When did you realize a campaign wasn't going to happen?

[ButzSanchez]

So recently a friend came to me saying a friend of hers was starting a campaign set in Wildemount and wanted to know if I'd like to join. We made a discord, talked about what characters we'd like, rolled on a table for their motivations, rivals, and allies, and I was getting really excited to see where we took these new characters. I was really invested and wanted to see how things rolled out.

I first noticed issues when a few days in only some of us had even bothered to roll stats for our characters. One person hadn't even assigned their stats until it was two weeks later and I asked some details about theirs. They only sat down THAT NIGHT to work on it after I asked them about it, and hadn't even pieced together any of their backstory stuff. Then I noticed one person, who had never played before but was apparently sure they'd like to play, hadn't even ROLLED THEIR STATS YET, much less rolled their backstory elements.

A bit before this our DM mentioned how they were getting sidetracked with a video game and hadn't found time to work on the campaign. Things finally sank in for me that this was never going to happen when they said they had no creative energy, and that the campaign would have to wait a little while. I'm not dumb, that campaign is never happening now. We have two players who have taken three weeks to finish putting their character together, one of which is a new player who was clearly unprepared for what goes into prepping a character, won't ask for help, and doesn't have the decency to say they probably can't commit to the game. And now we have a DM who isn't prioritizing the game and has already put it on the backburner before the damn thing has even started.

I'm probably going to take what I've already invested in the game and funnel that creative energy in to my own campaign, find some people who can commit instead of a bunch of people who say they'd love to play then drop off the face of the earth when it comes time to actually prepare.

How about you? Any tales of the moment you realized a campaign wasn't even going to get off the ground?

[HappyDaze]

As a player, I've dropped out of a few games in Session 0 when I can tell the game isn't going to offer what I want. I've also had a few where I give it 2-3 sessions before making that choice, but this is less common now that I'm pretty sure of what I'm looking for and willing to tolerate.

As a GM, I've abandoned a game at Session 0 twice, and had more than a few games that I don't want to run after a few sessions. In part this comes from players not being honest about what they are looking for in Session 0--they don't realize that they don't have to play in every game and not all games are going to be a fit for their styles. So, they say what they think I want to hear and then do the opposite. This can completely kill my interest in the current game and in gaming with them in the future (even if a future game might be something that better fits their style).

[Dork_Forge]

As a player, the part of the first session where we were TPK'd by an NPC we were railroaded towards, that used a modified version of Earthquake on our unsuspecting 1st level party, even the ones that made the save instantly died of massive damage. We were revived by a group of friendly NPCs and it was made very clear to us how indebted we were to them.

[Mr. Crowbar]

I also ditched in session 0 as a player. Everyone INSISTED on calling my character the wrong name no matter how much I corrected them and they all seemed immature/inexperienced. I realised I wasnt having fun and would rather be doing work so I ditched in the middle of it. The rest of them seemed to be having fun together, so the campaign could still be going -- but not for me.

And another where I was invited to fill a spot in an existing campaign, made my character, and then the DM ghosted me lol. I made the character alongside him so I don't think it was anything egregious???