DM Tips to other DMs

[Dirty_Boy]

I found this thread when I typed in DM tips into Google. I'm so glad I found it as I have a few good ideas for the upcoming adventure now. Thank you to everyone who put in their two cents.

[Nathanial of DK]

I find that in a game, there are 3 main types of players. The first are promising people who are new to the game. They are interested in it, and also possiby wan't to become a DM at some point. I fint the best way to entertain these people is to show them how everything works. Rather than telling them how to do things, let the try to work out some of the stuff, so they remember it, and understand how it works more. For these people, to much knollege doesn't ruin the enjoyment, it makes it better.

The second type of people are just normal players. The have reached there potential, and are content to have you as DM. For these people, you need well designed dungeons, and lots of monsters. You also shouldn't reveal to much about how your working things out, as it adds to the tension for them. For example, when your doing you rolls for random monsters, or rolls for monsters nearby hearing the group, don't let them know thats what your rolling for. Occasionally, you may wan't to even make a false roll, to throw them off, and make sure they don't recognise any patterns.

The third type of people are temporary players. These are people who are only there because there friends are, or because they have nothing better to do. If you have a group of people like this, it makes your life either easy, or like hell. If your a perfectionist, or are a DM with a playable character, then you may strugle with these people, and i advise you look for another group. If however, you find yourself short of time, or have a stressfull life, then these are the perfect group. All that you need to do to keep these people happy, is to have a interesting, but not complex storyline, have lots of powerfull items, and this bit is important LOWER THE NEEDED EXP FOR THE NEXT LVL. You will find that these type of people will rush through campaines, and will also go through characters quicker than normal. You may find that a character dies every week so because of a rash mistake. If this is happening, you can either lower the needed exp for each lvl, so they get the full experience of the game... or as much as they can, anyway, lol; or you keep major traps and battles out of your campaine, errasing all real threats from your characters lives. This allows the characters to reach a higher lvl than they normally would- possibly even reaching the lvl of a normal player- before they start again.

i hope this helps

[Zaneth]

Don't forget the mountain dew

[Zaneth]

Try to keep things serious, I once had an idiot in the party who, in a joking manner, ran into a wall of poison barbs, killing himself. Everyone laughed...until they encountered an enemy with high magic resistance and therefore needed the fighter who killed himself for ****s and giggles Though in hindsight, DMs should prepare for ****-ups and bend the upcoming parts of the story accordingly (ie: remove the deceased's shining moment if they had one coming).

[BlueMage]

I have been playing D&D for 23 years now, and DMing for about 14 of those years... I don't any more, though, as RL responsibilities (read wife & kids) have eaten up almost all of my free time. BUt from my experience, a few things I cna share are as follows:

1) do not be afraid of humor. don't think, "I can't make a joke right now, it will kill the great tension I've worked so hard to build up". Sure, tension is great, but if every battle puts the characters on the edge of their seats, then it's going to lose its effectiveness. a few well-placed, worldy-appropriate[1] one-liners will go a long way to keeping the balance between when the players are in a fight for ther lives or not.


2) campaigns should not read like a treasure map. First go to town A, then slay monster B. Take cryptic clue C, to crackpot mystic D, who gives you the next piece, etc etc.


3) make sure you have a couple of good plot twists ready to really throw your players... one of my personal favorites is to put the PCs into a situation where they uncover evidence of corruption in the local government, and they decide to expose things, but the problem is, the current government leaders are beloved by the pesants, so teh PCs have to choose between letting things stay as they are adn keep teh majority of the people happy, or turn the entire town/villiage against them by exposing the wrongdoing that's been going on.

4) Don't just read fantasy novels to give you good devices. read comic books, manga (japanese comics), adn other fiction books by mystery/suspense authors, like Crichton, clancy, King, and others. One good practical example of my point #3 above is the japanese manga titled Ubel Blatt (translated from teh German title, it literally means Evil Blade). Go read that.


5) don't just be a DM to your players. if you only get together with your players on game nights, you won't be as effective a DM as if you got together outside of the game for a movie, or to play some basketball...


6) the counterpoint to #5, don't be such good friends with your players that you give them all extra feats, or special weapons, or anything. Being friends doesn't mean allowing the pplayers to trick out their characters into walking Kobold Cuisinarts.


7) require the players to come up with a decent backgrond for their characters. this will give you the ability to rock them individually with a reference here and there. it will make the players be more involved if while in a dungeon, the thief discovers a clue that could help him find the information he needs to clear his family's name...


8) Alignments are there for a reason. if the LG player tortures a prisoner, have something happen that proves that they can't get away with that kind of action. Especially if they're playing a paladin... do the fall from grace thing, and come up with a creative adn long road to repentance for them. Or, more interesting, have them decide that they've had enough playing the goody-two-shoes, adn become an Anti-Paladin...


9) The library is your friend. Go check out past issues of magazines like dragon and DungeonMaster for other ideas.


10) don't consider teh rules to be absolute... I'll never forget the first time my old DM had us encounter a Beholder. He interpreted the anti-magic ray that it shoots out of its central eye as havign the power to permanently nullify magic enchantments adn items. We lost a necklace of Missles adn a Sword +2 Giant-slayer because of that.


I'm going to stop there, because I could go on and on and on, but that's a good start... i'll post more later...

Meantime, a few choice famous Last words that I've heard (either from my players, or from other DMs):

"The minotaur's got me in a bear hug? GREAT! I cast Flame Strike on it"

"I push the red lever, then the blue one... No, WAIT!!!!"

"Do you hear that?"

"What Landshark?"

"Of course I trust the thief. He's in our party"

Game on...

[Pellinore]

I typically am a stingy DM. I have found that if the characters are millionaires by 3rd level then they lose interest rather quick. Whenever they find a huge pile of treasure, remember that 10 coins is a pound in encumbrance, 100 coins is 10 pounds, 1000 coins is 100 pounds. Imagine carrying a 100 pound sack of pennies.... Sure they may find 10,000 silver pieces but how are they going to transport it? Then there are thieves and taxes (thievery in its own right...) to help lighten the PCs load

I do this not to keep them poor but to make them appreciate it when they do get to keep it... I also don't want said 3rd level party saying "*Another* +1 sword??!!" and throw it away.

[Chado2423]

My question is:

What do you do when you have players that want to level their character's up too quickly?

^^Witht the above.. I feel I have been far too lenient... but some of the leniency is campaign based. Of course, I've always told the players that this is temporary, if it was something they wouldn't normally have at their low level.

Also with the above: There is always a way around any mistake you may make.