Platterra logo

Session Zero and Safety Tools

When preparing to embark on a long campaign that will span months or years, it's important to get everyone on the same page by setting expectations as early as possible.

Laying the Groundwork

If you were creating an epic fantasy TV show, you'd prepare via the preproduction process: the creator and showrunner would build the writers' room, work with the producers and heads of departments to develop the look, feel, and vision for the series, and so on. If you were writing an epic fantasy book series, you might accomplish this by worldbuilding and developing characters, researching the genre, making a mood board, and outlining the book.

Many tabletop roleplaying games do this via a session zero, but this term means different things to different people. For Daggerheart, it's how you set up your group to tell a successful fantasy epic together. Before making characters or deciding on the setting, the group talks about what everyone wants from this experience.

The GM facilitates session zero, but all players should be active participants, advocating for what they do and don't want from the campaign.

There are many tools for structuring your session zero. If everyone in your group has played together before, you may already have a method for conducting this process. If you haven't done a session zero before or want to explore another process, the following sections offer suggestions.

An essential part of session zero is choosing your game's content and safety tools. These tools ensure players know they can avoid material that would be hurtful or upsetting—and beyond that, safety tools empower players to explore challenging subjects everyone has signed up to engage with (to be what we'd call "comfortably uncomfortable"). In addition, these tools help the GM and players communicate during play. In improvisation, there is always the chance that something unexpectedly troubling comes up, or the session might help remind what scary elements a group is avoiding or keeping "off-screen." Safety tools give structure to pregame conversations and tools for working through mid-game hurdles.

We recommend the following tools:

  • CATS
  • Lines and Veils
  • X-Card

CATS

One of many frameworks for discussing content and safety is the CATS Method. This framework presents four elements to discuss with your players to decide what the group wants from the game:

  • Concept
  • Aim
  • Tone
  • Subject

Tone

While playing Daggerheart, you and your group will build a world entirely your own. Even if you're using an established setting, your version of that setting will become distinct through your collective creativity. An important element of defining your world and campaign is agreeing on tone—the emotional landscape and tendency of the campaign. Establishing your game's tone helps align the players' expectations and ensures everyone has a good time.

A quick way to pick a tone is to list the following options on a piece of paper or note card, then circle a few everyone is excited to focus on and cross out tones the players want to avoid:

Adventurous, Cozy, Dramatic, Funny, Goofy, Gritty, Intimate, Lighthearted, Political, Romantic, Scary, Whimsical

Example: Emerson, Kate, Chen, and Asa are starting a new Daggerheart campaign. Chen nominates Dramatic to be highlighted and everyone agrees, so that option is circled as signal that it will be prominent in the campaign. Emerson says they're not interested in a Goofy tone, and nominates it to be crossed out. Kate is possibly interested in Goofy, but since Emerson's not, Kate is willing to cross it out. But in exchange, she asks that the group consider Romantic.

Chen isn't interested in Romantic being a central tone, but doesn't want to cross it out and completely remove it from play. Asa chimes in and nominates Adventurous for a major tone, and after discussion, it gets circled. The group agrees that they don't want a Gritty tone, so it gets crossed out. They also cross out Whimsical.

This leaves the group with the following list:

Adventurous ✓, Cozy, Dramatic ✓, Funny, ~~Goofy~~, ~~Gritty~~, Intimate, Lighthearted, Political, Romantic, Scary, ~~Whimsical~~

In other words, they're interested in a game that will be especially Adventurous and Dramatic; somewhere Cozy, Funny, Intimate, Lighthearted, Political, Romantic, and Scary; but not Goofy, Gritty, or Whimsical.

Subject

Discuss subjects you and the players actively want in the game and topics you want to avoid. Subjects to avoid can be broad themes, such as bigotry and torture, or specific elements, such as spiders or a particular name that carries emotional weight for a player.

When discussing challenging subjects, it's important to centre the needs and desires of players from marginalised groups who are personally affected by the issues and subject matter that could come up in a given storyline. In heroic fantasy games, some players find it empowering to face oppressive forces as part of the evils of the world—allowing those evils to be directly fought and overcome—but that should be a choice actively made by the players who are impacted by that oppression outside the game. Many marginalised people play TTRPGs to escape the everyday frustrations and pains of bigotry they experience in their daily lives, and they shouldn't be forced to struggle with them in a game. These choices should be made prioritising the needs of those most impacted by the subject matter. For instance, if your group includes LGBTQ players, prioritise their preferences on whether to include or exclude homophobia, transphobia, and other forms of oppression against queer people.

This is a good time to pick any specific safety tools you want to use during the campaign. We recommend the following to start:

Lines and Veils

"Lines and Veils" are a safety tool designed to be first employed in a session zero and revisited as needed throughout the campaign. When discussing the tones and goals for the game, the GM (or another player) should make a list of everyone's lines and veils. Lines are topics that players do not want in the game. They should not appear in any form. Veils are topics that players do not want to feature in the game, but can still exist in the world. Treat lines and veils like a living document—the list can be updated by anyone at any point.

X-Card

The X-Card is a tool that allows any player (including the GM) to remove content from the game. This traditionally appears in the form of a physical card, marked with a large letter X, that is placed within reach of all players at the table. That said, a table can represent the X-Card through a different icon, creating an X with their arms, or using another agreed-upon signal.

To utilise the X-Card, a player only needs to tap the card (or use the agreed-upon signal) and note the moment of play they want to "rewind" to. It can help if the player notes the detail they're flagging for removal, but this is not a requirement for using the tool. The group will simply go back to the designated moment and play forward, making a new choice.

For more information about all of these tools, visit www.daggerheart.com/sessionzero.

Asking Questions

During the session zero discussions, some GMs will find it useful to ask clarifying questions and dig deeper into suggestions and ideas. Regardless of whether you want to use an existing setting or build your own, one of the best ways to ensure that players are invested and excited to play is to encourage them to bring their ideas and interests to the planning stages in session zero.

For example, you might ask questions like the following during your session zero conversation:

  • "Can you talk more about what you mean by wanting to make a post-fantasy world?"
  • "When you said it'd be cool if elven clans worked like a beehive, did you mean physiology, or is this more about communication and hierarchy?"
  • "What aspect of that fantasy series you mentioned are you most excited to bring into the game? The plot, the setting, the vibes, or something else?"

Fostering an atmosphere of curiosity is also useful for interrogating your own assumptions in worldbuilding. Rather than treating typical fantasy conventions as the default, you can make conscious decisions about your world to intentionally build a setting that best fits the fiction your table wants to create. For example, your group might consider questions like:

  • "Should all the major countries in our setting be monarchies, or do we want them to have different forms of government? If they're monarchies, are they feudal, bureaucratic, or a different structure entirely?"
  • "How do people think about gender in this world? Do conceptions of gender vary by community, by region, or something else?"
  • "What, if anything, do we want to change in the existing setting we're using to better fit the story we're telling?"

Every group is different and every GM's style is their own, so use the parts of collaborative worldbuilding that excite you, and feel free to leave behind the aspects that don't.

Finding Campaign Inspiration

During session zero, look for hooks and nuggets of ideas to use as creative inspiration throughout the campaign. This can be things as small as a turn of phrase or the name of a creature or thing as big as a player describing a climactic scene they want for their character at the end of the campaign.

You'll especially want to note what the players give as their answers to the background and connections prompts while creating their characters. Those answers will form the bulk of the initial material for you to use to tie the story of the campaign to the characters, especially if you want that story to emerge from those characters' worlds and lives.

You might also choose to frame your questions with additional narrative you think is interesting. If you do, leave space for that player to push back on your additions to their answers and discuss as needed:

  • "Jasper, how did you get the Crystal of the Sunbearer? And what does it whisper to you at night before you drift off to sleep?"
  • "The smilah mentioned that his sister settled in a small town. Sprout, what do you think about having that sister be from the town you accidentally destroyed?"

Keep your GM principles in mind throughout this process—these apply to all stages of the campaign, not just in-scene play.

Example Session Zero Breakdown

Assuming a 4-hour time slot for session zero, here's an example of how you might structure it.

Beforehand

Ahead of the session, you'll want to prepare materials for the game. This process differs if you're playing in person or over a virtual tabletop, for a physical table, you might want to print off documents, but the digital files used during an online game could also be utilised through laptops or tablets.

Gather—or have players open digital versions of—character sheets, reference sheets, play guides, maps, notetaking tools, physical dice or online dice rollers, and any other play aids you think you'll need. Before the players arrive, prepare the physical or VTT play space and make it as comfortable for yourself and the players as you can.

Player Introductions (5–10 Min)

If you haven't all played together before, facilitate introductions as the players arrive and make sure everyone knows what pronouns to use for one another. If all the players already know one another, you can spend this time catching up and settling in.

Session Overview (5–10 Min)

Explain to the players what will be involved in this session zero. Point out the materials and explain when and how they'll use them. Many people find it helpful to browse through materials before using them, but encourage people not to get too far ahead of the discussion.

CATS (40 Min)

Discuss what the group wants from the game using CATS or another framework. This includes what the campaign should be about, what you want from the campaign socially and creatively, logistical details (like how often, when, and where you're going to play), the tone of the game, content to include and exclude, and anything else you need to cover before deciding the setting and making characters.

Break (5–10 Min)

It's good to take breaks to let everyone move around, refresh themselves, and get a little bit of time to decompress from creative discussions, which can demand a lot of attention and energy.

Worldbuilding (50 Min)

Whether you're using the guidance in the upcoming "Running a Campaign" section, a campaign frame from chapter 5, or your own worldbuilding tools, facilitate the process of creating or fleshing out the setting for your campaign. During the process, think about the elements (tropes, genres, influences) the players are especially interested in, then do what you can to build those elements into the setting. Worldbuilding can be expansive, but you don't need to define or name every part of the map at this stage. Leave yourself blank spaces to fill in later as you continue to build the setting together through play.

Alternatively, you may instead want to introduce players to a setting you've created. Use this time to introduce your setting and answer any questions they may have.

Break (5–10 Min)

Since character creation is such an important part of preparing a campaign, it's good to go in fresh. Consider taking another short break between worldbuilding and the next step.

Character Creation (70 Min)

Walk the group through character creation using the "Character Creation" section of chapter 1 and the "Character Creation" PDF guide, helping players with their questions and facilitating discussion and coordination between players. This step may also include explaining some of the game's rules so players understand the abilities from class, subclass, heritage, and domain cards.

Pay special attention to the group's handling of each character's background and connections, as they will play a vital role in your preparations for the campaign. This is a great place to ask questions and encourage players to flesh out their answers. If time is limited or this process is taking longer than expected, try to at least complete the background questions and make one connection per player.

Break (5 Min)

If you've got time left in your session, you can take a short break before doing wrap-up and feedback, or a longer break if you've got the time for a bit more play before finishing for the day.

Introductory Scene (Optional; 30 Min)

If you have the time, you can throw the characters into an initial scene to help the players get a handle on the rules and their characters. This scene can be non-canon or serve as a jump start for the campaign. You can start with something calmer, such as a slice-of-life scene, or immediately throw the characters into a dramatic opening.

Wrap-Up and Feedback (10 Min)

Use the last few minutes of the session to check in with the players—gather their feedback about the session zero, see if they have any additional questions, and ask if they want to revisit any safety tools or content concerns.