Do you include "beach episodes" in your campaigns?

The party gets up to some R&R at the beach, with possible whacky and/or sexy hijinks ensuing.

My dude

I ran one which could qualify as a beach episode, it ended when the parties minotaur
barbarian tried to have sex with a horse then got his ass beat by the yuan-ti bouncer.
after that I decided my party wasn't mature enough for R&R

youtube.com/watch?v=0pvXcOKJH1M

Sometimes. I mean, I refer to them as beach episodes but they're just comfy oneshots with the characters, unrelated to the plot and the things happening. They're mostly things about exploring a city like a tourist, tasting local foodstuffs and experiencing the place's night life and whatnot.

Some other times they go around shopping and upgrading their stuff, or chat with patrons at the local tavern. Not everything in these sessions isn't useful, but they're mostly dedicated to downtime and relaxation while we eat pizza and take it slow for the day OOC.

It's nice to break from the mold every once in a while and let out some steam with them, specially because after that you can fully commit to the rest of the plot or whatever since you don't have any background noise to take care off for a while.

Start it like a standard resort vacation, end in murder mystery.

Neither of the ones I'm running do for very different reasons.
One of them is Only War, so R&R is heresy.
One of them is an RP-centric PF game where the PC are the guard in a very cozy town of monster races and it's basically turning out to be Stardew Valley: the Tabletop, so a "beach" episode would be redundant.

Yes actually. At least with my group, they get pretty worked up when tension has been high for a while. I'll sometimes square away some time for low key nonsense that's meaningless to the campaign but re-establishes normality and develops character.

The newest guy in the group didn't like it at first, I'll admit. He wanted to be dungeon smashing 24/7. But I think he's coming around after seeing how it 'resets' people to be ready for the next block of action.

Of course! They're always fun.

Also fun but usually a little more overt about what the intention is.

Not beach episodes specifically, but we will run filler sessions if enough people can't make it to progress the story. My MAID group actually played a filler game just tonight.

The entire castle thought my character was pregnant because she tried to smuggle a wineskin of cider out of the kitchen under her apron and got caught by the ditzy catgirl, who misunderstood completely. My character thought she was just caught and in trouble and it took the master calling up the castle physician to have her looked at to get everyone on the same page. Usually the stuff we play is pretty straight-faced and serious so it was nice to just screw around for a session.

The idea of a monkey mountain god who's in charge of hotsprings is awesome and I'm going to steal it

is there a good example i could watch/read?

Gurren Lagan's is pretty good

jesus christ im not watching anime

Then why are you asking about beach episodes?

Where do you think we are?

Not any more. The last time our group had down time we started a race riot as a means to make some quick cash. Our GM never gave us down time again.

Yea, that's the only way I can imagine this not being dull as shit. Certainly characters want downtime, but there's no point in playing that out unless something makes this particular downtime special and interesting.

Playing out event-less R&R sounds about as unengaging a playing out a day working at the character's day job or playing out taking a shit. Just because the event happens doesn't mean you need to play it.

you should watch gurren lagann, its only 25 episodes and its hype as fuck.

If too many players are absent for a session, I'll do silly little just-for-fun adventures for the players that do show up. Beach episodes are one of them.

>25

It's 52

wtf are you on about

>jesus christ im not watching anime

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Gurren_Lagann_episodes

27. 42 if you count the parallel works that have at best a tangential connection to the plot.

as far as anime goes thats pretty fucking short

Fine I'll watch Gurren Lagann

People may treat it like a joke, but it's actually a pretty easy way to throw some levity into a campaign, and it can easily be one of the more memorable sessions.

We used to have beach episodes. This thread actually reminded me that we haven't taken the time to have one in a long time, and now we're all off to die with no time to get comfy.

Came to post this.

None of my campaigns have been near a beach. Closest thing has been a harbor.

Though a one shot for a silly beach game could be fun

Yes.

Always enhanced with variant of shark attacks if frisky or killer whales if feeling murderous.

Also crabs everwhere

>my two years long campaign did not have a beach episode but it did have an onsen episode (wherin relatively important stuff was discussed)

I am glad to have read this, user.

Yes.

A beach episode is where my now-shirtless adorable neechan loli said to the party "Don't be silly, boys don't wear bikinis"

Now that's something, was it a PC?

Yes, mine and was lying about being a boy

No.

Did tranny janny already make a snarky passive agressive post out of not being able to show off his hideous hon-bod at the beach?

>tfw your campaign has had not one, not two, but three hot springs episodes

well we've been playing for years now so yeah

Not yet, but having some low energy sessions is good to break things up, recuperate and have some silly stuff and roleplay.

>Not wanting your drill to be the drill that pierces the heavens
Absolutely plebian

We had a (public) bath episode that was ok, but it was inferior to the time our party had a Christmas themed episode

Normally no. I don't run campaigns with the same sort of tone as shitty anime aimed at horny teenagers. If I'm with a good group (ever rarer, as I get older), I can see such a thing being fun, leading to interesting and enjoyable situations. But only rarely. And I don't tend to run campaigns where something like that makes sense. Very few beaches in the depths of space.

The characters that are in the higher social classes will have bath house scenes to plot major events including:
>establishment of a new city
>creating a trap for a black dragon
>expirements that violate laws set forth by the gods
>pre-war planning
>plans to purge a spider-race and the city’s first religious jihad
Sexy and awkward bullshit always happens, contrasting the significance of what’s about to go down

Watch anime.
Yes it is that unoriginal.

Not a full episode, but we did visit a dwarven baths in Gauntlgrym once. We'd been being chased by drow for the better part of a month, so the break was awesome. Apparently my married half-orc attracted some amorous attention from a few dwarf ladies but he was too busy relaxing to notice or care.

Meanwhile they laughed at the elf ranger and his tiny manhood. The tiefling got all embarrassed, it was cute of her. The bard was out shopping. A good time was had by all.

Do hot springs episodes count? Because yes.
The second session I ever ran, in fact. It featured naked elf dong.

This. Had one in the game I'm in. Complete with a dick measuring contest between an elf and dwarf.

Yes.

They're called Hot Tub Intermissions.

There's a huge public hot tub in their colony they all sit around in, with a small handful of visiting NPCs, and they plan. Just about every single terrible act they ever wrought had the help of their little hot tub drink-and-bullshit times.

Obviously the elf won in length and the dwarf in girth, right?

>Implying your world has beaches where the water isn't mercury and the sand isn't a high explosive

Man, I always wondered what it would feel like to have a big 'ol vajayjay.

My larp group is going to the beach this weekend actually

Usually not.
I prefer not to push my luck with piloting skill rolls whenever possible.

youtube.com/watch?v=JdKI1wj-JpI

What kind of creature has blue cum?

Yes but only in anime games like Anima or L5R.

Had this too but it was secretly the episode that introduced of the main antagonists and resulted in the death of a PC.

>We had a (public) bath episode
My game is set in the ancient world, public baths are just normal locations of meetings and shit.

Yes, beach looked like this

Yes, because I only play with trusted players I can be assured will not make it weird. Innocent sexy hijinks /light "fanservice" is fine, no rapey shit allowed. I also tie it to the plot along with being an R&R break for the heroes.

How would y'all do a beach episode in Shadowrun?

What kind of pleb does that? Hot springs are where it's at.

no, I play games to have fun and I don't really see the need to combine all of my hobbies with masturbation

Depends on where they're at. If they're in Miami, every episode is a beach episode.

No

>What kind of creature has blue cum?

>How would y'all do a beach episode in Shadowrun?
In VR

Hamutaki, Monkey God
God of hot springs, inns, hospitality, and travellers.
Statues of seated monkeys with their right hand out, palm up, grace the entrances to springs, bath houses, and inns across the land, beckoning weary travellers to rest and recover.

It's mandatory.

Mein nigger.

In the first campaign I ever played in, the GM had us end up in Ravenloft for what was meant to be a couple sessions for a Halloween episode, and we ended up staying there for a year's worth of sessions.

Not specifically, but some downtime here and there is important.

No, you you never have either.

Because everyone is like you and everyone's groups are like yours?

I had a campaign where the party seized a tropical island and used it as their home base. Every time they went home was a beach episode.

I think he's saying that OP doesn't actually play games and just makes vaguely lewd threads on Veeky Forums.

Oh. Well, in that case, yes, OP is just a dumb fetishposter, but there's no reason we can't turn a dumb fetish post into actual Veeky Forums discussion.

Yeah. They're a good way to wind down after big serious shit goes down, and can be a nice opportunity to have the players interact with NPCs in a more casual, relaxed setting.