DnD is a game that relies heavily on storytelling. In fact, storytelling is one of its most important components.
When you’re casually describing a scene with friends before heading out to do something together, or when you recount how your character narrowly escaped the clutches of a mind flayer in your DnD game, you are telling a story!
Who guides the DnD storytelling and to what level?
In DnD it is assumed that the Dungeon Master tells the story. The players only make choices on the path that the DM offered. But is it always like this and can it be played differently? Can a player build the story together with the DM?
The Dungeon Master (or DM) is the person who has created the world in which your characters will live and play. The DM is a storyteller. They are holding the reins of the story in their hands. Guiding the players through what happens next. As a player in a DnD campaign, it’s important to understand that there is one person who is responsible for guiding your adventure along. But, that doesn’t mean that it’s a one-person show.
In fact, in my opinion, the best DMs are those who know when to step back and let their players take control of the reins and tell their own stories. Your DM isn’t there to force you into doing things that don’t make sense for your character. Rather, they are there to facilitate all of the things that do make sense for your character.
Critical Role storytelling
I already talked about the Dungeon Master’s responsibility of preparing the game in advance. He creates NPCs and thinks of all the possible choices players can make. But lately, my perspective on the DMs role is starting to change. Mostly because of Critical Role and Mathew Mercer’s way of Dungeon Mastering.
As a CR fan, I have been enjoying the storytelling which achieves new levels of creativity with each new episode. The collaboration between the Critical Role cast has developed through the years. A deep bond, friendship, and respect for each other have been crucial for their storytelling growth. In my opinion, this is what makes them so popular today.
Is the story scripted?
A lot of fans have advocated that Critical Role is pre-written. They think that the DM and the players have a script they follow to make interesting storytelling. So as we watch Matt Mercer’s descriptions of NPCs and places and the player’s interactions and decisions to go a certain way, we can’t but wonder. Is it scripted? Every episode has an amazing battle map prepared and somehow the players spontaneously choose the exact path to go, so the map can be used. With each new campaign, the level of professionalism and entertainment grows. They include the right music for a certain environment and even the light change, additionally evoking the environment.
But no, I would argue that Critical Role is not scripted. They have enviable cooperation and trust between players and the DM. This is what allows them to make up on the spot such interesting character choices and ultimately develop a great story together.
Letting the players affect the story
The main difference that I see in Critical Role and some of my personal game experiences: Matt lets his players affect the story. Firstly, he lets his players describe each character’s choice in detail. Secondly, he leaves a lot of space for character interactions i.e. roleplaying. This comes from the same trust and bond that I mentioned earlier but also from years of experience.
As a new player with not so much experience, I still am looking for my voice in DnD. I feel the need to rely more on the DM to lead the story. Unlike the CR cast, I still don’t have the knowledge to understand the level at which my choices affect the story and how much freedom as a player I actually have. Watching CR gives me a great learning experience and awakes the desire to learn and improve in shared storytelling.
DnD storytelling – Aabria Iyengar
Aabria Iyengar is the DM for Exandria Unlimited. A short campaign that streamed before the last CR campaign and was placed in Matt Mercer’s lore. At first, I didn’t like her DM style because she was very loose on the rules. Unlike Matt she let players roll again if the outcome on the die is not to their liking for the reason of a good story. Which in my opinion changes the basis of why this game is interesting and loses the spontaneity of a good or bad roll.
Regardless there was something that I liked about Aabria Iyengar’s DMing. She is very focused on the story and loves to give players a chance to describe their actions in detail. But also in the second part of the two-part Exandria Unlimited Kymal, Aabria introduced something to the storytelling that changed the way I look at DnD storytelling.
“In medias res”
Essentially Aabria introduced a coin to every player. Each player could use this coin once during the game. The story starts in media res. As the story is about a heist they all start by already doing it. Throughout the game, the coin is used to explain and describe how something was prepared in the past to overcome a present obstacle. She took this from an RPG Blades in the Dark and introduced it to DnD storytelling. This offered the option for players to affect the storytelling and the plot development.
This was probably the most interesting part of EXU Kymal for me. I loved that the past and present story intertwined. And what I loved the most about it is that the DM who prepared the story has also found herself surprised by the characters’ choices. In this way, she becomes an obvious player of the game herself. At one point this skip through time in storytelling has affected the present so much that the big battle she planned, couldn’t happen.
DnD – A shared storytelling experience
This is what this storytelling game is all about for me. The opportunity to work with my friends on a shared storytelling experience. To find a group of people I can trust, and create amazing stories together. Like in real life, my choices affect theirs and vice versa. And that should include the DM.
In my recent post, “D&D Tips for New Players”, I discussed how DMs sometimes get bored during gameplay. They become only story guides and game explainers. Especially with new players, they don’t have a lot of room to be players themselves.
| It is imperative that the Dungeon Master experience the same level of enjoyment as other players! |
I feel Aabria did a good job of achieving this in Exandria Unlimited Kymael part two. Letting the characters play an active role in how the story unfolds allowed her to become an equal player herself. This way of collaborative DnD storytelling opened up space for surprises and made the game more fun for everybody.
| In conclusion, the question of who is telling the story is answered. Everybody! |
Whether you decide to put more attention on the story and less on combat, or vice versa, if you want to focus equally on storytelling and combat, or whatever your playstyle may be, it is important to remember that this is a collaborative storytelling game and a story is told together.
