10 Tips For New Dungeon Masters
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Anyone that has had the idea of running their own dungeons and dragons game has all been there. We all started from the same place whether the dungeon master is Matt Mercer from Critical Roll or your best friend in middle school. Being a Dungeon Master for the first time is both intimidating and overwhelming. But it doesn’t have to be, worry no longer as these 10 tips will make any beginning dungeon master level up!
1. Read Through How To Create A Character And Make Some
Wait, I wanted to learn to be a dungeon master not a player character. One of the most helpful things that I figured out after years of struggling to create characters on my own was sitting down and learning how to do it.
You would be amazed at how much of the core mechanics and rules of the game that get picked up by doing this. A dungeon master that learns what characters are made of are inherently more aware of what the players can do in the game as well as just get a basic idea of what power levels might be and what items are generally out there to pick from.
So if you want to be a dungeon master, try creating a couple characters. As an added bonus, these can be help onto and given to any new players that want to join in for a single session and get and idea of what the game is like. You have them forever.
2. Get An Idea Of The Rules
There is no way around it. If you do not have an idea of the rules to the game, being the dungeon master is not going to go over well. Being willing to commit time and read the rules is a good place to start even if you have been playing as a player character for awhile.
While making characters is a great way to really pick up the concept of items spells and overall character archetypes, reading the rules will paint the missing picture for what really makes a dungeon master decent to great.
3. Take Content From Other Books
Not a fan of prewritten campaigns, that’s fine, but consider taking portions from these books and running with them and changing them to fit your own stories. The bonus here is that combat is really easy to get an idea for and after a couple setups, a clear sense of what makes combat fun starts to become really clear as well as the combat dynamics of the party that your are the dungeon master for.
This extends to dungeons, getting an idea of how to place traps of reading the flavor text of dungeons from prewritten campaigns can be a great way to come up with your own scenarios. It’s probably a good idea as a first time dungeon master to just simply go with a pre written campaign, this will teach you the normal campaign structure, dungeon styles and role playing and descriptive actions.
Not having to come up with this on your own will leapfrog you forward in learning to be a good DM.
4. Prepare Yourself
Prepare for the combat sessions that could potentially come up for the session so it appears that you are fully prepared and the combat will go pretty smoothly. Also having good name banks for areas that the players will be in or know characters that they interacted with in the past that they might come into contact with again. A prepared dungeon master is a great dungeon master.
5. Be Descriptive
The thing that makes a Dungeon Master really feel robotic to me is when they are not very descriptive.
It may seem hard at first to be descriptive when describing areas, but the more words and description a player gives, the less wok they have to do to get the scene set in the minds of the players.
The awesome thing about dungeons and dragons is that your words are what paints the scene in your players head, so make it cool and not flat.
Another part of being descriptive is voice acting.
I know this is not for everyone. But if you want to talk about a very quick way to get your players invested into the session, this is a must. It completely changes the feel of the game and gives each created character some depth that description alone would not be able to achieve.
6. If The Players Make Something Fun, Go With It
Don’t railroad your players to what you have envisioned the entire campaign to be around, let there be some diviation that makes the campaign feel much more organic. It’s very easy to tell when a campaign is railroaded and that takes away from some of the fun and actually creates more work for the dungeon master in the end anyways. Railroading is an easy way to get frustrated with your time and effort you put into the campaign when the game should just be a really fun time at the end of the day.
7. Build Off Each Experience
Every session there are new challenges, but the more things that you learn as a dungeon master the faster you improve to the point where not much intimidates you anymore as a dungeon master and it becomes much more about the story telling then the rule learning. Once you hit a critical mass of rules that come up the most, the enjoyment of being a DM becomes easy.
8. Have a Dungeon Master Screen
Speaking of rule learning, this is the easiest way to get those rules front and center so you don’t have to learn so much at once. Having a screen does a multitude of things. It can hide any die role fudging to make the game more interesting or allow for a players epic description to play out of their attack.
It’s also a good place to stage your combat for when it starts. I like to hang the initiative order using paper tents on the top of the screen so the order is clear and for me, and my players to reference.
Many pre made DM screens are also created to fit some prewritten campaigns, for instance, I used one for Curse of Strahd and with it came specific maps to the setting as well as random encounter tables and name banks.
Having this tool as a quick reference will really smooth out the game, and plus, who doesn’t enjoy sitting behind one?
You can pick up a basic one for yourself by Wizards of the Coast with our affiliate link.
9. Get The Appropriate Materials
Now that we have discussed the Dungeon Master Screen, let’s go over what should really be behind it aside from your stockpile of dice.
Be sure to bring along some notebooks, some highlighters and some pencils. It’s also good to have some paper that can be used for combat to show the initiative order that can be placed on top of your DM Screen.
Being prepared with the items that you need to record information will really benefit you later on as players potentially re encounter some characters that you need to remember the name to order the story and what the players are done.
10. Have Fun
Let people have fun. Let people eat, and drink. This is a game, and everyone should be having fun. Dungeons & Dragons is the game of escape for a lot of people. Some of the most memorable times that I have played Dungeons & Dragons stemmed from just the fun that I had with the rest of the group and the willingness of the Dungeon Master to allow things to happen.
If you are able to step back a little and let the players move the story along as well, it will organically make the entire process better. Being a Dungeon Master is all about giving and taking where necessary to at the end of the day, make sure that everyone at the table is having fun and wants to come back for more.
If you found this article helpful comment below and let us know. What was your first experience being a Dungeon Master like? For more Dungeons & Dragons content or board game content, be sure to check back here for more!
