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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sword of Spirit" data-source="post: 8035792" data-attributes="member: 6677017">I tend to like box text, even though sometimes I have to edit it on the fly. I'm not exactly sure why. I think part of it is social. When I'm reading box text, at that moment the players and I are in virtually an identical role as spectators of the adventure. Somehow that feels like there's a minor bonding element? I'm not sure how to describe it. It's also an out-of-character cue to the players that this particular element is probably something from a published adventure rather than something I home brewed (since my campaign is a mix of everything).I think it might even fill a role similar to comic relief. There can be an undertone of not-quite-seriousness to it when you interrupt your regular play narrative to read the boxed text. "And now a word from our writers."I actually kind of get a kick out of this. "There's this, and this, and it smells a little bit like cinnamon; oh and Dracula is here and wants to eat your face." Ties into that pseudo-comic relief element. But honestly, it can be rather difficult finding the right point in the description to mention the monster. Too soon and you risk them not paying attention to additional information, or jumping in to ask monster-relevant questions. Now, jumping in to ask questions is generally a good thing, but when you have boxed text it is supposed to be written so that shouldn't have to happen until the end. Since the point at which players are most likely to ask questions is after they know something there wants to eat their face, leaving that until the end might not be a bad idea. At the same time, if the description was otherwise boring, it's possible the players tuned out until they heard the monster, and now they're just going to ask you questions about all the stuff you've already told them because it suddenly becomes relevant.So perhaps a way to look at it is that boxed text isn't intended to just be doing the DMs work for them, but is instead intended to be punctuating the play experience with something different.</blockquote>

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