Stephan Hornick
Community Goblin & Master of the Archive
Platinum WoA
Wizard of Story
Wizard of Combat
Borderland Explorer
Hear Ye, Hear Ye! A Simple Way To Improve Gameplay, Engagement & Character Outcomes
From JohnnFour | Published November 22, 2021
Roleplaying Tips Newsletter #1,181
Brief Word From Johnn
Here's a refreshed tip from Roleplaying Tips Newsletter #5, going way back to 1999 right before the world was going to end with Y2K.
Too often we become trapped in our heads thinking three moves ahead, doing math, or coming up with names and details on the fly.
If we make the effort to be still and quiet while GMing, and listen to our players, we get valuable information to mine for our campaigns.
Below are tips from Issue #5, updated for modern times.
Listen & Mine Player Feedback
I’ve taken more conflict resolution, active listening, customer service, and employee communications courses than you can shake a stick at.
There’s one skill I’ve picked up from all this, though, that has truly made a huge difference in the quality of my roleplaying and game mastering:
Listening to my players and echoing their words and thoughts back to them.
Doing this offers several boons:
- Encourage roleplaying by incorporating player words and character actions into your narrative.
- Players will feel heard, appreciated, and respected.
- Have words and actions actually affect play beyond what the rules dictate.
You’ll find the quality of roleplaying in your sessions will shoot way up too.
For example, here’s two versions of player + GM interaction during a combat scene:
Scenario #1 No Feedback
GM: The kobold measures you up and down, snarls, and draws his short sword!
Player: What?! How dare he assault the great Roghan! I raise my bastard sword two-handed high up in the air, unleash a blood curdling scream, and charge headlong at the foolish creature!
GM: OK. Roll initiative… You win, roll to hit… Great hit! Roll damage… The kobold dies horribly!
Scenario #2 Feedback & Reaction
GM: The kobold measures you up and down, snarls and draws his short sword!
Player: What?! How dare he assault the great Roghan! I raise my bastard sword two-handed high up in the air, unleash a blood curdling scream, and charge headlong at the foolish creature!
GM: The kobold flinches at your blood curdling scream.
He nervously brings his small sword up to parry your headlong charge.
The creature is so intimidated that you automatically win initiative. Roll to hit and add a +1 bonus because of your mighty overhead swing…
You land a mighty blow! The creature howls, fear written all over its snout. Roll damage…
The kobold is cut down in one blow with your bastard sword.
The creature didn’t even have time to beg for mercy as, at the last moment, it sorrowfully realized it was completely outmatched trying to defend its family.
Great attack! How do you feel?
As you can see, I hammed it up at the end to try to make the player feel a little remorse — undeserved or not, it’s always great trying to draw a player reaction — but the essence of the point is there.
The player gave such a great attack description that I had the kobold react cowardly and gave the character a couple of perks by way of the automatic initiative and attack bonus.
This rewards the player for good roleplay and creates a better roleplaying experience for everybody at the table.
And don’t just do this for combat either.
Anything and everything the players and characters say and do can be embellished, reacted to, and rewarded (or penalized).
Seek Out the Nouns
If we pause and get out of our heads to listen to our players, we can not only improve roleplay, but change our game, too.
Players tell us what they want.
We need but listen to glean great hooks, inspiration, and portrayal ideas.
To make our listen quest easier, because we still have to think three moves ahead, do some math, and roleplay our NPCs and monsters, focus on one type of thing to start:
Nouns.
Pay attention when players mention a person, place, or thing.
Those become grist for your hooks and plots.
If players are interested enough to mention something, take note and find a way to bring it into play.
If players aren't mentioning nouns in their descriptions, questions, or roleplay, take that as a potential sign to add more such content to your campaign.
Note my general axiom to introduce a new NPC every session. Get into that habit and you'll have a full Cast of Characters in no time, and lots of material now for players to use.
And whatever — or whoever — they mention, you take that as a vote to include in future sessions.
Turn them into 5RD seeds, encounters, and narrative detail.
When players hear the stuff they're interested in come up in-game, they'll follow your thread!
So listen hard for nouns.
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