D&D General Read aloud text in modules: What are folks opinions about read aloud content?

[Dausuul]

The king is dead without a proper heir? Seems like a perfect time to institute a better system of government!

At that point you don't need box text. Just put on "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." It's all you'll hear that session anyway.

 

[Dausuul]

My instinct is to always put the "moveable" parts last. And I think that's how I always write mine.

I think you are right, but I'm still hesitant to change. I have always put the dangerous stuff last. Because myself once I hear the dangerous stuff I'm figuring out what to do and ignore the rest.

Of course if the text is long you're going to lose the player's attention no matter what.

What do other think? Danger first or last? (Assuming a nice short paragraph.)

My take: Stop fighting human psychology and put it to work for you.

If you present an indication of danger, the players will zero in on it. This is perfectly logical and entirely in character. It is also a valuable tool to the writer/DM: You can be confident that you have the players' attention and you know where it's going to be directed. So why squander that faffing around with random scenic detail?

Lead off with the danger -- maybe not literally first, you probably want to tell them if they're looking at a room or a corridor or a cave or what -- but certainly by the second sentence. And then present additional detail about the thing signaling danger, anticipating the players' questions. Think like a player: Presented with this danger signal, what would I want to know about it? If it suggests imminent combat, address tactical considerations -- terrain obstacles and the like. If it's a more diffuse threat, give them concrete details about the sights, smells, or sounds indicating danger.

 

[el-remmen]

Yes, personally, I would start with the most prominent thing in the room being described, whatever it is. If that is 8 orcs with scimitars jumping up from their card game, I'd start with that (and maybe the table with the cards and coins), and only make reference to the other features of the room without detail, providing the detail once the battle is over and/or when the PCs interact with them.

So I would not say, "on the lefthand wall is a bookcase holding rare tomes of orcish lore" when they first open the door and look in the room, but rather something like, "Eight orcs in light armor and with scimitars at their sides or on the table, were in the middle of playing cards when you opened the door to the smokey but well-lit room. They jump up ready to fight, coins and cards scattering. The room holds some other furniture like a bookcase and two large trunks."

I would be drawing out the location and the other stuff on the battlemat (or using scene dressing on my dungeon tiles if I am prepared and in the mood) as I gave the description.

 

[LordEntrails]

My take: Stop fighting human psychology and put it to work for you.

If you present an indication of danger, the players will zero in on it. This is perfectly logical and entirely in character. It is also a valuable tool to the writer/DM: You can be confident that you have the players' attention and you know where it's going to be directed. So why squander that faffing around with random scenic detail?

Lead off with the danger -- maybe not literally first, you probably want to tell them if they're looking at a room or a corridor or a cave or what -- but certainly by the second sentence. And then present additional detail about the thing signaling danger, anticipating the players' questions. Think like a player: Presented with this danger signal, what would I want to know about it? If it suggests imminent combat, address tactical considerations -- terrain obstacles and the like. If it's a more diffuse threat, give them concrete details about the sights, smells, or sounds indicating danger.

Cuz as I said, once you mention the danger, at least myself I'm not paying attention to anything else. I'm already tryin got figure out what my first action should be and I'm itching to roll initiative.

So yea, imo you're the one fighting human psychology.

But it's also very important to note, three sentences is about normal for what I put in a text box. Something like;
"You enter on the short side of a mostly rectangular cavern. There is a stream of lava running crosswise through the middle of it. You can see several fire elementals bathing in the magma."

If I put the fire elementals first, myself and some other players wouldn't even take note of the lava!

 

[wedgeski]

I love good boxed text. It's useful for describing complex locations efficiently, and invaluable for world building.

 

[Burnside]

Writing fewer words overall, including boxed text, was definitely something I had to learn as a designer.

Area description from my first published adventure (2018):

The door in the north wall of this small wooden cabin is knocked
off its hinges. A large trunk, its lid shattered to splinters, sits
open on the floor.

Plants of varying species clutter the floor and walls, including a
shrub growing in a large urn. It’s unclear how they are thriving
without sunlight. Several of the planters and pots have been
broken, and soil and uprooted small plants are cast about.

The walls are decorated with detailed, expertly-rendered studies
of plants and animals done in colored inks on parchment. A
smashed crystal globe hangs high on the western wall. A blackfletched
crossbow bolt is imbedded in the wall nearby.

This dwelling has no roof; the ceiling is open to the top of the
stump. There are mullioned oculus windows set in the northeast
and southeast walls. Lilies float above koi swimming in a water
basin at the south end.

This is filled with excessive detail, irrelevancies, and the area in general has too many distractions/too many little things going on. It's too much info for players to actually absorb in real time. If I wrote it today, it would probably be something like:

The door in the north wall of this small wooden cabin is knocked off its hinges. A large trunk, its lid shattered to splinters, sits open on the floor. The walls are decorated with detailed studies of plants and animals. A smashed crystal globe hangs high on the western wall. A crossbow bolt is imbedded in the wall nearby. There is large basin of water against the south wall.

Area description for something I wrote this year for Goodman Games:

The frozen corpse of a horrified monk crouches on the stone steps leading up to the shrine’s massive entrance. His arms are raised in front of him as if to ward off a horror approaching the shrine. Icicles hang from his brittle robes.

Boxed text needs to be short, evocative, and helpful to the DM and players. Too much is a bad thing. However, I personally am usually annoyed when an adventure has NO boxed text (Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage). This forces the DM to stop play and parse what info about the area should be immediately obvious to the players, and what shouldn't. A good designer should be using boxed text to do that work for the DM to the extent that it's possible.

 

[el-remmen]

Cuz as I said, once you mention the danger, at least myself I'm not paying attention to anything else. I'm already tryin got figure out what my first action should be and I'm itching to roll initiative.

So yea, imo you're the one fighting human psychology.

But it's also very important to note, three sentences is about normal for what I put in a text box. Something like;
"You enter on the short side of a mostly rectangular cavern. There is a stream of lava running crosswise through the middle of it. You can see several fire elementals bathing in the magma."

If I put the fire elementals first, myself and some other players wouldn't even take note of the lava!

I don't think you are wrong, but I also think what @Dausuul is saying makes sense as well.

Yes, you want the players to pay attention to some basic details of the room (rough size, if there is a river of lava running through it) before a threat is engaged with, but upon seeing potentially hostile elementals, I also think most superfluous detail* (is there a small chest in the corner? is there a crack leading out of the rough hewn rear wall? what kind of books are on that shelf?) would kind of fall away unless the PCs (in the midst of the battle) move / notice / engage with those details (which might happen after the fight or during it).

I also think if you are playing TotM or with battlemat makes a big difference, too.



* and by "superfluous," I only mean in the moment from the perspective of the PCs. They might actually turn out to be quite important.

 

[Lanefan]

I don't think you are wrong, but I also think what @Dausuul is saying makes sense as well.

Yes, you want the players to pay attention to some basic details of the room (rough size, if there is a river of lava running through it) before a threat is engaged with, but upon seeing potentially hostile elementals, I also think most superfluous detail* (is there a small chest in the corner? is there a crack leading out of the rough hewn rear wall? what kind of books are on that shelf?) would kind of fall away unless the PCs (in the midst of the battle) move / notice / engage with those details (which might happen after the fight or during it).

I also think if you are playing TotM or with battlemat makes a big difference, too.



* and by "superfluous," I only mean in the moment from the perspective of the PCs. They might actually turn out to be quite important.

This is fine for when there's a clear and obvious threat in the space: describe some quick generalities plus the threat and leave the details until later.

But when there isn't a clear and obvious threat in the space and the PCs have time to give it a good look over as or before they enter, that's when the boxed text needs to give a detailed description that both gets the sailent bits across and doesn't bore the players (and the DM!) to tears.

That said, personally I still prefer the occupants be left until last in the description unless they pose an immediate threat (e.g. are waiting right behind the door with weapons drawn); if only because once the players come to recognize this pattern they'll be more likely to listen to the rest of the text all the way through.

Thus, in the example of the elementals bathing in the lava stream, I'd mention them last as they're not an immediate threat; something like:

You've come to a huge hot rough cavern, easily 300 feet across in any direction with a roughly-domed ceiling rising at least 70 feet high at its peak. A river of lava about 30 feet wide runs across the cavern about 100 feet from you, slowly flowing left to right; the floor slopes down to the lava from where you are and then slopes up again on the other side. The lava lights the cavern enough that you can see what might be two passages leaving on the far side, along with a few odd-looking things - small chests, maybe? - just across the lava where it flows into the cavern. While looking this all over you also realize some strange movements in the lava stream could actually be several fire elementals enjoying a swim.

Were I DMing this I'd be drawing a rough map of the cavern on the chalkboard while reading this out. And yes, this write-up commits the cardinal sin of assuming they enter from a particular passage.

 

[el-remmen]

This is fine for when there's a clear and obvious threat in the space: describe some quick generalities plus the threat and leave the details until later.

Well, sure. That is the specific thread of this convo I was exploring

 

[Shiroiken]

I also think if you are playing TotM or with battlemat makes a big difference, too.

I think this is also something that's often overlooked, and is a problem for published adventures, since they don't know which one the DM will be using. Since I use a VTT, with the mini's already on the map, I don't bother describing the size of the area, because it's already obvious, and I describe the occupants last, since the players are already aware that they're present. The description of the occupants often leads directly into the encounter (either combat or social), so it flows better to put them at the end.

I think if I was writing an adventure, I'd probably have a pre-encounter description that includes relevant information for the combat, and a secondary description for afterwards. If the occupants have moved, then you just read the secondary description.