Access to social media (well, media in general) has only increased over the last several years. You can subscribe to (or pirate, I suppose) numerous streaming services for music, television, and movies and watch/listen to them almost anywhere. This is even true for books, comics, and games - they’ve all become increasingly accessible. And that's even before we start considering that “social” media. Having such a deluge of media available at our beck and call means we're likely to consume a wider variety of things, and also to have a wider variety of media “spoiled” for us. Busy watching the latest Marvel dump? Then you probably haven’t caught up on the most recent Star Trek entry. All caught up to Star Trek? Then you likely still need to see the latest Star Wars or other nerdly offering. While your tastes might not span all of these items, you get the picture…and these are just "small screen" examples, so far. Even "niche" media isn’t safe, depending on the crowd you run with. On the bright side, all this ease of access does open up the ability to find communities and friends that share your particular interests, although that might just lead you down even more media rabbit holes. One form of media that may be a bit different from the average movie, TV show, or book would be tabletop role playing games. How would one spoil a TTRPG?
With the rise in popularity of tabletop gaming streams, there's certainly the prospect of spoiling what's happening in particular “episodes” or story arcs. You’ll certainly see "spoiler-free" tags or spoiler blockers wherever people gather to discuss those stories. The same thing occurs with video games, as well. But one thing that seems to be exempt from this, though, is how one plays the game, along with the preprinted background lore in the published game materials. Unless it's a situational ruling or game ability, discussing character builds, rules, or game mechanics shouldn’t spoil a thing. Especially when it comes to GMing games, people have their own opinions on how different circumstances should be ruled, what the rules as written actually mean, and the best way to homebrew perceived gaps or flaws in a game’s design. That exception applies to both discussing with other GMs and specifically in discussions with the players of the game. After all, we want to know just how things are going to work for our characters while they're gallivanting around our imaginary worlds. What about lore that's particular to individual games, though?
There are two basic types of published game lore: the common lore that you see across various media (such as dragons and vampires), and specific lore that includes proprietary things like famous wizards, beholders or adventure modules. Common lore is an easier subject to handle - it might be impossible to dive into the realms of fantasy and sci-fi without running into those dragons and vampires. While there should be some commonality (vampires probably drink blood, and dragons are probably large winged creatures with some sort of destructive breath) not every detail is going to be in common (see vampires that, instead of bursting into flames, sparkle in sunlight or wingless dragons) It actually may be important for a game's enjoyment to "spoil" how more common lore elements work in your own game - you don’t want anyone to only find out once they're attempting to repel a vampire by holding a holy symbol in front of them that this isn’t a thing in this particular world. However, you do need to separate what a player (or GM) knows from what the characters would know. In these cases, it might be best for a player to ask something like “what do our characters know about dragons?” They might find out something they (as players) didn’t know, some misconceptions the characters might have, or simply asked to roll a check. Specific game lore is trickier. Unless you plan on running a certain adventure module yourself, you should probably avoid reading it, especially if you’re about to take part in a game that will be playing it. If you can’t help yourself, though, at least be upfront with the GM/fellow players before you start the module or come up against that monster, and try to hold yourself to what you know vs. what your character would know.
Spoilers can certainly be a tricky topic to navigate. You can hear or read something accidentally (or spoil something for someone else accidentally) or even purposely spoil it for yourself if you aren't in it for the surprise of plot twists and revelations. Try to remember that if something is spoiled for you, it hopefully hasn't been done with malice, and to do your best to keep from spoiling things for others. Make sure you're upfront with your fellow gamers if you know something that's already been spoiled for you, and try to keep your knowledge and your character’s knowledge compartmentalized. Next week is October and... spoiler alert! You can likely look forward to some spooky-themed posts. Until then, enjoy your tables, your dice... and even your spoilers, if that's your thing!
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