D&D 5E Oh, Man, Do I Need Some DM Tips. . .

Shiroiken said:

Some of the mechanics are going to affect how dynamic a combat can be, even if it's less than the value of terrain. 3E was actually the worst for it, because it generally assumed miniatures and there were advantages to getting into a particular position and staying there (flanking and attacks of opportunity). 4E also generally assumed miniatures, but the mechanics generated a more dynamic combat (due to various forced movement and several movement powers). AD&D could be better for dynamic combat, depending on if you used miniatures or Theater of the Mind, because Theater of the Mind allowed for the most dynamic combats of all. 5E fits somewhere in the middle of all that, since positioning still matters even in TotM, but lacks 4E's constant movement that generated very dynamic combats.

Good use of terrain can make even a 3E combat fairly dynamic, but you should always consider the cost/benefit ratio. If it takes you a long time to make dynamic fights with terrain (which was often true in 3E), you should probably limit it to important combats. Adding one or two terrain features should take almost no time at all, but add some flavor to the combat, even if it doesn't make it very dynamic. Otherwise the combat sucks, as a DM of mine found out when every combat he ran was on a featureless grid (because he didn't think terrain should matter). Something else that can affect this is running a per-published adventure, as the OP is doing with RotRL, where combat locations are often already made (and designed for the style of the original edition).

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I don't really want to get into a back and forth over editions so I'll just say that I also saw many fights in 4e, especially at the lower levels, degrade into fairly static battles because the terrain itself didn't reward forced movement (I mean you can push/pull/slide/etc. just because but IMO that's not really a dynamic combat). I think there has to be an incentive to use actions that promote dynamism in any edition or it's going to bog down to standard hit and damage tactics. Is it easier to prompt this type of combat in 4e rather than 3e...I'd sat probably yes (thought I'd argue 5e does a pretty good job of incorporating non-static features/spells into it's game as well) due to the various push/pull/shove powers but there still has to be a reason to use them (as opposed to say a power with bigger damage numbers) and that reason is usually terrain. I feel the same way about 5e's movement rules, some of it's Battlemaster maneuvers, Cunning Action, etc... if you give incentive players are going to utilize the fact that they can move, hide, move others, dash, etc. before or after attacks however if you don't they are going to go with hit and damage tactics because there's no reason not to.

pontinyc said:

Man, I was horrendous.

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Don't beat yourself up. I've been gaming for over 35 years, mostly as the GM. I've had many, many sessions over the years that just didn't work. Whether due to exhaustion, life priorities, or something else, it happens. Heck, we just scrapped our current game of two years because we realized that a couple of people had ended up with characters they hated (slow evolution from marginal starting concepts).

1.) I REALLY want to bring a much stronger RP element to the game while they. . . don't. Ends up with my describing too much and in too much depth. However, a meta game that just involves number crunching is extremely boring to me and I want to have some fun, too.

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Discuss this with the group. I tend to prefer heavier RP, while most of my group wants to either a) just kill stuff or b) get more toys. There's a balance point and pretty much everyone agrees that memorable characters will have some sort of personality. The exact balance point will depend on your group. But, don't overdo the conversation -- IME, RP-focused folks have a much, much higher tolerance for conversations about how to build character personalities, tie into the campaign setting, etc. than those who are more gamist.

There may be an actual incompatibility, though it's unlikely. In that case, you need to decide whether you are willing to run the sort of game they want. It's OK if you can't. The GM should be having fun, too. Maybe someone else can DM and you'd be fine playing a more casual game. Maybe a different system would change the perspective. It's no one's "fault", though. Try to make it work, but don't inflict pain on anyone. Hopefully, a group of friends will reciprocate.

2.) I thought I was prepared but continually forgot to track advantage, fear, use of spells, etc. This led to pretty decent pauses in the flow of combat occasionally.

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I forget these a lot, too. Using some sort of combat tracker or system helps. I use a DM5E, but just having a reliable paper system works, too. I've even made open notes on the battle mat because it's not like everyone isn't aware when a character is magically feared. Try different things until stuff starts to click.

3.) I allowed the combat to devolve into a bunch of people whacking each other while stationary until someone ran out of hit points.

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I haven't had this problem in 5E. There's not a ton of movement, but enough that it isn't completely static.

4.) Because of an insane smite crit from the paladin, the BBEG never got off an actual attack. While she had a lot of hit points, she was constantly playing catch up. This led for a really anticlimactic encounter.

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Poop happens. This sort of thing has happened to me more than once. It's frustrating, but part of the game. It actually makes the PCs feel pretty good, though.

5.) I didn't end on a cliff-hanger so the session ended somewhat antimactically, as well.

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Cliff-hangers and whatnot aren't manditory. Some might even question their benefit. Even if you like them, they don't have to happen every game.

I realize that I'm writing issues that seem directly solvable but the real issue here is that I think that I'm all ready to address these things prior to play and in prep, etc., and yet they keep somehow happening. Any help here would be wildly appreciated, thank you![/QUOTE]

I forgot to mention some advice I gave my wife years ago when she started DMing.

The DM's goal is to set up a game that is fun for the players, with their own enjoyment secondary. You may be besotted by your lovingly created BBEG, but the only point of the BBEG is to set up a challenge for your players. A challenge they will hopefully destroy without mercy.

Keep that in mind that your fun comes from giving your players surmountable challenges. How easy it is to overcome those challenges depends on your group.

Except for the bit on cliffhangers, I agree with [MENTION=6788736]Flamestrike[/MENTION]. And that disagreement is mostly due to use of the word "sparingly." I think most sessions should end on a cliffhanger unless you're wrapping up the adventure (and even then sometimes a cliffhanger will set up the next one). So, cliffhanger like crazy in my view unless it's completely antithetical to the campaign theme you have in mind.

I will add that the actual play videos you (the OP) referenced aren't particularly good examples of DMing in my opinion. You can pick up a few things from them, sure, especially as it relates to creating colorful NPCs, but there are lot of things they do which causes problems in my experience. Among those things is a propensity to describe what the players want to do for them. As an example:

Player: I attack the orc. *rolls* 21. *rolls* 10 slashing.
DM: You dodge to the side to get around the orc's greataxe, then leap up, swing your sword in a deadly overhead arc, the blade gleaming from the light of the fires around you. It connects and blood sprays from a sickening wound as the orc warrior dies.
Player: Cool. I move over here. Done.

Does that look familiar?

You questions are ones shared by many new GMs. I produce a podcast that is all about helping new GMs (and more experienced GMs) improve their craft. I've had episodes addressing most, if not all, of the topics you mention, and far more extensively than I could (or would want to) on a forum. I hope you'll check it out, and if you still have questions afterward, let me know, and I'd be happy to address them on the show.

So much good advice here. As a relatively new DM, I appreciate it. I don't have much to add, except for the resource tracking. This is something I struggled with as well. I'm got at keeping story elements in my head, but found it challenging to track combat. The evolution of my combat tracking over the past two years has progressed from:

1. Initiative tents with a picture of the character on one site and a few key stats on the other (passive perception, AC, etc.)

These would hand on the DM screen. I learned of the idea from a WoTC recorded-play session and then found DM David's template.

2. Paizo's Combat Pad

I learned about this at a convention where the DM of one of the games used it. It is magnetic and wet erase. Great for tracking initiative, HP, readied actions, effects, etc.

3. Hero Lab

I have the SRD and the community-created content, which is pretty darn complete for 5e now. Hero Lab has been a life changer as the party has advanced in level and monster powers have become more complicated. It is nice to have all the NPC and PC stats right in front of me. The combat tracker makes it easy to track initiative. I especially like the spell slot tracking.

I've since ditched the DM screen and initiative tents and I mostly use Hero Lab, but I do still continue to get a lot of use out of the Paizo combat pad. Some combats are so mechanically simple, that it doesn't make much sense to prepare the encounter in HL. Also, for random encounters or encounters that occur becuase the PCs do something you didn't expect, I'll often just open up to the adversaries statblock in the relevant monster manual and run it from the combat pad.

I also use various physical items to indicate status. I have a bunch of brightly colored, rubber bands that are circles a bit thicker and bigger than dental binders that I can put on a miniature. Gale Force 9 has nice status tokens, but it would be expensive to buy enough sets for use with all NPCs in a battle. Litko and Alea Games sell other status and area of effect markers that can be helpful in a game.

1.) the strongest RP elements come from meaningful decisions, not prose. Extra words does not mean extra roleplay. Therefore, on each player's turn, endeavor to identify their goal, place an obstacle between them and their goal and then ask what they do about it? The more regularly you do this, the more meaningful decisions they make that flesh out their characters. Later, when you're good at this, you can work on getting tricky. For now, focus on putting things in the way and asking "what do you do?"

2.) If you don't have time in your prep to create battle plans for your monsters (or read stat blocks in your published encounters) make life easier by using more straightforward baddies. Those without spells, generally. On their turns they use their nastiest attack on the closest adventurer. This should last for about 2-3 sessions so you get comfortable reading stat blocks quickly and having baddies act on their turns without pauses. This is a skill. Nastiest attack, closest adventurer. Then, when you're comfortable at moving baddies along on their turns quickly, you're going to start changing their tactics. On the baddie's turn, you ask yourself what it wants out of this situation and what's the best thing to do to get what it wants. Then you do that. Still with fairly straightforward baddies. Another 2-3 sessions of this before you start introducing complex monsters. Add 1 to an encounter with straightforward monsters. The complex baddie will start by using its nastiest attack on the closest adventurer. After a couple sessions, you can start asking yourself what it wants and what's best for it to do. But at first, nastiest versus closest. These are skills. Nobody starts good at them. You must train.

3.) Ah encounters. At the start, it's okay that they seem to devolve into HP attrition. You've got to learn their basic format, taking turns, tracking stuff, moving from player to monster to player. But when you've got that down, you need to start asking yourself what purpose the encounter serves. Why are we having this fight? What's at stake? What do they players want? What do their enemies want? You're going to want to start posing questions to yourself like a wartime newsreel. "Will our boys reach the bridge before ol' Gerry?" Questions like that tell you when your encounter ends. See, the HP of a baddie only tells you when that baddie is dead or done fighting. HP tells you nothing about your encounter. The purpose of the encounter tells you when you need to end it. And you need to end it no later than when your newsreel question is answered. "They made it to the bridge" means that encounter is done. Generally, your encounter has run long when your players repeat the same action round to round. You're just bookkeeping at that point. Instead, when it seems like victory is clear, say "You make quick work of the rest of them and move on."

4.) BBEG fights are often anti-climactic bc many DMs fail to have a purpose for the encounter and fail to consider what the BBEG wants to accomplish. Drama doesn't happen when good guys and bad guys get together. Drama happens when two people want the same thing but only one can have it. Or when opposing parties want mutually exclusive things. Train up your skills running regular baddies in regular encounters. Train up placing obstacles. Train up setting stakes in an encounter. Then your BBEG won't be playing catchup. You'll have drama.

5.) Cliffhangers don't just happen. You can't even have them unless you know what happens next. That sort of thing is the result of long term planning. Don't end every session with a cliff hanger. For now, end every session with a question. When you become very familiar with story structures, your campaign world, and the desires of your NPCs, then you can mess around with cliff hangers. Before that, its haphazard and hack.

6.) some folks want to say "D&D doesn't do X or Y" or something something about design philosophy. That's waffle. It's what comes of using the rules before using your brain and then blaming weird or undesirable outcomes on the system. When if we'd only used our brains first, we might've actually gotten the outcomes we wanted. Whatever.

Anyway. All this stuff is a skill and it's okay to be bad at it. Just do better than you did last time and you're solid gold.

Oh, one last thing. Don't tell the players what their characters do. Make them tell you instead. That's why we ask "what do you do?" And why we follow up with "ok, cool, how?"

I attack the wizard
"Ok, cool, how?"

I track the fleeing baddie.
"Great, how?"

Once you know what they want and how they try to get it, you can then ask for ability checks and think about what obstacles to place between them and their goals. Make these questions a habit. They pay off big.


-Brad

At the end of each session, write down
"Session x. Best Part:"

Study those and nudge your game in that direction.

mflayermonk said:

At the end of each session, write down
"Session x. Best Part:"

Study those and nudge your game in that direction.

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This is pretty good advice... I would add to it and say ask your players what they felt was the best part as well... if it's one thing I've learned as a DM, it's that often we are much harder on ourselves than our players are.

Bawylie said:

2.) If you don't have time in your prep to create battle plans for your monsters (or read stat blocks in your published encounters) make life easier by using more straightforward baddies. Those without spells, generally. On their turns they use their nastiest attack on the closest adventurer. This should last for about 2-3 sessions so you get comfortable reading stat blocks quickly and having baddies act on their turns without pauses. This is a skill. Nastiest attack, closest adventurer. Then, when you're comfortable at moving baddies along on their turns quickly, you're going to start changing their tactics. On the baddie's turn, you ask yourself what it wants out of this situation and what's the best thing to do to get what it wants. Then you do that. Still with fairly straightforward baddies. Another 2-3 sessions of this before you start introducing complex monsters. Add 1 to an encounter with straightforward monsters. The complex baddie will start by using its nastiest attack on the closest adventurer. After a couple sessions, you can start asking yourself what it wants and what's best for it to do. But at first, nastiest versus closest. These are skills. Nobody starts good at them. You must train.

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I find that I generally have all the time in the world to plan my monsters moves given how slow the players can be at choosing their combat action. So my advice would be: always be thinking about what your monsters are going to be doing on their turn while the players are taking their turns. Then you'll be ready to respond when your initiative slot(s) comes up.