GM burnout is a real thing. It happens to the best of us, and trying to force yourself to keep going only makes it more and more likely the game is just going to die completely.

Be honest with your players. Tell them that you're not feeling it and that you need a break, and discuss with them other options. Maybe one of them wants to run a oneshot or a short campaign, or maybe the whole group would be okay with taking a month break or so, giving you time to regenerate and reassess the situation.

>>47854834

WHY is the spark gone, though?

Is it your players?

Is it you?

And if it is you, are you sure you even like the hobby from the GM's side?

If it's neither, and it's the game, have you put thought into how you can reclaim what you enjoyed?

>>47854834
This guy knows what he's talking about.
>>47854869
I'd suggest trying to get someone else to run a short game and putting your current one on hold. Playing a game instead of running one is a great way to rebuild that urge to GM.

>>47854834
Try to get one of your players to run something instead or just call it off a few weeks, do something else in the meantime to get your head back together!

>>47854834
Try to sit down with your players and discuss what you all want to get out of role-playing and DMing.

The modern incarnation of pen and paper role-playing with the emphasis on plotted out campaigns/adventures and fine-tuned encounters for a very specific type of progression and combat focus is frankly really, really rough on the DM, it's borderline inhumane.

>>47854834
I've been GM'ing since 1978 so i know that this happens. It's unavoiable. GM'ing requires a state of mind and, sometimes, you can't get into it for some reason.

The best medicine for me is to tell the players. Tell them you want to take small break but, during that time, you'd like to play in someone else's game. If someone steps up, great! If not, then they really don't care enough for you to be worked up over it.

Play in the new game and be a model player. I can't help but think how I might do things differently but I never say any of it unless I am specifically asked for help. Eventually, I think all the thinking about how you would do things differently turns into creative thought which becomes motivation.

Don't rush back when you get to that point. Let the other GM run his story. Look for a logical place to take a break and, well before it comes (like at the end of a story arc you can see coming or something), give the gm a heads up. Maybe he wants to go a bit further than that or he has some surprise planned. Agree on some timeframe for getting back to your game.

As he runs his game to the point you've agreed on and, I use this time to prepare for the return to my game. By the time it comes, I am thoroughly prepared and ready!

All the preparation during times when I'm seriously motivated and expecting the return to your game has generally fueled my campaign arcs for months of actual game time

I like my campaign, but I fucking hate the current plot arc I'm doing. The party is already a bit more than halfway through though, should I stick it out or wrap it up?

The party would probably rate it 6/10 atm, while I rate it a solid 2/10 and I want it to end.

>>47854927

Not OP, but I've had a similar thing happen to me, and for me, it was that we had a long running campaign arc, and in both my and the players opinions, each new campaign was better than the last one, up until the very final one.

Mind you, my last run wasn't bad, but I really, really exceeded myself with the one before it, came up with something beautiful and brilliant that I couldn't recapture at will.

And I don't know, something about going backwards sucked a lot of the joy of it out of me, and I never did come up with a resolution to the long running arc I was happy with. I still get calls every so often from the core group asking when I'm going to finish the arc.

>>47854834
Get laid
It helps.

>>47854834
If you are not having fun you should stop. You can always come back to it later.

That being said, there are a couple things you can do to prevent this from happening.

First of all, don't just run games every week. It's best to alternate with another GM or be part of a different gaming group, so you play as much as you run. And ideally, have the two games you're part of be different settings and different systems. That will help keep you fresh.

Secondly, do not run long games. A game should have a plot and purpose, a beginning, middle, and end, and should last six months to a year, then be over. Then you move on to a very different game, different genre, different system, new NPCs and characters, new story. That will prevent you form getting burned out. A lot of people in this hobby will run, you know, generic Dungeons and Dragons every week for three years, and of course they burn out on it. You have to keep changing stuff around to keep interested.

>>47854834

"The spark"? You bitching about a spark? Enjoy your spark when there are no players and all that's left is that 'spark' weak as it is. If you have players, you play. People get busy, have kids. Get farther away and have jobs. There will come a day when you'll WISH you had just one day and even two people to roll dice to fuck your spark and fuck you.

>>47856888

Roleplaying games are meant to be fun for everyone, including the GM. Go fuck yourself. If you're not feeling up to it, you don't have to do it.

>>47854834
You should, at the very least, take a break. If you can muster up the energy, you should run a session or two to wrap things up. You don't need to finish everything (like the last episode in a TV series), but at least wrap up the part of the campaign you're on, tying up some loose ends and providing a good pausing point (like the last episode of the season in a TV series... when they aren't being dicks and leaving you with a cliffhanger). There's a chance that you'll never pick the thing back up, so the least you can do is not leave people in the middle of things.

A break may do you a lot of good, and make the campaign feel like less of a chore. Maybe after a few months to a year, you'll be inspired again, especially since you won't feel the campaign responsibilities hanging over your head the entire time (which is to say, a month that you put off playing doesn't renew you in the same way as a month of vacation, where you know from the outset that you won't be playing and don't have to trouble over it).

In the interim, play something else. Ideally, get somebody else to run something, even if it's a one-shot. Failing that, maybe branch out into war games, strategic board games and so forth. Or maybe run a one-shot or short arc in an RPG that's completely different. Do Paranoia or something. Or a space game if you were playing fantasy before.

But if you keep playing the same game you're burned out on, you'll make yourself miserable, the quality of the campaign will suffer, and at a certain point, you'll end up quitting anyway, but it'll be much worse than if you walk away now. And it may take you years to get over it in that case. So tell your players what's up and take a fucking break, for god's sake.

>>47854834
Have them sell it to you.
For a high death campaign have each player take a turn as GM when they die with you as Grand Master of the campaign and a player.
Make up new stuff that fits with the old campaign.