Getting players to Move

[Uller]

My question - how do you get your players to act and not talk when they hit this sort of rut?

Deus ex machina.

If they are stuck, arguing needlessly or going in completely the wrong direction it is usually because they've missed some key peice of information either by not finding it or dismissing as unimportant.

If this is going to get things seriously off track (like having them argue for an hour), I'll remind them of the information they have (point out the useless and useful info). If they are missing relevant information because they never really got a good opportunity to find it out, I'll dig it up as PC knowledge that the player doesn't have: "Hey Bob, you once heard a tale about a gem similar to this one. According to that story...insert clue here..."

Last game, the party was about to head in the wrong direction. They were going to go upstairs in a building they were exploring without really any reason to...an NPC just told them what they were looking for was down stairs. The NPC was still with them so I had her say "Uh...Why do we want to go up here? The Forge is under the fortress." If they really wanted to go upstairs, I certainl would have let them, but I reminded them that they weren't there to explore the entire complex...they just need to find the forge.

 

[Wicht]

Wicht, it sounds to me like you gave the players a tough decision with dire consequences for choosing wrongly and with few clues as to what the correct choice is.

Cool!

But I don't understand why, given that setup, you'd expect them to choose quickly. They thought that all the enemies were dead, and their next action would determine whether a demon was unloosed on the world.

Given that setup, I'd expect them to spend a long time talking.

However, if you want to move them along in a case like this, I'd suggest providing more clues. Maybe the ruby shows up to detect evil.

The ruby detected as massively evil and they were told it was evil. They have been having visions for some time leading up to this that I was really afraid they would understand too quickly what was going on behind the scenes. (I want there to be a little mystery here for them)

I can understand the discussion, its just that they kept going back and forth.

I'll post the story in my story hour here soon and then you can tell me if they had enough clues or not.

And really it is their time, I now have next weeks adventure done as of three weeks ago due to this, so its no skin off my back and some of their discussion was amusing.

 

[Wicht]

Chapter 11 in my storyhour details the players discussions and decisions. There are many other clues however in the preceeding chapters.

I am now interested in whether others think I failed to give enough clues as to what was going on in order to make a quicker decision. Maybe its a failing on my part.

If you read it, I am interested in what you think.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

The groups I run, when they were 6th level ran into a young adult green dragon. Thinking they were going to kick it's butt as they were the "band of infinte justice" they got foolish and goaded it into attacking them. Well three rounds later the entire party was dead except for the wizard who escaped invisible while the dragon was finishing off the rest of the group. The wiz rounded up some more people and reformed the group as the "band of infinite vengence", swearing to destroy the dragon and find the remains of the original group. Well after a treck outside of the cave system they were in they were tryign to think of which way to go when they went back in. They were talking for awhile and I threw out, "you can always go back and fight that dragon if it's still there". They are an 8th level party now and could probably destroy it now, but they were scared! They took an entire hour, the rest of the session talking it over. Making excuses as for why they shouldn't mess with it. It was great listening to them make excuses and whine to each other about how they didn't all want to die again. I don't think they will ever think of Dragons as just another monster.

 

[Leopold]

I start watching football on TV (we play on sunday) and just have them tell me whenever they are done and arrived at a point.


This way it's their fault that things don't get done and when all is said and done and they feel secure in their decision I then start rolling dice.

 

[Wicht]

I start watching football on TV (we play on sunday) and just have them tell me whenever they are done and arrived at a point.

Heh, I can't do this as I am dutifully taking down their words for my story hour.

 

[ForceUser]

My DMs will let us argue.

And argue.

And argue.

As long as it's in-character.

Eventually, someone gets tired of arguing and shuts up, and the most bullheaded person wins!

Seriously though, I used to try to reason with the two most argumentative players in the group before I figured out that one just argued to hear himself talk and the other guy felt he was always right. So I shut up. Without my voice adding to the semi-frequent "discussions," we zip right along. And I used to wonder why the two smartest players always kept their mouths shut in these discussions heh. We just let the guy who think's he always right have his way now. Funny though, now that nobody argues with him anymore, he'll turn to us and say "What do you guys think we should do?" Haha

Let 'em argue, I say, as long as its in-character.

 

[Zog]

When the players get involved in a long, heated argument, in character, about how to deal with something, I sit back and bask in the glow a well done job.

Think about. The players are involved enough in Your world, in Your plot, and care enough about it be able to argue for that long! You must have given them lots of information, and they read it! And remember it! And now are trying to use it! Glory! Praise!

And of course, the 'having less prep work for the next session' is always a winner!

When you think about all of the time that passes swiftly (the night passes uneventfully - you spend a day traveling along the highway), a few hours of in game discussion is Great!
You just have to make sure that Everyone is Aware that the discussion is In Game, and Time is passing. Spells are wearing off, monsters are healing, hiding, summoning reinforcements (if present, etc). And hopefully, the discussion is interesting enough so you aren't bored. Just break into a Large Grin from time to time. Never tell them why.

 

[Tiefling]

Heh, I can't do this as I am dutifully taking down their words for my story hour.

What you need is a good tape recorder. Then you can just go see a movie while they argue.

 

[Wicht]

What you need is a good tape recorder. Then you can just go see a movie while they argue.

Last night I was thinking about the benefits of taking some shorthand lessons, but a tape recorder would probably do the trick even better.

Which raises another interesting question, how do you other DMs handle taking notes for a possible storyhour write up - it took me 3 sessions to finally figure out a fast combat note system

I'll write something like A>17>pir which tells me Alairic hits a pirate for 17 points of damage or A>m>pir which tells me Alairic missed the pirate.

Dialogue is the real killer as I try to get it down more or less verbatim, or at least in such a form as to let me remember a whole conversation with only a few listed words.