thread: 2008-03-31 : Conpulsion 2008 Story 4: Indie Shortcomings
On 2008-04-01, ffilz wrote:
Sean,
I think I would have to disagree. Two of the longest running campaigns (Blackmoor and Tekumel) were started by people who were not all that young, and obviously they are not young people in any sense of the word now.
It's true that many gamers settle on shorter campaigns once they get serious responsibilities, but I suspect many still prefer the longer campaigns.
For myself, one of the big draws of RPGs is the long running campaign. Sure, I've never made it longer than about two years, but I still like the promise. The other attraction to RPGs is role playing itself, but I think the initial draw WAS the campaign. In one sense, I think role playing actually makes the long campaign possible. Sure, folks were doing various kinds of war game campaigns, but eventually someone wins such a campaign, they just can't hold the same promise as a role playing campaign.
I also enjoy one shots and short sequences of sessions.
Question: how much do folks preferences for campaign length mesh with their preferences for fiction length? Some prefer short stories, others novellas, others single novels, while others really enjoy long running series. I definitely prefer the long running series (and as another mesh with gaming preferences, really enjoy series which happen in the same setting but may or may not be connected to each other - when pressed to pick a single favorite author, I have to go with C.J. Cherryh and the Alliance-Union/Chanur setting).
Frank
