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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Truename" data-source="post: 9835662" data-attributes="member: 78255">I leaned hard into a player-driven approach for my last campaign. (5e 2014.) It worked okay, but not nearly as well as I hoped, and my experience was similar to yours: they stopped doing their homework and struggled with analysis paralysis. It ended up being too much work for me, so I brought the campaign to a close. Now I’m running a megadungeon that’s completely gonzo with no meaningful plot whatsoever and everyone’s having a great time.It started out well, with strong agreement that, if I was going to run a homebrew, “total PC freedom” campaign, I was going to need their help. Everybody was responsible for bringing a list of NPC names to use during play, coming up with NPCs that their PC knew, etc. We co-created the campaign world using Microscope.It all went great at first, but fairly quickly they stopped doing work outside the game. Part of that was my fault: I didn’t do a great job of keeping their NPCs and other inventions relevant as they moved away from their starting location. But mostly people just couldn’t be bothered to pay attention to the game away from the table, and we don’t have enough time at the table to do a lot of world-building. (About 2.5-3 hrs, ostensibly weekly, same as you.)Then the silliness kicked in. “Okay, you enter the smithy and a tall human woman greets you. What’s her name?” “Smithy McSmith-face.” The lists of NPC names got left at home or forgotten.In the end, it was just too much work for me to build everything myself. Indecision was a bit of a problem, too, but not to the degree it sounds like yours is. That may be because I found myself playing pretty strong hooks so I’d know what to prep next.I still like the idea of a player-driven campaign. I think part of the issue was my skill as a DM: both not doing enough worldbuilding at the table during play, and trying to do much prep away from the table instead of being ready to improv.I picked up Stonetop and it’s a brilliant set of advice for DMing a player-driven campaign. Its structure around player goals (building out the village) and external forces (threats) adds some of what I think my game lacked. Also, by having a central “home base,” I can make the players’ world-building long-lasting and impactful, which will hopefully help feel more motivated to take co-creation seriously.The PbtA narrative-first gameplay should help, too, making it much easier for me to improvise. And the setting book which is full of idea seeds rather than a bunch of stuff to adhere to should help me with prep to support that improv. But I think you could apply the GM advice in Stonetop to other game systems and settings too.All-in-all, I wasn’t super happy with my first attempt at a player-driven campaign, but I’m looking forward to trying again.</blockquote>

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