DMing 101: Yes, and...

My game running style is relatively off the cuff, I build skeleton structure adventures and then fill the holes in with improvisation. You might be a DM  who prefers to plan everything out and to have all your characters established before you sit down at the head of the table. Even for the most hardened scheduler, there will ALWAYS be something the players do that surprises you. No matter how much of a planner you are, this DM 101 skill is going to help you become a more fluid and more fun Dungeon Master.

This skill is called "Yes, and...", and it is a boon to DMs and players alike. "Yes, and..." is a skill from improvisation which encourages actors to take a statement that someone made, no matter how ridiculous, accept it as true, and then expand on it.

You might be familiar with the show "Whose Line is it Anyway?" In the scene below, you can see examples of the actors playing along with every weird statement made (Why do you have a bow? It's quieter, I guess). At the end, Lauren Cohan accidentally kicks over Wayne, who gets up from the stage and proceeds to run away even though he is supposed to be the dangerous zombie. Taking something that happens and making it something cooler, bigger, or funnier is what "Yes, and..." is all about. Wayne could have gotten up from the stage and said "Hey! I'm a zombie, I'm supposed to be the dangerous one" but he chose the funnier route of accepting the ass-kicking he got.

In Dungeons & Dragons, the "Yes, and..." principle is primarily useful for two purposes: the first is progressing storylines and the second is for making awesome moments.

How does "Yes, and..." work?
In improvisation, someone starts off the scene by saying something. Using the principles of "Yes, and...", the second person takes that statement and adds information to it. This continues on and on until the scene reaches a climax. For instance:

Actor 1: "You're right, this cheesecake is delicious, thanks for taking me here!"
Actor 2: "Well, the truth is I didn't just take you here for the cheesecake. I think I want to spend the rest of my life with you"
A1: "Oh. Um, wow. This is just our third date."
A2: "Yeah, but sometimes you can just tell. My love for you is like the taste of the cheesecake"


From these four lines we have established that one person is head over the heels in love with the other after only three dates and we are set up for a hilariously awkward or emotionally painful scene depending on where the actors take it. Imagine if Actor 2 had instead said, "What? We've been going out for over a year!" One of the characters would be a liar or delusional, and as an audience member, you don't know which one is true. Using "Yes, and..." the actors reinforce each others' characters.

In D&D, the most egregious violation of "Yes, and..." that I see is when people say "Your character wouldn't do that." One of the biggest flaws of the alignment system in D&D is that it encourages exactly these kind of statements. "Oh, you're neutral good? You'd never, ever torture a living being to get information." People are much more complicated than 9 buckets of morality, and allowing a player to play his character exactly how he or she wants to play them is the crux of "Yes, and...". Of course, characters still need to deal with the consequences of their actions, but the key of the "Yes, and..." principle is allowing them to take those actions.

How can "Yes, and..." progress the story?
As a DM, I would have a talk with my group about the "Yes, and..." principle before starting the game. D&D is a collaborative storytelling game, and everyone needs to understand that in order to progress the story, players need to react to the scenarios that arise before them, and the DM understands that what the players choose to do should make an impact on how the story progresses (the opposite of this is commonly referred to as "railroading.")

The most extreme instance I had of this was when I ran a very short (three-session) home-brew horror campaign. I told the players that their characters would have a ton of reasons to leave the mansion they were in and try to escape, but that for whatever reason (curiosity, pushover, fear, bravery) they would choose to stay. My players didn't take the principle to heart and it forced me to create a somewhat unthematic circumstance that kept them on the property. The alternative was to allow them to leave and for the game to just end, which wouldn't be very fun for anyone. Getting your players to buy into "Yes, and..." can inspire a game to move along.

The very first time "Yes, and..." will come into play is when you introduce the players to one another. As D&D players we love to make fun of somewhat unrealistic scenarios where we instantly trust someone we meet. However, being accepting of circumstances like this are necessary for the game to run and for the story to unfold. There is nothing harder for a DM than having players create characters and then spend an hour arguing about "why should I even adventure with you?"

The same goes for players reacting to circumstances. If you have a woman wailing about her baby and your party says "I don't care" then you have a real problem on your hands. Even if your group is a crew of villainous scallywags, they could still go up to the woman and say "Why should I care?" which gives the woman the opportunity to say, "I'm the wealthy Duke's daughter."

"Yes, and..." doesn't tell you HOW you must react, just that you SHOULD be reacting with something more than "whatever."

As a DM, you use "Yes, and..." to progress the story. In my previous campaign, the players snuck into a dwarven city that was being besieged by a necromancer and his legions of dead. I wrote two adventure sequences, one where they traveled through a secret mountain passage to assassinate the necromancer, and the other where there was a full on invasion. My players opted for option 3, which was to go and speak with the necromancer to see what he wanted. When he explained that he wanted to get through to the Underdark to go in search of a Gem of great power, the players OFFERED to go get it for him. As a DM, I had to "Yes, and..." their creative solution to the problem and re-plan the course of the game. This lets players know that their decisions truly matter and led to a new series of interesting events.

How can "Yes, and..." make for awesome moments?

The most basic example of "Yes, and..." moments are when players say "I'm going to do this insane thing!" and you say "Sure, go for it." One of my players attempted to aggressively use Tree Shape to ram a person who was flying just out of reach. Another player then proceeded to climb the Tree and jump off of it in an attempt to grab the flying mage. Unfortunately, both of these players flubbed their rolls, but the moments were memorable (and imagine how memorable they would have been if they worked!).

Another time, my players encountered an extremely dim-witted Ettin who enjoyed carving rocks more than his full profession of raising Giant, Violent Beetles. They talked him into giving up his life of violence and they supported his artistry by spreading rumors of the quality of his work in the nearest underground city. I had absolutely no expectation that my players would try this and it was so damn cool that I had to use the principle of "Yes, and..." to encourage the behavior (in general, I think most approaches to problems that aren't violence should be rewarded in D&D).

A word of caution about using "Yes, and..." though. There is certainly a limit of allowable realism. Sure, you can climb up the wall and try to jump off at the flying mage, but your odds of doing it fast enough and successfully grabbing him are very, very low. Sure, you can eat the demonic foci instead of allowing them to complete their ritual, but your stomach might burst into flames. Sure, you can try to persuade the mind flayer to let your friend have his brain back, but it just isn't going to work.

Let me know when you've successfully (or unsuccessfully) used the "Yes, and..." principle in your games in the comments below!