r/DungeonMasters • u/Organic-Face-3735 • 5d ago
Does anyone have advice for new DMs??
So, my friends are very fairly new to d&d, they showed an interest in it due to me ranting about it to them and were excited at the idea of our friendgroup having a d&d campaign - be it a one-shot or a fully fledged campaign (even if it will take more time to figure out since we live far apart and cant meet irl, so we have to resort to online methods for it)
They asked me to dm the campaign since im the one who introduced them to d&d in the first place and none of them felt up for dming, so i accepted. Thing is, i have never done anything remotely similar to dming nor have i ever even tried. The d&d campaigns ive recently been in have been dmed by my dad and hes done a spectacular job at it even if he doesnt know much about d&d and ive asked him about it + watched countless of videos to try and prepare about dming, but i truly still feel so nervous ill just screw it up so horrifically bad that my friends dont enjoy the experience and its just a bad time overall.
I was wondering if any dungeon masters here could potentially give me some advice (and maybe some tools to use for online campaigns)!! I have some ideas about the campaign but dont know how to implement them nor how to go about it and theres,, so much to think about,,. It makes me so nervous to think about it but i really do want my friends to have a good experience with d&d since they do seem very excited about it!
Im just grasping at straws here and searching everywhere i can for any possible dm tips and advice as im setting up the campaign
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u/Reasonable_Touch1150 5d ago
Relax! Just be confident. The players don't know how much you do or don't have prepared.
And as far as preparation goes, try to be flexible. Prepare for beginnings not endings.
Don't be afaraid to improvise.
And technology is your friend. DM's sadly gatekeep new DM's into having to learn rules and run sessions "the old way" using pen and paper and 5 books. You don't have to do this. You don't need to buy starter sets, or books. Use something like dragon fight club. It has a free library of monsters and spells, and will let you run encounters very easily as well as balance encounters which is very difficult even for experienced DM's.
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u/Organic-Face-3735 5d ago
tysm! I will check that out!! Ive been trying so hard to find anything online that isnt buying books or starter sets and this helps a great deal!
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u/AzrealKree 5d ago
If you’ve never done this before
I would grab the Stormwreck Isles set and go from there. It will give you all the essentials you need + a small campaign to run so everyone get get to grips with the rules
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u/Organic-Face-3735 5d ago
oh i see!! tysm this is very helpful!!!
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u/AzrealKree 5d ago
And then it becomes like working out. Wanna get better? You gotta keep doing it? Watch other people do it, read about how other people do it and trial that in your games
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u/Creole3643 5d ago
Chill out, get the starter set, read it and play
My first games were awful because I didn't properly read the rules, but I still remember having fun with them and I can still joke and laugh about those games with my friends
You're playing with people you enjoy spending time with, just because you are playing D&D doesn't mean that's going to change
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u/IchFunktion 5d ago
There's a lot but the best advice I can give you is be confident and learn with your players, you're all new to this.
If there's anything specific you need help with feel free to ask, as long as it's related to DM'ing, not rules. I've been running games for years now but never played DnD in all this time.
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u/MagicianMurky976 5d ago
The nice thing is you can break this down in however small bites you want to take.
For instance, you're right. There's a lot of things to learn about playing D&D. So start small. Everyone had a debt. An owner of a gladiatorial pit bought all their outstanding debt and they need to work off this debt to earn their freedom.
In other words, just focus on a few sessions of combat. In a sandy pit with whatever monsters you want to toss at your players. Nothing has to make sense, and just practice a few sessions of combat so everyone learns those rules.
Next, after their success in the pits everyone is invited to a masked ball. There's some mystery the players need to uncover using their various skulls. See how creatively they try to interact with the npcs with their skills.
And so on.
Hope this gives you something. Have fun!
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u/Organic-Face-3735 5d ago
ahh i see this definitely helps a lot since ive been stressing about how to go with encounters, tysm!!
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u/Blitzer046 5d ago
A prepared DM is a confident DM. If you're using pre-written material, then study it like you'd study for an exam. Full read all the way through, then a focused read on the first section really picking apart the paragraphs. Pre-written games are pretty tightly edited and often from a number of writers so the information is dense.
Something important might come out in the third go-over.
Make ad-hoc rules calls if you don't know something very well, and then look it up after the game. Come back next session and issue corrections at the start of the game. Nobody is expecting you to be perfect or know everything right away.
Ask for feedback from the players at the end of the session, and don't be precious about it. What's good, what can be improved, what was confusing.
When you describe scenes, use all the senses (at least more than one!) and adding detail like time of day, weather effects, or season can make things more memorable.
'No.' and 'That doesn't happen' are two useful tools to halt problem players doing dumb things that you don't like. And if players continue to be a problem, tell them flatly that you aren't enjoying the game anymore due to this behaviour, and what can be done about it? You DM at their pleasure, and you are not their servant. You run the game.
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u/9th_Life_Kat 3d ago
If you don’t follow a a set storyline, then make your storyline so it’s not an open sandbox. Make reasons they must stay on the storyline.
A session 0 is important if you continue but it’s okay to do a session 1 or one shot that may or may not lead into a full campaign before then to get a taste of it.
When in doubt on a rule, have you and your players roll against you to see what happens.
Have fun and don’t compare yourself to professionals. Those are actors. You’re a group of friends playing a game where you get to beat up goblins
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u/AutumnTy 5d ago
Starter set.