Taming the Chaos with Session Zero!

The smell of smoke was heavy in the morning air and a tremble of anticipation ran through my body. The mace in my hand was heavy, its balance clumsy as it was only a beginner weapon, but it would do. Oh, it would do just fine.

“What do you think?” I asked, knowing that another member of my party was walking up behind me. “Orcs? Are we just going to jump straight into battle?”

The full-bodied scream that came from behind nearly knocked me to my face in shock.

“LEROYYYYYYYYY JENNNNNNKINSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

The blurred figure of who I assumed was supposed to be my teammate raced past me, knocking right into my shoulder and leaving me completely baffled.

“Isn’t your name Jeremy?!” I shouted after the blur. “Wait, Sam isn’t that Jeremy?”

I turned to look at Sam and jerked in surprise when I was faced with a giant pink bunny costume, complete with plastic starry eyes.

“Yeah, that’s Jeremy,” came the muffled voice from behind the over-sized head. “He’s a memelord, or something.”

“Were we doing memes?” I asked in bewilderment, still trying to figure out this costumed thing.

“Why do you look like Aragorn?” Sam asked flatly. “I asked the GM to do a dystopian Hello Kitty-esque campaign this time. Animal costumes make more sense.”

“Was that on the group chat?”

“We have a group chat?!” a bearded mecha-pilot asked as his hunk of junk stumbled in the direction of the memelord. “Tonight, we shall dine in Valhalla!!!!”

“Dystopian doesn’t mean mecha!!!” Sam shouted in annoyance before pulling out a double-barreled shotgun and rushing past me towards the building chaos.

Maybe not. Or maybe to some people it did? I didn’t know. All I knew was that there was something big going on and it was in the direction of the smoke. The anticipation that had been building was now turned into a different sensation, one far less exhilarating. I was completely lost and running in blind. How could our whole party be on such different pages at the start of our campaign?!

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Has something like this ever happened to a campaign you were trying to run? You spent all of your time putting together an epic adventure with complex puzzles and intriguing rewards only to have everyone cracking jokes and trying to tick off all the NPCs? Or maybe the players were so mismatched that they fought among themselves far more than they fought against the villains of the story?

All of this can easily be avoided with something called a SESSION ZERO.

This is a session between the GM and players that take place before the actual campaign starts. A Session Zero isn’t just a character creation session; it’s the blueprint for the entire campaign! It’s a time and place that will form the foundation of the game play, set expectations, and bring alignment to the GM and players.

What should you cover in your Session Zero?

1.      The Tone

2.      Boundary Setting

3.      Rules System

4.      The World

5.      Length of Game

1. The Tone

What kind of story are the players wanting play in? A high fantasy epic? A gritty political drama? Or maybe a goofy heist crew?

This is where you align your players’ expectations with your own in regard to the mood, setting, tone, and how they should RP during the campaign. If you agree on a goofy heist crew, having one player constantly bemoan how ridiculous the whole heist plan is wouldn’t be very fun. They should agree on how goofy and ridiculous they want the characters to be, and that will also help inform you as the GM on how best to build the quests and missions.

2. Boundary Setting

• Rules of behavior and expectations of the people during the game play – some GMs prefer that there are no cell phones at the table while in session so that all the players are attentive and engaged, while others might be strict on their no-cursing policy. Personalize this to you and your party.

• The rating – you can use standard movie or game ratings to make things easy to understand for everyone. If you are planning an M or R rating for your campaign, make sure that you have a list of tropes or content warnings at the ready so that players can address any squicks or hard no’s before the game starts.

• How will you meet – in person or online?

• Plan for people missing sessions – will you reschedule a whole session if one person has something come up and has to miss? Or will you have a number of side-quests that the other players can do while missing a member or two? Or will the whole campaign be set up for players to come in and out of at will?

3. The Rule System

Which rule system are you planning to run the campaign on (Pathfinder, D&D, etc.)? Or will you be making a home-brew set of rules? Maybe even a special edition of an established rule system (D&D game play with a Lord of the Rings twist)?

Having this conversation in Session Zero will help people set up their character appropriately and not feel lost or confused about the game play itself.

4. The World

Talk with your players about the world you are building and see how they envision their characters interacting with it. How would the players’ characters know each other, or what would bring them all together as a party?

While not entirely necessary, this helps the players buy in to the campaign from the get-go. They will be a lot more invested in their teammates before the start of the adventure and will have a lot of information to look forward to during the game play without any real spoilers of the plot.

5. Length of the Game

Do you plan on running a one-shot or a long-arching campaign? Will they playing from level 1-6 or going all the way up to level 20?

Covering all of these points doesn’t have to be in one sitting; you’re not trying to interrogate your players, haha! Session Zero can actually be a couple of sessions, and the point is to ensure that all the participants are aware and in alignment with the rules, expectations, rule system, and world building. This will go a long way in alleviating any confusion and frustration through the campaign.

Another point is that a Session Zero doesn’t even really need to be sit-down sessions! Some online RP guilds have taken to posting their rules and regulations on their website/forum and this helps everyone in the guild to know this information from the start and before they enter into any of the campaigns.

Do what works for your and your party!

Do you have any tips or tricks about Session Zero that you’d like to share with us? Or do you have any interesting tales of mismatched characters at odds with the world building of a campaign? We’d love to hear about it! You can leave a comment on our YouTube video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWuZpca_Lhw) or you can share in our Discord channel (https://discord.com/invite/g2NBTssuMh).

Until next time, fellow adventurers!

Credit: Written by Meraki Forest