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Message: <blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 4980952" data-attributes="member: 22424">It's always difficult being the guy who has to take over from the successful old master. I don't envy him.The key thing is for the group to talk to the DM. Point out that you know he's got big shoes to fill, and that you want him to succeed. But remind him that when your old DM started out, he was far from the finished article as well - the new guy should try to start small and build from there.Also, you must be patient. Your new DM is probably his own worst critic - he knows the campaign doesn't have the nuance of the the campaigns run by the last guy, and he may well not know why. So, you will probably have to accept some very stripped down roleplaying for a time, and then some railroaded plots, and then the whole host of other mistakes that the other DM got past years ago. But if you do work through it, you should end up with an excellent DM for your troubles.Remember: you want him to succeed.I tend to divide the job of DMing into three aspects: "rules mastery", "story mastery" and "table mastery". These should, ideally, be tackled one at a time, in that order.Rules mastery refers to the mechanics of judging the rules. It includes knowing the rules (ideally, at least as well as the most knowledgeable player does), adjudicating the rules fairly, knowing when to apply the rules for best effect, and even knowing when not to apply the rules.Your post suggests that your DM is doing a good job in this area. If he is, indeed, on top of the rules, then move on.However, if there are significant problems with the way your DM is dealing with the rules, then I would recommend dealing with this before anything else - it's pretty foundational. Here, I recommend a quiet word, to straighten the guy out. Alternately, you could ask some leading questions: "I'm not sure how this works, can you help me out?", "Oh, you're not sure either? Well, let's see if we can figure out what the book says...". If he's having real trouble, it might be a good idea for you to work through some practice combats and practice scenarios, completely ignoring roleplaying or storytelling for the time being.Moving on...Story mastery refers to the business of constructing and running adventures, building worlds and NPCs, pacing, and all the rest of the business. This is where your DM seems to be running into problems.Again, I recommend starting here with baby steps. I would actually recommend starting his first adventure with the party at the entrance to the dungeon, and keeping the adventure confined within the dungeon (but allowing the PCs free reign therein).Then, move on to a more elaborate dungeon environment, with different monster factions at work, and various groups and contacts for the PCs to interact with.Then move to the town, and introduce friendly and unfriendly NPCs. At about this time, consider giving a choice of adventures, or shady patrons who may or may not be trustworthy. And gradually build from there.I would also caution very strongly against suggesting the PCs "should" or "should not" do anything... because they inevitably will do the opposite! In some ways, DMing is like writing half a story, and then letting the players influence and/or write the second half.Moving on again...Table mastery is my catch-all category for everything that is actually outside the game. This includes dealing with problem players, issues with the game location, and so on. Hopefully, there won't be any issues here - if it's a long established group then most of the issues will probably have been thrashed out.</blockquote>

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