Getting players to interact with each other more?


Online Campaigns General Discussion


Does anyone else have this problem?

I have players who barely interact with each other. By far, the majority of the replies are towards me as the GM.

This is the only game I've seen like this. Every other game I've been in has a ton of PC interactions, as that's where most of the fun is. But as soon as I GM a game, that seems to have all stopped.

It's to the point where players are literally skipping free magic items because they ignore/forget scenes where I gave them a magic item, and then ignore posts by other players reminding them of the free magic items.

I don't get it.

I mean, even the discussion thread is bare. Every other game I'm in, players talk to each other in the discussion thread. But not this game!

I even gave them a building to call a home base, and during their first in-character down time, half the players chose to be homeless instead of living in the free building they acquired as a group. Only a single player chose to live in the building!

Have you experienced a game where every player seemed like they're pretending it's a one on one game? What did you do about it?


GM Bookrat wrote:

Does anyone else have this problem?

I have players who barely interact with each other. By far, the majority of the replies are towards me as the GM.

This is the only game I've seen like this. Every other game I've been in has a ton of PC interactions, as that's where most of the fun is. But as soon as I GM a game, that seems to have all stopped.

It's to the point where players are literally skipping free magic items because they ignore/forget scenes where I gave them a magic item, and then ignore posts by other players reminding them of the free magic items.

I don't get it.

I mean, even the discussion thread is bare. Every other game I'm in, players talk to each other in the discussion thread. But not this game!

I even gave them a building to call a home base, and during their first in-character down time, half the players chose to be homeless instead of living in the free building they acquired as a group. Only a single player chose to live in the building!

Have you experienced a game where every player seemed like they're pretending it's a one on one game? What did you do about it?

It sounds like a problem with group chemistry. You can try to bring it up in discussion and talk to the group about it, but it may not ultimately be fixable if they've been going a while without interaction. How old is this group?

Questions:

Is this for a long-running game like an AP, or a short-running one like a PFS scenario? From the home base description, it sounds like this is meant to be a longer running story. If it's for something shorter... Grit your teeth, finish it, and move on to the next thing.

If it's for something longer, explain to the group about how this is making your job much harder as a GM. Get their opinions and insights into what's happening. See what they have to say. If you need to... Get to a reasonable breakpoint and end it. Not all games work. A game without chemistry is going to take far more energy than a game with it. It's better to end such a game early than struggle on too long.

I did have a recent game with little inter-character chemistry, but it was a PFS scenario and I toughed it out. Interestingly, the chemistry got far better in the last three weeks than the first three. Perhaps because we had a relentless pace, and a huge crisis to deal with in the second part, but it got better.

Hmm


Also how new are they? to PbP specifically, and RPGs in general.
I don't know about you, but when doing something new (or a first time at a new table) I am a lot quieter/more restrained as I try and get a feel for what is right for this group. If you get several people like that it can be a little difficult to gain momentum.

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