5 Ways to Make NPC Dialogue Better With No Accent - GM Tips

So you may not enjoy doing accents or its not something you feel comfortable doing, so in this video I show you 5 ways on how to make NPC dialogue better, and the kind of options available to you to do it.

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[HowtobeaGreatGM]

Thanks for watching!
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[ThePageTurnerPT]

"...and was inspired to take on Ursula 's shape..." is definitely my favorite line on the entire channel. That was fantastic and I adored it to the highest degree. Well done

[brusameba]

As an Italian i use body language when i'm on discord even if nobody see me

[fredbloggs]

I'm autistic so body language is a bit of a closed book to me, but describing how someone is reacting seems a good way to go.

[PufferGlitch]

Nobody ever seems to nail the Scandinavian accent but by the Gods, that 1:06 accent gave me flashbacks to all the times I've spotted Scandinavians in the wild while on vacation. Bravo!

[DyvekeChr]

One of the accent from the start was as a perfect Norwegian accent 😄 Impressive 🙏🙌

[lonestarr]

Remember that scene in The Two Towers where Aragon tells Gandalf, “There’s one thing you have not changed dear friend, you still speak in riddles”.

[Frankstomp]

As someone who struggles to change my voice even for transitioning, this is super helpful, thanks!

[sebbychou]

tl;dw is "just spell out the information you wanted to imply with the accent in the first place"

[starcrafterterran]

I've been to countries where I only know four words of the native language and I got by fine for 7-10 days without it. Some of this was due to them knowing a few words in my language, some of it was because I wasn't too far into rural areas, but one major thing was body language. I needed someone to call a number to tell someone I was at the bus stop. I couldn't speak to her, and she couldn't speak to me. I couldn't make the call myself since my phone had gone dead. But the number was on a piece of paper. I showed her the phone number, I held up my phone and shook my head that it didn't work, and I looked at her with a nod to ask her to make a call on hers while gesturing what a phonecall was with my phone near my ear. I conveyed everything I needed to convey with no words whatsoever.

[skylark]

another emportant element to accents is slang. An easy way to incorporate this is to take 20 to 30 of the most common expressions of an existing language and to change them to something that more closely fits the fantasy culture your trying to create. From there you can substitute where possible bits of their dialogue. It's a very easy way to create npcs that sound distinct, and results in interesting scenes where the characters are caught off guard by something they said.

[apothocareon]

Quite early.

This is also really relevant to games for people who aren't comfortable with verbal rp by introducing them via typed rps. It's one of the literary skill building elements of ttrpgs. I started with text rp years and years ago, about 15 years of it to date.

Highly recommend text role play for aspiring Dungeon/Game masters.

Especially when you apply expanding writing techniques to practice with. Like the popular instance of "A man went to the store to buy milk." And turning it into a 500 word story.

[Frederic_S]

Greetings from Germany, very useful tipps. Thank you a lot, Guy.

[Karazaro]

"Body language for us humans, *and for those of you who aren't"* - I feel called out :(

[PerpetualSmile]

Game in a few hours and this is exactly what I needed. Thank you!

[shaunlindsey]

I liked this video. I love doing accents and changing my voice. I've done it my whole life, but it gets tiresome and hurts my throat if I do it all the time, especially now that I'm starting to get older. I'm going to start peppering in description when I'm tired of doing voices.

[Random_Traveler_]

As a mainly text-only GM, I actually have _way_ more experience with this type of dialogue than I do with accents, since I can't really convey accent vocally.

Also, hi, Guy! I've been watching your videos for what seems like ages now, you are my mentor and a great influence on my story-telling/world-building! Thank you for your work, I don't think I'd be the GM I am today without you!

[ADayintheLifeoftheTw]

I like doing accents, but the majority of my players don't appreciate them, so these videos are a great help to flesh out the NPCs in our game. Thank you for all of your hard work.

[johnx]

I also like doing lots of different accents, but this was also useful for me, since describing body language, props, etc., adds a level of detail that can't be conveyed just by a funny voice. Excellent!

[scotthallmusicofficial]

I've been running a cyberpunk red game over zoom and its very difficult to convey these different personalities and tones with those inherent limitations. As always, brilliant video!!