1. Define navigate. Do you mean getting from one plane to another, or getting around while on a plane?
2. Skip it. Pretty early on, PCs get enough powers, spells and abilities that make travel obstacles trivial. Just hand wave the travel with, it took you two days to get from a to b.
3. This one is too big to answer on my phone, hopefully someone else can step in here.
*The following advice is based on what I do and how, others will likely disagree with me. Everyone has to find whatever works best for themselves.
Wait until the next campaign after more basic questions like 2 & 3 are no longer necessary. (Honestly, inter-planar travel can still be a pain in the @$$ for more experienced DMs at times.) Also, I personally find it useful to hold off on inter-planar intrigues until at least tier 3 if not 4. That’s not really because of the tougher opponents, I personally find 5e too easy. I hold off for two main reasons: 1A) I want the first 2-3 tiers to really focus on the world I have created for them, not all of those other worlds. Players hate info dumps, so the more time I have to expose them to my world (before distracting them with new realities) the slower I can take it, and the better they’ll receive the information. 1B) Late in the campaign, I can still break this glass in an emergency if I have to. I mean, I can always find an excuse for them to potentially go plane hopping if I need to, they are infinite after all. But if I don’t have any reason to incorporate other planes before tier 4 (if at all), and they don’t seek out planner travel themselves then it may never come up. (Especially considering how few campaigns go that long.) Mind, if I expect the campaign will go that direction for any reason then I start specifically foreshadowing planar hooks as early as I can as part of B or C plots. Then I can nudge it towards their A plot later. (The hope is that from their perspective it looks like there are many unrelated things all happening in the world around them all of the time “off screen.” That impression helps make any world feel more “real.”)
That requires finding the right mix between my answer to #3, and also interjecting just the right amount of opportunity for them to interact with your world. Whatever you decide is there for them to interact with doesn’t have to be combat, or even combat adjacent. It just has to be interesting and memorable. It might be a group of Bandits who also happen to be mostly Goblins, maybe other times it’s some vicious Beasts, or regular human enemies. But other times it could be a human carter or some pilgrims who could share news of the road ahead, or perhaps a Goblin hunting party with fresh meat to share (those could all be [Tooltip Not Found] with Human/Goblin Ability Bonuses and Traits added); or some animals who might need help; or just some inclement weather, or perhaps a cool cave or ruins to explore (maybe a quick 2-3 room “dungeon” to explore with some interesting creatures to discover or some cave paintings to teach them about the world’s history. They’ll eat this stuff up when they would glaze over at an info dump. Bonus Tips: 2A) Roll percentile dice at least once per day of “travel” and per night of “rest” and give them an impression of bookkeeping. You don’t actually have to roll for random encounters, but they’ll think you are. Players keep their Characters’ heads on swivels when they expect something might happen. It keeps the players‘ attention and also keeps the drama going without sucking up the time. Remember, they need it to feel like anything could happen, even if you want to move them quickly to their destination. 2B) For the kinds of combat encounters I exampled above, those fights don’t need to be any real challenge for the party at all unless you have a plan for what that’s supposed to teach them about the world. These fights just need to give the players something to interact with that also happens to teach them about the area like: “Gee, we met two groups of goblins and one of them was nonhostile. I wonder if there are a couple goblin communities around the area? Let’s hope that if we find one, it’s the nice group and not the bandits’ camp.” (But if you had tried to give them a geography lesson on the are they would have likely ignored it.
The way I try to handle descriptives is to be both brief and highly descriptive. The reason I often fail is that even when I’m not being highly descriptive I struggle with brevity. When I am being descriptive, like now... well you can see this wall-‘o-text. 🤷♂️ The goal is to be able to describe a scene (the countryside, a town, etc.) well enough that they could pick out your landscape (or whatever) from a photo lineup of landscapes, but to do it in under 5 sentences. Have you ever looked at a pre-written adventure and seen the “boxed descriptions” for the DM to read when the party first arrives on scene? Do that. Well chosen adjectives (& adverbs) help dial up the descriptions, pre-writing my “boxed text” helps with the brevity... a lot. 3A)The way the main DM in my group puts it: “Show them (with words), don’t tell them.” 3B) As my boss says: “Brevity.”
How descriptive and immersive are you now? Maybe you’re perfect!
I think the trick to getting better though is refining your whole oratory style. You have a lot of tools at your disposal as a DM and some suit one DM better than another. Find the ones you are best at and lean into them while you slowly practice the other ones.
What are these tools? Well, I don’t have a bullet-point list, but I’d start with: There are the actual words you choose to describe the world. My advice there - Strive for an elegant sufficiency. Maybe an artistic detail here or there, but nothing that they’re going to mistake for being important to the quest or they’ll get sidetracked; there’s world-building and how you show it to your players in such a way that they feel their characters are invested in the things happening outside their quest.
But we all know that the DM is more than a writer, a DM is also a performer! Are you the kind of person who wants to do funny voices and accents and really get theatrical? You don’t have to be, but it’s cool if you are. There’s your comfort with role-playing and your players comfort with it - how immersed does a given player want to be? There’s a lot of professionally charming personalities out there putting out an idea of the game that’s not for everyone; There’s learning to read the feedback that the players are giving you in the game (are they leaning in? how many are actually looking at you?). Let them describe things. They can all go ahead and immerse themselves!
Above all, communication with your players is the foundation.
2. Travelling is fun if you discover fun things. If you don't, it is boring. Like real life.
3. Do you need to be? People often think that to help the players immerse in the world you need to be really descriptive and use lots of words. You don't. You just need to give them enough words for them to be able to imagine it themselves. One of my players said they needed me to describe things more, but it turned out that what they needed was me to describe things more effectively.
Angry GM has a great article on this that helped me a lot;
Every time I see that article the dissonance between "Running D&D is FUN!" and Matt's face cracks me up. So much frown and so serious looking... still a good video...
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This are things I am needing help with in the current campaign I am running.
A New DM up against the World
1. Define navigate. Do you mean getting from one plane to another, or getting around while on a plane?
2. Skip it. Pretty early on, PCs get enough powers, spells and abilities that make travel obstacles trivial. Just hand wave the travel with, it took you two days to get from a to b.
3. This one is too big to answer on my phone, hopefully someone else can step in here.
*The following advice is based on what I do and how, others will likely disagree with me. Everyone has to find whatever works best for themselves.
Also, I personally find it useful to hold off on inter-planar intrigues until at least tier 3 if not 4. That’s not really because of the tougher opponents, I personally find 5e too easy. I hold off for two main reasons:
1A) I want the first 2-3 tiers to really focus on the world I have created for them, not all of those other worlds. Players hate info dumps, so the more time I have to expose them to my world (before distracting them with new realities) the slower I can take it, and the better they’ll receive the information.
1B) Late in the campaign, I can still break this glass in an emergency if I have to. I mean, I can always find an excuse for them to potentially go plane hopping if I need to, they are infinite after all. But if I don’t have any reason to incorporate other planes before tier 4 (if at all), and they don’t seek out planner travel themselves then it may never come up. (Especially considering how few campaigns go that long.) Mind, if I expect the campaign will go that direction for any reason then I start specifically foreshadowing planar hooks as early as I can as part of B or C plots. Then I can nudge it towards their A plot later. (The hope is that from their perspective it looks like there are many unrelated things all happening in the world around them all of the time “off screen.” That impression helps make any world feel more “real.”)
2A) Roll percentile dice at least once per day of “travel” and per night of “rest” and give them an impression of bookkeeping. You don’t actually have to roll for random encounters, but they’ll think you are. Players keep their Characters’ heads on swivels when they expect something might happen. It keeps the players‘ attention and also keeps the drama going without sucking up the time. Remember, they need it to feel like anything could happen, even if you want to move them quickly to their destination.
2B) For the kinds of combat encounters I exampled above, those fights don’t need to be any real challenge for the party at all unless you have a plan for what that’s supposed to teach them about the world. These fights just need to give the players something to interact with that also happens to teach them about the area like: “Gee, we met two groups of goblins and one of them was nonhostile. I wonder if there are a couple goblin communities around the area? Let’s hope that if we find one, it’s the nice group and not the bandits’ camp.” (But if you had tried to give them a geography lesson on the are they would have likely ignored it.
3A)The way the main DM in my group puts it: “Show them (with words), don’t tell them.”
3B) As my boss says: “Brevity.”
I hope that helps.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
How descriptive and immersive are you now? Maybe you’re perfect!
I think the trick to getting better though is refining your whole oratory style. You have a lot of tools at your disposal as a DM and some suit one DM better than another. Find the ones you are best at and lean into them while you slowly practice the other ones.
What are these tools? Well, I don’t have a bullet-point list, but I’d start with: There are the actual words you choose to describe the world. My advice there - Strive for an elegant sufficiency. Maybe an artistic detail here or there, but nothing that they’re going to mistake for being important to the quest or they’ll get sidetracked; there’s world-building and how you show it to your players in such a way that they feel their characters are invested in the things happening outside their quest.
But we all know that the DM is more than a writer, a DM is also a performer! Are you the kind of person who wants to do funny voices and accents and really get theatrical? You don’t have to be, but it’s cool if you are. There’s your comfort with role-playing and your players comfort with it - how immersed does a given player want to be? There’s a lot of professionally charming personalities out there putting out an idea of the game that’s not for everyone; There’s learning to read the feedback that the players are giving you in the game (are they leaning in? how many are actually looking at you?). Let them describe things. They can all go ahead and immerse themselves!
Above all, communication with your players is the foundation.
1. How do you want to navigate it? Do that.
2. Travelling is fun if you discover fun things. If you don't, it is boring. Like real life.
3. Do you need to be? People often think that to help the players immerse in the world you need to be really descriptive and use lots of words. You don't. You just need to give them enough words for them to be able to imagine it themselves. One of my players said they needed me to describe things more, but it turned out that what they needed was me to describe things more effectively.
Angry GM has a great article on this that helped me a lot;
https://theangrygm.com/how-to-talk-to-players-the-art-of-narration/
Good luck!
Oh, I almost forgot to include this, it really is the best advice I can offer:
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Every time I see that article the dissonance between "Running D&D is FUN!" and Matt's face cracks me up. So much frown and so serious looking... still a good video...