Suspension of Disbelief

[Tuerny]

Hello esteemed members of the ENWorld message boards.

While I believe that my setting and plot building skills are pretty good it has recent come to my attention that my skills at actually weaving a believable world within the confines of a session/adventure need some work. So I come to you with this question..what do you do to maintain suspension of disbelief within the context of the campaign? What do you find as being helpful? What is important?


Jesse Dean

 

[Renshai]

Watch them. Watch your players like a hawk. As you describe a scene see how they react to your description and then emphasize on what they seem to be interested in.

You are the window to the world they are seeing, make sure you are looking into the same window they are, so your desciptions will connect them to your setting.

I personally know that you are a great designer of fantasy settings and adventures, so I know the descriptive talent is there.

Another tip, relax. Try relaxing before the game and going over your ideas in your head. Form a good mental picture of the places you will be running in your game and store them away for the actual game. Things will flow easy after that.

Ren

 

[Furn_Darkside]

Salutations,

This is a tough one.

John Wick had an interesting essay on this - where he called it snapping the suspender of disbelief. Some people have tight suspenders- where it does not take much for them to snap and the person to have trouble believing the scenario. Others have loose suspenders and can accept a lot.

When it comes to fantasy- this becomes a very rough issue. How do you demand believability of a hit point system, but then accept a giant fire-breathing lizard?

I guess it would come down to consistancy by the dm. You need to determine the level of magic, the type of creatures, and the general "laws" that your universe works under- then you have to follow them.

I have found players will often have little trouble accepting what is going on as long as it is consistant with the campeign as a whole.

FD

 

[Tuerny]

Actually I was talking about more common things. I will give you some examples from my campaign that my players specifically brought up.


When I was describing an inn room they asked if there was a window in the room. I was having trouble deciding so I decided to roll randomly for it. They thought that this indicated I lacked a clear vision of it in my head, thus resulting in them having difficulty immersing themselves into it.


In a previous session they were being tracked by goblins and at one point the goblins were fifteen feet away from them and could not see them. They had an issue with this until I described the pile of boulders that was between them and the goblins. Thus screwing with their SoD.

Those are the situations they brought up to me.

Jesse Dean

 

[Furn_Darkside]

When I was describing an inn room they asked if there was a window in the room. I was having trouble deciding so I decided to roll randomly for it. They thought that this indicated I lacked a clear vision of it in my head, thus resulting in them having difficulty immersing themselves into it.

Ahh, ok, this is actually some what easy.

You tell the players the following-

"When I describe a room, I can not describe every possible details. You are free to make reasonable assumptions.

For examples- if you are in a bar fight, then you don't need to ask me if there is a bottle of wine on a table nearby. Assume there is and do with it what you may. You may not reasonanble assume there is a flaming sword of doom on a table nearby.

I, the dm, always has the right to veto any assumption that I don't think is reasonable."

This assumption rule allows the players the ability to picture the world around them to meet their SoD, and gets the burden of needing to worry about every detail off of your back.

In a previous session they were being tracked by goblins and at one point the goblins were fifteen feet away from them and could not see them. They had an issue with this until I described the pile of boulders that was between them and the goblins. Thus screwing with their SoD.

I use a lot of grid maps when it matters where pc's and npc's are- you may want to pick up a good grid map and some markers. It would help prevent problems like this one.

Assume whenever hostiles are within 50' of each other, then you will need to lay it out.

Good luck!
FD

 

[Shallown]

Sometimes give more information then the players would have.

What I mean by this if something seems odd to the players as in an NPC's reaction or such. Let them know the motivation behind it if it doesn't hurt the plot/story ongoing event. This lets them know you had a reason. A lot of Suspension of Disbelief comes from trust in the gm and that he has a vision of the world. Sometimes a peak behind the scenes helps with this trust belief.

Well it seems to work for me.

Later

 

[Dr Midnight]

Some great advice I read SOMEWHERE on these boards paraphrased to this:

Don't be afraid to make an ass of yourself.

It's true. Get dramatic. Get into roles. I've played a few games with Kevin "Piratecat" Kulp, and just ONE of the things that sets him apart is that he's never too embarassed to ham up a role. He'll loudly imitate a howler monkey your characters hear off in the distance. He'll roar even MORE loudly to represent the immense monster that just rose up out of the earth, Jack Kirby style. He'll proudly gesticulate and speak in a silly voice to portray an NPC.

Ham it up. Act. Let your face and body language help. Don't let the main villain's speech before the climactic confrontation sound like a deadpan seminar at an accountants' convention. If you don't look too embarassed, your players will respond.

 

[Darkness]

I'm with Pavlov: If one of my players doesn't manage to suspend his disbelief, I smack him upside the head with my DMG and yell "no!"

 

[alsih2o]

some dead feench painter once said "all is light", and i find this great for getting a descriptive handle on most situations...describing the light in any given situ allows for instnt recognition of time of day(usually) windows, shading mountains, yada yada.

it will not solve all of your problems, but it will add to the sense of the scene nearly every time and quite frequently help to set the mood.

this even works underground,"you hear a noise up ahead, and feel a slight breeze" isn't nearly as effective as "you hear a noise up a head, out of range of your torches, and the entire area seems to shake as the flickering light is swept in gentle arcs by a breeze"

hope that helps

 

[TiQuinn]

When I was describing an inn room they asked if there was a window in the room. I was having trouble deciding so I decided to roll randomly for it. They thought that this indicated I lacked a clear vision of it in my head, thus resulting in them having difficulty immersing themselves into it.

In a previous session they were being tracked by goblins and at one point the goblins were fifteen feet away from them and could not see them. They had an issue with this until I described the pile of boulders that was between them and the goblins. Thus screwing with their SoD.

Jesse Dean

Hmmm. Making stuff up on the spot is just something that comes with practice. Usually, I take questions from the players as cues for what they may or may not want to do, and usually I oblige. So, for example, if the players want to know if there's a lot of cover in a outdoors area, unless I have something that definitively answers this for me, I'll say "Yes, there is." The great part of this is that the next time the players go to an inn, you know that you'll think about things like windows, etc. Whatever you do, though, don't make a random roll for something like that. In fact, don't do any random rolls for anything, period. I'm of the line of thought that random rolls do not help a game.

As for the second situation, a little area description helps, obviously. Aside from that, I think your players are being a little harsh. They are just as responsible to be in the right mood to play as you are to provide an engaging environment. In other words, SoD is the responsibility of both the DM and the player. I just wouldn't worry about this. I've seen and heard of far worse problems related to SoD than this. Your players need to lighten up just a bit.