played those as well). To try and lure them in I promised it wouldn't be a very D&D-like game. I invented some homebrew rules system from scratch that was poorly thought-out at best. 3 sessions in we switched to 2nd Ed AD&D (there was less resistance to this than I thought there would be). Eventually this would result in arguments about the balance between the classes and the different XP tables.
Back to the first session. I endured the L5R comparisons and soldiered on. The 3 players seemed to be enjoying themselves. However, halfway through the session one of our other friends stopped by for no apparent reason and started playing L5R by himself at the end of the table. This ended up drawing the attention of one of the players. I basically finished the session with the attention of two players.
By the 4th session I had managed to gather three more players and lose two (both were well-known to be unreliable). That session I introduced one of the main humanoid races of the campaign. I had told my players that the typical D&D humanoids wouldn't be in the campaign (at least not recognizably) so I didn't give the creatures a name, just a description. One of my players (the one that was distracted by the L5R game in the first session) decided that they resembled intelligent orcs. He said that in Spelljammer there were intelligent orcs called "scro". They dubbed the humanoids in my game the scro and quickly determined their commander was the "scroju" (another L5R reference). One of them hit upon the idea that their general would be called "the scro-tum" (ha-ha :\ ). The general amusement that ensued derailed the game for at least 2 hours. In subsequent sessions they would come to refer to every un-named humanoids as "scro-x" (eg. scrogre for what they felt resembled ogres). One of the guys created what he called the "scrocabulary" where he would go through every monster in the Monster Manual and attach the preface of scro. The funny-sounding ones he wrote down and trotted out every once in while. Whenever they did it would bring everything to a halt for at least 30-45 mins.
I should probably mention we were all in our early to mid twenties at the time.
The campaign somehow survived several player shuffles (although two of the 3 present at the original session played right through to the end-one was the guy disctracted by L5R), the inability of the players to decide what they wanted to do to investigate the storyline hooks I tossed out (thus resulting in some railroading on my part to keep things moving), the ill-advised introduction of an NPC that traveled with the party (and was often forgotten and occasionally pulled the party's bacon out of the fire-yes I learned my lesson), and several player-to-player arguments. Overall it went for 3 years and was ultimately really enjoyable for all involved. But any one of the above elements came a hair away from ruining the whole thing.
It was a homebrew world where I had put a fair amount of work into. I decided the main country was a kingdom comprised of 7 powerful clans. Unfortunately my group was very into the card game Legend of the Five Rings at the time. For any of you that aren't familiar with that game, it features seven great clans. However, it is based in a fantasy amalgamation of Japanese and Chinese culture. My campaign was a slightly odd mix of Scottish and Eastern European cultures (don't ask). None the less, comparisons were made from the beginning of the first session. They even wrote "Shadowlands" on an area of the map handout I gave them.
To make things worse, most of my friends had sworn off D&D at this point (this was 1998). Only three of us (myself included) still played D&D and only one of the others was playing in this campaign. The other two players mostly played CCGs or Call of Cthulhu (I played those as well). To try and lure them in I promised it wouldn't be a very D&D-like game. I invented some homebrew rules system from scratch that was poorly thought-out at best. 3 sessions in we switched to 2nd Ed AD&D (there was less resistance to this than I thought there would be). Eventually this would result in arguments about the balance between the classes and the different XP tables.
Back to the first session. I endured the L5R comparisons and soldiered on. The 3 players seemed to be enjoying themselves. However, halfway through the session one of our other friends stopped by for no apparent reason and started playing L5R by himself at the end of the table. This ended up drawing the attention of one of the players. I basically finished the session with the attention of two players.
By the 4th session I had managed to gather three more players and lose two (both were well-known to be unreliable). That session I introduced one of the main humanoid races of the campaign. I had told my players that the typical D&D humanoids wouldn't be in the campaign (at least not recognizably) so I didn't give the creatures a name, just a description. One of my players (the one that was distracted by the L5R game in the first session) decided that they resembled intelligent orcs. He said that in Spelljammer there were intelligent orcs called "scro". They dubbed the humanoids in my game the scro and quickly determined their commander was the "scroju" (another L5R reference). One of them hit upon the idea that their general would be called "the scro-tum" (ha-ha :\ ). The general amusement that ensued derailed the game for at least 2 hours. In subsequent sessions they would come to refer to every un-named humanoids as "scro-x" (eg. scrogre for what they felt resembled ogres). One of the guys created what he called the "scrocabulary" where he would go through every monster in the Monster Manual and attach the preface of scro. The funny-sounding ones he wrote down and trotted out every once in while. Whenever they did it would bring everything to a halt for at least 30-45 mins.
I should probably mention we were all in our early to mid twenties at the time.
The campaign somehow survived several player shuffles (although two of the 3 present at the original session played right through to the end-one was the guy disctracted by L5R), the inability of the players to decide what they wanted to do to investigate the storyline hooks I tossed out (thus resulting in some railroading on my part to keep things moving), the ill-advised introduction of an NPC that traveled with the party (and was often forgotten and occasionally pulled the party's bacon out of the fire-yes I learned my lesson), and several player-to-player arguments. Overall it went for 3 years and was ultimately really enjoyable for all involved. But any one of the above elements came a hair away from ruining the whole thing.
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DM burnout. And since I am always the DM, when I burn out on a campaign then it is over. One I just ended it with an email (after obviously struggling with it for months), one I decided to 'take a break and come back to' (yeah, right). The last game I actually felt burnout coming on at level 16 and ran it right up through saving the world at level 19. Knowing that the end was in sight helped me stick with it.
I usually burnout for any number of reasons, but the biggest is that I just want to try something new. Early in the campaign I get a good idea and then work it into the game. Soon I have so much going on that when I have a new idea I have to shelve it or see the game collapse under its own weight. Meanwhile, new books with interesting new magic systems, base classes, and even combat systems keep coming out, but adding them would contribute to game bloat too much. When the weight of the ideas burning a whole in my brain outweighs the fun I am having running, I wrap up.
The players have almost never wanted a campaign to end, and they were very happy that I actually ended one with a climactic moment. But they understand when I just can't take it anymore, and they know they will soon love the new campaign as much as they loved the old.
I usually burnout for any number of reasons, but the biggest is that I just want to try something new. Early in the campaign I get a good idea and then work it into the game. Soon I have so much going on that when I have a new idea I have to shelve it or see the game collapse under its own weight. Meanwhile, new books with interesting new magic systems, base classes, and even combat systems keep coming out, but adding them would contribute to game bloat too much. When the weight of the ideas burning a whole in my brain outweighs the fun I am having running, I wrap up.
The players have almost never wanted a campaign to end, and they were very happy that I actually ended one with a climactic moment. But they understand when I just can't take it anymore, and they know they will soon love the new campaign as much as they loved the old.
I don't mind not lawyas winning in an encounter, I don't mind having to run like big ole chickens.
What I am talking about is something along these lines.
You enter a room in a dungeon and the door shuts behind you no matter what you try you can't go back through it so you go forward. You have already had two other encounters with ghast and ghouls so the cleric has one turn ability left, almost no healing. You are looking for a place to hold up and rest.
But instead you hear chanting it turns out to be three evil drow mages who if they finish their spell will bring the old evil god through.
They are on a scaffold with a floating disk in front in front of them the only way to get to them is to ride up so no way to sneak up.
So we ride it up ready to go. They know we are coming and as soon as we get even with them three ghast attack us. The cleric can't turn them they so we fight them. While we are fighting a wall of flame springs up before us. We kill the undead and the ones with enough bit points dive through the wall of flame taking some damage we feel like we have no choice because we can see an opening forming.
Inside the mages btw since they had a protection of arrows up that stops 100 points of damage have to be at least 10 level. I have bow designed to fight drow so I start firing away. The others get busy fighting the undead and three plate mail wearing fighters on this side. There are only three of us who made it through the fire.
The ones on the side with the mages get killed and the ones on the other side will die when the gate opens but luckily three planer paladins come bursting through and save the day.
I am not good at CR but we faced 6 undead that were high hit point than a second level cleric could effect., 3 fighters who had greater cleave and about 85 hit points and three at least 10 level mages.
We were a party of fourth level made up of a druid, cleric/fighter, ranger, rogue, psion.
This DM was throwing this kind of thing all the time. Our failure had nothing to do with bad tactics on our part or not knowing when to run hello locked and closed door. And facing the end of the world if we did nothing.
What I am talking about is something along these lines.
You enter a room in a dungeon and the door shuts behind you no matter what you try you can't go back through it so you go forward. You have already had two other encounters with ghast and ghouls so the cleric has one turn ability left, almost no healing. You are looking for a place to hold up and rest.
But instead you hear chanting it turns out to be three evil drow mages who if they finish their spell will bring the old evil god through.
They are on a scaffold with a floating disk in front in front of them the only way to get to them is to ride up so no way to sneak up.
So we ride it up ready to go. They know we are coming and as soon as we get even with them three ghast attack us. The cleric can't turn them they so we fight them. While we are fighting a wall of flame springs up before us. We kill the undead and the ones with enough bit points dive through the wall of flame taking some damage we feel like we have no choice because we can see an opening forming.
Inside the mages btw since they had a protection of arrows up that stops 100 points of damage have to be at least 10 level. I have bow designed to fight drow so I start firing away. The others get busy fighting the undead and three plate mail wearing fighters on this side. There are only three of us who made it through the fire.
The ones on the side with the mages get killed and the ones on the other side will die when the gate opens but luckily three planer paladins come bursting through and save the day.
I am not good at CR but we faced 6 undead that were high hit point than a second level cleric could effect., 3 fighters who had greater cleave and about 85 hit points and three at least 10 level mages.
We were a party of fourth level made up of a druid, cleric/fighter, ranger, rogue, psion.
This DM was throwing this kind of thing all the time. Our failure had nothing to do with bad tactics on our part or not knowing when to run hello locked and closed door. And facing the end of the world if we did nothing.
frankthedm said:
Yes it can never be that the DM is an idiot.
Sometimes players don't work as well oiled combat machine but I can gurantee that no matter how good your tactics are a low level party can't take on a CR threat that even the DMG says is to high and does not list XP for.
Our second level party took on a 15 level mage and because of our tatics we won of course in the end half the party was dead and needed to be raised.
We were always facing a much higer CR threat than was suggested for our level and the amazing thing is that we never had a TPK.
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