What simple tool or bit of RP is guaranteed to weed out non-serious players, flakes, and otherwise non-desirables...

Kek, depressingly believable though.

What?

That sounds kind of fucking retarded, honestly.

>Sorry you didn't say "this is OOC" so I'm going to contrive a reason to punish you

to be frank, planning OOC isn't an interruption in gameplay, it IS gameplay, and if people are having fun discussing what to do then let them. Never get in the way of your players when they're having fun.

I'd be mostly confused about a non-american having one.

I'm all in favour of getting setting guides before a campaign starts because you can generally get a good idea of whether the game is going to be shit or not.

Red flags you can spot from setting guides:

>likelihood of railroading/MUH NOVEL stuff
>existence of Mary Sue NPCs/DMPC fodder
>DM's magical realm
>existence of shitshow races like kender
>if it's poorly done ~CREATIVE~ trope subversion shit, political soapboxing, or just Eragon tier generic fantasy

Christ

Have an intro campaign if you're playing with enough new people to be uncertain.

Don't use the players' real characters, just give them one-offs and tell them it's an introductory thing. Hell, explain why you're doing it, if you wish protip: it sounds condescending as hell to actually tell players you think they might be shitters. Always frame your concern about being someone else, without naming names, or maybe something vague like "how the group works together" and make it into a legitimate story thing - like the prologue in an adventure movie where some characters who won't really be important until posthumously do something heroic and then get killed and then the story focuses on the everyman protagonists far away from the events in the start.

That way you have some fun, intro the setting and some major concepts from it, see everyone play together, weed out the people who are at least so terrible they can't even keep up with a one-off let alone an ongoing story, and don't have to do some dorky shit like testing people.

To be honest, I've had enough games and settings start out as generic fantasy (or generic steampunk, or generic modern day, etc) and slowly get more and more unique and creative over time that it doesn't necessarily bother me.

>To be honest, I've had enough games and settings start out as generic fantasy (or generic steampunk, or generic modern day, etc) and slowly get more and more unique and creative over time that it doesn't necessarily bother me.

It makes sense. You need to get everyone on the same page before you can expand it outwards. It's why most book series don't include the weirdest stuff right in the first chapter.

This, I'd assume it was for memes.

I guess you could substitute in [local decisive political party], but mostly it just seems like a whole load of bollocks.
Unless you've had a lot of groups fall apart due to politics wherever you are, it's just a weird thing to do.

What's next, having a prop Qur'an lying around to ensure people don't freak out about religion?
Just fucking throw dice and talk about dragons, that's what we're here for.

"80 points in broadsword" shitter is the thing, though.

Yeah, but he's not actually going to play GURPS.

For example, if the setting guide is all about the great heroes who you should look up to and who could do everything and beat Elminster, Kirito, Rey and Cato Sicarius blindfolded and whose names are anagrams of the GM's girlfriend, those characters will probably be DMPCs or some other bad news.

Similarly if the race guide focuses on the mating habits of various monster races (and doubly so if there's rape/vore/watersports/mpreg etc) you're entering a magical realm (milder version: preoccupation with bdsm stuff, oiled up dudes etc)

Or if there's a really obvious and terrible political allegory, that never ends well (You must overthrow Lord Thrump, the evil landowner/King Soetero the Moorish Usurper)

The bandits look puzzled as your characters talk and belive d6 is some sort of code, they attack your party.

People often forget, especially in long-running series, how the first entry usually comes before some of the most well-remembered elements were actually introduced.

Take Star Wars for example. In the original movie, 'the force' is just a weird, vague energy generated by living things, it has mystical power and frankly isn't very well explained just what the fuck it is. And Darth Vader is just some badass bad guy dude with black magic. The Emperor isn't even named or shown, only mentioned in passing. It's not until the sequel that we get iconic characters like Yoda who tell us exactly what the Force is and what it can do.

It's not all that unfair to call Star Wars, the original film, relatively generic scifi specifically in the context of 1977, since Star Wars was a large defining point for the genre later.

Pretty much all series end up like that, with the first entries relatively simplistic and generic compared to what gets thought up later.

The funny thing is that this would work.

However, you also have to remember that games aren't the same as books or movies. In a book, the reader doesn't need to know anything about the universe and it can be introduced and expanded as the book progresses. A reader is passive.

In a game, on the other hand, a player is expected to make a character and participate actively in the story, so they need some information about the setting. Of course, most RPGs do provide some information about their setting, in the character creation manual (which every player is expected to read), including stuff like what races are available, what are their attitudes and properties and stuff like that, so starting without a setting guide is usually fine for most games.

But, there exist generic systems like GURPS or Savage Worlds that really specify nothing about a setting and nothing can be assumed, so some sort of setting guide and session 0 is very helpful to get players started.

Granted, nobody's going to read through a thousand page wiki of the setting before making a character, but a one to three pages that explain the basics of the setting is really not too much to ask. After all, if you're going to be playing a Star Wars game, you at least expect everyone to know that it's set in space, that the Jedi are a thing and maybe something about the factions.

Of course, but you'd be foolish to think any setting - and especially one in a long-running game - doesn't change over time. The mere act of creating factions and NPCs and so on changes the world. Often changes are introduced specifically because of the players - any GM knows the feel of scrambling to bullshit something new because the players did something they didn't expect.

I agree a few pages of basics is not too much to ask and I generally give much more because I enjoy writing and I clearly separate what is expected-to-know and what is fluff, as any GM who is also a writefag should do, but you have to realize 'basics' are always going to sound a little generic at the start.

What would work faster is casually mention you are a practicing muslim.
The maga types too often are god-fearing white people quick to be offended when you don't base everything on bastardized European myth or are treated as untrustworthy outsiders despite playing humans, in my experience.
>now come on, tell me my subjective experience doesn't count

The GM has established entirely reasonable grounds for mistrust, on top of looking less than capable.
Either is a terrible situation to be in with a GM, the root of every bad GM/player interaction is mistrust.

...

You'd maybe have a point if the poster didn't specify that he wrote the phrase in large red letters on the second page, such that merely opening the packet would have been enough.

Hell, if the other players didn't agree with it, they could have let other players know about the page in casual conversation.

The way I see it, that GM saved everyone some trouble, got an enjoyable game for himself and the players who are left and didn't have to deal with players who aren't a good fit for the group and game style.

I'm so glad I've never met anyone like this guy

Case in point, my actual irl experiences don't count because reasons, but I bet if I was sperging about women being shitty players, you'd agree immediately.

No I wouldn't, 2/5 of my current players are women and both are fine.

Can you take this /pol/-tier drama shit and fuck off with it?

Most people don't look on the back of the cover for information the GM said wasn't important. The first few pages are usually table of contents, credits and the like, not the meat of the book.
What you DO see is a GM who has no idea what those players were actually like, has shown that he is unwilling to deal with his players forthrightly and honestly, which puts all their subsequent decisions in a suspect light, and is intentionally pushing the pool of players towards one that does not accept the GM at their word.

>t. the two liars who got BTFO'd

Maybe next time you will learn to speak honestly and plainly instead of lying your ass off and making excuses.

I don't think you read that screencap right.

He wrote that shit on page one, at the top in obvious clear writing.
It wasn't hidden. There weren't pages of contents, it was four pages, total. One cover page, three with setting fluff topped with the red text alert.

Except there's no TOC or any of that bullshit in a 4 page booklet printed on a home printer by the DM, and the red text wasn't on the back of the cover but on the first page. What I'm seeing here is that you didn't read the quoted image.

In fact, he has been honest with his players, he said "read the booklet, it's important" and then it turned out to be important. If he didn't follow through with his threat then his honesty would have been suspect to the players who did bother to open it.

The only thing that's relatively bullshit in all of this is that the test was after session 0, what he should have done is distributed the booklet before session 0 so as not to waste any time, instead of wasting some time designing characters and all that shit.

Your bait really needs work, user. Tut Tut Tut

I misread that as practicing medium at first, and was legitmately mad.

What's wrong with mediums? You shouldn't be small minded.

This is the kind of shit people like touhoufag would think is acceptable, for obvious reasons.

I should probably not hold my breath waiting for an actual argument because you are clearly baiting for (You)s

Be mindful that this only works if everyone else isn't already shitty. The most attentive person I've ever gamed with still needed to have everything explained to him at the beginning of every turn because he had poor hearing, the DM neither spoke up nor articulated particularly well, and other players frequently talked over the DM. Another player took a long time for each turn because the mechanics for his class were complicated, so the player had to re-explain things to the DM frequently.

That's actually a great idea. I'm using that.

I also ask questions about people's characters before each session starts. Anyone who struggles is out.
And I ban phones at tables IRL. Too distracting. Use your phone, you're out of the session.

Not playing D&D.

I ask everyone to fill out a questionnaire about their character before the first session. It's mostly basic questions; who does your character care about, where do they see themselves in five years, what's the motto they live by, and so on. It also includes the following:
>What's your darkest secret that, if discovered, would get you in serious trouble?
>List five things about your character that are average or unremarkable.

This has never failed to weed out power gamers and Mary Sue players from my games.

Just ask people to put their electronics away, show up on time and take the game seriously. These people are your friends, come on.

You know what you have to do, user.

Nope, no idea what you're implying there.

The first one seems like it doesn't work for a lot of characters. I mean, how many level 1 characters have an honest to god Dark Secret?

Post it, derail the thread with response posts.

What does level have to do with anything?
>They lied about their age to get enlisted
>This isn't their natural hair colour
>Dropped out of wizard school
>No idea how to ride a horse
>Scared of heights
>They stole a sweetroll.

How would most of those get you in serious trouble if discovered?

Okay I forgot about that last part.

2hu is my waifu, don't bully.

Yeah, that's sort of my issue with the question. Most level 1 PCs (Or PCs in general) are not exactly hiding Dark Secrets or criminal histories or such.

The neat thing is, this works whether they hold the same views or not. If they care about your political beliefs, whether it's because they need validation of their own or because they're looking for a fight, that means they aren't going to be paying attention to the game and should be dropped.

>thinking anyone can steal a sweetroll and get away scot-free

>legal ramifications or dishonorable discharge, possible shaming from their community
>there are ways to make this interesting if you work it into your background, I can't be arsed to think of one right now though
>unregistered mage, enjoy being hunted down
>then why did you join the roughriders?
>you monster.

This is genius.

>MAGA cap
>with an "I'm with her" pin on it

So they only actually matter if you made sure to make sure they come up in specific situations? As most of the time 'I can't ride' isn't really secret OR likely to cause trouble unless you went out of your way to make it so.

I prefer larges myself

I think you have a screw loose, I don't understand a single thing you're saying.

Easy. Here are some examples from my recent games:
>I studied necromancy, which is highly illegal in this country.
>As a soldier I left three men for dead when we were ambushed, and am basically a deserter.
>My real father is a minor noble of a hostile nation, and I'll be stripped of my land and titles if anyone finds out.
>I helped nurse a feral beast back to health and now it's attacking people where I used to live.
>My father's a demon and I haven't shown any signs of corruption... yet.
>My first job was killing a nobleman's child for money.
>I'm a brainwashed sleeper agent for a shadowy organization and I don't know it.
>I'm part of a barbarian tribe that's been pillaging and kidnapping people from local villages.
>I'm a pirate, which is already a death sentence, plus I plan on stealing the treasure and running later on.
>I'm a former cultist whose job was collecting people to sacrifice to our dark gods.

All of these characters were 1st level.

Presumably, if your character has the dark secret "I can't ride a horse", there's a reason that's a dark secret and not just "some thing about me I don't mention out of nowhere".

So either there's an element of the character's backstory that relies on hiding this bit of information. Maybe he's got a reputation for being a famous outrider, but he's a charlatan. Maybe he's lied his way into joining the PC group and it happens to be a team of horsemen, but he's going to do his best to low-key learn on the job while keeping his cover because being in this unit gets him something he wants. We're reverse-engineering the "dark" part of the secret here to show how it can be eligible.

I run a game that currently has all of the players, who started at level 1, carrying some kind of secret.
>Bard owes a massive debt to criminal organization for paying for a ressurection for his dead mother
>Mystic is an amnesiac and secretly the headmaster of an old destroyed psionic academy
>Fighter's parents were cultists and he has been branded and fated to one day join them
>Rogue is actually nobility and his weird name, weird clothes and weird personality are not because he's a crazy homeless guy, but because he's from across the world.
>Gunslinger has been Planeshifted from the Shadowrun World into the setting's prime material plane, and as such is the true inventor of all firearms.

He means the questionnaire dude. He wants you to post it.

See? Even in text the MAGA cap works.

Oh, sure.
1) Who does your character love or cherish unconditionally, even if that feeling isn’t reciprocated?
2) Who does your character hate, possibly irrationally or without good cause?
3) Who loves or cherishes your character, even if you don’t feel the same way about them?
4) Who hates your character and has a completely justified reason for their hatred?
5) What’s your character’s biggest vice, compulsion, or quirk that gets you into trouble and makes things harder for you?
6) What event made you the person you are today and shaped the way you see the world?
7) What code or belief does your character hold, one that would be tested or bring your character into conflict with others?
8) What drives you to seek adventure, even if it puts you in deadly peril?
9) Where does your character see themselves in five years? What deeds have they accomplished?
10) Describe a moment of weakness your character experienced that they needed help to overcome.
11) Describe five things about your character that are 'average' for a person of your race, class, or culture.
12) What's your darkest secret that, if discovered, would get you in serious trouble?

As a player, getting a setting packet, or any kind of homework really, is a gigantic red flag.

Stolen for use as a character building exercise.

That's actually good. I don't want a person to play a statblock, I want them to play a character.

So basically the point of this is "just have an answer, it doesn't have to be phenomenal it just has to make some degree of sense" right?

Been a DM for 15 years and honetly at least half of the points could be legitimately shrugged off with a "I have no interest/love/hatred/vice/substance abuse/objective apart from surviving and earning my food".
Others are good enough to start building a PC, but the last one is fucking specialsnowlfake-ism of the lowest genre, because one or at most two PC on a party of five could have such kind of background.

No. If your answers aren't up to the GM's incredibly high standards then you don't get to play.

I can be arsed. If you are in an east Asian setting, not having black hair may very well brand you as a foreign devil or bastard child. Japanese people with light brown hair need to colour it to attend school or go to work even today (not always, of course).

The issue with leaving out a MAGA hat as a joke is that your players might see it and think you're the kind of cunt that owns a MAGA hat as a joke.

Ironic MAGA sits next to "Hitler actually had some good ideas" as shit you should outgrow before you leave high school.

Striking a balance between unique and interesting content and relatable, digestible content is always a problem (for me at least).

If nothing comes to mind immediately, I take it I can add things to my character? Even if it takes like, almost an hour? I'm reconstructing it for some past characters and no. 1 and 9 are sometimes problematic.

You've got to put in some work. GMs bust their ass. You should at least have to do some light reading.

There are so many things wrong with your statement that I don't know where to start.

For me, backstory usually falls flat compared to in-game developments. I've had multiple character's that ended up contradicting their backstories because actual play develops a better character for me than whiteroom statements.

Go for it. Add or remove stuff that's relevant to the tone of your game. I prefer NobleDark low fantasy so the questions are tailored for that, especially 12.

Right, you need an answer that makes sense, it doesn't have to be detailed or well written. For question 6 one player wrote up three paragraphs about a friendly priest who inspired them to become a healer, another just wrote "After watching my squad-mates die in front of me, I've become jaded and keep people at arm's length." Both were great answers.

You can make a character with zero relationships, objectives, or quirks but they'd be really boring. Regardless you're the GM, if you don't like the idea of asking these questions to your players nothing is forcing you to.

Any answer that makes sense is good enough for me. It sounds like you're projecting to me.

Sure, you'd have plenty of time before and after we start playing. I send players the questions and the 'elevator pitch' of the campaign two weeks before we play. That gives them one week to answer those questions and to have a Session Zero, and another week for me to adapt my adventure to their answers.

Question 1 can be answered pretty simply; family members, pets (current or former), lovers, or even authority figures can count. One of my players cares deeply for his 'Uncle', a higher-up in the thieves guild who has been his mentor for a decade. Another player loved his dead wife, a third cared about her estranged brother. Question 9 is tougher, I can't give much advice other than to figure out what your character wants in life.

>The maga types too often are god-fearing white people quick to be offended when you don't base everything on bastardized European myth or are treated as untrustworthy outsiders despite playing humans, in my experience.
Nice projection, nerd.

>Most people don't look on the back of the cover for information the GM said wasn't important. The first few pages are usually table of contents, credits and the like, not the meat of the book.

It's four pages, you hopeless spergo.

He's talking about touhoufag, an annoying person who frequents Veeky Forums.

The questions exist to establish who your character is at the start of the story, not to dictate everything they'll do. I'll give an example with a few extra flourishes:

Macbeth
1) Lady Macbeth.
2) Thane Cawdor the traitor.
3) Banquo, my closest friend.
4) Thane Cawdor.
5) I am overconfident on the battlefield, yet sometimes paralyzed with cowardice.
6) Marrying my wife. Her counsel has steered me right for many years. I treasure her deeply.
7) I am loyal to my wife, and would do anything for her.
8) For king and country!
9) Happily married, perhaps with children, serving my king.
10) Banquo has saved my life on the field of battle, without him I would be dead.
11) Brown hair, average height, scars from the field of battle, superstitious, deeply loyal to King Duncan.
12) I am ruthless and nothing is beneath me. Only my friendships and the counsel of my wife keeps my boundless ambition in check.

This describes him at the beginning of Act 1. It's where he starts, not where he ends, which is the critical part.

Sometimes where they supposedly start isn't even where they should. Spontaneous (but consistent with what has been played so far) characterization that contradicts the written backstory leaves a bad taste in anyone who read the backstory's mouth. I feel that if it doesn't contradicts what has actually been played so far, then it should Trump whatever was written solo before the game even started. But a lot of people take the backstory as an absolute for the character.

I know, we call him 2hu, but only if you're close to him.

I would unironically play with most of the people in this thread.

need more opinions on this

>>if it's poorly done ~CREATIVE~ trope subversion shit, political soapboxing, or just Eragon tier generic fantasy
elaborate on all of them

what if you answer with shit like
>he doesn't care about anyone but himself
>he sees himself dead in five years, which is why he became an adventurer
>he has no motto
And the like? Would you kick him? What if the character was a narcissist, or maybe the word is nihilist? Anyway what do you fucking do

Your the only one I wouldn't like playing with. Just shoves everyone into a corner when making their backstory. You're basically writing it for them at that point & just sounds like a general autist.

>he sees himself dead in five years, which is why he became an adventurer
why would he spend the next 5 years in constant danger if he could wait for his death in peace? Last chance to do something great? Seeking a cure for whatever he has? Wishing to make enough gold to make something outlast him?
>he has no motto
is there a way to describe his actions? "tries to get as much money, fuck anyone that gets in his path" "Helps those that help him" or "every man, woman and beast for themselves. If you can't survive on your own I'm not going to help you"?
>he doesn't care about anyone but himself
why is that? Is he a pure narcissist? Is he jaded? Has he lost everyone he cared about? Normally people don't only care for themselves.

I'm not the questionaire user, but if a potential applicant would not be able to answer these questions or answer them with non-answers ("he just doesn't care", "he just goes adventuring without reason" and "he follows no motto") then I'd at least kick him

Answers like "He was born a narcissist", "he's dying and has nothing to lose anyway" and "he behaves like X" would be okay with me

and just to clarify that last sentence:
I mean it more like "He has been a narcissist from his birth. He never made many friends due to him not caring. It impacted him like XYZ.", "he's dying and wants to go out fighting, not in his sleep" and "his behaviour can be summarized as X"

Not him, but start anywhere. I'm curious why expecting players to have basic setting knowledge is wrong.

have to agree with please explain

You sure added a lot to this conversation

just as you did