On this page you've got the words included in the game deck, but also, below you'll find a little tool to help you and your group keep track of safety during your sessions. Hopefully, you'll find this useful, and go with whatever tools work for your group. Main thing is to have the ongoing conversation mentioned here, and remain vigilant to ensure everyone's ok.
An ongoing conversation
This might be placed within the ‘GM’ section of the game, but don’t think that ensuring safety around the table is a job solely for the GM. If you're playing with others but no-one else pipes up, before you begin the game, so maybe at a ‘session zero’ where you’re exploring what the game’s going to be like, try to start an open conversation with the player(s) about everyone’s expectations, lines and veils, house rules, and so on, focused on what might happen in the game and also around the table, creating and then monitoring collectively throughout the game a safe and social environment in which everyone, including you, can feel comfortable to immerse, create, and have fun.
Why is this a decent idea?
Well, tabletop roleplaying games like this, they can get pretty intense. It’s a shared experience with human beings, each of whom can rock up to the table with their own real-life beliefs, concerns, interests, and more. During the game, which can tend to have at its heart the resolution of conflict, players can get really invested in their characters, desperately making sure that they survive through life & death or emotive circumstances, that they get the glory, that they’re not misunderstood or ignored. If players feel, at the table, that they or their characters are being sidelined, or that they’re at the wrong end of discrimination, racism, behaviour that doesn’t have their consent, or that something in the game is triggering a real-life anxiety and the like, it’s the responsibility of everyone at the table to make sure it’s addressed efficiently and appropriately. To help with that, therefore, it can help to set some expectations from the outset.
A quick checklist
Here are just a few things to focus on, therefore, when you’re talking about safety in your game, and remember to check in and revisit them if needed from time to time during the game.
- What the theme & purpose of the game will be.
- Lines, so things that shouldn’t be mentioned or come up.
- Veils, like stuff that would be best discussed in private.
- What movie rating you’d all like the game to be.
- At any time, anyone can say ‘can we pause for a bit’, and space will be allowed to chat through what’s uncomfortable, what might be best adjusted, reversed, screen-wiped, etc.
- At any time, anyone can say ‘can we take a short break’, to help with recalibration, relaxation in tense moments, etc.
It’s your choice
Although someone, including you, might feel pressured to go along with things if it seems that everyone’s ok with it, at any point if they don’t feel comfortable, or if it looks like someone else might be, then hit that pause button, and respectfully suggest that maybe there’s a chat about what doesn’t seem right. And in any discussion that might follow, again if someone feels pressured to accept something that they’re still not understanding or comfortable about, then it’s absolutely ok for them to say so. And this includes stuff they might’ve agreed on at the outset, but then during the game it becomes clear that really it’s not ok for them. No need to explain either. In a table founded on respect, no means no, and that’s the end of it. Aim in all moments for a sharing of kindness, respect, inclusion, and empathy around the table.
The Pact Board
Safety Tool -- The Chaos TTRPG
The Pact -- player by player
Tone for this session
How the table will call a pause
Signal the table
Tap a signal to log it instantly. No words needed. The log below records what happened and when.
Drift log
- Nothing logged yet. Use the signals above or add a note below.
Session record
Review and edit everything below before exporting. All changes update the PDF.