Depending on your Dungeons & Dragons group, mature subjects can become part of the story. Although everyone at the table knows how to handle these with care, it can still make players uncomfortable. Alternatively, it is also important to ensure that people's expectations of your game are correct and will not trigger any negative feelings for them.
To make sure your game will be a fantastic experience for everyone at the table, you can use security tools before the campaign starts, during sessions or even between them. In this way, you know which topics are both safe to be handled and even who are preferred by your players, and you can create a fantastic experience for everyone.
Session zero
More than explaining the world
Session Zero is often used to discuss the game and its premise, along with the general idea and expectations that players have for the campaign at hand. Still, along with these expectations, you can also discuss boundaries.
A general example is if you intend to run the Curse of Strahd, a story that goes into heavy themes, such as Strahd and Ireen's relationship, or Hags and their plot to kidnap children. Use this moment to talk to your players about the themes you intend to have in your story or, if the story is homebrew and you create when you go, ask them what themes they want you to avoid.
Lines and veils
By Ron Edwards
Another common tool is called lines and veils, which is a list of these topics, which each player can mark as a line if they do not want this topic to be absorbed at all, or veil if they are okay with said topic, but do not want it to be explicit. Or they can leave things empty if they don't care. You can improve this by adding more subjects, reviewing it from time to time with the players to ensure that their opinions are still the same, or you can even add topics that involve romantic interactions, for example if a certain player is okay with NPCs flipping with them, or even other players.
You can also add a preference alternative, if the player believes that these topics give a good story and want to get involved with them rather than avoiding them. You can also leave empty areas where they are free to add everything you may have forgotten to add, for example to mention a phobia you can have. Finally, if you think your players are too uncomfortable to be true about these, you can make sure that these entrances are anonymous.
Your lines and veils pool can also be made during the session zero.
Same side tool
What is D & D for you?
The same side tools work slightly in the same way as lines and veils and can also be done during session zero, but this one focuses more on the expectations of the game rather than things to avoid. You can present some questions, either taken online or some you came with, and offer some answers for the players to choose (alternatively you can leave an open space for them to answer however they wish).
You can ask things like “would you be okay with another player's character that does something bad for you because it is in line with their character's behavior?” or similar things. To improve this, you can ask questions based on your DMING style and see if they are cool with it, and you can either make sure that these questions handle topics you want to use in your story. You can also wait for all your players to respond to these and then prepare the story with these expectations in mind and shape things in a way that will already work for everyone.
X-card
By John Stavropoulos
The X card is also an effective tool. The idea is that if something that makes a player feel triggered or uncomfortable happens during a session, they simply lift the card, and the scene stops; Then the current moment is quickly reconciled and changed. You can use gestures or words if it works better, or even have alternative cards, as those where your players can express that they are okay with what happens.
These options allow DM to ensure that they can continue their story conveniently for everyone involved. More card options can also be added, such as cards to skip something, or create a pale-to-black moment, and not actually role play on the stage-as one of the veil options above.
Open door policy
Taking a breathing is okay
If using cards or gestures is not enough, you can deal with the idea that a player only temporarily leaves when they feel uncomfortable without having to motivate their leave. Some groups can do it without talking about it, but you can mention this option and make sure it is okay to do it and thus avoid strange conversations about why someone suddenly got up.
There is not much to improve here, since the idea is just leaving when things get bad for someone. Still, you can choose to wrap the scene, make sure the player can return soon, or make a quick bathroom break or similar for everyone, so you can check the player and see if they are okay.
Stars and wishes
By Lu Quade
Roses and tags or stars and wishes are two similar concepts, so nothing prevents us from mixing them. The idea is to talk about expectations too, but this time you do it after a game rather than before. It is feedback on what the players liked (roses or stars), the things they did not like (tags) and things they want to see in the future based on what has happened so far (desires).
The biggest problem here is that, depending on the player, they may also feel in place when you ask them what they liked. They may even be reluctant to give you constructive criticism right to your face, as it can be uncomfortable. Thus, similar other security tools mentioned above, so that they can share these afterwards, in an anonymous way, is a nice way to get things to go smoothly. If you play online or just want to manage these lists and questionnaires later on your computer, you can easily make all these Google form lists.
- Original release date
-
1974
- Player count
-
2+
- Length per game
-
From 60 minutes to hours at the end.
- Age recommendation
-
12+ (although younger can play and enjoy)
- Franchis name
-
Dungeons and dragons
- Publishing co
-
The coast sorcerers
