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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Warrior Poet" data-source="post: 2346057" data-attributes="member: 1057">Along with the good advice already here, I'd add:  don't go overboard the other direction.Looking over your initial list of descriptions as you give them now, you know what?  They aren't that bad, honestly.  I used to want to describe everything to give my players the ultimate vision of the world as I saw it in my head, down to relative humidity levls and details like glints of sunlight off of micah chips embedded in the granite.That's great for a minute or two, but frankly, at some point, the players want to do something!  There's orcs to fight, treasure to loot, villagers to rescue, traps to foil, plots to unravel, griffons to tame, portals to close (or open), vampires to vanquish, demons to drive back, lost civilizations to uncover (or rebury), and more.  Description is great, and adds a lot, but it can also become burdensome if there's simply too much.One of the things I came to realize is that the players aren't going to see the world the way I do.  And you know what?  That's good!  They should imagine it as they will, because it's partly their world, too.So, my advice, is pick a few moments within a session or section of a session, and describe something in strong detail (Show, Don't Tell, as mentioned above -- this is one of the most important artistic maxims that can be applied to game description), and then move on to the action.  Later, when there's another important scene, describe something, and keep moving.  Players will remember the ornate jade headdress worn by the high priest at the top of the stone pyramid, the still beating heart of his latest sacrificial victim clutched in a bloody hand, while lightning plays out in the clouds overhead lighting the scene in eerie flashes of blue-white.  Now start the fight!  They won't be as concerned about the clorophyll striations in the lingering bromeliads clutching to the intersteces of stone blocks quarried from a geoglacial cirque some 200 miles away and dragged overland on rolling logs cut from lowland oak.Good writers (good storytellers) know when to quit.  Don't get bogged down in too much detail.  Description is great, but unless you're gaming a scientific expedition cataloguing the fauna of a particular region, you don't want to lose focus on the progress of the game. Also, learn to build descriptions (good, short, tight, evocative ones) as the PCs interact with the world.  Players are more likely to remember a description of something they had a hand in!  If the players do something that has some descriptive effect, then employ that description.  It will act as a signpost to memory of the event later.Warrior Poet</blockquote>

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