# Your "In a Perfect World, I'd be playing X" Roleplaying Campaign



## innerdude

Let's say you wake up this morning in possession of a magic djinni lamp, and the djinn has but one wish to give.

However, the power of the wish is limited to just your own personal roleplaying experience. Our djinn can't make you rich or a rock star, but can grant you the opportunity to play the "One Great RPG Campaign of a Lifetime"---the one life-altering campaign you'd always secretly hoped would come to pass.

You can choose any game system, and the djinn's powers are such that it will be GM'd with exceptional skill (by you or someone else), and the players will be absolutely ideal for the experience (yourself and/or others).

The campaign is guaranteed to have weekly sessions for exactly 18 months, and no longer.

What is that campaign?

For me, it would be a game of fantasy intrigue, a game of vying for political influence in a dangerous world of deceit and hidden motives. In tone it would feel much like Guy Gavriel Kay's _Sarantium_ novels.

Character growth would be slow and linear, but characters would begin as competent to competent+.

The setting could be nearly anything --- Golarion, FR, Terrinoth, Known World, homebrew, doesn't matter, as long as it hits the right tone and thematics.

And if we're choosing a system, at this moment I'd have to go with Genesys. It sits right at the nexus of trad + narrative style gaming, such that it would allow for nuance in play in ways that I enjoy. My usual group has taken to it and really enjoys it.

That said, I would be sorely tempted to go with Burning Wheel or a Forged in the Dark variant, but I just don't know  enough about them in actual play to be certain it would work the way I envision. And as much as I love Ironsworn, I'm just not sure it would have enough staying power for a weekly 18-month run.


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## Yora

My answer to that is the same thing as the campaign I am currently setting up:

An Old-School Essentials West Marches campaign set in a homebrew setting about a giant forest full of giant reptiles and pleistocene animals, filled with ruins of fey, serpentmen, and a necromancer empire.
Strongly inspired by the wacky sandbox videogame Kenshi, except as high fantasy in a dense forest instead of post-apocalpytic desert wastelands.


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## payn

Yesterday I would have said PF1 _War for the Crown_ AP, but somebody answered my hail Mary attempt to find a game and now I'm in it.


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## Reynard

As a GM: a big open table "Strike Force" level super hero campaign city where much is don in the downtime/over Discord/Bluebooking and heroes come together to deal with threats during session time.

As a Player: a fantasy campaign built around carving a kingdom out of the wild per BECMI/RC D&D.


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## Teo Twawki

With the caveat that my choice is one that--via the physical laws of our consensually hallucinated real world _cannot_ happen--I would say I wish we could play our homebrewed multi-era campaign based on Blue Öyster Cult's _Imaginos_ using the English-translation of _Nephilim_.

I say it cannot ever happen in this world because the homebrew author, gm, and friend took his homecoming 13 years ago. We're left with notes and ideas, but our forays into small scenarios of it has been good, but not great. He had this mapped out in his head to a far greater degree than mere scribbling on paper can convey.


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## Grendel_Khan

Great thread idea!

My pick would be Delta Green, using either DG's default system, Gumshoe or something insanely detailed, like GURPS.

Play would alternate every so often between PC groups in two or three different eras, where actions in one era impact the other(s). 

And I'd need to play it, since I don't have the stomach to properly run Delta Green myself, in all its nihilistic, PC-ravaging glory.


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## Grendel_Khan

innerdude said:


> That said, I would be sorely tempted to go with Burning Wheel or a Forged in the Dark variant, but I just don't know  enough about them in actual play to be certain it would work the way I envision. And as much as I love Ironsworn, I'm just not sure it would have enough staying power for a weekly 18-month run.




I know we're in hypothetical territory, but Forged in the Dark games aren't really made to run for that many sessions, unless you continue the campaign with new character groups. Characters tend to max out somewhere between 12 and 20 sessions.


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## GuyBoy

An interesting question and I’m going to stretch the djinn’s Powers a bit with my answer:
I’d choose to play the G and D series of modules. I really wouldn’t mind if we played using 1E or 5e rules but I’d want to “get the band back together” of all the old friends from high school that I played with back in the late 1970s into 1980s. Not going back in time of course; just the djinn using their powers to get us together once a month in someone’s house to play through the game. We’d all be 59/60 now, so lots to catch up on as well as giants to defeat.


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## HaroldTheHobbit

I may be boring, but as a forever GM with a fun table of perma-players I don't have any visions of unattainable dream campaigns. Since I GM and we mostly home-brew, I make campaigns that I want to run, often with some success.

With that said, and despite not having a rpg-djinn, I have very high hopes for a sci-fi campaign I plan to start around a year from now and that has potential to be a great one (campaign, not a lovecraftian godlike being). Savage Worlds, semi-sandbox and Travelleresque premisses to start with, but with politics, intrigue, conspiracy and ancient secrets to be unveiled.


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## hawkeyefan

I expect my answer would change at times, but I'd like a campaign that takes place over a great span of time in the fiction, with the cast of characters changing periodically due to time passing, but the story continuing on through the ages. 



innerdude said:


> That said, I would be sorely tempted to go with Burning Wheel or a Forged in the Dark variant, but I just don't know enough about them in actual play to be certain it would work the way I envision.




You may want to check out either Court of Blades or Rebel Crown. Both are FitD with a focuson intrigue and courtly espionage.


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## Bill Zebub

Darkening of Mirkwood


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## ART!

The setting is Middle-earth, at the turning of the 2nd to 3rd Age. The game starts during the Last Alliance, X years into the great siege of Mordor. The PCs can be anyone who would have any reason to be there alongside Men and Elves. The PCs would become trusted aides, and by the time Sauron falls would be positioned to become part of Isilidur's retinue, court, etc. After the military victory, the PCs would do various clean-up missions, deal with leftovers of the Enemy's influence, help with diplomacy and new treaties, and the like - but also deal with an increasingly erratic king.

System? My group is used to 5E, and I'm sure I could tweaks things to make that work, but something with stronger drama and corruption/temptation elements would be lovely.

I'm in love with this idea, and in the real world I'm prepared and thinking about filing off the Tolkien serial numbers and running this, but knowing my struggles as a GM my confidence is low that I would be able to handle all the diverse elements.

EDIT: So I guess really I just want the djinn to grant me confidence!


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## Dioltach

Sterling E. Lanier's world of "Hiero's Journey" and "The Unforsaken Hiero". Using either D&D 3.5 E6 or else D20 Modern. And if the djinn is really powerful, I'd like Lanier's ghost to finish the series.


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## monsmord

An epic superhero campaign in my homebrew Marvel/DC/AstroCity-esque world, with a pretty grand story arc (that includes discovering how supers and weird tech get their powers), using a perfected FASERIP system, and with custom miniatures, homemade terrain/maps, and game space paraphernalia for mood and effects (custom table, lights, music, environment controls, the works). Come on, djinn - is this so much to ask?


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## niklinna

Well, hm. I am biased by games I've played or am playing, and group dynamics.

In general, I would like a game where the GM and players alike are on the same page regarding group and personal goals. I've been in a few groups that work well in that regard, but more where things just don't line up. I think this matters far more than the system.

But as for system, I'd like one that doesn't devote all its detail to round-by-round combat and huge catalogs of spells and powers oriented  to round-by-round combat (or to short-circuiting narrative), one that allows for ways to resolve combat at a higher level. Blades in the Dark is a pretty decent stab at it. It sometimes takes work to make certain things not just a dice roll against a clock. But that's no worse than whittling down hit points round by round! Blades is also not great for really long-term campaigns.

I know very little about Genesys. Is that the one with the funky dice?

I have normally been a player, but am about to take my first real stab at GMing since high school, for my Torg Eternity group, with action centered in the cosm of gothic horror. In Torg, the system and premise kind of actively undermine gothic horror, and the way it handles gothic horror actively undermines the premises of, well, everything, including the gothic horror! I am wracking my brain to homebrew some stuff that will actually provide a sense of dread, rather than of merely losing points in stats. There are other problems with Torg horror I won't go into.

Given all that, I guess right now I'd like a system that can really handle gothic horror well, in a setting that establishes premises for stories without pre-scripting them, a focus on narrative vs. task resolution, and a group that can be above-board about motivations, in general alignment but with enough latitude for interpersonal conflict that doesn't wreck an 18-month series of sessions.


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## Snarf Zagyg

Eighteen months of Paranoia.

_I think I'm gonna need more clones_.


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## Malmuria

innerdude said:


> The campaign is guaranteed to have weekly sessions for exactly 18 months, and no longer.



Honestly it doesn't matter if I could have this kind of scheduling luck


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## overgeeked

A Changeling: the Dreaming 20th Anniversary game so uplifting and inspiring it caused the _players_ to all wake up to their fae nature and bound off into the Dreaming for some real adventures.


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## niklinna

Malmuria said:


> Honestly it doesn't matter if I could have this kind of scheduling luck



One of my two current groups is quite good about rescheduling the same week if we have to miss our regular day, and sometimes schedules an additoonal session just because. The other group (biweekly) usually lets slide for a month.


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## MNblockhead

Gamma World.


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## DrunkonDuty

GM: run my two part _Winter Whispers, Summer Swords_ campaign. Using the Legends of the Five Rings setting the PCs must first finagle and courtier their way through the build up to a clan war. Then fight in the war. Using Hero.

Playing: a supers game. With plenty of soap opera action to complement the spandex action. Either Hero or FASERIP.


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## chaochou

The game would be Burning Wheel. I don't have a strong feeling about the content of the game, since my group has made settings ideas collaborative and mutually created for a long time now. So part of the joy is building the concept, the perils, the personalities, the tensions and then playing to see what happens and why.


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## DeviousQuail

hawkeyefan said:


> I expect my answer would change at times, but I'd like a campaign that takes place over a great span of time in the fiction, with the cast of characters changing periodically due to time passing, but the story continuing on through the ages.



This is my answer as well. 

I've got this dream campaign that starts off in the Black Sails version of Nassau but with fantasy elements. Sailing, world building, fun and breezy, but with dark omens for the future. 

Part 2 takes place in a fantasy industrial revolution period. If you've seen Carnival Row or Shadow and Bone then you're in the right ballpark. Build on part 1 by fully introducing the baddies and their long term plans.

Part 3 is in the early information era and tech has begun catching up to and even surpassing magic in some ways. Think Dresden Files, Sanctuary, and a bit of Rick Riordan all without the magical masquerade. 

Part 4 ties it all together in a near future where tech and magic allow for humanity to start visiting other worlds a la Stargate with little bits and pieces inspired by just about everything Amanda Tapping has ever been in. The antagonists are defeated with the help of some resurrection/cloning shenanigans that allows every character to come back for the final showdown. 

Let it be my DMing masterpiece as I seamlessly bring together pirates, witches, inventors, lycans, demigods, gunslingers, artificers, cyber mages, commandos, Teal'c, IRS fairies, robo dogs, and a lady whose hallmark christmas movie life was shattered and now she's out for blood. Yes, she's a DMPC, but in this campaign it totally works.


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## Dannyalcatraz

I’ve sorta been through that.  I ran a supers campaign in HERO 4th using the Space:1889 campaign setting as a core, and had a cadre of players who were really on board.  It was my finest campaign EVER.

When I tried running an updated version of it a decade later with different players in M&M 2Ed, it fizzled.  There were problems on both sides of the screen.

So I suppose I’d want the djinn to let me recapture lighning in a bottle, running the updated game for the second group with the same skill & enjoyment as happened for the original group.


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## pemerton

For me, it would be playing Burning Wheel. My preference would be to be human, Elven or (at a pinch) Dwarven.


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## Aldarc

My list, especially as a player rather than a GM: 

Stonetop
Blue Rose RPG
Vaesen
Fabula Ultima
Worlds Without Number


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## John Dallman

innerdude said:


> However, the power of the wish is limited to just your own personal roleplaying experience. Our djinn can't make you rich or a rock star, but can grant you the opportunity to play the "One Great RPG Campaign of a Lifetime"---the one life-altering campaign you'd always secretly hoped would come to pass.
> 
> What is that campaign?



The continuation of the greatest campaign I've ever played, an occult WWII game that ran from 2007 to 2021, covering September 1939 to the early end of the war in May 1945. The GM ended it at that point, feeling he'd done enough. I feel that's entirely reasonable, and I'm running one of two parallel successor campaigns that went back to 1939 in different aspects of the war. But I don't feel I'm doing as good a job of it, so far, and playing through the post-war years would be great fun. 


innerdude said:


> The campaign is guaranteed to have weekly sessions for exactly 18 months, and no longer.



I'd like to trade that for a smaller number of monthly sessions. One needs time to think between sessions, and read more history.


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## MNblockhead

John Dallman said:


> The continuation of the greatest campaign I've ever played, an occult WWII game that ran from 2007 to 2021, covering September 1939 to the early end of the war in May 1945. The GM ended it at that point, feeling he'd done enough. I feel that's entirely reasonable, and I'm running one of two parallel successor campaigns that went back to 1939 in different aspects of the war. But I don't feel I'm doing as good a job of it, so far, and playing through the post-war years would be great fun.
> 
> I'd like to trade that for a smaller number of monthly sessions. One needs time to think between sessions, and read more history.



Was that a homebrew system?  If published, what was the game system?


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## Dannyalcatraz

For completeness’ sake, I’ll admit that the _alternative_ wish would be to play in a campaign with one of my odder characters that I haven’t gotten to play (or were already in an aborted campaign), and am unlikely to get the opportunity so to do.


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## niklinna

Dannyalcatraz said:


> For completeness’ sake, I’ll admit that the _alternative_ wish would be to play in a campaign with one of my odder characters that I haven’t gotten to play (or were already in an aborted campaign), and am unlikely to get the opportunity so to do.



I have nearly 20 odd Torg Eternity characters. I may get to play one of them, but we just did session zero for my stint as GM. The team is not as disjointed as I feared it might be!


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## John Dallman

MNblockhead said:


> Was that a homebrew system?  If published, what was the game system?



The system was GURPS 4e.


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## Dannyalcatraz

niklinna said:


> I have nearly 20 odd Torg Eternity characters. I may get to play one of them, but we just did session zero for my stint as GM. The team is not as disjointed as I feared it might be!



At one point, I owned over 150 different RPGs, and had designed at least one character for each one.  Inspired by Michael Moorcock’s Eternal Champion, Eternal Companion and other multiversal beings, there was even one I statted out across SEVERAL game systems (including Torg, as it happens).

So I have physical folders and all kinds of electronic files of PCs…_waiting,_

And yes, some are CLEARLY better than others_._


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## Jd Smith1

I run whatever I want, and around 50+ sessions is my standard. Thanks to online gaming, players are easy to come by. And everything I run is GM'd with exceptional skill.  

But to stick with the intent of the thread, I would like to run Space: 1889, with high-definition maps of Mars. The lack of maps is what has stymied my ability to field that particular campaign.

Or a really good WW2 campaign. Behind Enemy Lines holds great promise, and there are Weird War and Gear Krieg, but the former is dead and the latter two are a bit too Hollywood/pulp for my taste.


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## aramis erak

Palladium's Fantasy Setting or Mechanoids Setting (not the rifts version - it's significantly altered), but with a game that works better (and I don't have to do the conversions myself) to a much better engine.

Battlestations! (Gorilla Games)

Alien.


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## thullgrim

I want to be a player in a well run Enemy Within campaign from start to finish. I’d settle for being a player in a mini-campaign of WHFRP 4e.  I look running it so much it’s one of the few games I want to actually play.  Second runner up would a pulp style Masks of Nyarlathotep campaign.


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## GuyBoy

thullgrim said:


> I want to be a player in a well run Enemy Within campaign from start to finish. I’d settle for being a player in a mini-campaign of WHFRP 4e.  I look running it so much it’s one of the few games I want to actually play.  Second runner up would a pulp style Masks of Nyarlathotep campaign.



I’m lucky enough to actually be in an awesome Enemy Within game using WHFRP4 rules, run by @TheSword 
I can’t speak highly enough of the campaign. It’s dark, engaging, challenging and threatening. We are currently in the forests near Wittgenstein, trying to contact a group of outlaws to enlist their support against disturbing events at the castle.


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## TheSword

Yes me too. I’d love to play in The Enemy Within for WFRP 4e. Though I would need to have my memory wiped. Any good intrigue adventure would be good though FOR WFRP. Ubersreik Adventures, Ashes of Middenheim, the 3e Enemy Within. All could probably be adopted for D&D as well - though I think some of the challenges would be too easy.

My second place would be in a Forgotten Realms Menzoberranzan Evil underdark campaign - with a family trying to raise its fortunes.


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