Notes

Alright. Two things to address to my players.

I hope you take the time to read this,

as it's important to the game,

and also a little bit because "I put effort into this game so you can make an effort too".

Firstly.

I have recognized that, during our games, a particular dilemma of ours is maintaining a good pace/rhythm. A bit too much, it seems the game bogs down - slows - and as attention is lost, diverted, we lose our focus, and naturally the game falls out of sync.

I'm confident we can solve this if we put an effort in reducing non game-related activity at the table. I understand the temptation to check Reddit or have a philosophical debate with your neighbor, but I think it would be better for the game if we tried to limit that.

And i'll be honest, I don't even mind you using your phone when its not your turn; most (not all) of you are completely capable of recognizing it's your turn, taking your turn without delay, and going back to your phone. But the issue arises, when a second person decides to do the same. Suddenly you have 2 people not engaged, and that's [usually] half the party missing. I think all of us naturally lose focus when others do - which is normal I guess considering that dnd is surprisingly mentally straining. I personally find that when others aren't really paying attention, i often myself lose focus and i catch myself kinda just dozing off like "wth am i doing, I should be dming lel". The point is, when many people are actively not engaged, the game slows down. And let me be clear, when i say "engaged", I don't mean actively participating, I just mean like looking/listening at the person talking (you don't have to talk, just be part of the game).

I for one am beginning to believe that we SHOULD be taking more breaks, because the game is riveting and exhausting (melee?). It would definitely benefit us to go at it in 2h intervals with 30 min phone/food/games breaks [or something like that]. The game would move faster, so we'd actually still get just as far.

Truth be told, this may be a bigger issue for me then for you, because 1. I have a vested interest in seeing you play through the material I have prepared and 2. I have played in dnd games were the game progressed more steadily.

Please do share your thoughts/comments/protests



Secondly.

One of the cool things about dnd is that it's fun in different ways to different people. For me, one of the most rewarding aspects about the game is building a immersive world, telling a believable and memorable story. And so here is where I keep hitting a wall; and that wall is Player Absence.

Now understandably, not everyone can make it every time, but as players come and go more sporadically, so too does the structure of the narrative become erratic. I have dealt with these incongruities before, with a bit of sacrifice on behalf of the story, true, but without too much consequences otherwise. However consider this:

Next Saturday, many of our players are getting together for a juicy game of dnd. One of these characters is, of course, 7 days of march away from everyone else. That's hurdle number one of getting him back into the narrative. Next, I was forced to send two other PCs (player characters) away on some silly messenger quest just to justify there characters not being with the rest of the party. Problem.

We could be 7 people Saturday (which i can handle cause im the best dm), but that means jumping back into the current action... which involves 2 PCs + 1 unconcious PC. That in itself promises to be a gruelling 30 minutes of the 4 other PCs sucking their thumbs. Problem. And what happens if they don't even WIN the current encounter? How does story re-unite the PCs now? That's more complications I have no rational answers to.

I could "allow" you to escape, or "allow" you to just succeed, and magically re-unite you all together (like a kinda did last session), but I really don't like that. I feel like it takes away from the authenticity of the world and of the peoples in it (thus taking away from the story too).

Inconsistent Players makes inconsistent Characters, which, whether we like it or not, kinda kills the story. One thing that would really help is if players who can't make it send me ideas about why their characters are away from the party for that time.

Otherwise, I don't know, I'm at a loss and looking to you for suggestions.

I like that we have a dynamic group, I just don't like how the characters kind exist in a Meta-esque state in the story. I want them to be part of this agreeable and immersive world.

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