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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rel" data-source="post: 1325869" data-attributes="member: 99">1) Get yourself a copy of Robin Laws' "Robins Laws of Good Gamemastering".  Read especially carefully the section about player types, why they play and the things that will entertain them in particular.  I think a big reason why many early DM's fail (I know it was true for me) is that they design a campaign that THEY think is perfect but doesn't take into account what motivates their particular set of players.If for some reason getting that book is impractical, write down each player's name on a sheet of paper and write out three situations where they were playing and having an absolute blast.  Look for commonalities between the situations you wrote down for each player and determine his general "gaming personality".  Does he have the most fun when the party is kicking butt in combat?  When he is getting cool rewards from the adventure?  When he is solving complex puzzles?  When he is roleplaying interactions with NPC's?Tailor your campaign to be a good compromise between what you like and what each player likes.  Design situations where everybody gets some of what he really enjoys out of playing.2) You'll need to wing it from time to time as mentioned by others.  Make life easier on yourself by preparing for the event.  Get a list of at least 20-30 male and female names that you can use when you need to slap a moniker on an NPC that you had no idea was going to be important.  Get half a dozen or so maps of various places (WotC's "Map of the Week" archive is perfect for this) that you can use as improvised adventure sites.  Inns, castles, caves, dungeons, a hill fort, etc.  Prepare a few "random encounters" appropriate to the PC's level and have them ready.  If they throw you a curve ball, drop an encounter on them to keep them busy while you figure out what to do.3) Use index cards.  Use them to keep track of initiative order.  Have one card for each PC and prepare ones for use for the bad guys.  I almost never crack open my Monster Manual in the middle of combat because I jot down an abbreviated stat block for each enemy on a card and have it ready to slide into the initiative order.  Then I just cycle through the cards.  If somebody wants to Delay their action, I lay their card on the table in front of me so they know they can jump in any time they like.Other people write down treasure, particularly magic items, on such cards.  That way they can hand them out when the party gets the treasure.  This eradicates issues of "who was carrying what treasure".  Whoever has the card has the treasure.4) "Piratecat's Rule".  One of the best things I ever learned on this site was a brilliant bit of wisdom from our own Piratecat:  Whenever in doubt, ask yourself this one simple question, "What is the funnest, most exciting thing that could possibly happen right NOW in the game?"  It is hard to go wrong with this.  Sure it can create a small consistancy problem or two down the line.  So what?  You can rewrite things afterwards to accomodate whatever twists or turns you caused last session by doing the fun, exciting thing.The list above is by no means comprehensive but if you follow it you'll be 4 big lessons ahead of where I was when I started DMing some 20+ years ago.And in answer to your other question, I like rolling in the open.  I feel that it heightens the tension and makes the game feel more "real".Good luck and relax.  You'll do fine.</blockquote>

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