How long is a session?

[Munindk]

I realise that there are a lot of factors here, number of fated and so on, but how long is a session supposed to last? Are we talking 2-3 hours, 5-6 hours? more?

I'm mainly asking as the Fated are supposed to advance after each session and in the published Penny Dreadfuls I think it will matter if my players advance 3 times during the first act, because I've run short sessions.

 

[Omenbringer]

I would say that it depends upon your group. Some groups can push 5-6 hours, others struggle to manage 2-3 (life and all).

With that said I think what you are asking is how often should you provide advancement for your players. To this I would say, whenever the players accomplish (or fail) a major story plot point instead of each time you pause the game. Approach the Penny Dreadfuls as a short novel, where some chapters advance the characters, and others simply advance the larger story.

[zeeblee]

My group tends to be the 2-3 hour variety. I usually provide at least one point of experience at the end of every session, but only provide pursuit advancement/destiny steps every few sessions as it is plot relevant.

[Munindk]

I was thinking that the developers had a time frame in mind for each act when they wrote the Penny Dreadfuls and my question was a way of fishing for that

[Mason]

23 minutes ago, Munindk said:

I was thinking that the developers had a time frame in mind for each act when they wrote the Penny Dreadfuls and my question was a way of fishing for that

 

Generally, I consider one session to be "resolving a destiny step for a character," which generally takes place each time everyone sits down to play.

Most Penny Deadfuls are meant to be a "One Act per time everyone sits down to play" sort of thing, but sometimes players really get into their roleplaying or a combat takes longer than usual and things have to be split into multiple sessions.

When that happens in my games, I generally just say "we'll pick up next time" and spread the "session" across two different instances of people sitting down to play the game together.

 

If you feel like you want to give your players some extra XP like zeeblee noted above, I think that's fine, too.

[Grimcleaver]

7-10 is our usual block, though we've been known to push that back to 11 or 12. Not too often though. Folks gotta' work in the morning.

The developers have said before that about 4 hours is what they had in mind when they talk about session length, that if it's much shorter or longer than that you may want to change things accordingly.

[hdz]

more like 4 hour top for me. if my fated really enjoy the session and really want something more i put a bounty with just a little RP going to 6 hours

[RenoGM]

The days of the 8-hour game session are way behind me! Our group stays in the 4-5 hour range (the price of everyone being in their 40's I guess!).