performanceroll:SESSION 0!Aah, the fabled “Session 0″. Many have chosen to ignore it and many have f
performanceroll:SESSION 0!Aah, the fabled “Session 0″. Many have chosen to ignore it and many have fallen prey to their folly. It is a session you hold before the actual start of the game in order to familiarize your players with the type of game you want to run, as well as adapt your plans according to their particular needs. I can not stress enough the importance of everyone around the table being on the same page in regards to the atmosphere, content and rules of the game. Time and time again I see people complaining about DMs running their own story without regarding the characters’ backtories at all. Or having homebrew rules that no one discussed that are being pulled out in the heat of battle, having dire consequences. Or the game being more combat heavy while the players just wanted to roleplay. All of that, and more, can be discussed beforehand so everyone knows what they’re buying into. My second online campaign that I was a player in, I didn’t really enjoy playing. My natural proclivity is towards roleplaying and having meaning behind everything my character does. With that in mind I created an Artificer with an elaborate backstory and eventual mechanical servant to accompany him in his endeavors. I had a lot of things in mind to do with this character, with the end goal being inventing some grand invention to make my PC known throughout the lands. That would be the driving force of his actions.When joining into this game, the DM only told all the players to create a character who, for some reason, ended up in jail, which they wanted to have as a starting point - I had no problems with that and incorporated it into my backstory. No other pointers were given. As I found out a couple of sessions into the game, the DM had a story they wanted to run and any major detour would simply be turned down and squashed. They simply wanted players to play “their” game. This, naturally, resulted with me being unhappy for the majority of the campaign. My character had next to no motivation to follow the DM’s plotline and was just kind of tagging along. I was given no opportunities to “invent” something, tinker with my equipment (no pun intended) or even explore my class’ features. In fact, maybe a couple of sessions in, it was decided that having the mechanical servant with the party is too much of a hassle to deal with, due to frequently having to travel on a ship and the servant being too heavy for the ships, so it ended up being left behind in some city and pretty much unused. I was not happy. Now, I’m not saying the DM was a bad DM or that their story wasn’t great. It was actually quite interesting and playing with them at the reins was indeed fun. If only we had discussed the nature of the campaign beforehand. If I were only given a heads up about the nature of party travel that would prohibit me from using my mech servant (which is about a third of the Artificer class), I would have gone with a different character and different expectations and would’ve had much more fun. This is why session 0s are held.But what specifically is to be discussed in these preparatory sessions?ATMOSPHEREIf you’re going into the Curse of Strahd adventure published by WotC, you should know that the setting is dark and gloomy, everything is sort of depressed and not much levity is to be had. Don’t go into it expecting fart jokes, memes and puns. On the other hand, if the DM and the whole group agrees and wants to intentionally take the opposite aproach and make fun of how the adventure is written, more power to the whole group. My point is, that is something that should be discussed. Atmosphere is important.THE THREE PILLARSAny dnd veteran will tell you that the three pillars of dnd are combat, exploration and social interaction, However the DM wants to run the game or the players play it, whether it be more combat heavy, social roleplay oriented or based on a hexcrawl, everyone should be on the same page before starting. You don’t want to go Ranger with a focus in surviving in the wilderness, gathering food and tracking animals, and then finding out the campaign will mostly be held in a city and based around political conflict. HOMEBREWWhether it be rules that are not official or a setting where there are no humans, all homebrew material should be brought up before the campaign starts. No one wants to create an arcane spellcaster class and find out in game that magic doesn’t work due to some great devastating magic war a thousand years ago. The DM might even have a way for spellcasting classes to be able to cast spells or maybe plans for them to be the ones who discover magic again throughout the storyline of the campaign, but players should be aware of this before they start playing. LEVELING AND CAMPAIGN LENGTHThis is a tough one. These days, while games are much more accessible via online platforms, they are also more prone to disbanding before their natural ending. It is hard to predict whether a game will last as long as it is supposed to. When there were fewer options and most games were held in person, everyone put in an extra effort to have the game continue. Having said that, players should know what they’re getting into because it informs their choices of character creation. Maybe someone wants to play a class because of that one awesome ability they get at 14th level. If the campaign starts at 1st and ends at 10th, naturally, that player would not choose that class. Also, how will leveling be done? Standard XP system or nowadays more popular milstone system? Each have their pros and cons, but whatever you decide to go with, you should let everyone know beforehand.OTHEROther than what was already mentioned, anything else that you would like to be known. No phones at the table, no being late, no talking out of character, no metagaming, whatever the DM or the players hold important, should be made aware to everyone at the table. Now, all of this is maybe not so important when playing with friends you’ve known for a long time, especially if you’ve already played with them. But it is imperative for online games or games where you sit at a table without knowing the other people present. Trust me, when everyone’s on the same page, everyone’s happier. And that doesn’t mean that compromises can’t be made. Maybe the DM wants to try that critical fumble table for injuries and worse, but the players don’t - you talk it out and find a consensus. Dnd is a collaborative game, so collaborate - even before the game starts ;) In the campaign my friends and I tried starting before the current one, we were still newbies and neglected to have a session 0, which resulted in a TPK in the first session and a few member changes for the eventual game we are currently playing for almost 2 years now. But that’s a story for another day.Thanks for reading, as always, hope you’ve gained some inspiration ;) -- source link