The DM's Guide to DMing

So, I am going to be starting up a game soon, either voice (via Skype) or text (via Slack).

Here is the overall basic plot (spoilered because some people form this site might decide to play)

Spoiler:
  • nature cult that is trying to reduce human civilization back to nothing larger than villages because civilization has weakened everything. Very "survival of the fittest" idea.
  • The group that is behind it is a splinter group of the nature goddess. Her religion is content to preach and use peace/etc to get people back to nature. This splinter group is not content with patient, and wants to have it move faster. This group has been working behind the scenes for a couple hundred years to get things into place. They will have some agents in bigger central nations formenting discord, disease, riots,. The wilder nations they have been working on building up the various goblinoids. What is not known is that the leader of this splinter group is actually a lich in the employ of Orcus.

So, given that, I would like to know if anyone has seen how to

Spoiler:

stat up a druid as a lich. Basic story is this druid was working hard long ago to try to prevent civilization from expanding. Didn't work, and she was assassinated by mercenaries hired by some city lords. Her spirit was captured by one of the mercenaries, and has, for the past several centuries, been tortured by Orcus. Recently, servants of Orcus tricked the original leader of this nature cult to try to resurrect the original leader with a "powerful ritual" that ended up driving the soul of the original leader out (to a hidden corner of the mind) and turned the body into a lich/incredibly corrupt druid.

I have some ideas that involve stealing from a necromancer by appending "undead" to what they would summon. Also healing themselves by sucking the life out of plants, grass, animals, the dirt, etc.

I think your initial instincts on how to do it are very good. Personally I'd...

Spoiler:

Either start with the Monster Manual template for a vanilla Lich OR make a high level druid and then add lich-like powers.

If you start with a Lich ,adding Druid spells to repertoire plus a few special abilities - such as the one you describe seems like an easy way to do it. If you start with a high level druid and then add Lich-like powers / spells that will probably be a touch more complicated but also give you soem room to fiddle with the specifics a bit more.

Spoiler:

For the life-draining ability, you could probably use either Blight or Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting with some slight modifications to add a self-healing component. Or Vampiric Touch, but that might be a bit weak for a full-blown lich

I've been running a 3.5e group for a while now, they're about to reach level 9. It's a group of 6 players and only one of them (my wife) has played DnD before. I'm just now introducing them to multiclassing and prestige classes. Thankfully they're not min/maxing and prefer to take my direction on how to progress.

My biggest issue is trying to get them to stay in character. They enjoy strategy and figuring out how to solve combat encounters but they're not very receptive to dialogue. I think part of it is they're really into Diablo, etc. They like the progression and stats but struggle with the idea of being a specific character in the world as opposed to a group blob that blasts through the world. I guess it's ok because they're having fun but I'd like to try to get them into their specific characters more.

Anyone have any suggestions on getting new players into the role playing aspect?

It is tricky if the group as a whole isn't interested in that aspect of D&D to force it, but I think there are things you can do to gently bring character and dialogue into sharper relief.

If you check out The Unmarked podcast that the CC crew put up, I think that might inspire you. As a DM, you can up those sorts of stakes by asking the players questions about the plot:

"You are surprised to see the new King is someone from your past, someone who once did you a great wrong... Who is it?"

"One of you recognizes the woman with the glowing sword... Which one of you is it, and where do you know her from?"

Little things like that give players a chance to put a stamp on the story, which in turn invests them more in the narrative and the characters.

Also good:
-Address the character by name when asking the player what they're going to do.

-Ask how their characters feel about a turn of events (though it may be easier to ease them into it if its an NPC checking their reaction)

-Describe sensory details from the characters' point of view; you don't have to overdo it, but throwing in occasional little flourishes helps with embodiment. Smells, temperatures, humidity, texture, light, wind, and sounds. (Just one per scene is enough, an impression that implies a bigger picture)

-When they do something, ask them to describe how their character does it. If they search for traps, ask what specific actions they take. The point here isn't to look for gotchas- -no saying "oh you didn't look in the right way"--assume good faith, work it into the narrative if you can, and follow the dice. The idea is to get them thinking about what their character is doing in detail, the stage business as it were.

Thanks Harpo and Gremlin, I'm going to give your ideas a go on Saturday.

Anyone have any tips or tricks for an ice dungeon? Specifically one partially carved in a glacier. And how about an abandoned city? I feel I'm pretty strong coming up with these grand ideas (example, this dungeon is a floating city that crashed atop the glacier, the PCs will learn eventually), less so at actually, you know, making a dungeon.

Are you looking for specific setpieces? Or just some general design thoughts?

I've been diving into improv dungeon creation since I read The Perilous Wilds, though Planarch Codex also has a neat dungeon generator method. Haven't had a chance to bring them to the table yet though, since the last game got preempted by Microscope.

General tips:
- Do an image search on Google or Pinterest for "ice dungeon" or "abandoned city". This will get you a ton of concept art and stuff that might spark some ideas. Try some other searches too, for related stuff. Look at the pictures, imagine visiting those places and what hazards or special sights you might encounter,
- Who made it? Why? Fantasy dungeons generally shouldn't be taken too realistically, since it's more fun if the wizard doesn't have to worry if it's cost-effective to dig all of those tunnels, but having some general motivations are helpful.Knowing the history of the place lets you put in details that reflect that history.
- Pick a theme or three for the dungeon. Can be literal, like "ice" but can also be abstract, like "treachery". Brainstorm some examples for each theme, and use the themes to differentiate areas within the dungeon.

Ice Dungeon setpieces and impressions:
- The floor is coated with smooth ice, slippery and hard to keep your balance
- Ice has filled this stone tunnel; it can be melted, but that might cause worse problems
- The light refracts through the ice walls, casting distorted images of the other side
- Torches provide light and heat, which could be good or bad
- The ice here is broken and jagged, it's easier to climb but still slippery

History, context, and atmosphere come easy. Rooms, "puzzles," interesting skill challenges and the like are my hurdle. I'll have to consider making torches a problem, and hoping no one complains that a magical lantern shouldn't give off heat.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:

History, context, and atmosphere come easy. Rooms, "puzzles," interesting skill challenges and the like are my hurdle. I'll have to consider making torches a problem, and hoping no one complains that a magical lantern shouldn't give off heat.

Eh, it might be more fun to let them have the heatless lantern and then give them a reason to start a fire themselves. I'm always wary of going against the player's earned abilities; if they earned their way past my obstacle because they were prepared, I encourage them. But, then, I'm improvisational enough to roll with it when they derailed my entire campaign by stabbing the villain in the face the first time they met him, so YMMV.

For dungeon details, one thing to do is to browse the One Page Dungeon contest and crib liberally from clever encounters there.

For more specific details, it depends on what system you're using and the history of the flying city. A recent crash will be slightly different than a long-ago one. One exercise is to sketch out the city and then scribble out how the fall wrecked the place. Alternately, you can do something top down like the five-room dungeon--and don't forget that the rooms don't need to be literal rooms; they can be entire areas.

- When the city crashed, this ground under this room was uneven, and now there's a six foot cliff dividing the room in half.
- Gaps in the floor lead to chasms where there were none. Part of the city can most easily be accessed by going out a window and working your way across the face of the glacier. Jumping across gaps and using ropes to bridge them is good fun. So is getting attacked by flying enemies while you do it.
-The crash partially collapsed this room and blocked the door. Either you'll need the strength and engineering to clear it, or you'll need to find another way.
- Is there a nest belonging to a flying creature nearby? Could lead to an interesting risk/reward thing: do you hope the griffin doesn't notice you, or do you try to confront it in its lair?
- Consider time of day and weather. Will they need to find shelter from the storm? Night gets cold up on the glacier.
- Are there wild animals patrolling outside, ones whose natural habitat has been disrupted by the crash and are hungry and desperate enough to attack adventurers? Have some animals taken shelter inside the structure? Are they going to have to sneak past hibernating bears?
- Are the original owners of the city around? Did they set up any automated defenses? Or are there some elements of the city that aren't meant to be traps but are now dangerous because of damage? A cracked hot water tank might be especially bad, given both the potential for scalding steam, melting heat, and eventually turning to ice once it's away from its heat source.
- How did the city stay up? Magic? Did it have side effects or leave equipment lying around? Does it still work? Partially work? Have dangerous side effects from being broken?
- Are there sources of heat? Of light?
- How did the city fall? Is the source of the problem still around? Is it a threat to the PCs?
- Have any other groups found the city? Are they trying to study it? Use it for shelter? Loot it for spare parts? Restore it? Hide out in it?

Hope some of these spark some ideas.

They've both sparked some, and reminded me of some. And thanks for the dungeon link, quite excellent.

Gremlin wrote:

and don't forget that the rooms don't need to be literal rooms; they can be entire areas.

This is kinda related to something I'm tempted to try with this. I'll spoiler up the full circumstance:

Spoiler:

The city is home to a sub-villain the PCs have been seeking, a lich who used to rule it, and had grand plans for her people that came to an end when the city crashed, and she's spent the past millenia + obsessing over what she lost, so she's maintained and restored everything--mostly because an empty city that isn't ruined seems creepier and plays against expectations.

As a result, I'm wondering if I could actually do a dungeon that's just the PCs exploring empty streets, if I come up with enough description, while I play eerie music, and still have that be effective.

Bought into 5e and run the Starter Set (LMoP) using Fantasy Grounds, which works really well for my needs since most of my players are remote/busy adults who can't meet in-person; running the Full license, with the Core Players Handbook (only), Starter Set, and SRD. I imagine I would pick up the Monster Manual (which I have the hardcover for) but specifically for FG and whatever big campaign my players will move onto. Still debate about starting new 1st level characters or pushing ahead into a level appropriate adventure/campaign. Sadly, most of WoTCs books seem to be built for 1st level and up...

I am really enjoying watching Matt Colville's youTube series, specifically aimed at new DMs (which I would qualify since I haven't DM'd a game in 20 years - Expert Rules/Isle of Dread for those interested).

I like to mix background ambient sound/music during sessions using a variety of free resources on the net (youTube has a ton of game soundtracks/effects).

The many reference sites for looking up something quickly without leafing through books:
5e Online DM Screen
Sly Flourish's guide to 5e Narrative Combat
Combat Reference Sheet (I like giving these to new players/people new to 5e)
Kobold Fight Club if you need to build an encounter randomly or for adventures you are designing, this is pretty great.

Early Edition Converter : I am using this to convert some old Planescape stuff I own or anything I pick up from RPG Drive Through or DM Guild.

Now this is interesting!

Monte Cook Games and DriveThruRPG Announce the Cypher System Creator Program

Basically they are setting up a way that anyone can create content for the Cypher System and sell it for whatever they want through DriveThru RPG.

This was pointed out to me in a different Slack chat.

http://autorolltables.github.io/

Gremlin wrote:

For dungeon details, one thing to do is to browse the One Page Dungeon contest and crib liberally from clever encounters there.

mudbunny wrote:

This was pointed out to me in a different Slack chat.

http://autorolltables.github.io/

Those are both really good resources! Especially for alternative systems.

Gremlin wrote:

Just started Episode 4, and man are these so very, very good. First episode:

Not sure this counts as DMing but I made a custom Pathfinder race for fun (and possible use) if anyone wants to comment or provide feedback:

Spoiler:

Race Twice-born

The Twice-born are those who having once been an animal and often the companion of a druid, ranger, or some type of magic user have gained both sentience and the ability to shapeshift at will between between a humanoid form and their original form. The Twice-born are so called for the feeling that many share that they were not truly born until they gained their humonoid form, though most Twice-born (And the world at large) are not aware of the existence of others. While not in full control of their shapeshifting abilities in the way a druid or other shifters are, a Twice-born has some basic control of their abilities and often seek to further master their shape changing skills through further study of shapshifting.

Physical Description:
The Twice-born have no real commonality in regards to appearance. They are in humanoid form almost always of a medium build of whatever race is most common in the region they are from be they human, elves, or anything else. Their appearance does not however grant them any traits of these races. The things that do tend to stay consistent between all Twice-born is eyes of either green or blue that seem a bit too bright to be natural, and limbs that are slightly out of proportion lending them a sort of uncanny appearance.

Ability Score Racial Traits: A Twice-born’s ability bonuses depend on its first form. Tiny and small creatures gain +2 to DEX, Medium creatures get +2 to STR. they also gain a +2 to WIS, INT, or CHA depending on the sort of magic that granted them shapeshifting. They also take a -2 to Int but this can be nullified by having gained shapeshifting through magical means that draw power from INT.
Size: Medium
Subtypes: Twice-born are humanoid with the Fey and shapechanger subtypes. Additionally they count as a beast in beast form.
Base speed: 30
Languages: Twice-born begin play speaking Common and Sylvan

Skill Bonus:
Twice-born get a +2 bonus to Survival checks. (RP2)

Magical Racial Traits
Form Shift (RP5): Twice-born can shift between Humanoid and animal form as a standard action. Upon shifting any gear the Twice-born is wearing that can not be worn is cast aside unharmed. This is permanent until the Twice-born changes forms again but does not alter ability scores or at GM’s discretion grant qualification for any wild shape feats. Though the beast form will benefit from them if the Twice-born qualifies for them in any other manner. It does however count as whatever size the base animal is.

Twice-born are not able to speak in animal form unless granted the ability through other means

Senses Racial Traits
Scent (4 RP): Benefit: Members of this race gain the scent ability
Low-Light Vision (1 RP): Benefit: Members of this race can see twice as far as a race with normal vision in conditions of dim light.

Offensive Traits
Claws (2 RP): The twice-born can manifest a pair of claws granting them two natural attacks in both forms whose damage is based on the size of the Twice-born. This ability may not be used while wearing gloves of any kind.

Weaknesses:

Unconscious Shift (RP-2):
upon being rendered unconscious by means other than sleep (Both natural and magical) the Twice-born is forcibly shifted into its animal form and can not shift back in till conscious again.

Uncanny Form (RP-1):
In Humanoid form the Twice-born suffer a minus -2 to disguise and diplomacy checks due to their odd looks

Still missing a few details and could use some more clarity, and I might change the name to something that does not imply they spend time going door to door telling people the good news but for now I'm happy with it on the whole.

Given the discussion of people not feeling safe in tabletop gaming spaces lately, I thought it'd be useful to link to the X-Card.

The X-Card is an optional tool (created by John Stavropoulos) that allows anyone in your game (including you) to edit out any content anyone is uncomfortable with as you play. Since most RPGs are improvisational and we won't know what will happen till it happens, it's possible the game will go in a direction people don't want. An X-Card is a simple tool to fix problems as they arise.

It's more of a tool to deal with in-game, in-character content, versus larger out-of-game stuff in game stores and general interpersonal stuff, so it definitely doesn't fix everything. But as a tool in the toolkit, it can be handy. I've heard of players using it for stuff as diverse as spiders or architecture (the player was a professional architect and didn't want to break immersion by fussing over the details of how things stayed up).

I was once GMing a Call of Cthulhu game and the main bad thing was the spider god thing (I forget the name) anyway turns out one of my players had a massive fear of spiders. As in when I mentioned spiders, she jumped up and grabbed her boyfriend. Quick solution - spiders become snakes - god became Yig.
Never had anything else come up but we have a pretty solid group who have being game together for years now (the above story isn't from our regular group)

Didn't see this listed but I find it helpful, Donjon Fantasytools. Does a lot of random creation of dungeons, npcs, encounters, worlds, shops, ect.

The Dungeon Dozen has a bunch of different random tables you can roll on with a d12. They’ve even got a book (also in PDF).

Gremlin wrote:

Given the discussion of people not feeling safe in tabletop gaming spaces lately, I thought it'd be useful to link to the X-Card.

The X-Card is an optional tool (created by John Stavropoulos) that allows anyone in your game (including you) to edit out any content anyone is uncomfortable with as you play. Since most RPGs are improvisational and we won't know what will happen till it happens, it's possible the game will go in a direction people don't want. An X-Card is a simple tool to fix problems as they arise.

It's more of a tool to deal with in-game, in-character content, versus larger out-of-game stuff in game stores and general interpersonal stuff, so it definitely doesn't fix everything. But as a tool in the toolkit, it can be handy. I've heard of players using it for stuff as diverse as spiders or architecture (the player was a professional architect and didn't want to break immersion by fussing over the details of how things stayed up).

Thanks for sharing! I’ve seen this mentioned in a few of the blogs I follow. It’s a good idea.

For random inspiration, I've also used Dungeon Words. It's a set of evocative words, arranged to be rolled up with a d12 and d20.

For maps, there's the Geomorph mapping project that saw a ton of artists draw up sets of dungeon geomorphs. (Plus a tool to randomly assemble them into a map.)

Xpost from D&D thread:

So now my players are getting to the point where they are going to start getting some actual loot. Since i like physical things for players i've been making MTG cards with potion text and pictures on them from this site and then importing them into word and pairing them with a card back to print double sided cards. Anyone have a different/better way to do that? Lining the cards up is difficult in word but works well enough.

When I created initiative tracker cards for my game, I used Affinity Designer. I expect Illustrator would work equally well. Other than that, you could try Excel. It sounds crazy, but it might be easier to get a precise layout in Excel than Word.

Depending on your version of Office, you may have Publisher, which has a lot of good templates for things. I've used it for brochures, programs, and tickets for events, so there's probably a template for two-sided cards.

I typically use InDesign, which is maybe overkill for you. There's also tools like nandeck and squib, though they won't necessarily solve this particular problem.

When I do prototyping cards, I just put them in a card sleeve with a random card for backing.

Make sure the back design you use has a thick border so exact alignment is less necessary.

I really like this site for generating item cards: http://crobi.github.io/rpg-cards/gen...
You can click the "Load Sample" button on the left to load some sample cards and then modify them as needed.
It includes card back images so I just print double-sided and then stick them in card sleeves.

muttonchop wrote:

I really like this site for generating item cards: http://crobi.github.io/rpg-cards/gen...
You can click the "Load Sample" button on the left to load some sample cards and then modify them as needed.
It includes card back images so I just print double-sided and then stick them in card sleeves.

That is really, really slick. It would be good for making cards of character abilities or moves, too.

Celebration/venting time.

So, I've been DMing a campaign since last fall. Outside of a few Perdita one-shots this was my first time DMing. I'm finally starting to really enjoy it. Things started off pretty rough but I finally have a good consistent group of players and I'm starting to feel like I actually know what I'm doing sometimes.

Some backstory, spoilered since it might get long:

Spoiler:

Last summer I started looking for a group to play in and found a post on the r/LFG subreddit from a local DM looking to start up a new campaign. I got in touch with T, the DM, and he rounded up two more players (K and B) and a campaign was begun.

From the start, there were a few red flags. T was a weirdly intense guy and his campaign was set in this very complicated homebrew world that he'd clearly been developing for ages. He had also basically no understanding of the 5e rules but he'd played a lot of the earlier versions. The campaign was a huge mess of unconnected plot threads and over-complicated backstory which often just devolved into him delivering long monologues at us explaining all his wonderfully clever ideas.

I liked the other two players though, and I'd been looking for a group for ages so I stuck it out.

A couple sessions later, we gained two more players. One was a friend of K, and the other was K's neighbour. The friend was a good guy but he never seemed particularly invested in the game. The neighbour was an absolute nightmare: racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, constantly drunk/stoned, and prone to interrupting the game with lewd outbursts. He "just wanted to kill sh*t" and would complain constantly any time we tried to do anything that wasn't combat.

Meanwhile, B got fed up with T's ridiculous homebrew and politely quit the group. To replace him we recruited yet another player, M.

After a couple more sessions with the awful neighbour, T got sick of his sh*t and kicked him out of the group. This generated a ton of drama that led to K also quitting the group. Of the original players, only I remained.

During all the drama, T announced that he needed more time to prepare between sessions, and wished he could also get a chance to play a character. I offered to start up a second campaign, so we could trade off DMing duties each week. I made it clear that I'd never DMed a campaign before, so I would be using the Starter Set and running a very straightforward, by-the-books campaign. T claimed he was OK with this.

I should mention that T was prone to writing incredibly long, stream-of-consciousness style emails that tended to veer into uncomfortably personal territory. So while all this was going on I was receiving an endless stream of email novellas from T. If I didn't promptly respond to each and every one I would just get even more emails alternately prodding me for a response and apologizing for sending too many emails.

Helping T create his character revealed just how little he understood about playing the game. After multiple emails back and forth trying to get him to understand (and choose) skill proficiencies, I eventually just created a character sheet for him. He was much more interested in telling me all about how his super-special unique snowflake wizard had died and reincarnated countless times and he remembered all his past lives, or sending me giant lists of all of his character's distant relatives. I'm all for a well fleshed out backstory but this was:

  1. waaay too long, and
  2. sh*t

I started my campaign. We recruited another player who showed up for a single session and then disappeared off the face of the earth. K's friend, who stuck around during all the drama with K and his neighbour, also quit the campaign after a couple sessions. M recruited A, a player he knew from another game. So now, we're down to me, T, M, and A. M and A are great. T is continuing to try my patience by turning his character into weird Wizard/Druid multiclass.

You see, T hated combat. He said he'd been playing D&D for ages and killing monsters was boring now. He claimed he was much more interested in RP, world-building, etc. That would have been fine if it were true.
By his actions, it became clear that T wasn't really interested in "D&D as collaborative storytelling", he was actually much more interested in "D&D as simulation". What I mean by that is he loved to spend ages telling us all the possible ways he could abuse his spells and abilities to mess with the world. These included:

  • casting the Mold Earth cantrip over and over to gradually build giant earth walls around towns. He was obsessed with fortifying every town we encountered.
  • using Mold Earth and Firebolt to make ceramics
  • using Druid Wild Shape to turn into a giant spider, make tons of spider silk, and sell it to local weavers.
  • using Druid Wild Shape to breed with other animals.

Now, some of these are fairly creative but most of them were either incredibly tedious (nobody else wants to spend an entire session building walls, especially when the party is on a time-sensitive mission) or involved using low-level abilities to try and break the economy (no you can't make infinite silk with a level 2 Druid ability). Also that breeding thing is just f*cked up. The worst part though is that he loved to talk and talk and talk about all these hypothetical things he could maybe do sometime, but when it came to finding creative solutions to things in-game, his approach to everything was just "turn into a bear and attack". For a guy who claimed to hate combat he instigated a lot of completely avoidable combats.

Meanwhile, T's own campaign was continuing to devolve into a Gordian Knot of plot threads and weird DMPCs. Also a TON of railroading. The less said about that the better.

And of course, I'm still getting an endless torrent of emails from T. Mostly complaining. Complaining I won't let his character abuse his abilities to the extent he wants. Complaining about the simplistic nature of my campaign (it's the f*cking Starter Set for f*ck's sake!). Complaining about the 5e rules and how things were so much better in the older editions. Complaining that I and the other players don't appreciate his campaign. Complaining about a bunch of personal stuff going on in his life that I really didn't need to know about.

Then he started getting paranoid. I cancelled one session due to a schedule conflict and he became convinced that M and I were conspiring to remove him from the campaign. I explained that wasn't the case. Then he cancelled his campaign, rolled up a brand new character to replace his old one in my campaign, played that character for one session and then quit my campaign.

Good. f*cking. Riddance.

After all that, I was down to two players. We had finished the Starter Set and moved on to Princes of the Apocalypse. I really like these players but it was getting a little hard tuning encounters that were written for a larger party so that they wouldn't kill the Dynamic Duo. On the plus side, now that I didn't have a player fighting me every step of the way I started to have a much easier time DMing. My players were happy to work with me, and I was getting much more comfortable in my role as DM. I learned to rely on the campaign book less and just use it as a rough guideline rather than the gospel truth. I started roleplaying NPCs more instead of just describing the things they said.

Recently, one of my players managed to recruit another friend of his, who ended up bringing in another friend. Both new players fit in immediately and the first session with their characters was one of the best we've ever had. We've had one more session since then and it went great too. I'm having actual fun as a DM! I don't have to worry about problem players or TMI email barrages. I can finally just relax and play some f*ckin' D&D.

TL;DR things are great now but holy hell I had to wade through some sh*t to get here.