How to deal with non-geek players?

[Amazon]

So my situation is that I'm the DM of group of friends since high school.

Now that we are in college we had almost no time to play but we plan to change that.

The problem is that my boyfriend and best friend want to join the group and they are not fitting in.

Most of my friends love to make pop culture references and geek jokes... It is a very important part of the game since we can all speak the same language without being judged. And my Bf lived his entire childhood without tv or video games.
He does know a lot about fantasy, he read all from tolkien to lord dunsany. But nothing about games, music, movies or cartoons.

So my friends get uncomfortable since my bf and best friend don't get their jokes. And my bf and best friend get uncomfortable for not getting the jokes and feeling like they don't belong.
What should I do?

[MesiDoomstalker]

Expose your Boyfriend to some of the pop culture that your group references and encourage him to do the same with his friends. Or just wait. Slowly, they will start to understand the references even if not fully. My group has a bunch of references that, to this day I have no idea what their from but I still get a kick out of them. And I've been playing with this group for 7 years. A little bit of patience for everyone and tad bit of initiative for your Boyfriend and friends will go a long way.

[The Fury]

Before I decided to reform and actually be a good player I had a lot of fun saying things that sounded like they could be a reference to something but actually weren't. It confused the heck out of... well, most everyone. Great for putting a Rubala Tooba on the scene though! Am I right?

But on a more constructive note, I've been the one player that had never seen Farscape, played Starcraft or whatever happened to be referenced at the time. After I've been the clueless moron that doesn't get what everyone's talking about enough times, I started to think I ought to dial down my own pop-culture references and inside jokes around newer players. Besides, new inside jokes are likely to come up and they'll actually be in on them.

[Honest Tiefling]

Don't tell your friends to stop, seems like they wish to indulge in a little bit of shameless geekery. But have a little chat with them, and ask them to be more inclusive. Most of them probably know of a book series of two, so perhaps geek out about that so everyone seems involved.

In my opinion, it is quite rude to exclude others in conversation, through I am more understanding that it appears to be a stress thing and people wanting to relax.

Also, if not all friends are present or for different social outings, consider seeing if your boyfriend and your best friend wants to watch a movie while hanging out. There are going to be sessions that not everyone can make it, and presumably, these groups might want to hang out without the game being present.

[Knaight]

I'd suggest suggesting that the group try to skew things a bit more towards books, but this is a self correcting problem to some extent. My group had a similar dynamic, where we had a bunch of computer scientists, and then me, the guy who programs occasionally in Matlab*. So there were a lot of programming references I generally didn't get, up until I started to get them.

*Though that has become "the guy who spends twenty hours a week programming in Matlab" recently.

[Garimeth]

My group is all military, minus one firefighter. Most of us even deployed to the same regions or on the same deployment. We have all worked together at some point. Except Dave, the firefighter. Dave is one guy, Cory's, best friend from middle school and high school. Cory retired from the military recently and moved back home, hit Dave up and asked if Dave could game with us. (We game on Roll20) I said sure.

Now previously our group used a lot of inside jokes. References to deployments, professional jargon, sea stories, jokes about previous campaigns the whole nine. All stuff that outside of the sea stories would go over Dave's head, much like if he started talking EMS it would go over most of our group's heads. The solution wasn't to get Dave "spun up" on military stuff, it was for us to just not be so exclusive. We have had zero issues.

Now granted, if this guy is your boyfriend, you might want to share some of that stuff with him - but it should be for the purpose of sharing things about yourself with him, not helping him fit in with your friends. Similarly your friends shouldn't feel like they can't joke around, but they should understand that maybe it needs to get cut back some, and good friends won't mind.

[ILM]

The group I games with the longest was in college. There were 6 of us geeks, complete social misfits, and one guy who I can only describe as a jock. To this day I still don't quite understand how he landed in our weekly Thursday game.

Best time I've had playing tabletop ever.

Sure, we were literally from different worlds, but after the first games us geeks learned to curb our natural tendencies, he leaned in and started picking up on a few new things that he enjoyed, and more importantly the more it went the less we needed references to outside material since we had an increasing history among ourselves to draw upon.

So like the others said: don't sweat it too much since it'll largely fix itself with a bit of time, and make the process easier by making a small buc conscious effort to keep the references to things they might actually have a chance of understanding (or at least explaining the more obscure ones).

[Nifft]

Best time I've had playing tabletop ever.

Sure, we were literally from different worlds, but after the first games us geeks learned to curb our natural tendencies, he leaned in and started picking up on a few new things that he enjoyed, and more importantly the more it went the less we needed references to outside material since we had an increasing history among ourselves to draw upon.

So like the others said: don't sweat it too much since it'll largely fix itself with a bit of time, and make the process easier by making a small buc conscious effort to keep the references to things they might actually have a chance of understanding (or at least explaining the more obscure ones).

If I'm reading this correctly, it sounds like adding an outsider decreases 4th-wall breaking references and might increase immersion.

That sounds like a pretty positive result (assuming you like immersion more than 4th-wall breaking references).

[Segev]

Simply ask people to explain the jokes. To tell the whole stories behind them.

It may ruin the joke...that time. But it will let people retell old anecdotes and share parts of their zeitgeist culture that repeating would normally bore everybody...because they know about it. Now, though, it's new to somebody, so they can tell it with renewed verve.

Also, if there's a series or movie or something which is mentioned a lot, ask your boyfriend to join you on a date to watch the movie, or to spend a few evenings watching the show with you. Invite his friend(s), if needs be.

There are a number of in-jokes with my current group of friends for which I was absent when they were formed, but I've been "let in" on them and find them at least snicker-worthy. And I've become more than capable of using them, myself, as references.



Of course, this only matters if your boyfriend and his friend are enjoying the game other than this. If they aren't liking gaming...don't force it. But if they are, let them in on the jokes. That's really all there is to it. Invite and encourage those making references to share the full story behind it; if you do it with eager, "you've gotta hear this," attitudes, rather than "guys, come on, he doesn't know about this, don't reference it without telling him" attitudes, it should be uplifting.

[Red Fel]

Simply ask people to explain the jokes. To tell the whole stories behind them.

It may ruin the joke...that time. But it will let people retell old anecdotes and share parts of their zeitgeist culture that repeating would normally bore everybody...because they know about it. Now, though, it's new to somebody, so they can tell it with renewed verve.

Also, if there's a series or movie or something which is mentioned a lot, ask your boyfriend to join you on a date to watch the movie, or to spend a few evenings watching the show with you. Invite his friend(s), if needs be.

There are a number of in-jokes with my current group of friends for which I was absent when they were formed, but I've been "let in" on them and find them at least snicker-worthy. And I've become more than capable of using them, myself, as references.

A whole lot of this.

I can't speak to Greater Geekdom, but in the circles in which I move, Geekdom is defined not only by a passion for X, but a desire and willingness to share that passion with others. That means you'll have to explain the reference from time to time. That should be seen as an opportunity, not an annoyance.

I'm something of an eclectic individual. Among my science friends, I reference fantasy novels. Among my tabletop friends, I reference theater. Among my anime friends, I reference opera. I tend to have more references than friends who know them. But they make references I don't catch, either. And we share interests and references. And we've developed our own references as well, "Remember that time when..." stories and the like.

It sounds like you have a safe, non-judgmental group where everyone just wants to have a good time. That's a great thing. I think right now what you're seeing is what happens when you put two puppies who've never met in a pen together. They take a bit to size one another up, there may even be some tentative growling. But once each realizes that the other isn't a threat, they'll be pouncing each other and biting ears and gnawing faces...

... but in a good way, is my point. Just let them feel each other out, and encourage sharing. And maybe not biting, so much.

[Amazon]

It is all going well now thanks for the tips.

My friends think it is kind of funny how Star wars Darth Vader is luke's father is a spoiler for him. We even lan to post on youtube his reaction to classic movies.

And he is loving to play. It is like a child who can see a whole new world of games and fantasy.

[Pex]

For a date, watch with your boyfriend "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" and "Attack the Darkness." Another time the Lord of the Rings trilogy. That might not cover everything, but it's a good place to start.