So, you the Manager DM, or even the Contractor DM whose grown a little fed up with the lack of consistent expectations at the table, decide to come up with a social contract of sorts, a list of tenets that everyone must follow to play the game at your table. Or perhaps you hadn’t even considered doing so.
You will find that if you do, there are some very positive benefits.
Why?
When you corral a group of players for a TTRPG game, each of you will have different expectations and desires about what a TTRPG game should look like and what constitutes acceptable behavior at the table. You might have beer and pretzels players who are okay with a decent bit of out-of-character chit chat so long as everyone is having fun, you might have dedicated method players who want to be in-character at all times (and would love for everyone else to join in), you might have players who expect to be able to take some narrative control for themselves in certain situations or conversely, players who expect to simply declare an action and let the DM describe the result. There are a great many different mindsets that come into this beloved activity. Point is, your job as the DM to make your table functional enough that you can sustain a TTRPG game for however long you want it to last. When you create a list of core tenets that everyone must follow, it allows everyone to maintain their various viewpoints and differing interests in the hobby within a structure that keep the game functional and flowing. Without a core list of tenets, differing desires amongst players and the DM can cause immense havoc in a campaign and force it to end prematurely.
Common Expectations from Cultural Hegemony
Broadly speaking, there is a force exerted on every game by whichever culture dominates the TTRPG sphere. This force influences everyone to adhere to certain standards, for better or worse. When you run a game or join a game as a player, there is no real blank slate unless everyone at the table had zero knowledge of TTRPGs before they arrived (in which case, that’s impressive). Among the current TTRPG cultural standards are a few core tenets which pretty much every major TTRPG system encourages via its mechanics:
The Cult of Self: This is the overarching tenet of the current culture of the TTRPG sphere. The most important element of a TTRPG game is for the players to be able to express themselves and feel good about their expression through the avatar which is their character.
Survivability: To the end of feel-good self-expression, player characters cannot die without forewarning, the ability to prevent it, and the ability to stop it after or while it’s happening.
Human Biological Averaging: There cannot be any mechanical distinction between male and female humans (or other that of other races) even in grounded, realistic TTRPG systems because that would be untoward.
You can find more standards, but these three are the major ones. You’ll note that almost every modern TTRPG system has hit points or a wound track, or something to track the vitality of a player character, but very few TTRPG systems actually let the player character die when they reach 0 vitality. There is always some sort of grace period, a chance for allies to patch up the characters, a chance for the character to shake off even lethal damage, etcetera. These mechanics weren’t always there, but they started popping up as the Cult of Self TTRPG culture grew, a culture that is scared of negative outcomes. (God-forbid anything be truly dangerous lest my brave adventurer who swore to give their life for the cause of good dies and then I don’t get to tell my backstory to everyone every other session.)
You ought to be aware of this cultural force more consciously so that A) you take it as what it is, a modern trend with little rooting in the original form of the hobby, but nonetheless one with power that you must respect, and B) you can decide whether you want to adhere to these standards or not.
You will find though, that as you go farther and farther from magic-users of the seashore products and a few other similar products, the cultural norms have less of an influence, but they still exist. The basic assumptions that most players and DMs will adhere to are already established and if you attempt to do something different, you will likely be met with some amount of resistance. Note that most go along with the TTRPG cultural standards because they know little else, not because of any particular zealotry in favor of anything, so if you present an enthusiastic case for whatever you want to do, or simply just start doing it resolutely, you likely won’t get thrown out of your own house. In fact, players might actually find it new and enticing compared to what they’d experienced previously.
Functional Tenets: Disputable & Unique
When you come up with the tenets you desire at your table, there are a few things you ought to think about. First and foremost, your tenets should concern the social dynamics at the table, not specific game mechanics or fringe cases or anything like that (though your tenets will justify or rebuke certain game mechanics). Since everyone must follow them, only make something a tenet if you are willing to enforce it fully, meaning that you are willing (if it ultimately comes down to it after direct communication has failed), to remove someone from your game for violating them. Remember also that they are for you as well as your players, actually more so, because you are their harbinger and the role model of their positive impact.
You don’t really need to include the basic social norms of your IRL civilization - people know that they need to be basically respectful and not hurt anybody. These tenets are indisputable tenets as no one would question them. What you want in your social contract are disputable tenets. By this I mean that your tenets ought to be significant and specific enough that some people would disagree with them, that they are willing to be alienating (which is different than being alienating). Otherwise they are meaningless and will not accomplish their purpose which is to establish the norms of the TTRPG group for the purpose of a more perfect TTRPG gaming experience.
You will use disputable tenets to sift through players (and vice versa) so that your gaming table consists of people who share basic values with you. You will also use disputable tenets to sift through game mechanics so that your ruleset supports the experience you want to create. While there can be plenty of viewpoint disunion and diversity of interests around TTRPGs at a gaming table (and the synthesis of that disunion can actually add a lot of energy to your game), your best chance at a stable, meaningful, and enjoyable experience through the long-haul is when everyone is willing to adhere to (at least) the same core tenets which you set up from the beginning.
Tenets should also be unique, and this is more to avoid tenet bloat than anything else. You really shouldn’t have that many tenets because tenets are typically quality over quantity principles. So if you find yourself drawing up a list of ten different tenets or something ridiculous, you probably either have a few repeats that could be condensed into one, or you are being overzealous. Be very careful when you make your list of tenets and make sure you are able to hold each of them sacred. They are there to help you in forging a meaningful, enjoyable, awesome gaming experience with your players, not to play congressional bill-writer.
Bitterblossom’s Core Tenets
If you ever get a chance to play in one of my games, you’d find this at the top of the campaign guide.
These are the core things you must adhere to in order to play at my table and the principles I adhere to in order to facilitate this activity.
I have ultimate authority over and ultimate responsibility for the game. I own the game. I get everyone together and keep the game flowing by devoting my time and energy to it. If there is a problem or an offense pertaining to my game, regardless of fault, that is on me.
If I don’t trust you or you don’t trust me, we cannot be in the same game. Distrust between you and me will lead to resentment and eventually destroy my game. The way this works is that I adjudicate the results of the actions of your character and if you don’t trust me, you will view my adjudications with increasing frustration and spite. I will notice this and feel sad or angry at you or at the situation. Avoid this situation by directly communicating with me if you feel something is awry out-of-character; I will do the same.
When bad things happen in the campaign, it sucks, and that is the point. When a character dies, it sucks. When you fail at a mission and the results are disastrous, that sucks too. That suckitude, the fact that suckitude can occur, is the source of meaning for the game because without it all victories ring hollow. With it, the game is enjoyable, actions have true impact, and victories make you feel like victors. React to bad things in-character rather than try to mitigate them out-of-character because the latter is shooting yourself and my game in the foot.
I hold each of these tenets sacred. Each is disputable (2 may not seem so, but there are plenty of games that drone on with tons of mistrust between DM and players, so it might be one of the most disputable by the actions of many).
Your list may well be different, and these lists can evolve as you become more experienced. When they change, you ought to determine why. Something this important should not be changed lightly, but that does not mean it should not be changed when you learn something or realize something about how to forge a more perfect TTRPG gaming experience.
Ad Victoriam!