Which Edition of D&D (or OSR Ruleset) Has the Best GMing Advice?

[R_J_K75]

None. I think it's a skill best refined by the individual to learn themselves. Looking to a DMG to teach you how to DM is like looking to a book to teach you what religion you should subscribe to and teach you what it's about. It's all open to interpretation. Not only is there no right answer, I don't think there's an answer period. You gotta hoe your own road.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

None. I think it's a skill best refined by the individual to learn themselves. Looking to a DMG to teach you how to DM is like looking to a book to teach you what religion you should subscribe to and teach you what it's about. It's all open to interpretation. Not only is there no right answer, I don't think there's an answer period. You gotta hoe your own road.

Tell me you organized the 5E DMG without telling me you organized the 5E DMG.

 

[R_J_K75]

Tell me you organized the 5E DMG without telling me you organized the 5E DMG.

Maybe the 2024 DMG may but I dont recall any previous DMG being very good at teaching someone to run a game.

 

[Tigris]

Maybe the 2024 DMG may but I dont recall any previous DMG being very good at teaching someone to run a game.

The D&D 4E DMG has definitly a lot of good advice for beginner Dungeon Masters. It even tells what kind of different styles there are or one can choose, so its not saying there is only 1 way. It even includes advice ffor what to do to prepare depending on how much time you have. Tipps on how other players can take burdens away from you, how to teach new players (since this will happen) the game. Exact guidelines with examples on how to make encounters (with encounter math which works), including non combat encounters (traps, puzzles, skill challenges) and non combat ways to give experience (the encounters + quests). (The skill challenge part was for a lot of people not clear enough, but DMG2 did this better). How to use existing adventures, how to fix problems which occurs, how to build your own adventure.


Of course you still get better with experience etc., but the 4E DMG does give enough advice for someone such that they can start being a GM:

 

[R_J_K75]

The D&D 4E DMG has definitly a lot of good advice for beginner Dungeon Masters. It even tells what kind of different styles there are or one can choose, so its not saying there is only 1 way. It even includes advice ffor what to do to prepare depending on how much time you have. Tipps on how other players can take burdens away from you, how to teach new players (since this will happen) the game. Exact guidelines with examples on how to make encounters (with encounter math which works), including non combat encounters (traps, puzzles, skill challenges) and non combat ways to give experience (the encounters + quests). (The skill challenge part was for a lot of people not clear enough, but DMG2 did this better). How to use existing adventures, how to fix problems which occurs, how to build your own adventure.


Of course you still get better with experience etc., but the 4E DMG does give enough advice for someone such that they can start being a GM:

I didn't play 4E for very long, so IDR much of the individual books. I'm not the best DM by any means but I think that after playing and DMing for over 40 years it's easy to overlook this type of advice, just gloss over it or it I just didn't realize it was actually worth considering. Its been a very long time since I read any version of the D&D DMG, and I think I'm a bit jaded, because like many people in the 70s & 80s DMing was learned by on-the-job training.

 

[Theory of Games]

None. I think it's a skill best refined by the individual to learn themselves. Looking to a DMG to teach you how to DM is like looking to a book to teach you what religion you should subscribe to and teach you what it's about. It's all open to interpretation. Not only is there no right answer, I don't think there's an answer period. You gotta hoe your own road.

 

[Arilyn]

Mothership has very clear, concise and practical advice. It's great for newbies, as well as veterans. I don't think I've seen a better "GM guide."

 

[teitan]

I really liked Monte's Dungeon Master's Guide for 3e and the 3.5 revision to be honest. It was simple and direct but the cornucopia of advice for the DM is the 1e DMG and Dragon Magazine up until about 1993 or so and then during the 3.x period.

 

[deganawida]

Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG has several amazing bits and bobs, the best of which are Quests & Journeys along with the Judge admonitions. It's maybe 10 pages of text in the 504-page book. It's worth borrowing and reading if you're not going to actually play DCC.

Is that the part where the author talks about the worldbuilding? If so, that is hands down the best world-building advice that I've ever read, and really changed my perspective on running a campaign.