Purposeful Session Reports

Play reports are a vital part of the TTRPG hobby but there is a lot of unclear communication around the purpose of the play report. If you understand why you're writing play reports, you can write a better, more useful play report that accomplishes the stated goal. Here are a few purposes for play reports that answer the question "Why would I write a play report?" alongside some advice towards writing with this goal in mind: To Remember The Game: Writing a play report which includes a play-by-play of the game aids in solidifying and reinforcing the collective memory of the group. This is one function of a play report that allows them to be written by a player and not a referee, since everyone at the table should be able to relate what happened during the session. The only caveat to this is that a player might not know everything that happens, since the referee could have hidden information that the players don't have (though in my experience recording the public information makes it…