If I use these rules, then my game group will (1) reward/select for those who enjoy, tolerate, or are-afraid-to-object-to content that some other person might find disturbing and (2) punish those who find certain content distressing by forcing them out if they need to take a time-out more than once because nobody in their supposed-friend group prioritizes their friend in distress over their own brief fun for a scene in a game...it doesn't make any sense! I use actual safety tools because I actually play with people I care about...steer clear of this document if that applies to you. I read this doing my best to assume the author was writing this in good faith, but that part in particular (Tool 4 Freedom to Leave) broke any illusion of that. In my games, I want everyone to have fun--they're games. If people are not having fun, of course I'd want to adjust things! And if they're not just not having fun, but are in fact deeply distressed by something, I'd be an a**h*** to ignore that, but then to punish them for that is just incomprehensible to me. One player wants a brutal mob execution scene to play out when another's family member was killed that way? One PC commits sexual violence against another PC, and despite leaving the game for the session is told on return that this 100% happened in-game no matter their feelings about it? These rules don't address many situations I personally know of having happened. "Common courtesy" out-of-game is nice and all, but those who perpetrate these sorts of behaviors tend to argue "oh it's all in-character" and blame everyone else for "being unable to handle" reality vs. game separation. In LARPing communities, we call this "bleed"--and it's pretty universally recognized that it's essentially impossible to 100% compartmentalize, hence most LARPs having extensive safety tools. Big red flag against any player or GM who values a minute of provocative description over the mental peace of their friends and fellow players. These "tools" do allow for the GM to communicate things at the beginning of the campaign, but there is no opportunity for the players to communicate anything they are concerned about--nor is there any way for things to be resolved if the GM didn't communicate properly (far more likely than not). My personal thing is that I can't hear vomiting sounds (acted out or sound effects) or listen to a vivid description of vomiting without actually vomiting myself--but these rules don't account for this or many other situations, so woe to the carpet of whoever is hosting game I guess. Normally, this comes up during a session zero using actual safety tools, so it generally works out. Finally, according to this, game > campaign > all else; if I want that experience, I'll just play a video game. For GMs that value the campaign above the players, just go write a book already.

Then again, maybe everybody should read this; that way, if you join a game where the GM introduces these tools, you can know to steer clear.

I would give this more stars, but none of the PDFs I downloaded are fillable. Please fix and I will revise my review (if the site lets me). The one labeled "fillable" has some selectable lines that I think they meant to be the fillable fields, but they don't permit typing. I tested in Nitro PDF Pro, Preview (Apple), and Adobe Acrobat vs. other fillable PDF sheets I have. As it is, I like the design! For a one-pager. It would be cool to have another version that is at least two pages--I prefer to have more room to write things--but that's not required :). My other suggestion would be to have a version with a background grid in a lighter gray color so it's easier to read handwriting over it in thin black pen. Update as of 1/18/2024: Fillable version is still not fillable. Seems like they thought they fixed it to make it fillable, but they didn't, apparently not testing it and they didn't check back with the discussion thread, either, so seeing if editing this prompts them to fix it.