The Long Game (Part II)

In Part I, I outlined a few broad principles that have helped me successfully referee long-running campaigns. Now, I want to offer some more concrete examples of how I prepare and run these games, specifically what I actually do week to week to keep the campaign moving forward. As I said before, I’m not suggesting that my way is the only or even the best way. It’s simply what has worked for me across multiple campaigns that have lasted several years or more.

Start Loose

When launching a new campaign, I try not to overprepare. I begin with a broad concept or locale, often something quite minimal, like a regional map, a few factions, or even just a handful of evocative ideas. I don’t want to box myself in too early or create the illusion that the campaign has a “plot.” Instead, I focus on a starting situation with open-ended possibilities.

For example, when I began the House of Worms campaign, I gave the players a simple premise: they were junior clan members on an assignment from their elders in the bustling city of Sokátis. That was it. From there, we started to explore Tékumel together and nearly everything in the campaign developed organically from that starting point. Those early sessions were a kind of calibration, helping me learn where the players’ interests lay, what kinds of challenges engaged them, and in what directions they wanted to go.

So, early on in any campaign, I focus less on outcomes and more on possibilities: rumors, locations, hooks, and the movements of important NPCs. I try to offer meaningful choices from the beginning and avoid pushing the players in any particular direction. That’s why I usually use the word referee rather than game master. I see my role as that of a neutral adjudicator of player decisions, not the director of a pre-planned story.

Prep a World, Not a Plot

This is foundational to what distinguishes old school RPG play from many of its later descendants. I don’t write scripts. I don’t plan story arcs. What I do is keep track of the world and what’s going on within it. I try to treat it like a living place, where NPCs and factions pursue their goals regardless of what the player characters do. That means I maintain a brief set of notes on major players and what they’re up to behind the scenes. When the PCs intervene, those plans might change. When they don’t, the plans proceed. Over time, this creates the impression of a responsive, persistent world. It also generates future material automatically. When the characters return to a location months later, they’ll find that things have changed. I don’t need to know “what happens next.” I just need to know what’s already in motion.

Reuse and Recycle

I rarely throw anything away. Abandoned adventure seeds, unused NPCs, discarded locations all go back into the toolbox. Long campaigns are full of unexpected turns and something irrelevant in session 10 might acquire sudden significance in session 85. Players, I’ve found, are especially good at reviving old material. They remember a strange artifact or an NPC they met in passing and decide they want to follow up. When that happens, I run with it. I can pull out my notes, rework them a bit, and reintroduce the material with minimal effort. I also try to repurpose my prep across sessions. I might reuse the same map with slight modifications, though I’ll admit, it hasn’t always gone unnoticed. A defeated adversary might return with new motivations and goals. I treat the campaign like a compost heap: nothing is wasted, everything breaks down, and over time it becomes fertile soil for something new.

Track What Matters

If you were to look at the piles of paper on my desk and shelves, you’d see that my campaign notes are messy. (Yes, I still use paper; I’m old.) But they serve their purpose. I focus only on the most important details, such as what happened recently, what major NPCs are doing, and what potential developments are still active. I’m not writing a novel, so I don’t need exhaustive recaps. What I need are reminders: what changed last session, what threads the players are following, and what might happen next if nothing interferes. After each session, I spend a few minutes updating these notes. Just ten minutes of scribbling down events and adjusting NPC status can go a long way toward keeping the world coherent and responsive. I also maintain a running list of future developments. These aren’t predictions; they're more like a menu of possibilities. This keeps me flexible while still being (somewhat) prepared.

Encourage Player Investment

This is a big part of how I’ve kept campaigns going: I reward player initiative with more material. If a player takes an interest in an NPC, I flesh that character out. If they pursue a particular goal or locale, I give them opportunities to do so. In this way, the players shape a lot of the campaign’s direction and even parts of the setting. I see my job as referee as more about expanding and refining what they care about rather than inventing new material from scratch. This approach keeps players engaged and takes a lot of the creative burden off me. When a campaign hits its stride, it feels more like a collaboration than a performance. Everyone is invested. Everyone is contributing.

Keep the Flame Lit

Finally, I try to keep the fire burning between sessions, if only a little. For all of my current campaigns, I have a dedicated Discord server. I post information, rumors, and questions for the players to consider between sessions. I follow up on unresolved plans. I drop hints about future developments. These aren’t elaborate, just enough to keep the campaign present in the players’ minds. A long campaign is like a slow-burning fire. You don’t need to stoke it constantly, but it needs a steady trickle of oxygen to keep going. This between-session activity also helps me gauge interest. If players respond eagerly to something I post, I know I’ve struck a chord. If not, I pivot and try something else.

In the End

By now, you’ve probably noticed that I don’t do a lot of prep in the traditional sense. Instead, I’ve tried to adopt and maintain a few good habits: stay flexible; let the world breathe; notice what the players care about; don’t panic when things go off the rails. And above all, show up and keep the game moving. Even a short session is better than none. Over time, those small sessions build into something enduring and deeply rewarding. So, these are my “secrets” to refereeing a long-running RPG campaign. They’re not revolutionary: persistence, openness, and a willingness to let the campaign grow on its own terms. If you can manage that, you may find, as I have, that years later you’re still playing, still surprised, and still eager to see what happens next.

(There will be at least one part to this series, because, in the process of writing it, I had some additional thoughts people might find valuable.)