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My setting is live from the mid 90s. I've stayed in the same town, so hasn't had the same complications of his moves. We've got nearly 400 years of in campaign history. We've migrated through a lot of systems (currently PF2E). Its something I'm proud of, and its always pleasant when non RP nights end up with others talking of epic moments in our games from over the years. Friends who've sadly past are immortalised through the deeds of their characters as well, obviously not to take anything from their RL activities but its nice to speak of those who've moved on from the real world, whose exist as NPCs

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My campaign world covers about 2000 years. Most campaigns start towards the latter end of previous game’s longer lived characters’ lives but the exact setting usually isn’t made clear to the players up front. Sometimes it’s a prequel. No characters are immortal except one vampire, some zombies, and some gods but there’s some non linear temporal locations which occasionally feature. Most campaigns start with new characters who have little to no knowledge of the previous games characters and go through the process of meeting them and filling in what’s happened in the past few hundred years. Characters come and go, but CURSED ITEMS are eternal which is fun.

Most important is that everything is canon. Sometimes a campaign fizzles out. Still canon. The end of that adventure is free for the next DM to write out as they wish. Often these campaigns are considered to have had the party fail their quest.

Oh yeah, my setting has 2000 years of history... Its just 400 or so is player influenced and made.

How many characters have died in such a time spann? Like is any of the original characters alive?

Plenty. Early days, from a GM perspective my mindset was the risk of death had to be genuine and meant victories we're more to enjoy. Over the years I've relaxed a lot away from that. Its not often nowadays that players die. I don't run published adventures, and don't always keep things within the appropriate difficulty range. However i will always give opportunities to withdraw or escape if its something a little too tough. Some systems are a lot more flexible on what each party can handle but things like PF2E the math behind the system is strong and you can easily gauge what they can't handle.

Sorry i missed your second question. Plenty of characters are still alive. Characters retire into NPC formats, generally once they are lords and such. There is only so many apocalypses you can have to challenge high level characters. They can come on "screen" in other campaigns. They generally have their own faction that they operate off camera. New characters sometimes opt to be sons of earlier characters of their own, or of other players characters. It works quite well.

I have had to add a magical plant, which when processed, slows the aging process. I felt a bit harsh killing retired characters, so the rich and powerful tend to not age too much. Some players are fine with their characters to die off, but thats there choice.

Lastly we sometimes dust off old characters to deal with major problems or just for mainly RP type sessions.

Interesting read. I think the longest game I played was maybe 20 sessions over a year (it ended in a wipe). There is a fine balance between "feeling of danger" and losing interest due to deaths of characters that you have got attached to.

It requires some investment to keep it up but it is really nice to meet ppl on a regular basis for other things than food or alcohol.

Interestingly it was the thing that steered me away from alcohol. Being a brit i think we're prone to that. But Sunday night has always been RP night for me. Whatever is happening in my life, thats 'my time' and of course the wife and friends too. What else we supposed to do with Sunday nights, everyone is home and just waiting until Monday morning work. Hanging out with friends, eating a food delivery, telling jokes and story is peak fun in my opinion. Back in the 90s when this started that was my one night a week i weren't drinking so really helped me claw back from every night boozing. A net win on all fronts.

How do you feel about PF2E? I’ve heard it’s… complicated.

Not OP, but I can say that PF2e is complicated only in comparison to something like D&D5e. Compared to D&D3.5e (which is what PF forked from) it's more streamlined.

I think streamlined vs complexity is a topic that should be discussed here. Complexity isn't a bad thing- Street Fighter is more complex than Mario 1. But that doesn't mean it's bad, obviously. PF2e vs D&D5e are similar. Both are great games depending on what sort of complexity you're looking for, and that's personal taste. For me, 5e isn't complex enough.

Right. 5e is much easier to learn to play and DM but it also has less room for interesting things to emerge dynamically from events. 5e is arguably as fun to play but it is far less fun to watch, at least in my opinion.

Its a little crunchier. However from the GM perspective its a lot better to run. The math behind the system is real strong, which isn't something you get from RP systems. Its not like PF or 3.5 where there can be massive power differences between characters.

Combat is a lot more interesting, its not just roll d20's burning down the HP of whatever you fighting. I tend to find that 5e battles seem very same-ish.

As a GM, PF2e is quite easy and simple. There's great tables for DCs. It's pretty easy to determine what skill to roll. Calculating your roll is super simple. Scaling monsters is easy and simple. Creating encounters of any level is easy.

As a player, I think it has a higher learning curve because of the new action rules and the vast amount of actions one can do, but personally I think it's a good thing :)

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