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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Thu Nov 28, 2019 6:53 am
by Wrathbone
I’m not going to be able to do tonight unfortunately, so we’ll have to postpone till next week.

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Thu Nov 28, 2019 7:16 am
by Sly Boots
That's a shame, but no problem :)

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 4:22 pm
by Wrathbone
Provisionally should be free any day this week except tonight. I think this will need to be the last week before we have a break for Christmas because I've got all sorts of stuff going on from next week!

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 5:23 pm
by Raid
I'd prefer wednesday or thursday this week, but can do tomorrow at a push.

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 5:26 pm
by Sly Boots
If we can avoid Apprentice night that would be cool, so Thursday?

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 5:44 pm
by Mantis
I've got something on with work this week which I don't currently have a time for, though it is likely to eat up two evenings. I think Thursday will likely be my only chance to get a session in.

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 6:00 pm
by Wrathbone
Let’s aim for Thursday then.

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 6:02 pm
by Wrathbone
Really sorry guys, I’m still working, probably not going to be ready at any reasonable time. :(

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 6:11 pm
by Sly Boots
I'd forgotten to be honest. Shattered today for some reason so wouldn't be too unhappy postponing, but will that mean the next one will be in the New Year (think you said you had a lot of stuff on over the festive period, WB?)

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 6:26 pm
by Wrathbone
Yeah, the next few weeks will be tricky with Christmas plans and I’ll be away for a couple of weeks, so normal service will be resumed the first week of January.

What happened to things winding down for Christmas?! :lol:

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 10:34 pm
by Mantis
I wouldn't have made tonight anyway as I've had to stop away for work. Next two Thursdays we have Christmas parties too so that fills my schedule until new year!

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2019 2:22 pm
by Mantis
I'm running my Christmas one shot next weekend and the amount of planning I've had to put in just for a single session has been pretty crazy (though it will likely be a 12 hour game). Gives me an extra level of appreciation for those who DM a full campaign, particularly when you have players who don't take your hints on where they should go so you have to ad-lib everything as they go and burn down the local private eye's store. :lol:

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2019 2:59 pm
by Wrathbone
Good luck! :)

The more you DM, the less time you need to plan stuff, partly because you gain confidence with improvising stuff and so you become comfortable with allowing everything to go off-piste, and also because you learn more effective preparation. I've got reams of prep notes that I never referred to, but it doesn't matter because the act of writing things down is often enough to get in the right state of mind. Prep is all about getting to the point where you're comfortable you can run a decent session.

On the other hand, a lot of the time I spend hours designing maps or fleshing out NPCs just because I enjoy it.

If you end up DMing more often, I thoroughly recommend Sly Flourish's Return of the Lazy DM:

https://slyflourish.com/returnofthelazydm/

His method aims to get prep down to 15 mins for a session (with some caveats). I'm not quite there, but I find a lot of his ideas useful. I've also read his first book, which is good but not a patch on this one.

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2019 7:18 pm
by Mantis
I'm quite enjoying just doing all the groundwork for areas that in all likelihood won't ever be seen unless the group really takes a tangent from the actual objectives. The worldbuilding is proving handy anyway as it's part of a wider reimagined DnD setting with it's own history that I'm going to use as a basis for any campaigns I may decide to run in the future.

I've bitten off more than I can chew and started composing music for it too but haven't given myself anywhere near enough time so may have to scrap that idea.

Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Posted: Sun Dec 29, 2019 1:43 pm
by Mantis
Well I ran my one shot last night and it went down very well. Took about 7 hours and we finished at 02:30 in the morning but I'd already cut a fair few encounters out because the party spent a long time doing totally off the cuff things.

Two things I've taken from it. Ad libbing responses for NPCs you barely had given a second thought to is tough, particularly when some in the party are deliberately pushing you down unknown question paths. And second, micromanaging combat for the enemies isn't as fun as I expected it to be because I was conscious of party wiping the players with some of the more stacked enemies I'd home-brewed. The players weren't being particularly tactical either so if I'd gone all in on them with planned strategies they'd have been minced very quickly.

Good fun overall though. I'd like to run a full campaign at some point where trying to build everything into a single session isn't an added pressure, but we just don't have the time as a group to get together routinely enough.