Hey there everybody!

So I'm trying something completely new and that is being a dungeon master! I'm not quite sure what I'm doing but I want some ideas or inspiration or anything at all I'm guessing from everyone who reads this? What in your opinion makes for a great story to write/bring to life as well as make it fun for my players to want to continue??

Please help with any inspiration or ideals at all!

Remember that your player's characters are the main characters in your story. Try to involve as many personal elements as possible when telling your story, as this will allow the players to feel more connected to what's going on. Family, items of importance, goals, aspirations, bonds, etc are all good things to add or address in your narrative.

Also, put some mysteries in the plot, even small ones. A mystery makes the player want to continue until that mystery is solved.

A mystery can be: a very strange item, strange sequence of events....not all of them should the critical for the plot, but, if solved, they give the player a greater picture of the adventure.

You, and your players, might want to use something from our own history, and work it into the campaign(s).

Possibly adding in several historic timelines, in a way that is your own, without taking things too literally.

It will make things seem familiar, while keeping everyone guessing.

S

Before anything else... remember to have fun.

I think that everyone has a different process of obtaining inspiration for stories, but the important part is finding that 'spark' that makes you WANT to create. The thing that gets you saying "OMG THAT WOULD BE SO COOL AND ALSO ..." fill in the rest with your ideas.

Where to find sparks (with links):

• music
• movies
• books (even if you don't have time to read the books, their premise is sometimes enough of a spark)
• LIFE
• Searching "fantasy art" images on google (I once improvised a full adventure based on a cool pic I saw and ideas that just flowed from that click here to see the map)
• Twitter... okay maybe not Twitter.
• Facebook... okay definitely not Facebook, but MAYBE Twitter.

Important things to do for an adventure you're creating on your own:

• Start small, create the basics of where the adventure begins and know that well enough to improvise off of. You can always create more later, just start with what you need the most for the first game.
• Plan an adventure that will matter to the characters. This will require effort on your part to pay attention to the characters that the players have created. Once you know a little bit about their characters, jot a few ideas down that will allow you to weave their ideas into your own! 
• Prior to your game, write and draw things that will help you run the game while you're actually at the table. Succinct notes, page references, for the adventure, maps of wilderland and dungeons, whatever helps keep the game moving!
• Create encounters and monster groups.  This is really important. Players in D&D WILL do things you do not expect. They will straight up walk away from that 100 level dungeon you spent a month planning for them to adventure through on a whim, for no good reason. Let them! Bring the adventure to them, where ever they choose to go. When you build encounters, start by tailoring each encounter towards your planned adventure. When you're done, separate each encounter from the adventure. Each monster group and each role playing encounter you made for your adventure can be isolated and dragged/dropped into another path if your players have decided to do something unexpected. You may need to re-skin that orc into a thief brute, but use the raw stats to aid your storytelling and no one will be the wiser.

Things to do if you're running a published adventure:

• Read the adventure, and take notes
• Read the adventure again.
• Continue re-reading the adventure as needed before each game.

All of this advice assumes you know enough about the rules to get by. You definitely don't need to know them all, but I would suggest knowing combat rules and how ability/skill checks work first. But remember, the players are there for an intriguing story. As long as everyone is having fun, the rest will all work out. 

I'd say the two big rules to DMing that work for me are A) Be ready to abandon everything you worked on for a session if your players derail your plan, and B) To never let rule A keep up from drawing up big plans anyway. Sometimes, your characters will turn a fight into a social bargain, or a parley into a frenzy. If this happens, you can shelve the battle plan for a later session with minimal retooling. Just because the players avoid an NPC of note or a fight that had a neat terrain doesn't mean it won't come back later (and without there knowing).

Something that I like with Dungeon Masters I've played with is seeing villains that aren't actually evil. A party's enemy doesn't need to be a bad guy, just someone whose views are opposed to the party. Good or evil people alike will likely have goals that conflict with the group's and vice versa, and those need to be sorted out if your players want their way, whether through diplomacy or violence.  

Sometimes all you really need to make a great adventure is one great hook to build a world around. I ran a Christmas one-shot for my friends where they were hired by the ruling wizards of their home country to sail to an island far in the north to find the workshop of a long-dead wizard (see the Santa Claus reference) and it turned into a full-fledged campaign where they uncovered a plot to summon an ancient god that would destroy the world and how to stop it, requiring them to travel to different parts of the world to find different parts of a weapon that could kill the god if they failed to stop the summoning. Granted, we never really got to the end, but we had fun, and that's all that matters.

Yeah, that's it. Just make sure that no matter what everyone is having fun. Ultimately Dungeons and Dragons is a game. Rules are important, but if following them takes away the fun, then what's the point of playing? Things may get ridiculous but ultimately, that is the stuff you will remember fondly.

There are lots of Youtube videos that I use for advice, like Geek and Sundry GM Tips with Matt Mercer and Satine Phoenix, Matt Colville's Running the Game, and more.

Best of luck, and have fun! :)

Another big thing to remember: This isn't just "your" game. It's "you AND your friends" game.

Also, if your players are new to the game, I would suggest not rushing them through the first few levels. Take it slow for a bit and let them ease into their classes and the game mechanics. I find that most of my ideas for later adventures come from the first 3 to 4 sessions of a campaign. I'll have a loose idea to begin with, throw in a random encounter or two, then figure out which thing the players are most interested in and run like heck with it.

One more thing, try to involve or engage each character equally in each play session. Again, you'll get the feel for what each player is more into from your first few sessions, so incorporate a healthy mix of game elements into the first few sessions then just weed out the stuff they just aren't interested in.

Lastly... as others here have said, don't be mad when the players derail your story. It's just as likely that they could kill the big bad guy in the first encounter. Especially if your dice hate you as much as my dice hate me ;)

The only wrong way to D&D is to not have fun.