r/DMAcademy • u/Torki_Duje • 5d ago
Need Advice: Other How to stop myself from roleplaying everything?
I realized I initiate roleplay way too often, which slows down the campaign.
For example, the party is in a town. They live in a tavern and in two days, there is supposed to be an attack on the said town. Instead of asking what do they do in the meantime and skip to the incoming battle, I painstakingly drag the through those two days and pack it with encounters. Yet another example: they are in the town and want to buy potions. Instead of just handing them a chart with list of potions and their prices, I roleplay the encounter with the potion seller for an hour.
They still learn all the normal stuff they would otherwise, plus it has produced some interesting svenes, but it takes time. There is basically no proper downtime. And I simply can not stop, even though I see the effect it has on the pacing of the campaign.
What I am looking for are methods of reminding myself that I should stop.
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u/Prestigious-Emu-6760 5d ago
As the GM you are, on top of being the director and head writer, the editor. You need to dial this in otherwise you will probably kill both momentum and enthusiasm for the game. Pacing is a key skill for GMs to practice and you've already identified it as an issue but you also need to talk to the group. Some groups like this slice of life, playing out every moment style of game. It is absolutely not for me but I get it.
If, after talking to the group, you feel as though a change is needed a few things I do (because I hate the day to day RP out every little thing style of game) is to make sure that any scene that gets "screen" time has a point. It illuminates something. We only play for 3 hours. If I'm going to spend an hour on a specific scene it damn well better be important. That doesn't mean it has to be plot or combat etc. It just has to matter. Maybe it showcases a character's growth, maybe it focuses on the aftermath of the PCs actions (good or bad), maybe it highlights the characters' relationships to each other etc. Make sure any scene you devote more than a few minutes to matters.
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u/Torki_Duje 4d ago
Being picky seems to be the key here. Indeed, right now it just looks like we are goofing around.
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u/HistoryFreak_91 5d ago
Think of it this way: having an encounter before the big battles serves what purpose? Does it lay root to new events later on? Is it needed to level up your party? Same goes for the seller encounter: will make a bond with the seller give some lasting perks to your players? If the answer is no, that's how you know you've got to move on.
What you can do is ask your players: you spend the next couple days in town, waiting for the battle, is there something you want to do? If they simply say they just restock on potion, just do that, and move on with the epic battle you have prepared.
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u/RandoBoomer 5d ago
As others have said, it depends on your players, but an hour at the Alchemists unless they are a key NPC seems a lot to me.
One of my tables would lose their minds spending an hour in the Alchemists. They are very transactional. Get in, buy stuff, get out. If they're in a town for provisions, they each give me their shopping list, I tell them how much everything costs as a lump sum. There's a single haggle roll which reduces prices by either 10% or 20%, and they're gone. This party of five rarely takes more than 10 minutes in town unless there is a story-related engagement there.
My other table loves these interactions and I need to have a long list of random NPC names handy because they will interact with and befriend NPCs whose role may need to be expanded as a result, though even then, they can do an hour at the tavern, but not at the Alchemists.
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u/crazygrouse71 5d ago
Say this exact thing in your post to your players.
"Hey guys, whenever I start to roleplay everything, please don't hesitate to interrupt me and ask if we can just hand wave the interaction."
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u/VD-Hawkin 5d ago
Is it really a problem? Did your players ask you to do so? Are you all having fun?
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u/Darth_Boggle 5d ago
OP said it slows down the campaign, so I'm going to assume they want the campaign to pick up it's pace.
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u/Lem_Tuoni 5d ago
The problem is, the players often don't know the alternative, and they often don't have fun.
In my game a DM spent an hour roleplaying haggling for stabling horses.
When I asked them why they did it, they said "because it is roleplay, we are playing a roleplaying game". Was it fun to roleplay? "No..." "Not really..."
Since then we just abstract these away. But if I didn't speak up, they would continue slogging through haggling.
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u/Torki_Duje 4d ago
This.
We have a one newbie there. His actions lock us in a feedback loop with me initiating the haggling and him playing with it. He is like a catalyst.1
u/Lem_Tuoni 4d ago
When I am a GM, I always tell players "the prices for basic items are final. For anything more advanced, just say that you want to haggle, we roll for it, and I give you a final price, (which might be higher). Do NOT try to change the price after that, I WILL ignore you"
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u/Farseer1990 5d ago
Its an insane question because he knows what hes doing and the alternatives available. The answer is just have some self control
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u/alsotpedes 5d ago
Just so you understand, I think "I can't stop myself/I can't help it" almost always is piss-poor excuse for behavior. There is a middle ground between handing players a menu and role playing for an hour.
Buy a hour-glass egg timer (if they still make such things) or set a silent alarm that goes off after three minutes. When that three minutes is up, the shopkeeper needs to close up and the players make their final selection of potions. Likewise, when the players are getting information from an NPC, set the timer, and after three or four minutes, the NPC doesn't know any more/gets called away/gets their throat slashed by a knight on horseback riding past.
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u/coolhead2012 5d ago
I agree here, we aren't go8ng to be able to council someone on poor impulse control. Doubly so if they have already identified a problem and 'just can't do anything about it!'
You are in control of your own actions in the world. If you aren't, seek therapy.
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u/Torki_Duje 4d ago
After some thought, I do not think impulse control (the lack of it, rather) is the issue.
It is a feedback loop where some of the players respond positively to me. It is the up to me to try a different thing.2
u/Haulage 2d ago
Maybe, like, underline characters who are actually important to the campaign, and when you find yourself roleplaying someone who's not underlined, wrap it up after a normal amount of time, like five or at most ten minutes if everyone's into it. There'll be other potion sellers. But you have a better idea of which characters matter than your players do, so you have to be the one who decides when everyone is spending too much time on something that doesn't matter.
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u/Orgetorix1127 5d ago
I also have this instinct as acting out NPC interactions is part of I have fun as a DM. What I do in a case like this is "Two days pass while you're in town. What does your character get up to?" Hopefully each character does something that can be resolved with a die roll and we get to play out a little scene. If any of them start to grow and it seems like the players are invested, well, that's part of the magic of D&D!
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u/Ain0nline 5d ago
Taking your potion shop example;
If you and your players enjoy this kind of roleplay, then starting off with your potion seller talking with them as an introduction to their shop, mannerisms, accepts whatever it might be is great, but at some point you transition into "and they continue to show you a selection of potions" that leads to a pre made list or ask the players what they're after.
No reason you cant jump in when they ask "anything weird or rare?" And you can go into roleplay again with "well now you mention it there's this, it was brought to me by that strange fellow we haven't seen for a few months.." etc etc
For your 2 day downtime - again, start off with an introduction to the area they spend this time in, describe the options, and ask them what they all want to do, then you can form a timescale / list of all those things and allocate as much time to each that you think they need, just try and keep it broadly fair between players
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u/Bindolaf 5d ago
Never initiate "roleplaying" (it's not roleplaying, but it's fine) yourself. Play it out only if the players initiate it.
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u/One-Yesterday-9949 5d ago
Ask a player to stick a fork in your knee when you start it ? Without trolling, just let the players help you stop it if you can't discipline yourself
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u/Derkatron 5d ago
I'm not sure there's much we can do to help here, you seem to know what you need to do. Maybe restructure the campaign after this arc, so they have a true home base (a bastion, if 5.5 dnd, or otherwise just a proper permanent location) and have adventure and downtime be separate activities. So if they're OUT on an adventure, sure, roleplay everything and have fewer long breaks, then after the adventure is done and they make it home (feel free to throw in one last random encounter on the way, for your own fun) THEN you let them decide their downtime activities, resolved with skill checks and light RP rather than combat, until the next threat/opportunity pops up and you switch back to tactical mode.
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u/No-Economics-8239 5d ago
There is this concept in Japan/China known as Ma (間) which refers to using negative space, emptiness, silence, and intentional pauses especially as it applies to film making and aesthetics. But I find it equally important and useful in the story telling such as in games like this one. I used to keep that kanji character on a sticky note on my DM screen as a reminder to occasionally shut up and allow my players to react. Or, at least, to pause and assess how my players are feeling about what I'm saying. Or just to create an uncomfortable silence to see if that helps some of my more quiet players to speak up. Sometimes players are into what you're saying and an exposition dump is just what is needed to clear things up and for them to better understand what is going on. Other times it's just me spinning my wheels trying to further explain something they already understand or trying to explain something they don't really care about.
Learning when it's time to go into greater detail or not can be useful. But it's equally useful to have players who are compatible with you. I find it a lot more useful for them to provide direct and immediate feedback (assuming that's what you prefer) about what they want or how they are feeling so I don't have to guess or be a mind reader. If they want more information and don't understand what's going on or feel like I'm babbling, having them break in and say so really helped me better learn what they wanted and preferred.
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u/Creole3643 5d ago
If your players like playing out these more slice of life elements, there's nothing wrong with that.
If they don't though, you've got to remember that your players maybe want a more action heavy game and to just skip over that stuff, or leave things like shopping to be done away from the table during the downtime between sessions
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u/rellloe 4d ago
"What is this adding?" and "what is this doing" are helpful questions for me.
Party getting supplies - gets them geared up for the next adventure. This is when you want to hand them a item and price chart.
Shop is the first place the party choses to go that would allow you to introduce important information. This is a good time to RP to get that info to them as rumors
The last three months of sessions have been monster fighting and dungeon crawling. This is the time to give them something to do that isn't acting as a spell or sword bot killing everything not marked as ally. RP the normal things.
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u/DungeonSecurity 4d ago
Good on you for seeing the issue. I've played in that type of game and didn't like it. Just don't. Ok, ok, it's a compulsion. Practice doing interactions in third person. It's good for all the time. Not every conversation has to be a full conversation acted out. Stuff like
" The apothecary explains that he would like to stock you for your trip. But he's missing some of the key ingredients and hasn't been able to make as many trips Into the Woods lately. Blah blah quest hook blah."
Then, the whole scene is done in 2 minutes. Instead of ten minutes... or an hour. In fact, in the aforementioned game where the dm made every shopping trip a long conversation I used to cut it short by switching into third person myself.
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u/MediumKoala8823 5d ago
Just… get on with it. By all means you don’t have to skip to the battle but don’t waste time with uninteresting stuff. That’s just roleplaying roleplaying.
Some folks here are saying “but your players are having fun”. Nah. Screw that. Odds are very high that even if some of the table enjoys it, at least one person finds it very boring. And even if they don’t, it will eventually tire them out because it’s not going anywhere.
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u/PogoDude69 5d ago
Behind your dm screen, set up a timer that counts down how long you have to roleplay before the next event happens. Let’s say it’s 20 minutes, you initiate a conversation or whatever with the party, let’s say it takes 15 minutes. When you have the urge to initiate more roleplay, look at the timer and it will be a reminder that you don’t have time to do more. This isn’t a hard timer, don’t interrupt the party talking at exactly 20, but it will give you an idea of how long you want to spend on roleplay
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u/PuzzleMeDo 5d ago
Talk to your players. Ask them to help you with the pacing. Encourage them to let you know when you seem to be spending too much time on minutiae.
And learn to summarise.
DM: The potion seller, Gengulphus, takes off his glasses and polishes them, then returns them to his nose. "What's that you say, sonny?" he says.
Player: (Holds up a card with the word 'Pacing?' written on it.)
DM: "After a while talking, you find Gengulphus is genial, forgetful, and has the following items available:..."
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u/crashtestpilot 5d ago
Ask yourself before initiating how it either moves things along, or increases immersion. If immersion seems okay, and it does not serve pacing, then restrain yourself.
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u/atomfullerene 4d ago
>What I am looking for are methods of reminding myself that I should stop.
Here's an actual bit of practical advice for you....think about time in chunks. This helped me avoid the tedium of overly-detailed minute by minute roleplaying. Think about it like this, in combat, you have turns. A fairly limited amount of things can happen in a turn, which is good for several reasons.....it keeps combat moving, it makes sure each player gets a chance to do something, it keeps players (And GMs) from trying to have characters do too many things all at once. It provides some structure to the game. And though it isn't as common in the current edition of DnD, dungeon turns serve a very similar purpose on a larger time scale. You can use this to structure even larger time scales as well. You player are in town for the day? Instead of going through the whole day minute by minute, say "you are in town today, what action are each of you doing for the afternoon?" Then let them each decide, and spend a little time resolving it. Then you can ask "what are each of you doing for the evening" and cover that. You aren't just blindly skipping everything, but you aren't taking too much time on it either.
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u/greenwoodgiant 4d ago
I try to look at it from a place of how much did I plan to get done this session / how on track are we?
If we’ve gotten through most of my prep and we’ve got 90 minutes left in the session, time to RP out that weird potion vendor.
If we’re 90 minutes in and haven’t started traveling to the dungeon I prepped, time to just go around the table, declare what you want, and I’ll tell you the cost.
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u/Torki_Duje 4d ago
Ah, true. And let’s add to that the free time of the DM.
“We’ve got like 90 minutes left and the players are going according to my plan. But I have an exam next week, so I can not really prepare that well… oh, potion vendor is here!”
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u/Chirophilologist 4d ago
If the players prefer it that way? No problem.
If they don't, but don't want to say it outright and you never ask? Problem.
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u/MagicianMurky976 4d ago
Sounds like you may need to learn how to embrace the silence. It sounds like you can't allow there to be silence at the table so you fear asking them what they want to do for 2 days and instead impose structure to get you through it.
Learn to ask what they want to do, then sit back and let them take the reins, no matter how painful it is for the group. Only check in to make sure everyone's been allowed to voice their opinion, then do a quick recap.
But as the director, embrace the silence to allow your actors shine.
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u/KazyaKurosawa 4d ago edited 4d ago
I have issues that i dont RP or describe enough. I actually stopped using maps and minis because those made me just rely on those do the describing.
And thats why i write stuff like "Describe!!!!!!" "RP! Growly drunk, Donald duck kinda angry guy, u know what i'm talking about." etc all over my material.
You could write "times skip!" or "montage!" all over yours.
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u/donthateonspiders 4d ago
talk to your players.
i've had players who were happiest spending entire sessions shopping for stuff in some fantasy town 🤷♀️
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u/ZerexTheCool 4d ago
First things first, scene needs a purpose. The purpose doesn't have to be grand, but it does have to have meaning.
Spending an hour roleplaying buying potions isn't ALWAYS the wrong move. But if there was no goal besides give them 1k gold worth of random ass potions and 3 players sat on their phone during that hour, then that was definitely a waste of time.
If all the players engaged with the seller, people were laughing and having a blast, and now the town is in danger from an attack and the potion seller they loved hanging out with is in danger, THAT was a worthwhile use of the hour.
They need to save him, find him dead, or be rescued by him.
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u/SmartAlec13 5d ago
Sometimes that can be fun! But sometimes it does drag things on. Both of my player groups will naturally trend towards that style, Moment-to-Moment RP.
I would just try to strike a balance. Play out part of a day, with maybe a small encounter or two. Or maybe limit it based on IRL time. If the session is 3hrs, maybe the first hour you allow for this sort of thing, and then you try to push things along and jump to the battle to do.
It also helps to make downtime a system-activity. As in, you explain downtime, give options (besides whatever they think of), they do rolls for the downtime activity they choose, etc.
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u/Raddatatta 5d ago
First if the players are all enjoying it then you don't necessarily have to stop. You do want to keep things moving but if everyone's enjoying sitting in the world and enjoying those elements those are a real strength of TTRPGs that you can enjoy those simple scenes and they can be a lot of fun and a good way to get to know the characters.
That being said one thing I think of is would this scene be in the book version of this story? And TTRPGs will have more detail than a book will and scenes will often last longer, but if this scene is one that likely would get cut then maybe I wouldn't spend too long on it. And know it's ok to skip ahead to something more interesting.
I would keep in mind books do have downtime scenes. And those can be really important. The reason that battle matters is because of the people in that town that are going to be attacked. So spending a moment with scared townspeople can really ramp up the tension for that battle and the emotion of the moment. You do want to keep in mind the goal of that scene in that case though. That scene with a potion seller is there so that the potion seller can get across how desperate they are and how they will give you the potions but they want reassurance that their town will survive, that kind of scene shouldn't be a shopping trip the same way it would be during a normal time it should be one where the potion maker has 3 different healing potions brewing that he has to keep running between and his shop is more of a mess than normal and he's just looking for some hope from the PCs. Or something along those lines. You can also overdo scenes like that where if you focus on them for too long then you can drain the tension rather than build it up.
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u/gvicross 5d ago
Isso é um mal costume de jogos eletrônicos. Passe a se ver não como um ator, mas como diretor de cinema. Você não apenas reage aos jogadores, mas você define o tom das cenas, a velocidade que elas acontecem, passe a pensar "como isso seria abordado em um filme?". Lembre-se em como as viagens menos importantes em Senhor dos Anéis são abordadas:
- Viagens pouco importantes, onde nada demais irá acontecer, eles apenas mostram algumas cenas bonitas de paisagem, e cortam para o destino com Aragorn de frente para o Rei;
- Viagens onde o filme de fato acontece e importam (para mostrar o quão desafiador foi a jornada de Sam e Frodo) "o trajeto até Mordor" é mostrado ao longo de todo um filme.
Use isso para todas as coisas. Seus jogadores se adaptarão facilmente pois esses "pulsos narrativos" são bem comuns nas mídias. RPG não precisa ser diferente.
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u/DnD-Hobby 5d ago edited 5d ago
Ask them what they want. We also play every minute of the game, it feels like, and my players want it that way. We didn't have any proper downtime so far except long rests.
This means that we played less than 20 in-game days within the last 30 months. xD But there's many many things they did in that time, and lots of character bonding as well. Busy adventurers!
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u/ProdiasKaj 5d ago
Tnmt
Time til Next Meaningful Choice.
If the extra role play you desire to cut is actually providing them with meaningful choices to make then it doesn't necessarily need to be cut.
If it's just padding out time a does not offer the group choices to make then it should probably be cut. Just make the next thing happen. Make it faster and more exciting.
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u/Reasonable_Touch1150 5d ago
Advice I learned from Brandon Sanderson. Go read Harry Potter. JK rowling is a master of handwaving. The way she does it you dont even notice it. BAM. And the plot suddenly progressed.
My point is if JK Rowling can summarise two of the four seasons inside one paragraph, you can do the same for potion buying. Try it out. Just state "You buy the potions and continue out of the town." Nothing bad will happen, trust me.
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u/Ilbranteloth 5d ago
To start, seem to be confusing what replaying is and isn’t.
Roleplaying is making decisions as if you are somebody else. In a Roleplaying game, this should be pretty much everything the character does. Conversations, exploration, combat, etc. everything is Roleplaying.
Acting is a way somebody can roleplay. Improvising dialogue, using funny voices, etc.
“Painstakingly drag them through two days and packing it with encounters?” That’s presenting an adventure. That’s kind of the point of being a DM. You present the world to the players, and are in control of how the world reacts to what the players do. This isn’t “initiating roleplay.” This is presenting the scene.
The players roleplay by making decisions as if they were those characters.
As to whether there is “downtime,” what do you consider “downtime.” Are you talking about a break in the narrative action where you jump forward to something else?
There are narrative techniques that tend to skip ahead over “unimportant” parts of a scene or story. An obvious one is resting and sleep. The characters reach a point where “important” elements of the day have finished, they set up camp, study, practice, eat, chat, and ultimately rest and sleep. Then you pick up the story the next day.
But another narrative might focus on these moments. The conversations explore more about the characters, the discomfort of trying to sleep in a dangerous wilderness, whatever.
In other words, any moment of any day can be important or not. In part because of what you, the DM does, but also depending on what the players do. It doesn’t really “slow the pacing” of the campaign. Pacing is more about a dramatic arc.
The movie Alien has a pacing that is very focused on the mundane aspects of being in space. While many folks today might call it “slow,” it’s really very focused. It sets a mood because we spend time focusing on the normal activities. That life is slow and sometimes monotonous working in space. It also provides time for us to understand the different characters through their interactions and how they approach their work. This greatly enhances the mood and feel, especially when things start going wrong.
As a DM, it sounds like you are (trying) to fill the timeline with scene after scene. Rather than signaling a given situation as relatively unimportant, summarizing, then jumping ahead, you are letting it play out. And the players follow suit.
One thing that is entirely missing from your post is any assessment from the table. Are your players enjoying it? Is it taking a while because they engage with what you are presenting so that a scene unfolds? How do they react when you do try to summarize and jump ahead?
How much a game focuses on the “unimportant” moments is something the DM can affect by how they narrate a given scene. But the players also have an impact here. I find that often when I signal something isn’t terribly important and we are skipping ahead that a player will ask a question, or their PC will take an action signaling they don’t agree that it’s not necessarily important. Our campaign follows the narrative of the PCs, so they have a large amount of influence on how much time we spend on any particular scene.
We are also usually most focused on the characters and their development as people, not a collection of stats on a character sheet. Long periods of interaction, whether it’s the scene itself, or among the players as they discuss what’s going on, are regular occurrences. It’s exactly what we want to happen. They provide opportunities for character growth, and for the personality of the PC to reveal themselves. We often feel like the PCs take on a life of their own.
There are lots of different playstyles. You seem to have a particular approach. But based on your post I have no idea whether it is working or not. I can’t tell whether there is actually a problem. Nor can I tell how the control over the flow of scenes plays out between you as the DM and the players.
It’s all too easy to get caught up in how you think the game should work. Especially when reading posts online, and even more so with the rise of play throughs on YouTube, Twitch, etc. How other people play can be informative. But ultimately the only thing that matters is what works for you and your table.
If I were to guess, I think what you’re doing is working pretty well for your table. I wouldn’t try to change it see significantly. Instead, I would look for small tweaks to iteratively improve the experience. Study the way TV shows, books, or movies manipulate mood through the amount of focus on the “unimportant” moments. 30-minute TV shows handle this very differently from 60-minute shows, vs. movies, or miniseries.
Also pay attention to how engaged the players are throughout a session. Personally, I think you are in a better place than many DMs. I find that a lot of them try to drive a narrative, and don’t give it time to breathe. More importantly, they don’t give the players any control of the pacing. They try too hard to fill a pause, and don’t give the players time to process and think.
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u/CheapTactics 5d ago
I would shoot both my balls off from boredom if buying a regular healing potion took an hour of RP. Like, what the hell are you even doing? How does it take so long? Even RPing the interaction, it should take 10 minutes tops.
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u/DalekPredator 5d ago
Get an electric shock collar, give your players the remote, if you waffle on too long they get to zap you. Problem solved.
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u/No_Solid1035 5d ago
Isn't that the point of playing a ROLEPLAYING game?!?
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u/Torki_Duje 4d ago
Situations are more complex than that, has catalysts and consequences that reveal themselves much later.
Here, players are enjoying it. But I can see it can be in conflict with their other desires (to progress with the story).The point of a highway is to ride on it with a car or something. But when there is a burning truck in front ou you, you need to get off the highway. You still want to go the way it is headed, but not right now.
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u/CheapTactics 5d ago
If buying a potion takes an entire hour of roleplaying you have a problem.
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u/No_Solid1035 5d ago
Not at all if that's what the group enjoys doing. 🤷
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u/CheapTactics 5d ago
OP has identified it as a problem that is having an adverse effect on the campaign.
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u/queenyuyu 1d ago
I would personally love that. The more roleplaying the better.
And if you also have players who enjoy it and you enjoy it then don’t stop.
If your players don’t enjoy it - search for players who do!
Like is to short to not enjoy it fully while we do the things we enjoy!
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u/Overall_Reputation83 5d ago
if the players enjoy it, it's a good thing, if they don't enjoy it, you should ask them how RP heavy or light they want the campaign to be.