Ryan Rank has some good advice that can help you scare your players. In this essay I’ll talk about a few in-game things you can do to scare them.



The first thing is, the players can do a far better job of scaring themselves then you ever could. Don’t use the props to help you scare your players, use the props to help the players scare themselves. Most important, don’t expect the props alone to scare the players. Use those props in conjunction with other elements. A dim light isn’t scary all by itself. A dim light with an irregular scraping sound and the smell of brine and fish does a better job of making people uneasy.



Second thing, keep ‘em in the dark. Keep them ignorant. If they don’t know what it is, don’t tell them. Describe it to them instead. I have mentioned this before, but it’s even more important when you want your players scared. A thing unknown is a thing to be afraid of.



Third, describe. Describe what they can see, hear, smell, taste, and feel. It is true that your players have only your words to go by, but it is possible to invoke sight, smell, sound, taste, and feel with words alone. Most important, show don’t tell.



“A goblin is walking towards you down the dark granite corridor. His skin is pale. Torn in places to reveal the muscle beneath. There is no blood. The broken shaft of an arrow juts from his left eye. The right is milky-white and stares off into the distance. His clothes are torn and rotted. As he gets closer you can see a writhing mass eating away at a gash in his belly.”



It does take longer to do, but it will help bring looks of disgust and dismay to your players’ faces.



Fourth, learn how to use your monsters, NPCs, and the like to their best ability. Spectres are incorporeal. Think of the fun you could have with that. The party cleric’s slumped against a wall? Have the spectre reach out of the wall to give the priest the “personal” touch. In a game I was running once something attacked one member of the party as they camped in the desert. It reached up out of the desert floor. It missed (dang it). The players didn’t bother with fighting it. They did nothing to learn what it was. They left as fast as they could. Their only concern was with getting away from whatever it was before it killed them all. I can’t say if they were scared. I can say that they were very perturbed, and that is the next best thing.



Now, what if they do know what it is they’re facing? Take advantage of it. As I said just above, play your monsters et. al. to the best of their abilities. If the party is facing a band of zombies, emphasis the zombies lack of feelings. Their inhumanness.



“Your sword bites deep into his side. He ignores it. As he swings his fists at you the twisting of his body causes your sword to tear the gash wider. He ignores it. A fist smashes into your chain hauberk. The rotting flesh on his fingers is flayed off by the links of your chain, exposing the bone beneath. He ignores it.”



Put your players where their PCs are. Use props and descriptions to help them visualize what their PCs would be experiencing. Let your players scare themselves.



“He lowers his head to look you in the eye. His mouth is slightly agape, revealing a great tongue that could cover you completely, and teeth larger than your legs. His eyes are bigger than your head.



“A string of saliva hits the floor, digging a pit into the stone. You are hit by the smell of old meat, and his breath rolls across your skin like a warm mist with a touch of grease in it.



“He smiles a gentle smile and asks softly, ‘Could you please repeat what you just said about my mother? I want to be sure I understood you correctly.’”



A few suggestions that may help your players scare themselves. Have fun with them.



*****



Coming Up: I keep forgetting to prepare ahead of them, so I’m going to stop promising to do so. I also keep forgetting what it is I’m supposed to write about next. So I’m going to stop mentioning what’s coming up next time. On the other hand, instead of waiting until the day when the next Writing Practice is supposed to go up to write up an idea, I will henceforth go ahead and write the essay when I have the idea. So the next Writing Practicewill be as much a surprise to you as it will be to me.



As always, if you find anything in any of my columns you think you can use in your game, go ahead and use it. Make it your own. I write these things in the hope I can help make games better. Better for the GM and better for the players.



So use as you will.



Alan