Essay -- 7 Things Players Forget About Their Storytellers

I've been reminded through recent conversations that despite how long some of us have been gaming, there are certain truths we seem to have trouble coping with. One thing I tend to forget is that for some people, there is still a perceived gap between the 'Storyteller/Game Master/Game Host/Whatever' (I'll just use Storyteller from here on out for the sake of simplicity) and the players of a game. Just like people who've never worked in the service or retail industries have difficulty appreciating people currently working in such positions, sometimes players without extensive experience running a game don't realize or understand a few basic truths about what's really going on behind the metaphorical curtain when a game is being run.

Something I've tried to do myself over the years is help show people a little bit of the process, where ideas come from and what Storytellers are thinking when running a game or crafting a plot. The aforementioned recent conversations have reminded me that there are still a lot of players out there who don't get why Storytellers do some things and don't do other things. So I thought I'd put together a little list to maybe bring some awareness to some of our motivations for doing some things and neglecting others.

(Disclaimer: I'm aware of how adversarial and confrontational my tone is at times. I apologize -- but only slightly -- because this all comes from the fact that I care so much about making these games work and I easily get worked up. So please bear with me.)


7 Things Players Sometimes Forget (or Just Don't Realize) About Their Storytellers

1. We occasionally need reminders of your backstory details
Every Storyteller enjoys getting material to work with with a character and we like being able to emphasize parts of a setting that we know our players and their characters will respond to. That said, there's a lot we have to keep track of. Even if we have a printed copy of it, we can't always keep track of every little detail of what your character might be thinking in a situation. So sometimes taking the initiative and asking about things that would stand out to your characters is a good way to not only introduce the background or character element you'd like to emphasize but it's also a good way to show an interest in really participating in the game (more on this later).

Like pretty much anything else, repetition and consistent integration into a routine helps. So, while trying not to bring it up every five minutes, find ways to remind us about important details of your character that might impact a scene. (By 'important,' I mean things like checking auction notices for South American relics as opposed to telling us what ranking your current t-shirt has amongst your character's wardrobe)


2. We want you to have fun
This may seem to go without saying, but bear with me a moment. For as long as I've been gaming with people, there are always players who aren't entirely happy with how the game is being run. Maybe it's a game balance issue or maybe a plotline isn't making sense or maybe they're concerned that another player's ego-masturbation is having a negative effect on the game. And about 99 times out of a hundred, if the Storyteller ever hears of these concerns it's second-hand.

Here's the thing: If someone doesn't want to hear about what they could be doing to make the game more enjoyable for you, they wouldn't be running the game for you. Very rarely does a Storyteller voluntarily run a game for people he's unwilling to talk to. No matter how surly or stressed a Storyteller might seem when approached by a player, if they didn't want to hear player feedback they wouldn't go to the trouble of running the game. Half the reason some groups go out and get food after the game is ostensibly to talk about stuff like this but it hardly comes up even when people express a desire to discuss it. But getting into a commiseration spiral with other people outside of the game doesn't do anything on its own but get everyone worked up.

It gets even worse even when the Storyteller hears about it. (and assume they will, seriously -- at least one person who might read this has accused me behind my back of shit I didn't do and doesn't know I know it) When someone says "So-and-so doesn't like the game but won't tell you about it" what we hear is "so-and-so doesn't like what's going on and cares about it enough to let it affect their interactions with the game but doesn't care about it enough to do anything to try and help you fix it knowing full well that fixing it could make the game better for a lot of people." That upsets us and makes us wonder if running the game is a worthwhile use of time and effort.

True Story: When Sean and I were running the Hunter: The Reckoning LARP, we learned early on that our burnout was not subsiding with a change in venue and we were planning a natural point to wrap up the game. However, the game wound up being abruptly cancelled because we got wind of a player accusing Sean of cheating (and not in private) just to screw over the players in a session when a strategy simply didn't pan out. It wasn't the accusation alone that did it, but the fact that someone had the gall to say that behind our backs and assume we wouldn't hear about it but probably (based on past experience) still expect us to run the game for them. I slammed down the 'game is over' button on that one. You read that right: despite any preconceptions people have about Sean's behavior and attitudes, I was the one who declared "fuck it, I'm not blowing one more Friday on this" and ragequit that game.

(That said, if you do tell a Storyteller in a reasonable and non-confrontational manner about a problem and they dismiss you without a good reason or at least a sincere "I'll think about it," you've got my permission to find other ways to spend your time.)


3. We want the whole game to have fun
Again, seems obvious. But bear with me.
Sometimes we have to make calls and choices based on trying to keep the whole playerbase involved with a game. However, almost everyone wants the spotlight every now and again at game. Everyone wants to be the guy an entire scene hinges on. And there's nothing inherently wrong with that. But in a LARP that's really hard to do while making it fun for everyone. Handing a vital plot hook to just one player without making it available to a good chunk of the group is usually a recipe for disaster. Some people will think they're 'meant' to follow up on it on their own and hoard it rather than share it until they can do so -- sometimes getting their character killed and screwing up the plot hook in the process. Or they simply won't think it's relevant and sit on it rather than take the initiative and make it available to the rest of the group where, ideally, someone else realizes "wait a moment, I've got a puzzle piece that interlocks with that perfectly!" Or, at least half the time, their work schedule changes or something else happens and that player just can't make it to game for the next two months. (I'm not kidding on that last one, it does happen that often.)

What I'm getting at is that gaming -- particularly LARPing -- is a group-oriented activity and we can't always give specific people a bit of focus without basically making everyone else sit around and wait for 'their turn' to come up. It's a lot harder than it generally sounds and unfortunately sometimes we have to spread the fun kind of thin rather than let someone either intentionally or unintentionally take it away from everyone else.


4. We aren't obligated to let the players win
No session plan survives contact with the players. Everyone knows that. It's a cosmic truth that flexibility and improvisation are among the first skills a Storyteller develops. But we learn to adjust to what the players are doing, not what will necessarily let the players succeed. Now, this isn't universally true -- some games are more linear than others -- but more often than not what leads to the development of the plot and the setting is coming up with the consequences of the players' actions and choices as opposed to making sure the players' choices produce the consequences we as Storytellers want.

Just as not every plan a Storyteller has for a session goes off as hoped, not every plan a player has goes off either (not every idea is a good one no matter what side of the clipboard you're on). Sometimes, for the sake of the story, a player's plan will have a slightly higher chance of success than it probably should. But a little more often the story doesn't assume an inevitable victory so a 'crazy enough to work' plan isn't the best one. Some sessions are more interesting thanks to the knowledge that you've got some ass-covering to do next week. Sometimes 'winning' is actually worse for the players than 'losing.' The possibility of failure can make it that much sweeter when the wins are obviously earned.

Remember that "The Empire Strikes Back" is generally considered the best of the original Star Wars trilogy, and the only people clearly 'winning' by the end of that story are Darth Vader and Boba Fett.


5. We want players to take an interest
Sometimes all we have to go on is the feedback we get. This goes a little back to what I said earlier about how we want to hear when things aren't working. But also sometimes all the enjoyment we get out of a session is knowing that people want to spend time and energy on it. Knowing that people spend time thinking about the game outside of the session they're currently attending makes a Storyteller feel good about what they're doing. We want people to talk about game and take enough of an interest to ask questions about the setting (as long as the answers won't give away plot). Even when you're curious about what looks like a plot hole, at worst you're showing the Storyteller you're interested and at best you're pointing out something he needs to quietly fix (and most players' heads would explode at how many of the coolest things that come up in a game are only there because a Storyteller realized after the fact they need a proper answer to the question of "Why does X do Y when it should do Z?").

This also means that sometimes we want players to take the initiative. Some games are a lot more linear than others, but rarely does a game suffer solely because someone uses their character's personal agenda to get involved with the setting during a brief downtime scene (just for the record, I'm talking more along the lines of looking for news stories that are reported differently by various networks or contributing to local charitable causes, not just crafting awesome weapons for your buddies). Some games work better when people actually send their characters out to find plot seeds to bring back for the group. More often than not, if it looks like a player is getting a lot of attention from a Storyteller it might be because that player is actually spending time and energy to seek out plot rather than wait to have it spoon-fed to them. (Sometimes it's because the player is the personal sidekick of the Storyteller and is just allowed to use that to jerk off, but anyone who knowingly plays in those games deserves what they get)

But seeing that someone wants to be an active participant in a game is one of those things that encourages Storytellers and makes it seem like the effort is worth it. I'm not being rhetorical: few things say "This is worth the trouble" better than having a player who wants to contribute to the world their characters are inhabiting.

Heck, sometimes (but not always) it's enough to know that a player actually chose to attend a LARP over doing something else and isn't just at the game because their internet connection's down or there aren't any good movies playing.


6. We sometimes want to just get through this scene
Now, despite my little 'winning isn't always awesome' speech earlier, I will concede that winning is occasionally pretty freaking awesome. But sometimes winning isn't worth spending an hour and a half gearing up for a combat that will probably only take three or four rounds one way or another. Sometimes it's not worth 'winning' in a scene if it took so long to set up that most of the game is just glad it's over. I could be wrong but in my experience game sessions are more interesting when you can do more things. And it's easier to do more things when you can finish pre-existing things up quicker.

All I'm saying is that spending a half-hour making sure everyone's buffed and has their Skill bonuses all in a row isn't necessarily worth it for a scene that's not supposed to take the entire night. Unless a character's death is on the line maybe it's okay to let an inconvenient but shaky rules call slide until after the session when there's time to look it up properly. There's little point in holding up game for everyone just to spend ten minutes arguing that your +2 should be a +3 and then spend another ten minutes arguing that you aren't trying to argue when it would be better to make your point at a more appropriate time. And maybe, just maybe, if you got legitimately screwed over and were a good sport about it a grateful Storyteller might make it up to you later.

And this point segues nicely into the thing that players forget the most yet is probably the most important point on this list...


7. We aren't the only ones responsible for how good the game is
I said it earlier, plain and simple: gaming is a group activity, with LARPing even more so. In this little essay I've spent a lot of time and word count implying the point of this last list item, yet I feel the need to spell it out explicitly. The Storytellers of a game help establish the setting, set up plots and NPCs, and either build some rails or a sandbox. But a lot of the time it's the actions of the players that make or break the experience for everyone else.

And I'm not just talking about things people do with their characters. I'm talking about the attitude with which players approach the game. Players have an effect on the world around them OOCly as well as ICly whether they mean to or not. If it seems that I spend a lot of time harping on things that people do or don't do in a game it's because a Storyteller can't sustain a game for more than two sessions without being a little aware of what effect their choices have on the group -- but a player who won't open his eyes and take a little responsibility every now and again can cause problems for years.

I'm talking about how a single player's bad mood can lead to a bickering match that spirals out to throw off the entire session (or drastically change a game's playerbase). I'm talking about how a single player can get most of the game killed because they can't stand the idea not firing the gun they went out of their way to load. I'm talking about how all it takes is one player to tie up a Storyteller for most of the night and make it hard if not impossible for anyone else to actually play. I'm talking about times when the one player who can solve a problem isn't taken seriously because when given the choice they'd rather undermine themselves OOCly than spend the iota of effort it would take to prove they're better than people think.

But I'm also talking about times when someone takes charge of a rough situation and is able to resolve it because he doesn't care whether he looks awesome doing it. I'm talking about when a player has a valid personal beef with another player but sucks it up and plays nice because he knows that bringing OOC grudges IC will fuck up the game. I'm talking about a player who voluntarily decides to play against the stereotype he's built up around himself because he realizes it's more fun to play with other peoples' characters rather than against them. I'm talking about a player who occasionally realizes that everyone can see through the bullshit they shovel because they think it makes them look cool and stops insulting the intelligence of the people around them.

Really, this whole essay is just the latest chapter in a little personal quest of mine: To help give players the tools they need to make a game awesome. Storytellers do this anyways, in the form of a setting and NPCs and rules systems, but sometimes the best tools are those that exist outside the game. I'm not talking about metagaming but about keeping in mind that you're interacting with other human beings. The Storyteller and other players aren't some impersonal machine or subroutine that just gives you an error message if you do something you shouldn't do. You respawn in games but you don't always get second chances with the people around you. No matter how hard players try to keep OOC issues from reflecting on IC events it's that much harder to keep IC events from becoming OOC issues.

I've always endeavored to offer up a little transparency in the process of running a game and have done so as far back as the Changeling: The Dreaming LARP Sean and I ran for a time. This has been in part to remind people that Storytellers are people too and that most Storytellers' enjoyment from running a game comes not from telling the story and running the game but from seeing how the players respond to it. It's to remind people that not every Storyteller is some monolithic overlord who thinks he's doing them a favor by letting them watch as he jerks off his favorite NPCs all over them. More often, it's someone who busts his ass and spends more time and trouble than he should trying to craft an experience for a group of people in the hopes of getting a tiny vicarious thrill from their enjoyment. I'm just trying to offer a little bit of awareness because these points I've raised are ones almost every new player misses and even experienced players forget every now and again.

But one more thing that I think players forget: We do appreciate them. Even when they burn us and make us feel like crap, we still appreciate their presence and their patience and their tolerance and everything else they bring to the table. You can tell we appreciate them simply because we still want to keep running games for them.

Whatever you call the guy who runs your games, keep in mind that he only provides the setting and characters and plots (whether homebrewed or pre-printed). It's the players that make it a game.