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So it happens to the best of us on occasion, that time you end up due to often no fault of your own, within an endless void of RPG fans, Its just you and a buddy/partner/significant other to run games on those one or two special nights of the week. My query is what do folks think are the best ideas and styles of game to run when that happens.

The reason for this thread is yes, that is the position I find myself in, in fact have done for the past five (approaching six) years, with just myself and my wife playing each week. Its probably why so much time has gone into things like WoW, as apart from those rare occasions, my two player RPG's seem to struggle. Without the group the GM (ie Me) is left with a much larger voice cast to worry about, and has no down time as other players discuss ideas or chat IC amongst themselves.

Don't get me wrong I've run some awesome games in that time and I can cope with running groups, some of my Werewolf games I've run the other four members of the pack and the other npcs, but my game turnover seems much higher atm. I've also noticed game burnout is much more common. Oddly when I had a RP group back in cornwall I ran a two player game with her on an alternative night that lasted two years and was probably the most epic game I ever ran. So I know we can run a good two player game, but I do find much more strain with constant two player only games and with the sixth year approaching I am finding it much harder to focus on a good story.

It also makes running RPG's themed around a solid group all the harder, and trying to control two or three group members to move the game along sometimes causes more problems than it solves. So I also raise the additional question, are any other fellow RPG nuts here on Dakka experiencing similar issues, or have done in the past. Any thoughts, or ideas that folks could throw my way, as although I have no desire to stop playing, I am starting to run shorter sessions, and I'd like to find my former grove.

Of course it may well be general burnout, I've had it before where I needed to take a few months off, as this year marks twenty years of being GM/ST/Dm in all our RPG groups, can count my player sessions on one hand.

If folks want to chat about their own issues, please join me in discussion, we may find some answers within.

I've only had one experience running a 2-player game. I was the GM, and my friend was playing two different characters.

What I found interesting is that fairly soon he started referring to one character as "I" and the other as "they" (ie. "I will do this, and then they will do that"). From a psycho-analysis point of view, I thought that was fascinating.

It worked quite well, as I had written a fairly solid scenario from the outset, but I can't imagine running any more than 2 characters per player. That would get to be a bit too much.

I must admit it one thing I have not considered, having her run more than one character.

Its certainly something to consider, although she does get very deep into character when RPing so it may or may not work.

Certainly something to look at in the future though, so thanks for the input.

I still think it might be difficult as only having on person managing all of the PC's eliminates alot of the political-self interest aspects of a party. A player will, as mentioned above, favor one character over the other. The only scenarios I can think of that run really well as a single player is very environmentally driven ie dungeon crawl. These are the only scenarios I've run that have been at all satisfactory with a single player. That might just be my shortcomings as a GM, though....

I don't give the other player more PCs, but I do give him/her a lot of aid through NPCs. It's the type of character that the other player has chosen that determines what kind of NPCs are lent to the temporary group. Usually they fulfill whatever shortcoming the character might have relating to combat or its effects (I.e. such as a medic or a bodyguard).

Robert is right, though, in his statement that it is VERY difficult to have any sort of complicated campaign or scenario with just two players. You need at a minimum of 3, so that the players can converse and figure things out. Any conversation the PC will have with your NPCs will be you trying to help her without giving it away, so it just isn't going to work quite as well.

I've often run a character while GMing. I love to overwork myself though :/ You have to remember to run a low intelligence, quiet or somehow socially deficient character to make it really work though (otherwise you solve your own problems). You can kill off your own character to add a heavy mood to any situation too, though at that point it becomes an NPC if you don't handle it well. It depends on the player a lot too. One on one gives you a chance for someone to actually notice the subtle details that often a large group completely ignores because they're too busy strategizing/joking amongst themselves. You have to have seen a good movie or read a good book about how one guy goes out and does something. I think it gives much greater chances for character development.

I've run a two player D&D game back in 3rd edition. It was surprisingly fun actually! You don't have to worry about keeping everyone happy or interested or balanced against each other. There aren't any group conflicts or power struggles or the like. Basically you can work with the PC to weave whatever story they want.
In my case, my friend played a Rogue who eventually took over an entire city (in terms of starting an underground Thieves Guild). It was great to see them move up from pickpocketing peasants to assassinating figurehead priests to ambushing trade routes. This wouldn't have been possible in a multi-person group since it focused SO much on his one character, and was at a different pace than most people are in to.

Heh, the majority of the ones I have run the other player has taken at least 1 level of Rogue. Makes things so much easier

Don't get me wrong it is a lot of fun and we've been happily playing two player for a long time. I do think I was suffering some burnout to Werewolf the Apocalypse as well when I posted.

I say that as I started our first two player Dark Heresy game two nights ago and I'm quite enthused again.

She's basically running a Stranded ex Imperial Pilot from a MARS Battleship that crashed onto a Hive world near the Eye 100yrs ago via the warp. She with two others arrived in a escape pod five years ago (it launched from the ship as it was spiralling out of the warp to meet its fate) and she's since taken up work as a Assassin hunting down critters.

Basically for the time being shes playing a 'Necromunda' style game, but as it progresses it will turn out she is part of a Rogue Trader family by birth and then its will upscale to Rogue Trader.

She already found a Dark Angel Land Raider in the underhive from an old battle during the Heresy and this will lead to some 'fallen' issues in her near future.

Like a year ago me and a buddy of mine, were playing 3.5 dnd and it was just the two of us. One of the things we did was that we both had characters and we also switched of being the dm. For example, for a couple of weeks I would dm and my character would just be in the background (mainly to help out in combat), and my friend would play his PC, and then we would switch off, the next couple of weeks he would dm and his character would be in the background and I would get to roleplay my PC. It was pretty cool, cause I would dm and have an idea of where the adventure was going and then my friend would dm and we would go off in a completely different direction, and then I would dm again and go off in another direction. If you can try it, it was fun and sharing dm duties helps both of you from getting burnt out, plus neither one of you will know completely where the adventure will go.

A few years ago I played Dnd 3/3.5 as a lone player and a DM.

Two styles of games worked well, one where I played a single character, often a rogue/ranger/druid type, the kind of character that works well by themselves anyway. These games were great as the DM could focus on the goals of a single character, the plot was alot richer and the game ran alot smoother as there was no need to discuss what to do next.

The second style that worked well for us was to have me running the leader of a party while the rest of the characters were run by me but took a back-seat when interacting with NPC's. I did try to have a little PC to PC interaction when it seemed appropirate. Games like this were great as you could chop and change who you are going to control at any time. Not only that but if you do have more than two people turn up there are plenty of characters that the guest could pick up and run with.

Personally I prefere playing with a larger group or as a single character, but in many game systems a single character isn't very survivable so the DM will need to go easy on you or throw in some NPC help.

Greasy.

I've played some small group D&D before (3 people) and am looking to start some 2 player Necromunda with my wife.

I am glad to see that 2 player RPG's are possible over the long term

Personally, whenever I have been contemplating 2 player RPG's, I've always thought of playing a PC to guide and form the story initially (to then gradually fade into the background/leave the group/etc once the story is underway and the other person is more sure as to what they want to do), and an NPC to help with combat.

Though these plans are always based on playing with my wife, who is a novice to RPG's. I don't personally know what could spice things up for you both... perhaps drawing up random roll tables to determine missions, layouts, challanges etc?

Is it possible to run a RPG similar to how Bioware handles RPGs on PC and Console?

I just finished Dragon Age, and it seems to work fine when one PC is guiding the plot-line/story.

All the Party members/NPCs have their own agenda but work within the frame given by the Player's story.

If the GM and Player work together on gearing/leveling up the NPCs, I think it could work well.

Also, the GM would need to do some of the heavy lifting in combats, similar to the scripts the NPCs do by default.

For example, each has tactics, basic if then statements that they follow when the situation comes up. I can see this working in a 2-person game.