When relaying messages in private to a player, what do you use as a GM?
For a private message to the GM, what do you use as a Player?
I have used small notebook paper, and today's technology - text and private chat.
Index cards or asides if it's critical. Openly if I feel players are good at stopping themselves from metagaming. I try to avoid stroking the phone in public as much as I can. (But it feels so good! /secret shame ):o
GM perspective:
If I feel I just can't say it aloud, I will pass a note. If I'm super devious, I may have a few pre-written notes that I hand out simultaneously just to throw people off a scent, enhance what the "real" message is doing, or otherwise add to the confusion.
Example: in a Rogue Trader campaign, a warp gone away resulted in characters having crazy visions. One note amounted to "You have a frighteningly realistic dream/premonition that the Astropath turns into a daemon and stalks the ship, eating the crew", while the Astropath received one telling her she dreamed the Master of Weapons (or whatever he's called) had turned traitor and was intending to sell her to the Xenos. Everyone else had vaguely distressing but nonsensical messages, but was just concerned enough not to share any details. Paranoia and distress!
I might use the phone more often but since I have a player who has serious issues managing his own screen-time, I can't encourage it.
Paranoia notes.
OR I'll get up and talk with the player(s) in a separate room.
If it is face to face gaming, I use notes or I take the person aside. Notes used to be any handy scrap of paper but I've come to like post-it-notes and pre-printed handouts. The post its are nice since the player can stick the note onto their character sheet or adventure notes for handy reference later.
Preprinted handouts are nice for conveying setting or situation info that the PC would know, but that the player doesn't.
If I do notes, I often prepare banal or spurious notes for the other players to avoid everyone focusing too much on the one PC who just got a note.
Currently I play by Skype which makes physical notes impossible. And oddly enough, e-notes are more difficult as usually two people or two pairs of people are sharing the same computer screen(s). So it is often easier to do the reverse of taking one player aside by asking the other players to leave the room for a minute. If the interaction is much more than a few minutes then I tend to switch to not keeping stuff private or secret. Instead I rely on players separating OOC knowledge and a reminder if they forget if I feel it necessary. Allowing OOC knowledge is a compromise so as not to bore the shit out of people while a party is separated.
Are Paranoia notes from the game Paranoia, or just the sort of banal or spurious note that keeps everyone guessing?
When I was running Albedo at a convention I passed out notes to everyone. Some were blank. Everyone knew something had happened. But not what, or to who if it was not involving themselves.
I don't do private much anymore. Less player vs player in my games these days.
I've used post-its, notecards, small pieces of paper, notebooks (good for keeping track of threads in one place), asides, going into other rooms (with or without multiple GMs/referees), and Internet chat, phones, email, etc. They all have their pros and cons.
Quote from: Omega;919493When I was running Albedo at a convention I passed out notes to everyone. Some were blank. Everyone knew something had happened. But not what, or to who if it was not involving themselves.
That's actually a useful feint. Yoink! Stolen. :p
Quote from: Opaopajr;919577That's actually a useful feint. Yoink! Stolen. :p
Just as long as the players know better than to hold up their note to the rest of the table and say "Look my note is blank."
Notes or pulling the Player aside. Haven't tried texting yet.
Quote from: Bren;919592Just as long as the players know better than to hold up their note to the rest of the table and say "Look my note is blank."
And that just highlights my more
special players! How useful! :p
I've had "This is blank. Was there supposed to be something on it?" from my less clueless players, until I learned to write "Don't show this note to anyone. Pretend it says something Very Important."
Quote from: Bren;919592Just as long as the players know better than to hold up their note to the rest of the table and say "Look my note is blank."
So true. Thats why I promptly asked for them back. :cool:
Quote from: daniel_ream;919618I've had "This is blank. Was there supposed to be something on it?" from my less clueless players, until I learned to write "Don't show this note to anyone. Pretend it says something Very Important."
Two of the notes read "You are not a spy". One of the players blurted out. "I am not a spy?" and everyone else looked at him suspiciously. For the rest of the session whenever something suspicious happened someone looked his direction.
Quote from: Bren;919592Just as long as the players know better than to hold up their note to the rest of the table and say "Look my note is blank."
Which is why it's even more effective if you write them a note they are interested and/or may likely reply to, but may not really concern the other players, or not have much to do with the current situation.
I like to have enough notes and hidden rolls going all the time, that the players know stuff is going on all the time that they don't know about. It tends to get them curious/interested and conveys that the world/situation is full of stuff and possibilities, and also means when something IS going down, they won't get artificially alerted by the messages their PCs don't know about.
It also tends to get them generating behind-the-scenes stuff of their own, gets them keeping an eye on and even pranking each other, etc.
At first, I thought this thread was about dealing with backtalking ("An iron fist in a velvet glove!").:-)
Tried using FB PMs once. People weren't on their phones, though. So unlike real life...
Quote from: cranebump;919917At first, I thought this thread was about dealing with backtalking
That is dealt with via ethereal mummy ambushes.
In any game/setting, mind you.
Quote from: darthfozzywig;919928That is dealt with via ethereal mummy ambushes.
In any game/setting, mind you.
Ahhhhhh, thank you. See, I've been throwing martini glasses at them.:-)
Quote from: cranebump;919939Ahhhhhh, thank you. See, I've been throwing martini glasses at them.:-)
One-percenter! Best I could afford in that case would be Dixie Cups.
Intraparty politics, sigh. Work together, kiddies. As my son said once while wrestling another kid for a toy, "SHARING CARING!!!"
Depends how important the message is. Usually just a note, or take them to another room for a moment. Sharing openly if it's not that important that it remains secret. Text messages would be only in heavily PvP games, although I've used them successfully in a LARP for players to send me assassination targets.
Quote from: Bren;919592Just as long as the players know better than to hold up their note to the rest of the table and say "Look my note is blank."
Don't use blank notes. Notes that contain nothing of importance to the game should read " This is my note. There are many others like it but this one is mine." :p
Quote from: Exploderwizard;920024Don't use blank notes. Notes that contain nothing of importance to the game should read " This is my note. There are many others like it but this one is mine." :p
Cute. :) I don't use blank notes. There is always some bit of data I can give to any player based on what their PC knows, likes, or fears.
I hadn't used notes for years, but recently a new PC joined the group and he happens to be a local whereas the rest of the characters are foreigners. Kind of have to keep some things secret until the rest of the group is up to speed. Tried texting and even emailing once but everyone's phones are usually not at the game table, which I forgot :o, so that didn't work out too well.
Shemek
I actually run my live games with Roll20 as the map, since even my live stuff often has a skype needed, and that way we have a die roller for the online players, as well as a mapping system everyone can see at once. Obviously, this allows for PMs as well.
It works surprisingly well.
Quote from: Bren;920031Cute. :) I don't use blank notes. There is always some bit of data I can give to any player based on what their PC knows, likes, or fears.
If someone had blurted out "Mines blank?" that has some potential humour too as sure enough someone else would find that declaration suspicious.
Regarding blank notes - the concept was used in Trail of Cthulhu as also creating the "ooc/ic" perspective for a player whose character suffers from paranoia (giving out a lot of them to all the players except him, of course), and I can tell you from personal experience, it succeeds very much so.
Putting it in reverse, the PCs were once surrounded by some hostile Elves and I pulled a "telepathic Galadriel" where everyone was forced to answer "mentally" (i.e. 'no table-talk, just write your answer on a paper and give it to me') who in their group they pick to sacrifice so the others would be spared.
The answers I received were quite amusing. :)
I've never used notes much.
More often I'll take players aside for private chats. I haven't done this for a long time actually. I run a lot of convention games and don't find it useful there.
But I started a new home campaign a few weeks ago, and gave each player a private interlude (ok 2 were done in pairs) to start bringing everything together. I liked it and will probably continue to use it on occaision.
Some of the GMs who ran games for me when I was first introduced to RPGs used this, and I alwas liked it as a player.