Brief Debrief

Brief Debrief is a safety tool for tabletop role-playing games

When I was researching into debriefing techniques for my last game Mud Ghost Estate, most of the advice I found focuses on campaign play rather than one-shots. I decided to write my own debriefing safety tool that works for both one-shots and campaigns, and addresses bleed.

Brief Debrief is inspired by Lu Quade's Star and Wishes and the team building exercise Roses and Thorns. As a neurodivergent person, I sometimes find it difficult to package my emotions and experiences into neatly identified boxes, and I struggle to come up with good (stars/roses) and bad (thorns) experiences on the spot.

Another thing I wanted to address is bleed. Bleed is the breakdown of boundary between the identity of a player and their character. Most of us role-play to immerse ourselves in fantasy, and bleed is not inherently a bad thing. However, bleed can cause a player to bear the negative emotions experienced by the character as if they are their own, with the player being unable to separate themselves and their character. (Some people use “bleed” to exclusively describe the negative emotions one cannot withdraw from and “catharsis” to describe the positive emotions that one can easily separate, but I do not think there is always such a clear distinction.)

Also check out Tools to use after play by Black Armada.

Note: When I was researching into debriefing and bleed, there is a lot of info centred on LARP rather than TTRPG. Here are some links to LARP resources on the topic that is insightful and relevant to TTRPG as well:

• The Debriefing Toolbox by The Space Between Stories
• Coping With Emotional Bleed During Roleplay by Courtney Kraft (article mentions bleed in TTRPG, LARP and MMORPG)
• Debriefing on Nordic LARP Wiki
• Bleed on Nordic LARP Wiki

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Brief Debrief is written by W.H. Arthur

Fonts: Mystery Quest, Emilys Candy, Josefin Sans, Josefin Slab

Layout decor by Alderdoodle

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My goal with Brief Debrief is to present debriefing instructions that suit my style of play in a compact, business card format. It is also driven by the lyric game philosophy of speaking directly to an audience in concise and poetic language.

Feel free to use Brief Debrief in your TTRPG.

Any feedback about the safety tool is welcome.