Making 'em cry

Heathen72 · Feb 12, 2011

Movies and TV do it. Books do it. Theatre and musicals do it and even a good song can do it. They can bring you to tears.

So, if RPG's are akin to these other art forms it prompts the question: do they have the ability to really affect your emotions?

I am not talking about thrills, scares or laughs - gaming has those aplenty - and there is nothing wrong with games being just that, mind. Nor I am not suggesting that evoking tears is necessary for a good game. I just want to see if, in the experience of my fellow ENWorlders, RPG's evoke of sort of emotion that your average stoic male avoids.

Note, that I am not asking for reasons why they might, or how they could or should. I am looking for actual examples. To put it more directly:

GM's - have you ever made your players weep?
Players, ever moved your fellow players to tears?
Or been moved to tears yourself?

amerigoV · Feb 12, 2011

I've seen it once. We revisited some old (and cherished) characters in a one-shot (day long event). My character had passed to the other side years ago and was a Saint. He came back (secretly) as part of the adventure posing as a normal cleric.

At the end, someone needed to sacrifice themselves to close a rift in the Veil. My guy got to reveal who he really was ("I would sacrifice myself, but I have done so already and cannot do so again") - the look on the other players faces was awesome, both because they realized who my character really was AND one of their characters would have to step in. When one character stepped up to do so, it was a moving moment (I recall some tears from the volunteer and another player not happy about it). Probably the best gaming moment of my gaming career.

Sadly, years later that event was ruined when the unhappy player did a bit of fan fiction with the GM and got the sacrificed PC back. Note that it was not their PC - but I think the unhappy player was sweet on the player whose character sacrificed themselves and was expressing it though the characters. I told the GM at that point the campaign had "jumped the shark" for me and I would not be interested in revisiting that particular campaign anymore.

Ravellion · Feb 12, 2011

Does it count if it is becasue I killed their character somehwat arbitrarily?

I'd say no, it hardly is possible (basically), but then I think RPGS are more like books and less like film. I think music and facial expressions are integral to making people weep, and that requires not a DM but instead a DJ/Actor.

TarionzCousin · Feb 12, 2011

After a particularly moving conversation I had as an NPC with a PC, the player left the room bewildered. He came back a moment later and said "That was the most intense, most moving moment I've ever experienced in a role-playing game."

We were both on the verge of tears but I had to move on and GM the next part.

nedjer · Feb 12, 2011

Characters, challenges, dilemmas, pacing, creep, grit and intensity can be layered to encourage everything from quiet desperation through to blind panic in-game. Full-blown blubbing is a huge no-go for Scottish guys; but choking them up or sending a genuine shiver up the spine is fair game.

CharlesRyan · Feb 12, 2011

I've had it happen once or twice, but it requires a couple of things.

First, a powerful emotional investment in what's happening in the game. That means the PCs and key NPCs need to be well developed and the players must really, really care about them and the events in the game world.

Second, the players need to really trust the GM. No, "trust" isn't the right word. The GM and players must have built a world that seems to have taken on a life of its own. When you watch a movie or read a book, it's easy to forget that someone created it. So when something powerful happens, you think in terms of it happening within the context of the story. But when something powerful happens in an RPG, some players tend to look at the GM and say "I can't believe you killed that NPC" or whatever. To get the emotional response you're talking about, the world has to be so vivid that the players' first reaction is to see the event as something that happened in the world, not something that the GM chose to have happen.

WHW4 · Feb 12, 2011

Something interesting has been happening with our 2e Mutants and Masterminds game. Our group has a pretty heavy D&D background, with all the tropes that tend to come with it after so many years of play together, and we usually end up trying to carve a little piece of whatever campaign setting we are in and calling it our own; whether it be a mercenary company, or just a band of thieves, or heroes who rooted evil out of a local keep and stay there on guard - that type of thing. Generally "selfish" type things that in the end benefit the PCs a lot.

With our M&M campaign, it is almost a universal shift towards caring about the NPCs who we are trying to save, rather than subconscious meta-thought of "if we do X, they will help us Y." Villain threatens an innocent? The entire table springs into action; and while I haven't seen tears, I have seen actual inner turmoil on people's faces as they have to make choices like Save This Woman or Save this Bus of Kids. Then later the players will talk about how hard a choice it was. Stuff like that.

I believe it stems from the system, partially, and of course the attitude shift we seem to have encountered in switching games. I think since we are already powerful, that subconscious thirst for it has been removed, and it lets us focus on the story at hand.

At this rate, when one of the heroes actually dies, I think it will be the most moving scene up to that point.

Smoss · Feb 12, 2011

Oh yes. I've made several players bawl their eyes out.

Creating emotional ties to the characters (PCs and NPCs) is the key.

Best part is they come back for more. So it is all good. Though I had one gal accuse me of timing sad moments for when her cycle was giving her the most hormones. (As I somehow hit the timing right on every sad moment for her campaign)

Ah well. Back to being the evil DM.

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Smoss