D&D 5E The Transition: Old to New DM

[GameOgre]

Stay out of the Way.

It's often hard for a experienced DM to stand back and let the new DM go. This is because like everything else DMing gets a lot better the more you do it. So a new DM is going to suck,compared to a old experienced DM.

That's ok,let them suck. Don't rob them of learning the same way you did,by trial and error. You CAN NOT TELL THEM LESSONS.

Humans just do not learn that way. Otherwise we would have listened to our parents long ago and been much better off.

DM's only learn by DMing. Let that new DM be bad, it's ok hopefully it's still fun and she will get better over time. A LOT of DM's can't do this. We insist on (Helping). It isn't Help, even if your there just in case they have questions....that is bad. Part of DMing is learning oh I should have studied more before the game! Oh I should have known those rules because that sucks and i need to alter them ahead of time.

My advice if to have the player DM a game you don't know. Heck buy her a game! How nice is that eh? Some players but me a dang game to run and I will jump over the dang moon!

That way you have no worries because this new DM will know far more than you!

 

[delphonso]

GameOgre's sentiment, exactly. Let the new DM do whatever they want, especially mess up. And then bring it up afterwards.

As for advice for new DMs:
1. Don't worry. Players just want to play, and all you have to do is give them the information for them to play in. With a module, most of the work is already done.
2. Remember, your resources are unlimited; your player's resources are limited. If everyone is struggling, maybe skip an encounter and let them recover a little. If they're stomping through everything, add a few extra baddies to slow them down.
3. The worst thing a GM can do is say "No, you cannot try that cool thing." Let people try what they want to try, but maybe ask why they're doing it first.
4. Let your players do the talking. GMs can vary between 20% of the talking to 90%. Don't steal the show. It's your story, but the players are the characters and you can't control them.

and last but not least,
5. We all started somewhere.
My first session was absolutely terrible. I played a module with two friends and I played one of the characters too. I spent more than 80% of the time on myself and my character in a group of only 3 people. But, luckily that doesn't happen any more.