Reaching out here as I am a brand new DM to my group of friends. I have played D&D for about a year but I am new to being a DM and I need some help with campaigns. I do not know how to write them or where to start; so I need some help. I am a Lvl 8, and so is another friend; but we are starting the newbies at a Lvl 3-4 so, I am looking for some harder fights. We all love scary and horror stuff so I am open to listen with anything!
There are a few threads on advice for new DMS in the first few pages of this forum, so I'd recommend browsing through there and reading up on the advice (there's a lot of good advice in there!)
Regarding writing campaigns, what has worked well for me is to be very careful not to try and plan for the players actions, because there's no chance of them actually doing what you expect! As soon as you say "The players will ask Flember for help", you're relying on that one thing happening, and if it doesn't, your plans go out of the window.
Instead write up what has happened until the party got involved, and what needs to happen for a key set of events to occur. For example:
instead of writing "The players will go to see the king, who will ask them to save the princess from the dragon, which the players will agree to do, then they will go to the forest and be stopped by dryads, who they will fight, and then they go to the castle, kill the dragon, and save the princess", you need to write "The king's daughter has been kidnapped and locked away, and the king is seeking adventurers to save her, and will offer 1000gp as a reward. The forest to get there is guarded by dryads, who will attack anyone who harms the trees and will demand a payment of plants in exchange for safe passage (one slightly higher than the other to get the nice two-level effect, with a little path down the middle), and then the castle is guarded by a dragon who covets gold above all things."
This way you have the motivations you need for the NPC's, and know what they will do if the players do things. It will be far easier to improvise the unexpected if you're not expecting anything to start with!
For starting the newbies at level 3, if they are genuinely new to the game, I would recommend starting them at level 2.9, IE a few fights and they level up to 3. This way they can learn how they enjoy playing before making the big decision at level 3 for what extra abilities they want! I've played in a few new-guy campaigns, and it often resulted in someone saying "I chose this, but I don't like it, can I change to that?", which is easily avoided if you let them play before they make the decision!
Scary & horror is tricky in Dnd as most people play the hero, and in horror movies, the hero tends to get eaten first. They need to feel powerless. One trick is to make this not affect them - villagers are disappearing, and it's up to them to stop it from happening. If nothing ever directly attacks them, they have no way of knowing how powerful the thing is. For lingering horror, don't resolve it. Leave it lurking in their minds - they'll never know what was eating the townspeople.
Might not be the advice you're looking for but consider just picking up a pre-written adventure. There are literally hundreds of them, and if you're stuck at square one, it would really help. Plus, you can change anything you want to customize it, but use a pre-written adventure a starting point. It's much easier for you, and might be a more structured environment for you players since you're new!
Heck, you can even pull from old D&D editions if you want something with a more retro flavor. 3-5th are gonna feel sufficiently modern, but if you look at adventures from Second edition or Ad&d you're gonna find some wild stuff. I recommend you just do some snooping around.
A piece of advice for teaching new players? Teach as you go. Don't bombard them with different rules at session 0, give them the rules when they become necessary. For example, don't explain the rules for Unconsciousness, Death Saves, and Stabilization until a player or plot-relevant NPC drops to 0 hit points or the players want to "knock-out" a monster. By doing this, you can keep the game going and still give the players all the information they need without overloading them with information.
You are a level 8? Like you have a that character is? First thing I’d suggest is not running your character in the campaign. You’ll have enough on your plate as DM, doubly so for a new DM.
Second thing would be to have everyone start with new, level 1 characters. The more experienced player and the new ones all at the same level. New players need those low levels to ease them into things and slowly learn what their characters can do.
Lost mines of phandelver is a really good intro campaign for new players and DMs alike. If you’re looking for more horror, raven loft is the first thing I think of, but it might be better to save that for your second campaign. Playing through a couple published campaigns can really help you understand how they flow, and will make a future homebrew campaign better.
Start with the setting. That's what you need! That's the foundation of the players' experience. Be as descriptive and evocative and as downright poetic as you can manage. Write out a few notes or paragraphs in advance if you need to for each scene, to be sure you capture the full experience of the setting for them. Use a thesaurus. Describe the place with all five senses! Don't just say, "The road leads over a hill and then you see a small town burning."
"With the setting sun at your back and your mounts' breath coming harder after a long day's travel through the rain, a somber glow rises from beyond the next hill. The scent of hickory and death pours down the hillside to greet you, the smoke so dark in the humid air that you can almost taste it. As you crest the hill you hear the crackle of flame and the low moans of those not fortunate enough to have died quickly. What was once the familiar village of Hemstahd is now an inferno of green flame and charred corpses. You will find no rest here tonight."
Start them off at the bottom, so they will have no choice but to fight their way upwards. Never give them a clear path, but present every choice as the lesser of two evils. Make them feel that no matter what they do next, there'll be two other things that they should be doing. Make them argue amongst themselves over their priorities. THAT is horror!
Horror is not just monsters and gore. Horror is more than just shadows and gloom. Horror is fear. But not a fear of something you can face on the battlefield, or fear of what's hiding in the darkest woods. True horror is the fear of ourselves! The fear that I may not be up to the task. The fear that others will discover my weaknesses. The fear of what will happen if I fail.
Read.
D&D is improvisational theater. It is an act of cooperative storytelling. You present the setting, the players present the characters, and all of you, together, write the story. To be a good writer you have to read. Read poetry, read horror, read fantasy, read history, read graphic novels, and read the classics. Pay attention to how the best authors don't direct their characters' actions, but rather they present the characters with adversity and then explore how the characters respond to it.
And don't feel like you need to do too much all at once. Start small, build as you go. Your worldbuilding only has to stay one or two sessions ahead of the players, which is good because you won't know what to build until they go somewhere and believe me, you'll never be able to predict what they'll do next. And when you feel like you've hit a creative roadblock, and you're not sure where to go next with the story... take from them something they love. Give them an Uncle Owen moment.
If they are new players, start them at level 1. There is a deliberate learning curve built into the game. If you're really keen to get them levelled up, you can move them to level 2 at the end of their first combat, and level 3 at the end of session 1, level 4 at the end of session 2 if you really want to. For the sake of 2 sessions, let them have this levelling experience. Otherwise you are going to find that for the first few combats they'll have no idea what they're doing.
They also won't know how to build their characters if they've never even made an attack roll. How does a level 4 spellcaster know which spells are, and are not, good choices for their character if they've never played a fight?
If you start them off even at level 4, you're going to slow your game down hugely - combats will run at snail's pace for several sessions. I cannot recommend enough starting a new player at level 1.
I also recommend running this in session zero:
Give each player a very boring character sheet: they have hit points, ability scores, one weapon attack, and one spell each (vary the spells).
Say they are themselves; they are in a room. There is an NPC there. Roleplay with them. The NPC wants something in the last room in the game. Use social ability checks.
They go through a door. There is a room with a trap/puzzle in it. They have to get through. Use physical ability checks.
When they get through, there is a monster in the room. Fight the monster. Maybe they win, maybe they lose.
All this should take less than an hour, but now your players understand how to play the game - with no pressure about a complex character sheet or anything like that.
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Hi everyone;
Reaching out here as I am a brand new DM to my group of friends. I have played D&D for about a year but I am new to being a DM and I need some help with campaigns. I do not know how to write them or where to start; so I need some help. I am a Lvl 8, and so is another friend; but we are starting the newbies at a Lvl 3-4 so, I am looking for some harder fights. We all love scary and horror stuff so I am open to listen with anything!
Thanks for reading this!
There are a few threads on advice for new DMS in the first few pages of this forum, so I'd recommend browsing through there and reading up on the advice (there's a lot of good advice in there!)
Regarding writing campaigns, what has worked well for me is to be very careful not to try and plan for the players actions, because there's no chance of them actually doing what you expect! As soon as you say "The players will ask Flember for help", you're relying on that one thing happening, and if it doesn't, your plans go out of the window.
Instead write up what has happened until the party got involved, and what needs to happen for a key set of events to occur. For example:
instead of writing "The players will go to see the king, who will ask them to save the princess from the dragon, which the players will agree to do, then they will go to the forest and be stopped by dryads, who they will fight, and then they go to the castle, kill the dragon, and save the princess", you need to write "The king's daughter has been kidnapped and locked away, and the king is seeking adventurers to save her, and will offer 1000gp as a reward. The forest to get there is guarded by dryads, who will attack anyone who harms the trees and will demand a payment of plants in exchange for safe passage (one slightly higher than the other to get the nice two-level effect, with a little path down the middle), and then the castle is guarded by a dragon who covets gold above all things."
This way you have the motivations you need for the NPC's, and know what they will do if the players do things. It will be far easier to improvise the unexpected if you're not expecting anything to start with!
For starting the newbies at level 3, if they are genuinely new to the game, I would recommend starting them at level 2.9, IE a few fights and they level up to 3. This way they can learn how they enjoy playing before making the big decision at level 3 for what extra abilities they want! I've played in a few new-guy campaigns, and it often resulted in someone saying "I chose this, but I don't like it, can I change to that?", which is easily avoided if you let them play before they make the decision!
Scary & horror is tricky in Dnd as most people play the hero, and in horror movies, the hero tends to get eaten first. They need to feel powerless. One trick is to make this not affect them - villagers are disappearing, and it's up to them to stop it from happening. If nothing ever directly attacks them, they have no way of knowing how powerful the thing is. For lingering horror, don't resolve it. Leave it lurking in their minds - they'll never know what was eating the townspeople.
Make your Artificer work with any other class with 174 Multiclassing Feats for your Artificer Multiclass Character!
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Might not be the advice you're looking for but consider just picking up a pre-written adventure. There are literally hundreds of them, and if you're stuck at square one, it would really help.
Plus, you can change anything you want to customize it, but use a pre-written adventure a starting point. It's much easier for you, and might be a more structured environment for you players since you're new!
Heck, you can even pull from old D&D editions if you want something with a more retro flavor. 3-5th are gonna feel sufficiently modern, but if you look at adventures from Second edition or Ad&d you're gonna find some wild stuff. I recommend you just do some snooping around.
A piece of advice for teaching new players? Teach as you go. Don't bombard them with different rules at session 0, give them the rules when they become necessary. For example, don't explain the rules for Unconsciousness, Death Saves, and Stabilization until a player or plot-relevant NPC drops to 0 hit points or the players want to "knock-out" a monster. By doing this, you can keep the game going and still give the players all the information they need without overloading them with information.
You are a level 8? Like you have a that character is?
First thing I’d suggest is not running your character in the campaign. You’ll have enough on your plate as DM, doubly so for a new DM.
Second thing would be to have everyone start with new, level 1 characters. The more experienced player and the new ones all at the same level. New players need those low levels to ease them into things and slowly learn what their characters can do.
Lost mines of phandelver is a really good intro campaign for new players and DMs alike. If you’re looking for more horror, raven loft is the first thing I think of, but it might be better to save that for your second campaign. Playing through a couple published campaigns can really help you understand how they flow, and will make a future homebrew campaign better.
Welcome to the tables!!!
Start with the setting. That's what you need! That's the foundation of the players' experience. Be as descriptive and evocative and as downright poetic as you can manage. Write out a few notes or paragraphs in advance if you need to for each scene, to be sure you capture the full experience of the setting for them. Use a thesaurus. Describe the place with all five senses! Don't just say, "The road leads over a hill and then you see a small town burning."
"With the setting sun at your back and your mounts' breath coming harder after a long day's travel through the rain, a somber glow rises from beyond the next hill. The scent of hickory and death pours down the hillside to greet you, the smoke so dark in the humid air that you can almost taste it. As you crest the hill you hear the crackle of flame and the low moans of those not fortunate enough to have died quickly. What was once the familiar village of Hemstahd is now an inferno of green flame and charred corpses. You will find no rest here tonight."
Start them off at the bottom, so they will have no choice but to fight their way upwards. Never give them a clear path, but present every choice as the lesser of two evils. Make them feel that no matter what they do next, there'll be two other things that they should be doing. Make them argue amongst themselves over their priorities. THAT is horror!
Horror is not just monsters and gore. Horror is more than just shadows and gloom. Horror is fear. But not a fear of something you can face on the battlefield, or fear of what's hiding in the darkest woods. True horror is the fear of ourselves! The fear that I may not be up to the task. The fear that others will discover my weaknesses. The fear of what will happen if I fail.
Read.
D&D is improvisational theater. It is an act of cooperative storytelling. You present the setting, the players present the characters, and all of you, together, write the story. To be a good writer you have to read. Read poetry, read horror, read fantasy, read history, read graphic novels, and read the classics. Pay attention to how the best authors don't direct their characters' actions, but rather they present the characters with adversity and then explore how the characters respond to it.
And don't feel like you need to do too much all at once. Start small, build as you go. Your worldbuilding only has to stay one or two sessions ahead of the players, which is good because you won't know what to build until they go somewhere and believe me, you'll never be able to predict what they'll do next. And when you feel like you've hit a creative roadblock, and you're not sure where to go next with the story... take from them something they love. Give them an Uncle Owen moment.
And most importantly - HAVE FUN!!!
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
If they are new players, start them at level 1. There is a deliberate learning curve built into the game. If you're really keen to get them levelled up, you can move them to level 2 at the end of their first combat, and level 3 at the end of session 1, level 4 at the end of session 2 if you really want to. For the sake of 2 sessions, let them have this levelling experience. Otherwise you are going to find that for the first few combats they'll have no idea what they're doing.
They also won't know how to build their characters if they've never even made an attack roll. How does a level 4 spellcaster know which spells are, and are not, good choices for their character if they've never played a fight?
If you start them off even at level 4, you're going to slow your game down hugely - combats will run at snail's pace for several sessions. I cannot recommend enough starting a new player at level 1.
I also recommend running this in session zero: