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Having watched the first episode of Critical Role Campaign 4, it is clear that describing this latest venture as "West Marches-style" was somewhat misleading. The new Dungeons & Dragons story set in the realm of Aramán, designed by Brennan Lee Mulligan, vows to be an epic and enjoyable journey, yet the first episode shows it won't follow the West Marches structure.

What Defines a West Marches Campaign

Campaign 4 features an expanded cast of 13 players who will take turns at the gaming table by splitting into three rotating groups. Although rotating players is a fundamental premise of a West Marches campaign—first pioneered by game creator Ben Robbins—the real execution and structure differ significantly from what the show is offering in this newest season. But, if you are intrigued about West Marches and want to know why it might be a great option for your own game, continue.

The Origins of the Player-Rotating Format

This style started as the backdrop for a campaign led by Ben Robbins, who also designed the games Microscope and Kingdom. To address the frequent problem of varying player schedules, Robbins introduced the concept of not maintaining a set group. Because he could select from a big pool of players, he let them to arrange sessions freely. Once a sufficient number of players agreed on a date, the game would proceed as needed.

Using a rotating "group" is great for players: It doesn't matter if you can participate weekly or once a month, you will always have a spot at the table.

For a DM, though, it demands a specific approach when building the campaign. West Marches is, at its core, a sandbox campaign where players explore the world without being bound to an overall plot. At the conclusion of each session, they go back to town to recover and organize their next expedition. This is necessary to enable DMs to run a game with rotating players and ad hoc scheduling. Imagine designing a large, epic narrative, packed with villains, factions, and plot milestones, but without knowing who the main characters will be at each session.

Why West Marches Avoids Plot Cliffhangers

I'm sure every DM has experienced a session end on a massive cliffhanger involving a particular character, only to discover that the player could not attend the next session. It's like if Frodo had to leave Mount Doom for a moment before tossing the Ring. West Marches avoids this by effectively removing the main plot. However, that isn't to say a West Marches-style campaign has zero narrative.

As stated by Robbins: "There was background and interconnected details. Tidbits found in one place could provide insight elsewhere. Instead of just being an interesting detail, these clues lead to tangible discoveries."

The Way The Show Diverges from the Sandbox Approach

Initially, I thought a comparable approach would occur with Critical Role Campaign 4, with the mythology of the world emerging naturally and slowly through players’ actions in each episode, but I couldn't be more wrong. Episode 1 is strongly charged with pre-existing lore, and there is a powerful, dominant plot that guides the characters. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but West Marches offers a pretty different gameplay from many D&D campaigns, one that is worth trying at least once.

Advice for Running Your Personal Sandbox Campaign

For my first, long custom D&D campaign, I started from a concept like the classic The Keep on the Borderlands D&D module, which subsequently influenced Robbins’ first West Marches. After an introduction, the players were placed in a frontier town, a classic "last outpost of civilization" environment. From there, they have the chance to explore the surrounding wilderness, either prompted by quests gathered in town or by their own interest. This method of play is strongly focused on places, so if you're going to try it, make sure to fill your wilderness with interesting locations to discover. The last thing you want is your players saying, "Today we want to investigate the enigmatic ruins in the Swamp of the Dead," and you have nothing prepared.

• Personally, I like having a defined plot in my campaigns, so I also disseminated several hooks for an main narrative, both in town and in the wilderness.
• I believe that complete sandboxing and aimless dungeon crawling can become tiresome after a while, but Robbins raised an important point in this aspect when he explained the genesis of West Marches.
• "The reason in designing it this way was to address player apathy and unthinking 'plot following' by placing the players in control of both scheduling and what they did in-game."

Finding Balance in Every Campaign Type

The lesson here is that regardless of the style of campaign you're playing, it's important to find a balance between your responsibility as a DM in guiding the narrative and players’ freedom. Whether you're designing a intricate death maze for a classic dungeon crawl or shaping the fate of the world in a narrative-heavy campaign, consistently think about what your players may want to do. You prepare the table, but they choose what to eat.

Why Now Is a Perfect Moment to Start a Sandbox Campaign

It might be the ideal time ever to launch a West Marches-style campaign. D&D’s latest starter set, Heroes of the Borderlands, is a comeback to the Keep on the Borderlands, offering the ideal foundation to draw new players into this format. An add-on recommends how to more effectively connect the different quests in the set, but you can also run this as the core of a sandbox campaign and develop it as it continues.

In fact, the most interesting element of the original West Marches is the collaboration between the changing players. The town tavern had a map of the nearby areas etched into a table, where groups included information and drew new areas as they found them. This not only meant that players could help each other even while not playing at the table at the same session, but also that the world of West Marches evolved organically as the players ventured through it. If you're a DM who is trying to create a homebrew campaign or world for the first time, West Marches could be just what you need.