Hello everyone,

For those that have run "gritty realism" campaigns, I'm curious how many sessions/hours they ended up running.

How quickly in your experience, does that style of play wear players down to where the novely wears off and things become "unfun".

Thanks!

You're asking a question on a false premise, that "gritty realism" leads inevitably to unfun.  That's just not true.

It may not be your cup of tea, in which case don't play that style.  But plenty of D&D is played with a "harsher" reality in terms of injury and illness and food and shelter.  It's not the default mode in 5e because it insists on "further consideration" when adventuring which may interfere with how much the PCs get to do what many think is "the good stuff" (combat with relatively low stakes as long as some PCs make it through the encounter and exploration with little cause for trepidation).  It's a sort of dynamic where "planning" will likely take a lot more time than "executing" said plan, which many tables seem to be allergic to in D&D but gritty realism is a form of fun that some folks eat up. 

I've played many games outside of D&D and most of them have a significantly higher (or technically lower) grit grain.  Cyberpunk, Alien or maybe Call of Cthlulhu would be readily available entryways into the mode for the curious (at least the PDFs of Alien, that is, that physical batch of books I ordered is taking forever).  We played till the game itself played out narratively or external circumstances outside of game necessitated wrapping up or permanently suspending the, never stopped a game because it was "unfun", because as a GM it's my "job" to pick rules systems and stories that my players will enjoy.  I'm also adept at throwing new systems at folks and causing fun they didn't think would be happening.  I'd go so far as to say a DM who thinks their game is wearing down and becoming unfun is blaming the wrong thing when blaming the system or tone.

I run Gritty Realism outside of “dungeons” and normal rest rules inside of dungeons in order to make wilderness travel and such make more sense time-wise while still challenging resource management. The campaign has gone weekly for 18 months. 

Are you sure you don't mean to write DM's who let players kill themselves by their own decisions versus DM's who smurf everything so the party always wins?

As someone who loves putting my characters through the wringer, I love the gritty games and have played an original campaign for over two years. My character is the only one who has never died (Prays to Ioun that this trend continues), but the players at this table love the game. We only had to put it on hiatus because everyone at the table works in healthcare in some capacity and, as you can imagine, getting everyone lined up for a session is difficult, especially my ICU friend.

I will say though, that there is a difference between gritty realism and a DM that makes players roll until they fail. There is a distinction there that I think is hard to identify for some. Gritty realism where you have to treat a grievous wound until it is fully healed is awesome, rolling skill checks until you fail and the DM can pull your PC apart is not fun.

I think trying to put a single set of rules under "gritty realism" is where the question falls apart.  Our group hand waves some stuff, but watches others.  We don't pay TOO much attention to encumbrance, but we are pretty strict on rest rules, and any combat will cause interruption.  We don't usually run into food issues, as we carry rations and in one we have a Ranger who religiously goes for a brief hunt while we set up camp, offering a bit of fresh food to supplement rations.

I think, on a whole, you'll find vastly different ideas of what level of realism qualifies as gritty and the same for how long any campaign, regardless of what realism level, lasted or fell apart.

Quote from Erriku >>

I will say though, that there is a difference between gritty realism and a DM that makes players roll until they fail. There is a distinction there that I think is hard to identify for some. Gritty realism where you have to treat a grievous wound until it is fully healed is awesome, rolling skill checks until you fail and the DM can pull your PC apart is not fun.

Important point, some folks think "gritty realism" means "adversarial DM".  It doesn't.  Sure some of the "hard core" rules associated with gritty realism are often found in the toolbox of the adversarial or sadistic DM, but the way I feel "gritty realism" should be played is that the environment is just another adversary and the DM's role is to facilitate the PCs negotiation that environment.  Gritty realism does not mean the DM sits down with a plan to kill the party.  Rather, it means there's just a lot more to think about if the party wants to make it home in one piece.

Quote from Falwith>>

  We don't usually run into food issues, as we carry rations and in one we have a Ranger who religiously goes for a brief hunt while we set up camp, offering a bit of fresh food to supplement rations.

Does the Ranger ever fail at that?

I think, on a whole, you'll find vastly different ideas of what level of realism qualifies as gritty and the same for how long any campaign, regardless of what realism level, lasted or fell apart.

Another important point.  My "gritty realism" style also makes pragmatic logic for the sort of adversaries I can throw at players.  In a gritty realistic setting, an expansive puzzle trap dungeon out in the middle of nowhere defies plausibility.  Most structures they encounter are build around some sort of function besides providing a drain on attrition against PC resources before the BBEG.  Sentries are set up at entrances to sound alarms if assaulted and if the alarm is sounded, the structure will either respond via counter assault teams or evacuation with rearguard actions, or maybe send a negotiator.  The hardest room in any "dungeon" in a lot of my games is ... basically the lobby,  Prisons are the only places where it's easier to get in and harder to get out of, because they;re designed to keep things in.  I guess true "bank vaults" work both ways.

To answer if the Ranger ever fails, thus far, no.  She's proficient in Survival, so gets a boost to the roll and so far the dice have been kind and she always brings back a little something.  As said, however, we all carry some rations, but have been advised that if we spend a week eating just rations, it's going to have an impact.  In the non-Ranger-ed campaign, we have been in towns and settlements often enough for it to not be an issue so far.  Also on that one, we are in a spot where we were cycling a level of exhaustion, since we didn't have enough members for a full rest with watches for a time.  That was interesting.

We tend towards real-ish, I would say.  Outright lunacy isn't allowed or attempted, but we also aren't held quite as tightly to gritty details as a more hardcore table might play.  The balance, so far, works well for us, adding some level of planning, thinking and resource management to avoid negative effects.