So I'd like to start a D&D 5E game with my 7 friends via discord, dnd beyond, and i think maybe Roll20.
The problem, however, is that although I have watched a lot of D&D( critical role ), I nor my players (except 1) actually have ever played it. I've tried to do a lot of research, and ive found a lot of stuff but its all confusing. Plus idk how im going to do this over discord with my players not wanting to voice chat so i have to type all my descriptions out... I also think that starting as a DM who hasn't even played the game before, I'm most likely going to screw this up and forget a lot of stuff, probably even killing the motivation for the players to come back and ruin their first experience of dnd. I don't want this to happen. Honestly, I'm scared to start and I don't know how to approach this. Currently, I feel like I'm drowning in rules, and don't know how to make sure I'm prepared and my players are prepared. That's why I decided to come here and ask people here if they know of tips and tricks, tutorials, important rules, maps or something of the sort (i have noo clue what im talking about) or anything that could help me make this as enjoyable as possible for my players. I'd really like this to be the start of something great, and not be the end of mine or my players interest in the game......
So yeah, if someone can help me that would be amazing cause i have until this Thursday to figure this out D:
i put this in the dungeon master only thread but i realized i probs should of put it here so i copy and pasted it...
My suggestion is, don't stress too much. The most important part is to have fun. Trust me, you WILL make mistakes, but so will your players. Who cares? That's part of the game. Roll with it and try to make sure that everyone, including you, has fun and you'll be a great DM.
Just remember one thing, the rules are guidelines. My personal opinion is that you should make rulings on how things work on the spot when you don't know and then research the specific rule in question between sessions and if your ruling was the wrong one tell everyone, or let them do the research and tell you, so that the game keeps flowing and you don't stop and take time to read the rules in the middle of the game. But that's an opinion. There are other players who think that every ruling needs to be perfect at the time so they disagree with me completely on this one. :)
Don't stress too much. You have a small advantage in doing text. Your players won't see your looks of horror or shock or confusion =)
Have a plan, keep it loose, be flexible. Your players will probably do stuff you totally don't expect. Regarding plans, you can have your page of descriptions - rooms, monsters, etc. open and copy/paste. Easier than typing everything out.
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"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
Check out Matt Colville's Running the Game videos, they're meant for new Dungeon Masters and it's helped me a lot in my games. He talks about a lot of different topics so look through it and focus on the ones you're not so confident about, given you have just a few days to prepare.
I'm also very new to DM-ing (I just ran my third game last Saturday with 7 players as well albeit IRL). To add on to what other people have said, when the players are new, they are not really sure what they can do so it's good to give them some hints and spend some time explaining how things work (I also guarantee not everyone would have read the Player's Handbook beforehand, hahah). If they're stuck, you can also prompt them with questions to help lead them to options.
For my players at least, I also find that they enjoy the role-playing aspect of the game so I tried focusing on that (eg. they are given time to sit around the tavern in the inn to talk to each other, NPCs come up to them to speak with them, etc). Your first session may be to learn more about what your players like through the things you've put in front of them. Some may like battles, some the puzzles, others talking to the NPC or walking around town.
Don’t stress the little stuff. It will all come in time and with experience. Something I like to do with new players is create a common bond between the characters. Let them joke and play interact as a way to start the first session. I’ve had a lot of sibling pairs. Or I’ve had whole groups who grew up together in the same little village. Those who are a little hesitant to role play tend to start to relax while building the backstory. Once connections are built it becomes much easier to introduce the details of the campaign.
The important part is having fun. Create a good story and some interesting people and let your players do the rest while using the rules and dice rolls to help you tell that story. If you want to run a published adventure then focus more on the story and the people in that adventure and how you feel the story might progress, but players have a tendency to things in unexpected directions, just roll with it and write down things you might make up on the fly so that you can use it later when the players go back to a location or a person later on.
If you have OneNote, you might want to download the file from the link I'll provide below and use it to learn the rules, everything is searchable by the way which makes it easy to look up something you want to learn (it also tells you what book and what page the rule is coming from). I have a OneNote file that has all my campaigns divided into sections (I currently have 5 differnt campaignsl) and then an Encyclopedia Section with all the information about my campaign world. I then have sections for DM'ing, Roll20, D&D Beyond, and I've also copied the OneNote file below into my personal notebook so that I have everything in one notebook.
Remember, the rules are there to help you judge situations and add randomness to your story as players interact with your world. I don't memorize rules and I don't track everything that all player characters can do. If a character tries something or casts a spell then I look it up real quick just to make sure they're doing it correctly, but most of the time I let the player handle the rules of their character. When I teach the game then I usually will look over the character abilities and try to understand them so that I can help the new players better. It usually doesn't take new players long to learn how to play their characters, but be prepared to offer advice to a new players that are having a tough time making decisions.
Click the link on the right "Onenote SRD v 3.1 (.pkg file)" to download the OneNote file. I've been running campaigns for 20 years and this file has made running my games much easier.
When I started a few years ago, I found the rules overwhelming, too. I gave myself permission to ignore/omit certain rules, including:
-encumbrance (which we still don’t use)
-Opportunity Attacks (aka OAs; these got added back in)
-Reactions (I think; these have been added back in)
There may have been some others that I don’t remember now. I don’t use any of the optional rules. You may have different rules that seem overwhelming to you, so this isn’t necesarily a suggested list. I will say that eliminating reactions is particularly detrimental to the Rogue class as they level up; we made some adjustments for our Rogue player to balance that, until I felt comfortable with Reactions. I no longer remember what adjustments we made.
I also recommend using a published adventure to start with. The Starter Set is an excellent choice: In the early chapters, it provides lots of support for the DM, making some of the decisions for you; as you go along, it turns more of those decisions over to you. If you purchase it here, you can copy and paste description text from the module into discord, which should help some of your concerns.
There will also shortly be a new starter set related to Stranger Things. I can’t comment on how good an adventure it is, as I haven’t seen it.
Check out Matt Colville's Running the Game videos, they're meant for new Dungeon Masters and it's helped me a lot in my games. He talks about a lot of different topics so look through it and focus on the ones you're not so confident about, given you have just a few days to prepare.
First, don't worry too much about making sure you get everything right with rules and what not, you won't. Second, have fun.
Now you do have an interesting situation where voice is not an option. Roll20 might be the easiest option, if not just to keep the game orderly. You could also just make it a text based dungeon in Discord. But I would put restrictions on the chat, maybe have an ongoing initiative order to give everyone in the group a chance to be heard when the situation arises, like after you describe a room or after what an npc just said.
You'll be okay! I've run about 30 sessions of my current (and first ever) campaign and I still make mistakes and can't remember specific rules sometimes. I can't remember how many times I've stressed and agonized over mistakes I've made and worried about my players hating the game and...pretty much every time my players were fine with it or didn't even notice! It's good to be prepared, but also remember to cut yourself some slack.
D&D is a collaborative game and as your players become more familiar and comfortable with the rules they'll be able to take some of the burden from you. But for the first two sessions especially, don't be afraid to take things slow. Most of your players are new, too, so they will likely appreciate if you take time to remind them of things they can do in and out of combat (ex, "Now it's your turn in combat. You have an action and bonus action to use. Don't forget that you can also move up to 30ft if you'd like!" or "You see a symbol carved into the wall. Would you like to investigate it or try to remember its history?")
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So I'd like to start a D&D 5E game with my 7 friends via discord, dnd beyond, and i think maybe Roll20.
The problem, however, is that although I have watched a lot of D&D( critical role ), I nor my players (except 1) actually have ever played it. I've tried to do a lot of research, and ive found a lot of stuff but its all confusing. Plus idk how im going to do this over discord with my players not wanting to voice chat so i have to type all my descriptions out... I also think that starting as a DM who hasn't even played the game before, I'm most likely going to screw this up and forget a lot of stuff, probably even killing the motivation for the players to come back and ruin their first experience of dnd. I don't want this to happen. Honestly, I'm scared to start and I don't know how to approach this. Currently, I feel like I'm drowning in rules, and don't know how to make sure I'm prepared and my players are prepared. That's why I decided to come here and ask people here if they know of tips and tricks, tutorials, important rules, maps or something of the sort (i have noo clue what im talking about) or anything that could help me make this as enjoyable as possible for my players. I'd really like this to be the start of something great, and not be the end of mine or my players interest in the game......
So yeah, if someone can help me that would be amazing cause i have until this Thursday to figure this out D:
i put this in the dungeon master only thread but i realized i probs should of put it here so i copy and pasted it...
My suggestion is, don't stress too much. The most important part is to have fun. Trust me, you WILL make mistakes, but so will your players. Who cares? That's part of the game. Roll with it and try to make sure that everyone, including you, has fun and you'll be a great DM.
Just remember one thing, the rules are guidelines. My personal opinion is that you should make rulings on how things work on the spot when you don't know and then research the specific rule in question between sessions and if your ruling was the wrong one tell everyone, or let them do the research and tell you, so that the game keeps flowing and you don't stop and take time to read the rules in the middle of the game. But that's an opinion. There are other players who think that every ruling needs to be perfect at the time so they disagree with me completely on this one. :)
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Don't stress too much. You have a small advantage in doing text. Your players won't see your looks of horror or shock or confusion =)
Have a plan, keep it loose, be flexible. Your players will probably do stuff you totally don't expect. Regarding plans, you can have your page of descriptions - rooms, monsters, etc. open and copy/paste. Easier than typing everything out.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
Check out Matt Colville's Running the Game videos, they're meant for new Dungeon Masters and it's helped me a lot in my games. He talks about a lot of different topics so look through it and focus on the ones you're not so confident about, given you have just a few days to prepare.
I'm also very new to DM-ing (I just ran my third game last Saturday with 7 players as well albeit IRL). To add on to what other people have said, when the players are new, they are not really sure what they can do so it's good to give them some hints and spend some time explaining how things work (I also guarantee not everyone would have read the Player's Handbook beforehand, hahah). If they're stuck, you can also prompt them with questions to help lead them to options.
For my players at least, I also find that they enjoy the role-playing aspect of the game so I tried focusing on that (eg. they are given time to sit around the tavern in the inn to talk to each other, NPCs come up to them to speak with them, etc). Your first session may be to learn more about what your players like through the things you've put in front of them. Some may like battles, some the puzzles, others talking to the NPC or walking around town.
Hope this helps!
Don’t stress the little stuff. It will all come in time and with experience. Something I like to do with new players is create a common bond between the characters. Let them joke and play interact as a way to start the first session. I’ve had a lot of sibling pairs. Or I’ve had whole groups who grew up together in the same little village. Those who are a little hesitant to role play tend to start to relax while building the backstory. Once connections are built it becomes much easier to introduce the details of the campaign.
The important part is having fun. Create a good story and some interesting people and let your players do the rest while using the rules and dice rolls to help you tell that story. If you want to run a published adventure then focus more on the story and the people in that adventure and how you feel the story might progress, but players have a tendency to things in unexpected directions, just roll with it and write down things you might make up on the fly so that you can use it later when the players go back to a location or a person later on.
If you have OneNote, you might want to download the file from the link I'll provide below and use it to learn the rules, everything is searchable by the way which makes it easy to look up something you want to learn (it also tells you what book and what page the rule is coming from). I have a OneNote file that has all my campaigns divided into sections (I currently have 5 differnt campaignsl) and then an Encyclopedia Section with all the information about my campaign world. I then have sections for DM'ing, Roll20, D&D Beyond, and I've also copied the OneNote file below into my personal notebook so that I have everything in one notebook.
Remember, the rules are there to help you judge situations and add randomness to your story as players interact with your world. I don't memorize rules and I don't track everything that all player characters can do. If a character tries something or casts a spell then I look it up real quick just to make sure they're doing it correctly, but most of the time I let the player handle the rules of their character. When I teach the game then I usually will look over the character abilities and try to understand them so that I can help the new players better. It usually doesn't take new players long to learn how to play their characters, but be prepared to offer advice to a new players that are having a tough time making decisions.
Click the link on the right "Onenote SRD v 3.1 (.pkg file)" to download the OneNote file. I've been running campaigns for 20 years and this file has made running my games much easier.
http://www.cryrid.com/digitaldnd/2018/05/18/onenote-srd-download/
When I started a few years ago, I found the rules overwhelming, too. I gave myself permission to ignore/omit certain rules, including:
-encumbrance (which we still don’t use)
-Opportunity Attacks (aka OAs; these got added back in)
-Reactions (I think; these have been added back in)
There may have been some others that I don’t remember now. I don’t use any of the optional rules. You may have different rules that seem overwhelming to you, so this isn’t necesarily a suggested list. I will say that eliminating reactions is particularly detrimental to the Rogue class as they level up; we made some adjustments for our Rogue player to balance that, until I felt comfortable with Reactions. I no longer remember what adjustments we made.
I also recommend using a published adventure to start with. The Starter Set is an excellent choice: In the early chapters, it provides lots of support for the DM, making some of the decisions for you; as you go along, it turns more of those decisions over to you. If you purchase it here, you can copy and paste description text from the module into discord, which should help some of your concerns.
There will also shortly be a new starter set related to Stranger Things. I can’t comment on how good an adventure it is, as I haven’t seen it.
Trying to Decide if DDB is for you? A few helpful threads: A Buyer's Guide to DDB; What I/We Bought and Why; How some DMs use DDB; A Newer Thread on Using DDB to Play
Helpful threads on other topics: Homebrew FAQ by IamSposta; Accessing Content by ConalTheGreat;
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It bears repeating, so I'm repeating it. Matt Colville is an outstanding resource for new DMs. See also https://www.reddit.com/r/mattcolville/
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
First, don't worry too much about making sure you get everything right with rules and what not, you won't. Second, have fun.
Now you do have an interesting situation where voice is not an option. Roll20 might be the easiest option, if not just to keep the game orderly. You could also just make it a text based dungeon in Discord. But I would put restrictions on the chat, maybe have an ongoing initiative order to give everyone in the group a chance to be heard when the situation arises, like after you describe a room or after what an npc just said.
You'll be okay! I've run about 30 sessions of my current (and first ever) campaign and I still make mistakes and can't remember specific rules sometimes. I can't remember how many times I've stressed and agonized over mistakes I've made and worried about my players hating the game and...pretty much every time my players were fine with it or didn't even notice! It's good to be prepared, but also remember to cut yourself some slack.
D&D is a collaborative game and as your players become more familiar and comfortable with the rules they'll be able to take some of the burden from you. But for the first two sessions especially, don't be afraid to take things slow. Most of your players are new, too, so they will likely appreciate if you take time to remind them of things they can do in and out of combat (ex, "Now it's your turn in combat. You have an action and bonus action to use. Don't forget that you can also move up to 30ft if you'd like!" or "You see a symbol carved into the wall. Would you like to investigate it or try to remember its history?")