Your First Session is a Tutorial

Those of you coming from a video game space have probably experienced game tutorials that have evoked some fairly strong emotions. Good tutorials bring you smoothly into a game and ease you into the complexity, where bad tutorials leave you bored, floundering, or outside the important narrative moments of a game.

I think that several primary aspects of a good game tutorial that we should aspire to capture at the tabletop are:

• Introduce mechanics slowly
• Introduce mechanics safely
• Make the tutorial narratively important
• Cover multiple styles of learning (such as reading, doing, and listening)

A Book-First Problem

Most tabletop RPGs can't ease players into the mechanics because they require the players to understand how to create a character, and therefore a good portion of the game mechanics, before playing. Typically, I aspire to play games that are simple enough to be taught during the first session. This has informed a lot of my thoughts on this matter. Importantly, this means only the GM needs to read the book and understand the rules first.

In a traditional, fairly complex game, I don't think there is a single entirely perfect way to solve this problem, but I think some possible changes to help players learn to play without forcing them to read a whole rulebook before playing include:

• Start with character templates that the game master has pre-generated.
• Do a character creation workshop at the table, and let players modify their characters later.
• Have your players create simplified characters (such as attributes/statistics only).
• Start without making characters, assigning information as you learn it during the tutorial portion of the game.
• Ask your players what they want and make characters for them.

Keep in mind that each of the above solutions mess with the expectations and often the rules of popular games, so they may not work for every system without thoughtful or risky tweaks. It's up to you to decide what's right or necessary for your group.

Whenever introducing a new game, be flexible and forgiving about things that the players couldn't have known in advance. It’s common for games to initially force players to make decisions with low context, which they gain as they experience more of the game and the world around their characters. Once they learn more, let them make reasonable adjustments to their characters based on that growth of understanding.

Introduce mechanics slowly

Most game rules have multiple layers of complexity for dealing with any given task. Combat might require knowledge of skill rolls, initiative, damage rolls, armor values, and more. Don't start with all of this. Players may need to understand how to roll dice to start. Figure out the smallest possible layers of information that players need to learn and introduce them one at a time, even if the fictional situation might typically require more detail. Add in complexity later once your players have more understanding.

It's OK to resolve all of the combat in a single attack roll if it's the first time a player rolls dice. It's more important to not outpace your players and teach meaningful things than it is to play exactly correctly at this point. Don't hide this, it's helpful for everyone to know that you're working up to full speed.

As your players learn, add more detail. Ideally, by the end of the first session, your players will be close to understanding most aspects of the game.

1. Have your players narrate something they do.
2. Have your players narrate something they say.
3. Have your players roll to determine the outcome of their characters' actions.
4. Help your players learn to deal with a failure.
5. Introduce your players to any game meta-currencies, failure-handling mechanics, advantage/disadvantage, and so forth.
6. Involve your players in an action sequence or something similar. There is where traditional combat stuff might show up.

Introduce the mechanics safely

Within this context, mechanical safety means anticipating your players' ignorance, not punishing your players for not knowing, and not punishing their characters for "tutorial" stuff.

Players will probably need guidance on how to use game mechanics. If they're approaching a situation where a rule might come up or a roll might happen, mention it proactively. Show them the rule in a reference sheet or show it on a character sheet. Talk about what might happen if they use the rule and answer any questions they might have. Bring up examples in the situation at hand, adding context to the application of that rule.

Be gracious and patient when your players don't know something or make mistakes. Enthusiastic, helpful guidance goes a long way.

Make the tutorial narratively important

I believe that game masters should try to make as much of the time that we play games as important to the game as possible, which is to say that I believe in editing out the parts that aren't meaningful or helpful to the game experience at hand.

From the tutorial perspective, this means that we need to find ways to roll dice that are interesting scenarios that still have some aspect of a safety net or low-impact failure.

Try for:

• Moments that show signs of future danger that can span the whole campaign. These are opportunities to foreshadow, introduce possible enemy factions, or problems to solve.
• Moments where your characters can show who they are under pressure. Early moments of a campaign will probably be where your characters want to test drive their characters and their concepts. Let them do the fun thing. You'll be setting out approximate boundaries for future actions.
• Situations where failure does not result in death or the end of the campaign. There's an art to "fail forward" that could surely have an entire book written on it, but the important thing to focus on here is that you don't want your players falling into lava and dying at this point. That can come later.

Avoid training simulations, classrooms, no-stakes sparring, players being sidelined by a superior NPC, or something that feels artificial either as a player or a character.

Cover multiple styles of learning (such as reading, doing, and listening)

Humans are diverse in how they learn. As a GM, one of the best things you can do is increase the number of learning styles your players have access to. Games, being verbal, lend themselves well to teaching auditory or hands-on learners. Printed quick references and opportunities to take notes can help people who learn through reading or visually absorb the information more easily.

Keep in mind that learning new and confusing things can sometimes be frustrating to players. Work to reduce frustration by taking breaks, pausing to explain things using other approaches, or changing focus to another character for a little while to reduce any perceived social pressure.

As the GM, creating quick reference sheets can force you to consider how people learn, what information is important, and slowly work through the process of teaching someone else in your head. This will better prepare you for the teaching moments in your game.

Beyond that, the rules references will help your players read digestible versions of the rules, avoid asking questions if they're embarrassed, and round out the learning styles at your table.

So, what might a good first tutorial session look like?

For me, I think the highlights are starting with opportunities to roleplay, escalating into increased tension that might result in open conflict or danger. Some rough ideas that come to mind include:

The characters travel to their new home, risking getting lost. Players have to ask for directions, choose which path to take, interact with the rules to avoid getting lost, and dealing with desperate, hungry travelers on the road.

The characters unlock the divination of a god regarding a dangerous matter by heading to a temple, beseeching the priests, navigating a puzzle temple, and winning a duel with a warrior priest who tests their mettle.

The characters rise against an unjust bandit ruler, by preventing a fight breaking out that the village folks would lose, gathering information to find the bandit weakness, and uprising to kick them out for good.

The characters are caught in a magical catastrophe and must learn what is causing it, escape immediate danger, and confront the magical creature who is causing it.