Dungeons & Dragonsoffers infinite ways to use its rules and systems to design unique campaigns in a world of magic, swords, and gods. One type of campaign that doesn’t require a lot of work to adapt to D&D is the idea of time loops.
This is resetting the party back to a specific point in time over and over, trapping them in an endless loop only they are aware of. These types of campaigns offer a unique tabletop experience for veteran players and new players alike, and don’t require reinventing the rules to work as intended. Here are a few tips for integrating this concept into your campaign.
8Make A Timeline
The most important session note you will be constantly referring to in a time loop game is the timeline in which the loop takes place. This includes NPC schedules, major events, when routes are closed, and objects lost or stolen.
This will also be what note-taking players will be focusing on, establishing the timeline themselves so they can learn to navigate around it. you may streamline this process by improvising minor events and random NPCs. Just make sure you jot down anything you add as it will become a part of the loop.
7Allow Players To Fast-forward
Unlike traditional campaigns or one-shots, your players will be re-encountering dungeons, specific conversations, and reacquiring the same loot over and over. To make this process far less tedious, allow your players to fast-forward through sections they have already completed or survived.
In the world of the game, the characters will know the exact right words, actions, and where to strike during specific encounters, making rolling checks and saves redundant. However, always pause in scenarios where a check has failed before, allowing characters to adopt new strategies that could alter subsequent loops.
You should only fast-forward through sections if the party decides to do the same exact actions at the same time as before. Visiting a lord in the evening to have a conversation normally held in the morning might have crucial variables to consider.
6Design The Source Of The Loop
The goal of the campaign is likely to discover why the loop is happening and how to end it, lest the party forever relive the same day or days over and over. Establishing the source of the time loop, who made it, and why the party is able to retain their memories will inform the rest of the campaign.
This is also how you will beable to spread cluesas to the nature of the loop itself, which players can track down one at a time to unlock the final picture. Or rather, the source is apparent but impossible to reach without careful preparation and the right equipment gathered during a final, perfect loop.
5Inject Anomalies
One way to break up the monotony of fast-forwarding loops is to stop every so often to include a strange occurrence that would jump out to players after dozens of resets. This can be an NPC ordering something unique, a new creature soaring overhead, or spell effects appearing differently.
This is also a way to add stakes and include a sense of urgency, making NPCs disappear forever as the loops begin to wear down reality. Mostly, these anomalies serve as hints as to the nature of the loop, providing clues about what it affects and why.
4Plan Around Loop Resets
One of the first things to consider while designing a time loop campaign or one-shot is what causes a loop to reset and how long the loop lasts. Maybe it resets every time the party sleeps, forcing them to stay awake as long as possible while riskinglevels of exhaustion.
If the loop resets after a certain amount of time, ensure the players always know how long they have left and how long specific encounters might take. If the loop resets on death, then the danger of encounters will increase, now that death has far less of a consequence.
If the loop resets on death, an extinction event could also serve as a specific time limit.
3Make Loot Accessible
One of the main aspects of a time loop is that everything resets except for the character’s knowledge of the loop, including their wounds, money, and gear. This introduces an interesting problem for players, as they can’t stock up on new equipment and coins.
However, they will always know exactly where to find it and how to get it. This is a mechanic unique to time loop games, where your players must pick and choose which equipment they want for that loop, sacrificing time in order to obtain specific amounts of gold and magic weapons they might need.
You can also designate certain items as cursed or blessed, allowing them to be removed from the loop and always equipped.
2Create A Rival Party
In time loop stories, the one aware of the loop has an immense amount of power. Relatively normal NPCs might believe the characters are clairvoyant demigods, able to perform expert feats with ease and convince anyone of anything.
To balance this, havinga rival groupor antagonistic characters who are also aware of the loop creates an interesting problem for players. They will have to adopt new strategies to avoid these figures, setting traps or dropping misleading clues as to their goals.
1Use Media As Inspiration
Ever since the movie Groundhog Day was released, the number of time loop stories in media has grown exponentially and has been explored to death. Each trope uses the idea in unique ways that provide interesting takes on the origin of time loops and how to escape them.
In Death Loop, a single antagonist also aware of the loop constantly attempts to foil your plans, acting as a sort of BBEG. In Outer Wilds, you can technically solve the loop right away, you just have to search for the clues that unlock the mystery of what you always have access to.
