New DM

[Herzog]

When you run anything that is more complicated than a kick-in-the-door adventure, you will run into this:

Players are stupid.

Or, rather, they may appear stupid. Clues you lay out before them are ignored, misinterpreted, or even turned completely upside down.
This is because YOU know the background and context, and they have to work with what you give them.

Three things are important:
1. Be patient. If they really don't have a clue, give them a little extra info, but give them time to figure it out for themselves.
2. Be restrictive in your information. At some point, you might as well tell them directly what the conclusion from the clues should be. Try to avoid that, unless:
3. Don't let the adventures be hindered by lack of knowledge. If the players stop because they have no idea what to do about the problems you present, they need that info. You could suggest that the characters use divination to obtain the info (giving you an in-game reason to provide it)

When you run a pre-made adventure, make sure you know which parts of the adventure are important for the story and which are 'fluff'.
If something is 'fluff', you can easily replace it with something else and keep the adventure intact. You can also skip it if you feel it slowing the adventure down, or 'wing' it if you feel looking up rules is going to slow the game down.
If something is an integral part of the pre-made adventure, this is more difficult, since changes you make may affect other parts of the adventure. That doesn't mean you shouldn't do it, but you should be aware of it so you don't run into surprises later on.
Example: If the party needs to defeat a griffon for it's egg because the egg must later be used to create a special potion to defeat the evil wizard, replacing the griffon encounter means you need to change the recipe for the potion.

And, of course, good luck!

 

[Dross]

When you run anything that is more complicated than a kick-in-the-door adventure, you will run into this:

Players are stupid.

Or, rather, they may appear stupid. Clues you lay out before them are ignored, misinterpreted, or even turned completely upside down.
This is because YOU know the background and context, and they have to work with what you give them.

So true. You have to hit them repeatedly with a clue-by-four for them to notice an important clue, but they will remember some colour rag a random encounter grunt had 5 sessions ago and believe it is the key to running the ultimate McGuffin BBEG stopper.

Yet as a player I KNOW that the DM puts clues out, I look for them and damned if I can find them!

More than one answer to a problem is good (even if a player just says something that you think would work).

It has been said here often, you are only doing it wrong if the group is not enjoying it. (some more memorable moments have come from accidentally miss-using rules.)

 

[HoboGod]

Yeah, more than one answer is an understatement. The players get so stupid sometimes that you just let them solve it with whatever pops out of their stupid little mouths.

DM: "You fall into a pit, the walls are slowly closing in. You'll be dead in a few hours. Varies pieces of drift wood and flotation devices are all around you."
Player who recently obtained a Canter of Endless Water: "I burn all the wood to make smoke signals that I'm trapped in a pit."
DM: "You burned all the wood?"
Player: "Yeah, I burned all of it."
DM: "Not going to flood the pit and float to the top?"
Player: "Nope, I burned the wood."
DM: *sigh* "A troop of magical boy scouts appears and helps you out the pit."

 

[Dandu]

Smoke signals answered by Drow.

 

[Eloi]

It can be interesting to run into diverse folk and make a new friend.. or at least, have the stranger feel like they owe the party a favor.

A lone Drow scout losing a fight to an Ogre.. what will the party do? Rescuing the Drow means having another resource in the future ("Maybe that Drow you ran into would be able to translate this."), finishing off the Ogre after the Drow falls, and then finding out the party just saved the life of a woodsman that the Ogre had treed nearby, means becoming local heroes.

If you want to introduce a new monster, feel free to let the party run into one of them while the monster's attention is diverted (Trying to get honey, filling a basket with apples, assembling apple pies to lure a Pseudodragon into Familiar-spell range, or trying to eat someone attempting one of the previous three activities) and see how the party reacts.

Take a look at the Animal Handling skills present in the party. Would your players want to try to adopt a strange creature (or baby-creature) as a pet? Lots of good roleplaying can spring up around a pet.

When the party defeats humanoids, consider that the humanoids may have slaves among their treasure. Freeing and returning slaves to their communities can establish potent ties the party might need someday. And there's not that much bad about being addressed as, "Ah, these are the Heroes!"

Challenge the players with situations that call for heroic action, like a runaway cart (with spooked horses, or just rolling downhill) heading for a market/ some pilgrims / an old Gypsy. What do they choose to do? How the players respond will let you gauge how heroic their characters are inclined to be. A Dwarf is pulled off the street into an alleyway, and sounds of struggle are heard. Spot checks to gain a bit more information, Initiative for those who are aware that something is happening.. and "What are you doing?"

It's a change from dungeon crawls, but it might put a sparkle in your rules lawyer's eyes. Good luck, and see where it takes your group.

 

[radmod]

Also remember: The DM is GOD. Her final decision is that - final. However, try to be a fair god.

I will warn you that the players might try to test you by seeing how far you will go. Don't be afraid to screw them but don't go out of your way to do it. As in the above water example, let them drown. They made their bed, let them lie in it. That'll earn you respect.

As also somewhat mentioned above, don't be afraid to fudge the dice for both good and bad. A character casts an awesome spell that you didn't think of and which will end the combat in one round? Well, that save of a '1' sure looked like a '20' to me. Likewise, on a insignificant encounter, you just crit-ed three times in a row on the same guy and rolled another? Hmm, are you sure that '19' wasn't a '9'?

As a game mechanic note, if you find that there's way too much BSing going on and slowing down the game, consider using a codeword anyone can call out (such as "Push!") which will help to put focus back on the game.

Good luck and best wishes. You'll do fine.

 

[Dandu]

I don't know where you learned to DM, but back in my day we smited the players and smited them hard.

 

[Herobizkit]

New DM + 'overpowered' campaign + 'storytelling skills' = recipe for disaster, IMO.

If you do not have a firm grasp of how the rules will work, then having overpowered options will make you dizzy. In my experience, overpowered campaigns don't generally have much of a story line, mostly because every issue can be solved with magic or brute force. Social campaigns tend to take away the reason players play overpowered characters in the first place...

Maybe you should get your players to try a Superhero campaign instead of 3.5?

 

[HoboGod]

New DM + 'overpowered' campaign + 'storytelling skills' = recipe for disaster, IMO.

If you do not have a firm grasp of how the rules will work, then having overpowered options will make you dizzy. In my experience, overpowered campaigns don't generally have much of a story line, mostly because every issue can be solved with magic or brute force. Social campaigns tend to take away the reason players play overpowered characters in the first place...

Maybe you should get your players to try a Superhero campaign instead of 3.5?

Nah, it builds character having one's first time be as difficult as possible. DMing is a lot like comedy, the more hate you have for humanity and the people you're entertaining, the better you'll be at entertaining them.