Becoming a Dm

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Hey there everyone!

Ever since I heard of DnD, my mind was captivated by the idea of becoming a Dm. However I don’t have much experince in being a player or creating games. Whilst I have ideas, I am a bit lost when it comes to taking those ideas and crafting them into a proper DnD experince.

Simply playing and reading the Dm and Players handbook are the obvious choice when it comes to learning about, rules, the process of creating and structuring worlds. However if anyone knows about any other books, videos or other forms of information about this topic that could help me, I would really apriciate their help!

Thanks in advance!

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I actually took an online class (I believe it was udemy? one of those video based things) but honestly, it didn’t help much. (I think this was it, but I remember it being cheaper)

What did help was diving into DMing, writing down what went well and what didn’t, and just kind of rethinking the decisions I made on the spot and making mental notes of “broader situations” those little epiphanies applied to.

Also, reading the Monsters Know What they’re doing (at least before running an adventure, not the whole thing) and the proactive roleplaying book - the latter was more helpful in my homebrew campaign, because I’m not good enough at improvising to make most the concepts work in modules, but thinking about what they’re saying is still very helpful.

There are always going to be people who have an easier time because they know the rules better, think fast enough to keep track of everything, are just great at improv or have the time (or set priorities to take the time) to prepare in a really helpful way.

In my opinion, the big thing is: D&D should be about having fun. Everything else is just noise. So find that group of people you can have fun with, play with them, and practice the rest as you go.

That being said: I believe @cat4laugh recently posted about a DM “workshop”, and @Rayce_Kaiser has done similar things too, as has @xaosseed

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i learned through doing and listening to what others did. I feel like a lot of the videos on dming tips are often more helpful after some personal experience. plus if you play and note what dms do that you like and dont its also good.

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If you have read the Dungeon Masters Guide and optionally the players handbook you have already done more than needed. Everything else you will learn while running 10x faster and easier than you would anywhere else.

Be wary of falling into an over prepping trap. “Don’t become addicted to advice” just because you don’t feel like your story is good enough. This is a good watch

A story can simply be about killing a goblin camp to save some villagers, or capturing two wolves. No need to overthink it :slight_smile: your game won’t be perfect but don’t let that be the enemy of good.

And yes I will run a dm workshop soon stay tuned for the announcement

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Mortal, you have summoned the great Under God, Kaiser!! Be prepared to face the consequences!! You will recieve honest feedback and constructive critiscism!! Ooo~oooo More ghost noises.

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Precisely.

‘DM advice’ has become something of a cottage industry these days, to the point where it all sounds complicated and mystical and daunting.

It isn’t. Twelve-year-olds do this successfully. You’ll be fine.

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Thanks for the replies everyone! I’ll check out the books and video. I can already feel that my overthinking is gonna be a problem down the line :sweat_smile:. Anyway thanks again for the advice, and I’ll look forward to the Dm workshop.

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There is a whole big hobby that is “world-building” that DMs, computer game designers and writers share. It can seem like you need to build this whole world with huge backstories before you ever throw dice but this is not true.

To echo others above, it can seem like you need to do lots of complex backstory and world prep first but actually it is better to just run a game or two that are one-shots, simple and straight-forward (rescue the villagers, investigate the mine, etc).

As soon as you start - and even tell people it is your first time, folk are very understanding of that - you will see most of ‘how to DM’ snap into focus as you play. Then, as mentioned above, lots of the other advice will make more sense and you will be able to judge whether it is useful for you and your style…

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It is inevitable to do a lot of mistakes when beginning a new craft and being a DM is no different. Having that said, what made the most impact on my short journey so far is to start small, instead of building a complicated world and imagine a fully layered campaign, start with a simple one-shot that contains something like a village and a forest (or any other geography you want), 1 NPC and that’s it. Good luck!

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Awesome that you’re taking on the great honor of sitting in the DM’s chair hahah xD. I’m still a baby DM myself, running a campaign since April. So while I don’t have the wisdom of a veteran DM like some folks here, I can offer my two cents as a fellow newbie (who has a PhD in watching DnD YouTube videos, if that counts for something). :saluting_face:

Okay, so: It absolutely helps to play a few sessions at VALUE. We have so many great DMs here <3 Through VALUE, I got to experience different DMing styles from different people, which helped me figure out what I like, what works really well, and what I want to adapt for my own games. It also gives you a sense of how pacing works and what to do when things slow down, or how/when to nudge your players along so the game doesn’t bog down.

Pacing (!!) is sooo important, and honestly, books or YouTube videos don’t really teach you that?? I think??? You need to experience it :stuck_out_tongue:

When it comes to storytelling, there are a million great YouTube videos, but one I found particularly helpful is the 3-act method:

What also helped me is taking inspiration from popular media tropes and arcs. Think Lord of the Rings, Marvel’s Infinity Stones storyline, etc. Some might say that’s “”“UnOrIginaL”“”" but clichés are clichés for a reason. Especially as a beginner, sticking to the basics is a good thing! You can always add layers to the story as you go. That’s how I do it at least, espcially by bouncing off my players’ ideas.

Yes. Bounce off your players’ ideas! Listen to what they’re saying. You can usually tell where they want to go next or what they’re interested in. Aaaand bonus point, build the story with their backstories in mind! No matter how epic your story is, what they’ll actually remember are their special moments. <3 Give them their special moments.

A formular that I’ve found also works very well: Motivation + time-crunch. Having goal, even if it’s vague, mysterious, or just a short-term objective PLUS a time limit of some sorts is usually a great way to keep players moving and prevents them from wandering aimlessly.

Lastly, world-building. I don’t really do it, so I can’t say much there ^^’ I use Faerûn as a baseline, but I’ve told my players this is my version of Faerûn, so some things may be different. Maybe that’s something you could try? Or only focus on certain areas first. A friend of mine hosted a one-shot and only had one area built and planned on fleshing the rest out as the story went on.

As the others already said, having a perfectly fleshed out world isn’t necessary to start playing. In my opinion, having a fleshed out world & GoT-level plot isn’t important at all (hot-take). More important is that it feels ALIVE and you give your players stuff to do and find.

On that note, having various encounters and activities ready to pop in as “modules” is super handy! For example, I might have one or two soft-built locations I can throw their way if they need somewhere to go. Or I’ll prep stat blocks for bandits or monsters I think they might run into. Just in case. This comes in especially handy when I’m underpepped xD

Sorry for that rambly wall of text, I hope it helped haha xD

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xaosseed speaks truth. :slightly_smiling_face:

The emphasis here is on: you don’t need to build an entire planet from scratch. But if you enjoy that kind of thing, then go for it. The DM is there to have fun just like everybody else, and if researching backgrounds or designing worlds sounds fun, then by all means do so!

The trap here isn’t creating an elaborate setting, it’s expecting the setting to carry the game. It wont. (Speaking from embarrassing experience here. Once again, apologies to everyone who was bored stiff during the infamous Wisconsin game.)

The setting is just the bowl in which you serve your soup. It’s great if you have a nice bowl, but nobody’s going to care about the bowl if the soup is thin. As Clove said:

That’s the soup.

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Anyway, yeah. Great insight here. (Especially that bit Clove wrote about pacing. It’s true. Nobody has any clue or useful advice to impart. We all just wing it and hope for the best. Don’t tell anyone.)

As for that video …

This is terrible advice.

“You’re probably thinking this isn’t a movie, or a book, and I’m here to tell you: you’re wrong.”

OK, stop right here. This isn’t a movie. This isn’t a book. This is a game. Obviously. Says so right in the title. The players are not a captive audience for your precious story. They are players. Players of a game.

And if you “start to think of your campaign less like a game, and more like a novel or a movie,” well, you’re not going to design a very good game, are you?

Your players are expecting a game. It’s your obligation to give them one. And there are a lot of different ways to make something a game - D&D itself has been several completely different genres of game over its history, and it’s worth exploring those different games - but there has to be an actual game in there somewhere. This is the heart of what we’re doing here.

Want to create a movie? Go write a screenplay.

You’d darn well better start thinking of your campaign as a game.

But let’s go on to the part about “trying to tell a specific story”…

In a nutshell: Don’t do that. Design situations, not plots.

What happens if your story is “dictated by you” (quite the revealing choice of words)? Well, like the man says, you get players “being broody and not taking the bait.” Why do they do that? Nine times out of ten, it’s because they resent the story being dictated by the DM. And then you’re stuck having to have somebody’s brother appear in a dream and beg them to go somewhere, which is about the most desperate form of story-telling imaginable.

And all to get your story back “on track” when it shouldn’t be on a track in the first place. There’s a reason that ‘railroad’ is a pejorative when it comes to RPGs. Don’t make your players feel like they’re stuck in Dürrenmatt’s Tunnel with no way to escape the predetermined plot.

Be wary of random videos!

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By the way, none of this means that you shouldn’t draw inspiration from books or movies. D&D is rooted in fantasy lit anyway. Borrow liberally from whatever you’re reading; just keep in mind that it all has to be framed as a game.

Likewise, it can be helpful to think in terms of potential acts and denouements and that sort of thing. Just be prepared to discard it all if the game moves in a different direction.

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Regarding railroading during a campaign, when it comes to oneshots like the VALUE, is there more room for railroading since we only have 6-5 hours to wrap up the adventure or should I avoid it completly even there?

I’m asking since my idea for moving forward with Dming, is that I’m gonna try to do a few oneshots to test the waters (one that is a bit more combat focused, one that is more Rp oriented and a few mixed ones) and any ideas that I have for a longer campaings I’ll just put on the backburner till then and see how things turn out.

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It definitely helped me with how to even pace a campaign. But I totally agree with this (which is what I took away as a learning from this video):

It can be helpful to think in terms of potential acts and denouements and that sort of thing. Just be prepared to discard it all if the game moves in a different direction.

You shouldn’t rigidly adhere to the 3-act method, hero’s journey, or whatever plot points you plan. If the players will ever reach plot-point X & how they get there IF they even get there… that should be up to them and the dice gods :woman_shrugging:

@Generalhggy My two cents as a player when it comes to one-shots; I’ve found myself enjoying adventures the most that had an ending. Which means that there was sometimes a bit of nudging (nudging, not hardcore railroading!!) involved, otherwise it’s difficult to reach an ending in said time-frame. But that’s just my preference :)) Others may prefer more sandboxy one-shots that may not come to a conclusion in one session.

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Just leaving this here: Cat’s DM Workshop - Effective Session Prep - Arrange a Game - RPG Vienna

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