Need Campaign Advice for a Newbie DM

[PotentiaLeaena]

I could use some advice. After our last campaign died out, the DM of our group came to me and asked if I'd like to maybe take over the current campaign or start a new one. I'd be wanting to take the DM chair for a while, so after giving it some thought, I said I'd love to.

So I've been working on the campaign setting for the last couple weeks, and I'm just wrapping up fleshing out the major trade city my PCs will be starting in, and I have a dilemma. The campaign I was writing to go along with this setting, after taking a closer look at my outline, could take well over a year by PbP standards. The group is relatively new to D&D, minus one more experienced player, and this'll be my first time DMing a campaign.

I've considered revamping the campaign to be shorter, possibly more episodic in nature, but it doesn't seem to do the overall concept justice. As it stands, I haven't even added in various character threads or potential subplots, and one of my players is very much Deep Immersion (our prior DM actually), while the others tend to strike a balance between DI/KitD. Mostly I'm worried the collective attention span of the group would lead to the game dying out before we even reach the climax.

Would I be better off running another shorter, more episodic campaign (Episodic Narrative with an Open Sandbox) in place of the one I've been working on, or is it worth finishing the one I've been working on and letting the cards falling where they may?

I'm rather attached to that campaign, and I'm wondering if it wouldn't be worth setting it aside and running a gentler game to get the group more acclimated to D&D before I send them hurling into a world of secret societies, political intrigue, and the makings of a war in progress. I'm a an ex-Shadowrun player and a writer (I also know the rules better than our last DM), so I have no doubt I could make it work, but.. yeah.

If any of you took the time to read all that, I'd be extremely grateful for any opinions or advice.

[hymer]

A few thoughts...
Is it an inherent problem that it may take a year to play it out? How about just doing that, with the players' informed consent, of course.
As a DM of some time, I hold back ideas and use them some other time (I have an ideas bank so they don't get forgotten so easily). I do that, since I'm as sure as I can be that I'll be DMing in five years too. How sure are you that you'll get to use your lovely campaign idea if you don't do it now?
You can, of course decide to make it so. Lay the groundwork now, talk to people, write things down, and gear up for the real deal to come in a little while.
Anyway, just some thoughts, hope you'll have fun.

[PotentiaLeaena]

I can safely say that, everything permitting, I'll probably be DMing in 30 years from now. I'm sure I could set the idea aside and use it at a later date.

Initially, it was meant as an introduction to the setting, and the second campaign idea I had (the more episodic one) was meant to take place in the future, after the fact. I could talk to the players, and see if they'd be up for such a long campaign off the bat, but I also know that I was the most committed of the group during our last campaign, and for a couple of my players time is a precious resource. So that's the sort of thing that worries me about such a large-scale commitment right now. I'd love to run it, but if the players don't enjoy it and drop out part-way through, what was the point?

Fact is, in terms of continuity of time, I could run the two campaigns either way with a little tweaking. That might be what I do, after talking to our experienced player and getting a very similar response. Putting it in an "idea bank" might be exactly what I need.

And thanks, fun is exactly what I intend to have. ^^