Feedback Thread: Description/Language

[The1True]

Alright, let's open ourselves to the abuse. Ignoring issues of formatting, what works better?:

1. The Hut: This 20' hemisphere looks like a shaman's tent, with rune-smeared burlap walls on a strapped-together bone frame. A huge (4' diameter), ornately embossed, cast-iron cauldron boils over a glowing fire in the centre of the room, surrounded by animal-skin rugs and shelves of arcane oddities. Strings of clacking bones and fetishes hang from the ceiling, obscuring sight-lines beyond 10'.

or

1. The Hut: 20' hemispherical shaman's tent.
-rune-smeared burlap walls on a bone frame.
-4', embossed, cauldron boiling over a fire in the centre of the room.
-fur rugs, shelves of arcane oddities; strings of bones and fetishes hang from ceiling.
-vision obscured beyond 10'

or...

1. The Hut: 20' hemispherical tent. Boiling, 4' cauldron. Cluttered and fetid witch's residence.

I'm not here to argue about the Dimensions thing. It stays. I have recently realized that giving the reader at least one written point of confirmation with the scale printed on the map is very important. Just because the map scale is clear to you doesn't mean it's clear to the reader.
Anyway, whip me, beat me, call me bad names etc.

 

[bryce0lynch]

Warning: I'm bad at this. I can see when something isn't good but all the joy of life has been kicked from me, by myself.

Is hemisphere part of the dimensions? If so I'll respect it, but I think that "hemisphere tent" would be better. The rune-smeared burlap walls on a tendon-bound bone frame is good; I would move that up to be the first clause of the sentence.

I don't like huge, plus, it repeats because you already said the dimeniosn. A 4' orantly embossed (evil runes) cast-iron cauldron. bubbles over over glowing coals (or, should it be fire?) surrounded by deer-skin rugs and shelves full of [word for body parts preserved in jars?] and bitof teeth and hair.

Strings of clacking bones and fetishes hang from the ceiling, obscuring sight-lines beyond 10'. I might move this up to the first or second sentence. I think it influences everything that could come after it, making you see the riugs and skins, shelves, etc through them, so to speak, literally and figurtavly.

If you can do the first,para style, well, then I would go for that. I don't like the third at all. The second is ok, but. it is essentially the first with more carriage returns.

 

[Grützi]

I strongly tend towards your second choice.
It nicely breaks up the "Wall of text" from choice 1 and gives discrete pieces of information, helped by the fact, that the eyes don't wander that easily in a listed format. Choice 3 is too little for my tastest.

And I know you said to ignore matters of formatting... but in my opinion you really can't ignore it in this context.
The choice to include a listed version of the rooms contents in choice 2 is mainly a formating choice... which heavily influences how you write up the contents and what goes where.

My model/method for my current adventure goes like this:

Room Number and catchy title A box containing informations what the group/PC sees, hears and smells before they enter the room or when they get near the room in a short list. A short, flowing text description of the room. Detail A: Each specific part that can be interacted with listed under a small title. Detail B: Sorted by importance Monsters or NPCs Rules for Interactions with NPCs or very special stuff

Like this:

13 – The squeaking Tunnels

- Darkness - Sound of vermin (squeaking, scuffling of feet). - Strong smell of vermin.

A group of giant shrews has made their home in this cave, excavating a series of tunnels in the northern wall. The shrews are highly territorial, attacking anyone who either interacts with the puddle of water in the southeast corner or tries to cross the cave from east to west or vice versa.

Attack: 1d6+4 shrews will jump forth from the tunnels in the first round of battle with another 1d6+4 following in the second round.
Retreat: The shrews will relentlessly attack anyone in their cave but won’t give chase if the cave is left.

Shrew, Giant
Brown-furred, mole-like, insectivores with long snouts. Dwell underground; skilled burrowers.

AC 4 [15], HD 1 (4hp), Att 2 × bite (1d6), THAC0 19 [+0], MV 180’ (60’), SV D12 W13 P14 B15 S16 (F1), ML 10, AL Neutral, XP 10

Initiative: Always gain initiative on first attack. +1 to initiative on second attack.
Ferocity: Attack targets’ heads. Targets with 3 HD or less must save vs death or flee.
Climbing: Skilled climbers; can jump up to 5’.
Territorial: Ferociously defend their hunting area from all intruders.
Echolocation: Perceive their surroundings up to 60’. Unaffected by lack of light. If unable to hear (e.g. silence, 15’ radius): AC reduced to 8, -4 penalty to attacks.


(This is a WIP...so I will go over it when the adventure is finishied trimming down some of the text )

Now for the language part:

I prefer short, strong bursts of visceral and intense language embedded in the greater context.

So you get a short, flowing text paragraph that "sets the stage"... so to speak... followed by short, terse "bullet point" style informations that build on the flowing text paragraph.

Something like this:

1. The shaman's Hut:
This 20' hemispherical tent looks like a shaman's hut, with rune-smeared burlap walls on a strapped-together bone frame.

Full of spiritual Tools: shelves of arcane oddities; strings of bones and fetishes hang from ceiling, obscuring vision beyond 10'
Ornated Cauldron: 4' diameter, embossed, boiling over a fire in the centre of the room, Animal skin rugs surrounding it.

 

[The1True]

- Darkness
- Sound of vermin (squeaking, scuffling of feet).
- Strong smell of vermin.

Interesting format. I'm going to resist bringing up the monster stat block since that deserves it's own Feedback Thread (if we don't have one already?)

I like the outside-the-entrance impressions. That gives the PC's a chance to react/prep before the DM goes all whole-hog on a room description. I was going to say there's a risk of this not working in the case of multiple entrances, but all of those impressions are pretty much multidirectional, aren't they. very cool.

You advocated for the Point Form, which I'm a big fan of and was also a fan of in the latest Merciless product, but I might point out that in your above example you opened with a paragraph. But yeah, point form really lets the eye tick off details one at a time.
With regards to both your and Bryce's differing views on the matter of the paragraph, I should be fair and say that I did not include the full room description. I think we're actually in agreement stylistically, you and I. What I posted above was my leading paragraph like your leading paragraph and then I go on to list the room's interactive elements in point form.

I guess I started this thread to discuss Description, the use of descriptive language and the tradeoff between terseness and evocative writing. I was concerned that my paragraph was getting longish and it's possible that Bryce held back on that? Anyway, maybe the full room key will help frame this discussion better:

 

[The1True]

1. The Hut: This 20' hemisphere looks like a shaman's tent, with rune-smeared burlap walls on a strapped-together bone frame. A huge (4' diameter), ornately embossed, cast-iron cauldron boils over a glowing fire in the centre of the room, surrounded by animal-skin rugs and shelves of arcane oddities. Strings of clacking bones and fetishes hang from the ceiling, obscuring sight-lines beyond 10'.
-A simple shamanic receiving room made to impress the masses. There is little of actual value here.
-Konstantin's Murder Roach (...) lurks in the shadows of the ceiling (DC 28 Spot) in roach form.
-It stalks the PC's and attempts to assassinate them one by one, fleeing to its master if overwhelmed.
-The contents of the cauldron smell and taste vile but are not toxic. Though appearing to boil and radiating head, the
liquid does not scald the skin.
-Large objects dropped into the cauldron disappear and drop to the floor in the Empty Cell (4d4).
-Climbing down into the cauldron transitions the climber to the top of the Ladder (4b).
-The tent material spirals to a tight smoke-hole above the cauldron. No matter the time of day, starlight twinkles
outside the hole.
-Willing the smoke-hole to open further, transitions the viewer to the Observatory (6).
-A faded tapestry decorated with spiraling tribal knotwork rustles in an invisible breeze against the north wall.
-Moving the tapestry aside transitions the PC to the Altar (2).
-An animal-skin curtain hangs in an entryway to the northeast.
-Moving the skin aside transitions the PC to the west wall of the main room of the Kitchen (3).
-The skull of a large, tusked, one-eyed animal hangs at eye-height above a worn rug. Runes are carved into it.
-DC 15 Decipher Script, the runes ask: "What do you see?"
-Looking into the immense eye socket and wondering what it sees transitions the PC to the Phrontistery (5).
-On a shelf near a comfortable fur bed by the fire is a pipe, several twists of acrid tobacco and a small bowl of
-Witch's Powder (10 Charges) (DC 15 Knowledge Alchemy to identify).
-Throwing a powder charge on the fire creates a green flash and a thick screen of smoke for 1d4 rnds.
-Crawling under the fur while the smoke billows transitions the PC to the bed in the Bedroom (7).

 

[The1True]

tendon-bound bone frame

nice. yoink!
I have made the cardinal mistake of having asked for advice at the tail-end of a project. My willingness to revise may be sorely tested...

 

[The1True]

the revised paragraph:

1. The Hut: This 20' hemispherical room looks like a shaman's tent, with rune-smeared burlap walls on a tendon-bound bone frame. Strings of clacking bones and fetishes hang from the ceiling, obscuring sight-lines beyond 10'. A 4' diameter, cast-iron cauldron, ornately embossed with tribal knotwork boils over glowing coals in the centre of the room, surrounded by ratty animal-skin rugs and shelves of pickled entrails, bitter herbs, hanks of hair, leering skulls and other arcane oddities.

 

[bryce0lynch]

Nice!

I like "rune-smeared" a lot; it takes a bit for it to sink in though.


You should ignore everything below. I am now discussing philosophy, removed from the contents of this thread.
I know we're not talking about dimensions. But, seeing two of them in the same description (20' [not allowed to talk about] and 4') starts to raise my eyebrows. I wonder if something like "2 ton cauldron" would work better? There's something about TOO much specifics being bad. Somehow, the fact that there is an absolute FACT here (4') pulls my brain out of imagination mode. I'm looking, I think, for something specific but blurry/fuzzy, and a word to describe a 4' cauldron that isn't as specific as "4'" ... '

I think what I'm saying is that somehow being too specific, or, maybe, somehow, an apeal to absolute facts, pulls the brain out of fuzzy dream-like imagination mode. Or, maybe I'm asserting that,or suggesting that it is possible?

 

[squeen]

I think, for something specific but blurry/fuzzy, and a word to describe a 4' cauldron that isn't as specific as "4'" ... '

I think what I'm saying is that somehow being too specific, or, maybe, somehow, an apeal to absolute facts, pulls the brain out of fuzzy dream-like imagination mode. Or, maybe I'm asserting that,or suggesting that it is possible?

Byrce is right. The numbers are often less digestible to me than approximations or analogies (e.g. "kettle-sized" or "as big as a man's head").

@The1True : I like the revised paragraph a lot. The one with the massive lists of bullets is the black hole whose gravity we-who-live-in-a-post-MS-PowerPoint world must all resist. It's the death of readability, and was (IMO) what tripped you up format-wise in Irradiated Skies too. You are currently in good company---many current OSR authors are falling into this writer's abyss. They basically starting every paragraph with a bullet so that they just have a wall-of-broken-text with extra indentation margin. Total Eye Glaze.

I think bullets work well for small lists of related items only, and not multiple thrusts of random idea-daggers (or as 21st-century paragraph indicators).

 

[The1True]

I think what I'm saying is that somehow being too specific, or, maybe, somehow, an apeal to absolute facts, pulls the brain out of fuzzy dream-like imagination mode. Or, maybe I'm asserting that,or suggesting that it is possible?

I got called (justifiably, I think) on using 'Large' words in the past. It was a 'Great' Cauldron, but I started thinking about how I was calling everything huge/large/great and started to worry, so I just put in dimensions and let the raw data speak for themselves. In this case I need the DM and PC's to know that the cauldron is big enough to be stepped into and didn't want to mess around. Definitely a descriptive word would flow more nicely than a plain number.

 

[The1True]

I think bullets work well for small lists of related items only, and not multiple thrusts of random idea-daggers (or as 21st-century paragraph indicators).

You've mentioned this before and we're going to have to call this a matter of taste. I really liked the point-form led by a short but evocative paragraph in PoUR. It saves me having to go through and make point-form notes... I will agree that there should be limits to the depth and number of indentations that are reasonable and that the style does occasionally unnecessarily constrain clear writing.

 

[squeen]

You've mentioned this before and we're going to have to call this a matter of taste. I really liked the point-form led by a short but evocative paragraph in PoUR.

Sure. That was actually the part of PoUR's format that I didn't much care for. I even mentioned it to Malrex after the pre-print but he was quite far down the rabbit hole by then. Feels amateur to me (sorry!).

It saves me having to go through and make point-form notes...

I'm not sure exactly what you are saying here, but "saves me" probably shouldn't even be on the radar when you are writing for an audience.

Like you said, I think we just have very different aesthetics. I'll shut my yap about your stuff from here on out. I'm a caveman and you probably want to be hearing from your peers who stand upright and have mastered digital watches. Do your thing, and I wish you success. Over and out.

 

[Beoric]

I got called (justifiably, I think) on using 'Large' words in the past. It was a 'Great' Cauldron, but I started thinking about how I was calling everything huge/large/great and started to worry, so I just put in dimensions and let the raw data speak for themselves. In this case I need the DM and PC's to know that the cauldron is big enough to be stepped into and didn't want to mess around. Definitely a descriptive word would flow more nicely than a plain number.

I feel like numeric dimensions, where they are not important to player decision-making (ie. how far can I jump, or do I have enough rope), require an additional mental step to process. Or two, since a lot of people don't work with dimensions enough to have a ready understanding of what they mean (not a new problem, I'm looking at you, 10 x 10 room containing 100 orcs). And some are more familiar with metric.

 

[The1True]

And some are more familiar with metric.

I come from a metric country and it just makes so much more sense, but when it comes to D&D it's imperial all the way. I love the great work coming out of Europe, but it drives me crazy when they express distances in metric! lol

But what as an alternative to either bland adjectives (large/huge/great) and straight dimensions? Occasionally, I can pull off a comparative analogy (man-sized/fist-sized) but that get's repetitive or I end up twisting myself in knots trying to come up with a good comparison that reads 'smoothly'. ("A chest the size of a fat hog." etc.)

I mean, I guess these are objects that were large enough that I placed them on the map, so maybe I don't need to express their size at all and can leave it up to the DM?

I'm starting to think I should have been less lazy and thrown in the shelves, but I didn't want them to affect combat and they would have cluttered up the map. buuuuuut that's for over on the Maps thread...

 

[Malrex]

I got called (justifiably, I think) on using 'Large' words in the past. It was a 'Great' Cauldron, but I started thinking about how I was calling everything huge/large/great and started to worry, so I just put in dimensions and let the raw data speak for themselves. In this case I need the DM and PC's to know that the cauldron is big enough to be stepped into and didn't want to mess around. Definitely a descriptive word would flow more nicely than a plain number.

Bolded for emphasis. I agree and can totally see why you added the 4' diameter for that purpose.

A different approach could be to have something of interest inside the cauldron. What I mean is, it's boiling over (maybe adding some descriptive words of a hissing sound from the coals could set a tone too) but maybe there are some weird knobs that one can see poking out from inside the cauldron. This may give someone a reason for a closer look and realize the knobs are actually the top of a ladder. Or a skeletal finger with a ring on it frothing around the boiling liquid...
Maybe that's too easy, but the point is for the PCs to take a closer look. From your description, I don't think my PC would check out the cauldron too closely.

I prefer the paragraph, then bullet points...but I do agree with Squeen that bullet points lose their usefulness when the bullets are too long or there are too many of them. Sometimes this is a real challenge, especially with complicated rooms or features (like your example). To help with that, I started bolding key words to help scanning.

1true examples:

"1. The Hut: This 20' hemisphere looks like a shaman's tent, with rune-smeared burlap walls on a strapped-together bone frame. A huge (4' diameter), ornately embossed, cast-iron cauldron boils over a glowing fire in the centre of the room, surrounded by animal-skin rugs and shelves of arcane oddities. Strings of clacking bones and fetishes hang from the ceiling, obscuring sight-lines beyond 10'.

or

1. The Hut: 20' hemispherical shaman's tent.
-rune-smeared burlap walls on a bone frame.
-4', embossed, cauldron boiling over a fire in the centre of the room.
-fur rugs, shelves of arcane oddities; strings of bones and fetishes hang from ceiling.
-vision obscured beyond 10' "

So, I like #1....then I would include bullet points for the interaction bits. #2 is easy to scan, BUT for me--it's too dry.

But then you shared all the stuff that's going on:

"1. The Hut: This 20' hemisphere looks like a shaman's tent, with rune-smeared burlap walls on a strapped-together bone frame. A huge (4' diameter), ornately embossed, cast-iron cauldron boils over a glowing fire in the centre of the room, surrounded by animal-skin rugs and shelves of arcane oddities. Strings of clacking bones and fetishes hang from the ceiling, obscuring sight-lines beyond 10'.
-A simple shamanic receiving room made to impress the masses. There is little of actual value here.
-Konstantin's Murder Roach (...) lurks in the shadows of the ceiling (DC 28 Spot) in roach form.
-It stalks the PC's and attempts to assassinate them one by one, fleeing to its master if overwhelmed.
-The contents of the cauldron smell and taste vile but are not toxic. Though appearing to boil and radiating head, the
liquid does not scald the skin.
-Large objects dropped into the cauldron disappear and drop to the floor in the Empty Cell (4d4).
-Climbing down into the cauldron transitions the climber to the top of the Ladder (4b).
-The tent material spirals to a tight smoke-hole above the cauldron. No matter the time of day, starlight twinkles
outside the hole.
-Willing the smoke-hole to open further, transitions the viewer to the Observatory (6).
-A faded tapestry decorated with spiraling tribal knotwork rustles in an invisible breeze against the north wall.
-Moving the tapestry aside transitions the PC to the Altar (2).
-An animal-skin curtain hangs in an entryway to the northeast.
-Moving the skin aside transitions the PC to the west wall of the main room of the Kitchen (3).
-The skull of a large, tusked, one-eyed animal hangs at eye-height above a worn rug. Runes are carved into it.
-DC 15 Decipher Script, the runes ask: "What do you see?"
-Looking into the immense eye socket and wondering what it sees transitions the PC to the Phrontistery (5).
-On a shelf near a comfortable fur bed by the fire is a pipe, several twists of acrid tobacco and a small bowl of
-Witch's Powder (10 Charges) (DC 15 Knowledge Alchemy to identify).
-Throwing a powder charge on the fire creates a green flash and a thick screen of smoke for 1d4 rnds.
-Crawling under the fur while the smoke billows transitions the PC to the bed in the Bedroom (7)."

Holy bejesus! hehe.
-first bullet point, I would get rid of. It's fluff.
-the roach is fine I think
-contents of cauldron makes sense. Could bold some words--like cauldron in the 1st paragraph, then in bullet points as it relates to cauldron.
-not sure about large objects dropped in cauldron disappear if that is necessary (PCs wouldn't be able to see it happen anyways?).
-give a hint for PCs to investigate cauldron more to find the ladder.
--need a hint about the smoke hole in the main description paragraph...even if its stars twinkle from above or whatever. If during the day, that will be strange enough for PCs to check it out.
--need tapestry in first paragraph, otherwise no one knows its there to check it out.
--not sure animal skin curtain is needed....ahh..ok..so along with 2nd bullet for the curtain its important--so put it in your first paragraph. Make it a interesting or valuable looking animal skin so PCs go check it out.
--skull should be in description so pcs know to fuck with it. OR...with all the stuff going on in this room, maybe stick it elsewhere?
--bold shelves in paragraph and bullet point. I personally like to bold magic items and italicize spells..
--not sure about your last bullet. Needs to be more clear.

So there is a crapload going on this room. Another way to do it is maybe make the hut bigger and break some of this down into alcoves (maybe the skull is in an alcove, etc.)
Are you going to add roach stats or is that found easier elsewhere? Speaking of the roach, maybe it's tactic is to push a PC into the cauldron--this would provide another hint that PCs can go down the cauldron, etc.

 

[Beoric]

I come from a metric country and it just makes so much more sense, but when it comes to D&D it's imperial all the way. I love the great work coming out of Europe, but it drives me crazy when they express distances in metric! lol

But what as an alternative to either bland adjectives (large/huge/great) and straight dimensions? Occasionally, I can pull off a comparative analogy (man-sized/fist-sized) but that get's repetitive or I end up twisting myself in knots trying to come up with a good comparison that reads 'smoothly'. ("A chest the size of a fat hog." etc.)

I mean, I guess these are objects that were large enough that I placed them on the map, so maybe I don't need to express their size at all and can leave it up to the DM?
View attachment 1045
I'm starting to think I should have been less lazy and thrown in the shelves, but I didn't want them to affect combat and they would have cluttered up the map. buuuuuut that's for over on the Maps thread...

Is it critical to the encounter that someone should be able to step into the cauldron, or is it just a room feature that you think is cool or might come in handy? If it is the former, by all means include the dimensions or some other indicator of size. But if it is the latter, I would leave it out and let the DM interpret the environment however he chooses. Otherwise it is just cluttering up the entry and getting in the way of scanning for the information that is important. Leave the cauldron as "portly" or "sturdy" or whatever, and if the matter comes into play, trust the DM to improvise.

EDIT: Oh I see, the passability of the cauldron is a significant feature (I have to admit, I glossed over the wall of bullet points). Then I think including the dimension is fine if you can't come up with a more flavourful way to convey the same information.

 

[The1True]

Speaking of the roach, maybe it's tactic is to push a PC into the cauldron--this would provide another hint that PCs can go down the cauldron, etc.

Oh DAMN that is good! I was going to put a note elsewhere in the hut that 'so-and-so got send down the cauldron' but that still would have been vague. Basic roach stats (like in Irradiated Paradox) would have been here, but I didn't want to confuse the conversation with a stat-block debate. The full stats would go in a Monster Roster at the end.

-On a shelf near a comfortable fur bed by the fire is a pipe, several twists of acrid tobacco and a small bowl of
-Witch's Powder (10 Charges) (DC 15 Knowledge Alchemy to identify).
-Throwing a powder charge on the fire creates a green flash and a thick screen of smoke for 1d4 rnds.
-Crawling under the fur while the smoke billows transitions the PC to the bed in the Bedroom (7)."

Yeah this had the dreaded multiple indent formatting which got lost in the copy/paste. This one is not broadcast since there are other ways to the bedroom. It's there for the particularly ingenious to discover. The witch makes herself 'disappear' off to bed this way in front of her dazed clients. Konstantin (the evil mystic who has kidnapped the witch and taken over her home) has discovered the method and if PC's approach the hut during daylight hours and lead with a parlay with Konstantin, he might escape this way. Writing for this has been tough since the PC's could be in the Mutant Camp as guests or as invaders and I'm trying to get away from my 'if/then' writing style. Not sure I'm going succeed lol

 

[tetramorph]

The1True, I prefer your second example.

I particularly like Gürtzi's format template and example.

 

[The1True]

The1True, I prefer your second example.

I particularly like Gürtzi's format template and example.

I like @Grützi 's format too and love the stuff he and his buddies have been doing over at Merciless Merchants. 'Palace of Unquiet Repose' is worth the dough if you want to check out what I'm talking about! That's why I've been taking Malrex' advise and slowly adopting their format more and more (which you can see over in the later parts of this thread . Stick with it and there are links to edited PDF's which I by no means present as finished or perfect yet).

 

[Beoric]

So, I've had a bit of an epiphany on this topic recently, arising out of some difficulty one of my players has in following my descriptions. As a player and as a DM, I like quite spare descriptions, that don't contain a lot of detail that is not relevant to the encounter. A lot of irrelevant imagery is basically a written or oral wall of text, and impedes my understanding of the situation. I'm really big on evocative language, because a few words need to do a lot of work.

The player in question, on the other hand, gets confused if there isn't a lot of sensory detail, even if that detail is wholly irrelevant. Like, why do you need to know the colour of the floor tiles? It has nothing to do with the encounter. But she needs to know, or she can't imagine the situation.

After a lot of discussions, and a certain amount of reading, and some other diversions into unexpected topics, it turns out that I have aphantasia, which affects about 4% of the population. What that means is I have a somewhat limited mind's eye. Unless I concentrate, images are blurry and colours are muted; and I can generally only concentrate on small areas at a time. It is difficult for me to conjure images from a description, because I need to hold a description in my head for a moment, and concentrate, in order to process the information. This probably influences my extreme aversion to boxed text.

My player, on the other hand, does not have aphantasia, but may well have hyperphantasia, which affects about 2.5% of the population. She has an extremely vivid mind's eye, basically as vivid as actually seeing things. She has difficulty conjuring images from a more spare description, because she needs to have her senses engaged in order to vizualize an area. Unfortunately, given my aphantasia, it is extremely difficult for me to spontaneously generate those details if they have not been determined ahead of time.

There are a couple of other quirks that I think arise from this. I have a very easy time interacting with battle maps, and tokens representing creatures. My player has a very difficult time extracting information from such a map, and can't easily relate abstractions, like creature tokens, to what is going on in the encounter. Oh, and she is also colour-blind, just to complicate the process of coming up with language to engage her senses.

So I have been thinking about some sort of compromise, where I ensure that any encounter includes language that engages the senses, but is also strictly relevant so I don't get lost in the description. This, sadly, means I will need to prep them ahead of time, and may need to write much more scripted adventures than I prefer. It also means I may need to start writing boxed text for myself. Because spontaneously imagining colourful imagery is very difficult for me.

To complicate things, I suspect one of my other regular players is aphantasic, judging from his descriptions when he DMs; and one of our potential players, who is considering joining us, is entirely aphantasic (affecting about 1% of the population), having effectively no ability to visualize whatsoever. That person absolutely requires a battle-map to engage in play at all, since there is no theater of the mind for her. Probably visual aids for any interactive game elements as well; I may have to stick to the TSR modules that have these, like S3 and T1.

Given that these conditions are not all that rare (around 6.5% of the population is going to be affected in one direction or the other), I wonder how much of this has affected the conversations we have had around here regarding what constitutes a good description. I also wonder how much this should be considered in module-writing for the largest number of players.