I remember the first few campaigns. The thrill of discovery and what should I put my leveling into?
Now its more, "Can we just jump to the 'Good Parts' already?

How many people are still enthused to start at level one? Are willing to to play in the same setting, again?

I can only speak for my games  and My system.  with the   birth and eath of plat lines, and no forced  march? some of  our 'good parts' are down time.

 the  battles and conflicts   are also great, and? because of how  i use Mods, its hard to just 'build' to level up to somehting. Yiou need to have the PC ready for   life?

 so? it depends on the story line, plots lines  and   how much your players  are into it.  Great players make great games.

It could be that we've all 'done it before' too many times at low level. There's only so many options with a beginner-level character. As they 'level up', more and more options sprout, like a tree branching as it grows.

I like starting at Level 1. Gives me time to develop the character, let him or her unfold.

But then the game inevitably dies in a month or two or, as recently, multiple time-sucking family events and I'm left with a character I like that is going nowhere.

I can see where a lot of players here would like to simply cut to the chase.

my people start  at the beginning.. i may bump then  the 'latest bonus' points, but   vets  earned their  way, rookies  earn their way in. never had  anyone who was into the game complain...

I'm willing to start again, in the same setting. I love this hobby. I love these stories, settings, characters.

I also understand why many like to jump ahead a bit, or get some fun toys to play with. PBPs have a very high turnover rate; often, you start at "level 1" and don't get a chance to get too far before a game fizzles for any number of reasons. So for some that can burn them out.

Me? If someone will let me play in some D&D with a favorite Drow Monk or something, I'll get into character for the hundredth time without a second thought!

It's because the level you start at is likely the level that you'll be for the duration of the game.   With rare exceptions.

I absolutely love starting at 1st level and love the discovery of the world and my character. I also want the game to go slow and plenty of role playing opportunities. I also have no problem with playing the same setting over and over.

I don't tend to get tired of settings or that sort of thing, but...level one? Eh.

I wouldn't do it. Because, as Hunter mentioned above, "the level you start at is likely the level that you'll be for the duration of the game."

In far more years than I can remember, I can count on one hand and have fingers left over the number of characters I've had (in games that were level-based) that gained more than a level or two before the game inevitably fizzled out. I don't want to be stuck feeling ineffective for however long a game runs. That's no fun. I want to feel like my character can contribute. In things like D&D, that means level 3+, to me.

By the same token, I have literally NEVER had a D&D character level past 7 (on RPoL or otherwise), except in the rare instance where a GM was running a game of all level 20 characters (which was also no fun, because nothing at all was a challenge in any way), so maybe it's just my personal bias.

In reply to GreenTongue (msg # 1):

I'm a die-hard "Zero to Hero" player, and lean heavily into RP rather than Combat, like 75%/25%.

I've been in a couple rpol. games that lasted a year or more, but those weren't "character level" games  -  they were Amber games.

IRL, I've gone from 1 - 16th in 3.5, over the span of 5 years, and from 250pts to 750pts in a Champions game, over a span of about 9 years.

I've had my share of truncated games, where the character never got a chance to develop, and to me, that loss of being able to watch them grow, and overcome whatever deficits they began with, was far worse than not being able to "contribute" to whatever combat was lined up for the session.

Give me a broken character and a campaign, and I'm good.

I've discovered that around level 12 is the sweet spot for Pathfinder.   It's high enough you can do pretty much whatever you might need (including Raise Dead) but not so much that you tend to face-roll.

But level 20 games are fun, too.  ^_^

I don't understand what you mean by the 'good parts'? To me, character interaction with NPCs and PCs, the exploration of the setting, and trying to come up with some way of getting out of the trouble you have found yourself in are the good parts, and none of those are level dependent.

Yes, I am absolutely enthused to start at level one. To me, low levels are where a character's personality and traits are really developed, through how they deal with adversity with limited means, rather than an overreliance on abilities or items. Consequently, starting at 1st level is my preference, so much so that advertised games that start at anything higher than 3rd are a hard sell, and anything starting in the double digits is avoided. Those levels are something I want to play towards, not start at. And certainly, I would like to reach them. I do not mind a game that stays at low levels, but the DM should be clear that "the level you start at is likely the level that you'll be for the duration of the game". If that is the case, then there is no problem, otherwise, I would expect there would be reasonable advancement happening during play.

If for setting you mean campaign world, absolutely I would play in a favored setting more than once. If there is a D&D game in Mystara, absolutely it would receive an interest. The setting might be the same, but each DM is going to run it differently, and each game is going to have different players and characters. And it might be based in an entirely different area of that setting. So to me, it does not feel the same at all.

If for setting you meant a particular adventure, my answer would still be yes. Presumably the game is going to be more than one adventure, and again, it would not play the same anyway, so playing through an adventure again would be fine with me. I would be more concerned about the DM not wanting players who have already played through an adventure.

 Sight does strange things to people.

Okay, maybe its just me.

Do you ever get board with character creation?
in a word, literally, no.

1. Can I beat my last time, with a new character? Start here.  I've never created the same character twice, but wait there's more! Each time, whatever the system, it not only takes me longer than you sighted folks... some day we'll talk tables, and then you'll really love those eyes...   but I also have time scores in general character creation, but for different systems. 3.5 D&D is the shortest, simply because anything involving the SRD makes my life easier, and its the only srd that makes my life easier.
   
2. Character backstory. Give me five minutes, and I'll have a character history involving lovers, exlovers, family members, organizations, and the place he/ she grew up. The more DM details from the launch point, the longer this will be.  Never exactly the same.
   
3. Then there's the great question, how much of this do I fling at the DM... most don't want all of it.

Then there's the amazing feeling of "I'm in a game!!!!" This should be shouted at the top of the lungs, or imagined in all caps. Do not type it in all caps though. Yes, there's reasons for this, but we'll avoid them.

There are things in real life to which I've become jaded, but we won't discuss those here either, because they are utterly depressing things for most people.

I'm not sure if I'm jaded or just had my perspective warped by CRPGs and MMORPGs.

I use to love character creation, building a unique or interesting persona and putting together a backstory, but after countless times of putting all that effort into a character to have the game die or (as a former Cyberpunk 2020 gamer) have the character killed early on, I've lost a lot of enthusiasm for it.
Worse when you're asked to create a deep and interesting character and then you don't even get into the game (Happened on another site, not RPOL).

I doesnt help that in your average CRPG or MMORPG levelling up and getting better equipment is ludicrously quick - kill three giant rats and suddenly you're level 2 with a better sword and armour. You died? You dont need to roll a new character just respawn.
True, you dont get XP for Roleplaying on a computer, but the number of times the GM has awarded my character XP for roleplaying can be counted on the fingers of one nose. It's all about combat and saving throws.


I've started focusing on rules lite games like Savage Worlds or Tunnels & Trolls where I can throw a character together in 20 minutes with a basic backstory, and make the rest up as I go along if the game (and my character) survives.

In reply to OBorg (msg # 14):

I actually share a similar view, for probably the same reasons.   I can put together a character's stats in a relatively short period of time, but it takes me days to generate a decent background.  And you're also correct about another thing: how the character starts out often differs from how it looks once you've had time to actually play the character.

I love starting at level 7, simply because I played 5 games from 1st to 15+ and then never got to 20th (then). I had literally, literally literally, hundreds of campaigns that like clockwork died at level 7th. Oh we'd level TO level 7, but never do anything. The GM dwould introduce a plot and we'd either A. be like "Um, can we say no to killing a chaotic character just because they're a criminal" to "law" heavy game; or the GM would plan the "next" story as if we were in LotR, artificially saying "Gandalf was a 7th level wizard" no. If he were a magician hje wouldn't be arcane, and if he were arcane, he'd be sorcerer. A damn high intelligence, from age, but no; he was more like a wingless angel. A set in stone "spell-like" user. That through reincarnation remembered another life. One, literally one, dragon magazine issue said it, and it became gospel. I mention this because my GMs, back then, wopuld artificially make our level 7 characters feel like level 1 characters. Trolls, just, literally trolls had templates. Not some, all, not all we'd see, but literally trolls, in their world all of a sudden needed to be more powerful. That's just one example. There were games I would enter in the DM with an agreement that if they couldn't get to level 8, I got next DM trip.

I like starting at higher, because I've ran over 40 3.x games from 1st to 20th. I know it's more, because I only recorded the campaigns in 3.5, and some of those games while good, I just don't have as much good to remark on. The 40 I listed, some were more action, and some were more make up shit. Yeah, my players got to 20, but at least (looking*/-- literally can't was homeless, wrong Hard drive) so a least a few off the top of my head were 1st to epic, but non of the players reminise about That<i> game. I remember about...gaw, I'm so reliant on my list...I think eight excellent, four very good, maybe ten good but not great, and maybe another that were better than what the same players were playing, but just above "roll for inititiative" and "kill the dragon because...well...action!" Then like I said, some were more action and crisp. Eight months we did IRL meeting three solid 72 hours, in our youth, only stopping to eat and...aftereat...and that was it. No sleep, no playing cards. 72 hours or maybe 67 to 76 hours each week, for about 35 weeks.

So I wanted to start at 7th later on. I felt backstories of killin g Hezrou (Toad looking demon with blasphemy) were better than a 1st levbel character, and much better than goblin killed my village. I also like options, my players like having games with options. Magic users and warriors (excluding ToB) were at a crossroads were the paladins, monks, rangers, and fighters all had five level to get cool abilities, but casters were..casting! Not "saving my spells! in case I need to realize that's why I played a spellcaster" all these were reasonable for 7th level. Alot of prereqs that don't exist in 4e, and <I>mostly 60% to 70% not (90%!) don't exist in 5e, and in 3.5 improved familiar special mounts, druid companions, bunches of cool options existed my players and I wanted to have BE part of the BACK storyu, and not hope we'd wing it and make it happen.

We did, however, have two sessions of "playing" that was just talking, dialogue, of them narrating among themselves (or me when I played. That would come WAY later and more often) and agreeing on ther backstory that including not being fresh off the turnip field. BAsically, 3rd was 1st. If we played a "back to basics" there were no commoner NPCs, none...unless they were above ast level, or under minimum age EXCCLUDING addtional dice. So SOME orcs were 1st level commoners but also 9 years old. Some elves were commoners, butr they were 40 years old, could speak like a an 11 year old, but be pummeled by any 18 year old human that had just commopner levels. We changed that, the system had problem of wanting this rich backstory, but made zero things but rats, and cats, and things we joke about; at least everyone I ever knew, that "half level" PC could fight. Goblins could be beaten by just straight up die rolls, yeah it's split, but we never hear about a goblin shortage, and you'd think townthat DID .beat the goblins would, ya know, have leveled, and been able to form hatred of the unleveled goblins. Bascially we over thought it, and mostly...we just wantee combat, which is admittedly what most crunch is. Crnch in other systems resolves "conflict D&D is mostly combat as conflict. Conflict that isn't combat is quick and very messy and unsatisfy ing. Or long and tedious. Belive me, I tried an explorer game. IT got old suriving cold,getting food, climbing, swimming, OMG when one player asked "Hey, is it alright if I say....this isn';t fun" I remembering dropping my DMG (I was was looiking at weather) and just dropped it, sighing contented and saying "Yes!" I paused and read everyone's expression of wanting Blake, short lived, but great guy, to be given medal for saying what we were all thinking. So that game thankfully served a lesson that XP for NPCs can be good, suriving weather is a CR. As is killing CR 1/8 creatures. So...let it be NPCs, and do that as narration or exposition, and problems to resolve in game.

The answer is...yes. Most importantly, for me, because I played a level 13 wizard ion Living Greyhawk that had a 5 strength and faced eight modules were the worst (Great shadows, falling without Featherfall and needing to "climb" to catch my self, etc, grappling underwater and then siwmming, again, etc, I just mnetioned the swimming as OMG) I survived 8 instances whgere my character was toast, just utterly fruit salad, and my team, stranger IRL or llong time friends, even once a player that was the nerd that shaved, but gamer seat cracvk, and played knaves, the last of which was in the swimming, they all those players, put in their characters futures, as time investments that were sacntioned, and they pulled my 5 strength ass out of the fire, burning themselves and risking their certs
(Living Greyhawk was like the DCI of D&D. If you don't know, it was sort of silly, but it was "official": leveling. So you'd have paper proofs of modules you player with bean counting) anyway these players consistenty were GM (good mannered) and for the love of the team play, saved me going to 1st. I could, but enver had to, get a raise dead, but it feels bad. I knew players that that happened to, ;that couldn;t help but play with the rest of us at our APL (Average party leveL) as if they weren't just killed. They insisted (it';ll be fine!) and it wasn't 6th APL is easy, well...not easy, but if yopu played APL 4 you probably knew how to play APL 6, so very doabe, APL 8 is hard though. So I'd see a PC die at 8 AM, and at 5 PM they'd be 5th level and just look like compulsive gambler that bet their car as colleteral, and we'd pony up, but say "hey, we gotta either make new PCs, and work up to meet you, or we gotta play home games, and not LG together).

So yeah, I felt like I played about as hardcore as I could from 1st to 13th in LG, which is slow and meticulous. My homegroup only one player played LG, but we'd all play so often, for years, weekly at LEAST, we just like ropbust combat. At level 1, it's reasonable to heart "color spray, magic missile, sleep" and "assist to attack" or "assist to AC" or "bless, cure light, cure light, attack" and "power attack for 1. Attack. No power attack this time. Fight defensively. Okay power attack. Roll to assist heal" there were just patterns that weren't just optimal but realistically expected. Yeah charm person, but then wahat. Yeah diplomacy....but that's for YOUR char=acter. Eevn if they're helpful. Read that is applies to the diplomat. And Helpful is at best, at 1st level, going to make random stranger spot you 10 gold pieces in a tavewrn, at worse, piss off a rando to  start smack talking you. Sometimes it'd even og from smack talking NPC that the bard absolutely insists to "show manners" and rolls natural 4, not evena  1, and the ogre now isn't talking, just smacking.

So yes, I skipped to 7th for my players, and my own GMing that relied too much opn me being unfairly generous, or leavbing it to the dice, or avoiding combat. At 3rd level even, an orc could kill you. TWo could definitely. In 3e (not 3.5) this was notorious for the great axe *3 critical. at7th level, Gricks are no feat of might, but they're fujn to fight. A Troll can be fun, and I got to introduce my first fire giant which utterly wrecked an NPC, that the PCs liked so much they raised him, and essentially power leveled. A well guarded secret was his name, /had "kill" in it, and a play on words. Literally named him (I won;'t name him for IP reason, b ut he was meant to die) and the players saw the fire giant wreck the NPC and it was like my PLAYERS just leveled. They just saw raw damage, and askled sheepishly "Um...that's over 50 damage...um...does...wait! IS he still alive" Yes, he was "Okay....um...does he need...gawd...um...does he need to check for massive damage" and I'd purse my lips and just nod. "Yup, didn't think about that, that's true" and the NPOC made it. Bigh from the players "Second attack, onto..." NPC and the players /went from fear to rage. I have never had player physically fight me at a table, for any BS, but my best friend was so impassioned she stepped up and put her hand on my knee in teh chair, to show how she was (as a monk) kneecapping the giant and I felt incredible pain and juist cried out, to which my friend thiought that was the Giant, and the opther players were like "Anne!...stop" "Yes, PLEASE!" and it was like, okay...I am no longer going to assume LARPing is throwing paper fireballs. IT made for an emotional milestone.

Fighting with spells live slay living, havign raise dead be a PC spell cast upon NPCS that were unjustly dealt bad hand. Teleporting a distressed NPC, or just saying F-U to dragon and scrying on it to teleport in later. It felt more like game AND story. Dialogue dominated every game after, most sessions would be divided. It waas combat heavy or dialogue heavy session. Always, /well not always, but almost always some of both, ;but much more one than the other.

At 13th level, the first time I ran a game that high, I remember envying my players for hacing all thsi stuff, and I /was so tempted to make an NPC to "play" but no. Then the favored soul got 15th and asked if they could take leadership, with caveat, they wanted to have the cohort be an NPC that already was established, but sidelined. Because the favored soul's player, wanted to be a leader, he liked the tactical but also the chain of command leader in leadership. So I got to play a fatespinner wizard, and the bard was more friends to the fatespiner than the favored soul, but thje favored soul was his superior, his officer, not his friend or peer. Randal; (favored soul of Heironeous) was glorious and won many honors, and gave Sampson (the fatepsinner) the second in command for chivalry (Randal personally saved Sampson from execution by an anti magic mage coven) and war (Sampson wasn't a dam,age dealer, but had many divinations and other tactical spells Randal would direct him) anyway. I sampled it, and two of my players started a game at 3rd, and I got to play higher than 7th. I got play then on, under one of them for 5 major, major campaigns roll by roll on record, and 20 more than were excellent even if they didn't get to 20. Then of those, one, one single very unsuspecting "evil" game wwhere the evil mostly foguth evil, and did evil acts, but helped good people, but some of that evil untop evil, used neutral people in evil ways. Some do-gooder paladins might also have detected us and thought their god would save them...as it come to pass...that game starting at 7th went to 58th. That's (despite my innumerous others) not a typo. Fifty-eighth. If you might won der (wasn';[t that boring) No! But... YES! WE skipped some epic levels with droughts in monsters and level up abilities. I will say, it's good lesson. Wizards are tier 0 at 58th. Clerics at least are tier 2. Fighters, at least under a 3rd party book Immortals Handbook were tier one. ToB had nothing close to compensating for a fighter doing 800 damage PER attack, as a plus, not minimum, just the adder. The fact they critivally hit on a 17 and did *8 damage on critical m eant immune to spells or immune to criticals was the single definition of which team, team mental/social, or team physical, would play second fiddle. Sometimes though, yeah, we'd do 33rd, 34th, 35th, 36th and 37 th, but then go to 39th, and then 40th, but then go to...again I can't look! But maybe 44th, just so we had good CR alley and ALL PCs felt the level up, by hitting every PCs chart with at least one meaningful text that wasn't just plus integer.

After that game, we switched systems. We, I think more they, were going to go back to D&D, but I'd really fall in love with Exalted during these D&D, and finally on that big send off, I sort of felt like I'd gone to Mariannna trench and Everest in the same month. I prefer systems that havce conflict, even between allies, instead of mostly combat, and don't worry about levels, but instead focus or breadth. Crafting in D&D, every edition, artificers even, sucks. Serviceable if best, a slight discount at best. In Exalted...I feel like that can be side story, just making a magic item. I feel like what was pass or fail in 3.5, a skill challenge in 4e, and.. I don';t knwo what in 5e. I only played to ;7th. My choice, not any limit from the other players and GM, I just wasn't having fun, and they could tell. In exalted I feel; like that can be story, and have <i>some<?I> physcial combbat, or maybe some spells /to overpower, but also cause emnity, but lots of it is talking as players, and making small impacts session to session, but not just "oh they're convinced" or "No, you just don't make good argeuyment. You cvan retry next level" but instead you see the numeric willpower of having a ethical, or even financial disparity. Keeping a foe alive is often a debate from PC to PC, mine ands others. Are they now slaves? Turn them loose? Put them into a death camp. Forgive them. Indefnitely euthuinize them until we choose to wake them. Recruit them while redeaming them. "saving them" /by putting them into a prison but then forget about them, and start stacking up dozens of cells, where the only inmates are your foes that surrendered. As players sometimes we knew we agreed, but agrred our characters wouldn't have a small talk, and it would be a heated debate, so we'd roll out what's called "social combat".

Anyway, in most games, levels aren't a thing. Levels are prepackaged or fast food meals. Miost games are like a grocer or deli, or butcher or farmer's market. Some are also buffets, that have guilty written into them, but taste so good. In all these cases, XP is currency, not a binary of "below level" and "above level" it is spent on powers, skills, talents, perks, spells, attacks, backgrounds, reputation, so, 'so, so much though is "Okay, so you want to be 20th levek fighter. You start as starting character. You pick only combat 'stuff'. Congrats, there are some very powerful warriors that if you face will m,ay kill ytou, but most warriors will only have brief seconds to 'take a look around' and know every enemy you have will not survive, ;because you are an indestructible master of war" but then somone else can say "I want to be 20th level conjurer" and you say "Congratulations. You can summon most the mythical ungodly and quite legendary creatures. You will need only wait until you have the summoning (spell components) and you have the time (43 and 5e rituals) and you can summon these...for time...but it will take you time, and come with risk. That's what killed D&D for me. That feeling, of the OP. Systems I play, two specifically, they're built to let you be a master only outdone by the grand masters, in ;one ;area if you wish to be a laymen in all other ways. You also have characters that would be, by D&D 3.5, many 1st level classes, but feel like they have more "Levels" in some, but each has its own relative power, so more levels in D&D ina weak class maybe out done by a single level in a strong class. In other systems, you can have a learned all, mastered none character that has toolbox of perks, or talents, or just stuff. That's a thing too! I hate about D&D, that I can't unlearn, unknow. In other systems you can just start with like, 2o9th level magvic items, if you want, but that's what you are. Smart maybe not even, but otherwise Iron Man or Batman. Again, starting rules, minus the "plot characteeR" and especially genius. Batman without his intellect still has alot of cool stuff. Iron man and War Machine have a different user. But I love the scene in MCU Infinity War where War Machine is dropping cluster bombs after shield (not that shield!) is broken. I think Warmachines suit would be inferior, but more fun to play if I wanted to put one on with a single "get out of jail free" card. Starting, ast level, D&D characters feel like they are poor and inept and yet seemingly more powerful then most, yet having..honestly grind against 99% of creatures. 53 doesn't fix this by having levels not equate to difficulty numerics. A 20th level party against ten trolls is time consuming but forgone. It's either "what HP loss, and whjat spells spent?" and "how many more of these do we expect" or "What are we going to need before we have long rest? Are we going to face serious threat that we should string along this trivial combat but just rolling dice and conserving long rest..." stuff.

Play more realtime, and find a group you can feel comfortable to talk about starting level; GM included. Even if that GM is you. I did that, and can't go back and have that again. MY 20+ years long group finally parted. I have two friends I /play with, one online one is my roommate, Anne. Even the latter is deteriorating, and a matter of time. I colunt myself very lucky, but more determine than anything to play every level, and I did. A few games every single 1 to 20 beat for beat. Most though, I'd make four not 13 combats in level and every one would have serious severity; or I'd skip levels. I think, for D&D, if you want to get 7th level, that's a good goal. If you want to go from 7th to 13th, you might find that. Never, however, have IU seen a true 1st to 20th called prior. The opposite is true. Games that were meant to be short term went on for...basically the entirety of a user's time during a decade. Some I've seen have sweeping plots that went from 1st to 12th, and it feels way more like they played in a cut scene heavy game than a D&D battlemap game.

I think the answere, if if you get bored, is to look for people to compromise with you enough you feel you are starting small but growing quicker. Starting hggiher level isn't the only artificial means. You can increase XP, /or decrease antagonist threat levels, includuing HP. I despise this,  because it feels more like an ARPG then, even though I play some hack n slash, but if it helps speed up combat, especially on pbp, that might be good. quarter HP for "extras" 1/2 HP for sub-bosses. Full HP for long time antagonstist, but like two versus the entire PC party. Less GM rolls more PC rolls (that matter) helps too.

It kind of depends on the GM. If we're only "starting at 1" because that's traditional, but the GM doesn't have any particular plans until we get to level 3 or above, that's two levels of "Whatever".

I mean, level 1 could easily be lots of things besides "The low powered levels before you get to the fun stuff".

You could establish the flavor of the setting by having a few 'day in the life' side adventures before slotting in the beginning of the epic thing you're thinking about. (There are modules people have written where it's like "The Shire, if the Ring never came into it", and they're fun.

Or you could show how the intricate Game-of-Thrones court structure they're going to fight in works, protected mainly by 'killing your own servants is considered tacky and cliche' as a social rule.

You could run it almost as survival-horror, where everything can kick your ass or kill you, so you have to use different strategies than later, when you get your payback.

If you're running a military campaign, there might be loads of more-experienced characters around, and the challenge becomes finding ways to hang with them until you 'rank up'. And of course, those NPCs aren't immortal either, and you have to take their places.

And, if you were interested in this sort of thing, to me the defining part of a Film Noir sort of story isn't necessarily private investigators and fedoras and stuff, it's being out of your depth in some way.

It's the kind of campaign where we're walking down a road, the interesting part is at the end of the road, and the rest of it is us walking there, incidentally gaining enough XP to not die the second we get to the interesting part, that I find dull.

As to the setting, one way to 'refresh' it is to look at it as if you just bought the setting. Most settings from the 70s or 80s are a bit of a sketch-outline compared to what we have now, and for what I'm talking about, you might prefer that- with your abilities and knowledge, now, you can sort of "update" the setting.

Like, for fun and (eventually) use, I've been looking at Amn from the Forgotten Realms campaign. Really interesting place in the setting, but outside of the computer games, not really explored all that much. So, taking the cue that it's a bit like Renaissance Italy, a bit like Golden Age Spain, and using more definite details, I made it so someone playing in it wouldn't feel like we were playing in a rerun or a retread.

[For instance, "like Renaissance Italy" can include some really interesting things besides people hanging around doing court-intrigue. Just RL Venice alone had the Benendanti (a rural cult of people who believed they turned into werewolves to fight flying witches), secret police that citizens could simply drop notes to in mail-slots around the city, organized rioting as a sort of national sport, an intentionally-inefficient Inquisition, and so on.]

Alternately, you can use a piece of the campaign you didn't before. Like, (Forgotten Realms again) it has a Tibet analogue, it has three India standins, it has a steamtech Gnome kingdom and some stuff that's different enough to not have 1:1 comparisons. A campaign in that setting doesn't have to be set in Waterdeep. And (like the above) when you do get to Waterdeep, the GM and players can emphasize how weird Waterdeep is to them.

Basically, it starts with discovering new things about the setting, not just pretending you haven't played in it before. Obviously if you're using the kind of setting where all the lore is set in stone or there's really only one thing for characters to do, and people are going to start complaining the second you deviate from that, you're fighting an uphill battle.
This message was last edited by the user at 04:56, Mon 31 July 2023.

In tabletop, that's usually when you're the figuring character build and party dynamics.  In PBP, that's done before you even get started.