Are Red Herrings Derailing Your D&D Game? Here’s What to Do About It

3 Wise DMs

Rich, vivid descriptions bring your fantasy world to life. Unfortunately, they can also lead your players to think that the intricately carved and decorated elven bridge they’re crossing has to be an important clue or secret! If it weren’t, why would the DM have given it such a cool description?

This is the curse of the red herring: When you’re casually monologuing details to give the world depth, and the players lock onto something that you meant to be insignificant. Next thing you know, they’re spending 3 hours trying to investigate a mystery that isn’t there. Now, you can always put a mystery there to pay off their curiosity, but that doesn’t always fit the plans, timeframe or story you wanted to cover in this session. So, what do you do? Stop describing the world? Slap the players’ hands to get them back on track? Ditch your story and follow their lead?

In this episode, Thorin, Tony and Dave talk about red herrings they’ve seen get out of control and what they do in their games to try to back to the story … if they can.

3:00 A listener question: What to do when players think every detail you describe is hiding a mystery?

6:00 Sometimes DM-PC miscommunications are an opportunity for better storytelling

10:00 Balancing descriptions: What you spend time on the players will spend time on

12:00 Baby Walter and the creative power of player investment

19:00 Managing red herrings with consistent descriptions

26:00 How “Gotchya” moments lead to future DM-Player miscommunication

30:00 Getting the party back on track and off of the false lead

38:00 What really are the important scenes and secrets in your game?

42:00 Final thoughts