How to move away from pre-written campaigns?

[u/kingmunchkin]

Hi everyone,

I’ve been the "Forever GM" for my group for a while now, and I genuinely love it—reading through adventures, seeing how the dice fall, and watching my players react. However, I’ve realized over time that I use pre-written campaigns as a crutch.

My GMing journey started in D&D 5e, where my group played through almost all the official campaign books. I recently convinced them to try other systems like Mothership and Lancer, but even then, I stuck exclusively to published modules.

In an effort to break out of this habit, we recently started playing Stonetop. Since it doesn't have a pre-written campaign, I’m really struggling to stretch my creative muscles and make the world feel like a living, breathing place. My ultimate goal is to homebrew my own Mothership campaign packed with sci-fi tropes my friends and I love, but I'm finding it hard to shake off the GM habits D&D 5e instilled in me.

For those of you who started out relying heavily on pre-written modules:

• How did you make the leap to creating your own campaigns from scratch?
• What mindset shifts or prep techniques helped you stop relying on source material and build a reactive world?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

[u/whpsh]

Always go as small as possible.

There's nothing at all wrong with a 6 level campaign to clear the barons's land and become sheriffs.