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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AaronOfBarbaria" data-source="post: 7049295" data-attributes="member: 6701872">Talking about it and getting the whole group on the same page regarding amount of focus being spent on the game really is the best thing, so I'm glad you already suggested that.Other tools I've picked up over the years to help with keeping a session fun despite distraction-prone players include:Embrace distraction: Let everyone involved know that getting distracted is fine, because it's natural and it's going to happen at some point, and will in fact be tolerated, and even enjoyed - so long as each person involved is willing to say "Okay, back to the game" after a reasonable length of distraction.Players sit, DM stands: Thanks to school usually involving a standing teacher and a class of sitting students, people are generally better conditioned to pay attention under similar circumstances because they've spent so many years doing it. Sometimes, I've even seen it have the side effect of the players raising their hand when they want to say something and haven't already been prompted to.Incorporate food into the session: Assuming the food is on the healthier end of the spectrum and isn't itself causing a problem (like the classic cheeto dust-covered fingers messing up character sheets and books), creating the situation in which the players not doing something in-character will be occupying their hands and mouths with the act of eating a meal, could reduce the amount of distractions, resulting in the players being more aware of any in-game action that is currently taking place.Dinner-and-gaming can slow the action down a bit, but I haven't found that to be as much of a problem as distractions usually can be.</blockquote>

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