Our hosts are parents of small children, and we wait until their bedtime, which is about 8PM. The TV goes off just before that.

Our biggest distraction is our laptops and wireless Internet. I’m especially vulnerable to that myself. Right now, however, I’m reffing, so it’s not a game killer. I’m not happy with my own bad habit, but I know how to fix it: Turn off my AirPort!

That said, the biggest annoyance for me is volume. I understand that conversations come up. We’re friends and a few of us will get off on tangents. But when a tangent between two people gets so loud that no one else can hear what the DM is saying, then I get pissed. So, I guess it’s not really an annoyance, it’s an outright pet peeve. Please, be respectful of everyone else who is trying to LISTEN to what the GM is saying, kthxbye.

And yes, I readily admit to being as bad as anyone else at this. Sorry to all my GMs over the years…

There’s no TV at my house and no cell reception, so we don’t have to worry about those distractions! Really, the only distraction besides table talk is the use of laptops by players to keep notes/journal info or to look up information from scanned books. Since there’s no internet access, the laptops haven’t become a problem.

The second largest distraction is player laptops. I’m not really considering banning them, but have been known to request focus be on the game rather than WoW.

One big distraction our group has is food preparations. Two of the guys love to cook, and we usually game up until dinner time, so they’ll be getting up and putting things in the oven during the game. They both do their best to make it fast, so it’s not a big deal.

People dropping by who aren’t in the game is a big irritation. I don’t mind if someone wants to come, hang out, and make badass drawings of the party members – we have a guy who does just that, and it’s great. But when that guy comes, hangs out, and works on another art project that takes up table space while he does nothing but distract people, then it gets very annoying. All we need is a little peace and quiet in one small room – I don’t think it’s too much to ask, especially from people who don’t even live in the house. One particular housemate who doesn’t game is a problem. He likes to lurk in the room while deliberately looking judgemental, which makes roleplaying immersion rather difficult.

No TVs or anything like that – none of us want that kind of distraction. We’re not exactly a hardcore group, but we do see gaming as a time apart, an activity that should be separated from everything else going on in our lives.

Our GM and another player are both parents, and a few of us players were kids living with our parents, so we all realized that family came first.

Smoking wasn’t a problem, since the GM smoked in the house, and players could too. But when we’d play at another player’s house, we would take breaks to smoke or munch.

a) learning about social interaction
b) becoming interested in RPGs at an early age
c) are too young to really understand that they are providing a distraction

This is just part of being a parent and the GM. You have to learn how to handle it without causing the group or your child problems. I try my best to teach my children that the game is time for daddy and his friends to relax and that children can’t play the game, but I also run simpler games for them from time to time that are only for them.

If a player has a problem with my kids I try to address it, but if a player acts like an asshole in regards to my kids occasionally distracting me from the game that player is leaving my game. One guy said I had to “dope up” my kids because they were singing in another part of the house and that was ruining the mood. I and the other players all just looked at him and noted that none of use had even noticed until he pointed it out. He had other complaints like this and didn’t seem to like kids in general. That guy was asked to leave.

Seriously, my kids over D&D or whatever we are playing? Sorry D&D, you lose.

Cell phones – I’m on call 24 hours a day/7 days a week. I make sure to limit my calls on game night and work related emails as well. You can have your cell phone at my game, but if I can limit my work requirement for having it you sure as hell can limit your personal desire to have it during game night.

That said when I game at home, guess who is more potentially a target for interruptions than anyone? That’s right, it’s me. My SO is mindful that multiple interruptions are bad — but who can stop a 3 year old from barging in? No one.

The most distracting thing at a gaming table (in my experiences) are small children, pets, and unexpected company gawking at “whatever the hell we are doing at the table.” Most of us do not have kids and those of us that do are able to leave them with their better half during the session. Pets haven’t been an issue with the current group. There have been a couple of times, with my current group, where people not playing the game were a bit of a distraction — But only one case where I wanted to bury someone in the backyard.

Public gaming is always going to have distractions to some degree or other — ALWAYS. Private gaming is not near as troublesome, especially when precautions are made to minimize any potential distractions. Cell phones haven’t been too much of an issue with us, although a call comes in now and then.

One thing that helps get people ready though is we have a catch phrase that signals “Game on” (the phrase is actually the GM saying “When last we left our heroes…” with all players responding “Yay”). It might sound ridiculous but some kind of signal let’s everybody know it is time to get their heads in the game.

Polaris actually has a very nice mechanism for this where you must state a particular phrase to signal the beginning and end of play. I think these things help.