D&D General The DM Should Only Talk 30% of the Time... Agree or Disagree?

[Oofta]

Depends on the group, DM, players, situation. Sometimes I just sit back let the group plan and discuss plans. Other times there's a lot of exposition and presentation.

I don't really do the player driven description/story during the game. I'd rather have control of the world and have the world react accordingly to what the PCs say and do.

So while I don't know the ratio, I'm not going to try to push people to talk more if they don't want.

 

[overgeeked]

Quick Note: I tagged this as D&D General because I specifically want to talk about running D&D games. I know that other systems have really different ways of sharing the narrative burden. Feel free to bring those other games into this discussion, but let's overall focus on running D&D.

I'm an elementary school teacher, and I find a lot of my teaching practice bleeds into my DM'ing. One of the things I've tried to do in my classroom is reduce the amount of time that I, as a teacher, am talking. If I can have a student revoice something, I will. If I can have a student take attendance, pass out snacks, give appreciations, read the directions, etc etc etc, I will.

This is part of a larger trend of moving teaching (especially in elementary school) away from lecture-based lessons. The general idea is that teachers used to speak 70% of the time, and the goal now is that teachers speak 30% of the time, and students speak 70% of the time. Generally.

Anyways, I've started to think about this in my D&D games.

I've started to feel uncomfortable with how much my voice as a DM dominates the table during D&D. I'm often the one explaining the rules, describing scenes, and filling the session with talk, talk, talk. However, I feel like this is the base expectation of D&D: that the DM should speak 70% of the time. After all, it is my job to describe what the characters are seeing, then describe what happens when they try different things.

I do, however, want to try speaking less. I want to try to pass that burden over to the players. I want to try to speak 30% of the time.

Here are some ideas for ways I could pass the narrative burden over to players:

• Have players describe the consequences of their actions in detail (for example, I say "you hit, describe the blow").
• Ask players to describe inconsequential features of dungeons and towns ("Bob, tell us about this cultist statue...").
• Allow players to play as NPCs in scenes their characters aren't present in ("Kathy, why don't you play as the blacksmith...")

Here are some more radical ideas:

• Ask players to design important NPCs, and play as those NPCs.
• Ask players to design towns, then run portions of the session when characters are in town.
• Ask players to create interesting descriptions for dungeons, then run the mechanics while the player describes what the dungeon looks / sounds / smells like...
• Have players design random encounters, then describe those encounters when they occur...
• Ask players to contribute design ideas to settings during battles, and then have their descriptions be narrative truths...

So what do you think? Is this a strange, quixotic quest with no real benefit? Is this a molehill just I'm willing to die on?

Do you think there's any benefit to a DM speaking only 30% of the time?

The DM should speak as much as they need to. Considering that the DM is the whole world and every creature in it, unless the players only talk amongst themselves, they're talking to the DM. Hard for that to really come off.

 

[Dausuul]

I feel like there are generally three scenarios in the D&D games I play/run:

1. The DM is setting the scene, or having an NPC provide exposition. This is, obviously, 100% DM talking.
2. The players are interacting with NPCs or the world (including combat). I think this runs about 50-50, maybe a little more to the DM's side.
3. The players are strategizing among themselves. This is about 85% players; the DM talks only if the players fire a question at them, or if it turns out the players are operating on an egregiously wrong understanding of the game world (that their characters would know was wrong) and the DM needs to correct it.

I do try to minimize #1 as much as possible. I notice a lot of DMs like to give florid, lengthy descriptions to set the scene. Maybe it's my ADHD, but that stuff goes in one ear and out the other; I cannot for the life of me retain more than a detail or two. I wish the DM would just sum up the situation in a couple of sentences and get on with the game.

As for the balance of #2 and #3, I think I probably let it skew too far toward #3. It's easy to sit back and let the players debate, but I don't think that's what most folks show up for. I know that when I'm a player, if the session ends up being 75% strategizing, I come away feeling disappointed, even if I was participating.

 

[Hussar]

I don't see any value in setting a guideline that will have DMs second-guessing themselves as to whether they should hold off on speaking up at any given point. Whether a DM should be talking is determined far more by what is happening in the moment than by trying to maintain some kind of ideal ratio across an entire session.

I think the guideline is meant as more a rule of thumb, rather than a hard and fast rule here. "Should" is the operative term here. Getting the other players to talk rather than listen to me blather on for three hours is a very good idea.

 

[Vince_Snetterton]

Nope. DM is talking at least half the time. DM is playing the NPC's, DM is describing the setting. DM is dealing with all the combat. DM is asking for ability checks and savings throws. 60%, minimum.

 

[TwoSix]

Group size probably matters quite a bit here. My group with 3 players has some inter-party chatter, but it's much more of a "DM describes situation, players give quick responses, DM narrates change" situation. In my group with 7 players, inter-party chatter dominates play, which does slow down plot advancement quite a bit (but the players don't mind).

I do like to encourage more player interaction with the fiction, so I tend to seed my encounters with open-ended up complications that require player prompts to fill in.

 

[J.Quondam]

I'm in the "as much as necessary" camp. To be honest, I don't think it's ever been a huge issue that I can recall. When I GM, I'm pretty sure I end up talking quite a bit less than half the time anyway, since I'm fairly reserved while most people I've played with tend to be more gregarious. So it really depends on the players. I've had to rein in a chatty player on occasion, and tried to elicit more talk from a few quiet ones. But on balance, as long as everyone is content with the game, I think it's all good.

That said, if a GM ends up talking a lot, please at least make it interesting, and ideally somewhat interactive. For this, I recommend utilizing a variety of colorful sock-puppets.* After all, those bizarre gaming memories aren't going to make themselves.


* This strategy is also useful in the workplace and in romantic relationships.

 

[Campbell]

It depends on a lot of factors. My personal approach is pretty much what Apocalypse World says to do - GMs say stuff when players look to them to find out what happens next or if there's a lull. If players are going at it and having a good time no need to intervene. Our groups tend to have a good deal of scenes where player characters are interacting with each other. When that happens I'm mostly there as a rule resource and avid audience member.

 

[Burnside]

I don't know what the percentage should be, but in general I do think most DMs in most groups should be talking a bit less than they are.

In my sessions, I try to make sure than within 30-40 seconds of the start of the session, the players, not me, are talking. The players came to play, not to listen to me perform a monologue.

In general I agree with @iserith that being succinct is very important. Also, don't be needlessly ambiguous (avoid using "seems to","sort of", "almost", etc.) Make your descriptions as specific and evocative as you can while being economical and practical. Not always easy.

 

[Umbran]

So what do you think? Is this a strange, quixotic quest with no real benefit? Is this a molehill just I'm willing to die on?

Do you think there's any benefit to a DM speaking only 30% of the time?

To start with, there's no point in creating a number if you can't, or won't, actually measure it.

That means the real question is whether one, as GM, should aim to speak more, or less, than they currently do, and the answer to that really depends on what the goals at the table are, and how well those goals are being met.

I also think there's a flaw in trying to set limits on how much one should talk, without also considering what is being said, and why and how it is being said.