Winding down the campaign

[Reynard]

I am in the process of winding down my current campaign in anticipation of running a Pathfinder AP (Jade Regent) for the first time. I don't really run "story" campaigns -- that is, the campaign itself doesn't have *a* story, but many of them, some more important than others.

In any case, it is time to offer a little closure here and there, without blowing up the world, killing the PCs or otherwise making the campaign unplayable. Should we decide to come back to it at some point, i'd like to be able to just pick up and go. At the same time, I want the players to have a sense of closure for the campaign as it is.

How have you wound down your campaigns in the past? What methods have you used to appease players who might not be as keen on a fresh start as others? Have you ever left a campaign and then picked it back up some time later (months, years decades)? As a GM, how did you satisfy yourself and give yourself the closure you felt you needed?

 

[steeldragons]

I'm going to suggest a simple "ride off into the sunset" motif.

Assuming the party is of a certain level, give them a keep or or even just a region to rule (then it can be presumed they have to actually construct the keep). Give each character something "cool" to fondly remember the setting in...the mage goes off to crafte the "magic staff of his dreams"...ranger dude attracts a cadre of followers and makes a stronghold in the wooded pass leading to the other characters' castle...the thief gets to sit back and swims around in his riches in the castle vault...if there's any romance in the group, they get married...etc. etc.

Everyone leaves with the warms fuzzies of dreams they have for their characters...and if/when you come back to the game there's a lot more for the PCs to lose.



--Steel Dragons

 

[CuRoi]

How have you wound down your campaigns in the past?

Sort of... I ran an extremely long campaign that spanned about 12 years real time. We "wound down" twice as we took breaks for other games, tried to get people reorganized after scheduling conflicts caused breaks, etc. We also ran concurrent campaigns (alternating weekends) for a while.

Our first "break" came after a very long hiatus. I had been out of town quite a bit with my job and was unable to continue the campaign. I made sure we squeezed in enough sessions to get to a solid stopping point - the opening battle of a war that had been brewing throughout the campaign.

However, the result of building up about 6 years of material made coming back to it after about a 6 month break pretty daunting. Which leads to the next question-

What methods have you used to appease players who might not be as keen on a fresh start as others?

There were lost of unanswered questions but also lots of history. Once we took 6 months, some players started to get a bit fuzzy on that and a bit overwhelmed. So in that sense, some of the players were ready for a new start, but to help convince them I added a hook.

The fresh start was in the same campaign world - across an impassable sea where the original inhabitants of the previous campiagn's lands had come from. So the familiarity and the potential promise of merging the worlds was one "carrot" used to get everyone on board. Also, the players would be getting many questions answered about the original campaign because they had been battling shadowy, evil forces from this "old" world for months.

Have you ever left a campaign and then picked it back up some time later (months, years decades)? As a GM, how did you satisfy yourself and give yourself the closure you felt you needed?

Yes and no. Since the last campaign was a "child" of sorts of the original it doesn't completely meet your definition. We ended that "child" campaign with the PCs accomplishing their objective to travel to the "old" lands. Theoretically opening up the bridge between both campaigns.

The original campaign wound down at the aforementioned climactic battle scene. It was the typical "tolkienesque" sort of thing where I could bring back friends and foes from throughout the past to help add closure.

However, the "final battle" was never truly fought. This may sound a bit like the opposite of closure, but in gearing up for the battle they tied up many loose threads, met with friends, dealt with foes, and pulled together quite a bit of story in a satisfying way that accomplished many of their goals. However, by leaving the "final battle" unfought, it also left them wanting to come back, someday.

You say you don't have a "story based campaign" with just some stories more important than others. To really get everyone on board and feel closure as a DM, you need to wrap up some of those threads, without cutting or tying all of them off.

In mundane terms, it's a person getting ready to head off to college. They need to pay some bills, visit some friends, maybe settle some scores and then they are gone for several years. The story isn't that they went to college, that's the assumed future. The story is how they dealt with everything leading up to the climactic event. At any rate, one of those "more important" stories needs to provide an impetus for the PCs (and thus their players) to move on and the thing they do to prepare will wrap things up neatly.

Hope that makes sense...

 

[Gilladian]

In one campaign that ended a few years ago, the PCs had lived and adventured in one specific region of the campaign world; in it magic is pretty much anathema; the church rules with an iron fist and keeps wizards and sorcerers under their thumb. When the PCs blew up a major temple (with magic) breaking one PCs mother out of prison for being a wizard, they could not stay there. The final adventure wrapped up with them boarding a ship and taking passage for another continent.

Another campaign drew to a close when the PCs found out who one of several major big bad evil guys was and dealt with him; they never did find out who another was, and the third they realized was someone they'd probably never be able to completely defeat. The two main players were happy with this semi-victory, and were willing to call the situation a draw... they both settled down in their home town and began pursuing more mundane goals.

 

[amerigoV]

It should end the way it began...in a tavern. The difference is the PCs are telling the story instead of listening to others.

 

[Zelda Themelin]

If you intend to maybe return I would go like this:

First some adventure, which give them very good (or bad) fame. Depending on party level it may be related to their home village or capital of kingdom they are hanging in. Give them most relevant plot resolution and some good day job offers because of that earned fame. Some land owning, castle building stuff maybe, some apprance recruiting/training. Starting a company, sending other people to adventure for them. Major priest job at local temple. Projects. Do some reunions that players care about related to npc:s that are still are around. Do the forementioned tavern scenary... and fade to black when moment is right.


Alternativly do some nice adventure and from there take it to party or some festival. Resolutions, reunions and other stuff there.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I'm in the process of doing this. Both strands of the campaign are going to have a climactic battle (and there will be an opportunity for the renegade characters in the Freeport branch to return home to help save the day). I'm already planning a sequel campaign set several months later, picking up on outstanding plot threads, but I'm going to give them a rousing send-off for the first campaign, bringing back allies the characters have made over the last several years, giving them closure with some of their rivals and letting them resolve some of their interpersonal issues. Some of the characters/players may choose to sit out the sequel campaign (there are a lot more married/parent types in the group than when we started playing) and I want it to be a finale for them, if they choose for it to be.

The sequel will pick up a few months later, with a new ruleset, some minor retcons to the setting (like snipping out some of the WotC gods who never got used and are just gumming up the wiki) and new adventures springing, in part, from what the characters accomplished -- and what they failed to accomplish -- in the first campaign.

So while the renegades will (probably) save Freeport (they're on the last part of the Freeport Trilogy now) and the heroes will (probably) save the barony from the worst of the kobold army and aspect of Tiamat, it'll be a chance for me to kill off NPCs I found I really didn't like and even use a new map for the starting village next time around, if I choose to. (The new multi-map village from 0one Games' blueprints series is tempting). But the stuff I like will sail through unscathed and ready for several more years of play.

 

[synger]

We've wound down a number of games. In Werewolf, our GM often will ask what we expect for our character in the future. Then he makes a few chance roles to flesh out the good or the bad, and then he gives us a summary. For instance, I played a peasant-stock Germanic Galliard (lore-keeper) who lived for his sept, his wife, and his village. When we wound it down, I expected that he'd continue serving as an elder Garou in the sept, with the aim of becoming its chief lore-keeper, and would try to have a large family with his wife. Dice roll was good for lore/sept, and very bad for wife. She almost died having his stillborn child, and was frail for the rest of her life. He doted on her, and adopted children of other Garou, but it would always be a wound on his heart that he had no children with her.

Another game I played an Ahroun (warrior) who had killed two wolf kinfolk when in a frenzy. She never forgave herself for it, and ended up throwing herself into battle with less thought, trying to make up for it. When the game wound down, I said I expected that she would mate with a wolf to more quickly repopulate the kinfolk packs (though she was born human), and that I expected she'd die young, in battle (she was 16 when the game began). She lived to be 24, and had a good number of litters before her death in battle.

 

[Quickleaf]

I'm in the process of doing this. Both strands of the campaign are going to have a climactic battle (and there will be an opportunity for the renegade characters in the Freeport branch to return home to help save the day).

Campaigns with multiple parties like this always fascinate me. Must be a blissful headache to DM.

I am in the process of winding down my current campaign in anticipation of running a Pathfinder AP (Jade Regent) for the first time. I don't really run "story" campaigns -- that is, the campaign itself doesn't have *a* story, but many of them, some more important than others.

I've only read the outline for that AP, but isn't the main tavernkeeper NPC (Ameiko?) basically a stand-in for any NPC ally with claim to a throne? I imagine you've got a big cast of NPC allies you could choose from and file off the tavernkeeper's serial numbers.

How have you wound down your campaigns in the past?

Last campaign ended with more of a blitz than a winding down. Four intense encounters pretty much back-to-back until 2 a.m.

My old planescape campaign ended with a laid back session without any combat where the PCs were confronted with a dilemma of what to do with a memory stone that held an experience pivotal to the Lady of Pain becoming what she is. There was no resolution, just a funny last exchange:

Sensate fighter: "I dare you to use the memory stone. Think about it, what greater pain could there be than the Lady of Pain's ?"

Sensate wizard: "Listening to your inane attempts at philosophy?"

What methods have you used to appease players who might not be as keen on a fresh start as others?

[MENTION=98032]CuRoi[/MENTION] has a nice answer to this: same world, different area, a few carried over plot hooks.

IME players who have objected to a fresh start really are objecting to one or more of the following:
* Starting over at level 1 again
* Leaving behind a PC they've grown attached to
* Learning a new rules set
* They don't like the particular new setting being considered

I've allowed players to carry over favorite PCs into new campaigns provided they adjust their PC to whatever level the group is gaming at. When the level difference was too big, I instead offered to let them play the descendants of their high-level PC. Come to think of it, that always seems to get a good response.

Have you ever left a campaign and then picked it back up some time later (months, years decades)?

Oh yes. The planescape campaign went on for several years, then was on hiatus for almost a year. We ended the game with the PCs defeating an abyssal lord, saving several gatetowns from getting dragged into the Abyss, and eliminating the threat of a demonic invasion of Sigil. It was pretty broad-reaching and ran till 12th level.

When we picked the game back up, we only played intermittently so the continuing story was extremely narrow, and only ran to 15th level; it was more of a character study of the 2 PCs plus a denouement. The abyssal lord held a clue about the Lady of Pain; eventually the clues led to a secret society within the Sensates which the Lady of Pain once allegedly was a member of. The story was that the Lady of Pain took on the pain from this abyssal lord (via a memory stone) the PCs had defeated and that was what made her into what she was today. Hence the ending: What to do with the memory stone?

As a GM, how did you satisfy yourself and give yourself the closure you felt you needed?

My last campaign definitely did not have the sense of closure I like simply because I misjudged how loooong our session took to get through relatively small scenarios (we had a party of 6 or 7, several newer players). It was amazing that I was able to tie everything together for a battle royale at the end. Ah well.

If everyone walks away from the table at 2 a.m. smiling and reviewing the highlights, then I'm content. Then again, a year later I started plotting the revival of that campaign, so maybe getting closure is the cure for DM OCD?

 

[Jimlock]

How about setting in for a quite life... family business and the like.

...However, when a serious situation arises in the future, they will have to go.

Not because of moral and justice...

but because an adventurer's blood never runs cold... a quite life is NOT for him.

I know this sounds/is like the "retired cop who gets back to business" cliche,

yet I always like the idea that adventurers, heroes and the like, always find it hard to settle in for the quite life. It's a bug inside them that never leaves them at peace.

So you can introduce the "calmness" now, and when/if you ever want to continue playing with those same PCs you will have all this boiling up to storytell, that might start from one or two PCs... who try to convince the others.

I know there is nothing original with this, however there are certain cliches I enjoy