Last week, we talked about attention economy, about keeping your players engaged at the table, and with your game world. And I promised we would look at some ideas for creating interesting. evocative, interesting, and useful scenery for your players to interact with.
So, here goes…..
The Problem
We've gotten out of the habit of listening to boxed text descriptions of rooms -- at least, we have at my table. Of course, at my table if my players are listening at all, they're only listening for unintentional phallic imagry they can exaggerate and ridicule.
Some days I hate my players.
In the old days -- and the days that D&DN is trying to recapture -- a lot of the player's understanding of the world started with that boxed text. Anything that was important enough to be described we knew was somehow significant (like the dark outlined door in a bugs bunny cartoon) -- and we examined and poked and prodded at those things, desperate to ferret out the mysteries hinted at in the boxed text.
Times have changed, and so have players. And it's not just that more recent editions of the game have turned player attention towards the character sheet and away from the environment -- there are lots of social and cultural changes that have shaped the way we interact with boxed text. When politicians and public speakers lament the era of the sound bite, we need to understand that the sound bite "problem" applies to our DMing style, too. Our players, by and large, simply don't have the same sort of listening skills and expectations that we had back in the 70's and 80's.
So, it's not enough to go back to writing and reading boxed text to our players -- they won't hear it. If we're going to make the environment -- and our description of the environment important again -- it's going to have to be done without the crutch of just reading prepared text.
View attachment 56992
So How Do I Do This Without Boxed Text?
If you can help it, don't write boxed text for yourself. And if you're using an adventure, don't read boxed text. Distill what you need to talk about down to a list of bullet points -- sound bites -- that you'll explain in your own words. When it's time to describe the room, use those bullet points to make sure you cover everything you need to cover, but explain the room to the players in your own, unscripted words.
Use Aspects
The FATE system uses Aspects for everything -- PCs get aspects, NPCs and objects and places do, too. PCs can have upwards of seven, while a location might start out with just one or two. They're meant to be pithy, at best multidimensional, and at the very least descriptive.
For your game -- whatever system you're using -- you can help to create environmental feeling in a description by thinking in terms of those aspects. Spend your time coming up with just the right phrase to describe an aspect of a location. So, for example, instead of spending your time writing "your footfalls are drowned out by the pitter patter of rain on the leafy canopy above. The rain finds its way down to ground level sporadically, occasional gushes as a leaf that was trapping water can hold the weight no longer" you would try to write it short and sweet, like "rain patters in the canopy". You'll know you've got a good, useful, interesting aspect when you can assign some sort of game effect for what you've described. Perhaps "Rain patters in the canopy" inflict a -2 penalty on listen checks.
Coming Up With Aspects
Actually coming up with your aspects for a scene is the tricky part. It's one thing to say "give 'em sound bites" and it's quite another to help you come up with those sound bites and make sure they've got teeth.
To begin with, your imagination for scenes like this is a big stinky compost heap, full of everything you've experienced, watched, read, or heard about. That compost heap needs to be fed, and if you know what sort of output you're going to need, it's a good idea to dump a bunch of that in. Doesn't matter if it's trash. Sometimes, it's better if it's trash. So, if you're running a pirate game, watch a few pirate movies.
When you're stuck. Go to an image site like images.google.com or flickr.com and do a search for the sort of location you're trying to detail. Spend a little time looking through what comes up. An interesting alternative is the "commons" on flickr.com (flickr.com/commons), which is a sub-database of images that have no know copyright -- they're mostly old photographs from long enough ago that no one holds rights to them anymore, and have been scanned in by museums and libraries that have them in their collections. With photographic records that go back to around the last half of the 19th century, there's a lot of funky, interesting, evocative stuff to be found there.
If you can take some time before a session to think about your locations and what you want to make sure you describe, try to answer a few questions about each important location:
1. What obvious threats are there?
2. Is there something in the room they need to interact with to advance the story?
3. What objects would be likely to be in this room?
4. What will inventive players want to do here?
Also, think about some specific areas within the location. If it's a room, what's in the corner. What's on the floor. If it's a forest, is there a stream? what's on the bank of the stream?
Of course, remember that you're going to want to take the output of this exercise and turn it into aspects.
Use Your Aspects
Once you've created those aspects, given them a mechanical effect, don't leave them on the side of the road once the fighting starts. Make sure those aspects play into the description somehow. An excellent time for that kind of detail creeping into a scene would be when a player rolls a "1". Maybe the player didn't just miss or drop his sword -- maybe a water-laden leaf gave way and dumped a gallon of water in his face, just before his swing.
Encourage your Players to use Aspects
Here's where the whole project can really work wonders. It's one thing to use the aspects you've created to explain things that happen -- a critical failure, etc. But the goal we want to reach is for your players to start to look for advantages embedded in those aspects. You'll start by giving them spot bonuses for skill checks and attack rolls when it seems to make sense with the aspect. This will teach them to start looking for those bonuses themselves -- and eventually they'll start pitching them to you.
The Bottom Line
What we want from this is to come up with short, pithy, memorable, and impactful Aspects (or sound bites) for your locations -- aspects that will play a role in the entire experience of the encounter, not pass from thought as soon as initiative has been rolled.
So, here goes…..
The Problem
We've gotten out of the habit of listening to boxed text descriptions of rooms -- at least, we have at my table. Of course, at my table if my players are listening at all, they're only listening for unintentional phallic imagry they can exaggerate and ridicule.
Some days I hate my players.
In the old days -- and the days that D&DN is trying to recapture -- a lot of the player's understanding of the world started with that boxed text. Anything that was important enough to be described we knew was somehow significant (like the dark outlined door in a bugs bunny cartoon) -- and we examined and poked and prodded at those things, desperate to ferret out the mysteries hinted at in the boxed text.
Times have changed, and so have players. And it's not just that more recent editions of the game have turned player attention towards the character sheet and away from the environment -- there are lots of social and cultural changes that have shaped the way we interact with boxed text. When politicians and public speakers lament the era of the sound bite, we need to understand that the sound bite "problem" applies to our DMing style, too. Our players, by and large, simply don't have the same sort of listening skills and expectations that we had back in the 70's and 80's.
So, it's not enough to go back to writing and reading boxed text to our players -- they won't hear it. If we're going to make the environment -- and our description of the environment important again -- it's going to have to be done without the crutch of just reading prepared text.
View attachment 56992
So How Do I Do This Without Boxed Text?
If you can help it, don't write boxed text for yourself. And if you're using an adventure, don't read boxed text. Distill what you need to talk about down to a list of bullet points -- sound bites -- that you'll explain in your own words. When it's time to describe the room, use those bullet points to make sure you cover everything you need to cover, but explain the room to the players in your own, unscripted words.
- Why this is better: If you're reading to your players, you are not looking at them -- not really engaging with them. Because you're focused on "getting it right" you're paying more attention to the text you're reading than you are your audience. If you're going to get and keep their attention, you need to connect with them -- look at them, talk to them, rather than read to them.
Use Aspects
The FATE system uses Aspects for everything -- PCs get aspects, NPCs and objects and places do, too. PCs can have upwards of seven, while a location might start out with just one or two. They're meant to be pithy, at best multidimensional, and at the very least descriptive.
For your game -- whatever system you're using -- you can help to create environmental feeling in a description by thinking in terms of those aspects. Spend your time coming up with just the right phrase to describe an aspect of a location. So, for example, instead of spending your time writing "your footfalls are drowned out by the pitter patter of rain on the leafy canopy above. The rain finds its way down to ground level sporadically, occasional gushes as a leaf that was trapping water can hold the weight no longer" you would try to write it short and sweet, like "rain patters in the canopy". You'll know you've got a good, useful, interesting aspect when you can assign some sort of game effect for what you've described. Perhaps "Rain patters in the canopy" inflict a -2 penalty on listen checks.
- Why This is Better: Your players are going to remember that "sound bite" detail far better than they would remember any part of a longer description. And giving it a concrete mechanical effect makes it actually important -- and gives the players the opportunity to use that aspect to their advantage.
Coming Up With Aspects
Actually coming up with your aspects for a scene is the tricky part. It's one thing to say "give 'em sound bites" and it's quite another to help you come up with those sound bites and make sure they've got teeth.
To begin with, your imagination for scenes like this is a big stinky compost heap, full of everything you've experienced, watched, read, or heard about. That compost heap needs to be fed, and if you know what sort of output you're going to need, it's a good idea to dump a bunch of that in. Doesn't matter if it's trash. Sometimes, it's better if it's trash. So, if you're running a pirate game, watch a few pirate movies.
When you're stuck. Go to an image site like images.google.com or flickr.com and do a search for the sort of location you're trying to detail. Spend a little time looking through what comes up. An interesting alternative is the "commons" on flickr.com (flickr.com/commons), which is a sub-database of images that have no know copyright -- they're mostly old photographs from long enough ago that no one holds rights to them anymore, and have been scanned in by museums and libraries that have them in their collections. With photographic records that go back to around the last half of the 19th century, there's a lot of funky, interesting, evocative stuff to be found there.
If you can take some time before a session to think about your locations and what you want to make sure you describe, try to answer a few questions about each important location:
1. What obvious threats are there?
2. Is there something in the room they need to interact with to advance the story?
3. What objects would be likely to be in this room?
4. What will inventive players want to do here?
Also, think about some specific areas within the location. If it's a room, what's in the corner. What's on the floor. If it's a forest, is there a stream? what's on the bank of the stream?
Of course, remember that you're going to want to take the output of this exercise and turn it into aspects.
Use Your Aspects
Once you've created those aspects, given them a mechanical effect, don't leave them on the side of the road once the fighting starts. Make sure those aspects play into the description somehow. An excellent time for that kind of detail creeping into a scene would be when a player rolls a "1". Maybe the player didn't just miss or drop his sword -- maybe a water-laden leaf gave way and dumped a gallon of water in his face, just before his swing.
- Why this is Better: Your environment and description can't just be something that you deal with when you're setting up the encounter -- it needs to be a strand that plays out through the entire scene. Your players need to be reminded from time to time that the rain forest they're standing in right now is different from the tavern they were in for the first encounter, and different from the dwarves burial tomb they were in last week.
Encourage your Players to use Aspects
Here's where the whole project can really work wonders. It's one thing to use the aspects you've created to explain things that happen -- a critical failure, etc. But the goal we want to reach is for your players to start to look for advantages embedded in those aspects. You'll start by giving them spot bonuses for skill checks and attack rolls when it seems to make sense with the aspect. This will teach them to start looking for those bonuses themselves -- and eventually they'll start pitching them to you.
- Why this is Better: Once your players are paying attention to your descriptions, searching for something they can turn to their advantage or some potential hazard to avoid, you've succeeded in capturing their focus on your descriptions of the game world.
The Bottom Line
What we want from this is to come up with short, pithy, memorable, and impactful Aspects (or sound bites) for your locations -- aspects that will play a role in the entire experience of the encounter, not pass from thought as soon as initiative has been rolled.
