In Dungeons & Dragons, it is often up to the Dungeon Masters to create tension and anticipation to engage the players. The community shares their own methods of doing so and proves that they have too much fun torturing their friends.
How do the DMs want to unsettle their players? DMs (short for Dungeon Masters) are the players at the table who guide the rest of the group through the campaign, build levels, and tell the story. This often involves a lot of preparation to create a wonderful and exciting experience for everyone.
On Reddit, a DM (Its-From-Japan) asks about the methods of other Dungeon Masters to unsettle their players (a little). A prompt that, due to the many comments, leads to an enthusiastic exchange that not only amuses other DMs but also inspires them.
According to the various comments, DMs are not only motivated to create suspense but also to drive their players into absolute paranoia – this is not an accusation, as the evidence is provided by themselves.
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DMs share their different methods of instilling fear
What methods do the DMs report? Many of the proven questions and answers from DMs are those that, while honest, involve further potential possibilities to drive players insane.
Some DMs say they like to describe an object “too accurately,” even though it is actually nothing special. However, this false attention can deeply unsettle players. DM FROOMLOOMS explains on Reddit that after his players rolled a perfect 20: “There is a pile of loose stones, looks like someone placed them there.’ (there was a chest with 200 gold pieces and 4 potions). There followed 20 F****** MINUTES OF THEM PLAYING WITH THE PILE OF STONES TO SEE IF IT WOULD EXPLODE.”
Another thing that acts like a secret check is pretending to roll something with a die. “Roll without any particular reason; repeat regularly,” as RyRouk explains.
Another DM (Sociolx on Reddit) explains, however, that he doesn’t have to do anything special to scare his players because many players are already paranoid on their own: “My players drive themselves crazy. I can tell them directly that the chest is not a trap, and they will still assume that the gold in it must be coated with poison.”
What other questions work great to make players paranoid? The player ArgyleGhoul reports in his comment on Reddit that certain questions can already create real tension:
“Ask very specific questions. Sometimes they are important, sometimes not.
- ‘Where exactly do you keep your Bag of Holding?’
- ‘Where/how do you search for traps and what tools do you use?’
- ‘How many charges are left in your Wand of Magic Missile?’
- ‘How many hit points does everyone have left?’
- And of course the infamous question: ‘Do you touch it?’”
Players are (unfortunately) forced to trust the statements of the DM, or not. Because many see their Dungeon Masters as a kind of “omniscient god” who can decide the fates of the players and the outcome of the story. For this reason, the players of a DnD group were able to devise a plan that outsmarted their own DM: Players in Dungeons & Dragons get an impossible task, seek revenge through a nasty trap
