Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gilladian" data-source="post: 5071711" data-attributes="member: 2093">I think there are two kinds of roleplay, and the DM can facilitate/cut off both. There's inter-player roleplay firstly:The gnome bard is joining the party for a single session. He and the dwarf technodelver spend half an hour chatting about "stuff" they each do and own and want to get their hands on. The dwarf decides not to show the gnome his secret basement, and the gnome swipes a hand-grenade from the dwarf when he gets distracted.This kind of RP can be so easily ruined by the DM - all you have to do is butt in and start talking about the next phase of the game. Sometimes that's necessary, if everyone else is bored. But a lot of time, the DM can let it happen merely by saying to another uninvolved player "while they chat, you see...." and having a short RP session of the other type.The second type of RP is more "session oriented"; it usually has a goal for the DM in either moving the plot or building color for the world, or both. Most of these can be planned for ahead of time, or at least "seeded in" by creating NPCs with personality.For example, not long after the gnome/bard interaction above, the PCs were in a dungeon exploring. They met a ghost-type NPC who "chatted" with them. He was pretty limited in what he'd say, and how he'd say it, but he gave them some very good hints on what's going on in the dungeon. They tried to talk to him more, but he was just not capable of doing so... his nature is very fixed. So eventually they "killed" him. Not that he's really "dead" and they'll discover that later.And just before that, they met a "mentor-wizard" type NPC who hired them. They didn't really chat much with him, which surprised me. He's messy, slightly bombastic, but essentially "nice". He'll recurr several times if they stick with this adventure-scenario, and they'll get to know him better and better. They may not like him much by the end!As everyone else has said, planning for this kind of thing is just taking good (mental) notes of what you want to reveal, and how. The pacing just takes practice, and the more you do, the more you can wing. I don't think you're doing any better or worse than the rest of us!</blockquote>

Verification