Coming to the end of a campaign - what to do?

[Rob Lang]

My two year campaign is coming to a close. We could play another two years I imagine but I have a baby on the way and I won't feel like GMing when it arrives. So, I'm preparing for the end of my campaign.

Using waypoints
(and ) and am pretty sure that it is going to be a climax. Last campaign end, the players blew up the planet, so I can't do that again. I have some difficulty with my players because they refuse to be railroaded and are miserable if they are. Therefore, I have imagined 12 possible endings that I am ready for and have a series of waypoints so that I know when we're getting towards the last 6 session. They'll end up with their own ending but I'm determined to make the campaign end on a high.

Commemorative Handouts
I will be doing a and handing something out (my players might read this, so it's secret). and maybe a cheesey photo of the lads too. We'll probably go out to dinner the week after the last session to celebrate.

Anything else you recommend? Any pitfalls I should watch out for?

[Chainsaw Aardvark]

I've only made it to the end on one campaign, and it wasn't one I've GMed. I recall there being a bit of music (from End of Evangellion - extremely appropriate giving what our characters had sacrificed themselves to do) and a ending voice-over about people going on after the spectral apocalypse was averted. We discussed some of our facvorite moments, and how each of the players had changed over the four semesters we had played, and how actually acheiving a story arc would change our gaming priorities in the future.

That was what really changed for me. Thrughout Highschool, our Rifts sessions were just a bunch of unconeted missions strining along a band of adventures with little real purpose. Every Tuesday was a new game, once again starting in some office with a job offer. Characters came and went with no comment - just which of my half dozen sheets did I bring today. We would have been far better off with D&D and everchanging dungeos than what I GMed most of the time. Now I've got more focus on story arcs, but no group to run them with.

Well, the sum of this venting is that you should celbrate not just the end of the game, but that you began one and kept it together for so long, and told a story along the way. Think of all the great historical events that lasted less time than your game, and be amazed.

"I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me. "

[Rob Lang]

[Nicephorus]

[Rob Lang]

[Zzarchov]

[Chainsaw Aardvark]

[Rob Lang]

Those are both superb ideas. I can't beam forward as the campaigns sit in a contiguous over arching timeline. The things they see now will have affects in the future. I like the idea of a TV show. I think my players are happy for the unknown to occur to their characters. Not everything has to be neat and tied up. I think they enjoy the little bit of chaos they throw into the campaign.

I've begun planting my waypoints and I think they can all see what is going to happen next. It's not explicit, so I bet they're emailling each other about the things going on around them.

[Kinslayer]

It's a bit late, but I am a notorious Threadromancer...

As the end approaches, wrap up dangling plot threads. Ask the players what ones are still out there. Give them at least a session to think of others. On my last campaign ender, Session -4 was when I first asked, and Session -2 was devoted to the wrap-up. This gave me most of the penultimate session to devote to the big finale, with the final one mostly empty. The Big Bad was actually killed at the end of Session -1, but this wasn't revealed until the actual final session. A quick post-battle review followed that reveal, then the rest of our time was spent on the after-the-campaign stuff.

We discussed what we wanted the surviving characters to do afterwards. Some wanted to stay in the guild and continue their adventuring careers. Most opted for more of a retirement plan, even if they stayed in the guild. I did a sort of montage sequence with each character (or their legacies). It wasn't exactly a flash-forward, but showed what happened to each.

Something I consider very important--essential even, to playing Midian--is showing the effects of one campaign in later ones. Integrating campaigns has become an integral part of the Midian experience. Each player-character should have a lasting impact on the game world, if the setting is not to be discarded afterwards. One trick is to have the former pc's mythos be built up by way of rumour. They weren't just good, they were the best. They didn't just bump off a handful of goblins as part of a wandering monster encounter, they saved the entire barony from depredations by the Viscous Ooze tribe. Random Village #8213 wasn't just burned by a careless fireball; it was an act of terror by the most horrifying of archmagi. Instead of just having Melee (medium) IX, they were legendary swordsmen. Let your players know that their old pc's weren't just the miscreant band of violent hobos that we all know they really were. Instead, they have become mythical figures of legend, discussed in hushed and reverent voices.

There were some really good ideas in this thread. I'm going to have to bookmark it.

[kumakami]

Threadromancer? You try to make love to threads.....sir your need for love in forums may in fact be your down fall...