Keeping order in your game

[WanderingMonster]

Reinforce good behavior. A 100-200pt Good Citizen award should do it.

 

[hong]

I'm looking for some suggestions from the vast knowledge resource that is the ENworld discussion forum.
My group just expanded from 4 players to 6. Our last session several times disolved into people yelling over each other to tell me (the DM) what they wanted to do. I brought out the "Talking Totem" so that only the person with the totem would be allowed to speak. They totally ditched that idea and kept on yelling over each other. This had two results, one... the quieter players kind of faded into the background, two... I went to bed with a headache from trying to listen to two strings of conversation being yelled at me. Anyway, my question is this... what do the rest of you do to encourage (or enforce) order at your games?

Look on this as a character building exercise. No, not for your players, for you.

You need to work on your assertiveness. There are many self-help books that can give you pointers on this.


Hong "me, I just yell louder than everyone else" Ooi

 

[Keeper of Secrets]

No disrespect or anything but how old is your party?

There are a few different options depending on the age and maturity of the group. I would imagine that if they disrespected the Totem you may not be able to enforce other easy rules.

Did you try something as simple as explaining yourself to them? They need to take turns otherwise you can't hear anything at all?

 

[Gilladian]

I have just about the opposite problem in my game. One of my players is older (72; my dad) and he will often stop talking for a long pause. Someone else thinks he's finished, and starts talking. He gets mad and jumps in with "you didn't let me finish". Everyone is expected to wait until he's had all his say before they can even get a word in. Worse, he expects that if he says "we do...." then everyone agrees, whether they do or not.

Needless to say, it sometimes causes big headaches.

In the yelling situation, I just sit down and shut up. When they've all gotten it out of their systems, I start in with, "so, you do this, and you do that..." and if they don't like it, I say "well, I THOUGHT that's what you wanted...". I never try to be deliberately stupid, but when I can't hear what's being said clearly, I frequently get things wrong.

Gilladian

 

[Janx]

Some thoughts:

a. when some one is yelling at you, lower your voice. Its hard to talk loud when the other person is so quiet you can't hear them.

b. don't speak passively. wusses shouldn't GM.

c. what' going on in the game when the talk-fest goes on. Obviously something where everybody wants to do something. If its combat, the solution is inherent (you're supposed to take turns in combat, its called init). A good idea is to roll init very early, right when the PCs see the enemy. At this point, they're locked into the init cycle and can't compete for trying to shoot the orc first.

d. make sure your house rules document covers talking in turn. Mine does.

e. either make being bad painful, or make being good worth it. That means, do not listen to people who's turn it isn't and make it clear that you are ignoring them. Come up with a practical punishment system if need be (XP penalties, debris damage, random encounters from all the noise). Make it obvious that disorderly behavior results in bad things happening. XP penalties are usually the best because they don't interfere with the actual game. By making it hurt to be bad, the good players are effectively rewarded.

f. As GM, you control who sits at your table. If they're a problem, talk to them. If they're still a problem, get rid of them. There are far more players than GMs. If you're a good GM, you'll have no shortage of players.

g. I'm not sure what you were talking about with players having to make characters and needing a week or something. It takes an hour, 2 tops to make a character. It's been that way in every edition of every game system I've ever played. Even Travellers. This sounds more like some lame excuse for somebody not being ready. If they're really that slow, restrict them to just the PH. It can't take more than 2 hours to make a PC with just the PH. If their characters are weak, unburden them with survival of the fittest. Monsters always attack the weak.

Janx