Dungeons & Dragonscan be a very long game. Depending on how many players are at your table, everything you do can take longer and longer. For players, no matter how engaging the story is or their part in it, downtime and distractions will naturally happen.
With too much of this, keeping involved in a campaign can easily become discouraging. When the dice towers start getting built and the phones come out, you know you’ve lost them. So, what can you do to get your players engaged in the game again? Here are a few tips to keep your adventurers on track.
8Let Every Player Shine
Utilize Player Backstories And Abilities
One of the best ways to keep players engaged is to make the campaign tailored to them. While this sounds easy enough, most of the time, players who don’t get a chance to show off that level six skill they picked up because the opportunity doesn’t arise will be far less interested when the main plot rolls around.
It’s easy to feel like you aren’t a part of the game if you feel overlooked. Ensure your cleric gets to use their Channel Divinity, your sorcerer actually hears from their Patron, and the monk gets to visit their monastery.
7Keep The Group Together
If Everyone Is Involved, No One Will Be Left Behind
While you should have individual opportunities for every player, you should also ensure you keep the party together as much as possible once players start becoming uninterested. An uninterested party will further alienate themselves when the story doesn’t revolve around them.
Spending too much time on a single individual, especially with. A larger party will make it even easier for players to fall out of love with the campaign. The easiest solution is tokeep the party togetherthrough major story beats, but still provide time and opportunities for their individual interests. This also allows for more opportunity and interaction between players, as everyone is together when impactful story moments happen, and they can roleplay finding a solution to the problem together.
6Include Players In World Building
Involvement in The World Can Help Players Care About It
It’s never too late to get the party involved in the world and world-building; you don’t even need to have a session zero to do this. As the group adventures, you’re able to introduce locations and NPCs and allow the players to tell you about them instead of filling in the gaps yourself.
While this definitely works best during a session zero, allowing your players to give you the name of an NPC, what they were doing before they encountered the party, or even information about where they’re from can keep players engaged. You can easily add this new location to the map afterwards, and this NPC can be the turning point of keeping interest.
5Use Tactile Or Extra Content
Keep Their Attention By Keeping Their Hands Busy
If you can play in person, one of the coolest things you can do to keep players involved is use tactile content. If you’re all at the same table, handing over a letter to a player that would receive it instead of just reading it out can surprisingly go a long way.Something they can hang onto, keeping them engagedand involved, and allowing them to share it with the table gives them all interest and agency. The same can be said for physical puzzles, such as puzzle boxes, that can be unlocked in person or activities that can be done in character at the table with simple paper and pencil.
IF you’re virtual, allowing the players to do things at the table virtually can still have the same effect. Send the letter via DM, allowing them to read it out loud. Construct puzzles that they can do on their own, like a Sudoku-style trial. Even having someone record and announce initiative order in a fight if they’re losing interest cna be helpful.
4Vary Your Content
Shake Up The Predictable Formula
Another piece of advice that feels obvious but might be overlooked is to ensure that your content is varied. If you’re constantly doing exploration, dungeon, and boss fights, then maybe that formula is predictable and boring to some players. Change the type of puzzles you’re giving players so that they aren’t getting used to something that has become second nature.
Make your fights dynamic, something that will require everyone to be paying attention all the time. Switch up responsibilities and responses from your players by throwing unexpected checks and expectations their way. This is also a great chance to remember to let every player shine by giving them unexpected content using their expertisewhile keeping the paceinteresting for everyone involved.
3Scrap And Start Over
Preserve Their Love For D&D
Do not be afraid to scrap a campaign if your players just aren’t having fun. Despite how much work you’ve put into it or how far they are, sometimes the correct decision is to let it go and start fresh. It’s more important to keep them interested in D&D overall and have a healthy, interesting campaign than to draw out one everyone has lost interest in because they’re close to the midpoint or some big reveal that you think will save things.
Health in the hobby is more important than any story being told, so starting from scratch allows players to get renewed interest, test out ideas they’ve had during the campaign, and for everyone to regroup and start anew. If your players are not having fun, it’s a fresh option to consider.
2Get Session Reviews
Improve Your Game To Improve Theirs
At the end of a session, gauge how your players are feeling. Ask them what they liked, what they didn’t like, and what they’d like to see more of. Adjusting your DM style to help get them involved is part of the job.
Even better, these after session check-ins can help prevent players from being interested in the game in hte end if you solve the problem they’re having. Will more roleplay keep them entertained? Will more combat be helpful? Are they stcuk and tired of being in a rut in the story you didn’t even notice? A check in is the perfect move to thwart any issues.
1Manage Time Wisely
This is a lot more important than it seems. Sometimes players aren’t checked out because of the content. Sometimes it’s just poor time management that has them quickly losing interest. If you’ve got a bigger party, always take into consideration the downtime everyone else is experiencing while you’re doing your DM session with individuals in the party. Player interest will take a nose dive if you don’t manage your time properly.
Give everyone attention, make combat short by using one boss instead of tons of smaller individuals, speeding things up. Ensure players are ready by announcing when their turn is coming, ensuring they’re prepared to keep combat moving smoothly. Be prepared to close gaps in roleplay and conversation to keep things going. Use the time you have to your advantage to help get them involved in the game again.
This is a big detriment for larger parties. Eight players who have to wait seven rounds plus several NPC rounds that might not feature them at all become a 30-minute waiting game to do a single action. Using your time wisely is your best bet here.
