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When Things Go Wrong image

When Things Go Wrong

S1 E15 · Tabletop Tune Up
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30 Plays1 year ago

In this episode of Tabletop Tune Up, Mark and Ben dive into the challenging topic of recovering from a campaign that has hit a rough patch. We'll explore a range of issues that can derail a campaign, including story problems, bad social dynamics, poor system fit, and the ever present hazard of a dice attack!

We’ll discuss strategies for assessing what went wrong, evaluating player engagement, and ensuring a healthy group dynamic. When facing setbacks, should you push forward or take a break? Explore the importance of self-care and maintaining perspective. Reset player dynamics with open conversations about what went wrong. We’ll also cover practical steps to fit the game system to your group, how to get inspired by other GMs, exploring new influences outside of gaming, and how to use setbacks as opportunities for growth.

Transcript

Motivational Speech and Greetings

00:00:00
Speaker
why don't you stand up and fight this guy hard like had done before, that was beautiful.
00:00:09
Speaker
But don't lay down in front of him like this, like I don't know whether it is some kind of mongrel or something, because he's going to kick your face in pieces.
00:00:22
Speaker
That's right. This guy doesn't want to win, you know. He wants to bury you. He wants to humiliate you. He wants to prove to the whole world that there was nothing but some kind of a freak the first time. And he said you're a one-time lucky punk.
00:00:42
Speaker
Well, now... I don't... I don't want to get mad in a biblical place like this. but I think you're a hell of a lot more than that kid. A hell of a lot.

Resilience and Personal Anecdotes

00:01:36
Speaker
All right, we are back for another episode of Tabletop Tuna. My name is Ben Dyer. I'm here with my co-host, Mark Lehman. It is good to see you again, sir. How you doing? Good, man. How are you doing? I'm too shabby. I'm doing well. Excited for the the fall. Yeah. it's Weather's changing. Leaves are changing. The pumpkin spice must flow.
00:01:59
Speaker
and ah But you know, Mark, I i guess not all is well. You've got something you need to get off your chest today. Yeah, we're gonna be talking of today about getting up when you get knocked down. That's important. It's a key skill. It's a key skill, and I'm gonna start by telling you about a time, Ben, when I got i got knocked down.
00:02:24
Speaker
i'm I'm trying not to do the lyrics, but you got back up again. They ain't ever going to keep me down, buddy. All right. Good deal. What happened? yeah so Years ago, i met a group of when I first moved out to Minnesota, I met a group of like-minded nerds at the office. We decided to get together and play some D and&D. I was pretty excited and played in a little while since I moved out here. and I like these folks. Tish, Christopher, Josh, I'm going to give you some love of your way.
00:02:55
Speaker
But I put a lot of effort into this game. I wanted to develop their individual backstories. You might remember when Randy was talking about, you know, in our interview with him, I wanted to give them like a similar experience. So I planned out some pretty elaborate stuff for each player. It was going to be massive. I did not start small. We learned this stuff along the way, man.
00:03:15
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. We played for a few months and slowly pieces of each character's backstory started to surface. My friend Tom, who I knew the least but I did admire, he had this um this wizard that he created. He had a great backstory that he kind of concocted and threw my way. He had once been, like his character had once been a very powerful wizard who lost his magic and had to start all over. And he had these these gaps in his memory and he was trying to uncover the mystery behind them.
00:03:45
Speaker
So that's what he brought to me. Interesting. Yeah, that's a that gives you a lot of places to go. I've seen that done well in poorly, but it sounds like this was a good start. Well, this was done poorly. Oh, no. I came up with what I thought was a brilliant idea. Spoiler, Ben, it was not. Oh, no. I i thought, what if what if Tom's character had been a victim of a changeling?
00:04:09
Speaker
In this simplified scenario, I'm going to simplify it because we're not going to go into the details, but this Changeling tried to take you know his memories and his powers, but this Changeling became overwhelmed by Tom's character, high-level wizards, his power, his strength, and the mental battle that ensued damaged the Changeling mind, basically killing the Changeling, but leaving Tom's character, his wizard,
00:04:36
Speaker
trapped unknowingly in the body of this changeling. Oh wow, it's like some kind of a psych duel. Yeah, so this might explain in my mind like why his magic is weakened. He would need to rebuild all this stamina, his constitution, all that stuff to kind of regain kind of the full use of his power. But the idea was that he was like, at some point he would find out and he'd be have access to some of these changeling abilities as well. that's interesting He would be know kind of like a race to find his original form, his original body.
00:05:08
Speaker
I like it. That feels like it could work. Yeah, Tom did not like it. Oh, no.

Challenges and Failures in D&D Campaigns

00:05:14
Speaker
Yeah. When Tom found out, man, he was furious, like shaking with rage. Really? serious Yeah. Oh, yeah. He told me that I had completely stripped him of his agency, which, yeah, I kind of did. Okay. He said he had no desire to play this character because it wasn't his character anymore.
00:05:36
Speaker
and I honestly couldn't blame him too much. i mean but then But then Tom rocks me. He absolutely rocks me. He said I was the worst GM he'd ever played with. Wow. Yeah. Ouch. it's so That's hard to hear.
00:05:51
Speaker
It was a kick in the nuts. I'll tell you, um, cause like, you know, Ben, we all, we all define ourselves a little bit what by what matters most in our life. If you're like, let's say you're a doctor, you'd say I'm a doctor or like, if you're I'm a husband or you're a Vikings fan, uh, you know, for me, I would say I'm a GM. so Certainly the more time we invest in stuff, the more we, the more we care about it, the more we identify with it. Yeah.
00:06:15
Speaker
Yeah. So like when he said that, man, that hurt at my core. Like, uh, but you know what? Tom was hurting too, you know? So, uh, and I was the reason for that. So I apologize, but apologies couldn't fix a situation. Our campaign ended that night. Like just ended. That's dramatic.
00:06:36
Speaker
Yeah, it was embarrassing. I was with the other players. I didn't touch my dice for over a year. Really? Yeah. It got you out of the game for a year. Yeah, his parting shot defined me at that moment. And we're going to pause the story here because today we're talking about getting back on that horse. Boy, what a tip. Yeah, we're talking about picking yourself up when things go sideways.
00:07:05
Speaker
I've been there, I'm sure you've been there. Oh, I have. if you If you play games long enough, you're gonna have failures. And that's okay. Let's talk about how to get back up on that horse.
00:07:16
Speaker
This is a great topic for us today. And yeah, i just to make sure you don't feel like you're alone in that boat, I have tanked many campaigns. You know, I've had games that I've played in as a player and that I zigged when I should have zagged. And that basically led us into into all kinds of trouble. But even as a GM, I mean, I think those are the ones that that you feel the most because, of course, you're responsible for how that whole thing goes out. And, you know,
00:07:44
Speaker
Kind of like you're saying, like if players aren't coming along with it, or if you if you decide to get experimental in ways that maybe you're not really experienced in, things can go in weird directions, and you've got to do something to recover. So today, friends, we're going to talk about what to do, and how to recover, and how to understand what went wrong, and so on. And so let's actually just start by kind of getting on the board a little bit of an idea about what kind of ways your campaign can get knocked down before we then get into like what to do to fix it.
00:08:13
Speaker
let's Let's identify the types of knockdowns. First of all, you could have story problems. And this could be things like you just don't have your story put together. Players don't know where to go next. They get frustrated with the pacing of the story and how quickly things are happening. There can be all kinds of different ways that the in-game issues that you are teeing up for your players might go astray.
00:08:37
Speaker
We also could have things such as social problems, Ben. I mean, this is a social game. It is. Not everybody's going to get along. And there could be personality conflicts, maybe play style conflicts. So social problems could end a game, a good game.
00:08:54
Speaker
That's right. Well, and also remember back when we talked about engaging your players, we talked about how different players show up to the game for different things. I've had players that were very kind of technically oriented. They really were into the mechanics and the transactional bits and the rules and the game aspects. I've had other players who are very narrative focused. They really wanted to get in and act the part out, have a great time telling that story. And if you get both of those players in the same group, if they're not deferring to each other, if they don't expect that they're going to be sometimes doing the one and sometimes doing the other it can be kind of tough. Hey, Ben, have you ever encountered a problem where players just didn't like the system you were playing, you were running?

Game Systems and Player Engagement

00:09:34
Speaker
Yeah, I've wizened up at this point. And before I actually try out a new system with people, I kind of give them a little bit of a here's how it works, here's what it's about. um I was surprised to hear one friend of mine who was just like, I don't like dice pools.
00:09:49
Speaker
like period. And I was like, this is a dice pool game. and It was a great game. But he's just like, he just did not like that kind of mechanic. lot of money You know, I'm like, I don't, whatever, man, it's a mechanic. You kind of, it's not, like okay, whatever. But the point was, I figured that out before we got halfway into a game. And then we had a everybody at the table and, you know, and then he's disengaged or worse, you know, decides to just get up and walk out or do something horrible.
00:10:17
Speaker
Well, I can't say I dislike dice pulls, but I gotta tell you, I just love me a D20. I think there's a lot of people out there that share that view. Speaking of dice. Man, dice can end a game too. They can. Dice will turn on you. And, ah you know, as a GM, ah we've all, I'm sure you've had this experience where oh yeah players are kind of like they're down resources. Maybe they made a bad choice. They're a little spread, a little bit thin. And then all of a sudden the twenties start coming out and you're rolling criticals and you can't do a thing about it. You start hitting them hard and you don't want to. But the dice have determined that they're going after player blood that day. What are you going to do then?
00:10:56
Speaker
Ben, you know me, I like to roll in front of people. I like to roll my dice, like to see them see that dumb ah dice tumble across the table. Yeah, that's right. Like it's going to happen sometimes. So unfortunately. Sometimes the dice attack.
00:11:11
Speaker
um Let's all say, too, that like there's a whole aspect of this when you're starting out that could just be you as a GM. And that could be a variety of things connected to any of the above, right? It could be, as a GM, you know you may have to make rulings in the moment, and maybe you realize you didn't make the right ruling later, or maybe your players disagree, or or maybe you know you're really at sea with the book. Maybe it's a more complex system than you like.
00:11:39
Speaker
is is calling it bad jamming a little too harsh? Well, I guess the thing is, you could say there's there's lots of reasons for that, right? It could be an experience or it could be bad social skills. I mean, you know there could be lots of ways that could go sideways. There's been times I've been a bad jam, so like i get it it's okay. Yeah, I think that's an important note too.
00:11:59
Speaker
A big part of it as is you know maybe you just have poor system knowledge, you um but I think the times that I felt like I was probably the the worst, Jim, was when I had poor table management. I wasn't keeping track of time. I wasn't keeping track of pacing, which was causing players to get a little bored here and there. so I mean, these are all things you learn and you have to learn by doing, so don't don be afraid of that.
00:12:25
Speaker
That's exactly right. And the whole point of this episode is that that stuff, it's not like it could happen. Friends, that will happen. If you're starting out, or heck, even now, I mean, we we all still struggle with this from time to time. So we're going to talk today about how to get back on the horse. And frankly, there could be a lot of variations on these or even combinations of these, right? It could turn out that, you know, you're at sea in a new system and it turns out it's the wrong system for your players.
00:12:53
Speaker
So now we've we've kind of got some idea, you know, we got to start assessing when you've had a game that failed. We got to assess where it really went wrong. You're doing an autopsy on the ah the crime scene that is the failed game. Yeah. I mean, after a game session goes sideways, one of the best things you can do, or even if it's kind of going sideways and you're in the middle of it and you're like, Oh, this is going really sideways. Players could be fighting or this could be really awful or whatever. And you realize I'm just not prepared for this today, whatever it might be.
00:13:23
Speaker
Don't be afraid to actually call it for the day and go, you know what you guys, I need to actually kind of reground here. I need to get more into this book or I need to settle some stuff or we just need to kind of have a little cooling off period, whatever it may be, and then take some time to do your own little assessment about what happened. So Mark, what kinds of things should people look for?
00:13:41
Speaker
Yeah, you know just talking about the topics above about getting knocked down, you know we were we were talking about some of those. We need to assess how that happened. The group dynamic, for instance, the social issues, the group dynamic, do we need to let a player go? you know Or do we need to talk to a player?
00:14:00
Speaker
about their behavior. Is the game system right? ah These are all things you need to kind of like go back and and have discussions about. Obviously, when dice attack, that's not necessarily anybody's fault, per se, but maybe there be could be some things you could incorporate into your game that might help the players or give them an edge.
00:14:21
Speaker
Well, and also, like, if dice are attacking, it might just be that you need to stop for a minute and get some time to yourself to figure out what in the world you're gonna do. A TPK doesn't necessarily have to mean that everybody dies. You could wake have your whole party wake up the next day in prison or in the drunk tank, maybe more, ah you know, more, ah maybe lower stake. What's the right word for this? What is it when it's more congenially? That's not right. I don't know what you're talking about.
00:14:50
Speaker
Like when it doesn't turn out quite as bad as you're in prison or stuck in a chain gang on the way to some hard labor or something like that. It could always get worse.
00:15:00
Speaker
yeah Anyway, so it could turn out that things are going to happen off screen and the players don't realize that until their characters wake up after they thought they got killed. Yeah and you know one of the things I do when I can see when I can see things going south like with dice or just maybe they're not prepared for the severity of this next encounter that he just stepped into. Sometimes I might just stop for a moment either end the session and just tell him look you guys got to bring your A game next week and I mean that seriously.
00:15:33
Speaker
Uh, or just pause the game for a moment and say that it's like i'm gonna walk away from the table for 10 minutes I need you guys to dig into your inventory dig deep And come out swinging because i'm gonna take you all out And i'll walk for 10 seconds and then they need know right then to start looking through those, uh items Maybe those those magic items you might have been holding on to for too long Yeah, we don't use a lot of sports analogies here on Tabletop Tuna, but really this feels like the time out in the fourth quarter of a basketball game when, you know, the other team has like really been successful and you need to kind of break up that mental rhythm. One thing to kind of note too is that when dice attack, smaller groups are more vulnerable.
00:16:13
Speaker
So there's more resources when you get a larger group even though it can be sometimes harder to manage so just keep in mind that when you do have smaller groups you might need a few more trap doors and other sneaky tricks to get them restabilized if things go sideways so fair point. Okay mark we've talked about assessing what went wrong taking a break. What are some strategies what kinds of things might you come up with when you're figuring out how to get things set right.

Self-care for GMs and Player Communication

00:16:39
Speaker
Before you even decide ah you know getting back in the horse, do you want to get back in the horse? I mean, that's a serious consideration. do you Are you burnt out? Do you need time to recover from from this? That's a legitimate concern. Self-care is important. And as a GM, you're doing a lot of extra work for everybody. And taking time for yourself, letting somebody be else be a GM for a little while, these are important things to be able to do, just to rotate out and give yourself time to recover. Yeah, don't quit the hobby.
00:17:08
Speaker
You know, you'll be a player for a while. It sounds Mark. Like you had to take a break for like a year. You said, yeah, I was, I was a little too sensitive. and Okay. well that might That goes kind of to our next, my ego was bruised. I was kind of embarrassed. So I need to give myself a bit of a break. Probably not that long though.
00:17:30
Speaker
I think it's important to kind of remind yourself this is a game. You're with friends. This is something we all get together to do because it's something we like to do. It's something we get to do. This isn't something you have to do. This isn't like the s SATs. It's not like some work certification you gotta get done in the next two months or something, right? yeah This is something that we do because we want to.
00:17:51
Speaker
Not so like when you're when you're thinking about that off time, did you try your best? ah Bad games says nothing about you as a person, Ben. it's just you know I took it so personally, but it shouldn't be. Obviously, some people can make it personal, but as Stanley says, you can't give in to the haters.
00:18:09
Speaker
Well, and so once you've taken a minute and kind of done a little bit of a self assessment to figure out if you need a break or maybe if you've been, I don't know, kind of over investing or taking it too personally, then maybe what you can do is start looking at your players too. And maybe there's something about the conversations you need to have with them. Start having conversations about what went wrong. What do they think went wrong? And sometimes it's interesting. I mean, this is a sort of a counseling technique. You know, you hear the psychology people will do this. Like they're not going to, they're going to tell you all the stuff. They're going to ask you to come up with Well, what do you think happened and what do you think should be done about that? Yeah, open up that conversations with with your players. If you had ah maybe some sort of blow out with the player, you know, maybe that's something you need to address. You sometimes as a GM, you're in that leadership position. Sometimes you have to be that bad guy. And, um you know, sometimes that's OK. It is OK. And actually, sometimes it's necessary. And we've played games, you and I have both played games where
00:19:07
Speaker
We had to say, you know I'm sorry, this isn't a good fit. It's fine. And I think that's a good moment to remember that bit about, hey, this is something we get to do. It's not something we have to do. I've actually had conversations where I said to people, you know look, I think this is a great game to play. I want to keep playing with you. I don't think this is the group you and me want to be in. I think you and me need to make a different group. and We need to play with that group. It's a little more matching your sensibilities and what you want to get out of these games. And then this other group that we were part of,
00:19:36
Speaker
Maybe I'll keep playing with them sometimes times or whatever, but the point is is like that's not where you're going to have a lot of fun. And there's graceful ways to have that conversation. Let's talk real quick also about those games where maybe the system is having an issue, or even like dice rolling. We talk about how the dice can attack. That could potentially be a system issue, and we can fix that.
00:19:57
Speaker
Yeah, there's lots of different ways to fix system problems. One way is to, first of all, start with making sure you understand what kind of game or gameplay the group likes. ah Sometimes you've heard me talk about like groups that are more technically inclined. They like crunch. They like systems that simulate lots of little mechanics and give them lots of things to do. When we interviewed Randy, for example, Randy is somebody I think who likes a little more crunch in his games because I think he feels like it gives him lots of options and levers and things to try and be creative with. There's other people, I think, who find that that's not for them. They want something that moves more quickly and that they they just have a different sensibility about that. Both are good. Both are fine. The trick is what are you hearing from your players?
00:20:39
Speaker
Can I give you a ah quick example of that? Sure. Yeah, let's hear it. Randy and I had been playing this curious game for a while. Middle Earth role-playing games had these really crunchy crit systems. yeah Every time we rolled a 20, we would roll in those charts. And it was a lot of fun.
00:20:55
Speaker
but It wasn't fun for the other groups I played in. They didn't like it. um They didn't like that dad that death save kind of stuff. so Friends, if you've looked at a Rollmaster critical table, go treat yourself to just what kind of horrors might await you if you roll an E critical with a magic spell.
00:21:11
Speaker
We ended up softening that table a little bit by as characters kind of advanced in levels, they could swing the chart based on their level and stuff. So you kind of like mitigated some of the worst results and encouraged some of the best results in the player side and mitigated some of the worst results from that the monster side. you know So you can you can tweak your rules just a little bit, cater to your players, make them feel heard.
00:21:36
Speaker
Yeah, so figure out what kind of system they need. If you need to house roll it, as Mark is talking about, that's a great way to go. Sometimes it might just be a matter of changing systems, too. Any of the above is legit. The trick is to fit the right system to your group and figure out what they need, what they want to play in.

Improving GM Skills and Returning after a Hiatus

00:21:52
Speaker
So another thing you can do is spend time learning more about GMing, too, right? You can improve your craft. So first thing to do, listen to Tabletop Tune Up. Shameless plug. Oh, yeah. Shameless plug, nice.
00:22:06
Speaker
um The other thing to do is there's usually for any game, ah one of my favorite ways to actually learn about how to play a game is to go look for live play sessions, people that are essentially leading those discussions about the game into forums. There's so much out there right now that there didn't used to be, you know, when all we could find in our pre-internet days was a book and you kind of have to just figure it out.
00:22:28
Speaker
yeah One of my favorite ways, Ben, is to shadow the other GMs. I you know i stock or lurk yeah ah yeah when I'm a player in their game. I'll take notes of things they're doing that is really good, things I don't like, and then sometimes I might ask them, how'd you pull that off? like what What was your thought there? That was great. you know like When they do something really neat after the encounter and everything, ask questions.
00:22:48
Speaker
and I think then the other thing to do is go get inspired by influences that have nothing to do with the game. Go watch a movie. Go spend some time in nature. Go read a really fascinating bit of history or listen to some great music or something. right Find a way to get that non-cognitive thing that's in your heart inspired again. and When you're ready to do that stuff and you spend some time having those conversations,
00:23:12
Speaker
qualifying your ego a little bit, getting your energy back, changing the system as you need to. Then at that point, maybe you'll be ready to re-approach the group and say, hey, let's get started. I've got this great idea. Pitch it to them. Listen to what they have to say. We had a whole podcast on how to start a campaign. But Mark, what did you do when you came back from this hiatus? How did you get out of your slump?
00:23:34
Speaker
Well, Ben, I left my story at rock bottom. I was shaped by Tom's harsh words. you know About a year had passed, I finally returned to GMing. I stuck with pre-written modules. I was, frankly, just a little afraid to pour myself into any sort of game.
00:23:53
Speaker
But, you know, I wasn't necessarily alone. You know, my wife, Stacy, she's my greatest cheerleader. She always pushed me forward. and And of course you, Ben, I got to thank you and the strange circumstances of COVID, which which allowed us to meet a great group ah a group of gamers that inspired me.
00:24:11
Speaker
And through that that game, that shared storytelling that we all experienced, I was able to like redefine myself. I wasn't that worst GM anymore. I became a storyteller and I grew from that failure and I learned from my mistakes and I learned from failure.
00:24:30
Speaker
I think it's a great comeback story. Friends, this is hopefully gonna inspire you if things go wrong or if things are starting to go wrong, different things you can do to assess what's going wrong, how to figure out how to take that break and get back on the horse again. Remember, it's something you get to do, it's not something you have to do, and this is a great time. Just be intentional, listen, and you'd be amazed at how much a little bit of adult conversation will fix for you.
00:24:57
Speaker
Now I think it's time for us to get to our tune-up segment for this week, Mark. What do we got today?

Managing NPC and Player Interactions

00:25:02
Speaker
Well, we had someone who sent us this request. They said, I'm looking for ideas on how to run a multi-way conversation between two or more NPCs and the party.
00:25:13
Speaker
Particularly, there's a situation where these NPCs aren't in agreement, they're going to argue, and the party needs to intervene in some way. Or in other cases, there might be an example where the party is speaking to some ruling organization and they've got internal disagreements. This person that said, you know, if I'm the DM and I'm voicing all these NPCs, the players are spending a lot of time sitting around while I talk to myself. That's just awkward for me and boring for them. So Mark, what do you do in a situation like that?
00:25:38
Speaker
This is a really challenging question here because you want the players to feel interactive with this. You can't let them just be on the sidelines watching two people talk. Why don't we you approach this like a like a tree like one of those trees if they do this and this? So and at each one of those junctions, we want to maybe, if there's a skill check involved, consider a skill check that may be involved. You don't always have to have one.
00:26:04
Speaker
But the players want to interject into a conversation and say something powerful to sway one side or the other. Heck, that might be an opportunity for a dice roll. I think that's right. That's really interesting. So having essentially not a script as such, but essentially a flow figured out ahead of time.
00:26:24
Speaker
Right. Yeah. And so then in that that flow chart, yeah, in that flow, then you can choose. And this doesn't have to be super technical, friends. It could be just a kind of a list of bullets or it could be kind of a flow chart with boxes and diagrams and things like that. But whatever the case, if you've got essentially both sides of this NPC conversation, you can actually just descriptively tell the party what shape the conversation is taking. You come in, there's a furious argument going on. One side says X, the other side says not X. And in the course of about 15 minutes of listening to this, that you hear the following points are coming out on the one side, they want to say pro X for these reasons, you could essentially do that kind of descriptive bit and let some time pass.
00:27:06
Speaker
That's a great idea, Ben. And I think one thing you could add into that is don't leave the dice out at even that. ah Maybe make an insight check. Maybe that the guy's being performative, you realize. He's not as angry as as he appears. Maybe a perception check reveals one of them's got his hand behind his back with ah with a dagger.
00:27:22
Speaker
Yeah, no, I love it. And so the thought here, right, is if you've got both sides of this conversation that you're having happen with these NPCs, that doesn't mean the players aren't engaged, they're not doing something. Think about what's happening around the side. Think about what's happening in the margins. Think about the skill roles that might be relevant. And then, of course, it's going to be the case, I expect, that the players are going to want to intervene at some point.
00:27:44
Speaker
Think about where the natural place for that is. Think about what kinds of things the players are going to need to do to gain credibility in what is now a three-way conversation. Players might not even want to be involved with that conversation, you'll find. There might be somebody who says, I want to use this as an opportunity to pick pockets. Or I want to cut that person's mic with a hacking skill check. There could be all sorts of things they want to do. So just make sure you're checking in with their players, asking them, what would you like to do?
00:28:13
Speaker
Well, I think these are a lot of great ideas for how to manage a NPC to NPC conversation. Players get involved, or maybe players don't. Make sure you just give them things to do that maybe don't require them to be in the conversation, but that let them track and stay engaged. There's a lot of skills in a lot of games that help you with that. Friends, I think that's it for our episode this week. Mark, any other thoughts? No, I think I'm i'm good. Ben, always appreciate you. We'll um meet up here next week for another episode.
00:28:42
Speaker
Looking forward to it, friends. And until then, keep those dice rolling.