Where do DMs usually start out?

[Mouseferatu]

Okay, so we've had a lot of polls, over the years, asking how many DMs prefer to use homebrew settings, vs. how many prefer pre-published ones.

What I'd like to know, though, is not where you are now, but where you started out. When you ran your first campaign, was it a prepublished setting, or a homebrew?

Now, in some cases--such as myself--DMs start out using the "default" information in the book, but without really giving any conscious thought to how that info fits into a world. By that definition, I started with The Known World, and shifted swiftly to Greyhawk, but I had no sense of them as worlds. It wasn't until I'd played for a year or two that the notion of a "campaign world" even really entered my mind.

So, let's skip that stage, and jump to the point where you actually had some grasp of what a campaign world is. Please answer the question from that point...

 

[Glyfair]

My first D&D campaign was homebrew, but at that time there weren't any published D&D settings I had access to. Only Judges Guild had published any, and I never picked those up (the other DM did, however).

My second RPG that I ran was Runequest (indeed, I was given the 3 core books under the condition I ran a game) and used Glorantha as the campaign world.

 

[Shemeska]

I started off DM'ing a game after playing in a semi-historical game around AD 800. From there I spent:

About 1 year of running a sequal to that DMs semi-historical campaign. It died, Planescape killed it.

2.5-3 years of running a Planescape campaign, 5 years post Faction War, lower planar intrigue = yummy.

Currently running a sequal to that PS game, 150 years in game after that one.


Of course, Planescape being what it is, you can use that pre-published setting and never really use a drop of it because the setting is infinite. You can go about creating almost everything the PCs run into outside of the framework of the planes themselves, and perhaps the general scheme of Sigil. Ultimate creative freedom, just as good as a full homebrew world.

 

[TheGM]

I was using Greyhawk, and realised that I was making sweeping changes... The kind that would definitely not hold up in a major update.

I decided to take the plunge and build the world that suited my needs, and quit abusing Greyhawk to try and make it fit my needs.

Interestingly, I haven't had the urge to build more and more worlds as many people I know have. I have three build over the last 30 years, and only one of them (the middle one) is truly active (that's the link in my sig - to that world's online portal).

 

[arwink]

I started with the known world map from the expert set, but like Mousferatu didn't really have a concept of it as a campaign world when I started. I used the map and built around it for a year or so, then eventually moved on to creating my own worlds (usually short lived).

It was about ten years before I actually got around to creating consistent worlds that had an existence outside the location of the current adventure.

 

[Campbell]

The first real campaign I ran was a Fantasy Hero homebrew that nominally took place within the multiverse of Moorcock's Eternal Champion series. I've never really worked with a published setting, but I still chew through several a year. A good campaign setting, like a good fantasy novel does wonders for sparking my creative impulses. I have considered running an Iron Kingdoms, Valus or Planescape game as of late though.

 

[Arbiter of Wyrms]

Wow! 10 votes each. I don't know what I expected, but it wasn't this.

 

[MonsterMash]

I've generally used published settings more than homebrew as a GM, when I started GMing D&D it was using the Wilderlands of High Fantasy and the CSIO, with the other games I ran around the same time (Metamorphosis Alpha and RQ2) having fairly strong setting links.

 

[IronWolf]

The first campaign I ran in high school was set in a homebrew.

 

[Bran Blackbyrd]

Unfortunately, for many years after I first discovered it, my involvement with D&D was limited to simply reading the rulebooks. My friends and I were pretty young then and none of us knew how to DM a game (nor did we want to, we wanted to be players). My friend's older brother introduced us to the game, but he wasn't around to run it or teach us how to do it ourselves.
Even so, running a published campaign world was never a consideration, I just wasn't interested. I figured I'd just make my own adventures (though creating a cohesive world never occurred to me).
One day I got a flyer from TSR for an upcoming campaign setting called planescape (I still have it, in fact) and I was instantly fascinated. I'm still not sure how the flyer managed to capture my imagination the way it did (or why I got it, I must have filled out a survey and they had my address, despite not owning many books).
As soon as the boxed set came out I grabbed it. For a while I did nothing but eat, breath and sleep Planescape. I was dying to get a Planescape campaign going but I only had a few friends and no one really had the time (a few barely had any idea how to play). Had I been able to play, I probably would have used the setting but make my own adventures. Perhaps I would have bought an adventure and used it. I got Something Wild just to see what it had to say about the Beastlands since I was a big fan of the Cat Lord from MMII and the DT illo of the Planescape era version.
My best friend Dave finally decided to run his own 2E campaign which we played for close to a year when 3E came out. We converted without hesitation, played for almost another year or so before he burned out and quit (a move partially prompted by my comment that I had an idea for my own campaign world, the dirty punk).
/longwindedness
Anyway, by the time we knew how to play and had the time/ability to get together I had my own campaign world already under construction...
I ran a few sessions of the campaign before things like college, jobs and players moving away made it fall apart. :\ At least the players seemed impressed with what they did get to play.