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Improving as a DM?
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<blockquote data-quote="Rechan" data-source="post: 4743229" data-attributes="member: 54846"><p>As far as seeking advice from what your players want, I know hwo that can be. Some people are incapable of giving critique, others are just easily satisfied ("Hey, I jsut want to come and roll dice and socialize.") However, if your friends are just too polite, you could take one aside between sessions, and ask, "So, do folks say anything about my DMing away from the table?" </p><p></p><p>A lot of folks have contributed what I was going to say. But here's a few things:</p><p></p><p>1) Try different things. Look back at what you have done in previous adventures, and ask yourself, "What have I <strong>not</strong> been doing?" If it's been, for instance, heavy dungeon crawling, avoid that for a session or two. Do some "You need to broker peace between these two groups" or, suddenly it's an adventure about being stuck in one place, and the tension slowly ratcheting up (like <em>The Thing</em>). </p><p></p><p>Variety is important. Although, be aware that when you are going to do certain things, there are aspects. Horror (depending on what type of horror) has a lot of atmosphere to it, and it takes a <em>lot</em> of practice to implement it well. It's tone of voice, pacing, how much you reveal when, etc. Same with intrigue and mystery - it's Not Easy, so it takes practice. </p><p></p><p>The caveat here is that be sure it doesn't come across as a total about-face for the game. If, for instance, the game has been very "Good Vs. Evil" with very black and white terms, suddenly dropping moral ambiguity in there might confuse your players because "We assumed this is how the game works" (See the thread about Realism as an example of consistency and suspension of disbelief). </p><p></p><p>However, if you do want to drastically change things, it's easy to just do a one-off adventure. "You all are peasants, with NPC stats. Here are your characters. And now, let us play <em>Night of the Living Dead</em>. Let's see if you survive." </p><p></p><p>2) Think About it Constantly. That's usually how I develop an adventure; I just keep thinking about it and polishing it up. For instance, if I get a module and I look at it and keep thinking about it, eventually I'll think of a better way to do it, or a different way, or a way to change it so it's more interesting to <em>me</em>. Like "Hmm, this villain's motivation is a little bland. I'll change that." </p><p></p><p>On that same note, never run a module fresh out of the box. Look it over, think about how to change it to suit your needs, the needs of your group, how to make it more interesting, etc. </p><p></p><p>3) Read Everything you Can, even that which is unrelated to D&D. Inspiration for things can come from whole other sources. Movies, books, video games. </p><p></p><p>Not only that, but real world things. There are tons of sites about "Real world wonders!" Check those out, and drop one into your game. Reading up on strange real world cultures lets you drop interesting things into That Tribe of Elves Over There. Seeing things about History lets you see how things might progress, or useful implementations of things ("Hannibal went over a large set of mountains with lots of elephants in order to sack Rome. Army with weird animals traveling long distances for surprise attack! Hmm.")</p><p></p><p>Additionally, real life experiences can give you stuff to flesh out NPCs. If you want this NPC here to be comedic relief, think about who you've met/seen, and drop in traits of that person on that character. </p><p></p><p>4) Look at Other RPGs, Too. Yes, I know. But other games have other ideas. Gives you perspective as far as running games. Not necessarily DM advice, but different mechanics, and different ways of thinking. Other games have campaign settings you might go, "Oo, I like that, I'll use that in my homebrew." </p><p></p><p>5) Failure is okay. You're going to make a ton of mistakes as a DM. Just accept it, apologize, learn from it, move on. Talk to your players about it. They'll cut you slack. </p><p></p><p>6) Think about your "Style" of DMing, and what appeals to you. Do you like your players to account for every gold piece, have everything in their inventory listed ahead of time? Do you not care about the specific details, but you care more about the story? Know what you like, and try to develop that.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Rechan, post: 4743229, member: 54846"] As far as seeking advice from what your players want, I know hwo that can be. Some people are incapable of giving critique, others are just easily satisfied ("Hey, I jsut want to come and roll dice and socialize.") However, if your friends are just too polite, you could take one aside between sessions, and ask, "So, do folks say anything about my DMing away from the table?" A lot of folks have contributed what I was going to say. But here's a few things: 1) Try different things. Look back at what you have done in previous adventures, and ask yourself, "What have I [B]not[/B] been doing?" If it's been, for instance, heavy dungeon crawling, avoid that for a session or two. Do some "You need to broker peace between these two groups" or, suddenly it's an adventure about being stuck in one place, and the tension slowly ratcheting up (like [I]The Thing[/I]). Variety is important. Although, be aware that when you are going to do certain things, there are aspects. Horror (depending on what type of horror) has a lot of atmosphere to it, and it takes a [I]lot[/I] of practice to implement it well. It's tone of voice, pacing, how much you reveal when, etc. Same with intrigue and mystery - it's Not Easy, so it takes practice. The caveat here is that be sure it doesn't come across as a total about-face for the game. If, for instance, the game has been very "Good Vs. Evil" with very black and white terms, suddenly dropping moral ambiguity in there might confuse your players because "We assumed this is how the game works" (See the thread about Realism as an example of consistency and suspension of disbelief). However, if you do want to drastically change things, it's easy to just do a one-off adventure. "You all are peasants, with NPC stats. Here are your characters. And now, let us play [I]Night of the Living Dead[/I]. Let's see if you survive." 2) Think About it Constantly. That's usually how I develop an adventure; I just keep thinking about it and polishing it up. For instance, if I get a module and I look at it and keep thinking about it, eventually I'll think of a better way to do it, or a different way, or a way to change it so it's more interesting to [I]me[/I]. Like "Hmm, this villain's motivation is a little bland. I'll change that." On that same note, never run a module fresh out of the box. Look it over, think about how to change it to suit your needs, the needs of your group, how to make it more interesting, etc. 3) Read Everything you Can, even that which is unrelated to D&D. Inspiration for things can come from whole other sources. Movies, books, video games. Not only that, but real world things. There are tons of sites about "Real world wonders!" Check those out, and drop one into your game. Reading up on strange real world cultures lets you drop interesting things into That Tribe of Elves Over There. Seeing things about History lets you see how things might progress, or useful implementations of things ("Hannibal went over a large set of mountains with lots of elephants in order to sack Rome. Army with weird animals traveling long distances for surprise attack! Hmm.") Additionally, real life experiences can give you stuff to flesh out NPCs. If you want this NPC here to be comedic relief, think about who you've met/seen, and drop in traits of that person on that character. 4) Look at Other RPGs, Too. Yes, I know. But other games have other ideas. Gives you perspective as far as running games. Not necessarily DM advice, but different mechanics, and different ways of thinking. Other games have campaign settings you might go, "Oo, I like that, I'll use that in my homebrew." 5) Failure is okay. You're going to make a ton of mistakes as a DM. Just accept it, apologize, learn from it, move on. Talk to your players about it. They'll cut you slack. 6) Think about your "Style" of DMing, and what appeals to you. Do you like your players to account for every gold piece, have everything in their inventory listed ahead of time? Do you not care about the specific details, but you care more about the story? Know what you like, and try to develop that. [/QUOTE]
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