Looking For Inspiration

[Allistar]

I think I've gotten to the point both as a DM and a player that I've run out of ideas. I've run out of ideas for new characters and NPCs, I've run out of ideas for quests, I've run out of ideas for world-building. More than anything I fear that I've burnt myself out on the hobby, or even worse, I've run out of design space/everything has become way too generic in my mind and I cant make anything new.

I feel like I cant craft a compelling mystery, or an epic quest. I feel like I cant make anything that would have a lasting impact on the players. I don't think I can do anything that hasn't already been done, or that we haven't done in someone else's campaigns.

Maybe it's because I've accidentally written myself into a corner with my world-building, or because we've been playing 5e for multiple years now, but I've really got nothing. Starting over with either a new system or setting seems way too daunting, and I don't really want to leave behind the world that I've made over the past few years, but I think I might have to. Even then I have no idea where I would start even if I were to start over.

I don't know what I want to do, and I'm kind of lost here.

[MarkVIIIMarc]

I think I've gotten to the point both as a DM and a player that I've run out of ideas. I've run out of ideas for new characters and NPCs, I've run out of ideas for quests, I've run out of ideas for world-building. More than anything I fear that I've burnt myself out on the hobby, or even worse, I've run out of design space/everything has become way too generic in my mind and I cant make anything new.

I feel like I cant craft a compelling mystery, or an epic quest. I feel like I cant make anything that would have a lasting impact on the players. I don't think I can do anything that hasn't already been done, or that we haven't done in someone else's campaigns.

Maybe it's because I've accidentally written myself into a corner with my world-building, or because we've been playing 5e for multiple years now, but I've really got nothing. Starting over with either a new system or setting seems way too daunting, and I don't really want to leave behind the world that I've made over the past few years, but I think I might have to. Even then I have no idea where I would start even if I were to start over.

I don't know what I want to do, and I'm kind of lost here.

It IS possible to play D&D 16 hours a day, 6 our of 7 days and go through the whole monster manual so stepping back isn't always the worst idea.

BUT, if I'm DMing for a pretty regular and good party I hate to take time off.

Read your player's character's back stories for inspiration.

You could, feel the party out for ideas directly. Out of character would work for some players. Others might respond better if you have a bartender ask what they like doing the next Inn they are in.

One thing I have going on now is a party where some sessions they're working through the Tales of the Yawning Portal dungeons when they're done with one I have some homebrew and the next ready as options for them. The homebrew makes the character backstories relevant and gives some logical reasons why the party goes from here to there..

good luck.

[dragoeniex]

I'm hearing a lot of stress and self-doubt here. It sounds like this is really eating at you, and that the game may have ceased being a net positive for your experience. Honestly? It sounds like you need a break. Take some time off, then see if this is something you still want to press forward with.

A nice way to combine this with inspiration could be inviting your players to DM one or two-shot side stories so you can play for a couple weeks. Or months- not sure how often your meetups are. If one or more of them are interested, you all can choose whether these will be run separate from your story world or inside of it.

Separate can see them pulling in things so different from your usual environment that it breaks you out of the monotonous feeling.

Inside of your world has the benefit of letting them flesh out parts you wouldn't have thought to, or possibly even getting something about your world "wrong" and letting you think about what the implications would be if the world did work like that. Just anything that might lead to fun tangents.

It's also important to give yourself permission for two things: First, you do not have to keep doing this forever to be a valuable friend or storyteller. All things come to an end eventually; it might be time to evaluate whether this is it. Second, if you genuinely want to continue, it's okay to introduce similar characters/quests/settings. It's unavoidable, even! The real, memorable moments are going to come from what interacting with these things looks like in motion, and different choices/personalities/circumstances will insert some variety for you.

If no one wants to DM for a while, consider taking a few sessions off without D&D. Play other group games, or take those nights off and watch some movies or read a book you haven't had time for. Consuming fiction really helps you produce it.

[Mercurias]

One of the things I look to for inspiration when planning, writing, or roleplaying fantasy is Literally Any Genre Other Than Fantasy.

I’m a big fan of autobiographies and mystery novels. I’ve written characters people may never know were directly inspired by Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and other American founding fathers, as well as a Paladin inspired by Ghengis Khan.

I’m currently making a one-shot inspired by the California Gold Rush, in which a largely unpopulated frontier is suddenly turned into a burgeoning mass of small city-states that ally, betray, and war amongst one another while opportunists navigate them in order to find the next big score. If it ends up fun and people want to continue, I feel like there is enough material to run a full campaign out of it, either by trying to unify the region, demolish it all under the banner of an established nation-state, or let the politics hang while they join the rush for riches.

[BigBadHarve]

Luckily my last DM gave me an awared for inspiration, so I'll pass my inspiration die to you. :smallbiggrin:

But seriously folks ...

I hear where you're coming from, I have been there time and again.

As above, a little downtime never hurt anyone.

But consider this, ask yourself how much work you're putting into crafting your stories and ideas. Are you writing intricate plots? Mapping out events etc?

If that's the case, try handing off control of the actual adventure to the players. Create a few strands of possibility without writing a whole scenario. A setting with some fleshed out NPCs and no more than half a dozen possible adventure hooks. Beyond that let the players decide where to go, and let the dice handle the rest. Take a back seat to proactive DMing and just adjudicate.

Years ago, I settled on my gaming philosophy for D&D - We are crafting an organic story told from 3 points - The Players who serve as the protagonists and driving force, the DM who sets the stage and adjudicates the rules of the world, and lastly the Dice, which represent the Universe/chaos/fate etc.

Don't fudge the dice, and roll as many as possible out where everyone can see them (some dice rolls need to be hidden for various reasons, and that's fine, but anything else everyone gets to see). You'll find things start happening with your campaign that will inspire you. Ideas will flow from choices players make.

If you're burnt out, but still not willing to walk away from the game, start again but small, and real, and let it grow from there.

I hope that's helpful to you.

[Man_Over_Game]

Sometimes, using the cliché can be really helpful. It puts less stress on the creative process for the overall concept, and puts more emphasis on the fine details. Maybe the White Knight Paladin is generic in every way....except that he gets savage and violent around people that hurt the defenseless.

Not everything has to be overdramatic or extremely creative, as long as only a little bit is.

[Lupine]

Another thing that can help is to grab four sheets of graph paper. Pick up your pen with the intention to build a dungeon, and let it do what it wants, then decide "Why the **** would someone build such a convoluted dungeon?"
Then, write the story forward, starting with "who built this, and what happened to them?"
then "Why did it happen?"
then "What happened next?"
Repeat "Why" and "What" until you've built a dungeon. Then you need only connect some Mcguffin with the campaign

If that doesn't work, then take a challenge in dungeon design. For example, a classic trope of D&D that I have seen is the 5foot wide 6foot tall always that extends from a main hallway to a door. The problem with that is that it creates a five foot wide wall. Almost nobody build like that. Seriously. Presumably you're near some walls and a door. Open the door and look at the thickness of the wall, its probably 2.5 to 3 feet thick. This was an inspiration for me, because it forced me to create a different building shape.
This can spread to other aspects too. make a conscious effort to use things you don't normally use. Maybe use difficult terrain, objects that encourage movement, or different environmental effects in your encounters. (Think of ways you could design an entire encounter based on good use of difficult terrain)
Even small things like a DMG "Strong wind" condition can break things up, discouraging simple "I shoot them" actions, and creating a tough encounter against relatively easy creatures. Spoiler here because some of my players read this forum.
Players encounter a 400 foot bridge, covered with ice, and a few section that can break. stress the fear that a strong wind might blow you off to the fall below. Then, 100 feet down the bridge, the wind picks up. then the archers start shooting. I a using to Volo's guide to monsters Archer stat block. Just two or three, maybe four if we get enough people. The ranged attacks have disadvantage, but the archers can negate that with their ability. Now the players have a choice of running down the bridge (Remember, they can't end their turn flying due to the wind) or hiding. Even with disadavantage after their three shots, 400 feet is a little too far for most spells, so the archers have a tactical advantage. These are CR 3 archers, possibly giving lvl 10 characters a really rough time. All due to a little ice, and a strong wind, none of which I've really used that much.
Perhaps your characters are fighting a bunch of giant spiders on slippery tree tops, with a flash flood below. Giant webs allow creatures to stand without risking a fall, but limit mobility, and create options for the spiders to flank.

After that, NPCs, I guess. An interesting NPC can create an adventure.

If those don't work, but you want to keep playing but feel out of ideas, you can pick up a published module, and adapt it for your world. That can hold you over while you read a book with some epic battle music, and get some new idea.

Lastly, if nothing else works, take a DM break, and let a player try DMing.

[SpikeFightwicky]

I think I've gotten to the point both as a DM and a player that I've run out of ideas. I've run out of ideas for new characters and NPCs, I've run out of ideas for quests, I've run out of ideas for world-building. More than anything I fear that I've burnt myself out on the hobby, or even worse, I've run out of design space/everything has become way too generic in my mind and I cant make anything new.

I feel like I cant craft a compelling mystery, or an epic quest. I feel like I cant make anything that would have a lasting impact on the players. I don't think I can do anything that hasn't already been done, or that we haven't done in someone else's campaigns.

Maybe it's because I've accidentally written myself into a corner with my world-building, or because we've been playing 5e for multiple years now, but I've really got nothing. Starting over with either a new system or setting seems way too daunting, and I don't really want to leave behind the world that I've made over the past few years, but I think I might have to. Even then I have no idea where I would start even if I were to start over.

I don't know what I want to do, and I'm kind of lost here.

Lots of variables! How often do you play? Are you typically a player or DM? Do you enjoy more being a player or DM? Was there a specific incident, or comment(s) that your RPG group made that got you thinking this way? Does the whole group feel this way, or just you? Is there something else in your life that's subconsciously impacting your enjoyment and inspiration of D&D?

I think dragoeniex mentioned a lot of this. In my experience, memorable events aren't planned or setup. They happen organically when the players respond to their DM's world (usually typically in unexpected ways). Usually a throw-away thing or NPC resonates with the PCs, and you end up running with it and that's all it takes.

[jjordan]

"It's the Festival of Light and the big tent is jumping, literally. The latest song has everyone pounding steins on the tables and the hundreds of candle lanterns hanging from the ceiling are bouncing in time. It's late enough in the evening that everyone is feeling good and early enough that no one has gotten belligerent, or falling down drunk, or stupid enough to bring up any one of hundred touchy subjects. You're glad you decided to join in. And then you feel the world... skip, and you lose your balance, falling back onto the bench, almost, but not quite, going all the way over to the floor. There's a terrible sense of wrongness and you reach out to the table to steady yourself. But that's not your hand...

Please pass your character sheet to the person sitting to your left before we continue."

A major otherworldly creature has entered the world and caused ripples of distortion in reality. The characters have switched bodies. Reality has been distorted in other ways in other locations. The creature must build up enough power to allow it to move from the very limited location it can currently exist. When it does this, reality will be shredded.

You have carte blanche to make changes to an existing setting and to continue making changes. Things should get weird. Don't use these changes to actively railroad, but don't let the players sidestep every consequence. Don't let them use wishes or other means to get back to their original bodies, for example. So far as reality is concerned, they *are* in their correct bodies. The players can continue as usual with reality continuing to warp around them and the otherworldly entity steadily, and ever more openly, gaining power or they can do something about it. Play with the idea and have fun.

[Keravath]

1) It never hurts to take a break from the hobby for a bit.
2) It is hard to tell from your original post but is it possible that more is going on here than just D&D? The effects might just be more noticeable in your gaming at the moment. Are you eating ok? Sleeping ok? Maybe get a check up?
3) Creative blocks are pretty common but the way you describe this would seem to be more than that ..
-"I've run out of design space/everything has become way too generic in my mind and I cant make anything new."
-"I feel like I cant craft ... ", "I feel like I cant make anything ...", "I don't think I can do anything ..."

4) Is the problem that you can't come up with anything? Or that you just don't feel motivated at all to come up with anything? Or that you just don't want to do anything at all?
- Your comments about not coming up with anything new are an exaggeration. Truly and completely unique story lines ARE hard to come up with. Very few DMs, if any, have ever developed a completely unique and independent world that doesn't have influences from all the material they have read over the years. There is a vast amount of fantasy fiction that is used as inspiration, conscious or otherwise.

In addition, most stories are formulaic. They have heroes and heroines, villains (or at least conflict and differences of opinion that become the motivation for character actions). So when creating campaigns you combine elements to come up with a cool story line more or less unique to your world but which automatically draws on your experience and knowledge.

So, if you want additional inspiration - increase your experience and knowledge. Broaden your horizons, study something that interests you and incorporate it into your gaming. For example, maybe you find caligraphy to be fun and calming, learn some of the history, draw some of the historical elements into a gaming plot line with an oriental setting using caligraphy and codes or hidden symbols to transfer messages through a ring of spies - are they there to help the ruler? oppose the ruler? make sure the ruler survives? You decide. In general, DMs use the material they have read, what they know or have studied and their experience as inspiration so if you find yourself uninspired and there aren't any medical reasons then take a bit of a break and learn something new. Even studying computer programming could end up becoming a fantasy story line ... convert it to spell programming using contingency or specially designed magic items. Perhaps a council of wizards who wanted to improve the world but their magical technology runs amok creating autonomous magical constructs with their own agenda. (Yes ... maybe D&D meets the Terminator :) ... but DMs can draw inspiration from everything they know or have experienced).

However, if you are finding yourself just unmotivated and bored with the game, uninspired to develop future plot lines then if it is just D&D ... give it a break. If the feelings go beyond D&D, talk to your friends and family, eat well, sleep and perhaps see a doctor.

[Jophiel]

I've been listening to the Fear of a Black Dragon (https://www.gauntlet-rpg.com/fear-of-a-black-dragon) podcast. Each episode is around a 30-40min and they go through an old school RPG module in various parts: Basic walk through, things they liked, questions it left, etc. I usually come away from each episode with a few new ideas of things that might be cool to make an adventure around or just little aspects to sprinkle in. Might help give you some inspiration from the DM side.

[Contrast]

Starting over with either a new system or setting seems way too daunting, and I don't really want to leave behind the world that I've made over the past few years, but I think I might have to. Even then I have no idea where I would start even if I were to start over.

There are plenty of systems that are extremely rules light that you can dabble in without investing serious amounts of time in learning rules or a setting.

And just because you've invested a lot of time in developing your own setting doesn't mean that work is all just in the trash - it'll still be there if you get the urge again.