Last night, my group’s Stargate SG-4 campaign had a double feature: Our GM, Don, ran two short adventures back to back.
We took a dinner break partway through the first one, and then a levelling-up break before starting the second scenario, and it worked really well across the board. We weren’t too tired to do two sessions in a row, they didn’t feel rushed and we had a great time.
Don was looking at the double feature as a way to make up for calling off a couple of previous sessions (which was very nice of him), but I don’t see any reason that this approach wouldn’t work as a change of pace for any group.
It was good stuff, and I’d love to do it again sometime. Have you ever tried a double feature?
No, I’ve never tried this myself but it sounds like a great way to get some quick one shots together and still have a serious night of gaming. I’m very tempted to give this a go.
I love long adventures like this. Taking a couple of short adventures and linking them is good for attention grabbing details during a long span of game time.
Glad that you had a good time.
Regards,
Walt
My last gaming group was pretty spread out, with some driving as much as 3 hours one-way to play. With that in mind, we’d usually play one day a month, but for most of a day. We’d start around 1pm and run until midnight or so, with a break for supper in the middle. It worked out well and we got about as much done as a game that ran bi-weekly. The only problem was, it could be pretty tough to get schedules together to accommodate a whole day.
The nice thing about this past Saturday was that we only started two hours early, so it really wasn’t all that much longer than a standard session. If we’d had to schedule two standard-length games, that could have been trickier.
Pretty much all of our groups’ games are double (or triple) features. Someone drives 4.5 hours to play on Saturday, they want some substantial play.
In our case, the thing I like best about it is that it gives the group a chance to change direction radically, mid-way through the day. If the merchant house intrigue of the early session got wrapped up without any bad guy head bashing, the players can pick a later session objective that lets them vent a bit. 🙂
The switch means that you can easily switch emphasis on different story arcs. You could do that anyway, even with an adventure, but it might seem a bit too implausible for many people.
Probably did when I was 16, 17. Long time and much, much energy ago.