Day 28, #RPGaDay2020 coming nearer to an end, "Close" you might even call it.
Words of advice from a man full of regret, never close up your campaigns unless you're absolutely certain.
Like dropping the dramatic at the table, closing a campaign requires a deft touch. I'm always amazed at people who say they have an eight-session campaign or a ten-session campaign. Even if mine has an outline, there is no guarantee it will survive once it makes contact with the players. My GMing style was nurtured on random encounter tables, not standardized Encounter Ratings.
I regret every instance where I completely shut the book on a campaign. While there have been many times in my life where I wanted some finality, dammit if I wasn't clamoring to return.
The most common theme in all the years of #RPGaDay has been my Burning Trogs Rule! campaign for Hackmaster. Crafted out of the ashes from near-TPK from the previous campaign, I followed my advice above and didn't start entirely from scratch. Despite moving the campaign to the other side of the continent, I kept some outstanding storylines, and slowly worked on the surviving/inactive PCs on the side, working with them on other nights, to keep their stories alive in a new country. Luckily the PCs backstories allowed for emigration to another country, with some pretty cool stories to boot.
The problem lay on the back end of the campaign. I was planning a move out of the area in a few months, one couple in the group was about to have a child, another was moving to Boston, it was far more upheaval than I casually remember nowadays. So, in the middle of a giant continental war/crusade/jihad where they were acting as ambassadors from the Empire of Barthey (re: Byzantium), I decided their arrival in the Kingdom of Vlachia would be the final adventure.
It just happened that the adventure run would be Robinloft, the Hackmaster parody of I6: Ravenloft.
Even I was surprised how well those final two sessions went. Terval Sit, the lone mage in the party, managed to slay Count Tahd Vlad'neer in single combat. The Count was the acting King of Vlachia, and head of the Vampire Council, which threw that country into chaos and pulled vital support for the Master of the Desert Nomads of Yarbay. I had already run the wargaming simulation on both sides, and while the ambassadors would have more work to do, within six months, Barthey would successfully push the invaders beyond their borders. Mission accomplished!
I set up a nice wrap up with rewards, awards, and land grants. I worked with the players to see what they really wanted afterward. If I wanted to return to the game in their home country, most were perfectly set up to be used as NPCs in the next campaign.
But you can't let go of some things.
Around session 20 of the write-ups, our one player, Hoyce, needed to drop out to take a grad class. His character, Gnome Titan warrior Zorin Redrock, was the de facto leader and primary combat machine for the Trogs, and his absence hurt them greatly as they dove into the Slaver's series (A1-4). It was a complete and utter disaster, with half the party perishing, and the others taking months to return to their headquarters in Celsior. Many of those surviving PCs had made it to NPC status post-campaign, but the trauma from their experiences would be a great influence.
In our "exit interview," Hoyce kept Zorin's future very simple.
"I'm going to buy some ships, hunt down those fucking slavers, and kill every one of those c*cksuckers myself."
So, as I advanced the calendar a few years and ran a new Hackmaster group circa 2007 that had only the cursory of reactions with the Old Trogs, Hoyce's words always hung in the back of my mind.
If I had been smart, I would have (a) kept better lines of communication, particularly some PbeM (b) worked on improving everyone's technology. Tech options from 15 years ago were completely different than today's media smorgasbord, heck I used dial-up until 2009. Don't judge.
I'm sure it would have taken some work, but I think we could have cobbled together a continuance of the campaign, with a few face-to-face meetings over the years, and gotten the revenge certain people craved so much... or die trying. I've added a year in campaign time for every year in real-time that we haven't gotten together. Now, the campaign restart has a sixteen-year gap.
In sort of a reverse comparison, you shouldn't be close-minded in a campaign. Being narrow-minded and assumptive can lead to disaster and disappointment down the road.
My recent Star Wars d6 campaign has been a rousing success, all thing considered. I successfully converted classic Star Frontiers modules into d6 and the "heroes" are treading a lot of "gray" opportunities that West End rarely visited.
Looking to find some inspiration beyond the next step or two, I started my Challenge Challenge. I indexed the "Star Wars" (Traveller) material (Twilight: 2000 went in a second index) from issues 25-30. There is a ton of convertible data with scenarios, planets, flora and fauna, and some nice NPCs so I believe I'm set for a while.
Now the casual reader who was in my shoes might ask, "ViscountEric, why did you start with issue #25? Where's issue #1-24 of Challenge?"
Great question casual reader! The first-ever issue of Challenge was #25, because the magazine was the Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society (JTAS) for the first 24!
I've indexed all of the JTAS issues, and I have dozens upon dozens of pieces of campaign material... and I haven't even gotten to Challenge issues with Star Wars material!
But somewhere along this process, I came to an embarrassing revelation. As I reviewed each article, with notations how I would present it in a Star Wars setting rather than the hard-sci-fi-based universe of Traveller, I realized, I was piecing together a continuing storyline, with plenty of time for side-treks and diversions to avoid a railroad, but I had assumed at least the run from #25-30 would all take place.
It's laughable.
I'm quite certain that the two items from issue #25 (a scenario and a ship with crew) will enter campaign canon in the next few weeks. I also know the further we move along, the more things I can pencil into the campaign, but the idea that everything I've assembled, all 46 scenarios. and half as many NPCs, ships, and worlds, respectively is simply ludicrous. I should take a lesson from my own critique of other GMs and not guarantee an exact 10-session campaign, or 46-session one.
And to be fair, we've run two old Star Frontiers modules, and we're on session 12.
Words of advice from a man full of regret, never close up your campaigns unless you're absolutely certain.
Like dropping the dramatic at the table, closing a campaign requires a deft touch. I'm always amazed at people who say they have an eight-session campaign or a ten-session campaign. Even if mine has an outline, there is no guarantee it will survive once it makes contact with the players. My GMing style was nurtured on random encounter tables, not standardized Encounter Ratings.
I regret every instance where I completely shut the book on a campaign. While there have been many times in my life where I wanted some finality, dammit if I wasn't clamoring to return.
The most common theme in all the years of #RPGaDay has been my Burning Trogs Rule! campaign for Hackmaster. Crafted out of the ashes from near-TPK from the previous campaign, I followed my advice above and didn't start entirely from scratch. Despite moving the campaign to the other side of the continent, I kept some outstanding storylines, and slowly worked on the surviving/inactive PCs on the side, working with them on other nights, to keep their stories alive in a new country. Luckily the PCs backstories allowed for emigration to another country, with some pretty cool stories to boot.
The problem lay on the back end of the campaign. I was planning a move out of the area in a few months, one couple in the group was about to have a child, another was moving to Boston, it was far more upheaval than I casually remember nowadays. So, in the middle of a giant continental war/crusade/jihad where they were acting as ambassadors from the Empire of Barthey (re: Byzantium), I decided their arrival in the Kingdom of Vlachia would be the final adventure.
It just happened that the adventure run would be Robinloft, the Hackmaster parody of I6: Ravenloft.
Even I was surprised how well those final two sessions went. Terval Sit, the lone mage in the party, managed to slay Count Tahd Vlad'neer in single combat. The Count was the acting King of Vlachia, and head of the Vampire Council, which threw that country into chaos and pulled vital support for the Master of the Desert Nomads of Yarbay. I had already run the wargaming simulation on both sides, and while the ambassadors would have more work to do, within six months, Barthey would successfully push the invaders beyond their borders. Mission accomplished!
I set up a nice wrap up with rewards, awards, and land grants. I worked with the players to see what they really wanted afterward. If I wanted to return to the game in their home country, most were perfectly set up to be used as NPCs in the next campaign.
But you can't let go of some things.
Around session 20 of the write-ups, our one player, Hoyce, needed to drop out to take a grad class. His character, Gnome Titan warrior Zorin Redrock, was the de facto leader and primary combat machine for the Trogs, and his absence hurt them greatly as they dove into the Slaver's series (A1-4). It was a complete and utter disaster, with half the party perishing, and the others taking months to return to their headquarters in Celsior. Many of those surviving PCs had made it to NPC status post-campaign, but the trauma from their experiences would be a great influence.
In our "exit interview," Hoyce kept Zorin's future very simple.
"I'm going to buy some ships, hunt down those fucking slavers, and kill every one of those c*cksuckers myself."
So, as I advanced the calendar a few years and ran a new Hackmaster group circa 2007 that had only the cursory of reactions with the Old Trogs, Hoyce's words always hung in the back of my mind.
If I had been smart, I would have (a) kept better lines of communication, particularly some PbeM (b) worked on improving everyone's technology. Tech options from 15 years ago were completely different than today's media smorgasbord, heck I used dial-up until 2009. Don't judge.
I'm sure it would have taken some work, but I think we could have cobbled together a continuance of the campaign, with a few face-to-face meetings over the years, and gotten the revenge certain people craved so much... or die trying. I've added a year in campaign time for every year in real-time that we haven't gotten together. Now, the campaign restart has a sixteen-year gap.
In sort of a reverse comparison, you shouldn't be close-minded in a campaign. Being narrow-minded and assumptive can lead to disaster and disappointment down the road.
My recent Star Wars d6 campaign has been a rousing success, all thing considered. I successfully converted classic Star Frontiers modules into d6 and the "heroes" are treading a lot of "gray" opportunities that West End rarely visited.
Looking to find some inspiration beyond the next step or two, I started my Challenge Challenge. I indexed the "Star Wars" (Traveller) material (Twilight: 2000 went in a second index) from issues 25-30. There is a ton of convertible data with scenarios, planets, flora and fauna, and some nice NPCs so I believe I'm set for a while.
Now the casual reader who was in my shoes might ask, "ViscountEric, why did you start with issue #25? Where's issue #1-24 of Challenge?"
Great question casual reader! The first-ever issue of Challenge was #25, because the magazine was the Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society (JTAS) for the first 24!
But somewhere along this process, I came to an embarrassing revelation. As I reviewed each article, with notations how I would present it in a Star Wars setting rather than the hard-sci-fi-based universe of Traveller, I realized, I was piecing together a continuing storyline, with plenty of time for side-treks and diversions to avoid a railroad, but I had assumed at least the run from #25-30 would all take place.
It's laughable.
I'm quite certain that the two items from issue #25 (a scenario and a ship with crew) will enter campaign canon in the next few weeks. I also know the further we move along, the more things I can pencil into the campaign, but the idea that everything I've assembled, all 46 scenarios. and half as many NPCs, ships, and worlds, respectively is simply ludicrous. I should take a lesson from my own critique of other GMs and not guarantee an exact 10-session campaign, or 46-session one.
And to be fair, we've run two old Star Frontiers modules, and we're on session 12.
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