When your group is short and you’re considering letting a stranger join your game, how do you decide if they’ll be a good fit? I interview them — and I know at least two other GMs that do the same thing.
That might sound a little weird at first, but it works! Don’t think of it as a job interview — think of it as a gaming interview.
I’m picky about who I game with, and you probably are too. Over the years I’ve found that it’s better to put in a bit of time up front, rather than waste time gaming with people who you don’t really get along with (and we’ve all done that at some point).
So how do you conduct a gaming interview? Here are a few things that I’ve found to be useful:
- Meet in a public place
- Take someone from your group
- Don’t just talk about gaming!
- Tell them about your game
- Talk about gaming likes and dislikes
- Don’t decide on the spot
The first one’s pretty obvious: despite the fact that most gamers are pretty nice folks, there are some nutjobs out there. I grew up in New York, so I might be a bit more paranoid about this than most people — but I’d rather Joe Random Gamer not know where I live before I find out if he’s an axe murderer. Gaming stores make pretty good meeting places in this context.
Taking along a friend is good if you get nervous in interview situations, but the main reason to do this is that you’re going to want a second opinion. I know of a group back in Michigan that takes this several steps further, and interviews prospective players with the whole group in attendance. That’s a bit formal for my tastes (and I’d worry about scaring people off), but it might work for you.
“Don’t just talk about gaming!” might sound counter-intuitive, but it’s the single biggest factor in determining if the interviewee is someone you could be friends with. I don’t know about you, but I get tired of folks who talk all gaming, all the time pretty quickly — I’d rather spend time with more well-rounded gamers, particularly because the folks in my groups tend to become friends.
Telling them about your game and talking about likes and dislikes are pretty intuitive: you want to know if this will be a good fit in both directions, and it’s best to put that out on the table from the get-go. You’ve already gotten an idea of what they’re like as a person — now find out what they’re like as a gamer.
Lastly, don’t decide on the spot — that’s why you brought a friend! Go grab lunch or otherwise take some time right after the interview to talk things over with your friend, and see if you both got the same impression. Then sleep on it, talk to the rest of your group, and get back to the prospective player in a day or two.
(Edit: Shank pointed out in the comments that it’s best to follow up the interview with a “test drive,” and I agree. Once you’ve accepted a new player, make it clear that their first session with the group is your chance to see if they fit into the group, and their chance to see if the group is a good fit for them.)
Don — a fellow GM and part of my gaming group (as well as a TT regular) — and I have used this approach several times over the past year, and I’ve used it on my own before that. It works, and its well worth a try.
So how does your group handle this? If you’ve interviewed prospective players before, what are the highlights of your approach? Would it bug you if you were interviewed before being allowed to join a group?
We’ve done the gaming interview for years. It’s a necessity. Gaming isn’t like a pick-up football game in the park. You’re going to be in close social contact with this person for hours at a time.
Being from NY ourselves, we can especially appreciate the public place meeting. Never know what kind of people will latch onto you once they’ve been invited into your house.
As to the รขโฌลbring a friend/the groupรขโฌย thing, it really does have to be a group decision. Not necessarily a unanimous one, but everybody needs to weigh in. We always send the 2 main DMs to the initial meet. He and I have been doing this longer than anyone else in the group, and we’ve gotten a good feel for what the group dynamic is; and we discuss everything from game rules and experience, to sports, politics, music, literature, food and beer.
But if we decide the new player is worthy, we still bring them by for a test game. You don’t buy a car without taking her for a spin, right? And at the same time, the player gets to try you all out. That way everyone has an idea of what they’re getting into.
I’ve been “fortunate” in that my problem is usually the reverse. However, shortly after returning from college I was looking for a group and found one that posted at the local game shop.
They did the invite & watch/ create a character thing. Your method would have worked out much better.
I agree with both you and Shank; if they’re not already friends or acquaintances, an interview and a test game is the way to go. (Even if they are friends, it’d be good to introduce them to the whole group without a need to “fit in” right away. Especially so you can have player relationships develop (a little) before worrying about character relationships.)
I’ve started doing interviews in the past few years. I don’t always manage it (though I at least try and have an e-mail exchange before inviting them to a game). I haven’t ever involved another player, but that might be a good idea.
I also once has a DM interview (prospective player wanted to interview me). That was a little odd.
I have tried to get prospective players to talk about what they want in a game, and it doesn’t always come out.
I also admit that at times I’ve been a little too desperate for players, and invited players that I probably shouldn’t have because their styles just didn’t match mine. Of course my current campaign has two players who my initial reaction was to stay away from (though in some ways it would be easier without them, but they are also some of my most loyal players and they aren’t actually destructive to the game).
Frank
Hi,
Overall, I’ve found that for some strange reason, suggesting to meet before actually getting together to play tends to draw a lot less interest. Not in, “I meet them, then they’re not interested”, but rather, they just don’t even want to do the initial meet. But if you say you’re going straight into play, suddenly the floodgates open.
If I had a stable group, I’d probably be more picky in that way, but seeing how I’m doing short runs, I’m not too concerned, I’m more filtering through and meeting people and trying to decide who I’d actually want to play with for long term.
Overall though, I’ve found talking about gaming to be so much less useful than just getting to know someone personally and seeing how they operate in play.
Most people I know usually go on something like this, “Oh, I like story, more than hack-n-slash…role playing, not roll-playing…blah-blah-blah” and though every single person says the same thing in actuality, their play styles are vastly different, including being completely contradictory to whatever was said. Usually I’ve found people are so disconnected from what actually occurs in play that they are very poor judges of saying what it actually is that they really like.
So instead, I look for maturity as individuals first, and then look to see how they operate during games.
Lots of good points here!
(Shank) But if we decide the new player is worthy, we still bring them by for a test game.
Great point number one: the test drive is also a must! This is worth editing into the post, and I’ll do so shortly (and welcome to TT, Shank!).
(Scott) They did the invite & watch/ create a character thing. Your method would have worked out much better.
I ran through my share of not-so-hot approaches before settling on this one, believe me. ๐
(Frank) I’ve started doing interviews in the past few years. I don’t always manage it (though I at least try and have an e-mail exchange before inviting them to a game).
Good point number two! I view this as a must, but sort of ancillary to the the interview process.
(Chris) If I had a stable group, I’d probably be more picky in that way, but seeing how I’m doing short runs, I’m not too concerned, I’m more filtering through and meeting people and trying to decide who I’d actually want to play with for long term.
That makes sense — I’m in a pretty stable group (and that’s usually the case), so I’d rather run one person short than game with people I’m not wild about.
So instead, I look for maturity as individuals first, and then look to see how they operate during games.
Agreed! I hadn’t thought about people not really knowing/saying what they actually want, gaming-wise — that certainly heightens the need for a focus on non-gaming stuff in the interview.
I find I get the best idea of what they enjoy playwise if I can get them to talk about previous games and characters.
What’s interesting to me is that I’ve really not turned away any players as a result of interviews, but I’ve had players let me know they aren’t actually interested, so the interview is beneficial for the player also.
Frank
I go through several steps, each of which tends to on average eliminate 50% of the candidates. 1) Email (usually a list of general questions to see if the person can respond with coherant sentences), 2) phone interview, 3) in-person interview at a coffee shop with myself or at most one other person from the group, then 4) inviting them to play in a test-drive capacity (always seeing what the group thinks of the person afterwards as well).
It’s a fair amount of work but a time/pain saver in the long run, as it tends to weed out folks who wouldn’t be good fits, or are nice enough folks but not looking for something like what we’re running.
My “interview” process starts with talking about gaming (common ground) but I’m much more interested in what the person is like and if his/her personality will work well with the group, which is more important to me than their gaming knowledge and/or experiences. I absolutely won’t spend my limited gaming time with someone who is a poor match: not fair to them, me, or the rest of the group.
I’ll forgo the interview process on rare occasion, but only for someone who is known to a player or two and comes with a high recommendation, or someone I’ve played with before and have had a good experience with.
Martin, it might be interesting to know the results (real data) of people’s different types of screening (or not screening) players.
(Frank) What’s interesting to me is that I’ve really not turned away any players as a result of interviews, but I’ve had players let me know they aren’t actually interested, so the interview is beneficial for the player also.
By contrast, I’ve turned away most of the people that I’ve interviewed — but generally been happy with my choices. ๐
(Mark) Martin, it might be interesting to know the results (real data) of people’s different types of screening (or not screening) players.
You mean like this: I’ve interviewed X people, turned away Y and been turned down by Z? Or something different?
The only time our group had a player just not work out, we had a defacto interview via a convention game attended by me and one of the players. We got along so well, we invited him as a “guest players”, which is our usual method of bringing in a new player. The problem arose because our group is already large (usually nine players), that it’s hard to bring anyone else in. Group chemistry was immediately thrown off terribly.
At the time, I wasn’t in a position to run a second game, or I would have with the new guy and some others in our group that would have liked to play more. (I had run the previous campaign for two totally separate groups and enjoyed it immensely.)
I guess I’m a softie on the player question. I hate to turn someone away, and hate even more to tell them that they are out, when it is nothing wrong with them. Which is strange, considering that I’m hardnosed with the players actually in the campaign. ๐
I did interview for a game once, in my eternal quest to actually play some instead of DM all the time. It was very clear to me 15 minutes into the interview that I did not fit into that group.
Heh. What I really want is a way to interview prospective DMs to expand my group into a larger one with multiple DMs. I could easily add another 4-5 players to the mix.
(Jerome) Heh. What I really want is a way to interview prospective DMs to expand my group into a larger one with multiple DMs. I could easily add another 4-5 players to the mix.
I don’t see any reason why this interview framework souldn’t work for prospective GMs, as well — why not give it a try? ๐