PDA

View Full Version : Difficulty keeping attention



SilentDungeon
2008-10-07, 02:35 PM
Often, I find myself hosting a game of D&D. Me, being the DM, Tries to come up with the best campain possible. I often spend hours on a single map, trying to perfect it. Then, gaming day rolls around. I start up the session and things go well for about 15 minutes or so, then things begin to fall apart.
After the third encounter, things become tedious. My players begin to lose interest. After all that hard work, my game is undone!

Any help with this would be appreciated.

-silentdungeon

Fax Celestis
2008-10-07, 02:36 PM
Simple: Play with people who care.

Crow
2008-10-07, 02:38 PM
Why is it that your player's lose interest?

Gralamin
2008-10-07, 02:38 PM
Often, I find myself hosting a game of D&D. Me, being the DM, Tries to come up with the best campain possible. I often spend hours on a single map, trying to perfect it. Then, gaming day rolls around. I start up the session and things go well for about 15 minutes or so, then things begin to fall apart.
After the third encounter, things become tedious. My players begin to lose interest. After all that hard work, my game is undone!

Any help with this would be appreciated.

-silentdungeon

Another possibility then Fax's is the possibility that your spending to much time on something like a map, instead of say plot. But really, the question is, what do your characters like to do?
Do your characters like exploration?
How about Puzzles?
Combat?
Intrigue?
You need to know what your group enjoys, and focus campaigns around that.

valadil
2008-10-07, 03:13 PM
Figure out what part of game your players like. Cater to that. Over time you'll learn how to read the players to see what it is they're looking for, but for now I'd start with asking them straight up what they want to accomplish in game.

In my experience maps are useless. As a player I zone out when the GM shows them to me. As a GM, I have a lot of fun drawing them, but the map rarely has an impact on the game. Okay, so we go north when the villain flees to the next town? You could decide that arbitrarily without using a map. There are probably better things for you to focus your attention on than mapping.

Crow
2008-10-07, 03:17 PM
Do you have the tv on, or do your players have computers available to them when you game? I make my players shut that crap off, otherwise we have attention problems.

xPANCAKEx
2008-10-07, 03:28 PM
another obvious (but often overlooked) part of DMing - let the players actions have consiquences. all that planning might unintentionally lead to rail roading your players

Ponce
2008-10-07, 03:29 PM
At the start of the session, ask them for three fort saves each the instant they enter a room, mark down the results, and make no further reference to it.

xPANCAKEx
2008-10-07, 03:31 PM
At the start of the session, ask them for three fort saves each the instant they enter a room, mark down the results, and make no further reference to it.

will saves would be even better

fort saves will kill you
will saves... that just gets NASTY

SilentDungeon
2008-10-07, 04:02 PM
Thanks for your help in advance!

No, my players do not have any distracting stuff to help them not pay attention. Also, I do not try and railroad, but...i base my ideas off what i've experienced in RPGs. (quest based system anyone?) being relativly new to d&D in general, i have trouble coming up with alternatives to the, "you have a town, walk around and talk to people. Some of them might have jobs for you." as effective as this is in the short run, there is no real underlying plot.
though i can describe "box" dungeons perfectly, things like twisty roads, caynons that have many crevaces, and caverns are hard to describe. perhaps that is why they lose attention, not enough interesting description.
hm.......
Now that we realized my problem....any help?

Lycan 01
2008-10-07, 04:10 PM
Do they just start talking amongst themselves or something? Do they zone out?

Throw random stuff into the mix. Become what is known as an "evil" DM. Not a "bad" DM, mind you. For example...

Bad DM: *gets annoyed* Rock falls, everybody dies!
Evil DM: *smirks* Wow, so nobody paid any attention to what I said? Oh man... Too bad...

Bad DM: You enter a room. An orc attacks you from behind! Everyone dies...
Evil DM: You enter a room, and hear a strange skittering noise from nearby. *players turn around* There's nothing there... *players turn back around* Nothing there either. *players take two steps* Player A walks into a noose of web. It wraps around his throat and tightens. He begins to be lifted into the air, towards the waiting mandibles of friggin' huge spider.


Keep them on their toes. :smallwink:


(Note: This works best in Call of Cthulhu, but it works pretty good in DnD, too.)

LotharBot
2008-10-07, 04:28 PM
1) You said things "get tedious" after the first few encounters. Is there sufficient variability between encounters, or are you fighting yet another room full of orcs? Make sure each fight is unique and different, and make sure each fight requires a bit different behavior on the part of the players.

2) Are you sure your players want the sort of game you're presenting? Do they want more storyline than you're giving, or less? Do they want more dialog and roleplay, or more combat? Do they want more influence over the story, or do they just want to be given excuses to kill stuff? You should sit down with them and talk this over. Remember, it's not "your game" that's undone, it's "your group's game" -- so make sure you're writing the sort of game the group is looking for. (One mistake new DMs sometimes make is trying so hard to NOT railroad that they don't give the players any direction. Some players want to just explore a big town, but others would prefer a flashing neon sign that says "evil goblins that need killing, 3 miles this way!")

3) While you're at it, get everyone on the same page about their gaming expectations, and set some "table rules". If you have one player expecting to watch sports on TV while everyone else expects a distraction-free environment, that's something that needs worked out. Make sure your players understand that if they're going to get up to get more pizza, use the bathroom, etc. they should do it right after they've gone in the initiative or in between fights. As above, talk it out.

4) Make sure you're not wasting people's time (and make sure your players do the same.) A lot of time in D&D is taken up sitting and waiting for the other players to finish their turns, or for the DM to finish the monster's actions. This is OK to a point, but when a player or the DM takes too long making a decision or looking stuff up, everyone else is just sitting around bored.

Here are some time-saving tips. You might not want to use all of them, but hopefully you'll like some of them:

- initiative cards: write down each character's name in big letters on an index card or a small bit of paper, and make cards for monsters too. When initiative is rolled, put the cards in order, and put them where everyone can see whose turn it is and whose turn is next. When someone finishes their turn, put their card on the bottom of the pile and make sure the top 2 (or 3) are visible again. This should help your players be ready to act when their turns come up.

- if a player isn't ready to act when their turn comes up and another player's turn is next, ask if they'd like to delay until after the other player.

- Write down your monster stats beforehand. Include defensive values (HP, 3.5 saves, 4e defenses), attack values, special powers, immunities, senses, basically anything you need to run the monsters. Also include which page of which book the monster, and any special equipment or powers, came from -- this way if you DO have to look something up, you know exactly where to look. (I used to have a sheet with all of my monster stats for the whole night. Now I write the stats on initiative cards.)

- When you're writing down your monster stats, also figure out basic strategy for them -- "this guy is going to be aggressive in melee" or "these guys are going to focus on squishies using this particular power." This way, when their turn comes up, you already know basically what they're about.

- Know when to draw a curtain on an encounter. When the group of 8 enemies is reduced to two minions, don't play it out unless the players really want to. Be willing to say "and somebody kills it" and move right on to the next scene.

- Roll your attack roll and your damage dice at the same time. If the attack misses, the damage is irrelevant, but if it hits, you've saved the time of picking up a new set of dice and rolling them.

- If multiple players are doing things that either (1) won't effect each other or (2) will add together but not kill the monster, let the players act at the same time and then just get the totals when each one has worked it out.

- If it's going to take a while to set up an area, or if your players do something unexpected and you have to rewrite something, let your players know it's a good time to take a break.

- Take a few moments to describe the area and the monsters, including the actions they take and the condition they're in. Yes, this is a time-saving tip! When your players understand what they're looking at, they're quicker to act, and more likely to act in ways that will make the combat end quickly. When all they see is a generic room with 4 generic bad guys, they have to stop and ask "which bad guys are wearing armor?" and "what did he hit me with?" and "are any of these guys badly wounded?"

TheCountAlucard
2008-10-07, 05:54 PM
Bad DM: *gets annoyed* Rock falls, everybody dies!
Evil DM: *smirks* Wow, so nobody paid any attention to what I said? Oh man... Too bad...


One time, when my players weren't paying attention, I said in a calm voice, "The tavern's on fire."

Does that make me a bad DM, or an evil one? :smalltongue:

AslanCross
2008-10-07, 06:07 PM
One thing I noticed works well: Don't talk too much.

I spend hours preparing statblocks, dungeons, and encounters, but I noticed that writing massive paragraphs of descriptive text and reading those utterly bores players. Prepare them, yes, but only hand out teasers. A couple of sentences at a time is enough. Only give more when the players ask for more.

I also echo the statements above regarding consequences. Always prompt the players for what they want to do. That way they tend to think about the game more.

Though yeah, your players might not really care to begin with. It's best for the DM to really discuss expectations with the players.

Fax Celestis
2008-10-07, 06:10 PM
One time, when my players weren't paying attention, I said in a calm voice, "The tavern's on fire."

Does that make me a bad DM, or an evil one? :smalltongue:

Burning buildings are surprisingly difficult encounters for low-level characters.

magellan
2008-10-07, 06:49 PM
Diagnosis: Too much (meaningless) details

You arrive at the town. there is a peasant enjoying an apple next to a fully ladden wagon of straw. The straw is yellow, and the wagon is 5 feet wide and 12 feet long. It is pulled by 2 horses, one brown, one black. North east of it you have got this canyon, its walls slope up at a 37.5 degree angle. It is 12 feet wide. first it makes a bend with a radius of 60feet to the left. there are 4 little indentions on the north side of the wall. one of them is 3 feet wide, 1 feet high and 12 feet above ground level the other is 2 feet wide and a half fide high and 8 feet above ground level

In a CRPG (where you have your inspirations from) the above would be a single screen. A glimpse and everything is clear. At the table it fills 2 minutes without any relevant info for the players. And 2 minutes listening is *long*! no wonder they turn out.

Tabletop gaming is actually closer to the text adventures of old than to CRPGs. Ever played one of those? They give you a short, 1 or 2 line description of the room. the details you have to get through "look" or "examine" commands.

Thats how you present a location to your players: Short, concise, only the most basic stuff, they will tell you what they want to know.

Also you need a plot. Doesnt need to be convoluted. I found in the beginning a simple plot (Plz adventurer do this for me) is better. Many of mine early adventures came to a "Oh but i could improve the plot/descriptions here, here, and here" phase that went on for eternity (sealing said adventure in my notebook never to see the light of day)

BUT: No time whatsoever should be wasted to find the first plot. If the city mayor has a job for them thats the guy they talk first to. Dont be afraid of a little deus ex machina there either. While a CRPG can have a bunch of NPCs to fill the scenery that do nothing but say "sigh, times are tough" a table top game doesnt work that way.

Remember: While drawing and creative writing is fun, your players do not come to you to admire your skills in those areas.

SilentDungeon
2008-10-07, 08:21 PM
In a CRPG (where you have your inspirations from) the above would be a single screen. A glimpse and everything is clear. At the table it fills 2 minutes without any relevant info for the players. And 2 minutes listening is *long*! no wonder they turn out.

Tabletop gaming is actually closer to the text adventures of old than to CRPGs. Ever played one of those? They give you a short, 1 or 2 line description of the room. the details you have to get through "look" or "examine" commands.

.

ok, i am familiar with the old text games. I see your point. Being only used to CRPGs i describe my locations and format my games as such. I try it in different ways in the future.


Thanks!:smallbiggrin:

mr.fizzypop
2008-10-07, 08:37 PM
1) You said things "get tedious" after the first few encounters. Is there sufficient variability between encounters, or are you fighting yet another room full of orcs? Make sure each fight is unique and different, and make sure each fight requires a bit different behavior on the part of the players.

I second that
but I usually liven up adventures with very gory descriptions of your attacks they that stuff, tendons flapping, ribs snapping, elbows forced in awkward positions, its all good.


- Know when to draw a curtain on an encounter. When the group of 8 enemies is reduced to two minions, don't play it out unless the players really want to. Be willing to say "and somebody kills it" and move right on to the next scene.

Usually I have the last two monsters decide to run which leaves them open for:
a) to captured by the PCs
b) To be attacked with no dex bonus to AC

It also reminds me of a funny story...but its too off topic for this thread

Lemur
2008-10-07, 08:46 PM
I've noticed that throwing action in the players' faces gets their attention and motivates them to continue adventuring more than throwing "missions" at them. That is, instead of "the mayor asks you to hunt down some goblins who have been raiding the village," a better approach would be "as you walk in to the village center, a haggard villager runs in from the west and shouts, 'The goblins! They're attacking!'"

Either way the players have two choices: fight the goblins, or don't. But with the second option, refusing to fight the goblins isn't a passive decision- they still have to initiate action in the form of trying to escape, because the action is coming to them whether they like it or not.

Another thing to establish attention is to point in one direction with one hand, then slap them with the other hand when they turn their heads. Metaphorically, that is. For example, the PCs need to find an old man who lives inside a cave that has information they need. However, when they reach the cave to talk to him, a cave-in occurs, and they all fall into a deeper cavern system. Now they have to fight the deepspawn's slave army in order to escape, and prevent the deepspawn from enslaving the old man, who was taken captive after the cave-in occured. In my experience, at least, people pay more attention when they're never quite sure what to expect.

Raum
2008-10-07, 09:00 PM
Often, I find myself hosting a game of D&D. Me, being the DM, Tries to come up with the best campain possible. I often spend hours on a single map, trying to perfect it. Then, gaming day rolls around. I start up the session and things go well for about 15 minutes or so, then things begin to fall apart.
After the third encounter, things become tedious. My players begin to lose interest. After all that hard work, my game is undone! What does your campaign typically consist of? All you mention is a series of encounters and a map...

About the map, you may want to spend less time creating it and more on setting the game's pace. Some times making things happen faster helps keep attention.

Another q - how long are you playing? Would shorter sessions help?

Thanks for your help in advance!

No, my players do not have any distracting stuff to help them not pay attention. Also, I do not try and railroad, but...i base my ideas off what i've experienced in RPGs. (quest based system anyone?) being relativly new to d&D in general, i have trouble coming up with alternatives to the, "you have a town, walk around and talk to people. Some of them might have jobs for you." as effective as this is in the short run, there is no real underlying plot.
though i can describe "box" dungeons perfectly, things like twisty roads, caynons that have many crevaces, and caverns are hard to describe. perhaps that is why they lose attention, not enough interesting description.
hm.......
Now that we realized my problem....any help?It sounds like you may have a static world. Ask yourself this: What happens if the PCs do nothing? What will the NPCs do? The antagonists?

Set one to three goals per NPC / antagonist. One for simple NPCs will little interaction expected (combat is 'little' :smallsmile: ) and more for more complex / longer term NPCs.

Then when the PCs are at a loss for what to do next, ask yourself what NPCs in the area may be doing to reach their goals and how that may intersect with the PCs.

Devils_Advocate
2008-10-07, 09:12 PM
Diagnosis: Too much (meaningless) details

You arrive at the town. there is a peasant enjoying an apple next to a fully ladden wagon of straw. The straw is yellow, and the wagon is 5 feet wide and 12 feet long. It is pulled by 2 horses, one brown, one black. North east of it you have got this canyon, its walls slope up at a 37.5 degree angle. It is 12 feet wide. first it makes a bend with a radius of 60feet to the left. there are 4 little indentions on the north side of the wall. one of them is 3 feet wide, 1 feet high and 12 feet above ground level the other is 2 feet wide and a half fide high and 8 feet above ground level

In a CRPG (where you have your inspirations from) the above would be a single screen. A glimpse and everything is clear. At the table it fills 2 minutes without any relevant info for the players. And 2 minutes listening is *long*! no wonder they turn out.

Tabletop gaming is actually closer to the text adventures of old than to CRPGs. Ever played one of those? They give you a short, 1 or 2 line description of the room. the details you have to get through "look" or "examine" commands.

Thats how you present a location to your players: Short, concise, only the most basic stuff, they will tell you what they want to know.
To expand upon that a bit:

You don't have to require players to individually list everything that they want to examine. You can go ahead and give a lengthy description of the environment if someone says "I look around to get a sense of my surroundings." But if no one says that, hold off on describing things that one would only notice upon carefully examining the scene in detail. Because the characters quite possibly are not examining the scene in detail! Maybe they're hustling about with little regard for their surroundings, because they're busy people with places to go and things to do. Don't presume that they're paying attention to anything, unless it's something obviously attention-grabbing. The players are the ones who should be deciding whether and how their characters are examining stuff, not you.

Not only does a scene contain way to much detail for you to communicate all of it every time, you may be describing things the characters wouldn't actually be aware of! You want to describe the world as filtered through the characters' perceptions; don't even try to allow the players to see it as if they were there themselves. That's not just an unworkable goal, it's arguably a bad one.

Lycan 01
2008-10-07, 09:14 PM
One time, when my players weren't paying attention, I said in a calm voice, "The tavern's on fire."

Does that make me a bad DM, or an evil one? :smalltongue:


Evil. Thats not always a TPK, and it helps create a mood of intensity, obviously. Also, it serves as a funny red herring.
Player A - "Maybe the enemy light the tavern on fire to assassinate us!"
Player B - "Or the gods are angry with us!"
Player C - "Maybe a guard and a whore got too into it and knocked over a lantern?"
Players A & B - "STFU!"
Player A - "I bet it was the BBEG!"
Player B - "Yeah! Lets go hunt him down!"
DM - *doesn't bother to tell them player C was right. Enjoys watching them investigate non-existant leads*


Also, I might use that idea in my future CoC games if they piss me off. "Btw, you guys smell smoke. Also, there's a faint orange glow coming from the window. Oh, right. The house is on fire."



Also, why is Alucard wearing a pirate hat? His Fedora is much cooler... :smalltongue:

TheCountAlucard
2008-10-07, 09:17 PM
Also, why is Alucard wearing a pirate hat? His Fedora is much cooler... :smalltongue:

EDIT: ...What pirate hat? :smalltongue:

LotharBot
2008-10-07, 09:30 PM
"sigh, times are tough"

+1 point for the RPGworld reference.


Diagnosis: Too much (meaningless) details

Give MEANINGFUL details, of the sort that characters might notice, not just details for the sake of details. "One of the attacking orcs wields a bigger and shinier axe than the rest" is important; "there are about 8,000 apples in the cart" is not.

Lycan 01
2008-10-07, 09:40 PM
EDIT: ...What pirate hat? :smalltongue:

Oooooh, you're a sly one...


You avatar makes me want a Hellsing one... I wouldn't know who to get, though - Anderson, or Pip? :smallconfused:

Kranden
2008-10-07, 09:41 PM
Give the players more meaning to their decisions and allow them to change the story based on what they do. Don't have your heart set on a certain outcome and try to force the player to do it. Let them make their own moral decisions and have them make tough choices. (Should I save that hot chick from a Dragon or save that big pile of treasure that's sinking in lava!)

When in doubt make a more evil campaign! >=) (think of what rich did with OOTS destroying Dorukans gate except more extreme) Try to turn the good guys into badguys! The goodguy stuff is pretty cliche and boring. Yay I saved the day again! next dungeon!

Crow
2008-10-07, 09:48 PM
Should I save that hot chick from a Dragon or save that big pile of treasure that's sinking in lava!

Of course my group will split up to try and do both, failing miserably!

SoD
2008-10-08, 02:16 AM
Of course my group will split up to try and do both, failing miserably!

Whereas my previous group would do so, and one lot would nearly end up dead, the other group nearly reaching the BBEG before deciding "Let's see what the others are up to?" and my current one...well, one would go one way, the others would go the other...and would soon see the lone guy tied up and unconcious after being defeated by an orc with a dagger.

leperkhaun
2008-10-08, 04:20 AM
if you are having trouble with short sweet descriptions or even coming up with a plot, get some old 1e, 2e....3rd party modules.

They often have short sweet room descriptions and can give you ideas for your own plot, also unless your players have played extensivly they are unlikely to know those modules.

It should be realitivly easy to convert monsters and such (or find comparable ones).

SilentDungeon
2008-10-08, 05:56 AM
To help you understand what my average campain is like, I'll describe my latest one to you guys.

"you wake up in an abandonded army camp in a clearing. there are no survivors."
(it was a tad more elaborate than that, but im saving space here.)
"the terrain around you seems cliff-like, almost rocky. there is a path to the north, heading out of the clearing you're in. to the south, is a similar passage."

That was, give or take, the opening statement for my latest campain.
The object of the first few sessio was to figure out where the hell they were and how to get out of the mess they're in. The rocky ravenes and twisting gully's had MANY random(not really, sort of a table I rolled on) encounters. After a while, they got to a cave formation that would eventually lead them out. Not before making them go through a small classic esque dungeon first.
After the upteenth encounter, and as soon as they reached the mouth of the cave, they REALLY lost interest. I called it a day there. (Keep in mind, the session had only gone on for about 2hrs by that point.)


Now lets play "whats wrong with this picture"!

leperkhaun
2008-10-08, 06:10 AM
To help you understand what my average campain is like, I'll describe my latest one to you guys.

"you wake up in an abandonded army camp in a clearing. there are no survivors."
(it was a tad more elaborate than that, but im saving space here.)
"the terrain around you seems cliff-like, almost rocky. there is a path to the north, heading out of the clearing you're in. to the south, is a similar passage."

That was, give or take, the opening statement for my latest campain.
The object of the first few sessio was to figure out where the hell they were and how to get out of the mess they're in. The rocky ravenes and twisting gully's had MANY random(not really, sort of a table I rolled on) encounters. After a while, they got to a cave formation that would eventually lead them out. Not before making them go through a small classic esque dungeon first.
After the upteenth encounter, and as soon as they reached the mouth of the cave, they REALLY lost interest. I called it a day there. (Keep in mind, the session had only gone on for about 2hrs by that point.)


Now lets play "whats wrong with this picture"!

1) the players may not be intreasted in playing...what happened here. To their characters they have no vested intreasted in finding out what happened, they just might want to get back home and finish the other things they were doing. They simply might not like playing this type of game.

2) there was no progression in the session, nothing to hold their intreasts. Sure they are trying to find a way out, but thats all....they dont have a bigger picture and bigger reason to care. Its more like...geez lets just get through this and go home (from character PoV).

You should drop more of a hint, clues to what is going on, WHY would the characters care what happened? And you need to provide them with that quickly.

3) Umpteen random encounters. Random encounters are nice, umpteen random encounters are not. Random encounters should be used to keep the players on their toes, to make sure they dont go nova in 2 encounters. They should not be the Main Threat. They should not become so repetitive that they become Umpteen random encounters. It prolongs the game and provides no benifits story wise to do that.

4) There was little/no story telling involved. You end up in a field, something happened....GO. Very boring. Provide more hints, allow more investigation.... give them SIGNIFIGANT challanges. That does not mean giving them CR 20 mooks to kill, it means provide them with challanges that provide something other than random monsters to kill.

magellan
2008-10-08, 06:20 AM
First: Why more elaborate? got a perfect picture of that szene with those 2 sentences. (If i want to know if the dead guys have loot/ show signs of what army they belong too i will ask you)

Second: We are having the basic "amnesia/who am I?" Plot here i take it. Ok, tried and true, explains why the characters dont know anything about the world they are in either. (and not just their players)

The random encounters in the gullys & ravines sound a little meaningless from the information you have given here. Could be that they felt to generic for the players to pay attention after a couple.

My main question would be: did you give any ominous hint as to why they are there/got amnesia/things to come? In such a situation players need something to play with. Stuff to examine and theorize about its meaning for their specific situation.

Raum
2008-10-08, 07:01 AM
To help you understand what my average campain is like, I'll describe my latest one to you guys.

"you wake up in an abandonded army camp in a clearing. there are no survivors."
(it was a tad more elaborate than that, but im saving space here.)
"the terrain around you seems cliff-like, almost rocky. there is a path to the north, heading out of the clearing you're in. to the south, is a similar passage."First question, where are your NPCs and what are they doing? Someone put the PCs in the camp and killed the army which was there before them...why? What are their plans?

NPCs / antagonists with goals give you two things, consistent plot elements and, possibly more important in your situation, the ability to be proactive. The NPCs don't need to wait for the PCs to follow the path.


That was, give or take, the opening statement for my latest campain.
The object of the first few sessio was to figure out where the hell they were and how to get out of the mess they're in. The rocky ravenes and twisting gully's had MANY random(not really, sort of a table I rolled on) encounters. After a while, they got to a cave formation that would eventually lead them out. Not before making them go through a small classic esque dungeon first.
After the upteenth encounter, and as soon as they reached the mouth of the cave, they REALLY lost interest. I called it a day there. (Keep in mind, the session had only gone on for about 2hrs by that point.)Was there a purpose to the encounters? Did they fit the location? The plot? Or were they merely random obstacles in the path? Were the PCs there to do anything other than fight their way out?

chevalier
2008-10-08, 03:56 PM
Diagnosis: Too much (meaningless) details

You arrive at the town. there is a peasant enjoying an apple next to a fully ladden wagon of straw. The straw is yellow, and the wagon is 5 feet wide and 12 feet long. It is pulled by 2 horses, one brown, one black. North east of it you have got this canyon, its walls slope up at a 37.5 degree angle. It is 12 feet wide. first it makes a bend with a radius of 60feet to the left. there are 4 little indentions on the north side of the wall. one of them is 3 feet wide, 1 feet high and 12 feet above ground level the other is 2 feet wide and a half fide high and 8 feet above ground level


What are the horses' names?

What is the peasant wearing?

Can I cast detect evil on the peasant?

DM Raven
2008-10-08, 04:54 PM
Several things could be happening here...

As someone mentioned, you may need to find players interested in the game. Many years of DMing experience has taught me that there are some people out there who just don't enjoy D&D and RPing games in general. Are your players newbies or have they played D&D before?

If your players usually enjoy playing D&D, then you may want to speak to each of them in private and try to find out what the disconnect is.

If you want to try to fix things in game...here are a few suggestions.

Don't be afraid to kill characters who aren't playing smart. If your players don't see consequences for their actions they won't take the game seriously. Also, I suggest not allowing any raise dead effects until your people hit level 6 or so...make them re-roll a character starting average party level or one level below that.

Use random encounters if you think things are getting boring. A battle usually gets everyone listening, especially if they know their characters can die.

Bring in an interesting NPC to get things on track. If your players seem lost or confused as to what should happen next, an NPC is a great way to give them direction.

Roll dice. It may sound strange to just randomly roll dice, but it makes your players paranoid. Especially if they are in a dangerous situation. In my games, it's gotten to the point where my players will stop talking and look at me whenever I roll a die. If they think you're rolling for something, they will start paying much more attention to their surroundings. (Especially if you've killed them.) Also, make sure you make upsetting noises when you roll high on your random die. Word like, "Uh oh" "hmmmmm" and "sssssss" followed by a frown make everyone uneasy and get them in A game mode. (Again this only works once you've proven you're not afraid to kill them.)

As someone already mentioned, ask for random Will or Fort defences from people while rolling dice. Again makes the players paranoid and much more observant.

Starbuck_II
2008-10-08, 05:23 PM
Burning buildings are surprisingly difficult encounters for low-level characters.

Create Water is a low level spell....

SilentDungeon
2008-10-08, 05:39 PM
I seem to understand now, random encounters are not to be used as serious enemies. right-o. Also, my "friends" are quite new at D&D in general. One of them doesnt even have his rules straight! So, ive taken all of you all's ideas and formed them into the start of a new campain. It involves a BBEG and a line of progression, as well as an overlying plot. Also, the action comes straight to the players. Muahahaha....

Thanks for all your advice!:smallbiggrin:

oh, and where'd that Lich template go....
*rummages around*

Inyssius Tor
2008-10-08, 06:01 PM
I seem to understand now, random encounters are not to be used as serious enemies. right-o. Also, my "friends" are quite new at D&D in general. One of them doesnt even have his rules straight! So, ive taken all of you all's ideas and formed them into the start of a new campain. It involves a BBEG and a line of progression, as well as an overlying plot. Also, the action comes straight to the players. Muahahaha....

Thanks for all your advice!:smallbiggrin:

oh, and where'd that Lich template go....
*rummages around*

Good!

There is one other point, though: random-ish encounters are perfectly fine. They just need to fit verisimilitude ("how did the lizardmen get past the carrion crawler? Why did the lizardmen get past the carrion crawler?") and emphasize a point or three, like "this forest is succumbing to corruption", or "scavengers tend to flock to battlefields after the battles are over", or "in this campaign, you don't need to kill every single monster you encounter", or "not keeping watch when camping outside the Forest of the Red Spiral is really stupid", or what have you.

And they have to be interesting encounters in their own right. Don't throw an owlbear at them and assume it'll keep the players entertained. Keep the encounter's terrain in mind, make sure the monster has things to do, make sure your players will have interesting tactical options, et cetera.

Here (http://www.rampantgames.com/blog/2007/03/wandering-monsters-and-random.html) is a good blog post on the subject.

kbk
2008-10-08, 06:34 PM
Okay, so here are some thoughts off the top of my head.

1) My group is kind of large. Combat takes a while, and it takes a while to cycle through 7 player's actions. This results in players getting bored, or starting up side conversations.

2) No TV on, but people tend to have laptops handy. We make good use of laptops for reference material while actually playing, so turning them off wouldn't always be optimal.

3) Also, with a large group, while we're doing RP situations, there is the inevitable splitting up. I found this was a problem even in smaller groups with White Wolf games. One thing to do is to make sure there are only limited or no encounters while the group is split up, and discourage them while actually out in the wild or in a dungeon. Splitting up means only one or two people are actually playing at a time.

4) Ultimately, we've sort of decided that this difficulty playing attention is not bad. We laugh, we joke, we enjoy ourselves. Gaming is the excuse to get together, and we take it casually like that.If we get sidetracked for 15 minutes or so, 3-4 times over the course of 5 hours of play, its not a big deal. Besides, as a teacher, I know people do have difficulty staying completely focused for more than an hour at a time. Build in breaks, or let them happen naturally. The GM makes sure he knows what needs to be done in a play session, and encourages us to get back on track at some point.

5) All of this assumes that you have an entertaining and good quality game, you are a competent DM, the players are interested in playing your campaign, and everyone is at least nominally accepting the system (Be it 3.5, 4th, Call of Cthulu, White wolf, whatever). Some players are much more passive aggressive and actively seek to derail a game session for a game they are not enjoying. Either discourage these players from coming, or change the game to suit them.

6) This applies to some of the other points, but fundamentally what is your goal? If its just to have fun, then I wouldn't worry about a few distractions. If you want a more hardcore setting, maybe plan some breaks ahead of time and really budget your time. This will allow players to stay focused for short periods of time and still allow for some release.

valadil
2008-10-08, 09:12 PM
You might also want to try some more interesting plot hooks. Giving the PCs hints in a tavern isn't going to draw their interest. They'll board the train, but they're just going along for the ride. Give them a plot hook that actually grabs their interest. This is really easy when they give you a detailed backstory since you can just make that childhood enemy show up. But if they haven't given you a character backstory (I'm guessing they haven't since they don't seem motivated enough) you can just go with some over the top shenanigans.

Here are some examples of hooks sure to draw in your players:

When they go to look for missions there's a wanted poster with a huge reward for one of the PC's fathers.

As they approach town a man sprints away at high speed. He is naked save for handcuffs. As he runs he yells "get out of here, it's gonna blow!" Then the town goes boom. Extrapolate an explanation from there. Or kill the naked guy in the explosion and leave the players with a difficult investigation.

Make a rival adventuring party that closely mirrors the PCs. Any time the PCs fail or decline a quest have the rivals take it up.

Have some pickpockets mistake the PCs for an easy target. When the players kill or capture the pickpockets, the thieves guild retaliates against the players.

Ethdred
2008-10-09, 05:39 AM
DM - *doesn't bother to tell them player C was right. Enjoys watching them investigate non-existant leads*


Oh yes, non-existant leads are the DM's friend! Not only do they provide much amusement as those stupid players completely ignore the really obvious thing to do (because it's always obvious to you, you wrote the darn thing) but they can also provide new ideas to the sneaky DM. One of my parties had got this idea that they would have to fight lots of undead, even though I didn't think I'd said anything to give them that impression. But they banged on about it so much that I eventually threw in a load of undead - once they'd decided they weren't going to meet any so weren't prepared for them :) Another good thing is when they start getting suspiscious about previously innocent NPCs - seeing conspiracies everywhere - often this can give you good ideas for good conspiracies. :)

A similar idea is to just throw in a problem that you don't know the answer to and see what they make up. I recently gave a party 10,000 lbs of gold ore as a reward for clearing out a mine. Now they just have to figure out a way to get it back. (In the end they came up with a really clever solution which I hadn't even considered.)

I think it was Raymond Chandler who said that anytime he got stuck writing a book, he just had a man come through a door with a gun.

LotharBot
2008-10-09, 08:56 PM
The object of the first few sessio was to figure out where the hell they were and how to get out of the mess they're in. The rocky ravenes and twisting gully's had MANY random(not really, sort of a table I rolled on) encounters. After a while, they got to a cave formation that would eventually lead them out. Not before making them go through a small classic esque dungeon first.
After the upteenth encounter, and as soon as they reached the mouth of the cave, they REALLY lost interest.

I would say that "what's wrong with this picture" is that your players don't understand what's going on because your world doesn't make sense, or hasn't been presented in a way that makes sense (even if YOU think it makes sense.) It's hard to get into a story that seems like it's just purely random, or like it's just an excuse to throw a bunch of monsters at them.

Even "random" encounters should advance either the story or the players' understanding of the world somehow (and some of them should give the players powerups / ph4t l3wt.) If each of your "random" encounters included some sort of clue that, when put together, would let the players puzzle out some larger story point, that's worthwhile. If, 2 hours into the game, all they've done is fought a bunch of monsters that don't seem to have anything in common, that can get pretty boring.

Given the "abandoned army camp", which, presumably, had a lot of dead army guys in it... you could have some of your random encounters include, say, a freshly-slain corpse wearing the same sort of uniform (clearly another escapee who didn't have the luck and/or good sense to be in an adventuring party). You could have some encounters include creatures that seemed unnatural in some way, that tied back to whatever unnatural evil destroyed the camp. You could have some encounters include enemy soldiers whose army had fought yours recently -- and whose army may have suffered the same fate. All of a sudden, instead of just going through a dozen random fights, the party has gone through some story-building. So when they get to the cave mouth, they have some theories, like "I think an evil lich caused the army to go mad and most of them killed each other. He might be somewhere inside this cave complex!" That gives your players a motivation, and a reason to choose to go into the cave (or to choose to explore outside for a while longer.) It gives them a reason to keep going, beyond "there might be more stuff to kill in here."

Xavion&Pavion
2008-10-13, 03:12 PM
Well, first of all no disclosing of my identity.

Now, onto the dmining stuff.
What i usually try to do, is set up a good map, and have the PCs start in an interesting place. Throw them into the plot. Chuck them overhead at the story. (thats why my group has bruised foreheads) Make the plot interesting. not just "OMG BIB BAD EVIL GUY! OMG KILL KILL KILL" then repeat. It doesn't sound like you do that, but trust, some people would. Also, don't go into uber description. We don't need to know exactly how much hay there is packed around the gold. Just, the gold. Try to use only 3-5 sentences to describe a room/ town. Third, keep them entertained. If they like plot, give them so much plot, they will think they entered a Lost, desperate housewives, and monoply cross-bread rpg. If they like killing, make it a gore fest. Make it so that surgeons will have to be excused! If they like getting drunk at the tavern, make a town full of TAVERNS!!!

Last, don't starch yourself. If you know what I mean, good. If not keep reading. Don't be afraid to have a few laughs along the way. It is healthy, and makes the expierience alot more fun for everyone.

Hope this helps *cough cough*

Vinshwitz
2008-10-13, 05:52 PM
CUz none of us excually want a serious game, we got like barely half way thorught the town and you kiled a player already! and it was you who ended it an hour earlier than it was!!!!!!!!:smallfurious:


and wait was it me you refer to as "does not have his rules straight?"

Vinshwitz
2008-10-13, 05:56 PM
Thanks for your help in advance!

No, my players do not have any distracting stuff to help them not pay attention. Also, I do not try and railroad, but...i base my ideas off what i've experienced in RPGs. (quest based system anyone?) being relativly new to d&D in general, i have trouble coming up with alternatives to the, "you have a town, walk around and talk to people. Some of them might have jobs for you." as effective as this is in the short run, there is no real underlying plot.
though i can describe "box" dungeons perfectly, things like twisty roads, caynons that have many crevaces, and caverns are hard to describe. perhaps that is why they lose attention, not enough interesting description.
hm.......
Now that we realized my problem....any help? also to add on asimple is easy and more fun and i think all of the "players" will agree to that. Besides..... "Why So Serious?"

Vinshwitz
2008-10-13, 06:02 PM
Do they just start talking amongst themselves or something? Do they zone out?

Throw random stuff into the mix. Become what is known as an "evil" DM. Not a "bad" DM, mind you. For example...

Bad DM: *gets annoyed* Rock falls, everybody dies!
Evil DM: *smirks* Wow, so nobody paid any attention to what I said? Oh man... Too bad...

Bad DM: You enter a room. An orc attacks you from behind! Everyone dies...
Evil DM: You enter a room, and hear a strange skittering noise from nearby. *players turn around* There's nothing there... *players turn back around* Nothing there either. *players take two steps* Player A walks into a noose of web. It wraps around his throat and tightens. He begins to be lifted into the air, towards the waiting mandibles of friggin' huge spider.


Keep them on their toes. :smallwink:


(Note: This works best in Call of Cthulhu, but it works pretty good in DnD, too.)
no we do not zone out we just have some jokes and fun but silentdungeon, if you as a dm can't handle that then........

Xavion&Pavion
2008-10-13, 06:17 PM
Ah, now the other side comes out... and with a list of grivencies (sp) against you.

Vinshwitz
2008-10-13, 07:48 PM
usually, yeah o yeah and it wasnt our falt the pc died, he made us take a freakin save or die check within 1 hour of playing fomr the beginning of the campaign.

BizzaroStormy
2008-10-13, 09:34 PM
Ah yes, the difficulty of paying attention. If you ask Lord Tataraus, you'd know that im a prime example of this. That is to say my boredom usually results in me overeating and pelvic thrusting at everything that moves and some things that don't. Not to mention the fact that our sessions usually last 6-10 hours.

1. Anyway First thing I would reccommend doing is playing PBP games or at least PBIM. This will allow better roleplaying on the part of both you and the players mainly because those who feel embarrassed to try to "seduce the barmaid" while looking at their DM, will be able to express these dealings more comfortably. This really helped my group and even resulted in a love interest for my character. PBP games also means that the player is on their computer, meaning they can screw around online while waiting for something to happen.

2. Cut off certain aspects of the game. Experience is a good example of something you can cut. Have the players level up when you feel it is appropriate. This will eliminate filler fights and keep the game on track. For things that require XP components, you could either have the character severely drained of energy for a time or require an exotic component that would either be very expensive or require a sidequest to obtain.

3. Don't keep your players bored with exposition for too long. For instance, I'm putting a Funny Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZiU3TRnfu8) in this post to break up the monotony of paragraphs of text.

4. Require in-depth backstories. Unless you're doing dungeon crawls, having your players write a backstory and put some work into making their characters will hopefully force a sort of attachment to that character.

5. If you do decide to go PBP, don't think you have to wait for everybody to post their actions in combat before you can move on. If 2/5 of the players have posted their actions, make a post that goes up till the next player's initiative.

Thats all I can think of at the moment.