You hear this all the time, right? Folks talking about D&D and immediately jumping to the “performance” angle. Like whoever is running the game is supposed to be some kind of one-person improv show, constantly trying to wow a crowd. I’ve been around this hobby for a good while now, and I’ve definitely wrestled with that idea myself.
I remember when I first started running games, I absolutely thought that was the deal. My mission: entertain! I’d spend hours, and I mean hours, prepping. I’d practice character voices in the mirror – some good, some, well, let’s just say my goblin voice probably scared my cat more than my players. I’d write out long, flowery descriptions for every single room, every dusty old book they might find. I even tried to time reveals like a stage magician. It was all about putting on a show for them, the “crowd.”
And, you know, sometimes it landed. There’d be laughs, some “oohs” and “aahs” when I did a dramatic reveal with a voice I’d practiced for a week. But honestly? A lot of the time, it felt like I was working way too hard, and the players were… politely waiting. Waiting for me to finish my big speech so they could actually do something. It felt a bit like I was on one side of a screen, and they were on the other, just watching.
I kept this up for a while, thinking if I just got better at the performance, it would click. I bought fancy maps, tried to get elaborate soundtracks going. The works. But the more “performance” I threw at it, the more it sometimes felt like the actual game, the shared story part, was getting a bit lost. It was like I was trying to make a movie, but they just wanted to play a game.
Then, things kinda shifted. I joined a different group, a bit more casual, and the person running it wasn’t really “performing” in that big, showy way. It was more conversational. They’d set a scene, sure, but then it was all about what we did, how we reacted. It felt less like watching a show and more like being in one, together.
So, I started to ease off my own “performance anxiety” when I ran games. I still did voices if they came naturally, still described things, but I stopped trying to make every moment a perfectly scripted, dramatic monologue. I focused more on asking “What do you do?” and really listening, building on their ideas instead of just trying to shepherd them through my pre-planned spectacle.
And you know what? It was a revelation. The games became more dynamic. The players were more engaged because they weren’t just an audience; they were active drivers of the story. We were entertaining each other. It wasn’t about me entertaining a “crowd” anymore. The “crowd” disappeared, and it just became a group of friends telling a crazy story together. Those sessions? They were often way more memorable, way more fun for everyone, myself included, than my most elaborately “performed” ones.
So, is D&D always about performance to entertain a crowd? From where I’m sitting now, after all these years and all these games, I’d say no. Not in that strict, one-way-street sense. When it’s at its best, it’s not a performance for a crowd, but a collaborative creation by a group. And that, for my money, is far more entertaining than any solo act.
