I was recently asked to be a Dungeon Master (DM) for the new series of Dungeon & Dragons (D&D)

Image by Señor Bohnke via Flickr

Encounters for our local game store, Wandering Havoc, and while I was honored, I was also freaked out of my mind.

See, I still consider myself a D&D noob. At times, I feel less than stupid. But after last night, I DM’d a hard one-off adventure called Siege at Gardmore Abbey. This is a level 6 one-off, so the powers are better for the characters and the monsters are a bit harder too. Now, what they don’t tell you in these one-offs is that as a DM, you do A LOT of page flipping. Back and forth and back and forth to get all the information you need to run the game. Normally, this wouldn’t be so back, but when you have a 7 year old and a 2 year old clamoring for your attention, it is really easy to lose your place and forget what you are doing. From now on, hire a babysitter when DMin, check.

So, after that adventure, which turned out fine, but could have been a lot better, I sent a frantic text to Tiki, who is also known as Tikipedia. The man knows it all about D&D! The other two that are right there with him are Tim, aka Timminy Cricket, who can be heard across the store saying “Use (xyz) for that.” much like Jimminy Cricket, hence the nickname. And of course, Richard, who I just realized we don’t have a nickname for. (That will have to be remedied!). But, I digress, back to texting Tiki. I felt like a flop, but Tiki assured me that everyone had a good time and really it all boils down to that.

I also think that one-offs are a bit harder, because they seem to short in comparison. With the new series of Encounters, Beyond the Crystal Cave, there is more information for me and the players. I have more a chance of researching and adding in little things for each character to make the game more enjoyable. For instance, my friend, Tiki is playing a Hengiyoki, (yep, say that 5x fast!) and he has a really cool backstory, so while it’s not written into the encounter story, I can write something in just for his character and for my other players characters to make the game more interesting in the long run. This will work for this encounter, because this series is more role playing based than tactic based. The last set of encounters, was more tactic based and this approach would not have worked as well.

All in all, I am learning and getting better each time I DM. I have to remember that I can’t compare myself to other DM’s, especially rock start ones! 1. I am a different person and I approach things differently and 2. it takes time to be a rock star! So, I am going to do my best and be the best DM, I can be!

For more information about being a great D&D player or DM, make sure to check out my friend Richard’s blog: GM Central

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