speech

“Em-Fā-Siss on the Wrong Sa-Lab-El”*

I have always had some issues with speech. It started when I would mouth through the words I just spoke. I got called out on it several times by my family and eventually broke that habit. After that, I started slurring my words together. Let me tell you, no one understands you when you mumble. I have now found myself stumbling over words.

If you have been watching, you have heard several misspoken words, wrong word order, and very bad grammar. Over the last year, I have learned to embrace it. Words just don’t work for me most of the time (hence why my novels are still tucked away). Scripting what I should say even fails me at times, and I am particularly bad and going “off-script” anyway.

As a GM, there is nothing wrong with this. So what if I said “brassiere” instead of “brazier” (episode 30), we got a good laugh from it, and OMG the imagery! The discussions on how to pronounce “foyer” are endless. Even the professionals get twisted, just check out how Matt Mercer says “sigil.”

Streaming has made me even more aware of this. All my mishaps are forever immortalized in video format for all the world to see. If you struggle with saying words, or have any speech issues, do not let that stop you from taking the GM role. Yes, it does require you to speak more to share the lore, set the scene, describe other characters that may be encountered, but go with it. The more you do this, the more comfortable you’ll become, and you may get a few memorable moments with your players in the process.

* https://torawriting.com/english-is-weird/