When Games Go Wrong, with Bridgett Jeffries

Hello and welcome to the good friends of Jaxner Liars, a regular podcast about Call of and where everything goes wrong all the time consistently inevitably it's going wrong right now I'm still regaining in general I'm Scott Arewood I'm Bridget Jeffries and I'm Matt Sanderson and this episode we are talking about some of the ways in which games might go wrong and how we can possibly fix things when they do yeah but before we get into all that catastrophic stuff Bridget for anyone who hasn't already encountered your your work and who hasn't listened to the last episode which they should then watch they do about you yeah so once again thank you gentlemen for having me back I'm excited to be released from both the trunk and the basement of Matt's house it's nice to be above ground right now and you know fresh air that's got to be especially confusing to anyone who didn't this is the last episode he definitely know you haven't been anywhere near Northampton if you think this fresh air anywhere near around here yeah those who didn't watch 333 are aptly confused but this is the episode where we talk about things going wrong so improv pivot and make adjustments that's necessary hi guys my name is Bridget I am the community coordinator over at kiosk him which effectively means I'm kind of like the manager of the discord but also I'm your liaison between things that are happening on the community floor and getting it back to the partners or the respective departments in kiosk him I am also one of the people that spearheads the community content programs so if you're looking to publish for a call through the room quest 7c pin dragon and then very soon incoming age Vikings howl arch girl I can help you with that and then my business is our own symphony entertainment which is a gaming company that focuses on nothing but horror gaming and I'm loud that pretty much categorizes me but you make an art form of wearing about 15 different hats all at the same time I'm not having them just fall off this is true gorgeous this is true sometime I tower sometimes it lean sometimes I'm doing like a hula hoop situation with either ways entertaining onto our main topic when games go wrong while our games always run perfectly of course we have heard from folks out there though that they sometimes can go wrong what are some of the problems that can bring a game to a crashing halt and what can we do is keepers or players when that happens but yeah of course ours are absolutely fucking perfect we have no blemish whatsoever yeah we spent a bit of time talking about this on discord ahead of recording and it did I think degeneration to us listing all our convention horror stories there's probably gotta be some overlap between that discussion and this episode yeah but british did suggest at some point that perhaps we should have a follow up in discussion about convention horror stories yes I'm feeling like that one should probably be a patreon only thing just so that it's not out there in the wild because otherwise we might get sued you're not wrong baby yep nope yep yep nope I support that decision let the patreon I say those stories yep I made the uh some watts maybe dubious mistake of looking into the chat when I thought hang on there's a labsolute shed load of messages flying around here that I haven't caught up what's going on here and then insert meme of homo simpson walking backwards through the hedge I mean I've had a lot of really fantastic convention games yeah I've had a lot of great convention games I've had a lot of great games at the Milton Keynes Club I've had a lot of great games with friends I've had a lot of great games with my old university RPG club yeah and there are some wonderful players out there but fuck me I've had some shit games yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah and we all have bait whether it's due to uh inexperience whether it's the weather whether it's the moon phase whether it's a problematic table whether it was a lack of expectation whether it was poor writing poor design poor right yeah we've been there we've we've all been there and sometimes sometimes you can extinguish that raging dumpster fire sure and actually get some fun out of it yeah sometimes you can't and we're just going to talk about some of our own personal experiences of things that have gone wrong how we've dealt with them all certainly in my case how years later I've realized I should have dealt with them yeah yes lord and also perhaps about what we can do when a game can't be salvaged yeah because that happens hmm one thing Matt said that I thought was really brilliant in his copy is what can we do as keepers and players when that happens and I just love the fact that he forward phase day shared responsibility that if you're a player on a player side and this whole thing is on fire you have a responsibility or an opportunity to course correct just as much as if you're the keeper you're watching the table fall apart you have a responsibility or an opportunity to course correct so I just uh shouting out Matt there I appreciate the copy were you actually included the player perspective of us addressing ways that a player can help try to get things back on track or put out the fire or salvage it's very easy to be like as a geoh what do you do when you're table yeah blah blah blah blah blah like well what happens when you're a player where does your responsibility begin in there I think it's it's a great perspective to start with well I do actually have this in my notes for the episode and we might as well jump into that now because I think it's a general thing which is I don't think that this is going to be the GM's responsibility all the time because there's this weird social contract that is developed around games that where it's a traditional game or where even if it's a gm this game where you've got one person who's the facilitator who's perhaps teaching everyone else had to play it that they are somehow responsible for all aspects of the game they're responsible for policing any disagreements or conflicts that come up they're responsible for just managing the entire thing and I don't think that's very fair if you've agreed to GM a game or facilitator game for a bunch of players you're doing a very specific thing there you are making that game come alive for a group of people yeah and that is a very different thing than if someone is drunk at the table suddenly acting as the bouncer or whatever yeah yeah you might be a really good GM you might have a great imagination you might have a gift with words but you might also be really conflict averse in absolutely paralyzed in situations like that in which case having another player at the table who can just robustly tell that player to fuck off yeah it's going to be an absolute godsent yeah as a GM yeah thankfully in the instances I can think of or I've had drunk players at the table and yes I've had that happen thankfully it's not got to that stage where I needed a bouncer to step in yeah the instance that sticks in my mind was still a fun one watching their antics but yeah it was oh yeah definitely one of those moments where this could go wrong very quickly if these guys turn a little bit angry but no thankfully that did not happen yeah did you end up having to do anything to cause correct the game or to cater for the fact that the players were drunk there weren't too bad maybe drunk is a bit overselling it but they were definitely very very very buzzed this was of all places at Gencon oh wow oh just assumed it was a British conventionist invention from my mind went to UK conventions we're not used to host my cocktail bowl in the days when I could actually drink alcohol I never had that problem at a UK con even when I was plastering people with zombies throughout a session because most of my players that drink in games like that are responsible they they stick to the two drink limit when it gets special and comes to something that particularly potent have we ever played to get through a convention's map because I am not a two drink limit kind of player I don't impose that limit but least the people that like to go for something like a zombie where it's all the rum and more and more they know their limits and they cater accordingly but these particular two players I can think of at the game at Gencon this must this is easily maybe coming up to even 15 years ago this is a long time ago now oh wow they turned up to the table nice happy sort of smiles and very very jovial and then put the crates a beer that they were carrying down the floor first thing I think you've got multiple crates okay damn yeah this is each this is going to be interesting hmm oh their main goal throughout the games it wasn't to disrupt at all they were determined to use every single skill on the character sheet that was their goal got it okay nice I like that as they got progressively more inebriated the situations they were setting up to engineer the use of said skills became more and more humorous so yeah it was okay it wasn't a tone that necessarily I was aiming for with the scenario but in those kind of instances you roll with it because the table vibe was they were quite enjoying the antics of what was going on here as well so I thought I'm not going to stop the fun I'm just hoping that if they don't end up crossing a line somewhere and thankfully it didn't happen oh so you were able to read the environment and the situation on that one and be like all right they're safe I'm safe everyone seems to be having a good time intervention is not required here okay yeah I mean that's good when that happens if again It ends up having a very different vibe than you expected. Yeah. Maybe it is because of our call, maybe it's just because of the group of players and their expectations. Yeah. Then if you as a GM can lean into that, that's great. The only time I've not been happy about that was a game I ran, or at a UK convention, must have been 10 to 15 years ago, where there was a group of very, I don't think they were all drunk, but there was definitely alcohol involved and very ladish humour and very boisterous. And there was one player who wasn't a member of that group who was sitting there and she was clearly quite uncomfortable with the whole thing. Oh, yeah. She was at number four to one by these players. Yeah. As a GM, I could try to steer the narrative in such ways that we were perhaps getting away from the more excessive stuff. But ultimately, there's a bit of advice I read on RPG net years back, which I think is going to come up over and over again with this discussion, which is you cannot fix out of game problems in the game itself. And where you've got players who are behaving in a way that's making someone else uncomfortable, it doesn't matter what you do to their characters, it doesn't matter what you do as a GM, it doesn't matter how you frame scenes and so on, it's not going to mitigate that behaviour. Just to re-quote that, you can't fix out of game problems in game. Yes. I'm literally getting ready to send that to another friend in a cross situation. That's great, great perspective. You can't fix out of character, out of game problems in game. Another story, true. I know I did make some fairly discrete suggestions to the players at the time. Very tone things down. In a very kind of jockey jockey way, I didn't read them the riot act or anything like that. And I think it helped a little bit, but it didn't really help enough and the whole game did feel uncomfortable all the way through. It was an awkward situation because I'm not very good with conflicts myself. And in that situation, I know if I'd spoken to the four lads involved and said, clearly you're making so and so uncomfortable here, just read the room, guys, then I would have been putting her on the spot. That probably would have made her feel even worse about the whole thing. That pigeon on swings, yeah. So I'm not sure what else I could have done in that case. Maybe I could have called a break thinking about it and while everyone was heading to the bar or something like that, I could have gone up to the one by one and said, yeah, a tone it down, guys, tone it down. But it's short of that. I'm not sure what else I might have been up to doing that situation. It was awkward. Yeah, that's a tough one, Scott. And if I'm hearing you correctly, you said it was uncomfortable all the way through. Yeah. It might have been worth it once you recognize that. If you had an high size 2020, okay, we can only operate at the capacity of the level that we are in any present moment. You have grown since then, your skills have developed since then. You have more experience. And then looking back, it's really easy to be like, I could have blah, blah, blah, blah. You did what you could do in that moment. But that might have been a good one to like, I'm just going to call the game. Hey guys, I'm uncomfortable. I'm going to call the game. Let's go sit at the bar for the next 30 hours or whatever options there. But it's hard, especially when you're dealing with inebriated or compromised people. It's hard. And also, according to the game at that stage, I feel might have put that one player in an even more awkward position because it would be obvious that that's why I was doing it. In which case, she might have felt guilty and the other people might have presented her for it. Might have presented it for you. The same thing if you would have introduced convention staff to help you out. You would have caught a break and gone to constaps like, hey, I need help dismantling this game or talking to the players that could have isolated her as well. That's a tough one. Yeah. So it's certainly from a player perspective. I'd say, look out for that. When alcohol is involved, it becomes all the more difficult because it lowers social inhibitions and people get more boisterous. Yeah. But if you are there and you can see that particularly if you're a group of people who play together normally and you have your own vibe between you. And you can see that there's one person at the table who really isn't fitting in. Then be considerate of that. Yeah. Don't shut them out of your own jokes. Try to incorporate them in their character and what you're doing. And if your style of humour doesn't seem to be landing with them, that's not their fault. Try to be considerate if you can see that they're getting uncomfortable. Yeah. And then just as a total clarity FYI, I guess, or caveat or whatever you want to call it, when you're dealing with an e-breety people, just be careful. Yeah. Just heart, in general, just be careful regardless. It didn't feel like that in this case because I knew the people involved. I'd gave them many times before. Yeah. So I never felt like they were going to turn on me or anything like that because you know that you knew it. They were people I got on with, but their behaviour in this case just crossed the line. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, that's a tough one. I'll share this story, not with actual coaching advice, but just kind of comparatives as we're all kind of, hey, how do we deal with the e-breety people at a table? I was at a convention this October call Conor Nakap. And there was this big premiere event where they had a six or seven foot Jenga Tower. Well, it wasn't six or seven foot. This high emerging dread game. So the lights were turned down. There was all this atmospheres music and they had professional NPCs running around, doing stuff and blah, blah, blah. And the game is starting and there's a group of buddies that came in, wasted, and go figure. They also had that one outlier girl that was just like babysitting, but didn't actually have rains on anything that was going on. It was more like just embarrassed. And they were very loud and they were very boy stories, but the one thing they were definitely doing on top of just disrupting the kind of energy and the atmosphere of the room is that they were bulldozing other players consistently. They wouldn't let other people pull from the tower. They were mansplaining rules to people. They were cutting people off when they were talking a role plane. And you know, I watched it go by. So disclaimer and spoiler alert, Bridget is hyperconferential. Let's just go ahead. Not everyone is wired like Bridget. Bridget has a problem. Bridget is hyperconferential. I will advocate for my experience in my boundaries, 85% of the time. And I can do it professionally. I can also, my black woman can come out real fast. And that's what happened at this particular event. This is what you want in the community organizing. You ready? Scott Matt, I let it go by once. I was like, yep. And then someone who writes dread games, one of these motherfuckers trying to explain to me how to pull from a tower. And I was like, no, nope, nope, nope. Nope, it's not floating by again. So what Bridget did, some people might consider this passive aggressive, but I was in a room with like 40 or 50 people and they were the only drunk people. So I knew I had the room reading the environment. I started calling out the behavior immediate when it landed. So oh, this is how you feel. I've been writing drag games my entire life. Please do not man explain pulling from a tower for me. And then everyone was stopping. Look at them and they would look at each other because they weren't leaning towards malicious behavior. They were just inebriated and didn't have any type of, you know, situational awareness was going on. So then that stopped. So then GM was like, okay, I need somebody to pull on the same drunk guy come. I was like, Hey, can we maybe let everyone in the room have a pool before you guys dominate the tower and everyone stopped and looked at me and looked at him and he's like, Oh, yeah, yeah. And that's like, Hey, how about that girl over there? The wallflower. She's like, yeah, I would love to pull great. Come up in pool, babe. And then when she pulled, I applauded her and everyone applauded and it was great. The next time something. So every single time nonsense landed, I loudly called out the nonsense. And eventually they got real quiet. So I will say this is a dangerous approach for this much. I started othering them in a group, which when you're in a community group can get real fucky. I'm going to go ahead and take that criticism on myself, but I started othering them for the behavior. So they got smaller and smaller and smaller. They got quieter and quieter and quieter and they started moving further and further back to the corner of the room. Should I have stopped at this point and maybe wandered over and done a check in with them? Yes. Was Bridget angry and was like, I'm not doing that. Also yes. At some point that group came over to me in the middle of like a scene transition and to do flat out, he's like, Hey, we've had one too many shots of rum and we're really sorry. Can we try to start over? This wasn't the GM. This wasn't the storytellers. This wasn't a production staff. This was the drunk guy. I was like, Yeah, yeah. Let's go ahead and try to start over. He said, Okay. And they reintegrated back in. And we reintegrated back in. And for the most part, it went fine for the duration of the time. I'm not saying I strategy is going to work for you every single time. Yeah. But sometimes calling out the behavior is enough to snap someone out of a moment and have them actually take a look around when they're not looking around because they just don't have the intentionality or the capacity to do so. The problem is, however, that some people are just assholes. They are. Yep. You don't find mercifully too many of them in this hobby, but they do exist. Yeah. And we have a couple of people with a weekend with good friends. We have had a couple of occasions where we've had people, John Games, who are just playing bigots. Yeah. In a couple of cases, we've had people who've really taken the exception to non-binary players or people playing non-binary characters and started going on about pronouns. Yeah. As soon as that happens, the only thing you can do is kick the fucker and ban them from the server. You ain't gonna change that mind in the middle of that game. Yeah. It doesn't serve anyone. to debate their position in that case. - No. - If someone is going to be objectionable and attack other players identities, then fuck them, they're out. - Yeah, let 'em go. You're not about to change their mind in the four hours that you have for a game. Let 'em go. Let 'em go. They're not gonna be happy. You're not gonna be happy. Prolonging that misery on both ends. Just let 'em go. - Yeah, it reminds me of reading a line somewhere that when I want to say it's Eddie Webb, who said this, that when you hear a player say, "Oh, but it's what my character would do." - Fuck me. - That is an immediate flag to say, "Hey, I'm a toxic player." That would be just the immediate time to put your sights on them and eject that toxic element from your game entirely. And yeah, unfortunately, I have been subjected to far too many of those people in the lap, so played, for a long, long time. They're just completely waste of skin at that point. They sap everyone's enjoyment. And yeah, just, you can do without that influence in your life. - Yeah. - You call it, Kathulu, I think. It's a very small part of the fandom, a tiny part of the fandom. But there are some people who really seem to be drawn to, which shall we say, the wrong aspects of the historical settings. - Yep. - This is something I see more in discussions online, but I have seen it come up in games where people have been cross when you don't observe or represent historical intolerances in say a 1920 setting. There are some games, there are some scenarios like Harlem Unbound or Friends of Dorothy where bigotry is a part of the setting and you do want to represent that. But if you want to say, well, you can't play a non-binary character in this 1920s game because there were no non-binary people then, or there were no trans people for a start. That's not true. But secondly, just fuck right off. If the players and everyone else in the group is happy with that, then I don't care that it runs the game for you. - Yeah, expectations on the front end can save you a lot of frustration on the back end and during for sure. And I want to save space for the people 'cause they irritate the hell out of me too. But I want to save space for the people that are just so hyper focused on the historical accuracy that anything that deviates from what they understand, what they understand of history at the time just causes them to blue screen. It's not always malicious, it's not always aggressive, it's not always exclusionary, but they have a vision in their head that they can't let go of. And it's like, babe, I'm just pull your hand off to real for a little bit. If Matt decides to play a they-then character, how does this negatively impact anything that's happening with your plot? Right, babe, it doesn't. You guys let that go. But also, is that a conversation that you want to have in the first 15 minutes of character distribution when you see a they-then pronoun on a character sheet? That might not be your moment, babe. But just anyone who's listening who has it, 'cause I know some people that are kindhearted individuals that just can't let go of, there's no black people in this area at this time. My guy, just playing a person of color, just wrapped anything that you got going on with your shotgun. Yeah. Or your me go, or your other imaginary shit that we're working with right now, no? Okay, let it go. You're hyper focused on the wrong thing, baby. Come on, come with us. And the thing is that you can look back at these points of history anyway. And you can always find people who don't fit into your historical conceptions of what was going on. Yes, they might be exception to this setting, but this is a game of that exceptional people so deal with it. And also the people who get hung up on that never seem to worry about things like the historical accuracy of making telephone calls or catching long-distance flights or how cars work or stuff like that. Or currency, or nope. Yeah. The blue screen on that is, "I baby, come on, little ones, let's be." [LAUGHS] It does seem to be that whereas that phrase, it's what my character would do would be a thing of player hides behind. But this isn't historically realistic or historically accurate would be the shield, the GM hides behind. Ooh. Because it will be they've included this as how their NPCs react to certain people and events they depict. It's rare that a player in a game that I've run or played in has questioned and details about accuracy in a vertical, like that. OK. It's normally the GM that I see, pull that kind of stick. And it's almost the same kind of toxic flag. They've got a chance of redemption with that because as long as you can back up your points and you can make a legitimate argument to say, "No, these are the facts. That you've got a chance to maybe enlighten them." But yeah, the previous one, you've got no hope just to check the toxic little sod. Holy shit, Matt, that's actually-- I'm going to have to sit with that after recording. You're drawing up comparison. And I think I completely agree with that the shield of-- that's just what my player would do-- is the exact same formula, the exact same font presence and wiring of a GM going. But that's not how history said it was. It's, oh, I'm going to sit with that. But I think initially right now, at the time of recording, that's profound. But yeah, if you ever, in a game like that, do find yourself thinking that's what my character would do. And it's something that you can see is ruining the game for the players. Then remember that you're the one playing that character you have to fall over it. No. No. Scott, it can't be that easy. I'm a person playing a character. Yeah, this isn't a say-ons where you've been possessed by the character and they're speaking through you. Oh my god. Unless you're playing over the edge. That's true. I love the caveat at the bottom there. Wow, Scott. There was a game I ran into the convention years back, which was the worst example of what my character would do. I'd provided pre-gents for this. And it was a spiritual century game that largely took place on a German airship in the early 1930s. And the antagonists in it were Nazis on this airship and the heroes obviously weren't. Oh no. One of the players had been looking at his character sheet and sort of said, yeah, my character was in the Anzac forces and this is before the Second World War. So yeah, I think he's going to find the Nazis more sympathetic than the bare characters. And so he just decided for the rest of the game that he was Team Nazi. And again, in retrospect, I should have just shut that fucking game down then because I argued with him and I said, no, that doesn't seem very fair. But he said, no, no, it's what my character would do. And every time I kept arguing with him about it and saying, please stop this. What I really should have done was just booted him from the game. And I didn't. I should have, I didn't. But it was just such a weird thing for him to fixate on and a weird thing for him to do that I guess part of my brain short circuited and it was like, is this really happening? Right, right, right, right. Do I have a Nazi sympathizer at my table that is looking for a chance to find friendship in game? Is that what I'm looking at? No, that's the thing he came up to me in the bar afterwards and said, I'm not a Nazi. If you ever find yourself having to explain to people that you're not a Nazi, you should take a long, long look at yourself. Oh my god. My dude, masked a character sheet and was like, I'd actually be sympathetic to them. My guy, what you're not being sympathetic to is the resident table, the signals, the signs, the story, the game. The GM telling you to shut the fuck up. Right, that's what you're not being sympathetic to. How about we take a step back and kind of bring some situational awareness to that? Oh, Jesus. [GROANS] Yeah, and what it have been, again, it's so easy to look at our past mistakes or experiences and critique them and pull them apart and shame ourselves and whatever. But we're not who we were when those situations happen. Like, would another player been at the table saying, my guy, we're not doing you playing a Nazi as a PC. Can we move on from there? Everyone was saying that to him all the way through. Oh, he was just not-- so yeah, that would have been a boot. Yeah, that would have been a band hammer, Thordlands, band happens, and we all move on about our day. And then he could have explained to him whoever that he wasn't a Nazi off table. Oh god. Yeah. Yeah, no, that's a tough one. That's a tough one. You know, that's the almost like the conversation of Krivo that someone just introducing a balloon to a pin. It's just pop-- Yeah, that's the atmosphere gone now. Yeah. Yeah. On the other end of the scale, one of the weirdest problems I had in the game and one of the times I think I handled much better was a game that I've managed to convention years back that it was pitched as being a Kathubian mythos game. But I used the hot wall mechanics for it. It was my time and time games. And the player who'd signed up for it, I don't think realized what kind of game he'd signed up for. Oh, yeah, there happens. I think he thought that it was going to be much more of a traditional call of Kathudo game, one where he could play very passively. And for more, your characters are all very driven, are all-- Yeah. --the GM is acting in reaction to everything the players do. So it's a very different style of play. This was a fairly young inexperienced role player. I think he was in his teens. And he was there with three players who'd all played this kind of game before, who were in their 40s, very experienced, very loud and outgoing. And I think from the word go, he was absolutely paralyzed by this situation. I could see even once we got through the character introductions or got to him in the character. from reductions, this real deer in the headlight looks. - Yeah. - And every time I'd set up a scene and say, "Right, so what about your character "do here or what do you think you should do?" And he'd have absolute decision paralysis. He was, I think he was very shy by nature. - Yeah. - Bless the rest of the players because they saw what was going on with this as well. And it was like the rest of us were mentoring in through this game. - Yeah. - I was going to the extent of adjusting my body language. I was, at the time when I was running convention games, I used to do so while standing up because it kept my energy going. But I was going over and I was suffering kneeling down next to him having this conversation so that my head was below his and trying to gently cook stuff out and speaking in a very soft way and stuff like that. And I think it eventually worked and he got more confident as the game went on. So if you have someone who does have decision paralysis or is really shy in a game like that, I guess there are two ways of doing it. One is what I did there in really trying to cook some out. And the other is perhaps take them to one side and sort of say, "Are you enjoying this? Is this the game for you? Do you feel like you've made a mistake sign of this up?" If you want to walk, there is no harm, no shame and there's your perfectly welcome to. Don't feel compelled to play if you're not enjoying it. - Yeah. - You can definitely tell that was well over a decade ago 'cause both the prospect of you and or me getting down on one knee just so that is now realistically as such a statistically and probability without screaming and having someone help you up. - I could get down on one knee. I just wouldn't be able to get back up again. - I'm just not getting back up, right? I can go down, I'm just not lifting up. There's a difference. So if we're talking about ways to unfuck your gaming, this is kind of like a preventative unfuck question for you Scott. Did you include in your event description that it wasn't using call-to-go-through rules that you were using a different rules set? Okay. Easy ways to set yourself up for success guys. Read the damn descriptions. Seriously, read the event descriptions. Ways to set yourself up for success. Keep your story tellers, whatever you are. Be real transparent in your descriptions. Transparency includes content warnings. If Scott wrote a great game about spiders, originally don't fuck with spiders. If I see that in a content warning, so I won't waste my time signing up for that game. And you know who wins? I do. You know who wins? Scott does. Because I read, because there was a communication that happened between the two of us on that front. And, oh, Scott, it's a tough one because I think we've all been likely, have all been in a situation where you have that one player at the game that isn't quite connecting for one reason or the other. Even if expectations are set, they are the person listening to this episode. How do you unfuck a game when you're having a terrible time because of X, Y and Z reason? And I personally love the way that you handle that. Also, adding an escape route is always a good thing, especially for people that can't advocate it for themselves. They might not be able to take the door themselves, but they might be able to run through it if you offer it to them. And I love that your table executed patients and not intolerance of frustration with the baby that was trying to keep up or trying to find their footing or blah, blah, blah. Yeah, I think when you're an experienced role player, particularly in a convention situation, it's easy to forget sometimes that we all started out somewhere that we were all finding our feet when we first started playing. And I've been in the position a few times at conventions, which surprised me of running what turned out to be someone's first role-playing game at a convention. And I feel like there's perhaps quite a lot of pressure on you as a GM and also as a fellow player in the game like that, of making sure that that is a good experience for them because I've certainly spoken to other people over the years who have been put right off role-playing games by that first one bad experience. For sure. They've sat down with a table of really shitty players who've ruined the whole thing for them and they've just decided, oh, yeah, role-playing games aren't for me. Yep, very much so. So gentlemen, question of the day here as keepers, just because Scott teeth us up. If you're running a game and you look across the table and it looks like you've lost the entirety of the table, what do you do? They're either not following your clues or they're not connecting with the mechanic. We've been in this, I'm pretty sure all three of us have been in this position before where we looked up and looked around and was like, I'm sitting up here all by my guy, damn self. Yeah, I've been there. How do you, what's the actual topic is that? Unfuck your game or is it just when games go wrong? How to fix it? Is that just us saying, "unfuck it into this GORCHAT?" (laughing) I think unfuck your games is the subtitling thing. Yeah, okay. Yeah, how do you guys handle that? The example again I'm thinking of also happened at GenCon. It's not just my bad experiences happening at that one event. It does happen elsewhere as well. It was back when Scott will be remembering a familiar this. Back when I was play testing, one of my two scenarios for World War II London, the second scenario in the collection, which is a captive audience. Oh yeah, yeah. The premise for this particular game, again, is very investigation heavy, trying to follow the threads of an event that's previously happened. But the players for whatever reason they weren't, it wasn't a case of that they were drunk at the table, but one guy in particular just lent him to some impression in their head that because I'm in London, I have to act like Sherlock Holmes. Oh, oh, Lord Jesus. Okay. Even to the point where he would be quoting things like, "The games are foot and would be very over the top all the way through." Oh, Lord Jesus, be a fist. Okay, yep. Yeah, but it ended up in you got two other players at the table, which were very much, now everything's a joke, we're just gonna completely try to embrace any kind of humorous angle with it. Oh shit, told shift. Okay. Yeah. And it ended up that the party slowly kind of lent more towards their angle of things that everyone was kind of embraced, the called the weird, oh, not switch the weirdness, but again, the absurdity of a situation. And by pure luck, it happened that the players had done something that meant I could kind of bring the game almost. Not kind of full circle, but short circuit, it's a point where embracing that stupidity got them to a satisfying conclusion. Essentially, they turned up and they ended up finding the cultist sort of behind it and having this kind of meta-conversation about how they thought, "Oh yeah, there's this bunch of dummies that are following us, but you guys have come to join the cult, so it's all great." Yeah? Here's our plans and this is what we're gonna do. And they all afterwards, it was like, "Ah, actually, that was a really fun way to bring it back on track." Embrace the humor when it works and use it to mask any problems that you might have, 'cause say, sometimes, humor is the best medicine. The songs you come away with that smile and a warm feeling of having a good old laugh, it can help to put aside any feelings of my god, this went really bad for whatever reason. Wow. So you didn't try to fight it, you didn't try to course correct it, you met it where it was, I was like, all right, I'm just gonna steer from here. Interesting, okay. The only time I'd think that would perhaps crash and burn or at least not work as well, would be if there were a complete mismatch at the table between some people taking it really seriously and some people not. Oh, I hate that. And certainly, I've run one of my most serious scenarios for a very unserious group before, in fact, it was natural play. I ran Bleak Prospect for Pretending to Be People, who are very much a comedy podcast, and they played a lot of it for laughs, and it worked. Happily, I realized going into it, this is the kind of thing that we were doing. And, you know, though it is an absolutely deathly serious scenario, we found the humor in it, and I was really happy was how it came out. But did they burn the house down like I did in playtest? No, no, they don't. No, no. No. (laughing) But addressing directly what British are asked about when the entire table is looking at you blankly, I think I've only had that happen once at a convention. And it ended up being one of the best games I've ever run. And it was weird. So I was play testing this scenario seed that I was writing for the "Dead of Night" second edition rulebook, that was basically this really nihilistic psychological existential horror, you said. - Oh, yeah, it's true. The complete dissolution of reality around the player characters. I really front loaded the nihilism. I told them ahead of time, this is going to be an incredibly dark game that will be no happy endings to your characters will not survive. - Mm. - Okay. - I tried to set the expectations, and I think they were still wrong-footed by the approach. - Okay. - The first half of the game. And it got to the stage where I think they were sitting there about an hour into the game, sort of thinking, yeah, right, but how do we engage with this? How do we, what do I do in this situation? What I did, I don't know whether it was a clever thing to do, was rather than step back and try to make things easier for them or have an outer character conversation, I just persisted with it. I just kept thinking, "I'm just getting dark, or in darker." And it's like at some point, I could see the gears changing their heads. - Oh, you could see them reconnecting, yeah. - I say, "Realized, oh, this is the game, we're playing." And for the last half of the game, it was absolutely amazing as they just played hard towards destruction. - Oh. - So I have a contrast to that one, Scott, there's actually one of your scenarios. And yeah, good times. So it's Hell House, your Hell House scenario. Where's that sitting at? Is that in a dark, dark, dark area? little things will leave behind things we leave behind thank you so much gorgeous yeah so I live in Well right now I live in metropolitan Ohio, and I know that's a big surprise to everyone There is a city in Ohio, but uh There's a lot of rural area in Ohio that has a fuck ton of hell houses So as a teenager I ran through these often all different youth groups and things in that nature And they were always completely wild to me and you I'd walk out and like the fuck was that Me while other kids are like crying like you know confessing their sins and saying they're gonna be good kids for the rest of the day I'm like fuck was that anyway So anyways, I had a real good time with hell houses growing up So I decided to run it for a group and Scott you had a moment where you just kept dialing in you persisted and then those clogs those kicks are Locking into place and started rolling Mine started moving the opposite direction. I did the setup with the funeral I did the examination with the church and then we hit the hell house and I saw the first Disconnect that's like oh, it's okay. We'll just all persist and then I saw the next disconnect By the time we got to the third room I quickly realized that none of these players were fucking with this house and it wasn't because of the content It might have been the way I was delivering the content or it might have been in a peripheral way Just too close to their own experiences. Yeah, or their own Pass when it because there was a lot of comments about like yeah, I remember this particular blah blah blah especially There's a there's a few with I'll just say childbirth. There's a couple rooms that have some It's not that the content warnings weren't there. It's just sitting in a you guys know how I do storytelling I really like to sit next to my players and then like just we go to hell together Yeah, and I persisted and I persisted and I finally got to a point where it was just like oh this is terrible We went on break and we just never came back from break. Yeah, I mean that's fair that scenario I think is got some real risks in that respect. I know yeah, certainly I've spoken to Mavhenzi about it as well in the Had to tap out the stereo pretty quickly for similar reasons because they'd grown up in an evangelical cult as they Did it and they've been through a lot of this stuff for real and it was just hitting that stuff in a game Wasn't fun for them and and that's fine. That's fine Yeah, and I think that's a really important lesson that you know if you do find a Game is stirring up all the wrong things for you. Yeah, this perhaps applies more to games where there's a lot of Improvisation and stuff is going into areas that you didn't even think to flag up ahead of time correct And you've been blindsided by all this and it's ruining the game view Then yeah, there is no harm no shame in just saying I'm not having fun because in the end you're playing games to have fun if they're not fun Then don't do it. Yeah, yeah, and I know self-advocates he is hard guys I know boundaries are hard and they'll say no is hard and I know looking at friends in the face and saying I don't want to be here His heart. I know all of those things are hard, but your time is valuable your piece is even more valuable Yeah, it's okay. You want to talk about how to unfuck your game and experience if you're not having fun go game somewhere else Yeah, and your time is valuable so we'll keep this little commercial break short Have you visited our red bubble stall? We have t-shirts stickers and all sorts of goodies that you or someone you know might like Check it out just click on the Merchant Dice link on our website blasphemerstones.com And now let's return to the conversation for some unconventional advice And let me tell you if you guys just want some just honoring the backer I believe that did this this suggestion if you're in the middle of a virtual game and you don't know how to get out of it Let me tell you people's internet connections die all the goddamn time Unplugged zoom. Cinemesters like oh, that's why my internet just dropped love y'all Like you have options. It's so funny just as a total side note So I was going through something with my therapist and blah blah blah blah blah and I was just like and did it and I know she's like so just lie and I went I clutched my whole pearls I looked around I said this bitch just tell me the why she's like people lie all the time just lie I was like wait a second she's like no no no no no you can throw that whole honesty is everything out of the window You know what sometimes to protect your peace and to advocate for yourself. You just have to lie just lie Now I still have some choice of opinions about that, but let me tell you Sometimes just lie the internet dropped out bam. This is suddenly you're out of the situation You don't have to explain shit to nobody you don't have to hurt skies feelings You don't have to tell people why you're upset you internet fell off It is real easy up I got a phone call from so so I got to go there are ways to excuse yourself from the situation If you don't have the confrontation skills or the communication skills or the courage or the whatever to be like I don't feel comfortable here anymore. There's ways you can get out baby protect your peace I think 90% of British society is built around In plausible lies Deliver to the ways that no one actually built it But we accept it because it's polite. It's right thinking of when game again when games fall apart or walking away from games There's a couple of semi-recent examples I can think of there Where I've been rather than as the GM when a game's fallen apart It says when to play it as the games the fall Oh yeah, and yeah one of them was in a lap Oh when we were I think easily eight or nine months into a campaign that the GM had expected was going to be maybe a couple of years to run But having spoken to a number of the players they were all and me to an extent as well getting on board with this to a point were all wondering what the hell do we do that we seem to be in this game nothing is making sense When certain things happen they're either being blocked or there's nothing for me to do And it became a very much an exercise in frustration Oh a number of people ended up voting with their feet and did end up leaving They just decided well, we're just not going to turn up to the sessions anymore. That's that simple yeah And it did get to a point where the GM finally acknowledged yeah, I've got half of my player base Yeah, what the hell is going wrong and instead of the game session we all could have vocalized Well, we've got these problems and we just can't see what the hell is going on to the point where we're just going to sit back and do nothing because that's the only thing we think we can do Shit Yeah, and at which point the GM's outline well in which case I think we better call it because I'm going to explain what the hell the story was And then he sat down and explained what was the premise behind his plot Where the idea of the kernel of the idea came from and was then revealing well actually behind the scenes like you've been in the journalist You've been in journalist pointing at me saying well, he's the barley in the corner. He's definitely an infernalist And yeah, it was that we're all thinking oh you've either walking down the path of corruption He wanted to turn all these Essentially good in inverted commas characters in this vampire game And turn them into a whole group of all-been kind of evil aligned essentially On paper it seemed like a good idea Yeah, but then of course you met the player base who then weren't Interpreting all the signals that they were being given yeah, and the whole thing fell apart If he'd been up front with the premise of saying this is the kind of thing that this is the story I want to tell rather than hiding his little plan behind his GM board Then hell I think people could really embrace it and really huh. No pun intended with the vampire game. Yeah Yeah, people would have been able to run with it a level up more effectively. Yes, sir. Yeah, this is a less not learned the hard way At a convention game many years ago where it being a convention game I'd attached our pre-gents to everyone And there were hooks on each one of the pre-gen characters that basically Suggested how they might interact with the other characters. I didn't specify it. Yeah. Yeah But despite the fact that it wasn't a player versus player gamer and it's not that An awful lot of the setup working relied on the characters interacting with each other. Okay Not doing specific things but just interacting with each other And the setup for it was that there was a group of characters who's Boat Hood I think become lost and they were ending up docking on this island that they weren't expecting to dock on and they'd found someone who knew all sorts of stuff about what was going on But was a bit shell-shocked and he he was in this Lifeboat that was floating away from the island and he was one of the player characters. They picked him up They could take him on board and I thought right. Yeah, this is the point of which one of them is going to ask What are you running away from or he's going to say oh you don't want to go to the island because or something like that And they didn't talk to each other at all Yep, yep, and then they got to the island and the one character again with all the information that would have set the Others in motion just I've said right. I'm going to run away from the others and hide Yeah, man. You're like your whole clue trailer and plot went with that. Yeah, there you go Yeah, and I was just sitting there thinking right. Well, how the fuck am I going to get the information there? Yeah I kept trying to engineer in character ways of of getting the characters to get her and so on And this guy was absolutely teflon coated every time I tried to Find some way of getting the two characters in the same place. It was sort of right. Okay. Well, I'm going to run away from that and hide behind that rock Yeah, okay. Yeah. Well, this game's not going to happen Right, you taught me quite a lot about scenario design for these one shots and that You can't put all your eggs in one basket like that. You've got other ways of getting that information Other ways of getting the hooks out there if you place all your hooks with one character and that Characters played by dick you are fun. Yeah. Yep. Or someone that shy or didn't read the sheet well metabolize information. He wasn't shy and actually in retrospect I think this was the same guy whose character had Nazi sympathies in that. Oh we need to just ban him from your life there Scott come on like this. Let's let's yeah let's get his face out there. This was the first game I played with him and then the second one was the Nazi one and I've not played with him since. She. You'd be surprised how many players out there love to be Teflon coated and if they get a secret thing treated as their precious they will hold it they will squeeze it they will love it they will not share it they will let no one see it. It's my precious. Yeah it's not as uncommon as you think. Just in general advice then if you got a three or a four hour game and you've got this stuff on your character sheet. Yeah that's there to come into play. Correct offload it guys. Your character might have that is as their deepest arc of secrets they might want to go to the grave rather than have that secret come out. Yeah. You as a player should be looking for every way you can of getting that secret into the wild. Absolutely it's more impactful in game than after the table so we're like hey guys guess what my character was blobbed while the entire time. That could have been way more fun if introduced in type of games that we could have played with it versus getting a recap afterwards. Yeah although don't be too quick to reveal those things because I can think of a certain instant in the game you've run where someone before the game had even fucking started said also I make clock clock robots do I yeah I remember that one. Well there's the big fucking twist in that scenario gone right out the window before the first line of description. Yeah yeah guys it's just a dangerous thing to embed platforms on momentum into your PC back stories or just you never know if if you for like I've read some it's miss the time for post story scenarios where everything hinged on what one character knew but the player completely forgot when it mattered or that player or that character she wasn't even selected because the GM didn't have a foresight to make sure that character was in play. Yeah like things like that happen to scots I can't tell you how many times I've been in a situation that Scott just described where it's just like these two characters are my in game and they're not talking to each other at all. Waste to unfuck your game. Heart suggestion do not be shy about just articulating shit out loud off the table. Yeah. There is nothing wrong with like I'm stuck on this warehouse and we're gonna go to the warehouse and for me just to keep her going like guys ain't shit at the warehouse. Let's move on. They ruin nobody's immersion to find don't waste their time don't waste your time. Fuck off at the warehouse or like Scott and Matt will you guys please just do me a quick favor look at your share of back stories. Yes yeah okay look at God can we please introduce that. I have explicitly said to players sometimes have you read the second paragraph of your back. There's nothing wrong with that that's a great way to unfuck your game in that particular situation like guys guys guys look at page two. You got oh and then rock back on. I have had a GM do that to me where they said how you want to read your background. I'll just particularly thinking of Paul Fricker when he ran docks like dogs for us at concrete cow one year just after I shot a guy in the face that I found in the back of a car. Do you have read your background? I'm just not in a swallow that. Including that line that says insert spoiler here. Yeah. But also yeah this is one that as players you can very much unfuck. Yeah by engaging with the game. Yeah. I know if you're playing home games all the time and you're used to a very specific style of play you might be playing the long game you might be eating out secrets. Yeah. But yeah if you are suddenly in the situation of playing a one shot remember that you're playing a one shot. It's that simple. Correct go and get yours in at four hours three hours two hours that you have. Don't be afraid go and get yours. Yep for sure. Drive it like a stolen car. Drive it like a stolen car baby for sure. If you don't want to engage with it don't play it. If you are playing it and you can't go with it then tap out. Yeah. Not if you can't go with it. If you're not enjoying it tap out. Tap out. Yeah. But otherwise yeah engage with it. Next level down I'll say from Scott's engage with the game is ask questions. Yeah. That's a great way as a player that you can help facilitate the unfucking of your game. Now Matt brought up a great point that I've been kind of running through my head about his LART. LART plots are not the same as tabletop role playing. LART. They're just not they're just their different style of engagement and problem solving and reconciliation. But inquiries go a long way. So if you're sitting in a gaming situation and you're not connecting with the clues you don't understand there's nothing for you to do. You feel paralyzed start asking questions like Scott. Hey just quick question. I don't understand what the fuck is going on. Is this a situation where you want us to go blah blah blah blah blah is this a situation where I'm supposed to be problem solved. I don't understand what's going on or can you clarify these clues for me? Yes. I have the handout in front of me. I'm coming off of a 12-hour ship and my coffee hasn't kicked in yet. That handout means fuck all to me. What am I taking away from this handout? There's nothing wrong with stepping away and asking for clarity or conclusive evidence or directionality from an out of character standpoint. And those questions wanted bridges the gap between the disconnect you feel with your keeper. Because now they realize why you're staring at them with a blank face and you can go like you're going to get a blank face and you tell me what that handout means. Would you want me to get from that map? I don't know what the fuck we're doing. Wow they're actually still in games they care. They just don't have the tools to move forward. So let me bridge that gap. That's a great way to start unfucking your games as a player. Just start asking off table questions. What do you want me to do with that? It's definitely something I've done. In fact, only about 48 hours ago now at the start recording. I tried to, if I'm running a four-hour game at a convention, for example, try to break in about the halfway point. And I always have that litmus test just to ask the players, is everyone happy with the tone of how this is going? Yes. Basically, what is everything working for you? Is everyone enjoying this? And particularly with the game I'm thinking of two nights ago. I ran in period maladictum for the first time. And I deliberately set out to write a story that nothing involved chaos. There was no zenos activity. So kind of almost like the anti-war hammer type of scenario, but focusing on aspects of the setting that really appealed to me. But I wanted to make sure that they appealed to everyone else in the game as well. Yeah. And as it turns out, I've got a winner that they really enjoyed it. So it was nice to find that they go. They like to hold out a gang land activity in I've let go. Well done, baby. Well done. I think a common theme of a lot of the problems we talked about so far is communication. Yes, Lord. Yeah, as he was saying, Bridget, I mean, having those out of character discussions and pinning down things is really important. And I think so often we get caught up in the role-playing. We don't think to do that. I mean, I had an example last year where I was the problem player. And a lot of it did come down to wrong expectations and poor communication, where I was playing in a Delta Green campaign. And the handler, sorry, I say the handler, that's what they call the gym. But our handler for our cell was an absolute household had been lying to us, being basically just a completely unreliable untrustworthy character. And so my character basically treached him as such and was was, you know, sometimes just not following his orders or disrespecting him and so on. And the GM of the game had it very much in his mind that this was something you don't do within the fiction of the game. Whereas I was thinking, yeah, I've written scenarios like this where you have someone who's in charge of you who is completely untrustworthy and you should be worthy of games. And so instead of communicating that to me out of character, he just basically had my character. First of all, institution-lized and then just plain murdered by the handler. I got a little bit cross about that because he just did come down to communication. But in retrospect, what I should have done was said to him, am I reading the situation right? What should I be done here? Because it sounds like I really shouldn't be doing what he's saying. But you as a GM seem to be getting upset that I'm not. Yeah, you could have raised a flag early on as I say, hey, is this a monotony of expectations? Are we not telling the same story here? Where am I off? Yeah. But on the back end, you articulated this at the very beginning. You can't fix out of game problems in game before the GM duke and nuke shoot. That could have been a conversation like, hey, in character consequences aren't going to fix the fact that you have an out of character engagement disconnect. I mean, the thing is that it felt like my issue with it was more of an in-character one than out-of-character one. But maybe a lot of it was my misunderstanding as a player of what the expectations of the genre were. Yeah. Yeah. And in the day, guys, clarity is equity. It really is. Yeah. Clarity is equity. The other quote that I'll tag onto this one is disappointment is the result of an expectation not being met. So if the expectation isn't articulated, it's very easy to find your way to disappointment because no communication was had to actually define what the expectation was. Yeah, I think that's particularly a problem that resides in games that have got a large amount of metaplock. behind them like Delta Greek, where there is so much material out there that people think, well, this is the only way that this works because that's what they've been exposed to. So yeah, it can be a pitfall. So if you are running games like that, God's sake, talk with your players if they start to be acting count what you think the setting runs like, because they'll be a reason why they're doing it. So find out what that reason is. Don't be afraid to take that moment to peek behind the curtain and check in. Okay. Everything going all right over there? Why are you doing this? Oh, if I had a fan, I would clap that one. Well done. Yes. If you guys want to edit in the sound of Bridget clapping a fan, an affirmation to Matt do it. Just the clap right there. Yes. Good articulation. If we're in that kind of moment of realizing personal flaws as well, I will fully admit, if I've got a problem as a player, I have two reactions that I've got to default to. I either become Mr. passive aggressive and will try to fuck your plot up in any way, shape or form that I can. Okay. So this is the mode that comes out when I'm putting a position where I find I can't do jack shit to affect the plot. So I will find any god damn way to screw up, make your life hell. Alan Ravel, if for you. Yep. I'm not here to listen to an audio book of your novel. No. No. I'm here to engage with the story. Yep. And to have an impact on where that story goes. Yeah. And the minute you start showing those rails, that's when in a passive aggressive Matt comes out. Yeah. The other one is that if something gets the point where it's again absurd and that everything we try fails or it becomes get a similar car territory, I both become Mr. Statler and Mr. Wardle. I will go complete peanut gallery heckler when it comes to certain aspects. Oh. I think you've got to be very careful with that approach. It's not you, Matt, but there's someone else I've played with fairly regularly who if he's not enjoying a game because of the mechanics of the premise or that his expectations haven't been met in any way, that he will just passive aggressively try to destroy the game for everyone and ruin everyone's fun. Everyone else at the table can be having a great time, but as soon as he stops enjoying that game, your game is fucked because he will ruin it for everyone. If I'm unhappy, we're unhappy. Yeah. And you don't want to be that person. Yeah. Oh God. No. It's that kind of situation. I make it very specifically tailor-made to me doing the things that I am trying to do that won't mess up the table, but just so at least gets any kind of impression that, yes, I have got freedom to do at least something here. And yeah, it's not a mode that comes out from me that often. In fact, most of the time it's I refer to Statement and Ward often, usually end up if it's an online game, sending private messages and heckling to other players that I can see real or so in the same boat. And we have a good old laugh about what's going on. Yeah. I have no personal flaws in gaming at all. I am absent blemish and perfect in every way. We knew this project. We knew this. Oh, no, it's good to be loved and not held accountable during these two hours. I'm happy to. Absolutely. Absolutely. We've told a fair bit about the problems with the fiction of the game or with the interpersonal relationships. But I guess there's also what happens when you don't connect with the mechanics. Oh, fuck me. Yeah. When for whatever reason, the game just isn't working for you mechanically. Mechanical dissonance is tough. Now, Scott has already said it. It's just me echoing what he's already said. A lot of this comes down to communication. Oh, here's a great example. So Graham Wombsley, Scootlou Dark. I ran a Scootlou Dark game on symphony at some point during the state orders. And I took some generous liberties with the rules. I know that's saying a lot because those rules already fit on the back of like my pinky nail. I understand. But I took some general liberties with the rules to fit better with what I wanted to do with the story. And the game went great. But I had a player message me afterwards. It's like, I came to play a through the dark and that wasn't a through the dark side. I didn't feel like I got my experience out of it. And at first, I was personally affronted. I mean, fuck you. I ran a great game. And then I looked at it. I was just like, I didn't run through the dark. Yeah. And that player came with the expectation to play through the dark. So whether the story was great, the table was vibing. I got mine off. Whatever it is, I still fell short on the expectation that was set that I set for everyone when they signed up for the game that we were playing through dark. So I would say from a communication standpoint, it breaks down into two categories. Were either going to play the rules as written as close as possible because that's the expectation I want to learn with the bullet's trajectory at this speed with this weather pattern on this moon phase while Saturn's rings are in retrograde, but I want to learn that. So we're going to spend the three hours to learn it. That's the expectation of the table. That's what y'all want to do. Or you don't and you make adjustments and you collectively decide or at least majority decide we're going to approach this in a different way. Don't strangle yourself with mechanics, but also know your expectations walking in. Do you actually want to learn the rules and do the rules? Because if so, then that's what we're doing as a rules. If not, then don't. Yeah. Yeah. No, I agree. I do very often deviate from the rules as published when I'm running convention games because sometimes you don't necessarily want to play out an entire combat if it's going to take half your game. And so you find ways of just abstracting certain parts of it. And then I think that's fine. But if someone has, as you say, signed up to the game because they want to, for example, learn how to play Call of Cthudo and you're not quite running it is written. I can see how that would be frustrating. So yeah, it's never occurred to me to do so, but it might be perhaps worth if you're doing it into the convention, putting on the sign up sheets that yes, you'll be house ruling little bits of it to try to speed up play. It can save a lot of time. Even if you're in the middle of the combat and you're just like, guys, we've got 40 minutes left before we have to be off of this table and a new GM is going to sit out. We're going to narrative gloss on this combat. Is that okay versus going around by round? That could save a lot of frustration right there because at least people can recalibrate in the moment and then try to figure out what they're, what they want to do or how they want to handle it. Just as in the side, I've played Call of Cthudo with Jared Logan a number of times now. He's a great Call of Cthudo keeper. And he has this rule that he's instituted, which I think anyone who's running Call of Cthudo conventions, who should at least contemplate, which is he will limit any combat to three rounds. Oh, I've seen that in vampire too. Whatever happens at the end of the third round, that resolves the combat. Yep, it's done from there. Nice. I like the gas and the accelerant on it. Yeah, as someone who doesn't particularly like combat in almost any game, but I play, then hell yeah, I think that's a great rule. Yeah, actually he does the same in his world of darkness games. So yeah, uh huh. It might be rules that's written unless I'm wrong in world of darkness with V5 right now. I have the third round where y'all at is where y'all at. I was going to say I haven't read V5 yet, but certainly I was remembering from the old editions hell no, I've been in combat. So gone on for hours and hours. I know and it's so exhausting. And if I'm wrong, complain about me in the YouTube comments, I'm not going to read many videos. But the other thing I'd say along those lines is if you're going to run a game, do try to make sure you understand the rules. Honey, this is another one I've got wrong. I remember running, not even running as a GM this game, but facilitating this game called, I think it was called capes this GMless indeed super hero game. Yeah, match like yep, that's it. I've facilitated it the MKRPG club many years ago and I thought I understood the rules. The rules are much more complicated than they seem at first. There are a lot of moving parts, a lot of things to track. And within half an hour it was really obvious I did not understand them as one as I thought that if no one else had read the rule book and the game really did crash in. I mean, we sort of had fun with the fiction of it and we messed around and it made each other laugh. But as a game of capes, it was a miserable failure because it was my first time running it and I just hadn't absorbed them as much as I really should have before bringing that game to the table. Yeah. Yeah. Oh. Although if you're in that situation as well, do not be afraid to ask other players who do you know do know the rules or at least you think know the rules better than you call upon them for help. I've done it. In fact, using that example from Imperial Maladictum, thankfully I had Keith at the table who introduced me to that game. I had no fear of asking Keith, is there a particular skill that covers this? What does this particular condition mean? Yeah. And he gladly helped out. Do not be afraid to do that. You don't have to be some perfect paragraph of, oh, I know everything in the book. But yeah, just ask for help when you need it. Yep. Well, sit. It's become such a trope on push the roll. We have these bingo cards that one of the listeners has put together for the game. So that every time this new push the roll, you draw random bingo card and you go through and tick off the things that happen. And I can't remember if there's the free square on one of the cards, but certainly one of the cards has got Ross asks about the rules. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. You should leave us some curiosity in exchange in life, ask Ross asks about the rules. Dan, he sure does. Yeah. Also, let that be a great example. Don't get keep yourself out of not knowing something perfectly to run it. Yeah, 100% that's also funny square though. That's good shit. That's good shit. Cup dies should also be like a whole worldwide. It is. It is. Okay. Good. Good. I feel better. And I think we bully copies another one. But like babe, you want to get shirts made hashtag. We bully cup. That should be a fan club. We're good. That should be one of his patrons tears. Oh, we love some cup. There was another broad category that I had down my notes, which I don't know how often this happens. But this one I've been guilty of and it's one that I've seen happen in convention games, which is don't use games as therapy. Oh, Jesus. Actually, I'll rephrase that. I think you absolutely can use RPGs as therapy. I think you can gain quite a lot of emotional support and self insight and so on out of RPGs. But particularly if you're playing with people you don't know or you don't know very well or hard, comfortable with you using the game is therapy. Don't or don't know Jesus. Yeah. Just just don't just don't just don't. They have therapy game masters at this point. There's a whole certification of course for it. If that's what if you actually want to do, introduce therapy in with your middle health, there are professionals out there to offer. But don't assign me or your table as your secret therapist or your group therapy session. You ain't told none of us was going on and then you're making as personally responsible for your expectations, not being met. Just don't do it. Or even if you're the GM, I, I want going to too many details about it. But the most surreal convention gaming experience I've ever had was at a British convention many years ago. And I was there with a couple of friends. The three of us had signed up to this game. We were the only players. We didn't know the GM. Yeah. And the GM, she wasn't a very good GM to begin with. I mean, she just wasn't. I think she wasn't very experienced and she had a really awkward sense of humor and kept inserting jokes into the game that didn't land and stuff like that. And she wasn't allowing a lot of player agency or the usual bad GM stuff. But we played this game for like an hour and two weird things happened in a row. One is she suddenly dived under the table in a panic. We sat there awkwardly for a moment and then she popped up again. She said, Oh, sorry. I saw someone over there who looked like my ex. I thought it was him. It wasn't him. It's all right. So and then we carried on playing and thought, Oh, that's a bit weird. And but we, you know, sort of calmed it down a bit. She clearly took us kind of calming head down to heart because about 10 minutes after that. She looked at us all mid game. We weren't even on a break and said, Well, I think I know you all well enough now to tell you about my suicide attempt. Which is just the single weirdest moment I have ever had in the game. And none of us knew what to do. None of us knew what to do. Oh my god. Ah. So if you're a GM playing for people you don't know, don't do that. Just don't. Yeah, those don't do that. Don't just just under no circumstances do that. Ah, Scott. I don't even. I don't even know. I don't even know how to. I think I would have had to go into the bathroom or just not came back. I was very tempted. Yeah. Yes, Scott, you got me on that one. I'm trying to even keep up. And I'm just like, I don't even. I just blew screened. There's a part of me that just wants to do a heart rule. Don't bring your off table emotional baggage at all to the table. There's just part of me that just like don't do that at all. But also we're all human. Yeah. We're all completely human and some of the best self advocacy that I've done is to sit down at a table and be like, I just put my mom in hospice this morning. There's a good chance I might start randomly crying on you in the middle of the scene. Sorry. And then just go. But that's not like, Hey guys, let me walk you through the horrible experience of me putting my mom through hospice. Let me put in my dog down this morning or this accident my niece was in blah blah blah blah. There's a way you can advocate for yourself to bring awareness to the fact that you are human and ask for some extended grace without forcing the table to bear witness to whatever it is you're going through. Yeah. Suddenly it can be very helpful, particularly I think for younger gamers, because role playing is also a method for exploring your own identity. And I think most queer gamers that I've spoken to about it have had some experience of figuring themselves out by playing different types of characters. And I certainly did a lot of that as a teenager as well. I think it's a very useful way of learning about yourself. But I think if the other players at the table aren't expecting it and it becomes obvious what's going on there, it can probably also be very, very uncomfortable or weird for them. Yeah. And so if you're going to do that, make sure everyone's on board with it. Like as you said there, Bridget, you know, talk to them about it. You know, let them know I'm working some stuff out of the month. Is it okay rather than just trauma dumping or being weird with them unexpectedly? Yep. Yep. Trauma dumping or what is it? A most, uh, your friend Nate gave me the phrase. I have to go through our message, but it's something like emotional hostage taking. Yeah. I think that's what he called it or something similar. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've certainly been in a few instances normally where it's after a pet's died. So if one of our birds has passed, I've gone to games to distract myself. Yeah. It's going to be fairly obvious whether that kind of situation happens because I get very emotional. Yeah. That I do let folks around me know to say, yeah, just say, kind of let you know, this has happened to me. Please, please help me distract myself today. Get and let me get through this. But yeah, don't worry too much about feeling that you might be putting a lot of that baggage on them. But it's just you're giving them heads up to say that this is something you're doing with. They don't have to deal with it with you. But it's something that can help them tailor their actions towards you. Correct. Yep. And also to cut you some slack, if you suddenly get weirdly emotional, that things that they were expecting. Correct. Yeah. Correct. I'm in a fragile headspace right now. Love you on a death. Just give me your heads up. Let's rock. The game is communication. Oh, but and I went into the game. That's wild, honey. Scott, I'm still floored by the story. Jesus be a fist that child Lord have mercy. The baby. Let's wrap things up then. Shall we buy? Yeah. I talk you about what happens when a game is beyond repair. And also how you can tell when a game is beyond repair. Now, one thing Matt was talking about earlier, which really resonated with me because I've been in a similar situation was with that lap, you were talking about where people had stopped turning up and so on. Where there's a group where suddenly everyone seems to have scheduling problems out of the blue. I think that is such a big red flag. In your particular, you've got lots of last minute cancellations. Yep. At some point you've got to just ask everyone, is this game working? Do we either change the system? Is that why this isn't working for you? Do you want to play D&D instead of Call of Cthurdu? And if so, what the fuck's wrong with you? But I'll shade love it. But is this working for you? Is it the game? Is it the setting? Is it that you want someone else to GM or something like that? Yeah. Or is it that we as players just don't work together? Because not everyone is going to enjoy playing with everyone else. If it's that the group itself can't be repaired, then groups fall apart. People go off and join other groups and that's fine. If it's just that the game needs to change, then change the game. Let someone else GM for a change. Yeah. See if it can be salvaged like that. But if we can't just take all the adder out behind the woodshed and shoot him. Sometimes you just got to put it down, guys. Yeah. The thing that I try to remind myself, if I've had the bad experience and I'm talking back to what I'd said previously in a passive aggressive, Matt comes out to the forefront. Hey, it makes us a great anecdote. But also B, it gives you a whole lot of list of stuff to remind you of what not to do in a game. Because if you didn't like it, there are bound to be other folks that don't as well. So use it as a learning exercise, use it as an excuse to say, this is what someone did. And I've got the first hand experience of when it went wrong, I will foul that this will not happen in games that I run. Yeah. All right. I'm going to take a picture of this and send it into the group chat later. And if I get this better, but you guys know those flow charts that help you make decisions. Like does she have red hair? Yes or no? No. Okay. Were you willing to blah, blah, blah? So I'm making up my own flow chart based on our conversation right now on how to know if your game is beyond repair. If it's been fucked to the point that it just cannot be resurrected. Question one, am I having fun and then I breaks down into yes and no. Okay. Well, if it's yes, then your game isn't beyond repair. You have the go to great stories. If it's no, the next category is, are you willing to advocate or try to fix it? If the answer is no, your game is too fucked for you. Let it go. Just let it go. If it's a yes, then the drop down is going to be let's start asking questions or let's start finding solutions. And then eventually you can run through some additional tears from there and eventually you'll find yes or no. But I think if I had to sit back and go, let's take this. recording for example you guys are inviting me over to the to the good friends I was like am I having fun with them? Yes, okay cool. There's nothing unfuck you were good Am I having fun with them? No, okay? All right, are you willing to advocate for yourself or you know try to fix it? Well if the answer is no I need to get off this call because at this point I'm not having fun and apparently I don't want to have a conversation about why I'm not having fun Let it go let it go. Yes. Oh, okay. Well, let me start asking some questions to Matt and Scott to figure out where we can do to make This a better fit to make me more comfortable. Hey, I don't like this topic Hey, I don't like the pacing. Hey, I don't like the scheduling head I like to blah blah blah blah blah and then start going through tears from there. So that would be that would be my thing Are you having fun? Yes or no? If it's no are you willing to fix it? No, then leaf Yes, well then your tear continues Skopper just still here. We must be doing something She said it herself in a really long-winded way Yes, building on that just to reiterate don't try to fix out of game problems in game if there are interpersonal Problems between the players don't try to fix that through the game and If you aren't enjoying the game. Yeah, it like you say you'd leave it don't ruin everyone else's fun Please please don't do that because I think those games it's fucking miserable It's miserable and your time in your piece is important. You don't give a damn about nobody else stay yourself itself and leave yes I'm the that seems like a point to leave on Well before we go to the wrap-up bridge it is there anything you've been working on a bag came out recently that people should know about Oh fancy fancy fancy. Yes, so there are two items that are Recent at least outside of my NDA and where people can put their hands on things right now Just like the gorgeous people that are on this call with me right now We are all in Graham Wombs least cosmic dark. Yes, so if you want to hop on to it back or kid or kickstarted wherever he did the Funding for that is available It's also on his patreon at patreon.com/gram because somehow Graham was able to get that handle because I hate him So I have a nasty little scenario in there by the name of periphery You go into a go ship and there are lights and I'm just gonna say that Enjoy and then I just had a scenario published and the newest Cult Divinity loss kickstarter which is broken reflections is called the silo and you're basically a family on a rural farm An angel crash lands on a silo or into a silo in your farm. You're not aware that it's there It's aware that it's there and now it's aware that you're there and it's Drive star permeating in through the ecosystem. So you start getting challenged with what family means to you With sacrifice means to you what worship means to you and what submission will soon mean to you So those are the two pieces of the content that I have out that are most recent on the shelves that you can go grab somewhere Off of somebody's back or kid when touched by an angel goes wrong Yes, yes, Scott. Yep. No notes Yeah, otherwise you guys can catch me over at symphony entertainment dot com or if you need to count me with anything chaos and related it's Bridget at chaos and dot com bridge that you walk across with two T's at chaos And dot com. Oh, thank you came for joining us Bridget You're listening to the good friends of Jackson Elias You can find show notes for this episode at blessperstones dot com where you'll also find all our social media links We have t-shirts and other merchandising available at a red bubble store if you're enjoying this show Please consider backing us at patreon dot com forward slash good friends of Jackson Elias. Thank you for listening It is that time once again when we would like to say thank you to people and thank you first of all to you for listening to this podcast Thank you very much to anyone who was over the back to us at any stage and we have a number of new people to thank by name And first of all our thanks go to Benny Naknama. Hopefully I've got that right in the pronunciation and thank you very much to Mark Marshall Thank you also goes out to Brian Holt and thank you to Simon Barton We're taking another guess at this one. So hopefully we've got it right. Thank you very much to Reich so thank you very much Reich who up to their pledge level and Thank you very much to Stuart Hawks who up to his pledge into the Cudley Cuthonian level all the best Cuthonians are Cudley Speaking as someone who could very much be described as Cudley Well by the pricking of my thumbs something weekend this way comes specifically on the 12th of the 14th of June I'll understand. Yeah, weekend with good friends is returning in 2026 This of course is the online convention organized by our lovely listeners and it will be three days of online games and panels and just fun stuff lots of fun stuff So yeah, thank you very much to the organizers particularly PT who are busy putting this together at the moment and We will share more details as they become available about deadlines for game submissions and play a sign-ups and all that good stuff I'm beginning to wonder if we shouldn't call it a long weekend with good friends just so we don't get accused of being miscelling it false advertising and all that Well, you've been listening to the good friends of Jackson Elias and until next time is a cheerio for me I almost just want to stay here silent but I will say it's a bifurcant Oh, I'd affair well from me Hello Bless for my stones How to unfuck your podcast