D&D 5E Your one best piece of GM/DM advice?

[GameOgre]

Don't do it unless it's fun. This applies to everything. Don't DM unless you have fun doing so. Don't kill off the player characters unless that group finds death being a important thing to have in the game. Don't build a chase into the adventure unless it's fun.

Fun is what this entire endeavor is about but fun is also subjective! One group might find fun into the constant threat of Death while another group finds it fun only if their characters are allowed to grow and change over time without the threat of being taken away. It's important to know what fun means to yourself and the people you game with.

Once you understand that one thing the rest comes by trial and error over time.

 

[Stalker0]

Ultimately, make the players feel cool and special.

As I and my gaming group look back on our games, what they remember is not the plots...they remember moments. Moments when their character did something really cool.

Create those....and your game will be well remembered.

 

[PoJo72]

Adapt.

I created one encounter where I had a ton of goblins swarm on the party. In my mind this was going to be a Lord of the Rings type epic battle. When the time came, the party cast Leomund's Tiny Hut and basically just picked off each goblin one by one from the safety of their dome. We can argue about whether that spell is to powerful and all of that, but in reality, my epic battle instead became a funny moment more like Indiana Jones shooting the swordsman. Either way it was awesome.

Take what they give you and roll with it.

 

[Christopher Olson]

I'm at my peak performance as a DM when I've had a couple of Jameson's on the rocks.

I'm a firm believer in the Drunken Bell Curve of DM Excellence. 3 Drinks and i'm at the top of my game!

 

[Ristamar]

Spend more prep time thinking about how to improve your game via your rulings and practices as a DM instead of world building and crafting clever plots. Your success as a DM is not determined by your strengths as a storyteller, but by your ability to facilitate a fair, well paced game with minimal interruptions in play.

Analyze trouble spots after every session, particularly the areas that you perceived were unwieldy or confusing for you or your players. Study the rules again to fill in your knowledge gaps and create new tools for use at the table to help facilitate better play.

Before expanding or trimming sections of the rules to enhance your game, always examine and reconsider your application of the existing rules before making any modifications. Sometimes a simple change in technique or application at the table is better than implementing a new house rule.

If you need to create or modify mechanics, err in favor of simplicity and conformity. Verisimilitude at the price of added complexity is often not worth the cost paid at the gaming table.

 

[robus]

I'm a firm believer in the Drunken Bell Curve of DM Excellence. 3 Drinks and i'm at the top of my game!

4 and I forget to roll my attack dice and instead throw them at the players. When I hit, then I roll for damage

 

[smbakeresq]

Understand the big picture, especially when it comes to rules. Examples:

Your Goliath wants to use larger versions of weapons that increase damage size die by one step. It will have no discernible affect except making the player happy and feel special.

Your players are doing great against your creature, you are rolling terribly. You decide to just recharge the special ability and blast the players, costing them health but not really changing the outcome. You just changed a cakewalk into a memorable encounter by “cheating.” Good job.

Many, many things like that come up. Most of them will not in anyway change the outcome except to make the game better.


Sent from my iPhone using EN World

 

[jgsugden]

Story first. D&D is an RPG. Characters play a role in a story. Make sure the story is good and everything else will work out.

 

[Sunseeker]

Based on my commentary on other threads recently, I'd add this:

Don't overdo it with NPCs.

Make the NPCs that matter, matter.
Don't sweat the NPCs that don't.

 

[Imaculata]

I'll add to that this advice: be careful that your npc's do not dominate the game, and override the agency of the players. If you abuse your npc's to make choices that your players do not want to make, they may grow to hate those npc's.