Category: GMing Advice

How do we craft a good experience for our players when they’re just voices in our ears and videos on our screens? After all, experience is more than the points that gets handed out at the of the session. I want to talk about the charisma-based skill challenges we face when our campaigns are digital—the soft skills, the social stuff.

As the GM, you are your players’ eyes, ears, and other senses. The choices you make when describing your game literally build the way they perceive their characters’ world, and their perceptions of the world will determine their actions. When they latch onto the wrong thing, be it the goblin barkeep instead of the mysterious figure in the corner or the stale corner of bread instead of the bloody murder weapon, nine times out of 10, it’s a failure of description.

Last month, I talked about giving your character...