I spoke to @matthewmercer about his D&D Player Tips. We've talked about this before and its changed for both of us over the years.you and i a long time ago the first time we met uh we talked about player tips have those changed and would you mind telling people your your general player tips for playing any role-playing game sure you’ve got so many people that you know watch critical role and are inspired by these characters and want to jump in but it can be such an intimidating thing sometimes to do so it very much can be and uh player tips change in the fact that they just continue to grow yeah um you know when i first came out of the gate uh on doing critical role and began to talk about this all of my player tips could only come from my personal experience and then as the years have gone on and i’ve had the opportunity to play with other people i’ve watched other people play i’ve watched as communities have spoken about their wonderful experiences their not so wonderful experiences and we’ve all continued to learn from each other it’s a really great time to have all these resources to learn and tailor what sort of game you’re looking for which is a big first tip as a player if there’s a certain type of game you’re looking for or there’s a certain type of experience when playing d d that you want to uh to find in a group make sure that you express that to the other players and to your dungeon master if you’re if you’re specific about only really feeling like you enjoy hack and slash adventure you want to fight a lot of crazy monsters and delve into deep dungeons and you don’t express that to your player group you might end up discovering sessions in that you’re with a bunch of people that don’t enjoy that in which case it causes tension at the table your dm might feel bad that they’re not providing the experience you want but how can they do that if they don’t know that that’s what you’re looking for and so in all the players expressing what kind of excites them about playing dnd a dm could find alongside what excites them about running it ways to implement parts into their story to make each player happy and there’s also the possibility that not every table works for you and you have and that’s not a bad thing there are billions of people in this world who live very different lives and have very different ways they enjoy the things they do so being at a table and realizing this doesn’t work out for me is totally fine and you express it with respect not you’re all bad and you should feel bad but like i don’t know if this is working out you know i might look for another game you know or telling a player like i don’t know if this is right for you or so you know if this is working out but um that all comes from communication out of the gate you know having a session zero and discussing these things really helps everyone make sure that you’re on the same page and that you can respect what everyone’s looking for and be excited when other people are getting the opportunity at the table to indulge in the things that they really enjoy about the game even if it’s maybe not yours and you can instead be supportive of them in those moments and then when it comes to a chance for you to really shine you can do that too so setting your expectations out of the gate and being very vocal with it with the rest of your gaming group is really important and understanding that this is a shared experience so just being as engaged with other players at the table as you as you want them to be engaged when your moments to step forward and be part of the story happen through that mutual trust and respect some truly magical things can happen um other player tips also be respectful of players boundaries and that comes from those early conversations as well let me go over a little bit in the book too um make sure that you do not make choices or say things in the game that puts other people at the table in an uncomfortable place um part of that discussion is being like what i’m comfortable with what things make me uncomfortable with but they’re okay if we like you know brush by them and if at any point it starts getting uncomfortable have a way that you could express that or anybody the table can express it and you all go okay and you continue the story but just kind of shy away from that and adjust to it’s not to get it to a place where anyone could have a really bad time at the at the table um so these are all things that i didn’t know growing up as a gamer you know we didn’t have these safety tools we didn’t have this kind of important discussion and looking back at a lot of the not great game tables that i walked away from i could see where this would have been an extremely helpful thing to have at the time so i’m very glad that we’re having these conversations that we’re learning these things from each other as far as as far as player tips within the game oh man there’s so many great resources online so i would say look online you know search on youtube uh search on on google you know look look for player tips from different people and find tips that you think very much fit the kind of experience you’re looking for at the game and also listen to things that maybe aren’t and be like okay that’s that i wouldn’t think about this when i was at a game table you know that other people might have phobias for certain monsters so as a dungeon master if a person player the table really really hates spiders not like oh they’re gross but like i have a deep fear of spiders i will not put a spider in the campaign you know but you wouldn’t know that unless you have these conversations or you know you’re told to fight for some of these tips online um other great things at the table uh support other players it’s very easy for one player who’s very comfortable role-playing to unintentionally dominate a table and other players don’t have an opportunity to do so if a person at the table is beginning to dominate to the point where you think it’s beginning to pull from the experience don’t be afraid to have a conversation after the game about it but don’t do it in an aggressive manner just like hey just letting you know i didn’t feel like i had an opportunity to really jump in there you know and if you know when we play future games you know it’d be cool if you just even in character have a chance to kind of bring me in or give me an opportunity to speak up that would be really you know appreciated uh and as a player too if you find yourself often in starting perspectives don’t be afraid to take a step back and be like talking about npc trying to convince them of something and being like yeah i mean you know what i’m talking about and pull them in sometimes that can be a little you know uh uh but that can be fun too as long as you trust each other and that support is there yeah and if the player’s like i’m good then be like okay how about you go to the next one you know basically teeing up other players share that spotlight uh begin in a social encounter and then take a step back and be like does anyone else want to continue and let you know let opportunities arise where you can tee up other players and lift them up and support them to be part of this as well um you know these are all just things that come from experience and learning and the dynamic within your game group too so those those are some tips off the top of my head that i think have definitely become very prominent over the years and i see recurring within the community when it comes to discussions about gaming and dnd if you liked this interview and you’d like to see more go ahead and like the video subscribe to the channel and hit that little bell symbol so you’re notified anytime a video like this comes out thank you so much for watching https://t.co/Ha3S9V9AHz via @Wizards_DnD pic.twitter.com/hTApJIx30k
— Todd Kenreck (@ToddKenreck) February 16, 2022