As player characters wind their way through your imaginary world, you (the game master) seek to keep them on the edge of their seat. You want to introduce intense encounters and heart-pounding battles. But how do you create that tension in your game, and what does it have to do with a rubber band?
Just like a rubber band, tension in a D&D game comes from the pull and release of opposing forces. The tension comes from not knowing when the rubber band will break. As the game master, your job is to create tension by presenting obstacles to the characters’ goals and making the players aware of the consequences of failure. Additionally, you might occasionally subvert their expectations regarding obstacles or consequences so that you can increase the tension even more.
Obstacles: Getting in the Way
While your well-created story hook has engendered a desire in the hearts of the characters, you create tension by not letting them have that thing they want. Obstacles represent whatever difficulties stand between the characters and their goal.
Oppositional Obstacles
You can create tension by putting an NPC—an individual or an organization—into your game whose goals diametrically oppose those of the players. This opposing force is actively trying to thwart the PCs in order to achieve their own goals. One way to oppose the PCs is to have the opponents be seeking the same goal. So if the players are seeking the great Sword of Awesome, then your bad guys will be after it two.
A second way of directly opposing your players is that the goal of the bad guys is simply to thwart the player characters. In this case, the feeling is not seeking the sword of awesome for its own sake. Rather, they are seeking the sword as a way to keep their enemies (the characters and all they stand for) from getting any more powerful. This method is much more personal against your PCs.
In both of these examples, the enemies are purposefully, seeking the exact same code as the heroes. Their goal is to stop the heroes from achieving the hero goals. However, not all obstacles have to be the result of such conscious planning.
Other Obstacles
Conscientious enemies are only one of many ways to build tension. Many times the obstacles are simply part of the game world or inherent to the character themself.
Here are seven other possible obstacles to ratch up the tension:
- Physical obstacles: These are material barriers that prevent characters from achieving their goals, such as a locked door or a high wall.
- Environmental obstacles: In addition to man-made problems, other challenges are posed by the natural world. This includes such things as difficult terrain, natural disasters, or extreme weather conditions.
- Emotional obstacles: Characters might face emotional barriers, such as fear, anxiety, or grief.
- Social obstacles: Some barriers exist in the social structure of the story’s world. For example, a character might face prejudice or discrimination. They might also have a chance of breaking an unfamiliar cultural taboo.
- Moral dilemmas: Characters may face situations where there is no clear-cut right or wrong choice. This forces them to make difficult decisions.
- Internal conflicts: Similar to the oppositional obstacles, there is someone thwarting the character’s plans, but this time it is the player themself. They struggle with their own inner demons, such as addiction or guilt, and that halts their progress.
- Lack of resources: Characters may not have the tools, finances, information, or support they need to achieve their goals. Alternatively, this might include a technological breakdown or malfunction.
Consequences
But simply introducing a villain isn’t enough. You also need to add consequences to failure. What happens if the players fail to stop the villain? What are the consequences for the town or the world at large? By making the stakes high, you increase the tension and give the players a reason to fight with all their might. In other words, if the rubberband does not break sometimes, the characters will not feel anxious the next time you present them with a rubber band.
Your consequences can come from both big and small failures. This might be when players fail to achieve their major goals; such as, stopping the orc raiders or befriending the king’s messenger. Most of these failures have obvious consequences and the players can see them coming.
However, you might also penalize small failures. I like to do this when a skill check seems appropriate but in a situation where the players need to feel successful. Rather than telling them that they failed to achieve their desired outcome, I tell them that they succeeded but with a consequence. This is an idea quite common in Powered by the Apocalypse games. When the characters fail, then the game master makes their own move and the players feel the consequences.
There are many types of consequences that might stretch characters:
- Physical Injury: The characters suffer wounds, broken bones, or debilitating injuries that affect their abilities. Your classic poison dart trap fits in this category.
- Curse or Ailment: The characters face magical or supernatural curses, diseases, or ailments that hamper their abilities or have long-lasting effects. For example, failure to resist a vampire’s charm results in the characters becoming cursed, with their health slowly draining away.
- Equipment Loss: Valuable items, weapons, or magical artifacts are damaged, stolen, or lost. For instance, drawing attention to themselves in the seedy part of town leads to the characters’ gear being stolen by a skilled thief.
- Resource Depletion: Similar to equipment loss, characters lose valuable resources like gold, supplies, or magical components. For instance, a failed attempt to navigate through a treacherous wilderness causes the characters to deplete their rations, forcing them to scavenge or risk starvation.
- Reputation Damage: The characters’ failures become widely known, which tarnishes their reputation and makes it more difficult to gain the trust or assistance of locals.
- NPC Betrayal: A trusted NPC turns against the characters due to their failure at a task. The party’s failure to protect a key ally allows an enemy spy to secretly befriend that NPC and leads to their later betrayal at a critical moment.
- New Enemy Alliances: Similar to NPC betrayal, failure allows the characters’ enemies or rival factions to form alliances. This consequence adds to the number of character obstacles. A failed attempt to prevent a villain from acquiring a powerful artifact leads to that villain joining another evil force, which will team up against the players.
- Environmental Changes: The failure in completing a crucial task results in alterations to the environment, which affects the landscape or inhabitants. For example, failing to stop an evil ritual transforms a once-thriving forest into a cursed wasteland.
- Information Loss: Failure results in the characters losing crucial knowledge, clues, or access to vital information. This might come from losing the actual piece of intel like a letter from an NPC lost in a fire. Alternatively, it might also result in the intelligence losing its value because it no longer represents the situation of the organization being spied upon.
- Disruption of Plans: The failure of the characters’ actions allows the villain’s plans to progress, resulting in dire consequences. Failing to intercept a shipment of dangerous artifacts allows the villains to successfully smuggle them into a city, increasing the threat they pose.
Ticking Clock Consequences
However, you do not have to impose consequences at the moment of the failure. You might explain that a consequence is coming after a specified amount of time or a number of failures. Game Masters often refer to this as a ticking clock. (See Blades in the Dark which has a great mechanic for these clocks.) Maybe there’s a bomb that’s about to go off or a ritual that’s about to be completed. Whatever the case, by adding a time limit, you create a sense of urgency and tension that drives the players forward.
Subverting Players’ Expectations
Finally, you can also create tension by playing with the players’ expectations. By subverting their expectations, you create a new layer of tension and force the players to think creatively in order to overcome the challenge.
One way to subvert expectations is by using misdirection. This technique involves leading the players to believe one obstacle will occur while setting up the scene for another. For example, the GM may describe a dark, ominous forest, and the players expect an ambush from a group of goblins. Instead, they come across a friendly druid who needs their help to stop a pack of wolves from attacking a nearby village. By using misdirection, the GM has subverted the players’ expectations and created tension.
Another way to subvert expectations is by introducing a scenario that throws a wrench into their normal style of play. In most RPGs, players rely on their abilities and equipment to overcome challenges. By blocking their usual path, the GM can create unexpected situations that force the players to think creatively. You can do this by making an area that limits an ability, restricts movement or line of sight, or disallows the use of an item. For example, the GM may introduce a magical artifact that makes a portion of the battlefield a zone of silence that limits some spell use and the communication of players. This twist can subvert the players’ expectations and create a new level of tension.
Creating unexpected consequences is another way to subvert expectations. When the players take a certain action, they expect a particular outcome. By changing the outcome, the GM can create tension and surprise. For example, the players may choose to confront a band of thieves who have been terrorizing a town. The players expect to defeat the thieves and return the stolen goods to the townsfolk. Instead, the GM reveals that the thieves were stealing to feed their starving families, and the players must now decide whether to help the thieves or turn them into the authorities.
Subverting expectations can also involve changing the nature of the challenge. For example, the players may expect to fight a dragon, but instead, they must navigate a maze to reach the dragon’s lair. Alternatively, the players may expect to negotiate a peaceful resolution to a conflict, but instead, they find themselves in the middle of a battle.
Conclusion
In conclusion, just like a rubber band, tension in a D&D game comes from the pull and release of opposing forces. By introducing interesting obstacles, adding consequences to failure, and playing with their expectations, you can create a thrilling and tension-filled game that will keep your players on the edge of their seats. With each step you will pull the rubber band a little more, always emphasizing the likelihood that it will break. That tension created by the unknown will engage your players and spur them into action.
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