New DM Handbook: Starting Your Adventure
As of this writing, about 10 days ago The DMG Info shared a video with Nerdarchy about starting your adventure, and how you’re doing it wrong. A week later, Nerdarchists Dave and Ted posted a response video. Today, in a bout of Nerdception, I want to give my thoughts about the subject as a whole, as well as drill down the subject to my experience with my new players.
New DM Handbook: Character Backstory
There are a lot of people who either don’t feel creative enough to make up a character backstory, or who feel like they’re going to do it wrong. There’s no real way of doing it wrong, as long as you can paint a vivid enough picture of your character for yourself (although I’m sure a lot of DMs would prefer to have something concise, if you’re going to share it with them). Still, I know some people feel lost without some help, so I’m going to share a tool I created for my players that’ll help simplify the process.
New DM Handbook: The Rival Party
From Beowulf vs Breca, Muhammed Ali vs Joe Frazier, Maverick vs Iceman, Marvel vs DC, Bill Gates vs Steve Jobs, and Gary Oak vs Ash Ketchum, rivalries have been an integral part of history and culture from the beginning of civilization. They drive and fuel us to do better. To be better.
Rivals aren’t just opponents to be vanquished. They’re the measuring stick by which we compare ourselves. Pepsi doesn’t compare itself against Shasta. It competes with Coca-Cola. In turn, the Dr Pepper Snapple Group may aspire to be in competition with Pepsi and Coca-Cola, but being that both companies have no problem sharing space with Dr Pepper products, it’s obvious that they aren’t.
New DM Handbook: Adventuring Guild Agencies
Earlier this week, the Nerdarchist Primes did a video on good practices for using adventuring guilds. It made me think of something I’m putting together for my world: Adventuring Guild Agencies. I know it sounds really weird, but I would best describe it as a cross between an adventuring guild and a talent agency. It’s a place more than an adventuring guild hall. More importantly, adventuring guild agencies can provide the GM and the players with significantly more tools in their game.
Nerds, Give Sports a Chance
I’m going to preface this by saying I know not all nerds hate sports. Hell, I’m one of them. What I’ve noticed is that a lot of nerds either borderline or outright relish in the fact they don’t know anything about sports. Some go as far as to mock people who love sports. My sister is one of those people.Her disdain for any sport is palpable, and she talks down to sports the way most people would about Dungeons and Dragons, Cosplay, or LARPing.
New DM Handbook: Starting gaming in Adulthood
At first, I wasn’t going to write this article because Doug, one of our newest writers, coincidentally wrote an excellent piece this week talking a lot about a lot of the same things I was going to before I could. Seriously, if you haven’t checked it out, read it now. It’s a very well written article. However, I eventually realized there are actually a few different experiences that we’re going to have by pure virtue of when we’re starting playing Dungeons & Dragons. Enough that I think it’s worth an addendum.
New DM Handbook: Explain Your Actions
I can’t speak for experienced players, being that my only experience is with new players, but if the show Critical Role is any indication, then it likely applies to everyone. As the Dungeon Master, you have to play the role of enemy creatures and NPCs, which means thinking like them. Your decisions have to reflect the decisions they would make. That means making a lot of unpopular decisions.
New DM Handbook: Let Your Players Inspire Your World
This article is going to largely stem from my experiences when adjusting to my Platinum Dragonborn Oath of the Ancients Paladin Gladiator, but that’s largely because she was the only one of the group who I felt required significant adjustments to my world. This isn’t to say she dictated that my world needed to accommodate her. She made her character choices, and I chose ways I felt were best to accommodate her character. I didn’t do it just to accommodate her, but because Dungeons & Dragons is a collaborative story, and it’s made all the better the more everyone is willing to work together. In my opinion, my world has been made all the better for it, and I can’t imagine too many that wouldn’t benefit from some accommodation, either.
New DM Handbook: The Tutorial Quest
For a while now, I’ve been talking mostly theoretical, while including some real-world personal experiences to support my claims. While that won’t completely go away, especially since I have a lot more philosophy I want to go through, I wanted to start talking from a place of experience.
The Tutorial Quest or:
First Impressions of ‘Underworld: Blood Wars’ movie
If you’re a fan of the Underworld series, you won’t be disappointed. It hasn’t changed at all over the past 14 years, and hasn’t bothered to modernize in any way since its last sequel 5 years ago. For those expecting more, there is a small glimmer of hope Blood Wars may not be a standalone movie. I think it’s a transition into a new direction. It wasn’t a predominant feature of the film, which largely hit all of the exact same notes as the previous installments, including the increase of power levels not too dissimilar to the Resident Evil movies, or Dragon Ball Z. That being said, the introduction of new elements to the world may be the precursor of things to come. I, for one, welcome these changes. I was never a fan of the overboard Goth/Hot Topic aesthetic, nor of the ham-fisted melodrama, but I always enjoyed the premise.
New DM Handbook: The 10 Commandments of Tabletop RPGs
These are my 10 Commandments of Tabletop RPGs. Some of these are based on personal experience, where others are based on observation. I won’t always indicate which is which, but I feel confident in my assessment.
First Impressions of ‘A Monster Calls’ movie
I’ve never read A Monster Calls, but if the traditional ratio of quality from books to movies is any indication, the film has inspired me to pick up the children’s book. For those who never read the book, I won’t spoil it. Having come fresh eyed from the film, I felt the journey was easily the most important
New DM Handbook: Your Story Doesn’t Matter
This is going to be by far my most controversial post, which I believe says a lot. Based on my observations, it would seem that the mentality among Game Masters is they have a story to tell, and the players are there to play in...
New DM Handbook: Old New Players
Last week I DMed my first game. I originally didn’t have any intention of addressing it right away, and I won’t get right back to it. I still have a number of things I wanted to talk about how I see things before getting to it, but this is something that new DMs should be aware of.
This article is written based just on one session, with two players being completely new, and two having played a long time ago. It’s not a very effective sample size, but what I observed is worth consideration for other new DMs.
The Old New Player
What do I mean when I say Old New Player? They’re someone who played a long time ago but fell out of the hobby, and are now coming back after many years (if not decades). Why they left doesn’t matter. Maybe they stopped playing because they felt they grew out of it, they didn’t have time for it anymore, or maybe they stopped playing due to peer pressure. It doesn’t matter. You’re
putting together a game, and they’re excited to get back into something they really enjoyed a very long time ago.
New DM Handbook: An Introduction
Welcome to my new series, ‘New DM Handbook.’
I know it’s a weird name, but it’s way better than “My Journey as a New DM, the Lessons I Learn Along the Way, and a Guide to New DMs and Players from Someone Just Like You.” Plus, it’s a lot shorter. If “New DM Handbook” is still too long, NDH will work just fine.
Straight to the point with D&D
My goal with this series is to chronicle my exploits as not just a new Dungeon Master, but as one who is almost completely new to the hobby. Veterans to Dungeons & Dragons who provide insights for us inexperienced players are invaluable, but decades of experience can become overwhelming for those just trying to figure things out. There’s so much D&D history which experienced players draw on. So many kinds of mechanics, and so much lore. There’s multi-classing and optimized building. There are endless experiences to draw from.
