Latest / Sessions Canceled / Managing Your Games Spotlight: Ep. 173

Transcript

Managing Your Games Spotlight: Ep. 173 · Sessions Canceled

• 0:15
  Hey everybody. So we were set up for a pretty
• 0:17
  good session today. And then for some reason, I just
• 0:20
  feel like the GM kind of ignored the rest of us.
• 0:24
  Like his new girlfriend. Like she was doing everything.
• 0:27
  He was crazy, he was getting all these roles, and I'm pretty sure
• 0:29
  he actually got a bunch of loot that she definitely didn't roll
• 0:31
  on. But it's fine I guess.
• 0:34
  I don't know, I just thought it was kind of weird.
• 0:35
  So we just kind of got bored and left, I guess.
• 0:39
  The session was cancelled. It's always the girlfriend.
• 0:45
  Always the girlfriend. JKI bullied my girlfriend in my
• 0:50
  games. Oh, it's so funny.
• 0:53
  The amount of times where it's like, so baby, take it another
• 0:57
  hit. She's just no favoritism.
• 1:00
  Cool. That's fun.
• 1:03
  You're like, yeah, yeah. Shame.
• 1:07
  So funny. Listen if I show any.
• 1:11
  Favouritism. You all get mad so I opposite.
• 1:14
  It's true, I have to bully her instead.
• 1:17
  You know it's funny, Aunt does the same fucking thing.
• 1:22
  It's, you know, it's, it's a choice, it's a move.
• 1:26
  I was going to say it's a good solution.
• 1:28
  I don't know if it's a good solution.
• 1:29
  It's a solution. Well, it's great, right?
• 1:30
  Because. Because now Cass has her
• 1:32
  revenge, she's run the game and now she's bullied Ant.
• 1:36
  There you go. It's all come full circle, baby.
• 1:38
  Here you go. Anyway, welcome back to the
• 1:42
  Sessions canceled podcast. It's me, Isaiah, and I'm here
• 1:45
  with Josh. Yep, I'm I'm like choking and
• 1:49
  dying a little bit. It's fine.
• 1:50
  I'm holding in a yawn so bad. Took a took a sip of some drink
• 1:56
  and it like went down the tube and I just I was, I'm having a
• 2:00
  moment. Anyway, well, so today I had me
• 2:07
  think right, because on Monday do with Fran ran Part 2 of what
• 2:12
  seems to be a three parter in the monster hearts one shot that
• 2:16
  we're doing. And I don't know if you felt
• 2:20
  this way, but it it felt like there was times when because we
• 2:25
  were all trying to do our own thing and like, figure our own
• 2:28
  shit out, it seemed like Fran was having a little bit of
• 2:34
  trouble, like maintaining pacing and, you know, trying to keep
• 2:38
  the four chuckle fucks in a relatively close enough position
• 2:41
  that they could interact with each other consistently.
• 2:43
  You know what I mean? And I feel like a lot of the big
• 2:48
  events that she planned things like the the pageant, you know,
• 2:52
  the thing with Cody, Alex and Jackson, etcetera, etcetera, she
• 2:57
  had to like speed run those bits, which is unfortunate,
• 3:00
  right, because clearly she worked really hard on them.
• 3:02
  She did really good on those bits.
• 3:03
  But like I felt like the the spotlight was a little
• 3:07
  fractured. And it's not her fault.
• 3:11
  She's a new GM, you know, and was busy trying to keep the
• 3:14
  wrangle on us chuckleships. But I think it's interesting to
• 3:21
  see it from the other side, AAGM, who's trying to get the
• 3:28
  hang of the system and not just our roles within it, right?
• 3:32
  Us as players, as like pieces in the story machine, but the GM
• 3:37
  themselves as sort of the arbiter of the story.
• 3:43
  And so while I was perusing the Reddits, I saw it's so funny
• 3:49
  that I'm like actively on Reddit now, but anyway, you know, I
• 3:54
  just read it things. I was perusing the reddits and
• 3:58
  someone brought up a problem they're having with one of their
• 4:02
  players stealing all the spotlight.
• 4:06
  And I, you know, I I post that if you wanted to see it, but in
• 4:10
  not I don't think any of us did that particularly except I don't
• 4:12
  know, maybe me. I feel like I always feel like I
• 4:14
  talk too much, like I just try to exist as little as possible
• 4:18
  until like I find a good spot and then I will exist for a bit
• 4:20
  and then fade back into the shadows.
• 4:24
  But I think it's worth bringing up for new GMs and people who
• 4:28
  are less familiar with running the idea of the spotlight.
• 4:33
  And of course, for those of you who don't know, the spotlight is
• 4:36
  like a colloquial term for moments in the narrative when a
• 4:38
  particular character or plot point is the target of focus.
• 4:41
  Think about framing in a camera in a movie.
• 4:47
  I thought it would be good to sort of talk about that and how
• 4:50
  to or, or or how to. But you know, perhaps some
• 4:55
  strategies by which AGM or aspiring or otherwise can help
• 5:00
  sort of maintain balance, keeping all their players and
• 5:04
  very much the stuff that they want in the spotlight all
• 5:07
  present and accounted for with equal importance before we do
• 5:13
  that. Just take a moment to think it's
• 5:17
  it's kind of funny that you're like, you know, the spotlight
• 5:19
  like when the movie, when the camera is on somebody, a movie
• 5:22
  and you didn't go with when the actor on stage has the spotlight
• 5:26
  on him, which is where the phrase comes.
• 5:28
  From No, yes, I, I do. But I think you're very similar
• 5:31
  where you think about sessions in terms of like a movie like
• 5:36
  you, you, you sort of, yeah, I, I visualize a camera.
• 5:39
  I do I think that. Came most smoothly to mind.
• 5:42
  It's just funny to use the phrase spotlight and then not
• 5:44
  talk about plays, which is where it comes from.
• 5:48
  I yeah, fair enough. Like you're not wrong.
• 5:51
  You're not using it wrong. It's just like a weird, it's one
• 5:53
  of those, it's like, it's like the floppy disk being the save
• 5:56
  button, you know, it's one of those weird anachronism.
• 6:00
  Yeah. They, there's a, there's a term
• 6:02
  for that. What is that called?
• 6:04
  Idiosyncrasy. No, no, there's like a.
• 6:06
  Word for an for for. An an item or a phrase that has
• 6:12
  maintained usage but has no tie to its original usage.
• 6:18
  God hit the the save button is is literally that right?
• 6:22
  The save button is a floppy disk, even though we don't use
• 6:24
  floppy disk anymore. It's like that that concept has
• 6:27
  a has a word for it, like can't remember what it is.
• 6:32
  It's just that's kind of what you do with spotlight.
• 6:34
  I just thought it was funny but. Yeah.
• 6:40
  Before we get into it, though, please follow us on your podcast
• 6:43
  platform of choice, appreciate that kisses, and maybe zip on
• 6:48
  over to our coffee and help feed Brett.
• 6:52
  We're running out of crumbs. He keeps forgetting to say this,
• 6:55
  but there's a link in the description.
• 6:57
  I was gonna fuck it this time. All right, well.
• 7:01
  Too slow this fucking guy. Yeah.
• 7:08
  Now generally speaking, when you're running a tabletop game,
• 7:13
  it is the player characters themselves that will be taking
• 7:16
  up the majority of the spotlight.
• 7:18
  The party itself will always be the general focus and the thing
• 7:27
  that typically drives the plot. While when characters go off or
• 7:31
  personal moments or other inter character dialogues, a lot of
• 7:35
  that is to advance personal objective and that seems kind of
• 7:40
  self-evident. And you might be asking why
• 7:43
  describe any of this? What's the point?
• 7:48
  Because I thought it was interesting.
• 7:50
  That's really it. I just thought it was kind of
• 7:52
  like a fun thought study to sort of work through.
• 7:55
  And Simply put, because in practice, finding that balance
• 8:00
  for who holds and shares the spotlight and how long they do
• 8:03
  it and all that fun shit is a key factor in my greatest and
• 8:11
  eternal enemy in the running of games.
• 8:13
  Fucking pacing. That thing I can't ever figure
• 8:15
  out for some reason. And my mission this episode is
• 8:22
  to discuss the usage of the spotlight, framing, narrative
• 8:26
  focus, etcetera, and how to better handle giving each
• 8:31
  character adequate time. That, to be fair, does not
• 8:36
  always mean equal time. We'll get into that later, but
• 8:39
  adequate time. No, it definitely does not mean
• 8:41
  equal time. In fact, it I would say often
• 8:44
  doesn't mean equal time. Yeah, it's it's it is a bit of a
• 8:52
  misnomer to believe that every character must share perfectly
• 8:58
  equal, well, shares of spotlight or, or of narrative focus.
• 9:04
  That's not really true. It is an ideal you want to
• 9:08
  uphold, but it will always vary depending on party.
• 9:12
  Well, I don't actually think the idea of the equal spotlight is
• 9:18
  virtuous. I think, well, OK, let me
• 9:25
  rephrase that slightly. I don't think the idea of the
• 9:29
  equally shared spotlight in a session is virtuous.
• 9:35
  I think that's an important distinction here.
• 9:39
  There the idea of the spotlight focusing on a particular player
• 9:44
  slash player character for an extended time on a session by
• 9:49
  session basis, I think it's fine.
• 9:52
  The thing that I think you need to be more worried about is when
• 9:55
  the spotlight is on a particular character over extended amounts
• 10:00
  of sessions or all the time, That's when it becomes a problem
• 10:04
  because the idea of for the next 3 arcs, we're interacting with
• 10:10
  Goromaru's back story. So Goromaru's going to have the
• 10:12
  spotlight on him for the next three sessions or so.
• 10:14
  For this arc. I said next three arcs.
• 10:17
  I meant to say next three sessions.
• 10:19
  We're focusing on this arc. That's not.
• 10:24
  I think that's fine. So the idea of trying to make
• 10:26
  the spotlight perfectly even in that scenario, I don't think is
• 10:29
  necessarily like a good thing to like strive for.
• 10:34
  But OK, we just did Goramaru's back story for three sessions
• 10:39
  now. There should not be another
• 10:41
  three sessions that are also focusing on Goramaru immediately
• 10:44
  after that. Instead, you should flip to, OK,
• 10:47
  now we're going to deal with Senna's stuff for three
• 10:48
  sessions, right? I think that is much more
• 10:51
  important because if you think about it in the context, like
• 10:55
  you were just saying of ATV show or a movie, an episode of a show
• 11:03
  is going to be like, you know, this is the what's like a good
• 11:11
  come on, brain, let's kick it into gear a little bit here.
• 11:14
  Oh, OK, here, let's use the Hashira from Demon Slayer.
• 11:16
  This is kind of a weird one, but it's what came to mind.
• 11:18
  I don't know. It's where we are.
• 11:19
  The Entertainment District arc. We're talking about Tenzin.
• 11:23
  Tenzin's the Hashira of the moment.
• 11:25
  He's our guy. Tenzin's the dude.
• 11:26
  We're really focused on Tenzin after that arc.
• 11:29
  He becomes a background character the next arc,
• 11:31
  immediately after we get Kanoroji.
• 11:33
  And I always forget Miss Kid's name, even though I like him.
• 11:38
  Toto, Toto. Miss Tashira.
• 11:42
  Anyway, Miss Tashira, I can't think of his name.
• 11:44
  I don't know why. I'm I'm going to, I'm going to.
• 11:48
  It's really not that important, but I'm going to Google it.
• 11:52
  Right the next arc after Taquito Muchiro Muchiro Taquito.
• 11:57
  I knew it was some Luchiro Taquito anyway, right?
• 12:01
  The the the arc immediately after we got the love Hashira
• 12:04
  and the miss Hashira are the focus, whereas before it was the
• 12:07
  sound Hashira, right? Like that idea, if you take it
• 12:10
  in a show context of from arc to arc or episode to episode, you
• 12:14
  have different characters that are kind of the main character
• 12:17
  for a little bit. You know, it's a little
• 12:20
  different in a show, obviously, because TV shows have literally
• 12:23
  main characters, which we want to avoid in Tabletop.
• 12:26
  But the idea of this player is the main character for this
• 12:32
  chunk of time I think is fine. Get what I'm saying?
• 12:36
  Yes, very much so. And if I just jumped ahead too
• 12:41
  far in the notes, I'm sorry. You mean?
• 12:43
  Yes, but it's fine because it is something I want to bring up.
• 12:47
  I have, I have different ideas on it, but yeah, fair enough.
• 12:54
  Where was I right? I think a fundamental aspect of
• 13:01
  understanding how to utilize narrative focus is really to
• 13:07
  understand your relationship with it as the GM, right?
• 13:11
  Because it is, for all intents and purposes, you.
• 13:16
  You are the camera. You are the mouthpiece by which
• 13:19
  all information in the campaign is given.
• 13:23
  Not accounting for like minis and maps and shit like that.
• 13:26
  You are the camera. Yes, and it is.
• 13:32
  Funny phrase. Which is true, right?
• 13:35
  No, it's true. It's totally true.
• 13:37
  It is through AGM setting of scene and and creating
• 13:41
  interactions with characters that the game is played.
• 13:45
  And yes, there are GM systems that GM list listens that exist,
• 13:48
  but for the sake we're not going to be focusing.
• 13:51
  On. Mostly because we haven't played
• 13:52
  any of those. It's true.
• 13:53
  I want to. I really want to play Haunting
• 13:55
  on Hill House. That seems really fun, but I
• 13:57
  haven't done that yet. I'm a little iffy on if I'm if I
• 14:01
  have any interest in GM list systems.
• 14:03
  I'm going to be honest, I've heard about a couple.
• 14:05
  I know how a few of them work and I'm like maybe?
• 14:08
  It's something I want to, I want to look into because just to see
• 14:12
  if we're ever like back in Colorado or something.
• 14:15
  And, you know, you get that, you get the itch.
• 14:18
  You want to be able to, like, pick up and play, right?
• 14:20
  You don't have to like, I mean, but I know we're going to be in
• 14:22
  Colorado for five days, but give me a week to plan this one show.
• 14:26
  True. Yeah.
• 14:27
  I mean, one GM list system that has definitely piqued my
• 14:29
  interest a little bit is Alice is missing for sure.
• 14:33
  Oh, I've heard of that. I don't know anything about it.
• 14:35
  Though it's a the premise is that you're all friends with
• 14:38
  this girl, like you as the players are all friends with
• 14:41
  this girl, Alice, and she is she's missing and you all have
• 14:46
  to text. You all have like rules of what
• 14:49
  your character like is and their relation to Alice and you all
• 14:53
  have to text each other to like figure out the mystery and like
• 14:57
  why she's missing. You can't talk.
• 15:01
  There's no talking. You only text each other.
• 15:04
  Oh, that's cool. Yeah, it's a weird vibe.
• 15:07
  It's by fucking I. I think it's by Spencer Stark
• 15:18
  who wrote Daggerheart. I think.
• 15:22
  Oh. Think.
• 15:23
  Don't quote me on that. That's kind of sexy.
• 15:26
  Yeah, yeah, a lot of people talk about that one a lot.
• 15:31
  A lot of it is Spencer Stark. I was right.
• 15:34
  Yeah. OK.
• 15:35
  A lot of game designers bring up Alice's missing, but yeah,
• 15:42
  that's a gemless system. All right.
• 15:45
  Definitely going to look at that one.
• 15:50
  It's what does it say? Every environment that you
• 15:53
  describe, every set of dimensions you give, every
• 15:56
  character that you embody take up a portion of the narrative
• 15:59
  large. And every time you interact with
• 16:06
  the game at all, you're adding to the overall runtime of the
• 16:12
  story. And clearly, if you focus on any
• 16:17
  particular aspect for too long, you suffer from bloat, right?
• 16:21
  The runtime increases, increases, increases, increases.
• 16:24
  And that you know, 6 month campaign is now 4 years long and
• 16:29
  you have no idea what you're doing or where the plot is, and
• 16:31
  you're just confused and scared and want to be done with the
• 16:33
  whole thing. Inversely, if you focus on any
• 16:37
  of these sections too little, you're going to find out pretty
• 16:41
  quick how fast your prep notes just evaporate in front of your
• 16:46
  eyes. I've been in both of these
• 16:48
  situations. Both are terrifying to a point
• 16:55
  that Josh brought up, though right now that we've sort of
• 16:57
  pushed past, you know, the understanding of the spotlight
• 16:58
  in general. There is a common problem that
• 17:03
  happens when people begin to run games, which is that you are
• 17:10
  always going to have a favorite player and a favorite character.
• 17:16
  Yes, a little little known secret I'm going to share with
• 17:19
  you. Every GM does this and they if
• 17:21
  anyone tells you otherwise, they're fucking liars.
• 17:24
  Every single GM has a favorite character.
• 17:26
  Every single GM has a favorite player.
• 17:28
  It could be you, the player who read the GM is like 100 pages of
• 17:31
  world building notes. It could be fucking the one
• 17:34
  person who, who is the, the, the, the lore, the the rules
• 17:38
  index. You look at that one player and
• 17:39
  you're like, how does that work again?
• 17:40
  And they just, they've just memorized the book.
• 17:43
  It could be the, you know, quickest person on in on the
• 17:47
  draw when it comes to interacting with the game, that
• 17:49
  one person that the GM sort of sets up as the de facto plot
• 17:53
  delivery service. And you can always look at that
• 17:56
  player and go, all right, so you're going to do the mission,
• 17:58
  right? And they're going to go like,
• 17:59
  Yep, I'm doing that mission. You go, nice, that's me.
• 18:04
  And this is also true. It could just be the character
• 18:08
  that the GM thinks is fucking coolest.
• 18:12
  That's a tough one. That's a toughie when you're
• 18:14
  like, ah, fuck, I really like this character's vibe.
• 18:17
  Shit. And then someone's really
• 18:18
  excited about their other character and you're like, yeah,
• 18:23
  yeah, I I try not to do this. This is this is a sad.
• 18:29
  This is a sad, but it's I've definitely had that Where where
• 18:33
  certain characters that people have have made.
• 18:39
  I'm like, yes, that shit. That's the coolest shit.
• 18:42
  I can't wait to figure out what that's about.
• 18:44
  And then other players have given me stuff and I'm like, I
• 18:48
  don't what the fuck am I going to do with this?
• 18:54
  Oh oh you mean like like giving you a good like back story idea
• 19:01
  or something like that you just don't know how to work it in or
• 19:05
  or like what? Text you like it's, it's like,
• 19:09
  you know, if you're playing, if you're playing Cyberpunk, for
• 19:16
  example, right, and everyone's doing their St. samurai and
• 19:18
  their net runner and all this shit.
• 19:21
  And then you have the the, you know, weird hot head, super Zen
• 19:31
  naturalist person who doesn't have any Chrome and won't have
• 19:34
  any Chrome. And you're like.
• 19:35
  You're talking about the other direction.
• 19:37
  Yeah, yeah, we're like what the fuck do I do with this?
• 19:40
  You're saying when somebody gives you, like, something
• 19:43
  that's just so far afield that you can't even.
• 19:45
  Yeah. Yeah, I I've got it both ways.
• 19:48
  I I've had the. Yeah.
• 19:50
  I don't know what to do with this from a story perspective.
• 19:52
  I just don't know what I'm looking at.
• 19:54
  And then I've had the did you just really want to make a
• 19:59
  vampire in VTM? And we're just playing, playing
• 20:03
  a shadow run. Yeah.
• 20:05
  Like, is that, is that what we're doing right now?
• 20:11
  It's never fun, but it is a thing.
• 20:13
  It is a thing that happens. And if you ever feel like you're
• 20:17
  not the G Miss favorite specialist little boy or gal or
• 20:22
  individual, that sucks. And I think the only way to
• 20:29
  really cure this problem is that you as AGM just need to know
• 20:35
  that you need to maintain a a a healthy distance from the
• 20:39
  character in the narrative well. I think there's two.
• 20:47
  Depends on which side of the table you're on, right?
• 20:49
  Because if you're the player who often makes a character that it
• 20:52
  seems like the GM is just not biting, then my response to you
• 20:58
  is OK, when you go to make your character or come up with your
• 21:02
  idea, ask the GMA bunch of questions and try and really
• 21:07
  latch onto the premise that the GM is giving you, right.
• 21:12
  So if you're, if the GM is like we're going to play, you know,
• 21:19
  Blades in the Dark and the GM is like your characters are
• 21:24
  scoundrels, They're villains, thieves, murderers, whatever.
• 21:28
  They're not good people, right? And you're in the town of
• 21:32
  Duskwall that's really corrupt and fucked up.
• 21:37
  If you as the player go, I'm going to make a pacifist
• 21:43
  priests, your GM is going to be like, no, no, no, no, no, no,
• 21:48
  not going to work. Let's let's workshop your idea,
• 21:53
  OK. And then you as the player and
• 21:54
  then the GM could be like, all right, what part of this are you
• 21:56
  attached to? And the player goes, well, I'm
• 21:59
  kind of attached to the idea of them being a pacifist.
• 22:01
  And the gym goes, all right, well, that's a little tricky
• 22:03
  with Blades in the Dark. How about this?
• 22:06
  Instead of a full blown pacifist, they have a kind of
• 22:10
  fucked up psychology about how they justify their violence,
• 22:16
  right? They look at themselves as a
• 22:17
  pacifist because they don't hurt what they qualify as innocent
• 22:20
  people, but they have a weird way of justifying hurting who
• 22:24
  they want to, right? And then you're getting into a
• 22:27
  much more Blades in the Dark character because they have some
• 22:29
  sort of very fucked up sense of like justice or morality or
• 22:34
  whatever. And now it's like, now we can
• 22:35
  make that work. OK, on the GM side of thing, if
• 22:38
  you have a player who's constantly not giving you things
• 22:43
  to work with, they're making the, the pacifist character in
• 22:45
  D&D, for example, or the Blades character, as I was just saying,
• 22:49
  you as the GM one try to encourage, be like, OK, do you
• 22:53
  know, do what I just said and like encourage them to be like,
• 22:55
  all right, what if we did this or that?
• 22:56
  The other thing is take the thing that they're doing and
• 23:02
  come up with some interesting conundrums around that problem.
• 23:09
  Right. So the pacifist priest character
• 23:12
  in Blades, put them in situations where the pacifism is
• 23:16
  just going to get them fucked over.
• 23:17
  Like they just, they have to do something, you know what I mean?
• 23:20
  Like put them in a rock and a hard place type situations and
• 23:23
  really just take whatever they are giving you and concoct
• 23:28
  scenarios. And then hopefully you only have
• 23:34
  to do that a couple of times until the player then starts to
• 23:37
  bite themselves a little bit more naturally.
• 23:42
  You know what I mean? And then it will be easier to
• 23:46
  move the spotlight on to them more consistently, more
• 23:50
  naturally, because ultimately that kind of a, that kind of a
• 23:57
  character, I don't know what the fuck to do with this is, you
• 24:04
  know, like it it, it takes 2 to tango, right?
• 24:07
  Like it's a problem on both sides.
• 24:08
  You have to contend on both sides of the table.
• 24:11
  It's not only the players fault, it's not only the GM fault, you
• 24:14
  know what I'm saying? No, yes, 100%.
• 24:18
  I really appreciate that you added that, that insight on the
• 24:20
  player side, because I didn't even think about.
• 24:24
  That I I've seen it happen. That no, I'm sure you have I I
• 24:29
  like, I think it's, I think genuinely because I, I, I run
• 24:33
  into that problem because I am always like I want to deeply
• 24:37
  ingrain my character as into the lore as possible because I
• 24:41
  that's. That's what I was just about to
• 24:43
  say, actually. You, like you specifically,
• 24:48
  often end up being the favorite player in my game because you
• 24:53
  almost inevitably will have the character idea.
• 24:59
  And then we'll latch the roots of the setting stuff into the
• 25:02
  character and tie them in a knot so intrinsically that you can't,
• 25:07
  like, you can't pull one from the other, You know what I mean?
• 25:11
  Like, and I don't know if you're doing that consciously or that's
• 25:14
  just kind of like how you think about coming up with characters.
• 25:17
  But like you, yeah, you always do that.
• 25:19
  So sometimes I feel bad because I feel like I'm giving you as a
• 25:24
  player too much attention. But the problem is, every time I
• 25:27
  throw the bait in your direction, you almost always
• 25:29
  bite because you've made a character that is really easy to
• 25:32
  bite with. Well, so here's the thing.
• 25:34
  And no, I am doing it 100% on purpose because one of the
• 25:37
  biggest problems I have and I, I think this, this comes partially
• 25:43
  from my traumatic RPG back story where I hate when my character
• 25:50
  is treated like I like they don't know what's going on in
• 25:53
  the setting, right? This is the like, if we live in
• 25:57
  the forgotten Realms, people probably know how a troll works,
• 26:04
  right? You've heard stories about
• 26:05
  trolls. You know, your granddad maybe
• 26:08
  fought a troll when he was a mercenary working or you know,
• 26:13
  working for what they called flaming fish in, in Baldersgate,
• 26:17
  right? Like I would probably know to
• 26:21
  keep fire on me. Like I don't have to be a
• 26:23
  Witcher to know that. I would just be like, oh it's a
• 26:24
  troll. Like fucking away away.
• 26:27
  You know what I mean? I'm just.
• 26:29
  Away. So I try to ingrain myself,
• 26:33
  myself so deeply into the setting.
• 26:36
  So I, as you know, I don't, I don't particularly think of
• 26:40
  myself as intelligent, but like someone who knows a a a little
• 26:44
  bit about a lot of things can use my natural intelligence to
• 26:48
  the best of my ability and make it make sense in the narrative,
• 26:52
  right? Yeah, yeah, you're, you're,
• 26:56
  you're making it so that the, you as the player and your
• 27:00
  character feel congruous. And also your player, your,
• 27:03
  your, your character feels like they, they slot in nicely,
• 27:07
  which, yeah, I mean, most CMS are going to be very happy when
• 27:12
  you do that. And like, I, I will try and do a
• 27:16
  similar thing, not for exactly the same reason.
• 27:19
  I will do a similar thing. Well, I will try to make sure my
• 27:21
  character is like latched into the setting or the scenario.
• 27:24
  Or at the very least, it's a character that has the potential
• 27:29
  to get involved in the situation really easily.
• 27:31
  You know what I mean? But for me, that's just because
• 27:36
  I want the GM to give me those juicy hooks, like throw me the
• 27:40
  bait, you know, like I'm just a, I'm just a fucking alligator at
• 27:44
  the zoo at feeding time with my mouth just wide open.
• 27:46
  Like, now give me chicken. You know what I mean?
• 27:50
  Just yeah. You know, like, no, I get that.
• 27:53
  Goofy ass face that alligators make when they're getting fed.
• 27:56
  Yeah, they're like the one that they look.
• 27:58
  They look like they're the happiest person on Earth.
• 27:59
  Yeah. Yeah, they look so excited,
• 28:01
  Yeah. It looks like they're literally
• 28:02
  saying aw hell yeah. Yeah, exactly that, yeah.
• 28:05
  No, yeah, I mean, I get that. I'm like that too.
• 28:07
  Like I think a good as far as a character goes.
• 28:13
  I will. I will also though try to steer
• 28:15
  players on the GM, like when I'm GM ING, I will try to steer
• 28:19
  players as much as I can in that.
• 28:20
  Like, I don't, you know, you don't want to be too pushy, but
• 28:23
  I will try to steer because I know it because it can also
• 28:27
  feels bad, man. When you make a character that's
• 28:29
  kind of weird and out of place and then the GM just like
• 28:31
  doesn't have anything for you, you know?
• 28:35
  Yeah, yeah, of. Course, you're just kind of
• 28:37
  there. When it comes to players, my
• 28:40
  strategy typically is to figure out what my players know about
• 28:45
  the setting or genre and if they don't know anything about it,
• 28:48
  show them some stuff about it or or find out what they like
• 28:54
  outside of the genre and find that in like we talked about
• 28:57
  that I think last session is finding the in.
• 29:02
  So, like, I know with Siffy, right, she kind of, I don't know
• 29:06
  if she knows this herself, but I think she finds something deeply
• 29:11
  attractive narratively speaking about the like the for you know,
• 29:17
  what's the word I'm looking for the exiled Prince slash Princess
• 29:21
  trope. Intriguing.
• 29:24
  I think would be a better word in this case, but yeah,
• 29:25
  continue. Yeah, yeah, I, I and I I say
• 29:30
  this because her last two characters have been this thing,
• 29:33
  her Lancer and her exiled royalty.
• 29:36
  Yeah. So I'm like, OK.
• 29:37
  Disgrace the noble. Yeah, I'm like, OK, I think I
• 29:41
  know what her in is, right. And I was like, OK, well, you
• 29:46
  know, the Carrick and trade parodies are Dune.
• 29:48
  I'm watching Dune right now. I can sort of make her a Paula
• 29:53
  Tradies without all the crazy overpowered bullshit and the
• 29:58
  fact that, like she was cast out of her noble house and I can
• 30:02
  give her all the stuff. And that, you know, when that
• 30:03
  started, I was like, OK, well, you know, you'll probably like
• 30:05
  the Carrick and trade baronies. I know you kind of like that
• 30:07
  vibe. And it was like hook line and
• 30:09
  sinker when when she originally was like, I don't know, maybe
• 30:12
  like super soldier, I'm like, you're thinking too much.
• 30:16
  Stick with what you know if you don't know a lot.
• 30:17
  You know what I mean? Right, Right.
• 30:19
  And yeah. If you're not, if you're not
• 30:21
  deeply ingrained in the setting or the genre and keep it, keep
• 30:25
  it basic level and then you will get more like invested over time
• 30:32
  and you know it it. Sometimes it's a little bit of a
• 30:35
  tough conversation not to call my girlfriend out as I so often
• 30:38
  do, but this is a really good example.
• 30:43
  For Seno was not her first character idea, or Seno was like
• 30:46
  a possible character idea, but one of the characters she idea
• 30:50
  as she had was playing like a sentient cat.
• 30:53
  Like like a talking cat. Like shalkwar from DS2.
• 30:59
  Yeah, yeah, basically. Big, fluffy Persian.
• 31:01
  That's like, real good. You're like, yeah, I don't, I
• 31:04
  don't know you very well, Kat, but I will do literally anything
• 31:06
  for you. Right.
• 31:08
  And I, and I kind of talked her down from that one because I was
• 31:11
  like, that's going to be really like, that's going to be too far
• 31:18
  afield from the vibe I'm trying to do.
• 31:20
  Like it's going to come off a little weird.
• 31:21
  And I basically said, you can do it if you can, if you think you
• 31:26
  can tool it in a way that works, but I'm going to need a little
• 31:29
  something else. And there was definitely the
• 31:32
  twinge of like, disappointment. But she kind of thought about it
• 31:38
  and was like, all right, well, then let me retool my other idea
• 31:41
  a little bit and landed on what Senna is now, which I was like,
• 31:46
  yeah, that'll work. You know what I mean?
• 31:48
  And she's still playing a weird because she I think I don't know
• 31:52
  this part for a fact, maybe she'll tell me.
• 31:54
  But I think a little bit of desire was to just play a a, a
• 31:59
  like a weirdo character in the group, like someone who just
• 32:01
  sticks out in a funky way, which she's very.
• 32:05
  Familiar with those? Yeah, and like she still is that
• 32:08
  right. Like she's she's a plant lady
• 32:10
  dryad thing. So she is still the weird
• 32:13
  character in the group who was born yesterday or whatever.
• 32:15
  Like she's still hitting that vibe.
• 32:16
  It's just, it's just a little closer to the tone I was
• 32:20
  shooting for. So she fits just just that
• 32:22
  little bit more snugly in and I can work with that.
• 32:25
  You know what I mean? Whereas the talking cat thing,
• 32:27
  here's the thing. Could I have probably figured
• 32:28
  out ways to make the talking cat work?
• 32:30
  Sure. But in the way that we had
• 32:33
  established the setting, and Fabula doesn't have its own
• 32:36
  setting, right? So we had to set up our own
• 32:38
  world. It would have been really hard
• 32:41
  to, like, justify these random farmer peasants just being cool
• 32:46
  with the talking cat, you know what I mean?
• 32:48
  Like, yeah, like there would have been so many scenes of why
• 32:52
  the fuck is that cat talking to me?
• 32:53
  And why can that cat cast spells?
• 32:55
  And that at a certain point that would start to get really
• 32:58
  annoying, you know what I mean? Oh, OK, so here's here's my
• 33:01
  thing for that. When you have situations like
• 33:05
  that, I am willing to sacrifice a little bit of congruity in the
• 33:10
  narrative for my own sanity. Sure.
• 33:12
  Yeah, in Hellscapes I made it very clear that mutants, there's
• 33:17
  like a good amount of them, you know like if, if the the
• 33:20
  wastelands got a population of like it could be close to
• 33:24
  10,000, there's probably a couple 100 like mutants and like
• 33:28
  animal people combined. So when half the party are
• 33:31
  weirdos, I was like, OK, well, I could make the conscious
• 33:35
  decision to be like, why are you all a bunch of fucking weirdos
• 33:38
  the first couple times people did it.
• 33:40
  And then I just kind of gave up because I was just like, I can't
• 33:44
  be fucked, keep doing this, you know?
• 33:47
  Right. I mean, yeah, that mean that
• 33:49
  things change a little bit. Yeah.
• 33:51
  But for my own sanity, I was. I was fine with that.
• 33:54
  Yeah, there's a you you can shift a little bit to make that
• 33:59
  kind of thing. Yeah, like to save your sanity
• 34:03
  for sure. But if you can head it off at
• 34:08
  the pass a little bit upfront, I think it'll be.
• 34:13
  The other thing too, is, and I know a lot of players often feel
• 34:16
  this way where they're like, oh, but you're shutting down my
• 34:20
  idea. I'm probably shutting down your
• 34:23
  idea. Because if you go with your
• 34:24
  idea, it's not going to be as fun as you're thinking.
• 34:27
  It's going to be right? Because I'm telling you as the
• 34:30
  GMI don't know what to do with that idea you're giving me.
• 34:33
  Which means when the when the game starts, it's probably not
• 34:37
  going to be that fun because I'm going to have a hard time
• 34:40
  knowing what to do with your character, you know, like,
• 34:42
  knowing how to respond to them. And so in a way, me shutting
• 34:47
  down your weird idea, or at least having you adjust it is
• 34:51
  also for your own sake. It's like sanity, you know?
• 34:55
  Yeah, like I'm, I'm saving myself a little bit, but I'm
• 34:57
  also saving you as the player. I think OK well so let me ask,
• 35:01
  do you think there is a way to do that character in a way that
• 35:09
  is satisfying for the player and not very stressful for the GMI
• 35:19
  think it is? I think the answer is is that
• 35:23
  you need to be OK with the runt of your interaction with the
• 35:29
  setting being that you're the weirdo and or like like
• 35:34
  essentially you have to make your own fun of it, right?
• 35:37
  A lot of the fun I had being Django was less in the like
• 35:41
  ancient war machine and a lot of the like everyone's like Django.
• 35:46
  I don't know if that's how that works and him just going and you
• 35:50
  are incorrect, like just just being a machine, right?
• 35:54
  Just being a robot and people being like, oh, that's right.
• 35:56
  You can't reason with cold logic like you.
• 35:59
  You can't or not that you can't reason with, but you can't.
• 36:03
  You can't like emotionally, you can't appeal to his emotions at
• 36:06
  all. Exactly.
• 36:07
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 36:10
  In a lot of ways. Right.
• 36:11
  Like, he didn't understand happiness, but he also, you
• 36:12
  know, people were trying to be intimidating.
• 36:14
  And he's just like I am. What are you doing?
• 36:16
  Why are you in my face? Please leave my personal space.
• 36:20
  I I think, yeah, I think the idea is to make that work the
• 36:27
  best at one, Yeah. Like you're, like you said, kind
• 36:30
  of make your own fun with it to a certain degree.
• 36:32
  And also just as the GM go, OK, that character is the exception
• 36:39
  to the rule and they're going to get treated as such and then
• 36:45
  come up with a reason for why they're so present in the
• 36:52
  setting. Because the one, the one thing,
• 36:55
  the thing that really can make it a bit of a struggle is that
• 37:01
  the, the exception to the rule character is fine as like an NPC
• 37:09
  who comes around every once in a while.
• 37:12
  When they're a player character, it's like they're on screen all
• 37:14
  the time and the NPCS have to respond to them because they're
• 37:20
  like a main character, quote UN quote, right?
• 37:22
  Like the game is focused on them.
• 37:25
  So you have to, they feel a little bit less like an
• 37:29
  exception. So it's like you have to juggle
• 37:31
  the idea of like, you're the exception to the rule, but the
• 37:33
  world still needs to react to you in such a way that the plots
• 37:37
  can happen. You know, like you just have to,
• 37:43
  I guess what I'm saying is you just have to be kind of aware of
• 37:47
  that character and always keep them a little bit in the back of
• 37:49
  your head, I guess is ultimately what I'm getting to.
• 37:52
  Oh no. Absolutely like.
• 37:53
  Especially in a game. Like that you are going to get
• 37:58
  the same reaction frequently. Yeah, and, and especially with a
• 38:02
  game like Fabulous Ultima or Draw Steel where the players are
• 38:05
  like ostensibly heroes, then you really got to be like, OK, not
• 38:12
  only is the half demon, half Angel guy the weird exception
• 38:15
  character, everybody also is probably going to have to have
• 38:18
  some form of respect for them at a certain point because they
• 38:21
  keep doing all this stuff and helping people.
• 38:24
  How's that going to work out? You know what I mean?
• 38:26
  Yeah. So some games, some games it's
• 38:30
  not a problem, right? Some games you're playing like
• 38:32
  fucking, you know, like, I don't know why I like, I can't.
• 38:38
  Some games you're playing like are like Shadow Dark where the
• 38:41
  the, you know, the game is about dungeon fucking and monster
• 38:44
  slapping and weirdos go into dungeon and get money.
• 38:48
  Some guy who's a talking sentient cat who just went into
• 38:51
  the dungeon and like robbed a bunch of goblins.
• 38:53
  The town people are going to be like, yeah, I don't know, dude,
• 38:56
  the fucking cat has a lot of money.
• 38:58
  Like whatever. Let's just not, let's just
• 39:00
  pretend like we didn't see anything and you know, those
• 39:02
  games, it's not a big deal. Actually OK no no, I take my
• 39:06
  opinion, I take my my, I take my statement back.
• 39:09
  My favorite weirdo to play was EO for the 2 episodes for the 2
• 39:14
  sizes I played him. Oh, the Fairy and Daggerheart.
• 39:18
  Yes, not because he was a fairy bug man, but because he was a
• 39:23
  really tall as opposed to being like on the shorter end and just
• 39:28
  people being like expecting one thing from the fairy bug man and
• 39:31
  then getting this weird melodramatic Phantom of the
• 39:38
  Opera type and just being like. And almost a little and a little
• 39:43
  like not emotional, right? Like dramatic, but not very
• 39:49
  swingy emotionally. No.
• 39:52
  Yes, everything he said sounded like it was from Shakespeare,
• 39:55
  but he was like, pretty casual about most things.
• 39:58
  Yeah, he was very theatrical, but not very emotional.
• 40:01
  Yeah, like simple things like, you know, someone opening the
• 40:05
  door for him and it's like yes, 1000 thanks upon me.
• 40:10
  You have done me a great service this day and he'll being like.
• 40:14
  I just opened the door dude. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 40:18
  I just the yeah, he was a weird one.
• 40:21
  I literally I used I would think like what's the weirdest thing I
• 40:25
  can do right? Yeah, what's the most out of
• 40:27
  pocket shit for me to say right now?
• 40:29
  Yeah, or like when they were like, oh, we're, you know, we're
• 40:31
  going to drop the lift down to get you.
• 40:32
  And he just kind of looks up and just starts eerily floating up
• 40:37
  the the fucking lift shaft with his wings and people being like,
• 40:40
  no, you know, you're supposed to wait for the lift.
• 40:42
  That that's like a respect thing.
• 40:43
  No, just come back down here. And he's like, I do not.
• 40:46
  Why would I do that? Yeah, why would I waste my time?
• 40:49
  Yes, yeah, sorry. I, I, I, I I was listening to
• 40:54
  what you're saying. I just in my head, I was like,
• 40:55
  is it Django? No, Django was funny or Django
• 40:59
  was fun, I think. But EO was funny.
• 41:02
  It was just Django. I was like Django had quite the
• 41:06
  like emotional arc do. He did.
• 41:09
  You know, it's weird how many of my characters become a dad.
• 41:13
  It seems to keep happening. I don't know really why it does,
• 41:17
  but it it keeps happening. Trend, if you will.
• 41:21
  It is, dude, it's a fucking trend.
• 41:22
  So like even the NPC is like, you know, the they're like my
• 41:26
  the handler and my Lancer fucking Obon is like kind of
• 41:30
  turning Sippy's character into his like weird surrogate kid,
• 41:33
  because it's like I yes, I see you also came from the streets.
• 41:36
  I know that struggle, you know, like, and she's always like, I
• 41:42
  can't wait to see him hit her with some like, weird, weird
• 41:45
  fucking. I've been there, kid Wisdom and
• 41:49
  Goro is like basically a dad. Django was actually a dad, kind
• 41:53
  of kind of a really good repair man really.
• 41:58
  But like, yeah, he's dead. If Django was a dad, does that
• 42:02
  mean he's a bad dad because he went through eight kids 4/1?
• 42:08
  Beta 2 adult? I mean, no, because he's not
• 42:17
  like a normal child. For for context, by the way,
• 42:20
  Kiss Edward's curious what what Isaiah is talking about is he
• 42:22
  was playing an artificer war war for his artificer, and he got
• 42:26
  the homunculus servant upgrade, which gives you a little
• 42:29
  homunculus. So he decided that the little
• 42:31
  homunculus was his child, but the child died a lot.
• 42:35
  The the child in question was a tiny little robot that just
• 42:38
  looked like him but smaller, and Mark 3, which was the first
• 42:45
  atomist, made it pretty far and then that one died 4 in five, No
• 42:56
  four died really quick, 5 lasted forever, six and seven died
• 43:01
  pretty much one session after the other, and then 8 was the
• 43:04
  one that brought it to the end. Honestly, I don't remember.
• 43:10
  I just remember 5 being the one that stuck around the longest,
• 43:12
  like over a year, and I was like, no, he's doing pretty
• 43:15
  good. Good.
• 43:15
  And then that one dragon was like, no more, no more of this.
• 43:22
  I was genuinely sad when we lost Mark Five.
• 43:24
  I was like, no, it's like when you lost your horse in Conan for
• 43:28
  the first time and you're like, dude, no, I can't, I can't, I
• 43:31
  can't there's. So mad, so mad.
• 43:38
  Oh, my God. We're so off topic.
• 43:39
  All right. Yes.
• 43:41
  Yeah. Where was I?
• 43:43
  Yes, you know, as AGM, it's good for you to keep a a healthy
• 43:50
  distance from characters. Like you can like a character,
• 43:53
  you can engage with the player, you can brainstorm, you can have
• 43:56
  your your fun like what if conversations, But you really
• 44:00
  have to keep in your mind that that character is not the main
• 44:04
  character. They are a player character
• 44:06
  amongst a party of player characters.
• 44:08
  And they might have more development than the others, but
• 44:11
  that means that you have to take the extra step to make sure that
• 44:14
  the other players feel, you know, maybe not just as
• 44:19
  developed, but close. That being said, that doesn't
• 44:26
  mean that you can't build fun moments for specific characters
• 44:30
  or like follow a character on their plot line to, you know, I
• 44:35
  don't know, avenge their family and take back their hometown
• 44:37
  from a vampire and a necromancer lady with your trusty demon gun
• 44:41
  and your weird smoke demon best buddy and gaggle of chuckleshits
• 44:44
  is. That a reference to something.
• 44:47
  Yeah, Critical Role. Oh, oh, oh, OK yeah, yeah.
• 44:53
  I don't know why that 1. I did that one, missed me for a
• 44:56
  second. Interesting, I OK that one.
• 44:59
  I literally wrote that example down in my notes almost word for
• 45:01
  word and I figured that's the one where you're like ah yes.
• 45:05
  It also is like low key the best art one.
• 45:10
  Low key, high key. Yeah, that's fair.
• 45:15
  That's a that's. That's an example of what I was
• 45:17
  talking about though, right? Like the spotlight was on Percy
• 45:19
  for quite a while, but eventually did shift away from
• 45:22
  him. It was, and this is, I think,
• 45:24
  the other really important thing about that part with Percy.
• 45:28
  And as the next part of this example, it does mean that that
• 45:33
  character story does not go off in some random reaction and stay
• 45:36
  there. Everything going on with the
• 45:39
  Briarwoods was tied into the main story right?
• 45:42
  They were working for Vecna. Other characters origins became
• 45:48
  situationally relevant to deal with the shit with Fecna or or
• 45:53
  with with the briar was right. Yeah maybe like a character's
• 45:57
  fencing master was killed in a duel with the evil King's top
• 46:01
  general, right? And then that the sword master
• 46:03
  player character is like, ah well they killed, you know his
• 46:06
  minion killed my master so I will help you get revenge right?
• 46:11
  Maybe the demon that cursed the character's family mysteriously
• 46:14
  goes missing and the only one with information is the warlocks
• 46:17
  patron. There's a bunch of ways to keep
• 46:22
  the party active as participants in another player's back story
• 46:26
  and not just the side character in a random ass hero's journey.
• 46:34
  The the that that can help with the spotlight idea quite a lot.
• 46:40
  Also of. All right, well, I'm gonna, I'm
• 46:49
  gonna have to invoke the dark Kobel.
• 46:52
  But he did. He had a very good point when he
• 46:54
  said this forever ago. You know, he said one of the
• 47:00
  best things you can do when a player or yeah, when a player
• 47:03
  hands you their their big long three page back story is take
• 47:08
  all of the proper nouns out of the back story and then throw
• 47:11
  the rest of that shit in the garbage.
• 47:13
  He's like, because ultimately what you as the GM can actually
• 47:18
  work with when it comes to a player's back story, because a
• 47:20
  back story is stuff that already happened, right?
• 47:23
  So the only things that matter to you as the GM for what's
• 47:27
  going to happen are the proper nouns, which means, you know, if
• 47:31
  mom and dad got named in the back story, use that.
• 47:34
  If the sister is referenced, use the sister.
• 47:36
  If the evil general that they had a duel with is referenced
• 47:39
  and is still alive, use the evil general.
• 47:41
  Right. The Briarwoods are the proper
• 47:43
  nouns in Percy's back story. Use that and then reintegrate it
• 47:48
  to whatever you have planned. And then by by taking the proper
• 47:55
  nouns and integrating them into the campaign itself, it becomes
• 48:01
  very easy to then bounce that spotlight around from character
• 48:04
  to character to character. Because you've integrated you.
• 48:07
  Basically, you planned ahead and made sure that characters are
• 48:10
  going to have that spotlight arc because, you know, all right,
• 48:15
  when we get to here, this is going to be, you know, in
• 48:18
  relation to Grog's uncle, right? Grog's uncle is going to be
• 48:24
  relevant here. I know where this is going to
• 48:26
  fit in. This is where Grog's spotlight
• 48:28
  is going to happen. Boom, bang, boom, right.
• 48:31
  It becomes a lot easier to do the spotlight dance if you take
• 48:37
  those proper downs from the backstories and actually work
• 48:41
  them in ahead of time. I think it's worth mentioning
• 48:44
  that. That's not that hard usually.
• 48:46
  No, it's not. And that might the people who
• 48:49
  like don't quite understand. That might sound bad.
• 48:53
  Like take only these things and throw the rest out.
• 48:56
  It's kind of a joke, but yeah. No, yeah, but it it is.
• 48:59
  It's hard to understate that at the end of the day, a lot of
• 49:05
  that stuff is fluff because it kind of has to be.
• 49:10
  Well, it's again, it's a a back story is stuff that already
• 49:14
  happened, right? Right, right.
• 49:17
  But like, so it in the case of, you know, a character being
• 49:21
  like, ah, yes, my my mother was a seamstress and my father was a
• 49:25
  mercenary, but they are divorced now.
• 49:27
  It's like, OK, that means I can't really use them in tandem,
• 49:33
  right? Like.
• 49:34
  Yeah. Like, yeah, maybe, like maybe
• 49:37
  when you meet the father, it's like, oh, you know, how's mom
• 49:39
  doing? You're like, but that's not
• 49:43
  that's. About it, that's not a lot of.
• 49:44
  Substance, right? I can't form a deep complex back
• 49:46
  story about. I mean I can but like.
• 49:50
  Yeah, there's not a lot of work to tie.
• 49:52
  That into the the main narrative when it's like, oh, yeah, hey
• 49:57
  guys, I need you to help me rescue my mom.
• 50:00
  Why? Well, my dad and my mom divorced
• 50:02
  a while back, and then they were kidnapped by bandits who hate my
• 50:05
  dad. Like, yeah, the players will
• 50:08
  help you because they as players are like, ah, this is clearly
• 50:11
  important to you. But like, there's kind of this
• 50:14
  idea of like, why the fuck is this our problem?
• 50:15
  You know what I mean? Right.
• 50:18
  Yeah, yeah. Why do we care?
• 50:20
  Yeah, So it sounds worse than it is.
• 50:24
  Like I, for me, I've read all my characters 12 page back stories
• 50:30
  and I use the bits that I think are important or that fit, you
• 50:37
  know, more seamlessly into the narrative that I'm like, you
• 50:40
  know, building as we play. And then the rest of it becomes
• 50:45
  effectively kind of like when you're playing Oblivion, right?
• 50:49
  And you find the books in the setting, you'll find information
• 50:53
  from the characters, 12 pages that could be helpful, right?
• 50:57
  In a conversation, you know, of the, it's the like, what's my
• 51:02
  mother's name? We keep bringing a critical
• 51:03
  role, but it's the what's my mother's name, right?
• 51:06
  That's a really important line in the character's personal
• 51:10
  story, that characters don't know his mother's name, right?
• 51:14
  But that wasn't like, Matt didn't do anything with that.
• 51:17
  That was a thing for Sam as Scanlon to use with the party.
• 51:22
  And well, for Sam and by Sam. Yeah, for Sam, by Sam, for Sam
• 51:26
  to use. I guarantee you, assuming that
• 51:31
  he did have this written down, if Matt had not brought up his
• 51:35
  character's mom or, sorry, if Sam had not brought up Scanlon's
• 51:37
  mom, Matt would have never done anything with it.
• 51:40
  It's just kind of how it shakes out, you know?
• 51:43
  Yeah. Because you know, as the GM you
• 51:49
  can well, for starters, you can only do so many things right?
• 51:52
  Like there's only so much shit you can put on the plate.
• 51:55
  But also, it's, it's a back story, it's stuff that happened
• 51:59
  and some of it's going to be fluff.
• 52:01
  Like if Scanlon's mom as a character is not that relevant
• 52:05
  to him, like not that relevant to how he is in the campaign,
• 52:09
  then the GM doesn't really need to do anything with it, you
• 52:14
  know? Yeah, obviously, again, if a
• 52:17
  character, if a player is like, I want this thing to come up,
• 52:21
  that's a different story, right? There's an expectation there and
• 52:24
  you're like, OK, I'll, you know, I'll see what I can do.
• 52:26
  And even then, if it's really out there, it might not come up.
• 52:31
  You know what I mean? Like.
• 52:33
  It might not, but if they, I mean if they ask you you, I'm
• 52:35
  sure you can figure it out. Here's the thing, if I know you
• 52:39
  as the player want it and are going to react to it in some
• 52:43
  fashion, then I can go out of my way to make it work.
• 52:47
  But if I don't, you know, a lot of the reason that back story
• 52:52
  gets ignored is because I, as the GM might bring up something
• 52:56
  from back story and you might not really respond or do
• 52:59
  anything with it. And then I did work for nothing,
• 53:02
  you know? That yeah, and well, I but.
• 53:05
  If you tell me, if you tell me, if you're asking me, then I know
• 53:08
  you're probably going to respond and do something with it.
• 53:10
  Then I could do the extra work for that spotlight moment.
• 53:16
  To a point, I think like, for example, when we were doing a
• 53:21
  Vernus Cardell's first character, Teshian was from
• 53:28
  chances to see Japan. Yeah, the D&D equivalent of
• 53:31
  Japan. If he was like, I really want to
• 53:33
  go there. You're like.
• 53:37
  Yeah, that'd be a tough sell. We're going to a Vernus, like,
• 53:41
  where are we going to have the time to do that?
• 53:44
  He did not actually ask for that, but that's just, you know,
• 53:46
  an example. You know, at some point you just
• 53:50
  can't accommodate that. You're like, look, I can try to
• 53:53
  have it come up more, but we're doing a pre written campaign.
• 53:57
  We're not going to have a whole section.
• 53:58
  Yeah, and there's a pain there's.
• 54:00
  A degree of reasonable. There's a degree of reasonable
• 54:03
  expectation for sure. I mean also I think if you're
• 54:06
  doing a pre written campaign you have to just accept that if you
• 54:09
  do not tie your character intrinsically into the story of
• 54:13
  the pre written campaign then they might not get that much
• 54:16
  attention. Yeah, it's a pre written.
• 54:19
  Campaign like that's just kind of kind of how that goes.
• 54:21
  Yeah. We're sort of assuming home brew
• 54:25
  campaign in this scenario, yes? Or at least I mostly AM, because
• 54:31
  pre writings often bring their own can of worms.
• 54:36
  Now, when it comes to the question of you know or the
• 54:42
  problem of you know, I'm AGM, I'm running my games.
• 54:45
  I feel like my characters are unhappy with the pacing or how
• 54:51
  their characters are representative for the spotlight
• 54:53
  or representatives in the spotlight.
• 54:56
  The ultimate solution to this is just to run games, study
• 55:03
  stories, know your party, and a lot of trial and error.
• 55:08
  You're not going to get it right.
• 55:09
  I've been doing this for six years.
• 55:11
  I haven't gotten it right yet. It's a work in progress.
• 55:14
  The the thing you're pointing out with the Monster Hearts
• 55:17
  game. I think some of the problem that
• 55:18
  Sarath was having there was less about the spotlighting and more
• 55:22
  of a pacing thing. I think.
• 55:25
  I think spotlighting is. Maybe.
• 55:28
  It's a part of it is a factor in the greater hull that is pacing.
• 55:32
  Yes. And yeah, like I said, main
• 55:35
  thing is just trial and error. Just keep working at it.
• 55:38
  You'll get better at it with time.
• 55:40
  I think Josh is way better at it than I am, certainly.
• 55:44
  You want. You want the trick.
• 55:47
  Please regale me. Just keep booting them in the
• 55:49
  ass. Yeah.
• 55:51
  I mean, that's a part of it for. Sure, it's like honestly, like I
• 55:54
  want to extrapolate it slightly when any time where I feel like
• 56:00
  there's a moment of players meandering or not knowing how to
• 56:06
  push themselves forward or not knowing exactly what to do next,
• 56:09
  you as the GM just boot them in the ass.
• 56:11
  Just kick them and say, all right, next thing, we're doing
• 56:13
  the next thing. Like don't ask any questions,
• 56:16
  Just say all right, next scene like a director does with the
• 56:19
  actors, right, The actor, the director doesn't say to his
• 56:21
  actors, all right, guys, are we ready to shoot the next scene?
• 56:24
  Are we good to go? There's like, all right, we're
• 56:25
  doing the next scene. It's a fucking job.
• 56:27
  We're doing the thing we're we're working people.
• 56:29
  Let's go. Right.
• 56:30
  Like it's kind of just that you got you.
• 56:32
  You're like, I got a schedule to keep.
• 56:34
  We got shit to do. I want to get to this thing that
• 56:36
  I prepped. Fucking let's roll people, that
• 56:40
  is. That is honestly one of my main
• 56:41
  tricks. Fair enough.
• 56:43
  Not the only one, granted, but it's one of my big ones.
• 56:48
  And as part of that, I figured I would share some solutions that
• 56:51
  I have seen or used or, you know, were recommended to me.
• 56:56
  Like that's a good one, just, you know, not requesting the
• 57:02
  progression, but just sort of. Just implementing things
• 57:04
  forward. It's it's the orcs attack idea.
• 57:07
  Yeah, I mean, I definitely do that in my games.
• 57:08
  I you know, if if there's a lull, I ask people like, all
• 57:11
  right, does anybody want to do anything?
• 57:12
  Going once, going twice, Sold. All right, we're moving on.
• 57:15
  Yes, I don't even. I don't even ask anymore.
• 57:18
  Fair enough. One that Matt actually
• 57:22
  recommended to me and I am trying to implement it more is
• 57:26
  scene times like scene timers. Effectively, you create a set
• 57:33
  time frame that players can speak or interact with one
• 57:36
  another, with either each other or other NPCS, and you try to
• 57:41
  maintain that pacing throughout the session.
• 57:45
  Typically it's about 15 or 20 minutes, and you have to let the
• 57:52
  players know when a scene is dragging.
• 57:54
  Don't just cut them off. Just like, you know, they could
• 57:57
  be having this really heartfelt, I love you speech going on.
• 57:59
  And you're like, all right, moving on.
• 58:01
  Like don't do that, but if that I love you speech is hitting 25
• 58:05
  minutes, be like, hey guys, I really love what's going on
• 58:08
  right now, but we are we're we're dragging a little bit.
• 58:10
  Can we just keep the ball rolling?
• 58:11
  Yeah, let's keep the ball rolling a little bit.
• 58:13
  That I that communication is always relevant.
• 58:19
  I sort of do that. I would say I, I don't, I don't
• 58:23
  set a time, but I will. I will watch the clock and I
• 58:33
  will how do I how do I phrase it?
• 58:40
  I will feel feel out the I don't I'll vibe check the players like
• 58:50
  I don't really know how to phrase what I mean.
• 58:51
  Like I'll watch the clock, but I will also see how the players
• 58:56
  are responding to each other. Well, they're doing something
• 59:00
  like that. And if the momentum of the
• 59:03
  responses is keeping a pace and a pace meaning like they're
• 59:08
  responding. Basically, if if they're doing a
• 59:11
  scene and it feels like a natural conversation you would
• 59:14
  have in real life is still happening, then I'll let it keep
• 59:20
  rolling. If it feels like it's getting to
• 59:22
  the point where they're having to force the response and think
• 59:26
  a little too much about what their character would say, then
• 59:29
  I will start eyeing the time and being like, all right, how long
• 59:32
  have we been doing this? All right.
• 59:34
  Should I nudge it along? Probably.
• 59:36
  You know what I mean? That's a big one.
• 59:39
  I kind of use circles. Yeah.
• 59:42
  It's not even necessarily circles.
• 59:44
  It's like there's a different tone when a character or when a
• 59:51
  player is talking in character and it's very clear that the
• 59:55
  player knows exactly how their character is going to respond
• 59:59
  and they say it and they talk like they're having a real life
• 1:00:01
  conversation, then I don't want to stop it.
• 1:00:05
  As soon as it gets to the point where the player is now starting
• 1:00:09
  to step out of character a little bit and contemplating the
• 1:00:14
  response, then I know that it's starting to lose momentum
• 1:00:17
  because generally. Especially if you've been
• 1:00:22
  playing your character for a while, right?
• 1:00:24
  If it's session fifteen, you probably do know how your
• 1:00:28
  character would respond. As long as the conversation is
• 1:00:31
  is making sense and keeping pace, you probably have a
• 1:00:34
  response that you're going to say naturally that makes sense
• 1:00:37
  in character. As soon as you have to start
• 1:00:40
  kind of thinking about it, that probably means it's going in an
• 1:00:44
  awkward direction, because generally players at a certain
• 1:00:47
  point get pretty in tune with the character they're playing
• 1:00:50
  and know how they were going to respond.
• 1:00:52
  Most of the time. You'll have moments, of course,
• 1:00:54
  where you as a player will respond in a way that makes
• 1:00:58
  sense to you, the player, but maybe doesn't make sense the
• 1:01:01
  character. That will happen from time to
• 1:01:02
  time. Just by sheer you're just a
• 1:01:05
  human being and you're just responding how you would respond
• 1:01:07
  in real life. That will happen, but most of
• 1:01:09
  the time players are pretty good at locking into that character
• 1:01:15
  mentality when they're doing that kind of a scene, especially
• 1:01:19
  if you're, especially when it's the kind of players that want to
• 1:01:22
  do a scene like this, right? If you have the beer and
• 1:01:25
  pretzels dungeon fucking players, that's a different
• 1:01:28
  story because they're probably not that interested in getting
• 1:01:30
  into their characters heads. But we have a game like our
• 1:01:33
  Fabula campaign. I know that all of you guys are
• 1:01:36
  in your character's head like 90% of the time.
• 1:01:39
  So I the flow is there. You know what I'm saying?
• 1:01:41
  Yeah, I, like I said, I, I agree with you there.
• 1:01:43
  I think the thing with my players specifically is that if
• 1:01:47
  characters get into disagreements and then Lancer,
• 1:01:49
  that's pretty common. It can get to a point where
• 1:01:52
  they, you know, someone goes why?
• 1:01:55
  You know, there's this thing and they and another player will go,
• 1:01:58
  yeah, well, you know, I don't know.
• 1:02:00
  And they're like, OK, yeah, well, like I, I don't know.
• 1:02:04
  And they talk a little bit and one player goes like, I don't
• 1:02:06
  know, like it's this. That it's that.
• 1:02:08
  It's this endless back and forth and that's what I go like, guys,
• 1:02:12
  we got to. That's when you say scene cut,
• 1:02:14
  right? That's when the director cuts
• 1:02:15
  the scene, yeah. Yeah.
• 1:02:17
  I think that often comes from a like, I know what you're, it's
• 1:02:25
  the, it's the argument about the what to do kind of thing.
• 1:02:28
  I feel like that happens a lot because players have started to
• 1:02:34
  slip away from what can we or like what can we or can't we do
• 1:02:39
  in the world? What, what makes sense?
• 1:02:41
  What does it, you know what I mean?
• 1:02:42
  Where especially if they're trying to figure out, This is
• 1:02:45
  why the mission debriefing, you know the meme about we spent 4
• 1:02:49
  hours planning a mission and didn't actually do the mission.
• 1:02:52
  That's why that happens because players are like, all right,
• 1:02:54
  what can we do? What can't we do?
• 1:02:55
  Because ultimately we're dealing with an imagination space,
• 1:02:57
  right? So everyone's brain is thinking
• 1:02:59
  of a slightly different thing and what would or would not make
• 1:03:01
  sense. That's kind of like what you're
• 1:03:04
  talking about. I feel like it's somewhat of an
• 1:03:06
  extension of that. When they get into the argument
• 1:03:08
  and it's not, it's not. They don't know the full
• 1:03:12
  parameters of the argument they're making because it's not
• 1:03:15
  the real world, right? That that or ideals.
• 1:03:20
  Like characters arguing over ideals in the same way that
• 1:03:22
  people argue over ideals and can't agree.
• 1:03:25
  Yeah, yeah. And and yeah, not that that's
• 1:03:29
  kind of similar though. Like if they get stuck in that
• 1:03:32
  loop, a lot of the time it's because they're arguing over
• 1:03:35
  ideals, but they're also making up these ideals for not a real
• 1:03:40
  person, right? So sometimes the parameters of
• 1:03:44
  quote UN quote, the ideals get wishy washy at a certain point,
• 1:03:48
  but you don't want to necessarily.
• 1:03:49
  You want to keep making the argument to make it make sense
• 1:03:53
  and feel correct. But it's a little unclear to you
• 1:03:56
  sometimes, you know what I mean? Yeah, I can see what you're
• 1:03:59
  saying. Like you're envisioning a
• 1:04:01
  character, whereas you know, for an author who's writing
• 1:04:05
  something, you have that space to really nail down like what,
• 1:04:11
  what is this character's ideals and what is the world I'm
• 1:04:14
  setting at? You know what I mean?
• 1:04:16
  It's like a, it's a symptom. It's a symptom of the genre or
• 1:04:19
  it's a symptom of the, it's a symptom of the medium itself is
• 1:04:23
  kind of what I'm getting at. Like that, that weird argument
• 1:04:27
  loop. Because I I know what you're
• 1:04:29
  talking about, it's hard to, it's hard to quantify it.
• 1:04:33
  But I know exactly the kind of argument you're talking about.
• 1:04:36
  Yeah, I mean, we've had them in Fabulous a couple times, like
• 1:04:40
  Arrow's fight with Irina, where it's like, why are you acting
• 1:04:44
  this way because of this? Well, OK, I don't like the
• 1:04:46
  tracking this way, OK? But this is how I am, OK?
• 1:04:49
  But I don't like tracking this way, right?
• 1:04:51
  But This is why I act this way, so I'm not going to stop, right?
• 1:04:53
  But I don't like the tracking this way.
• 1:04:55
  Like it it, it just kind of loops back in on itself.
• 1:04:58
  And I, you know, I don't think either characters are wrong.
• 1:05:01
  I think both, you know, both players believe that their their
• 1:05:05
  characters ideals are both valid and and poignant.
• 1:05:12
  But it does just lead to a point where, yeah, like these, they're
• 1:05:15
  not real ideals. Yeah, they don't really exist.
• 1:05:18
  So you can kind of. Yeah, it's, it's not a real
• 1:05:21
  person. It's a person you're making up
• 1:05:23
  and controlling. So sometimes you get.
• 1:05:26
  It's like you put yourself as a person in a weird logic loop
• 1:05:29
  sometimes. Yes.
• 1:05:32
  And you don't always know what to do.
• 1:05:34
  And I think also it's partially because there's no stakes,
• 1:05:37
  right? Like there's stakes for the
• 1:05:39
  characters and there's stakes for like the narrative of the
• 1:05:42
  game. But in real life, there's no
• 1:05:44
  stakes, right? Like in real life, we're just
• 1:05:46
  doing the funny ha ha and doing the voices.
• 1:05:49
  And if we don't agree on the thing in character, we could
• 1:05:52
  just stop playing and act like nothing happened and nothing
• 1:05:54
  would change, right? Whereas if you're having that
• 1:05:59
  argument, if you're having an argument with someone like that
• 1:06:01
  in real life, especially if it's somebody that you're like a
• 1:06:02
  friend with or or a relative to, there is like a degree of stakes
• 1:06:06
  to a certain point. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:06:13
  Oh yes. I think something that both you
• 1:06:18
  and I will agree on is, is the second solution of encourage
• 1:06:23
  group problem solving. Yeah.
• 1:06:26
  Do not, not, no, not do not. But it's not uncommon for a
• 1:06:34
  player to want to go off and do their personal back story shit
• 1:06:37
  or accomplish a personal objective.
• 1:06:40
  It's common. It's totally fine.
• 1:06:42
  It's valid for the character to want to do that.
• 1:06:46
  But that does mean that there is a stretch of time where the
• 1:06:50
  other characters are forced to play audience to a single
• 1:06:52
  player. You know, character playing the
• 1:06:55
  game alone. And if this becomes a situation
• 1:06:59
  where the game becomes effectively musical chairs for
• 1:07:03
  characters having one off adventures during the group
• 1:07:06
  storytelling experience, the plot just goes nowhere fast.
• 1:07:10
  I have had this problem plenty of times where characters want
• 1:07:13
  to go off and do their own thing.
• 1:07:15
  The simplest solution that I have found is just levelling
• 1:07:20
  with the players. And even if it doesn't really
• 1:07:24
  make sense that they would do this in character, maybe they
• 1:07:26
  don't know each other well enough yet.
• 1:07:28
  Anything you just ask them, hey, can you try to keep going off on
• 1:07:34
  your own to a minimum? And if you're going to go
• 1:07:38
  somewhere or do something, bring a buddy.
• 1:07:41
  Because at the very least, then there's another player there
• 1:07:43
  who's doing a thing that they want to do or, or trying to
• 1:07:47
  accomplish a goal that they're trying to accomplish while
• 1:07:49
  you're doing the same. And it does make things a little
• 1:07:54
  weird. Like I said when I did it with
• 1:07:58
  the Oh no, I just forgot what I was talking about.
• 1:08:01
  Oh, like characters not seeing, like seeing a talking cat and
• 1:08:04
  just not mentioning how weird it really is.
• 1:08:07
  You do sacrifice a little bit of congruity when the wizard's
• 1:08:11
  tower is conveniently right next door to the Thieves Guild.
• 1:08:17
  But you know, you lose a few things chasing a dream.
• 1:08:21
  I mean it's you can often justify it pretty easily too.
• 1:08:25
  You can, but in the kids situations where you can't it be
• 1:08:29
  that way sometimes, you know? I mean, yeah, I feel like most
• 1:08:34
  more often than not, even if it's a little contrived, you can
• 1:08:38
  still whip up something that makes enough sense, you know
• 1:08:41
  what I mean? Yeah, it's not impossible.
• 1:08:44
  Like a little contrivance ain't going to kill anybody.
• 1:08:46
  No, no, not at all. The next one.
• 1:08:51
  And Josh is the bigger proponent of this than I am.
• 1:08:54
  Well, actually, I I just wanted to say to the encourage group
• 1:08:57
  problem solving idea. I think it's also just This is
• 1:09:06
  why you want to make characters that want to be a part of a
• 1:09:11
  team, right? Because then even if it's a
• 1:09:14
  situation where it's really only one player's problem or one
• 1:09:19
  character's problem, if you have player characters that are team
• 1:09:25
  players, you know, team oriented, then you know, the
• 1:09:31
  paladin is like, I need to go on this quest to retrieve the magic
• 1:09:34
  blade And everyone's like, all right, man, we'll help you.
• 1:09:37
  We got this. Like, we'll just come with you.
• 1:09:39
  It's fine. Like, even though it doesn't
• 1:09:40
  matter for us, like we'll just come and help you 'cause like
• 1:09:42
  you're a, you're a homie. Like we, we got this.
• 1:09:44
  Just just lead the way. You know what I mean?
• 1:09:45
  Like that's why you want to have that kind of character for a
• 1:09:52
  tabletop game. That's why you kind of need that
• 1:09:54
  kind of vibe. Or even if even if you don't
• 1:09:59
  have a character who's necessarily like the A-Team
• 1:10:01
  homie, find a way to kind of make them self justified in
• 1:10:06
  their own head, right? Like the rogue is like, I don't
• 1:10:09
  really want to help the fucking paladin, but if the party
• 1:10:12
  ditches me for three days, there's a bounty on my head, I
• 1:10:15
  might be in trouble. I'm probably safer with the
• 1:10:17
  chuckle fuck brigade, so I guess I'll go with them.
• 1:10:20
  You know what I mean? Like always have those kind of
• 1:10:23
  things in your back pocket. And then on the GM side of
• 1:10:26
  things, always encourage that behavior, right?
• 1:10:30
  Right. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:10:31
  Or even just make it part of the quest itself.
• 1:10:36
  If the paladin needs to go collect their family's blade
• 1:10:39
  from the ancient lake, just say to the players the ancient lake
• 1:10:43
  is infested with monsters. If the paladin goes by himself,
• 1:10:46
  he's just going to die, you know what I mean?
• 1:10:47
  Like just be like, you have to help him or he's fucked.
• 1:10:50
  Yeah, right. That kind of vibe.
• 1:10:53
  This also does loop back into what we were saying before with,
• 1:10:57
  you know, oh, I have to find out where this demon is because it
• 1:11:01
  cursed my family. And then the warlocks patient
• 1:11:04
  shows up and it's like, oh that guy.
• 1:11:06
  Oh, I know that guy, you know. Yeah, exactly.
• 1:11:08
  Oh, yeah, yeah, I know who that is.
• 1:11:09
  Yeah. That it's, yeah, always that
• 1:11:11
  that that ties into the reusing NPCS, right.
• 1:11:15
  And then reusing NPCS to then fill into other characters to
• 1:11:21
  then put the spotlight on the other character with an existing
• 1:11:24
  right. Because, like, all right, I have
• 1:11:25
  the warlocks patron and the warlocks patron's been really
• 1:11:28
  relevant to the story for XY and Z reason.
• 1:11:31
  If I use the warlock patron to shift the spotlight away from
• 1:11:35
  the warlock onto the paladin. Yeah, Yeah, that could work.
• 1:11:37
  OK Yeah, yeah. The warlock patron knows the
• 1:11:40
  demon who killed your family paladin and the paladin's like,
• 1:11:42
  I need to talk to your patron immediately, Warlock.
• 1:11:44
  And now the spotlight's on the paladin.
• 1:11:46
  Boom, boom. Right.
• 1:11:49
  Like I'm a big big proponent of NPC reuse.
• 1:11:55
  Does a body good? Yin, yeah.
• 1:11:59
  Does a body good? Yeah, yeah.
• 1:12:03
  Everywhere you can do it. But the, you know, you should
• 1:12:07
  try sometime that you do that I do agree with is keep party
• 1:12:11
  small. Yeah, this is a big one.
• 1:12:15
  And I'm learning this painful lesson.
• 1:12:18
  Keep the parties small. It seems self-evident.
• 1:12:24
  But man, you don't realize as a dungeon master or a game master
• 1:12:30
  or whatever you want to call yourself, you don't realize the
• 1:12:33
  freedom of only having to juggle 3 characters, Yes Sir, as
• 1:12:39
  opposed to five. Plus it, it cannot be
• 1:12:43
  understated. It's also I mean this is a big
• 1:12:46
  thing. Smaller parties often tend to
• 1:12:50
  stick together because they don't have a choice, they have
• 1:12:53
  to interact with each other. They will form bonds much
• 1:12:57
  quicker than a larger party, and because the party is smaller
• 1:13:02
  they are very aware about how quickly they can get pub stomped
• 1:13:06
  if they are not careful. Well, they're the, the
• 1:13:08
  characters are going to be more tightly entwined no matter what.
• 1:13:11
  Because if you have, you know, seven players, it's really easy
• 1:13:16
  for two characters to get attached to each other and not
• 1:13:19
  the other 5, right? Because the other five can go
• 1:13:22
  talk amongst themselves. It's like when you go to a party
• 1:13:25
  at somebody's house, inevitably what ends up happening is people
• 1:13:29
  split off into like groups of three or groups of pairs or
• 1:13:32
  maybe a group of four, right? Like everyone kind of sections
• 1:13:35
  off to their little bits and bobs, and then you bounce
• 1:13:38
  between each other from time to time.
• 1:13:39
  But you generally kind of section off.
• 1:13:41
  And it's because you as a human being can just only juggle so
• 1:13:44
  many people, right? And then, you know, the host
• 1:13:48
  tries to bounce around the most. And the host in this scenario is
• 1:13:51
  the GM. But you could still only juggle
• 1:13:54
  so many people. And the, the, yeah, the smaller
• 1:14:00
  party is just going to intertwine themselves with each
• 1:14:03
  other naturally and more easily. And, you know, fuck, it's just
• 1:14:11
  like, it's easier to split your attention three ways than 5.
• 1:14:16
  Like just mathematically, you know what I mean?
• 1:14:18
  Like. It it is.
• 1:14:20
  It's just one of those things. I'm doing 5 right now, and five
• 1:14:25
  is exponentially easier than six, but three is exponentially
• 1:14:28
  easier than 5 exactly. And, you know, people will say,
• 1:14:34
  well, you miss out on some things.
• 1:14:37
  There's an argument you've made that a bigger group has certain
• 1:14:40
  pros to it. But I don't know, at least for
• 1:14:44
  my money, the pros of the bigger group or the cons of the bigger
• 1:14:48
  group outweigh the pros and the smaller group.
• 1:14:51
  Just I, I like those pros better, you know, like.
• 1:14:55
  Yeah. That's just kind of how I be
• 1:14:57
  feeling. Some games make it a little
• 1:15:00
  difficult, right? Some games are kind of balanced
• 1:15:03
  around the four to five to six range.
• 1:15:06
  And in those scenarios you have to kind of consider, you know,
• 1:15:09
  do you want to adjust the math? Do you want to deal with it?
• 1:15:12
  What do you want to do? You know?
• 1:15:13
  But yeah, if the game allows for three, it's like it's a good
• 1:15:19
  number. Yeah, I got the press pretty
• 1:15:21
  attractive. It's a good, it's a good number.
• 1:15:23
  It's a good number. It's also worth pointing out
• 1:15:26
  and, and I feel like people don't, there's a tendency to not
• 1:15:30
  think about this because people often think of GM and players,
• 1:15:37
  right? But if you're just counting
• 1:15:39
  people, if you have three players and one GM, you have 4
• 1:15:46
  people and four people just in general in any interaction like
• 1:15:54
  it in real life, four people is a good interactive number,
• 1:15:59
  right? Like if you're sitting at a
• 1:16:01
  table, you're going out to a restaurant 4 right?
• 1:16:06
  You, your girlfriend, your buddy, his girlfriend.
• 1:16:09
  That's a good, easy number to bounce around, talk to everybody
• 1:16:12
  evenly, make eye contact. You know, you don't need a giant
• 1:16:16
  table. You can, you don't need to ask
• 1:16:18
  somebody to pass you something down, you know, three people
• 1:16:21
  deep or whatever. You know, it's an easy good
• 1:16:23
  interactive number. So when you have three players,
• 1:16:26
  you're operating with a four person group, it's like there's
• 1:16:29
  a natural you're tapping into, say like human psychology a
• 1:16:33
  little bit is what I'm getting at.
• 1:16:35
  Yeah. I just, I, I say that 'cause I
• 1:16:39
  know people have a tendency to only count the players and not
• 1:16:42
  count the GM in that equation, you know?
• 1:16:45
  Yes, I am guilty of that. Like everyone subtracts one,
• 1:16:48
  they're like, well I have six players.
• 1:16:49
  I'm like OK, so you have 7 people, right?
• 1:16:52
  Like that, that like you still like the GM still a person and
• 1:16:55
  and then you would deal with like 7 people to schedule seven
• 1:17:00
  people to communicate, 7 people in the Discord server or their
• 1:17:03
  group chatter, you know, like you got to add that one person,
• 1:17:07
  the GM still a person at the end of the day, you know?
• 1:17:12
  It's true. It's just it's, yeah, I don't
• 1:17:15
  know, I find that funny. People always talk about player
• 1:17:17
  count but don't equate the GM in the player count.
• 1:17:21
  And I'm like, yeah, but the GM still is a factor there.
• 1:17:23
  They are, yeah. Yeah, you also, I mean this is a
• 1:17:28
  small, small bonus. Smaller parties means that
• 1:17:33
  option 2, the group problem solving, it's an automatic.
• 1:17:37
  It just kind of happens that way.
• 1:17:38
  It just it has to you. Don't need to.
• 1:17:41
  You don't need to nudge it as much because they only have so
• 1:17:46
  many people to cooperate with anyway, so it's like they're
• 1:17:49
  just going to cooperate with who they have at hand.
• 1:17:51
  Yes, and they're also going to have to try to cover as many
• 1:17:53
  bases as they can. This is also generally why I'm a
• 1:17:58
  proponent for less NPCS than more, for kind of the same
• 1:18:02
  reason. If you have less NPCS that
• 1:18:05
  you're juggling, the players have less like allies to go to
• 1:18:09
  when they have a problem, which means they're more likely to go
• 1:18:12
  to like the same character or the same couple of characters.
• 1:18:15
  And then they'll get a rapport and you'll get a better idea of
• 1:18:20
  who that character is, and maybe they'll learn more about the
• 1:18:22
  character. So that big back story you wrote
• 1:18:24
  up for the NPC like team leader or whatever or organization
• 1:18:28
  leader will actually be relevant because they don't have that
• 1:18:32
  many other characters to go to. That's a good point.
• 1:18:35
  I the reason why I like big NPCS is because I feel like I
• 1:18:39
  personally want to feel like the world is big.
• 1:18:42
  You know, like when you go places, you'll always meet
• 1:18:44
  people. And I on a player level, I
• 1:18:46
  always like the, you know, having that will, you know,
• 1:18:53
  people being like, oh, remember that one guy who could like who
• 1:18:56
  is tailor made to help us in this situation.
• 1:18:59
  And sometimes you do get the the GM being like, the fuck was
• 1:19:02
  that? That's not, I mean, typically
• 1:19:07
  don't have that. That's because I keep very,
• 1:19:08
  very, very well documented notes of all my NPCS.
• 1:19:12
  Yeah. I mean, you're not off base with
• 1:19:14
  that that like instinct. I get what you mean.
• 1:19:19
  I guess I would just say perhaps a good way to think about it is
• 1:19:23
  that because you're right, there's a certain, there's a
• 1:19:29
  certain mentality to making the world feel like populated and
• 1:19:34
  lived in. I think a way to think about it
• 1:19:37
  though, is maybe having like primary, secondary and tertiary
• 1:19:43
  MPCS and maybe breaking them up a little bit more.
• 1:19:48
  And, and what I mean is like, you know, you have your, your
• 1:19:54
  primary MPCS are the ones you reuse and you flesh out and you
• 1:19:58
  make sure you got a lot going on with them and you, you, you, you
• 1:20:01
  give them love and attention. And then your secondary NPCS are
• 1:20:05
  like useful tools for when the players need them, but maybe you
• 1:20:08
  don't spend as much energy on them as as the GM, you know,
• 1:20:12
  whether that be not as much back story or not as much mechanics
• 1:20:16
  or not as much, you know, time, even spotlight time.
• 1:20:21
  And then the tertiary MPCS, which are like the background,
• 1:20:24
  fill in characters of like that one guy who shouts at you from
• 1:20:27
  his stall about the bread he's selling and, you know, the other
• 1:20:30
  guy who's selling you wine or whatever, like that kind of a
• 1:20:33
  vibe, you know? What I'm saying, no, that's
• 1:20:35
  that's absolutely how I do it. Like there are certain
• 1:20:38
  characters who have one line of lore, like is the shopkeeper at
• 1:20:43
  that place can get you things that you can't otherwise get
• 1:20:46
  right. But that that one line of like,
• 1:20:50
  don't we know that one black market dealer who can get us
• 1:20:53
  shit for like, maybe not cheap, but they'll get it to us fast.
• 1:20:57
  You know what I mean? Those are the interactions I
• 1:20:59
  want to have. I want the players to have you
• 1:21:02
  know. Yeah.
• 1:21:04
  Especially now in Lancer when people have like a phone and a
• 1:21:07
  lot. Of players, you know a guy and
• 1:21:09
  then you're like. Let me text that guy real quick.
• 1:21:12
  Hey yo can you get us a nuke like?
• 1:21:16
  Real shit. A lot of players forget though
• 1:21:18
  that those MPCS exist. They do.
• 1:21:21
  And that's why I have a big, big dossier full of characters
• 1:21:25
  because I love watching them go, wait, we know him.
• 1:21:28
  Oh God. Oh, and they're just fucking
• 1:21:32
  scrolling up and down, up and down, trying to find and they're
• 1:21:35
  like, where? What folder are they in?
• 1:21:37
  What folder do they able? To dossier, yeah, yeah.
• 1:21:40
  And then I go. You'll find it.
• 1:21:42
  I believe in you. I think it's also there's a
• 1:21:45
  degree of setting relevance here too right?
• 1:21:46
  Like the Mecca space game lends itself to meeting a huge shit
• 1:21:51
  load of people. More than the, you know, the
• 1:21:55
  Witcher travelling across the plains kind of game.
• 1:21:58
  That's fucking true, yeah. I mean, space opera, you, you
• 1:22:01
  need, you got big, everything's bigger numbers.
• 1:22:03
  Everything's big, you're travelling farther right,
• 1:22:06
  There's more even if you think about it in like a like a
• 1:22:10
  practicality sense, if they're on a big ship that's part of the
• 1:22:14
  the, you know, the faction they're a part of probably need
• 1:22:17
  a lot of people to fly the ship right?
• 1:22:18
  Like a a what the fuck brain? What are they called?
• 1:22:24
  What are the Doritos in Star Wars called?
• 1:22:26
  Isaiah help the Doritos the space.
• 1:22:27
  Doritos, Star Destroyers, or *? Destroyers.
• 1:22:30
  Jesus Christ, why couldn't I think of Star Destroyer?
• 1:22:32
  What the fuck? Well, 'cause so you got.
• 1:22:33
  You have the Star Destroyer, the appearance starter, and they
• 1:22:35
  have the Venator class. I I meant the starter.
• 1:22:37
  Starter. Let's not get, let's not get too
• 1:22:39
  nerdy here. I like the Venator class Star
• 1:22:42
  cruiser it's. I know, I know, I know.
• 1:22:43
  It's fine. I just, I'm just saying.
• 1:22:45
  It's not as cool as my favorite, the V Wing Interceptor, one of
• 1:22:48
  the fastest starships in Star Wars.
• 1:22:49
  It's fine. Every time.
• 1:22:52
  Every time. But but what I'm saying is like
• 1:22:55
  if the players live on a Star Destroyer, right, there's a lot
• 1:22:58
  of motherfuckers that man Star Destroyers.
• 1:23:00
  I think they've said it's like, what is it like 500 people or
• 1:23:03
  something to a Star Destroyer or something?
• 1:23:04
  Oh, it's more than that. It's thousands.
• 1:23:06
  It's yeah, it's a ridiculous. It's like a whole fucking city
• 1:23:09
  lives on this fucking * destroyer.
• 1:23:10
  So it's like maybe not city like small town, I guess It's like,
• 1:23:15
  you know, in those scenarios it having that crazy amount of MPCS
• 1:23:19
  like lends itself a bit more. So there's also an element of
• 1:23:23
  genre and vibe that makes sense. Basically I I'm justifying your
• 1:23:31
  nonsense. However, I do still think you
• 1:23:33
  should try and reuse MPCS a little bit more than you perhaps
• 1:23:36
  do. I I will try it.
• 1:23:38
  Yeah, OK. An Imperial class Star Destroyer
• 1:23:40
  man's 37,000 to 47,000 food. OK, more than a small town.
• 1:23:47
  That's like a medium sized town. Yeah.
• 1:23:49
  What the fuck? Oh, you don't want to know how
• 1:23:51
  big the numbers are for 40K it gets really.
• 1:23:53
  Fun. Wait, 37th that well, 40K
• 1:23:55
  they're flying. Or like the entirety of
• 1:23:57
  Manhattan on a ship. Yeah.
• 1:24:00
  Hold on, hold on. What is the hold on?
• 1:24:02
  It was like the population. Like where at?
• 1:24:05
  Hold on, no. Where I live is 20,000.
• 1:24:08
  You know where I lived in New York was 20,000.
• 1:24:12
  Ain't no way. Seriously.
• 1:24:13
  Yeah. Oh Jesus.
• 1:24:16
  OK, yeah. So the the 30 something 1000 is
• 1:24:19
  like the population of where I live right now.
• 1:24:22
  Yeah. That's ridiculous.
• 1:24:25
  Anyway, where were we keeping the party?
• 1:24:31
  Small. Well, yeah, keeping the party
• 1:24:33
  small it it. I know you have all your friends
• 1:24:36
  that you want to play games with.
• 1:24:38
  Here's the thing. If you.
• 1:24:40
  It just doesn't. I hate to admit that it works,
• 1:24:42
  but it does. When there's less people in the
• 1:24:45
  game, more people want to play the game, more people are
• 1:24:47
  willing to fucking bite the bullet and run a fucking game.
• 1:24:53
  I hate that Josh was right on this one, but he fucking was.
• 1:24:57
  And I'm never going to live it down, but God damn it, it's
• 1:25:00
  fucking true. Because now we got two people
• 1:25:02
  starting to run games now, and it's probably because we got
• 1:25:05
  small parties and people want to play shit that nobody's running.
• 1:25:09
  So, you know, not to get weird in all up in your ears.
• 1:25:13
  I'm right here in the only Love. But like, there's a little
• 1:25:15
  truth. There's a little truth to it.
• 1:25:17
  And, and also worth pointing out that, you know, you have all
• 1:25:21
  your friends you want to play a game with or whatever, and you
• 1:25:23
  know, so you have your seven person D&D group.
• 1:25:27
  Look, a, a couple of people are going to fall by the wayside,
• 1:25:30
  right? Two or three players are going
• 1:25:32
  to be not as invested probably as the other four or five.
• 1:25:36
  And they might not even be having a good time at a certain
• 1:25:40
  point, you know, and then you're in a situation of like, they
• 1:25:44
  probably would be better off not being in the game, you know what
• 1:25:47
  I mean? Like really goes back to the no
• 1:25:50
  D&D is better than bad D and DI. Mean there's, there's, there's
• 1:25:54
  some truth to that, I mean. I stand by that statement
• 1:25:58
  firmly. I've seen so much evidence for
• 1:26:00
  that to be a true play, a true what's the word I'm looking for?
• 1:26:09
  Platitude that I stand by it. You know, here's the thing, I I
• 1:26:13
  can't fully buy it because I have seen bad DND get turned
• 1:26:17
  into spite and then good DND is if you got bad DND, there's a
• 1:26:23
  good chance that somebody would be like fuck it, I can do it
• 1:26:25
  myself. Right.
• 1:26:27
  But that that still kind of reinforces the point because
• 1:26:31
  that means the person saying I'd rather be doing something other
• 1:26:35
  than this bad game, right? Like it's still kind of it's
• 1:26:39
  still kind of is. No DND is better in the sense of
• 1:26:44
  not playing this DND campaign is better, right?
• 1:26:47
  You know what I mean? Like.
• 1:26:49
  Yeah, I can see where it's true. It's not exactly the same
• 1:26:52
  obviously, as how people use it, but like it, there's an element
• 1:26:54
  of like, it's still kind of reinforces the point.
• 1:26:57
  But yes, absolutely the Spike campaign of I can, I'll do it
• 1:27:01
  myself is real for sure. That is very much a thing.
• 1:27:08
  I've seen it. I've seen that one a couple of
• 1:27:09
  times. Oh yeah, the the last solution
• 1:27:19
  that I found pretty recently about apparently this has been a
• 1:27:21
  thing for a while. Spotlight tokens I think is an
• 1:27:25
  interesting concept. You heard of this before?
• 1:27:30
  Yeah, I people will often suggest mechanical or or semi
• 1:27:40
  mechanical solutions to this problem of passing around the
• 1:27:45
  spotlight equally and making sure no one hogs at the scene
• 1:27:48
  too much. But man, I don't know, I've just
• 1:27:52
  never found much satisfaction for dealing with this kind of
• 1:27:55
  problem in a mechanical way. I know I'm always the like
• 1:28:00
  mechanics make the game work kind of person, but for this
• 1:28:04
  particular thing it just never feels like, I don't know, I'd
• 1:28:09
  just rather handle it on a more psychological, sociological
• 1:28:15
  level. Look, I totally get you.
• 1:28:17
  I just thought it was interesting.
• 1:28:19
  It felt like it was valid enough to share.
• 1:28:21
  So to those of you who might not know, spotlight tokens are
• 1:28:24
  effectively a soft currency that each player is given at the
• 1:28:27
  start of session. Anytime a player chooses to
• 1:28:30
  interact with the narrative or share the spotlight with another
• 1:28:35
  character, you pay for it with a spotlight token and you get to
• 1:28:40
  do whatever you're doing, finish the scene, however long it
• 1:28:43
  takes. Once you've used all your
• 1:28:46
  spotlight tokens, typically it's one or two at a time.
• 1:28:50
  You your character is considered either busy or indisposed, or
• 1:28:55
  just sitting in the background and letting players have their
• 1:28:58
  moment. And once every character has run
• 1:29:02
  their gambit of spotlight tokens, then they are, you know,
• 1:29:06
  they are re upped, you get them back.
• 1:29:10
  So there could be a session where that only goes around once
• 1:29:14
  if characters are doing the round Robin or it's happening
• 1:29:18
  constantly. Cause characters are trying to
• 1:29:20
  have conversations with this character.
• 1:29:22
  And I want to talk to this character.
• 1:29:23
  OK, but they use their tokens. OK.
• 1:29:24
  So I'm going to talk to you and use your token.
• 1:29:28
  And you know, they'll, they'll just start.
• 1:29:30
  I hopefully they will start shifting through it and get as
• 1:29:33
  much as done possible as they can.
• 1:29:37
  Yeah, I, I get the idea. I don't know, I, I guess my my
• 1:29:43
  problem is I feel like it's going to it's just going to so
• 1:29:47
  quickly get into a place of feeling like a little awkwardly
• 1:29:51
  contrived. And I just, I would rather just
• 1:29:56
  as AGM hone my skill of passing the spotlight around, you know,
• 1:30:02
  work basically. I would rather practice my
• 1:30:05
  cinematography more than trying to force my actors to behave a
• 1:30:10
  certain way, you know what I mean?
• 1:30:11
  Like there's just like a little bit of a weird contrivance to it
• 1:30:15
  that I just don't jive with. You're definitely not wrong.
• 1:30:20
  I, I would rather have it done the former way as well, but I
• 1:30:25
  think, you know, certain parties call for different, you know,
• 1:30:30
  different parties call for different situations.
• 1:30:32
  It could be a situation where one player specifically just
• 1:30:36
  keeps jumping into the spotlight where it is.
• 1:30:40
  You know, it might be a malicious thing.
• 1:30:41
  It might not be a malicious thing, but it is a habitual
• 1:30:43
  thing that a character's doing. And it can be a way to wrangle
• 1:30:50
  them in a way that doesn't feel actively disparaging towards
• 1:30:54
  them. You know what I mean, right?
• 1:30:56
  The GM goes, I'm not putting a leash on you personally.
• 1:31:00
  I'm giving everyone equal length on this leash.
• 1:31:04
  And if you want that to go, if you want to go again, you have
• 1:31:10
  to encourage other players to try to take the spot to get your
• 1:31:14
  turn back. Right.
• 1:31:16
  Yeah, I mean. There's no reason why a
• 1:31:18
  character can't be like, you know, I'm choosing to forfeit my
• 1:31:21
  token because there's really nothing I want to do.
• 1:31:24
  You know, I wanted to go to the shops, and now I'm ready to go
• 1:31:26
  do the mission. I don't want to have to talk
• 1:31:28
  about how we cook dinner tonight.
• 1:31:30
  I just want to get on the ship and do the thing.
• 1:31:33
  And yeah, a character could be like, all right, I sacrificed my
• 1:31:35
  token. I just want to go.
• 1:31:36
  You're like, all right, come on off.
• 1:31:40
  That being said, you. Know it's funny, Daggerheart
• 1:31:45
  sort of kind of did this in the rules where, yeah, so they added
• 1:31:50
  it later, but there was like an optional rule thing that they
• 1:31:56
  added where it basically said 'cause you remember how like, so
• 1:31:59
  Daggerheart doesn't have a turn order, right?
• 1:32:01
  But it has the whole action token thing.
• 1:32:05
  And it was basically like as an optional rule.
• 1:32:09
  If you feel like you have a player who's just like hogging
• 1:32:11
  the scene too much 'cause in a game like Daggerheart or
• 1:32:16
  Apocalypse World or Blades where you know, you're not beholden to
• 1:32:21
  a turn order, you can't have a situation where 1 character just
• 1:32:25
  like takes an action, takes an action, takes an action, does
• 1:32:27
  the thing, does the thing, does the thing right.
• 1:32:28
  And that can just keep happening and happening in Blades in
• 1:32:31
  Apocalypse World, it doesn't tend to be as much of a problem.
• 1:32:34
  I think just by the nature of the kind of narrative that those
• 1:32:38
  games are doing you, you're, you can only be locked into doing
• 1:32:44
  stuff for so long before shit hits the fan.
• 1:32:47
  And then some other player is going to have to go come into
• 1:32:49
  the scene no matter what. But yeah, they added a rule
• 1:32:56
  where if a player can only take like a certain number of actions
• 1:33:01
  and then they can't act. Again.
• 1:33:03
  Until the other players have taken their actions and they
• 1:33:07
  basically made this like kind of like pseudo initiative
• 1:33:10
  situation. And it's a similar thing that
• 1:33:13
  you're talking about, except it's only in like combat
• 1:33:15
  scenarios when the action, you know, when the action tokens are
• 1:33:17
  in play basically. Interesting.
• 1:33:20
  Yeah. I mean, we definitely had that
• 1:33:21
  situation where we were playing where it was, you know, so
• 1:33:24
  certain characters couldn't think of anything they wanted to
• 1:33:27
  do. So they were, they were telling
• 1:33:28
  my, you know, I was chasing the weird dragon like bladed
• 1:33:31
  dragonfly thing. And they were like, all right,
• 1:33:33
  I'm just going to pass the EO because he's actively fighting
• 1:33:36
  the boss. We're kind of just trying to
• 1:33:39
  talk these guys down. Yeah, I just didn't.
• 1:33:44
  I just didn't feel like it was that big of a problem, honestly.
• 1:33:47
  It didn't it because for me, anytime I'm playing a game like
• 1:33:52
  that, you know, I and I, I honed this muscle on like on Dungeon
• 1:33:56
  World and Apocalypse World. I'm just following what makes
• 1:34:00
  sense in the fiction. And if you think about it in
• 1:34:03
  that, in that cinematography movie sense, if Captain America
• 1:34:10
  is still doing his cool fight scene on the roof, then it just
• 1:34:14
  makes sense to keep the camera on him.
• 1:34:17
  You're not going to jump away to see what Iron Man is up to if
• 1:34:20
  he's just like taking a piss, you know, like you keep the
• 1:34:25
  camera on where the action's happening.
• 1:34:26
  So for me, it just doesn't ever feel like that big of a problem.
• 1:34:29
  You just focus on what shit is going on.
• 1:34:33
  And if you feel like a character's just, you know,
• 1:34:36
  hogging up a little too much, you just say, all right, other
• 1:34:39
  players, what the hell are you up to?
• 1:34:40
  Because you got to do something here.
• 1:34:42
  And generally, the best way to keep the other players doing
• 1:34:44
  something is to make sure that the situation they're in, they
• 1:34:47
  can't just sit there with them up their ass, You know what I
• 1:34:49
  mean? Like, harangue them, give them
• 1:34:51
  something else. Like, attack them with something
• 1:34:53
  else, make sure they're doing something else, give them a
• 1:34:54
  problem. You know, that kind of vibe.
• 1:34:56
  I don't. Know bring up a good point.
• 1:34:58
  It's never felt like an issue to me I guess.
• 1:35:00
  And I, I had this thought when we were, we were playing on
• 1:35:03
  Monday is I feel like, not that she knew to do this, not that
• 1:35:08
  anyone told her to do this, but I think Fran would have had an
• 1:35:13
  easier time just pointing out where our characters were,
• 1:35:20
  right? Like the situation where we were
• 1:35:23
  like, oh, you know, you're like, oh, I'm looking for Nico.
• 1:35:25
  Where's Nico? And then she would go, you know,
• 1:35:28
  she'd look at me and go, well, where is Nico?
• 1:35:30
  I think she would have been valid and I wouldn't have been
• 1:35:32
  upset. If you're like, oh, if she if if
• 1:35:34
  she went. OK, Hannah, you're looking for
• 1:35:36
  Nico. You've been because they're no
• 1:35:38
  like perception checks, right? You can go, Oh, you think you
• 1:35:42
  spot him over in that direction, right.
• 1:35:45
  Because we're in an open field, Carrot.
• 1:35:47
  Like, people are walking around. It's not crazy to assume that
• 1:35:51
  you're like, all right, where is that fucking good?
• 1:35:53
  Oh, oh, is that him over there? All right.
• 1:35:55
  Yeah, I'm just going to go. I'm going to go get his.
• 1:35:56
  You know what I mean? As opposed to, you know, like
• 1:36:00
  characters potentially being in the same space and not seeing
• 1:36:03
  each other and that that is normal.
• 1:36:05
  That does happen. But it can, yeah, you kind of
• 1:36:09
  have to. It happens in real life.
• 1:36:11
  It doesn't happen in movies because.
• 1:36:13
  Exactly boring. It does.
• 1:36:15
  Exactly. Yes, and I feel like she
• 1:36:17
  probably would have saved herself a lot of time had she
• 1:36:20
  just been like. You find him.
• 1:36:22
  Here you. Yeah, you see him over there or
• 1:36:25
  you just saw him walk by and you lost him in the crowd.
• 1:36:27
  So you know where he's going, even if you don't know exactly
• 1:36:29
  where he is. And then she could have asked
• 1:36:31
  me, do you want to be found? Like, do you want to deal with
• 1:36:35
  another character in your business right now?
• 1:36:36
  And I could have said yes or no, right?
• 1:36:38
  Like that. That could have changed a little
• 1:36:39
  bit. I mean, yeah, I literally any,
• 1:36:42
  any, any situation like that where a player is like, I'm
• 1:36:47
  looking for this other character, you know, or this
• 1:36:49
  other player. I will just say, cool, other
• 1:36:54
  player. You're currently doing XY and Z.
• 1:36:56
  When player A walks up and find, you know, walks up to come talk
• 1:37:01
  to you. What do you, how do you respond?
• 1:37:02
  Like, I don't even leave a gap. I'm just like, Yep, you find
• 1:37:06
  them. Unless there's a reason that you
• 1:37:08
  might not immediately find them, right.
• 1:37:10
  If there's a justification for why player A cannot find player
• 1:37:15
  character B, then that's a different story.
• 1:37:18
  But in a situation like that where it's like, yeah, you're
• 1:37:20
  all walking around the festival doing similar things, yeah, you
• 1:37:24
  just find him. Because again, if we think about
• 1:37:28
  it like a movie, it'd be really fucking boring if the main
• 1:37:31
  character's like, oh, I need to go find my friend.
• 1:37:34
  And then we get like 3 scenes of him just kind of wandering
• 1:37:37
  around random places doing nothing, you know what I mean?
• 1:37:42
  Like, no, obviously he goes, obviously Captain America goes
• 1:37:45
  we need to go find Tony. The next scene, they find Tony.
• 1:37:50
  Like that's unless Tony's kidnapped, and then the next
• 1:37:54
  scene is Tony in a room being kidnapped, right?
• 1:37:57
  Like it's that whole thing. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:38:00
  It's literally, yeah, follow the movie structure.
• 1:38:02
  It's just 'cause that's kind of, listen, that's kind of what
• 1:38:08
  you're doing with RPGs, right? You're you're kind of making a
• 1:38:11
  movie for each other in like a it's a.
• 1:38:14
  Good way of thinking about it. In so many words.
• 1:38:17
  Yeah, I think, to summarize, I, I think, and I, I agree with
• 1:38:21
  you, I do that as well, where it's like, you know, oh, I want
• 1:38:24
  to go talk to this character. OK.
• 1:38:25
  You find that, you know, I'd be like, OK, where would your
• 1:38:27
  character be? Would you be, would you be
• 1:38:29
  findable right now? Are you on base?
• 1:38:31
  And if someone's like, yeah, I'm probably like, you know, I'm in
• 1:38:33
  the the hangar. I'm like, OK, that's where you
• 1:38:35
  find them. Yeah.
• 1:38:37
  There is an option where they might not be, right.
• 1:38:39
  Like you're said, like Tony might be missing a character.
• 1:38:40
  Be like, Oh no, I'm in the city right now doing my own plot
• 1:38:43
  thing. And then I go, OK, so they're
• 1:38:46
  not there. You can probably call them, but
• 1:38:49
  that like that might not seem important, but that is important
• 1:38:51
  if you're if you're trying to build intrigue, right?
• 1:38:53
  That person is isolated now. They're alone.
• 1:38:55
  They cannot be held easily. Good to keep to think about.
• 1:38:59
  If you, if you want to leave the table open for the other
• 1:39:03
  character to potentially be like sort of a little bit narratively
• 1:39:11
  indisposed, if you want to leave that room, then say to the other
• 1:39:13
  player, all right, where do you think you probably are AT?
• 1:39:17
  And would it make sense for them to find you?
• 1:39:18
  Like you can do that, but you're still, again, the camera is
• 1:39:22
  still effectively player character A says I'm looking for
• 1:39:26
  player character B. The camera jumps to player
• 1:39:29
  character B, right? Like that's, that's the
• 1:39:31
  important part that that camera jump, that cut, you know what I
• 1:39:35
  mean? Yeah, OK.
• 1:39:46
  Sorry, I didn't mean to. I'm listening.
• 1:39:48
  I just we're at the end. Yeah.
• 1:39:53
  And to something that you brought up earlier before you
• 1:39:58
  could have a situation where the where some characters or some
• 1:40:02
  players, sorry, just. Don't want to be in the
• 1:40:07
  spotlight, right? They are.
• 1:40:11
  They are actively choosing to take a sit back and they're,
• 1:40:14
  they're doing the beer and pretzels thing.
• 1:40:17
  And if that's the case, you as the GM need to understand and be
• 1:40:27
  OK with that. Because if you start stressing
• 1:40:30
  yourself out, and again, I'm talking about myself, if you
• 1:40:34
  stress yourself out constantly throwing bait at the player who
• 1:40:39
  is clearly just not taking it. And it's not because they're not
• 1:40:42
  getting it. When they do bite, they kind of
• 1:40:45
  they give you a little bit. They're like, oh, yeah, my, my,
• 1:40:48
  my character. What would I do?
• 1:40:51
  They'll they'll like scan the area and then you're like, OK,
• 1:40:56
  you ow why? What?
• 1:40:59
  Like, give me something. But if they just don't want to
• 1:41:04
  do that, don't do anything. Just let it rock.
• 1:41:10
  Right? Like this is what we were
• 1:41:11
  talking about at the beginning, where it's give them adequate
• 1:41:15
  but not necessarily equal time. If one character is perfectly
• 1:41:20
  fine sitting in the background and watching the movie play out
• 1:41:23
  until they think that their character has something poignant
• 1:41:26
  to say, let them say it. And at that point, their
• 1:41:31
  enjoyment, their ability to seek enjoyment from the game is 100%
• 1:41:35
  on them. You have given them openings,
• 1:41:37
  you will give the openings if they show that they're
• 1:41:39
  interested. But until they are ready to
• 1:41:41
  bite, you've got, in my case, four other players to worry
• 1:41:46
  about. Do want to do their own thing?
• 1:41:49
  Yeah, I mean, if you if you offer them a slice of pie, they
• 1:41:55
  do not want a slice of pie. You cannot shove the pie down
• 1:41:58
  their throat. Yes, you cannot make someone
• 1:42:01
  drink the tea. Yes, you cannot oops.
• 1:42:06
  If you offer someone tea and they do not want tea, do not
• 1:42:09
  forcibly make them drink the tea.
• 1:42:11
  You cannot make them drink the tea, and if they say they want
• 1:42:13
  the tea and then you make the tea and by the time you return
• 1:42:17
  they said they. Changed their mind and do not
• 1:42:19
  want the. Tea.
• 1:42:20
  You cannot give them the tea. Look, I understand.
• 1:42:23
  I understand the context in which that power that that
• 1:42:26
  presentation was given. But if I make you tea,
• 1:42:29
  goddamnit, and I take the time to make the goddamn tea and I
• 1:42:33
  waste the tea bag on your. Head and come.
• 1:42:36
  Back and you're like, no, I don't really want it anymore.
• 1:42:38
  I'm not going to make you drink the tea, but I'm a bust that mug
• 1:42:41
  upside your head. I'm a fucking glare.
• 1:42:44
  You down something fierce. Yeah.
• 1:42:47
  I'm a watch you sitting there sipping my own tea, burning a
• 1:42:51
  hole in your in your psyche. Yeah, yeah, for the sake of
• 1:42:55
  this, we are actually talking about nicking tea and not the
• 1:42:58
  point of that actual. Yeah, not what that actual
• 1:43:00
  video's about. No, no.
• 1:43:02
  But as a broke Hispanic, if I if I cook you food of any kind and
• 1:43:06
  you don't eat after you said you were hungry, I'm gonna fuck you
• 1:43:10
  up. I'm.
• 1:43:11
  Gonna lose my God damn mind. Consent is key.
• 1:43:16
  But I'm going to fuck you up. I might not force you to eat the
• 1:43:20
  I might not force you to eat the chicken, but I might hit you
• 1:43:22
  with the pan I made the chicken in.
• 1:43:24
  Yes, that is literally it. I won't make you eat it, but
• 1:43:27
  there is a chocolate and it is meeting your head terminal.
• 1:43:30
  Velocity. Yeah, the quiet player I.
• 1:43:36
  I look, I'm really, I'm literally, I'm going to kill my
• 1:43:40
  quiet player like. Sometimes that isn't L, you just
• 1:43:45
  got a hold. It is, it is, it is.
• 1:43:48
  And another thing that you know, people might not want to tell
• 1:43:53
  you, but this is true. So I'm thinking about this right
• 1:43:57
  now. If you feel like that quiet
• 1:44:01
  player is not putting in the effort to interact with the
• 1:44:08
  things you care about, it's not the end of the world to tell
• 1:44:13
  them that maybe the table isn't a right fit for them.
• 1:44:17
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. That can know, and that sucks to
• 1:44:20
  hear and it sucks to. Say, but also also where it's
• 1:44:24
  pointing out they could be not necessarily reacting in the way
• 1:44:30
  you're expecting, but are enjoying absorbing everything
• 1:44:34
  passively. You know what I mean?
• 1:44:35
  No, yes, that's true. That can't happen, and that is
• 1:44:38
  almost certainly what's happening with my player.
• 1:44:41
  Why? Given the fact that they do not
• 1:44:46
  participate as much as the other characters, they are primarily
• 1:44:51
  passive, and this is really the clincher.
• 1:44:54
  They have a nasty habit of not showing up to session.
• 1:45:00
  Well, that's a little. Or giving me very little notice
• 1:45:02
  that they're not showing up to session be one of them things.
• 1:45:08
  And unfortunately they are typically the passive player is
• 1:45:11
  often a problem player in that regard because it's a casual
• 1:45:15
  thing for them, right, right. Typically you, if you have a
• 1:45:18
  character like me who is like doing my thing and and and
• 1:45:23
  deeply ingraining myself in the story, that player will often be
• 1:45:26
  the one who's like showing up to every session is they've put the
• 1:45:30
  work in and they care enough. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:45:32
  Like they've put effort in, you've put effort in.
• 1:45:34
  It's like a mutual understanding thing there, yeah.
• 1:45:36
  Yeah, it is unfortunately true that typically the passive
• 1:45:40
  casual players are ones who are little more, shall we say?
• 1:45:49
  What's the word help me out here?
• 1:45:50
  Frustrating. That's a good word.
• 1:45:54
  That's a good word. I was going to say.
• 1:45:56
  A little truant in their. Yeah.
• 1:46:04
  Session attendance, shall we say?
• 1:46:06
  Yeah. But but again, also like if
• 1:46:14
  they're not truant, but they're still the really passive quiet
• 1:46:17
  player, they still might be like on the vibes, you know, like
• 1:46:21
  they still might be loving it. So you got.
• 1:46:23
  To if. If you got to, you got to check,
• 1:46:25
  yes, you got to kind of see. You, you cannot just have a
• 1:46:28
  passive player or you should not have a passive player and they
• 1:46:31
  just go, well, they're not interested.
• 1:46:32
  I'm just going to kick them from the game.
• 1:46:34
  That's not all what I'm advocating for, but there is a
• 1:46:38
  point where if the passive player.
• 1:46:44
  Yeah, if you're. Like if they're if the passivity
• 1:46:48
  come to gets to a point where it is distracting for you.
• 1:46:51
  It's slipping your sanity, yeah. Yeah, then it is your table.
• 1:46:56
  You know, you can, you have the right to lightly ask them to
• 1:47:00
  step away. And if they look at you and go,
• 1:47:02
  no, no, I don't want to go away. I really, I'm having fun here.
• 1:47:05
  I'm really doing my thing. If they show enthusiasm for that
• 1:47:10
  game, then go, OK, that's fine. I would ask that you try to put
• 1:47:17
  a little bit more of a foot forward.
• 1:47:18
  Right. Like ultimately this is this
• 1:47:20
  whole episode is just another one of the 18 trillion fucking
• 1:47:23
  ways that a a personality on the Internet tells you to talk to
• 1:47:25
  your players. Always comes back to that point.
• 1:47:29
  Don't. It does, yeah, but this is a big
• 1:47:31
  one. Talk to your players.
• 1:47:33
  Just try it, it'll probably go better than you think.
• 1:47:39
  That's The funny thing. Yeah, it often does go better
• 1:47:41
  than expected. Yeah, look, it's it's a pain in
• 1:47:44
  the ass. You don't want to do it.
• 1:47:45
  I don't want to do it. I've had to do it several times,
• 1:47:47
  and each time I get fucking annoyed.
• 1:47:49
  But more often than not, it does yield better results.
• 1:47:57
  Do you not any not any closing thoughts?
• 1:48:07
  No, I mean, like I said, the the main, the big thing for me with
• 1:48:10
  the whole spotlight conversation, which comes up a
• 1:48:13
  lot, I feel is, yeah, don't think about it so much on a
• 1:48:17
  session by session basis and think about it more over like a
• 1:48:20
  whole campaign or over an arc of things and you know, spread time
• 1:48:24
  out a little bit. One episode is this guy's
• 1:48:27
  episode and other episodes, this guy's episode, episode number 3
• 1:48:31
  is this girl's episode. Like that's a natural flow of
• 1:48:33
  things. Again.
• 1:48:36
  I'm especially going back to that movie and show framing that
• 1:48:39
  we keep talking about. I would prefer, you know,
• 1:48:44
  playing a healthy balance of the short and long term.
• 1:48:46
  You know, be cognizant and cognizant of it in the short
• 1:48:51
  term, but you don't necessarily have to immediately act upon it
• 1:48:54
  in the short term. If one character is not the
• 1:48:56
  spotlight of an episode, it's fine.
• 1:48:58
  It's following the. It's following the logic.
• 1:49:00
  Like what? You know what makes sense, what
• 1:49:03
  feels right? Yeah, yeah.
• 1:49:05
  I mean, I think that's a valid point.
• 1:49:10
  I don't really have any. I've been talking for an hour
• 1:49:12
  and 20 minutes. I don't think I have any closing
• 1:49:15
  thoughts, you know, just. Eat your vegetables.
• 1:49:19
  Eat. Your vegetables keep working on
• 1:49:21
  it. If you're having this problem,
• 1:49:23
  you're not alone. And why, You know, try some of
• 1:49:26
  this advice and see if any of it helps you, especially you, you
• 1:49:28
  new peeps running games. Moon, I know you're listening to
• 1:49:32
  this, and I know you're listening to Common.
• 1:49:34
  Common common issue that crops up.
• 1:49:37
  Yeah, so let us know in the the doobly Doo if any of this works
• 1:49:44
  for you or if you agree or disagree, if you got any
• 1:49:46
  Actually, if you have any ideas of your own, I I would like to
• 1:49:49
  read them. No, drop them down and the.
• 1:49:52
  Doobly Doo I feel like a we I feel like we can't steal it.
• 1:49:55
  That's I can't. I can't but also B the doobly
• 1:49:58
  doo's the description, not the comment section.
• 1:50:00
  Fair enough. I I so I originally I thought it
• 1:50:02
  was a Colville thing but I've heard so many people say it and
• 1:50:04
  I don't know if it came from Colville or he just.
• 1:50:06
  No, apparently it comes from Vlog Brothers.
• 1:50:12
  Who? The fuck?
• 1:50:14
  Oh well, you just, you just made my girlfriend very sad.
• 1:50:18
  I I guess I did. Sorry about that, Lita.
• 1:50:21
  It's an old, old to, to, you know, the, you know, John Green
• 1:50:28
  who wrote Fault in Our Stars? Yes.
• 1:50:32
  Yeah. He's one of the two brothers in
• 1:50:33
  question. Oh.
• 1:50:35
  Yeah, there's a whole story behind that, but yeah, behind
• 1:50:41
  them, I should say. Old YouTube channel, Very old.
• 1:50:45
  Well, very old relative to YouTube, I should say.
• 1:50:47
  You know, Obviously not. You know what I mean?
• 1:50:51
  Do you have any like OG YouTube channels that you watched from
• 1:50:54
  back in the dizzy that are still uploading?
• 1:51:00
  Like I'm talking like. Re 2015, maybe Jesse Cox, I
• 1:51:07
  don't remember when he started his channel.
• 1:51:10
  Total Biscuit would have been on that list, but you know.
• 1:51:14
  Yeah. Obviously he's not uploading
• 1:51:16
  anymore. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:51:23
  Let me hold on. I'm going to take a quick look.
• 1:51:25
  Why are we? Why are we doing this, Sir?
• 1:51:27
  What do you? Because I'm curious, like I'm
• 1:51:28
  just I'm curious. Give me a second.
• 1:51:29
  Let me let me let me let me just let me just let me just oh God,
• 1:51:35
  no, I don't think I have any from like at least pre 20 a game
• 1:51:38
  grumps, I guess. But like I don't really follow
• 1:51:40
  them. I just, I've just not unsubbed
• 1:51:43
  them. I have a terrible habit of not
• 1:51:47
  unsubbing people. I've got like maybe 200
• 1:51:49
  something Subs in my YouTube and just a bunch of them don't
• 1:51:51
  upload anymore. I think I like to keep it as
• 1:51:53
  like a memory capsule. Anyway.
• 1:51:58
  Yeah, yeah, that's been us, you know, follow us on the social
• 1:52:04
  medias if you please. And I don't know each
• 1:52:10
  vegetables. Be gay, do crime.
• 1:52:12
  Be gay, do crime. And you know, I was going to say
• 1:52:17
  something that got me mad today. I'm not going to.
• 1:52:18
  No, I'm not bringing that that fucking negativity in the way
• 1:52:21
  you smart fuckers. I'm out.