Tales & Trails of a Traveling Wiseguy

In my previous journal entry I introduced how roleplaying games, particularly Dungeons & Dragons, have been a pastime of mine for many years. I wrote a lead-up to an idea I've been thinking about again just recently, the concept of a Session Zero. I wish I could claim ownership of the idea, or even the term, but alas neither originated with me. Though I did start figuring out the concept of Session Zero on my own, as it addresses a gaping problem in the play of roleplaying games, long before finding that others had already fleshed it out even more than I had. And had coined the catchy term.

Session One & The Breakfast Club Problem

In the old days, a roleplaying game like D&D would start with rolling up characters. A group of players would get together, create characters, and as soon as they could roll them up and put stats to paper the roleplaying would begin. Typically, as a trope, that meant having the characters meet each other for the first time at a tavern and then head off to explore a dungeon wherein there might reside a dragon. Call that Session One.

The problem with starting at Session One is that the players don't always want or expect the same thing out of playing the game. They just get together and go. There's no agreement on how to play. Imagine that while in the game the story is "meet at the tavern, go to the dungeon, kill the dragon and take its treasure", at the table the story is more like The Breakfast Club. Five people who kind of know each other are in the same room for the same purpose but have completely mismatched expectations of what's going to happen.

Two players are motivated to kill the dragon is because it's evil and a threat to good people, one wants to kill it because killing things just seems kinda fun, one wants the dragon's storied hoard of treasure, and the last one wants treasure, too... and is willing to take it from the dragon or steal it from the other players when they're not looking, whichever seems easier. And because this isn't a John Hughes movie there's no happy ending 2 hours later. The players just grow frustrated with each other. Some drop out of the game, and entire friendships may suffer. (I've seen at least two close friendships shattered due to disagreement at the gaming table.)

Session Zero: Get Aligned!

The idea of Session Zero, then, is pretty simple. It's an opportunity for the players to align on what they expect to happen in the game.

One important area of alignment is the group's moral center. What kind of people are we, overall? What's our tolerance for people with different morality? We don't necessarily have to agree 100% but we do have to make sure we're compatible enough with each other and with the scenario the game master (GM) has prepared so we can collaborate in telling an enjoyable story. (At the end of the day that's what a roleplaying game is: collaborative storytelling.)

Another important area for alignment is What do we (players) enjoy? Different people want to get different things out of the game. Some like the sense of adventure, some enjoy the dice-rolling simulation of combat, some like the challenge of portraying an alternate person, some even like games as morality plays. There's no one right answer. But a game in which different people want incompatible things is the wrong answer, because some or even all of the players will be unsatisfied.

Other topics to work out during a good Session Zero include what skills and backgrounds the various characters have (often you want a group that "covers the bases" in terms of certain skill sets), what the style of play is (shoot first and ask questions later?), and the logistics of things like how frequently the group will meet to play, for how long, and what they'll do if 1 player can't make it that session.

Why Was This a New Idea?

The idea of Session Zero didn't exist back in the old days— basically the 1980s and early 90s. Back then it assumed that there was only one motivation for gamers and that all right-thinking players automatically shared it. Does that look preposterous when written out like that? Heck yeah! But that was the essence of what was written about how to bring players together in the context of a game. Only a little of that was written in the rulebooks themselves; the creators of the games thought it was so obvious that it went without mention! Those same creators wrote more at length in early gaming magazines. Alas length did not equal wisdom. The issue remained an ongoing source of woe for gamers everywhere.

In the early 90s I started to figure out for myself that players needed to agree on the style of a game before playing it. I began working with players ahead of the start of the game— i.e., in something like a Session Zero— to gain alignment. The thing was, in my gaming community I was virtually the only person with this idea, so it was slow going. For my players it was at best an unfamiliar concept they needed time to understand. At worst they were hostile to the idea, arguing I was a weak GM who sought to limit their creativity. By the early 00s, thankfully, the concept of a Session Zero had caught on in more places as the term had been coined. It may even have appeared in some rulebooks of the era; certainly by then it appeared in online discussion and blogs.

Update: Subsequent entries about Session Zero:

• The Risk of Skipping Session Zero: Batman & the Joker
• Session Zero Successes & Failures: 5 (more) Examples
• Session Zero & Narrative vs. Meta Gaming