Playing with Preferences

How understanding our own preferences, and those of the other people at our table, can help us all to elevate our TTRPG experiences.

    We've had a call to action from the Prismatic Wasteland blog to share our thoughts on How to Be a Good Player. I think I've already done my best work on this topic with my Beginner's Guide to Role Play, posted back in April. That was a topic I was thinking about a lot at the time, and had been inspired by a couple of player-focused posts by Patchwork Paladin around the same time. Well, this blogwagon has inspired some conversation in response to some of the posts that have come out so far, and it helped me to realize I really prefer an advice post to be specific. I think Patchwork Paladin's posts are a great example of what I mean, and she did it again with her new post on Giving Feedback as part of this blogwagon; I would also submit my guide to RP post as an example of what I mean. With that goal in mind, I landed on a topic I wanted to share as something I learned from my own experience playing over the past couple years.

Why it's important to discover and discuss what we actually want in a game.

    I do kinda worry that this falls under the category of "This advice is too vague. It's just 'don't be a dick, and collaborate' but said with too many words. Heard it all before." However, I decided this idea was just specific enough to share my own perspective. 

    I think the biggest lesson I've learned as a player, because the GM is a player at the table, too, is that we should be trying to trying to achieve a balance of our preferred play styles, rather than trying to bring others to our own preferred style. To be clear, I do mean this as commentary on being a good Player and applicable to everyone at the table, although it is something I learned as a GM. 

    This entails understanding our own preferences in playing TTRPGs, which does require some effort and probably reading some things (or watching videos) specific to this topic. Once we've done that work of introspection and have some knowledge about what our preferences in games look like, along with having the vocabulary to frame these ideas, we can apply that to...

    Understanding the preferences of the other player in our game and accepting those preferences without judgement. This does assume some things about playing in good faith, and that no one at the table has preferences which are hostile, hateful, gross, or otherwise outside the established Lines and Veils for the game. 

    Talking about our own preferences with our fellow players, and then working together to understand each others' preferences, so that we can find the balance that gets everyone as close as possible to their ideal game. Compromise should be the assumed state in any social interaction or collaboration. It is extremely unlikely that five people are going to find that they all have the exact same habits and are seeking the same joy in their agreed upon game, but it is entirely possible for those five people to find that they do share a lot of similarities and can make some small adjustments to accommodate their preferences in alignment with those of their friends.

    This does not entail accepting things that you just straight up don't enjoy, even if they aren't egregious violations of the game's social contract. No one should feel obligated to stay in a game if they don't like the genre of the game's setting, find that the GM is running a sandbox when they would actually prefer a linear adventure, or that the focus of the game has gone from "save the world" to "influence the local politics of a remote hamlet." Just for a few examples.

    Now, it could be expected that differences in preference such as these should be ironed out before a campaign ever begins or during a session zero, but I think that assumption can be exclusionary. It can take time for a person or group to discover their preferences; alternatively, their preferences my change over the course of playing a game together. We can't, and shouldn't, be expected to cover every possibility in a session zero or campaign pitch. 

What preferences? 

    So, what kinds of preferences do I think can be examined and adjusted in this sort of collaborative practice for building a game that serves all players? I'm thinking of things like how we role play (speaking in first person and "doing a voice" vs describing what our character does or says in third person), how much of a focus is given to each pillar of play, how much discussion about the game is done in the fiction vs above the table, or who's handling which player roles if any.

    In my experience, these are the components of play which can take time for a person or group to understand. Either from a single person's perspective or as an outcome of the group dynamics. For me, these are the kinds of things that could be revealed through self examination or by thinking about what your table mates demonstrate during a session. None of them are reasons to leave a game as the default response, but it's also reasonable for that to be the best possible outcome after a group has discussions about these preferences in good faith.

End

    Talk to your players, but also, talk to yourself. The number one answer to every question or issue in TTRPGs remains the best answer about being a better player, and I think it's improved by the practice of examining our own preferences. We are absolutely entitled to seeking our own fun in these games, but I believe that goal is easily balanced in the pursuit of finding where our fun best fits together with the fun of everyone at the table. 

    Being a better player, or GM, means understanding our own preferences and then working to adjust our own desires so that we are collaborating to build a game we can all love.