talk me out of this, please!

[dehro]

I have made a homebrew setting for a campaign with a group of players with varying levels of expertise... meaning 3 of them are absolute noobs and 3 are very experienced players (including a forever DM)
We started at level 1 and are now at level 3.. I am taking my sweet time and they are also exploring the realm, whilst some of the big plot themes are just now starting to roll in the background, waiting for them to bump into them
the whole thing seems to be going well.
this is also my first experience at DMing

I have a second group of players, with whom I have been playing for almost 10 years... I have never DMed them.
all of them are of course fairly experienced players/DMs.
I am starting to DM them in a week or two, in the same setting.

now.. the easy way would be to recycle the content of the other campaign in as much as they roughly follow the same general plot and, depending on whatever choices they might make, take it from there.

the other option however is to have the second party start someplace else, or at least with a different starting point... and have the actions of the other party influence what the new party might or might not encounter...who knows, maybe one day have them face off or ally against a common enemy (difficult because of language barriers, but..who knows)

I am fairly good at storytelling in general, but this is my first DM experience.. so I don't quite know the pitfalls of what I am fixing to do... I am afraid that the different pace at which both of the parties might move could cause me to write myself in a corner, plotwise...


in other words, I am very tempted, but also think I would be in over my head...


so.. has any of you ever tried something like this?
aside from giving me advice on whether to do it or not.. do you want to share how your experience was? any good stories related to something similar?

[MoiMagnus]

the other option however is to have the second party start someplace else, or at least with a different starting point... and have the actions of the other party influence what the new party might or might not encounter...who knows, maybe one day have them face off or ally against a common enemy (difficult because of language barriers, but..who knows)

I am fairly good at storytelling in general, but this is my first DM experience.. so I don't quite know the pitfalls of what I am fixing to do... I am afraid that the different pace at which both of the parties might move could cause me to write myself in a corner, plotwise...


I was a player at a table campaign like this.

First issue:
Be prepared for a few sessions with both groups at once (especially around the climax of the campaign), because it will eventually happen unless you railroad them to force it not to happen.
So my main issue with your play is that your first group is already 6 players. If you had two groups of 4 players that could be doable, but that seems way too much here.

Second issue:
Relative pacing.
Sometimes, we had session cancelled not because the players were not there, but because the other table cancelled their previous session so they were late.
As long as the teams are far away from each others, you can allow one team to skip ahead a few days for downtime. But when the team start to be in the same area, the GM needs to become heavy handed with the pacing (potentially forcing long rests, or cutting part of a dungeon so that the team can finish it in time, etc) so that no real issue happens. Obviously, this does not need to be dictatorial, if the GM is open about the situation, the players usually understand the potential issues that can happen.

Third issue:
Well, that was not really an issue in our campaign, but it could have been if our characters were less of the "opportunistic bastards ready to switch side at any moment" kind.
One table might "lose" the campaign, without having done anything wrong, just because of the consequences of the acts of the other group.
EDIT: or as Osuniev said, one table might "win" the campaign without having done anything to deserve it.

[Osuniev]

My first two campaigns were like this, went on for 3 RL years.

One issue I had : if both teams have similar objectives, one of them might "win" (some of my players were a bit disappointed that the BBEG was killed without their intervention. Another one decided their character now wanted to kill "that Tiefling Fighter" to get back the artifact she had found).

Also, be careful of any real life tension between members of both groups. They shouldn't come up at the table, but alas, sometimes do.

[f5anor]

I am fairly good at storytelling in general, but this is my first DM experience.. so I don't quite know the pitfalls of what I am fixing to do... I am afraid that the different pace at which both of the parties might move could cause me to write myself in a corner, plotwise...


I have played the same material with different teams several times, and invariably players manage to find a different way to go through the same story, sometimes in quite unexpected, even destructive ways.

My guess would be that if you rely too much on the two groups finding touching points you will be disappointed, and you might be temped to railroad them into finding touching points.

I think this would be unfortunate, both for you and your plans which likely will be frustrated, as well as for your players which will not appreciate the railroading.

Its good to try and derive inspiration from various groups playing the same material, but my advice would be to be careful about exposing this to them, or making specific plans on how this will occur.

[Burley]

I would have the second group always following behind the first, cleaning up their messes, as it were.
Idea: The first group slew some orcs that were harassing a local farmer, demanding food tribute. But, they left town before the orc tribe decides to full-on ransack the area for the slight.

Never let on that there's another adventuring group and never let them catch up. Keep track of what the first group buys/sells in towns (because that's what the second group has or doesn't have access to). The second group would probably find that "dungeons" are already filled with looted bodies, but secret rooms could be added, as well as more powerful creatures attracted by the stench of a dozen kobold corpses.

[jojo]

If you're going to do this then, you need a Co-DM. Running 2 games simultaneously for as many as 12 players is basically a full-time job and, unless you have time to treat it as such then you're very likely to make a lot of mistakes regardless of how "good" you are.

Just look at the content of Actual Plays like Critical Role and such. Those are professionals with production teams behind them because that's what it takes to produce content to that quality on a schedule.

The only real alternative open to people who don't DM/Play full time is to "adjust your production schedule" I'd say that you would want to run one game per month for each group AT MOST with 2 weeks in between each of these games.

[Keravath]

It can be done and could be quite fun. However, you don't need to decide now. If you start the characters in very different parts of the realm they may not encounter each other for a long time. By that point, you may decide if it would be cool to have them directly interact, you may decide that it isn't worth the effort and let both games continue independently, or you may include side effects of some of the actions of each party in the other game without direct interaction.

However, you don't need to decide for a long time and by that point you should have much more experience DMing, be more used to your own realm and the events happening there and be more aware of the parties and what motivates them (some might be looking for fame and glory, or wealth, or helping the common people, or building their own power). The party motivations may make them more natural allies, limited cooperation or enemies depending on how the two stories develop but it likely won't happen for at least a year in real life.

One thing you don't want to do is think that this idea is so cool that you have to make it happen NOW. That won't work in either the short term or the long term. The two groups don't even know that this could be happening in the background - it is just two separate games with the DM bridging common elements or events in one game that could affect the other.

So, my advice is to start the other group in a different part of the realm far from the first party. Have the second group run into different threads of whatever plots are going on. Consider whether you want to organize a session with everyone from both parties as they work together to take down a really big opponent (they might think this to be the successful completion of the plot line but it doesn't have to be - the parties return to their respective bases and something else happens to convince them that more is going on - perhaps the parties use a sending stone to share occasional information but otherwise continue independently - I wouldn't do this before everyone is level 7-10ish but that depends on what you are comfortable running).

If the groups start separately dealing with different content and you coordinate any overlap by adjusting your world consistently then you can decide when the time comes whether you want the two parties to interact at all or not.

One thing I find very useful to keep in mind as a DM is that the players have no clue what is going on unless you feed them information. Things that seem obvious to the DM because they know everything are opaque and inscrutable to the characters sometimes even when the DM has come out and given what feels like entirely too obvious hints. So no one will be aware that there is another party operating in the same world on the same time line unless you tell them :) ... decide later if it makes sense for the two parties to interact and keep the option open by keeping the world consistent between the two parties.

[togapika]

One campaign WILL become the favorite, and the other will be the "step-game"

Source: I play in the "step-game"

[dehro]

I forgot to mention, my "new party", the one of experienced players, is comprised of 7 players, with one or two routinely being absent.

I wouldn't have the two groups meet anytime soon, if at all.

the setting allows for multiple very different directions for the game to go.. much of it derived from the background of the characters..

the 2 groups do not know each other.. entirely different crowds.. one revolves around a family member and several of his friends spreads over 3 countries, the other is an established party of friends in yet another country, so I don't see conflicts coming from that...

but yeah, many of your observations do make a ton of sense, so I think I will stick to using the same environment but making 2 separate campaigns...


ultimately, I think my main reasons not to do it are that the amount of notekeeping would grow exponentially and the fact that I am still too new to DMing for me to want to complicate matters even further beyond having my first campaigns set in a homebrew environment, which already is a full plate...

[Rfkannen]

I've run two campaigns in the same world at the same time, it went well! I would place them fairly far apart (like separate countries or even continents) and only have them occasionally hear about the other's actions. It adds some flavor to a world without overloading you with book keeping.

[Rashagar]

The first campaign I ran I did this, (due to too many players interested in joining and me not wanting to let anyone down).

The main problem from my experience was that the 2nd group felt a bit like they were the step-child rather than the stars, simply by knowing that the 1st group existed. (This was more of an irl thing I think, but the "grass is always greener on the other side" effect was definitely felt by the 2nd group despite me actually putting more time and attention into their side than the 1st).

The good bit was that both groups had an ".... are we the baddies?..." moment almost simultaneously, which brought me a lot of joy XD

[Tanarii]

Don't recommend it if you're going to drive the campaign based on some kind of 'plot' speed.

It's fine if you run try to run a campaign world with adventuring sites and/or campaign enemy group driving events on a timeline. Then all you need to do is keep a single timeline across both sets of sessions. Base it on real time.

[da newt]

Can it be done well - yup.

Does it increase the difficulty for the DM - double yup.

Do you want to make things harder for yourself and introduce a possible source of chaos into your world? Then go for it.

Do you want to keep things as simple and easy as you can, and retain the control that comes from being the only source of world input for the party in game, and be able to focus on just that one party, and tweak your world as desired for them alone? Then don't do it.

DM-ing well is hard enough without adding extra layers of difficulty for yourself, but if you love the challenge ...