The best thing a GM can do for a campaign is to make it personal for the players. When players feel attached to a story, and especially when they feel personally responsible for much of its creation, they will be more invested in seeing it through to the end.
Why doesn’t every GM do this? Well, it can be kind of tough. Not because there are inherent barriers against it. The problem lies in the fact that this is a specific skill that needs to be learned and then cultivated in order to use it. And many GMs have never learned the skills to harness the creative input of their players.
Today, we’re going to cover a few of these skills, and how you can start using them right now to engage your players.
On the last episode…
How do you do your recaps? Every story, outside of one-nighters, is going to have a recap moment. How you handle this is extremely important because it can either be the re-introduction to an engaging campaign, or the setup to a night of boredom and disengagement. The recap is the very first connecting point back into the story. So make it personal.
Something I heard the @rpggamerdad podcast do very well, specifically in their Mass Effect episodes, was to have a player give a dramatic retelling of the events from a character’s point of view, often in the future tense. This sets up dramatic interest, and gives the “actor” sort of players a chance to shine right out of the gate so you aren’t fighting them for the spotlight all night long. It also gives you a chance to hear the character’s point of view. As the GM, you know the answers to all the mysteries, but you also need to know what the characters think the answers are. They might actually be better answers, anyway. And if you tweak your story in that direction, then you’ve helped them feel clever as well, as if they figured out a plot twist all on their own. Two birds, as they say.
Another option is to have one player give a recap in character, and then have the other characters fill in details from their own point of view. Rotate the primary character each week. This gives characters and players a chance to disagree and compare notes, so everyone is thinking on the same page.
Once you’ve got the art of the dramatic recap, players will be excited from the first moment. Then you don’t have to worry about recapturing their attention.
Let players help shape new NPCs
Most GMs, we have an NPC’s personality and quirks in mind ahead of time when we plot the course. Maybe we’ve only got a rough idea, or we’re excellent at improvisation. However it goes, we GMs are the ones who decide the personality and behaviors of every creature in the world.
But think about it. These NPCs are the ones the players will be interacting with. How many times have you had an NPC you thought was really awesome that the players brushed aside like last year’s cheese? Have you ever tried to introduce a romantic interest for a PC, only to be told that the NPC was boring or uninteresting to the player? How many random, stupid, backwards NPCs have those players clung to against all your intentions, and even been willing to sacrifice themselves for when you try to kill off the NPC by hurling them into the sun just to be rid of them?
Get down to the root of this issue and fix it. We GMs shouldn’t be deciding every personality. The players are going to be interacting; let the players help shape the other characters in the world!
When the dramatic enemy steps out from behind the curtain, FREEZE FRAME. Only the tip of the foot is in view. “Quick,” you call out, “each one of you give me a descriptor, something you want the villain to be.” “A troglodyte!” “Pregnant!” “With a Jersey accent!” “Really overly rich and super proud of it!”
Your players just designed the villain they want to be facing. The group has customized their own villain, and now every time that NPC appears, they’re going to remember this scene. And every scene since. Because THEY HELPED MAKE THAT VILLAIN.
Yes, you’re going to get silly ideas. And yes, you’re going to have to really bend your mind and your vocal chords. You are always free to veto an idea if you just can’t do it. I admit that I would be hard pressed to hold a Russian accent for four hours straight.
Head distractingly silly ideas off at the pass. “This is going to be a real villain, possibly for a while. Are you sure you want him to have a massive nose with a huge amount of nose hair?” But don’t feel like silly ideas are going to ruin your game. Every character needs flaws. AND YOUR PLAYERS WILL GIVE VILLAINS FLAWS.
And, truth be told, players are going to veto ideas they really don’t like all on their own. If they’re working together to create a villain, they aren’t going to tolerate constant silliness that ruins their immersion. And if the whole group is silly, that tells you a lot about what they’re looking for in a game.
The art of the sub-recap
“Who was that guy again?” This is not what a GM wants to hear said about their favorite NPC. I’ll show you how awesome Mr. Bernard Waddlesnort is. Oh, I’ll show you all.
Players have a hard time holding all the names and characters in their head, campaign after campaign after campaign. “Remember that one guy four towns back from three months ago who was selling boots, and asked if you wanted to buy one? How could you not remember him? You got into a bar fight and stabbed his pet monkey!”
Odds are, one person at the table will remember. And just reminding them out loud is boring. Take a page from the Borderlands games and FREEZE FRAME here as well. Have a player who remembers give a one or two sentence description of the party’s history with the character.
“Lord Thunderface. He offered to pay us to retrieve his daughter. Then one of us convinced her to marry a gnome.”
Now EVERYONE remembers why they should be terrified to see that he’s the one presiding over their trial.
The name of the game
I was once in a game run by a friend. He gave my character a cursed item. The first clue that the item was cursed was when I picked it up and felt a powerful heartbeat. When that game concluded, I ran the next one, and I jokingly told him that every single item in my game was going to be cursed and have a heartbeat, including his gloves and food. The group named my game Heartbeat Theater. And it stuck, forever. They never asked, “Do you want to play D&D tonight?” or “Hey, is the game happening on Wednesday?” It was always, “When are we playing Heartbeat Theater again?”
Give your group the chance to name the campaign. Sometimes the players pick a groaningly awful pun. But you know what? If it’s memorable, and it sticks, that will be perfect. The players will start referring to it by that awful name, and the game will become personal. It won’t be plain old D&D. It will be “Fiddler on the ‘Net” (sorry, @fiddleback).
Make sure you’re designing personalized scenes alongside your players, instead of just for them
Players are going to be most engaged when they’ve helped design a scene. Yes, yes, you want to keep it a mystery. But have a text conversation with them about what sort of scene would draw them in. Give them a choice of a few details. Ask for two NPCs or backstory characters they’d like to see. If they know their long-lost sister is going to show up in the next session, they’ll be ready for it.
You won’t ruin the surprise; you’re going to heighten the suspense and bring them running to the table, heavy with anticipation. And this way, you are far less likely to have a clunker of a scene where the player wanders off and ignores what you’ve written.
Dramatic recaps, customizing NPCs, NPC recaps, naming your campaign, and letting players help write their own scenes. I hope you have success implementing these personalizations into your campaigns. Whenever I’ve used them, player appreciation jumps off the charts, and people come running back for more. Your players are creative people; use that!
Let us know in the comments below how you feel about some of these ideas, if you’ve used them, and what sort of success you’ve had.
