Hello all,
Michael here with what I hope is a first post of many focused, for a change, on the Player. The majority of the posts we have here and our podcasts are aimed at helping new DM’s become better or at least give them something to think about and/or steal for their own games. With this new series of posts I want to focus more on how to be a Player that will add to and enjoy the game more.
No Roll Before Its Time.
Rolling Dice is fun. Okay, there. I said it.
While there are RPG games that do not use them, the vast majority of games do. Since those games still exist we must conclude that they add or at least do not subtract from the enjoyment of the game. I’m a believer that they add to the fun. Sure it stinks when you botch a roll or just wiff on an attack, but those minor set backs often set the stage for those singular moments when you have one shot left, one toss of the die. The entire campaign and the lives of all your various PC’s hang in the space between those bouncing polyhedrals; a moment when everyone, including the DM stops what they are doing and rise slightly from their chairs to watch your D20 come to a rest.
Having said all that, as a DM I would prefer that Players not chose on their own, when they should or shouldn’t roll their die. It seems like a minor thing, but there are some meta-game implications.
Here’s what I mean:
A DM’s job is not only to create but to present. Whether they have created a campaign world whole-cloth or stolen liberally from print adventures or podcasts, their job is to now submerse their players into that setting. Give them a chance to explore its riches and add to it.
A Player’s job it to react to the world that is presented. The DM set’s the stage, provides the props and populates not just the audience, but the other actors, as NPC’s, and then it’s up to the Players to provide the script. They do that by asking questions and stating actions.
For example:
DM: “You emerge from the Caverns of Souls seemingly victorious. You have defeated the army of Undead and returned the Rod of Recruitment to the vaults where it it once again under Wards. However, standing in the dense forest you sense an unnatural silence and then notice tracks leading away – perhaps you did not defeat all of the Undead. What would you like to do?”
Player 1: “I’d like to check those tracks? are they humanoid? Based on my time fighting the Zombies below, can I tell if they are shuffling steps?”
DM: “You inspect the tracks and they are clearly the same shuffling steps you’ve seen below.”
Player 1: “Can I tell how many of the creatures have escaped?”
DM: “Roll a Wisdom check, Add tracking if you have it.”
Now I would guess that many of you reading that above would have expected that the DM would have called for the D20 roll after the players first questions. And many of you would have been right, in many games that’s where it would have come from, and that’s okay. In this situation I, as the DM, figured that the PC’s survival of the Caverns of Souls would have included numerous battles against the Zombies or even avoiding them and so they would have been making checks like this for “days,” and since I want the story to progress quickly I skipped that first roll. Now when the Player wanted to know how many of the undead escaped, that was a great time to have them Roll a Check. For the DM, a failure here could add tension or humor later when they track down the dozen or so Undead to find only two, or two-hundred of them.
Now let’s review that same exact scenario but change it to show what I mean by a Player rolling unnecessarily.
DM: “You emerge from the Caverns of Souls seemingly victorious. You have defeated the army of Undead and returned the Rod of Recruitment to the vaults where it it once again under Wards. However, standing in the dense forest you sense an unnatural silence and then notice tracks leading away – perhaps you did not defeat all of the Undead. What would you like to do?”
Player 1: Rolling a D20 – checking his sheet and then leaning back frustrated.
DM: “What?”
Player 1: “I wanted to check the tracks to see if I could learn anything, but I got a 6 on my roll.”
So now, the DM has a choice to make.
1. He/She could wait to see if another Player decides to check and hope they roll better (though in my scenario Player 1 is the Tracker which is why they were asking to begin with and it makes less sense that the Cleric of Storms can track better)
2. He/She could move on and have the Players stumble into more information down the path and hope the Player rolls better this time.
3. He/She will ignore the 6 and just tell the Player what they wanted him to know anyway.
In this situation # 3 is the same thing that happened in the original scenario, but it’s actually the worst option for the DM. The Player, by rolling without being asked, has forced their DM to make a tough decision. Different DM’s will handle this in many various ways (and likely more ways than the 3 examples I thought of). I’ve done each of the ones above myself, but here’s the reason I think #3 is the worst choice:
The Player knows that they rolled badly, so now if the DM ingnores the bad results and tells them what they wanted them to know anyway, the thought of none of my rolls really matter, because the DM is just telling us a story anyway will slowly start to creep into all the Players minds. This is a very dangerous road to travel. It’s the kind of road that can destroy the vermilsitude of a game and make it harder for Players to role-play. They can start to make rash decisions simply to see how much crazy stuff they can cause to happen because that’s the only real way to affect the story the DM is telling.
This type of unraveling doesn’t happen because of one single D20 roll, but is a cumulation of things that DM’s, both good and bad, do in their games, but are certainly propogated in this manner.
So, very long story short – As a Player, your job is to ask questions and react:
How wide is the chasm?
“Can I understand what the voices are saying?”
“Is the door wood or iron?”
“Do we have enough rope?”
“I want to jump the chasm”
“I want to mimic what I heard the voices saying before.”
“I want to break down the door”
“I want to tie my rope together and climb down the pit.”
Your DM will decide when and if you need to roll a D20 or other die. It may seem like a small difference, but a character in a movie or book doesn’t pull out a D20 and roll to see if they will try to jump a chasm and neither should your PC. Every time you roll a D20 you’re stepping out of your PC’s skin and being a player. It’s part of the game, sure, but by only doing it when it’s necessary you make each roll more important and more importantly keep yourself immersed into the game as much as possible.
Thanks!!
Michael – AKA Mumbles.
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