Last night I was GM in my two-player Dungeons & Dragons campaign, but only one player could make it.
And it was a blast!
The thing is, there was no set adventure, which meant we could play even though there was only one player.
This was possible as I run an open-world sandbox, letting the players dictate what they do and even who they play.
Multiple Characters
The players have a stable of 3-4 characters each they can play in any given session. This means that if one of their characters is tied up doing something else, they can choose another and the session goes ahead.
There are no cancelling sessions (unless I, as GM, cannot make it).
1:1 Time
The other part of this equation is that I have started running 1:1 time.
This means that one day in the real world is one day in the game world.
It doesn’t mean that time cannot be paused if the session ends in a dungeon (which many many many D&D YouTubers get wrong) – this just means that the characters are frozen in time until you complete that dungeon crawl in another session.
And then catch up time to the current time by way of downtime.
Downtime
I love downtime in my campaign. And it plays an important part of what the characters achieve.
And a character can achieve a LOT during the week between sessions – the player just needs to message me what they are doing during the week (hope not just an hour before the next session).
This way, when we are “at the table” (we play online), we can focus on the more immediate events and see what happens based on what they downtime produced (if anything).
Zine
If you want to learn more about downtime, I have a whole zine issue devoted to it.
Articles
I also have an article explaining the benefits of downtime, and another that shows you how to run downtime using a world generator.
A Living World
This also means I move the world forward each week, and the characters hear rumours or experience shifts in the world – factions take action to further their goals, monsters attack settlements, and time marches ever forward.
If what the characters want to do last longer than one week, then they are out of action for how ever long the task takes them.
Let’s say the party’s magic-user wants to research a spell, or the party’s cleric wants to go on a pilgrimage and that these downtime actions take 3 weeks to achieve – they player cannot play those characters as they are doing other things that cannot be interrupted.
This is why they have 3-4 characters.
So we can play each and every session no matter what is happening.
Related Blog Posts
Real World Example
To give you a real-world example, one of my two players has been out of action with bad pain for a few weeks now, and the last session he played was 4 weeks ago and that session ended with his character and the other player’s character locked in a fight with a rat-man in the sewers.
That was 4 weeks ago in real time, and 4 weeks ago in game time. Four weeks for everyone else. No time has past for those two characters. The next session both players play will be the completion of that fight – four weeks ago.
After this, those characters were planning on guarding a caravan of prospectors to some nearby hills. And that will still happen as we play out that travel across multiple sessions – in the past (according to the campaign time).
The trip will take around 3-4 weeks there and back, assuming they make it back okay, they will have some downtime and catch back up with the current timeline.
When running 1:1 time, it is important to keep everyone around the same time, but you can have “frozen” characters from time to time, as needed.
Because there has only been one player in the last few sessions, another of his characters – a halfling fighter/thief – has been planning and laying the ground work for turning a squat tower into a way-stop for travellers.
As a single character, he hired mercenaries and labourers to help him travel to the tower safely and to carry much needed supplies.
The last session was him buying what he needed and travelling to the tower. Two of his characters went along and he swapped back and forth between playing each one – one was organising the tower, while the other went out hunting.
The only combat in the whole session was a random encounter which consisted of a single orc scout, who tried to ambush the character and the two mercenaries he brought with him.
One merc was badly damaged (down to 1 hit point) and the character – a ranger – was killed by the orc.
It was a combination of unlucky die rolls and good tactics on the orc’s part.
Even though a character died, the session was a great one, and the player created a new character – a gnome ranger/druid – which he is keen to play.
And the whole combat lasted but 3 rounds.
The rest of the session was planning and logistics.
And it was a blast!
Why Your Campaign Fails
Most sessions fail because everyone needs to be there to “continue the adventure”. This is a terrible way to play because more often than not, someone will fail to show – no matter the reason.
By running an open sandbox, and by players having multiple characters, you can still play no matter who turns up.
You don’t need to run 1:1 time, but strict time records should be kept and you should try and move the world along by using downtime and by having the world take action between sessions.
You will play more and your campaign will last much longer.
Over to You
Are you still playing adventures, or have you moved to a sandbox yet?
While You’re Here…
Since 2021 I have been publishing d12 Monthly, a monthly zine, which has a ton of articles for any edition of Dungeons and Dragons.
Printed copies are available in my store. The PDF is available on DriveThruRPG and you can get both, plus support my work, via my Patreon.
I will also be releasing some more products in the near future.
Feel free to reach out to me on Twitter or my contact page any time.
By and large, I agree. Better to do whatever it takes to keep the campaign going. Players can’t make it? Their PCs “wander off” until next session. Also, I’m all in on the sandbox. Love yourself.
Cheers. And thanks for stopping by. Long live the sandbox!
I’d agree, I am loving it and will be back real soon!