i need a little help with campaign scale, please? i have a bunch of good ideas, but im worried that the campaign will be waaay longer than planned. do you have any advice on planning a campaigns length, aka what at levels the characters start and end? how many levels do you think one could get done in a standard school year?
This is a very tricky question since every person who runs a campaign is going to have an entirely different pace when it comes to story/campaign progress and leveling. My campaign lasted two years (roughly) and I started players off at 1st Level and ended somewhere around 14th Level I think? I boosted my players up a few levels toward the end so we could unlock some pretty cool abilities and prepare for our final battle. So let's look at what you can do to help keep your campaign on track!
I started doing this after listening to The Adventure Zone because I thought it felt kinda cool, but I realized it's actually a super useful tool for running a campaign! Each arc should have a roughly sketched out beginning and end. The villain attacks the city and bumps into the party before taking one of their friends captive! The villain escapes and hides away in a flying castle that hovers over the mountains to the north. Your players will spend this arc fighting toward their goal and eventually overcome the villain or perhaps fail? As your players begin this arc and make their way through you can determine how quickly they go through the story itself, which will be helpful for later arcs.In addition to that, while they are going through the current arc you can foreshadow the plot for next one! However players can do unexpected things, perhaps the next arc will change entirely when they take control of the flying castle themselves and suddenly have greater access to the rest of the world? Don't be afraid to be flexible and have the ending change entirely! As long as they reach some sort of ending the next one will be waiting.And since you are running in a specific time frame, the arc system is very helpful to know how long you have before the end. You're only 3 out of 6 arcs done? Cut some ideas, combine them! Rework your ending. Speaking of which...
2. Have a Rough Idea of Your Ending
This kind of goes hand in hand with the arcs idea, but this covers the ENTIRE campaign. Each arc should be quietly leading up to an overarching plot that ends with the finale! The final confrontation with the evil Queen who has been building her army to counter the party after they betrayed her because she was not a virtuous Monarch, but a ruthless Tyrant. Giving yourself a rough idea for how you want the campaign to end is important. I didn't know how long my campaign would last when I started it, but I knew where I wanted the story to go eventually. And after running for three semesters of school I realized I had roughly 4-5 months left before the campaign needed to be wrapped up. At this point I began gearing toward a finale and managed to achieve a really successful and satisfying ending. After running for a few months you should get an idea of how often you play and how quickly the party goes through the story.
3. What If I Don't Care about Narrative?
Now, I'm going to assume your question is gearing for a narrative campaign but that may not be exactly what you are looking for! If you're looking to do a more sandbox world and just letting your players explore the world and discover their own arcs and adventures I'd say you probably won't run into any problems with trying to end it in a year. Still in line with what I've said above, as long as you let everything build up to a definitive ending and give you and your players time to play til it's over just do your thing and everything will work out.
4. How Often You Meet Makes a Big Difference
Your group is supposed to meet once a week but suddenly Person A and Person B have missed a session or two and you've had to cancel for twice in a row. This can be a big problem if it happens too often. Keep this in mind when planning out your campaign as people miss decently often. But don’t be too worried if you miss a session or two or don't meet a specific in game deadline because the players are progressing slower than you'd like.
To focus in on specifically leveling up and how to pace that out I don't have an exact science. In a year I’d guess maybe 8-10 levels? Again, not too sure but here are some ideas on how to do your leveling:
You can keep track of experience points and level them up mechanically and to the book! It's a bit of math but it's straightforward and simple.
You could set a goal for what level you want them to be at when the campaign ends. If your goal is 10th Level, you could probably start your players at 1st Level and have them gain a level up roughly every 2-3 sessions (except early on, I'd recommend leveling them up a little more quickly of course!)
Now if you want your players to end on Level 20, that's a whole other deal. I personally wouldn't recommend starting at Level 1. Perhaps start them off at higher levels. 6 or perhaps even 10? Depends on how much you want them to advance.
My personal method is just to sort of... Level up when it seems right? There's nothing to it besides gut feeling and rewards for big accomplishments/fights. I also generally don't like to level up my players too fast so they can get accustomed to their current skills before upgrading to new ones. Too many too fast can be overwhelming for new players leading them to not really understanding their characters mechanically. It also helps me understand how tough they are and what I can throw at them.
I hope these ideas are helpful! Not everything here needs to be adhered to exactly, just as long as you find your method and rhythm I'm sure things will work out great! Take your time and don't be afraid to slow down or you may make silly mistakes like me. And make sure to focus your campaign on fun before all else and I'm sure you'll be amazing!
