Re: Nerdist | Having Trouble Scheduling Your DUNGEONS & DRAGONS Games? Here?s the Solution

On Fri, 25 Apr 2025 07:29:06 +0200 (CEST), lkh <lkh@dwalin.uucp>
wrote:

kyonshi <gmkeros@gmail.com> wrote:

On 4/20/25 16:57, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

On Sun, 20 Apr 2025 14:15:27 +0200 (GMT+02:00), kyonshi
<gmkeros@gmail.com> wrote:
 

Source: https://nerdist.com/article/keep-your-dungeons-and-dragons-games-on-schedule/
>
>
Having Trouble Scheduling Your DUNGEONS & DRAGONS Games? Here?s
the Solution

 
The DM sets the time and that's that? Those are rules written by a
young person who has lots of time. Between kids, work, vacation,
doctors, etc., once you get to a certain age, those rules just CAN'T
work. You'd end up with a game where less than half the party shows
up, every time.
 
;-)
 
 

 
The whole text actually seems rather similar to the whole open table
idea that has been gaining traction in OSR circles lately (uh, the last
few decades) where you keep a dedicated slot for the game open and play
with whoever comes to join that day.
We've been running games in a very similar mode lately (with online
signups though, so not quite the same) and it works quite well. I have a
game that happens every Tuesday 8.15pm, and I just play with whoever
shows up.
 
It's a drastically different approach to playing games though, as there
really isn't a way to have any story or plot going where the players
take center stage. It might easily be that the character you planned to
do stuff with just doesn't show up for two sessions. That means plot, if
it is happening, is bound to the location instead of characters.
.

>
Well, open table with a fixed date is one thing. But If you go back to
the original post about westmarches [1] there was no fixed date.
Westmarches is based on the idea, that players interact in some way in
between sessions and then schedule a session as demand arises to further
their goals. In theory that's my favourite for a campaign game.
>
Does it work? Place your bets ...

It can. Years (and years and years and years and years) back, our
campaign sort of worked this way. We'd have the main session once a
week, then during the intervening period, the players would meet up to
plan, and I (the DM) would occassionally meet with players for
'mini-adventures' (that's what we called them), which would range from
letting me know what the players were up to, or planning out
logisitics for the next 'main adventure', or asking for clarification
on rules or setting, or even brief solo-adventures.

It worked because we were all young, full of energy, and lived and
worked in close proximity to one another (often at the same jobs). But
as soon as there started being some distance between us, it fell
apart... and this despite the fact we still routinely connected via
email and chat (which we tried to use to replace the ad-hoc nature of
our earlier meetings).