The Long-Term Campaign episode went live a month and half ago on The Classic Adventure Gaming Podcast. Gus invited us to share more about our Conquering the Barbarian Altanis campaign. This Monday we celebrated our 200th session.

Since the episode went live I have received a number of questions via Discord, email, and in-person. I have collected them all (as much as I could remember) below. Feel free to comment if you have additional questions. You can listen to the episode here and find my summary here.

The questions are sorted in order I received them.

Question

Do you have a marked up map of Barbarian Altanis showing your campaign's travels? Or more zoomed in maps of the sub regions?

Answer

Yes, of course. What I don't have is the historical evolution since I haven't been taking snapshots:

Note: don't study the above screenshot if you are playing in our campaign.

First 50 sessions were around Antil region (center left area). From then on, most of the action has been around the Hara region (centre south area). Adventurers fled Antil on a merchant vessel and disembarked in Hara.

Furthest north they went is up to the Eyestones Jungle; furthest south by the south south of the Ghinarian Hills (where they got smacked and enslaved). They just begun broaching over the hills north-west from their new base in Ironburg.

I wrote high level summary of sessions 50–120 and 120–180, but no maps since they contain a lot of Judge facing information.

Question

Excellent episode guys. Hats off to you Attronarch in particular. Stellar.

Some questions I have: Did a group of mover&shaker PCs establish? If yes, what character levels are they at? In what ways (generally or specifically) have the affected the greater setting?

Answer

Thank you!

With close to 200 sessions a lot has happened, exactly because of player characters interacting with the world. I've been publishing regular session reports, but it would be quite a feat to read them at once. I summarised most important events from sessions 50 to 180 in the following two posts: 50—120, 120—180.

Did a group of mover&shaker PCs establish?

Yes, several times. So far it has mostly resulted with them being shaken out and driven away. There is a lot of political instability in the Barbarian Altanis, civilisation is scarce, and wilderness is well, wild.

If yes, what character levels are they at?

Most recent “mover & shaker” PCs are:

• Gomm, a thief level 6, who established his own hideout in Ahyf, as well as a new, disguised persona of an old sage which he used to convince the Elders to follow his lead. Since Ahyf had been conquered by Wizard-King Racoba his current whereabouts are unknown.
• Dalkanarion, a fighter level 6. He made a name for himself as heroic and just warrior, slew a dragon, and was appointed the Castellan of Cedarwade Keep by the Red Queen. After returning from an expedition (which was Cauldron 2025 session) he was defeated and enslaved by the Bull God tribe. He was rescued with great effort from his fellow adventurers. Unfortunately, he found a Chaotic sentient sword, got dominated when he was weak, killed a fellow adventurer (a hobbit!), seized his ring of invisibility, and fled. His current whereabouts are unknown. (This is being resolved in private play-by-post, in essence 1:1 with player.)
• Ambros, a cleric level 7, was the most influential adventurer. Over several years he became the Patriarch General and Justice Supreme of Kingdom of Hara, and a loyal subject of the Red Queen. On one of the adventurers he had recovered the Golden Gavel of Justice, and became a High Priest of Forseti. This triggered “name level” forces to arrive, in essence his crusading army. Players used to conquer the Cedarwade Keep, pacify some of the area around Midway, and bring Hara back under control. When Dalkanarion was captured, Ambros made the hardest choice in his life. He left Hara, despite intelligence that Racoba is marching with great force, assembled a team of finest adventurers, and went to Ghinarian Hills. Dalkanarion was rescued, but Hara was lost. In the process adventurers lost their vault, reputation, and pride. A bit more:

Kingdom level:

The Indomitable Wizard-King Racoba has subdued eastern Altanis, having crushed the traitorous Red Queen and her incompetent forces. Suffering an embarrassing defeat, her armies fled in all cardinal directions. Racoba is currently exercising his megalomania and dreams of a City-State of his own to eventually challenge the World Emperor himself.

Adventurers grovel and plead at his feet, hiding like mice in a mining thorp at the northern border. The mightiest among them, former Patriarch General and Justice Supreme of Kingdom of Hara, and a loyal subject of the Red Queen, was subjected to painful humiliation ritual. Paladin of Justice carved the Traitor's Mark on his forehead; his life now rendered worthless; and was exiled from the kingdom.

Local level:

As if their humiliation was not sufficient, the newly appointed baron treats them like petulant children. He is trying to recruit the most promising among them and get rid of the rest. He is happy to point them in the direction of trouble he deems unworthy of his men.

But the baron is a former career mercenary and warlord, and is inexperienced with any meaningful governance. It remains to be seen if he delivers what the Wizard-King expects...

In what ways (generally or specifically) have the affected the greater setting?

In so many, and all the ways. At this stage, setting and characters are interwoven. Characters, through their interactions, keep generating encounters, sites, NPCs, etc. Read summary reports above to get an idea.

But perhaps one of the most interesting developments has been the Wizard-King Racoba himself. It is a character that absolutely all the players hate. They never met him. When they arrived to Hara for the first time, they were hired by then current castellan to break up a suspected spy ring. While searching through the undercity they found maps and evidence of foul play, plus Racoba's sigil. At that time Racoba was the Headmaster of Wizard's Guild. He fled, and has been persistent nuisance ever since. Adventurers, over the years, ignored all the bounties on his head, no matter how lucrative. Even when merchant families tried to contract them to hunt the wizard down, they opted not to get involved. But Wizards are megalomaniacs, and this Wizard returned with force, three years later.

And (still assuming) did at any point conflicts of interest between particular PCs arise, as far as influence on the world is concerned?

There have always been disagreement about what to do, which direction to take, whom to align with, but nothing that would split the party. We maintain strict no PVP rule so maybe that contributed. I ask players to discuss and commit together.

Question

Attronarch I read the post im genral above the current major movers before, are these the highest lvs or just the strongest of the current stable? Does the campaign shift geographic focus necessitating changes in stables? Are these the “next gen” of previous PCs?

Answer

Highest level; Ambros is strongest among the clerics, followed by Tam o' Shanter and Tarkus the Promising. Dalkanarion, Balarus, and Beorg the Gravedigger are among the strongest fighters. Ignaeus is the highest level magic-user, but is an elf.

I am not sure I understand the second question. Players choose where their characters go; they are the ones choosing geographic focus. After Hara fell and they lost their army they spent few sessions collecting PCs across the kingdom and getting them to Ironburg.

Nobody created any progeny, yet. Dalkanarion has been most interested in achieving that, got himself a wife and everything, but fate had different plans.

Question

Thanks for the answer and sorry for the confusion. I was confused that after 180 sessions the highest level was 7 so was wondering if it was because multiple people were in multiple parties/tpks/characters getting retired, etc

Answer

I think it is due to a combination of factors, but at its core it boils down to simple numbers stemming from open table. I don't have all the notes with me at the moment, but I would estimate that between 150 and 250 player characters have participated in the campaign so far. All of them took some XP. Most frequent players are also levelling up their whole stable, so XP disperses. Maybe I crunch all the numbers one day! But not today.

Question

I finally listened to the latest episode and it was great and fun to listen.

There was just one thing I’m interested in and it was probably mentioned but I missed it.

Attronarch what System do you run? I tried to find the answer on your website but on there you’ve listed OD&D/S&W, AD&D/OSRIC and B/X.

Do you use all of these? Did you start with one and it evolved into another? Do people use characters from whatever they like and you convert on the fly to match your world?

Like I said it was probably mentioned but I don’t know 😅

Answer

Sessions 1 thru 134 were B/X with Judges Guild house rules; sessions 135 and onwards are Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised with house rules. My plan was to begin with Basic for a year and then choose between OD&D and AD&D. I chose the former. Then I thought I would just take lbbs and a supplements and arrange them a bit so players can reference them easier. Two years later I had nothing except a ton of research notes so I decided to use Swords & Wizardry with house rules and work on the aforementioned for next couple of years.

Question

Cool. Thank you for the reply.

May I also ask why you chose S&W over AD&D? Is it because it’s more flexible due to less rules?

And it’s nice to hear that S&W is capable for this kind of campaign. It’s the only real OSR game that I own (the German translation of S&WC).

Answer

I chose OD&D over AD&D. I fell in love with it via early Wilderlands and Judges Guild material. That's all. Swords & Wizardry Complete Revised is a compromise until I finish what I had initially planned. (As an aside, when you collate all OD&D books and Strategic Review it is over 600 pages. There are a lot of rules in there.)

Question

I have another question.

How do you manage when all PCs at that particular session are in different places on your map and in different activities?

Do you jump back and forth or do you play with one group then the second group and so on till the session ends?

Answer

The first question is for the players to resolve, not myself. If they want to adventure together, and are so far apart, then they have play-by-post between the session to organise that.

It is rare that there are individual characters scattered around like that. They are usually in groups. When that happens, players that show up on any given session decide which group they play.

We play on discord. For each session I create a discord event for which players can sign up for. It is not mandatory, but is useful to signal who will be playing. On the day of the session I ping all the players and ask them what is the plan for tonight. This is more for them than me. Over the years I have been very consistent with my expectations—when we show up to play, you (players) have to have an answer to “what are you doing next.” If they don't, they get a ten minute timer. If they need more time they spend in game time (turns, days, weeks, depending on situation). They come ready.

Question

Awesome podcast, fellas. I really enjoyed it! There's a wealth of great, practical advice and reminders on running a solid game that I think extends beyond just online gaming. Really enjoyed it. Usually I listen to these a few times and this one will definitely be in the rotation, one of my favorites.

Couple questions... with a totally open table:

How do you handle it when a new player joins or an existing player misses, but you are in the middle of something and maybe there's not a seamless “entry path”? Just ignore it – the PC pops in/pops out? Practicality/gamism over “realism” ?

Also, what happens when new player joins or new PC joins (after a death) when everyone else is higher level? Still starts level one, but advances quickly if he can stay alive?

Answer

Thank you, we appreciate your kind words! I tried to focus on practices that worked for us, and which I think can be acted upon.

How do you handle it when a new player joins or an existing player misses, but you are in the middle of something and maybe there's not a seamless “entry path”? Just ignore it – the PC pops in/pops out? Practicality/gamism over “realism” ?

These are two different scenarios, with slightly different emphasis. If a new player is joining our campaign, then the goal is to throw them into action as quickly as possible. If they happen to join a session which resumes a previous expedition, then I decide the exact moment of introduction on a case by case basis.

Are we resuming during a combat round? If I believe it will conclude within 3 rounds, then new player will be rolling for monsters. More than 3 rounds, I work them in. Are we resuming during an underworld expedition? As long as it isn't some hyper-exotic alternative plane of existence or antediluvian place, we will work you in with a simple “What are you doing here?!”

When existing players cannot make a session, and there is a party that is one a expedition, then two things happen. If at least half of the players whose charterers are on the expedition are joining, then it can resume. Character whose players can't make it do not vanish, but are delegated to carrying light sources and similar. Their players designate another player for decision making. Any rolls that might result with their death are mine to roll.

If less than half can show up, that expedition cannot resume. Players have to pick another character they have and figure out what to do with them.

My operating principles could be summed up as shortest time to action, we will work you in, there is no vanishing out of danger. Risk, consequences, and all that.

So far no has attempted to “game” our system.

Also, what happens when new player joins or new PC joins (after a death) when everyone else is higher level? Still starts level one, but advances quickly if he can stay alive?

Every new player get to roll three characters with zero experience. They pick one and introduce them. Then they start playing.

Players can write in-character session reports. Each nets their character 300 XP. After they have written 20 session reports (or created drawings, memes, poems, whatever), all their new characters begin with 5000 XP.

Once a character has been introduced to the game, player can freely choose which one will go on an expedition, engage in downtime, etc. This is helpful for sessions when only two to four players show up. Then each player usually controls two of their characters, plus whatever retinue they have. This enables them to assail bigger dangers. It also backfired several times when they gathered big numbers, stormed a dungeon, and then had to divide experience into twenty shares... Decisions, risk, reward, consequences, and all that...

Yes, exactly. Old player from three months ago drops in, his PC is 300 miles away from the others. He uses a fresh level one PC maybe, that's popped into the main group?

We have that frequently. Some players travel the world for their work and can only play sporadically, or during specific months. I have locations of each character. When they show up, I look up how much in-game time has passed since they played last. Usually enough time to judge they would have been able to travel to where ever action is right now. It hasn't really been an issue so far; we were always able to work out something that has satisfactory verisimilitude.

Question

Hello Attronarch,

I just listened to the CAG podcast's episode on your open-table sandbox campaign! Fascinating!

I am preparing to run an (in-person) open table campaign, so it is really useful to listen to your advice and your players' feedback.

Could you please expand on something that you touched upon towards the end of the episode)? Unfortunately I can't join the campaign to learn by experiencing it (its time conflicts with my work schedule). I would love if you could address it via Discord on or a blog post.

What I am referring to is how you handle continuity/discontinuity between sessions/parties.

The conventional view—or at least the “Alexandrian view”—is that an open table session needs to start in town and end in town—and, if PCs don't, a “table of doom is” used. I haven't tried it, but, I was getting ready to do it... So I was very interested when I hear your take on this, which goes against the conventional view.

Paraphrasing, I think you said the following (I'll be adding some specific questions along the way, and then add some more). For the purposes of this summary, I'll refer to “party XN” as the party (group of players/PC) that exist on a specific session. You said:

(a) Don't force each party to end the session back in town; the session can end in an adventuring location, e.g., deep in the dungeon.

(b) Let's say party A1 ended the last session deep in the dungeon. Next session, if half of the players with PCs in party A1 show up to play the game resumes on the same adventuring location with, e.g., same room of the dungeon; we could call this party A2.

Question 1: how do you handle, narratively, the absence of some PCs of party A1 in the location? (This question assume not every player of party A1 showed up on the next session.)?

Question 2: relatedly, how do you handle, narratively, the presence of PCs of party A2 who were not in party A1?

© A corollary: if less than half of the players of party A1 show up on the next session, then the session focuses on a different location/party (let's call it party B1). I imagine this could be another party that was exploring that location (so its more of a case of party B2).

Question 3 & 4: same questions about verisimilitude mentioned above, related to absence/presence of PCs.

More questions, and perhaps more important questions:

Q5: Did I get it right?

Q6: Could a party C explore the same adventuring location that is being explored by party A?

Q8: More generally, how do you handle the interaction of parties, and their potential impact on the world, when those parties may be operating in different times?

Q9: How do you keep track of who is doing what and when, and interactions between what they do?

Q10: what are other procedures, decision-making processes and resources that you use for this “many parties in many places” approach?

I know it's a lot of questions! Maybe if you explain more your approach many questions will be answered at once! Also, if you have already explained your approach, please point me towards the relevant message/resource where you did—you must be already quite busy running the campaign! Thanks!

And later, an addition.

A related question: how do you allocate XP? When an expedition has ended and the treasure has been taken out? At the end of the session, regardless of where PCs are? And who gets it? PCs whose players are present only?

Answer

Thank you for your kind words. I am happy to hear you found the episode inspiring. I have answered some of the questions above so I will not repeat them at length. Before doing so, I wish to stress that handling “continuity/discontinuity between sessions/parties” is less onerous and disruptive in play than it might seem at first. So, in order.

Q1: I handle this on a case by cases basis. How did the previous session end? How are we beginning the session? Would it be plausible for the player character to leave the dungeon and reach a safe place (a guarded camp, a hidden chamber, a settlement, etc.)? If the answer is no, then the player character does not simply vanish, nor do they “fade to black.” They are still present but delegated to holding light, offering support, and similar. If we ended in a dangerous situation, and the player can't make it, then they nominate another player to take care of their character.

Q2: Likewise, on a case by case basis. I consider the player character, the situation, and the location. Would it be possible for them to simply walk in and join? Is the site expansive enough that they could be just around the corner? We meet weekly for three hours to play, surely we can suspend our disbelief enough to figure out a way to introduce new player character. Over the years we have everything from poof here is a dwarf to divine interventions and simple around the corner they come. All of them worked because they were ground in the current situation.

Q3 & Q4: Same answers as above. Consider the conditions: where are these characters? What are they doing? In practice, treat it as any other expedition, because that is exactly what they are. Thus, answers are the same.

Q5: So far, so good!

Q6: My default answer is no, unless special conditions are met. If it is a sprawling locale (think megadungeon with multiple entrances), then I might allow it. Once an adventuring party enters a locale I am not interested in bringing more different parties at the same time. That is too fragile regarding time coordination. Exceptions are for example if Party A is captured or defeated, and Party C is rushing in to save them. We had that several times during our campaign and it worked fine. For example, when Dalkanarion and others were captured they crawled the deep tunnels, while the rescue party advanced overland, and then crawled other portion of the caves. They eventually reunited, rejoining the parties.

Q7: I don't see question seven, let me know if I accidentally overlooked it.

Q8: Assuming you are asking about play parties, I don't handle their interaction in any particular manner. Those are player characters, they interact with each other as they (i.e. their players) wish. I merely keep track of where and when the characters are. Players do too; I help them if they lose track of time.

Q9: Over the years I have developed a session tracker. I started with pen and paper, then reusable PDF templates (still pen and paper but less prep), and am nowadays using a spreadsheet with those same templates. It consists of four elements:

• Session dashboard. Session number, real-world date, in-game date, for each character: player name, character name, race, class, alignment, armour class, notes (special abilities, memorised spells, etc.), monsters encountered and overcome, treasure recovered, judge's notes.
• Day tracker. Session number, real-world date, in-game date, season, watches, turns, turn notes, day notes, compass. Makes it trivial to mark any unit of time, note anything of significance, and track resources.
• Combat tracker. Session number, real-world date, in-game date,, rounds, round notes, party notes, monsters and monster notes. Goes to 60, i.e. 6 turns or a full hour.
• Calendar. In-game calendar with months, days, and seasons. I mark the first and last day played during the session.

All of these fit a single A4 paper, so I have overview at glance. I might write a longer post on keeping time records in a practical manner. Perhaps later this year. These allow me to quickly get up to speed, calculate experience, check who is who, and who did what, so on and so forth. I use them when writing the session reports too.

Q10: The single most important thing a Judge can do is knowing who is where and when. That is it. When they know that, then they can easily summarise the situation and available options.

Also, I feel it is important to stress that the goal isn't to have “many parties in many places” but that it is something that happens due to open-table and sandbox approach. Thus, the Judge has to be comfortable with it, but should not necessarily strive for it.

As I said on the podcast, a valid reason for that is ending a session while an expedition is ongoing because the party is dealing with a large dungeon, locale, or site. An invalid reason is getting bored, distracted, or whatever, and attempting to start seven parallel expeditions at once. If that is happening, then something is amiss.

I continuously ask players about their plans, goals, intentions, ambitions, and similar. I ask them to discuss them with each other between the sessions, during the sessions, in different ways and scales (e.g. “what are we doing today” versus “what do we want to accomplish over the next three months”). Frankly, I do not care so much about their answers, for they can change their mind at moment's notice. No, the valuable part is them articulating aforementioned to each other, developing alignment, and shared agenda.

After all, they are playing together. Why then would they want to be separated most of the time?

BQ: I allocate treasure and monster experience after the expedition has concluded and adventurers have returned to a safe haven. I go through the session trackers, make a list of all the player characters that have participated, tally up sessions they played in, and then reward shares accordingly. Here is a multi-session expedition example:

SESSIONS 193, 194 & 195 EXPERIENCE

Total experience earned:

5 260 XP.

Eligible characters (number of shares):

• Ainsley (3)
• Ambros (2)
• Aurella (1)
• Balarus (3)
• Hedwig of Hogwarts (1)
• Ivor (3)
• Tam (3)
• Tarkus the Promising (2)
• Thorinda Bung (3)
• Volkard (2)
• Wilbalt (1)

Total number of shares = 24.

XP per share = 219 XP if 5% XP bonus = 230 XP if 10% XP bonus = 241 XP if 15% XP bonus = 252 XP

Reminder that multi-classed characters gain no bonus to earned experience.

No treasure recovered.

The player looks for their character, and then simply multiplies the XP per share with their number of shares. That's it.

More questions?

If you have a question of your own drop it in the comments below or via email. I will answer, but might take some time to do so.

Fight on!

#Resource #Podcast #Reflection

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rootring
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In December 2025 I sat down with Gus of The Classic Adventure Gaming Podcast to discuss our ongoing campaign Conquering the Barbarian Altanis. I was joined by four players: JP, never_plays_elves, SleazyB, and Dreadlord. We have been playing weekly since March 2022, and at the time of recording we were around 150 sessions in.

Over the years I have shared some of our experience (see Resources at the end of the post), but this was the first time I did so on a podcast. It was a lot of fun, especially since Gus was such a great host. The “panel” format with players, I think, worked well.

Since the episode is nearly two hours long, I will attempt to summarise the key points. In essence, we focus on what has and hasn't worked for us to establish, and maintain, a long running open-table sandbox campaign. The discussion is mostly centred on various techniques, strategies, mindset, and community dynamics that, we believe, contribute to the longevity of our campaign.

Some of the principles we discuss are:

• Consistent scheduling. The major enemy of working adults. We do fixed weekly slot (Mondays, 3 hours), I am always present. This builds habit, reliability, and player trust; players plan around the game.
• Open table. Multiple characters per player, anyone can join or leave. Builds resilience, accommodates real-life constraints, filters for committed players.
• A living, evolving world. I maintain strict time records, and session reports; the world evolves without players, it shapes them and is shaped by them. This creates a persistent world, makes catch-up possible, and allows for emergent situations that are not divorced from the in-game reality.
• Consequences and stakes. Characters have ultimate agency to do as they please, but freedom to act is not freedom from consequences. Lethality must be fair, and treasure must be plentiful. This helps create real stakes, rewards skill, and balances danger with opportunity.
• Minimal prep. Wilderlands setting inspires me; I use random tables, and develop elements (characters, sites, etc.) iteratively. This reduces prep burden, allows flexibility, and leads to surprising and memorable situations.
• Rules as a robust framework. I continuously study OD&D, AD&D and other old-school sources to develop deep understanding of the rules. This provides a consistent, fair, and robust framework that handles any situation.
• Community. I set clear expectations, and we do our best to maintain consistent tone, and friendly atmosphere. This creates an environment where invested players self-select. We are responsible for our shared experience and enjoyment.

We discuss a whole lot more. We did our best to share practical and actionable insight. You let us know how we did. :)

You can listen to the episode on Anchor, Spotify, Apple Play, or using the player below:

Regarding the resources I mentioned above, previously I had shared our experience in the following blog posts and essays:

• 21 Lessons learned after running 100 sessions (blog post)
• On Character Death and Long-Term Play (blog post)
• 21 Lessons Learned After 100 Sessions (essay in Fight On! #16)
• 7 Contrarian Practices for Running Online Games (essay in Fight On! #17)

We hope you find our experience helpful and inspiring to start, or improve, a sandbox game of your own. Don't hesitate to reach out if you have any questions.

Fight on!

#Resource #Podcast #Reflection

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rootring
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This July we celebrated the 100th session of Conquering the Barbarian Altanis campaign. Our first session was on March 8, 2022. Time flies! Below are my reflections and answers to some questions I have received about running the campaign.

Background

Our campaign is located in the Wilderlands Barbarian Altanis. We play weekly (Tuesdays evening) for three hours, online, using Discord and Owlbear Rodeo. Between the sessions we sometimes engage in play-by-post, especially for downtime activities. That way we can really focus on action in every session.

Each player makes three characters when they join the game. They pick one they begin with and start playing. They can activate another character in case the first one dies, or gets stuck somewhere (e.g. in another dungeon delve we are not continuing because more than half of the players aren't present).

I've allowed anyone interested to join us and try out our game. Since we've begun there have been dozens of players that came and went, with around twenty sticking around. Roughly a quarter of those are active non-stop, another quarter is active but joins live sessions a bit rarer, and remainder joins whenever life allows.

Our campaign is very open ended, with a lot of freedom for the players. This also puts onus on them to decide what to do, what do prioritise, and how to organise themselves. Over time this has led to players controlling multiple characters, embarking on concurrent expeditions, racing against time, causing and fixing trouble in the land, and so on.

In other words—we are playing an open ended sandbox where the world is alive and is actively shaping and being shaped by the players.

Lessons Learned

1. Don't take it personally. People come and go. Life happens. Miscommunication happen as well. When somebody leaves the game without notice or stops playing I don't dwell on it.
2. Be consistent and predictable. Game is on Tuesdays evening. Game happens as long as someone signs up. Game event is put up three days ahead, and player roll call is broadcast the day before. Game happens every week. If there is change of days, that is communicated a week before.
3. Clear boundaries. I have only two hard rules that would make me act immediately: no player-versus-player behaviour and no sexual violence. I repeat these two rules to each new player. I state them in a direct, no chance to misunderstand, manner.
4. Keep a furious pace. We are playing for 180 minutes. That isn't much time. There are no breaks. “What are you doing next?” is my most common question. For longer discussion I activate a ten-minute timer that is visible to all players.
5. Keep interferences to a minimum. I do my best to ensure players need as little as possible to play. Currently they only need internet browser with three open tabs: Discord for voice chat and dice rolling, Owlbear Rodeo for simple VTT map, and Google Slides for their character sheets. I don't want them to waste time wrestling with tools.
6. Keep the game running and review rules after. If I can't look something up within 180 seconds, and it is not a life or death situation, then I'll make a ruling and tell players that I'll look up the exact rule or numbers after the game.
7. Don't correct. If I make a mistake while running a module or something I've written down, I do not retcon it. The “mistake” becomes canon and I work it in. One such “mistake” led to fifty memorable game sessions.
8. Be generous. My default stance is to rule in players' favour when uncertain or if I made a procedural error. For example, if I forgot to ask for declarations and one of the PCs was supposed to cast a spell, I will allow it. After all, it is me who made the error. There will always be another chance for that PC to die, no matter how generous I am.
9. Don't be afraid of exceptional PCs. Scroll with powerful spells? Magic weapons with strong bonuses and abilities? Large treasure cache that would allow everyone to level up? Gasp! Who cares! Let them have it! The stronger they are, the more fun we can have! Players always find novel ways to kill their characters anyway.
10. Fun isn't always right. Long-running open-ended sandboxes require some logistics and politicking and serious intelligence gathering. Sometimes a winding down session is welcome after a series of mentally intensive sessions. A “boring” session every two dozen sessions is a welcome respite that also allows players to realign regarding their goals.
11. Take great notes. I have created three templates that I use every session: day tracker, combat tracker, and session tracker. I take notes on every character, combat, and in-game day. I maintain in-game calendar. At any moment I know where and when each and every character is. That is critical for running an open-world sandbox with multiple player characters adventuring at the same time.
12. Do the math. After every session I list recovered treasure, earned experience (in bulk, as not to reveal how much XP each individual treasure or monster is equal, which is sometimes useful), and distribution of experience (what character are eligible for experience and what is their share). I also write out how much XP is each share worth, including bonuses. Since I take great notes this takes me less than five minutes and preemptively solves many questions. Players just need to find their character, share, and update experience.
13. Don't overprepare. I have an inexpensive egg timer. My partner hates its ticking sound. So I use a watch instead. 30 minutes for a session. That's how much I give myself. If I do something more than ten times, then I either automate it with a spreadsheet or script, or create a reusable template.
14. Do the bare minimum. I prepare everything in iterations. Published material is organised so I can easily access it, while everything else has just the essential ready. For example, if players suddenly decide to take a turn into some settlement, then I'll play with nothing but one to two sentence description and procedural charts in my Judge binder. If they remain in the settlement for longer than one session, then I will sketch it. If they stay longer, I'll flesh it out a bit more. Same goes for dungeons and wilderness locales. First they are rumours, then they are entrances with areas around them, then they are fleshed out.
15. Everything beyond the bare minimum should be a reward in itself. If I decide to spend more time on something it is because I want to, and have no expectation players will do anything with it. Creating a dungeon or locale, researching rules and procedures, polishing house rules... I do them because I find them fun, and might use them in game, but without any plan or expectation to force them on the players.
16. Prune the Judge binder regularly. Every quarter I go through my Judge binder and move sheets around. Those that get used during the game go up front. Those that get used during prep go to the back, separated by a coloured divider. Those that don't get used get removed.
17. Convene community. Since we are all on the same Discord server, the discussion is always flowing. We have a generic “lobby” channel where we discuss many non-game related topics. There are players from all walks of life so there is always something new to learn from each other. Memes and jokes are shared, new products and crowdfunding campaigns recommended so we all get a bit poorer, ideas are traded and critiqued, and so on and so forth. Everyone participates, regardless of how often they play.
18. Create a space that encourages mutual support and reflection. Many players mean many different personalities and play styles. Of course, those that remains are relatively similar, but that doesn't mean there is no room for improvement. I often use plurals and ask players to think “we” and “our,” especially when discussing their next steps.
19. Facilitate players outside of the game. Love for specific type of gameplay is what brought us together. It is fair to assume there might be more mutual interests. If someone wants to run a one-shot with different rules or their own game, or recruit people for a game they are starting, or needs help with something they are working on, or anything else, I do my best to connect them together.
20. Public praise, private punishment. I do my best to congratulate and reward good play, thinking, and cooperation with a kind word and explicit praise in front of everyone. If somebody is misbehaving, then I have a one to one conversation with them. Public shaming is for military and prisons, not games.
21. Don't absolve responsibility. At the end of the day I am the person responsible for our game and community. That isn't something that can or should be delegated.

Questions & Answers

I've received some additional questions about our campaign and my style that aren't covered with above lessons. I'm including these questions and my answers below.

If you have a question of your own feel free to email me or share it in the comment below, and I'll reply when I have time.

Question

How to handle dropping players into a sandbox game without them feeling lost, overwhelmed with so much potential choice that it feels like no choice at all, or lacking direction; and about how to encourage them to seek out adventure hooks and pursue their own goals. I wasn't there for the first session of Barbarian Altanis, but I'd love to hear about how you set up that first session, and how you prepared prior to the beginning of the game. Did you begin by giving the players a clear quest to go on? Did you give them a limited number of hooks from which they could choose? Or something else entirely?

Answer

Preparation: I read the Wilderlands material and picked region I liked the most, Barbarian Altanis.

Session 0: I introduced Wilderlands, Barbarian Altanis, type of game I will run (open-ended, player driven, no PvP, no sexual violence). Then I asked players to pick a starting point. They choose Kestizar.

Session 1: we begun playing. I read hexes around Kestizar and placed some dungeons within 25 mile radius. I collated hooks and gave them out randomly during the sessions. I mixed that with random tables. There was no clear quest; purely player driven.

Reflection: in retrospect I think some of the players were a bit confused and/or lost. It took several sessions before they committed to a specific hook. Few of them led to very violent outcomes with few survivors. Our first year was a bit mudcore, to an extent because of player choices (since I never intended it to be as I placed plenty of treasure and magic items, but refused to railroad you to them). There were multiple (!) occasions where they'd give up right before hitting a big pile of treasure. But then the hydra lair changed everything. ;)

Question

Advice that worked or didn't work for you. Resources that you found useful—what books did you keep on hand during sessions and/or prep, sort of thing? Is there a book/resource that isn't made that you would have loved to have used?

Answer

Honestly, I did not seek advice beyond the rulebooks. First I spent a year or so reading B/X, then BECMI, and then Rules Cyclopedia. Then I read AD&D 1e DMG and PHB. In parallel, I spent a lot of time understanding TSR's catalogue, editions, publications, how they tie in together, what is their focus, and what are the differences. I don't remember why, but I decided to try out B/X and RC/BECMI, so I found a game of each and begun playing. I want to see the rules in action. From that experience I decided to run B/X first, so I master it and then in the future potentially upgrade into a more advanced system. After all, that was TSR's promise!

When I was exploring TSR's catalogue their main settings did not grab me. Mystara was fine, but not captivating. I liked Dark Sun, but wanted something closer to regular fantasy or sword & sorcery. Thunder Rift was cool, but felt too constrained. Then somehow, and I don't even remember when or how, I stumbled upon Wilderlands of High Fantasy. It blew my mind. It was fucking awesome.

CITY STATE OF THE INVINCIBLE OVERLORD.

BARBARIAN ALTANIS.

CITY STATE OF THE WORLD EMPEROR.

Hex one-liners with crazy hooks. Vast, but not too big. Populated, but not too dense. Ready for adventure as is, but easily expanded and filled out with anything. Setting that can take abuse. Setting that can be improvised with. I like the content, I liked the aesthetics, and I liked the ethos. That was the time I took a deep dive into Judges Guild and their catalogue.

Having picked the ruleset and setting, my next step was to get all the core books. By now I have acquired most of the TSR catalogue, so I begun hunting down Wilderlands publications. After studying the four booklets and Necromancer Games boxset, I felt like I was ready to run a life long campaign. My next step was to pick an area. I've selected because (1) I liked it so fucking much, and (2) it was in the middle of everything. My next step was to read up on adventures and shortlist a dozen or so I want to run.

I spent time making a list of best rated modules (usually starting with tenfootpole.org), and then I'd seek more reviews of publications I liked. If I was still hooked, then I'd buy and skim them. If I still liked them, on the list they would go. When the players selected their starting point on the map, I looked for few low level modules and placed them in the region.

Following all that, I made a binder with key notes on Barbarian Altanis, list of modules, empty papers for additional notes, and print outs of modules the players would be most likely to visit. Then I made another binder, the Judge binder, where I put all the procedures I use during play, including those for random procedural generation. I'm confident enough to improvise anything, but still like using good tables.

Bar none, my most references book is Ready Ref Sheets by Judges Guild. It is amazing. Some of the procedures are bad. Most are great. But the flavour is inimitable. Besides those, I frequently reference d30 DM Companion and d30 Sandbox Companion. Heck, I got d30s just because of them. I do have a collection of other tables as well, mostly from AD&D 1e and Arduin.

I don't feel like I need another book in life. With above two binders I could run a game until I die. That of course does not mean I am not acquiring more books... What can I say, I like reading stuff old and new.

Question

Did you find your preparation methods shifted, and how? and was that change from your own developing skill, or because of the length of the game? Is there anything you learned or did that you wish you'd known or done before you started, or that you wish you had done earlier in the campaign?

Answer

Over time I shortened my preparation even more, but the methods are still the same. Or at least I think they are.

Once I made a four-level tower with adjacent camp and underground dungeon with cave complex. I made it because players were dead-set on marching on it to fight barbarians there. Then, after mustering a mercenary army they decide to go somewhere else instead. I do not regret making it, but it was a good signal to maintain my usual iterative approach to developing points of interest.

Question

You've run a long open table. What are the stats on your player pool? Did trends emerge for how players played in an open table format? What sort of players should GMs of open tables look to recruit? What sort of “player stable management” did you do?

Answer

Yeah, it's been going more than two and half years now. I've been maintaining a public character roster that includes characters from all players that are still playing.

When a player leaves, I delete their character from the “Alive” list, but keep them in the other lists. In other words, I haven't been tracking exact number of how many people came and left. There was a good number that was curious to learn more about our play style, who would come play a few sessions and then leave. There were some that would join and then leave.

There are currently 21 players with 34 characters. There are more, but some of the are uncertain, so I don't want to spoil anything. Let's just say that at least two have been playing in a months long play-by-post session that still hasn't come to an end.

Regarding recruiting, I basically try to recruit more people that are like people I'm playing with right now. As I wrote elsewhere, I strongly believe that good games are to be had with good players, hence I care more about attitude than skill or years of gaming experience. The only foolproof way to test compatibility is to play a session together.

For player character “stables” I did not use anything special. Make a character sheet for each character and keep track of them. That's it.

Question

How was it putting session reports in A&E?

Answer

It is fun! It took me some time to get use to the format, and contributors publishing their reaction and comments to previous issue in the next issue. Like commenting on blogs, but with longer delay and more in depth commentary. Collating reports for A&E is another chance at proofreading, and I often cringe at mistakes I catch. Another thing I used to do much more, but haven't done a lot of it in my latest submission, is including art. Initially I'd hunt for stock images, play with Midjourney to generate something usable, and try to fill in the gaps with art. Now I just use a little bit of abstract art and maybe one or two stock illustrations. My plan is to keep publishing the reports in A&E as long as the game keeps on going and zine keeps coming out. A fun side bonus is getting fan mail from strangers.

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