Voting on upcoming campaigns

[RyanW]

Just to get a feel of interest levels, I gave a list of campaign ideas I'd be interested in running (pretty much just genres, not any kind of synopsis at this point) to my players and asked for their input. The way I did it was to ask for a check (or x) by any they were (or weren't) particularly interested in, doubled if they felt strongly. No ranking or limited number of points to give.

If there wasn't one that had universal support, I'd speak with the holdouts of the closest ones to see if there was an option that would address their concerns. Fortunately, I had two options that everyone was positive on, so we discussed those a bit to settle on just one (in our case, cyberpunk).

NB: We are a small group of close friends that can only reliably get together maybe three days a month. I pretty much considered a double x to be a veto, because cutting someone out of game night would be unacceptable. If I was running the same straw poll off a bulletin board in a game store backroom, I'd be judging very differently.

[ericthered]

I hold a vote before most of my campaigns. I stick out a blurb, and then My players get to rank order the campaigns. After that I generally just choose which one we do, but with preference for the games with broad support.



And yeah, if its the same folks every time, people are allowed to veto if they feel strongly about something.

[whswhs]

My votes work out differently, because I normally have enough players for at least two campaigns. So I use their preferences to sort them out into groups. A campaign that one player rejects outright may still be appealing to a sufficient number of other players. The trick is to make sure that no player rejects both (all) of the campaigns I end up with.

That has a couple of advantages. It lets me work with a bigger player population, and it lets me mix and match players, so each cycle has groups with different chemistry, even if it's the same player population (which in fact hardly ever happens; in my current cycle, for example, I have one new player from the San Diego group, out of nine—though her husband has played in a few of my previous campaigns). An occasional third advantage is that I can bring in a guest star from one campaign to play an important NPC in another campaign.

On the other hand, it means that I either have to space my games out (which in fact I do, with each campaign on a once a month cycle) or run two games a week with different groups.

[sir_pudding]

I used to do this, but I found it often produced games that fizzled anyway, so it was more trouble than it was worth.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

I used to do this, but I found it often produced games that fizzled anyway, so it was more trouble than it was worth.

That happened the first time I handed out a prospectus, but it hasn't been an issue since then. Not that my campaigns have all been equally good, but a lot of them have gone quite well.

I wonder if there's a difference in our methods, or in our player populations, or if it's just luck (good or ill)?

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I wonder if there's a difference in our methods, or in our player populations, or if it's just luck (good or ill)?

I largely copied your methods. A lot of it was scheduling, and maybe being too ambitious about how many people actually would commit reliably. One of the things I intend to do with my next campaign is structure it in such a way that I can still run it with absent players.

Also rather than two campaigns with different groups, this time I'm experimenting with running two groups in the same campaign, with indirect interaction between them.

[Varyon]

I can certainly see a voting system working for some groups. Personally, I have a bad habit of losing motivation quickly, so I don't think I'd be able to keep with running a game setup this way - rather than coming up with a few genres, my own inclination would be to come up with the basics of a single campaign itself, then describe it to my potential players to see if they're interested; if some aren't, find out if there are changes that would make them interested; if still not, I'd either exclude those players from the campaign (if I had enough interested parties to go forward without them, and doing so wouldn't cause issues) or go back to the drawing board. After that, I'd probably have them come up with basic outlines for their characters; if there are characters who don't fit into the party (say it's a military-themed space opera campaign and most of the characters are infantry and someone decides to have a dedicated pilot like [i]Mass Effect[i]'s Joker) I'd either have them change the character to fit better (so a skilled pilot who can also serve as infantry) or modify the campaign in some fashion so they'll work (maybe the Joker-expy teleoperates a combat drone); I'd do the same if someone creates a character who doesn't quite match the campaign setting (say there's no sapient AI in the setting and someone wants to play as a robot; I might have them instead be a full-body cyborg, an experimental mind emulation, a secret prototype AI that seems sapient, or similar).

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Varyon

Personally, I have a bad habit of losing motivation quickly, so I don't think I'd be able to keep with running a game setup this way - rather than coming up with a few genres, my own inclination would be to come up with the basics of a single campaign itself, then describe it to my potential players to see if they're interested

To be clear, I don't present my players with Genres: I present them with the basics of a campaign. I don't say "something space opera involving epic psi users and a quest". I say:

2) Called from Exile
The Seer of the Imperial Nebula has, as traditional, predicted three possible successors to his powers, and with it nominal rulership of the Delphian Empire. One of the names is shocking: an exiled claimant to a rival empire's throne. The journey to find the claimant will not be easy, and interference from the ruling factions of two different empires is likely.
Characters are members of the delegation to inform the possible successor, and may be inspired by all sorts of science fiction. Psionics is key to the story.
250 points plus social, cinimatic, or psionic advantages. fairly safetech TL10^ with diverse tech paradigms available.

In addition to what's in the blurb, I have the basics of the setting sketched out. about 8 planets were visited in this game, and a the time of voting I had 6 of them sketched out, as well as the FTL system and why the players needed to visit each world.

This works because I just sort of generate campaigns in my spare time, and work them up to that point. Its fun. At least for me. I actually do loose interest in long campaigns, and tend not to work on a campaign nearly as much once we start playing.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I wonder if there's a difference in our methods, or in our player populations, or if it's just luck (good or ill)?

I know that with my current group there are not enough members interested in online discussion. A majority just barely responds to reminders of the next session from our Facebook group.

We have to decide these sorts of questions in person in a more informal process. We also have multiple GMs and usually change GMs when we change campaigns. Potential GMs suggest genre, system (and usually published adventure) until something sticks to the wall.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

I know that with my current group there are not enough members interested in online discussion. A majority just barely responds to reminders of the next session from our Facebook group.

Back when we all lived in San Diego I used to hand out hard copy. I wasn't looking for discussion so much as for numerical ratings, which required less back and forth.