Sustained or long term games

[Khador]

So I just wanted to ask people a quick question about how to maintain long term games,

I am running a game of L5R, which originally was supposed to be a short 10 sessions but the games have gone so well with players wanting to continue.

Now the main theme is the players are working for the Ivory Champion as essentially the cities C.I.D and the players enjoyed it so much that they want a long term campaign which I have a half baked idea for a plot.

The question itself is as this will be the first time running something that is longer than one plot arch, what are the best ways to flesh out the game without ending up with folders upon folders of files?

[PlasmaCow]

My Dark Heresy (warhammer 40k) Skype group is well into it's 3rd year, probably approaching it's 4th actually. The main thing that's helped keep it going so long (aside from a changing membership, only two of us have stayed the full length, but another of the original 5 has recently returned) is the fact that the role of GM has rotated for each campaign. I am currently GM in what is our 6th storyline.

While not the sort of advice you're after, I think this rotation of GM helps bring in fresh ideas for challenges to set the group.

[RedNightmare]

I ran a D&D Eberron game for 2 years once. All the players changed throughout, but it was one consistent story.

I would say take it slow. Don't introduce new things to quick (at least not things that will pop up again later) so you don't have to keep track of to many things. You also have the advantage of making little stand alone mysteries, some of which end up tying together and others don't. Not everything needs to be connected, some crimes can be about shining the light on one of the PC's, others just stand alone altogether.

[JustHarms]

Good advice from both posters above. Might as well share some of my experience as well.

I almost exclusively run long campaigns (2+ years on average), and the most successful ones have been the player driven stories. I tend to sink most of the prep hours into defining the setting and first arch, while keeping the overall plot vague (you are space mercenaries looking to make fat stacks). A well-honed initial arch lets you know what you and your players want and how they respond. From there if you stay flexible the encounters will design themselves and the players will keep the campaign running because they're doing what they want to do.

Mechanically, GDocs is a GM's best friend. It helps to make a simple people and place appendix and timeline to jot down notes at the end of the each session. So a year down the road you're looking for plot hooks and remember that your crew's wannabe playboy mech pilot had a very nice date with officer Briar that could have been perfect if an attempted gang abduction hadn't been pencilled in for the same night. Maybe he should give her a call back.

[Prospero101]

An alternative method to those suggested above is to keep your game somewhat episodic in nature. Not necessarily have everything reset to zero at the end of every session, but work with a series of defined arcs as opposed to one long, sweeping one.

Alternative to the alternative, you could have an episodic game that nests inside a longer story arc, which is common in TV drama these days.