Satine Phoenix DM Tips: Playing Dirty w/ John Wick

hello and welcome to GM tips the show where my friends and I share with you our thoughts and suggestions on how to gain master your role-playing game I’m your host Satine Phoenix co-creator of Mazur Khanna and a guild addict for D&D from breaking roles as a GM to manipulating expectations today’s theme is playing dirty the game master is a mysterious storyteller who weaves tales for players to find their way through the mind magician who wields possibilities she’s the one who dictates how the rules are used he’s the one that sets the pace and mood they’re the one that bends reality to help or hinder the group it’s easy to follow rules from a book but rules are merely guides to the game you have to respect game mechanics but once understood you can bend them to your will let’s list some ways you can twist your game for a more personalized experience tip number one environment manipulation sound silence mood music sound effects ambiance soundtracks lighting dim or bright changing as the adventure changes smell incense candles or foodstuffs whether a breeze from a fan heat or chill in the air all of these can be manipulated during the game try setting up the area before your players arrive for a more immersive experience establishing the mood before they even start playing tip number two adding mechanics from other systems the fun thing about homebrews is that you can not only take away rules but you can add in rules from other games what I really like is from 10 candles allowing the players to help develop the world around them creating facts within the scene that could possibly aid them or the NPC’s this I do selectively in a specific moment rather than all of the time tip number 3 allowing some rule-breaking based on excellent roleplay I get super excited when a player can roleplay the dice away when players have great ideas at normal rules contradict I’ll sometimes allow it because it encourages a group to be more creative and even work together tip number 4 sensory emotions evoke certain emotions not by telling your players what they feel but by placing things in the environment trigger words like birthday cake to evoke childhood memories mothballs or doilies might trigger the memory of one’s grandparents which might lead to a certain odor memory or sound you can draw out the feelings or move the players quickly choose specific words or textures to guide your players in and out of their own memories while traveling through your story you can describe these in-game or purposefully place items around the gaming room to subliminally evoke certain emotions both the real world and mine world are available to play with tip number 5 and PC is bending the world allow the players to affect the NPCs negotiate change their minds and reasons for things allow the players to affect the lives of the NPC is the way a conversation might change how a player sees the world and in the same vein trust that your players can handle being backstabbed by an NPC they trust I could roll on but instead let’s discuss this with any Award winner the author of play dirty and the creator of 7c John wick thank you so much for being here it’s very welcome thank you for inviting me and congratulations on all of your any’s this year that’s pretty mind-blowing it was really weird I I did not expect us to win anything and then boom boom boom boom boom and it was only our after the awards ceremony I was like did we win so let’s talk about played dirty what’s the philosophy behind play dirty the philosophy behind play dirty is that well I did two books of G M advice and the philosophy is that if role-playing games are the only literary medium where the author and the audience are the same person right I will do anything in my power to make that to make that happen you can watch a movie and you’re watching Tony Stark on the screen you’re not Tony Stark you can read a book and you’re not Jon Snow right but in role-playing game there’s a moment where your characters in trouble and you think I’m in trouble right and that’s the it’s the only literary medium that does that so if if every if if a game if there is a GM if I don’t try to just exploit that I’m feeling yeah otherwise you’re just playing a board game we may as well be playing dissent or talisman or anything else so I want you to not think my characters in trouble I want you to think I’m in trouble and it’s and and I will do anything in my power to make that happen anything you say anything well I’ve done there’s a lot of examples in the book and and a lot of it has to do with exploiting the environment using music using dropping the temperature in the room when I run horror games I call it Cthulhu and but for example I did a game called 30 which is where you play the last 30 Knights Templar and you go on this big magic journey right and at one point you’re the Knights Templar and you’re in the modern day you’re not exactly sure where you are and I’m explaining to you that you walk up to a door and the door looks and as I explained it looks a lot like your door to your house or your apartment or whatever and you knock on the door and as soon as I say that we’re sitting at the table there’s a knock at the door and the players all look up and I like what’s going on and they and one of the players goes to the front door and they open it and there’s a knight Templar at the door planning yes I had my cell phone on and my friend had his cell phone on and he does historical recreation so he put together his knight Templar outfit and as soon as the players in the game their characters the Knights Templar are walking up to the store that looks like their door and then there’s a knock and then they open the door and there’s a Templar at the door and that’s the moment where they go what is going on what what’s happening in the game is happening here and that’s an example of one of the things that I’ve done to make the players have that really brief moment where the line between who they are and who the character is is just gone so that’s a bit of planning and it’s kind of like a more severe how far do you go well it has a lot to do with consent right I have at my table I have a source contract which is that if if you’re gonna sit at my table and I’m gonna want to want more on my play dirty games you have to be prepared for anything to happen you have to be prepared to lose control your character you have to be prepared that maybe we’re gonna get up and move you have to be prepared for maybe I have planted things in the house or the apartment or people all of those things so it’s you have to be prepared for anything to happen your character and you have to be ok with it but then of course there’s always the time or somebody goes okay time out right and that’s the that’s my little symbol of okay time out I need to stop right because that that moment of breaking that wall can be really extreme can be emotionally extreme and so whenever anybody says timeout right that’s it everything stops the lights come up you know and and we all talk and we all calm down everything like that but that’s the kind of gaming that I’m interested in I’m not interested in playing a board game with role-playing you know I can roleplay as my character I can play world Warcraft and roleplay but that’s not a role-playing game a role-playing game is specifically designed for you to tell a cooperative story with your friends where you are the hero and you are crossing over into that hero realm like Greg Sanford says and having the adventure you and you come back transformed from the adventure right the whole hero journey thing and that’s what I’m interested in role-playing games so let’s talk a little bit about sensory emotions yeah and how you design your game with these people knocking at the door or changing the environment a little bit how did you how did you realize that that was a very valuable asset to have at the table it came a lot from theater right when I was younger I took which I think every GM should do should go to Community College drop the money and take an improv class right every every GM should do that it teaches you how to how to react instead of act it teaches you how to how to engage people and all that kind of stuff and that’s part of it right for me being a GM is far less about I’m going to tell you my story and much more about I’m going to help you tell your story so environment wise I think about where are they I know that like when I run a Call of Cthulhu game every Halloween it’s the first role-playing game I ever got was called a Cthulhu so when I run Call of Cthulhu I turn off every light in the house I unplug all the power for everything there is no oven light there is no clock light there’s nothing there’s no light and and then I drop the temperature in the house I turn the air-conditioning way up I start playing Polish horror music right in the rooms I will go and get friends of mine because I’m like I only have five people in my Cthulhu game and that’s it right and you know them that’s I know that yeah and that’s you know how how each of them responds so you’re really navigating all of them very specifically right and they have limits right like a friend of mine has a certain phobia that I will not cross right that’s that’s a no cross right but everything else he’s like everything else is fair game you can do whatever you want to me but this thing please do not do this thing so I respect that right and then and so I know what they’re all about so I design a story that is really tailored to them what they want out of the game I pay attention to character sheets and then I don’t have plans I have contingencies I set up I don’t really have long-term goals because no plan no GM plan survives first contact with the players so why make a plan right instead you go okay I’m gonna throw this at them and this at them and this at them and this at them they pick this up okay let’s go here right but otherwise the the other things that I do is I use vocal imitation I use I use vocal changes for different characters different NPC’s all wear different hats for NPCs I collect hats so I have different hats for all the NPC’s I will this is what I usually wear as a GM well wear a suit a black suit because it’s old called a Cthulhu gimmick the man in black and but I will change out into a different jacket or I’ll do the things so the players really feel like they’re talking to that character I will adopt physical mannerisms for that NPC and because of that the player start doing the same thing right they start going oh my character should speak with a lisp or I should speak I should speak with it right or and they start looking for things to to give their characters affectations to make the whole thing more some I want to say subversive which is what it is you’re actually subverting their expectations and subverting their their their preconceptions so that you can hit them in ways that that you know like I say and playing dirty that their character she cannot protect them well by watching other people get involved in that manner they they get permission to do that yeah and then they get permission to allow you to pull them deeper yes so it’s just kind of like the stages of interest the stages of involvement for them because everybody I feel sits at this certain level around the table like we’re gonna have fun we’re doing this thing but I know you and you’ll take me a little bit deeper and I trust all of these people and we’ll go a little bit deeper and deeper like we did with dread which was insane we just we all got so deep that you weren’t us anymore we were only the characters and we responded honestly that way so that’s what it sounds like from what you’re saying is by adding all these elements in you guys all had that contract where we’re going yeah I’m gonna go really deep yeah we’re gonna and and it’s gonna be fun and and and it has all of the rules of of you know of consensual play it’s like okay stop I need to stop right now and everybody’s like yes with respect to stop right or somebody like in r7c LARP one of the things we do is we have the thumbs up and the thumbs in the middle of the thumbs down so I was playing a villain in the in the 7c LARP just at Gen Con and I was really evil I was really really evil and one of the things we have is like when I engaged with with a with a woman in the in the game I was very evil I was very upfront I was very in her face and I was very physically touch her because that’s LARP right but I was very intimidating and I would get up into her face and then I would do this I just do a little the check-in yeah the chicken are you okay should I tone it down should I stop oh that’s beautiful right and that really comes from Danielle who do it and like it’s it’s something that we kind I kind of do an alarm anyway in a verbal way I’m like are you okay are you okay but in this way if I do this I don’t have to stop being my character I’m going to ask you three questions okay what is your pregame house rule look like we will talked about a little bit I have a when I run a play dirty game because I’ll run a regular games but when I put in a play dirty game there is a consent moment right and the understanding is is that I will do anything in this game I will break rules I will because rules are really about your character sheet is something that you’re using to communicate to me what you want right so I will read character sheets and will go through and also I will ask the players telling me three things about your character that aren’t on your character sheet what do you care about what would you die for what would you not die for what would you kill for those kinds of questions what is the most important thing to your character that’s not on your character sheet and once I have those as a GM I’ve got you what is your favorite GM moment that the Templar moment was one of them but I recently ran I was I was the villain in the LARP and and I I was playing a villain and I was with a player and I did the I said can I he was playing a priest I’ve had a scene priest from 7c and I said can you guy grab you by the collar and he said yes so I grabbed him by the collar and I said grab hold of my wrist so that you can you know and I dragged him across the room and I gave him a choice and I said you can either kill I’m going to kill someone in this room and because you lied to me I’m neither gonna kill this man I’m gonna kill that woman which one is it oh right and things happened and it’s a long story but at the end of the game he told me he said I’ve been a fan of yours you know for a long time I’ve read the play dirty books and I’m always looking for that moment that John wick a moment where for my players and he’s like and when you grab me by the collar and started dragging me I had two thoughts and the first one is my character is going to die and the second thought was oh my god I’m having my chammak woman and John wick is doing it to me and that was that was a really great he later he’s like you made my GenCon thank you and I was like yay because that’s my job my job as a GM is so that you have that moment and that’s my satisfaction mm-hmm third question is a quick tip to the audience that can be anything do not so there’s the mr. Miyagi rule mr. Miyagi rule is teachers say student student do and I apply that to games games say player do right so games tell you not just what the rules are about how to play them right don’t look at the rules so much look at what the game is telling you how you should play all right because people play call of cthulhu differently than they play D&D they play legend of five rings or seven see differently than they play apocalypse world or anything like that look at how the game is telling you how you should play is that really what you want to do right is that what you want to do is this again because that’s what’s going to happen the players are gonna read the rules okay rules whatever but they’re gonna read the parts that that are between the lines that say this is how you play the game is that the kind of game you want to play and if it’s not you should find a different kind of game that’s our show for today thank you so much for joining us here oh where can we find you on the Internet I met John Luke presents calm there’s also a John wick presents Twitter and John wick presents Facebook and it’s it’s real easy it’s just John wick presents and congratulations on all your successes thank you as always I’m Satine Phoenix at setting Phoenix you can ask me gm2 questions at hashtag ask Satine and find me every Sunday at noon on maser connoisseur if an echo on twitch.tv slash maser Khanna and every Tuesday night dungeon mastering on twitch TV slash dandy thank you so much for watching us here on geek & sundry see you next time wait can you do one thing for me anything for you would you please yeah miss out of here yes I understand you have your favorite character with you I do well this is your favorite character this is mirror that you made with Zach right so when you were very when you were younger you had a rivalry with an evil sorceress and and this rivalry went back and forth back and forth and you lost track of each other but you’ve recently discovered that she’s trying to become a lich so yeah so you and your friends you and your fellow adventurers are gonna go to her lair and stop her from becoming a witch I’ll it I’m sorry however as soon as you take a step into the dungeon something happens you feel odd your fingers go numb and and your tongue does it feels thick and and suddenly you’re a voice in your head and and your limbs freeze and tighten and you realize that you’re no longer in your body and you hear the voice of your old rival and she says I was mummified but now you are and I am in your body your friends don’t know this yet as a matter of fact I’m going to tell you this before the game starts so the other players don’t know and I have two goals mirror the first goal is to escape this place as you and the second goal is to hurt your friends as much as I now here’s how this works you Satine are going to be playing the evil sorceress and you are going to do your best to make sure that you hurt your friends and escape at the dungeon and every time that you roll a die any die I’m gonna give you a chance to escape to break this spell you’re gonna make a roll you’re gonna make a you’re gonna make a will save or a charisma save you know whichever version you’re playing and you have to roll higher than her and you have to make the save and if you do you will break one part of the spell you need to break three in order to get completely free now every time she rolls a die I’m going to give you an opportunity to roll you don’t have to roll but I’m gonna give you a deep bonus d for every time that you roll a die alright so you can save those d fours as you go so when you make your will save you can roll all those d floors with it or you can try to make the roll okay but every time you do and you fail part of you is going to die you get three chances so shall we begin [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music]

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