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Post by Sidera on Oct 9, 2016 12:38:50 GMT
I'm a very newbie DM currently running my first campaign. I was always interested in the idea of D&D but didn't have access to any of the stuff or friends to play it with. Then a couple of years ago my boyfriend bought me the starter set for 5e and offered to DM it for me and his friends. I ended up putting more time into organising the sessions and calculating and dividing our xp afterwards along with doing a write up of the session on our fb page, getting counters for us and making a inch square board to set up battles on, than he did into setting up a session. He very much read a chapter 10 minutes before the session and relied on me and my brother to point out how things worked in game. I ended up offering to DM the next campaign because I'm happy to put the extra effort in and I didn't trust any of his friends to DM (they weren't very much team players in the game and had a very much video game oriented mindset, one even cheated a roll right in front of me and then after I pointed it out he seemed to have it out for me in game). We never finished our first campaign with them as interest petered out from his friend group and I transferred organising sessions to him in case it was due to me being overbearing. But that meant nothing was ever organised and no sessions were planned. So basically after some time passed I offered to fulfil my offer of dming, but instead just doing it for my boyfriend and my brother via the Out of the Abyss story  (You can read how that's going here) (And more of me yacking about this in my meet + greet post here) |
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Post by sparkusclark on Nov 5, 2016 0:50:37 GMT
It was my fourth or fifth year of college when my wife and I started playing 3.5 (just on the cusp of 4th coming out). We were playing a d20 modern homebrew on Tuesdays and a homebrew traditional D&D on Thursdays. Between two games and a boatload of classwork, our DM was a little overwhelmed, so I asked her if I could take over the Tuesday slot and she said yes.
Our merry band of modern-day adventuerers finished a mission, were given time on leave, and promptly got teleported to Greyhawk by feudal lord looking to bolster his armies by summoning warriors from alternate realities. He was, of course, destined to be the villain of the piece. Looking back on it, I may have wanted to go too big too soon and tried to sling in too many concepts; but everyone had fun and we had a lot of great moments along the way. Such as:
- Fighting a Troll Druid and her giant mantis animal companion in a fog filled shanty town.
- Solving a series of graverobbings in order to have the funds to woo another party member with a gift.
- Chasing a halfling on a riding dog through the back alleys of Saltmarsh.
- Discovering an ongoing battle between driders and were-phoenixs.
- My wife coming into her own rp'ing style as her character beat her way to victory in the area of Kord.
- The rogue burning Saltmarsh to the ground.
- The ranger getting pregnant.
- The barbarian centaur dumping most of his skill points into stealth and being a four-legged Batman.
- Eventualy discovering that the feudal lord who summoned them was operating under the influence of his grandfather who was a reality-hopping Lich Hitler.
You know, the usual first time campaign stories.
Sadly we never finished as graduation happened and the campus didn't want us coming back.
Thank god my wife's coworker, who hadn't played since '79 and insisted that, finding out I was a DM, we start playing again, or we would never have had the excuse to pick up 5th.
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Post by dmross on Nov 14, 2016 4:15:07 GMT
I wanted to give it a shot. That first one was an utter train wreck. Since then its been a passion to do it right. Always keep moving forward, always.
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Post by Jesse Ross on Dec 1, 2016 19:24:52 GMT
I got my start as a DM with friends in middle school, but fell out of it after I graduated high school.
Then, after seventeen years of my books and dice getting dusty on the shelf, I was recruited by my daughter and her friends. They all saw Stranger Things and wanted to battle their own demogorgon. I now host a game every other weekend for seven 13- and 14-year-olds (and occasionally pull in one of my high school buddies to help out and relive our own youth).
So far, they've:
- Hunted what they thought was a werewolf but was really zombie sheep (thanks Mitch and Chris for that bit of inspiration!)
- Saved a beloved local chef from meatball monsters and animated spaghetti
- Been recruited by a traveling circus troupe to attempt a bank heist
- Discovered that a candy factory is stealing its ingredients from the Feywild (and maybe also turning people into candy?)
It's been quite the series of adventures, and I've managed to pass the love of D&D onto a new generation. Also, I get to bond with my daughter and her friends at a time in their life when they'd almost certainly rather not be hanging out with grown-ups. I'm so grateful to have this game be something that we can share, and grateful to have such an active, D&D-loving internet community to provide me with inspiration. Thanks, all!
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Post by dmsam on Dec 2, 2016 3:09:00 GMT
Let's see. . .
I started playing DnD 4e once or twice during the first year of my residency thanks to a few friends. However, trying to shoot an arrow past a friend while calculating different types of cover was too cluttered for my taste. This is especially made apparent by my experiences as a video-gamer, where "responsiveness" of an action felt very important to me at the time. It also didn't help that nobody at the table was serious about playing. . .Needless to say, the experience fell apart quickly after a couple weeks.
We tried this again when 5e came out, and the elegant, streamlined rule-set instantly grabbed my attention. After playing 2 games as a player, I instantly realized that I would much rather play as the DM. I wanted to build a world full of rich cultural backgrounds and believable characters. It all started with a little city at the border of an empire, then quickly rippled out into a continental world filled with political intrigue and strife.
It took a few tries to get a stable group of players together, but in the end, it's worth it!
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mcookman65
Commoner
Posts: 1 
Favorite D&D Class: Rogue
Favorite D&D Race: Humans
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Post by mcookman65 on Dec 5, 2016 15:23:25 GMT
We all have stories on how we became a DM, so why not share them here. Hello everyone! Someone had better fix that door because even I was able to wander in here, BTW.  Anyway, answering the question and introducing myself, at the same time, is the task at hand, so let's get on it with it. Short version: I became a DM because our group's DM got a girlfriend and he stopped running our campaign. In fact, he stopped having ANY interest in Role Playing Games at all! I mean, sure, she was a varsity cheerleader, but it was like we no longer existed. Someone had to take matters into their own hands and I was that someone. It was 1982 and I was a sophomore in high school at the time. My game then was terrible, BTW. It has gotten a lot better over the years though.  Mark S. Cookman Black Shark Enterprises |
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DMsardu
Commoner
Started my first game and they liked it!
Posts: 8
Favorite D&D Class: Rogue
Favorite D&D Race: Any Elf
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Post by DMsardu on Dec 5, 2016 15:44:51 GMT
On again off again D&D player. D&D has been my mistress since I was 14 before I got into punk rock, drinking and premarital sex. We have broken up and gotten back together more times than I can count. When the going gets tough the tough gets rolling....D20's I find the D&D will keep me out of RL fist fights, bars ,jail and womens beds. So I decided to get playing again then figured I have no games to join as Im pretty new to Texas so I would start my own. In high school I played Second edition then later 3 and 3.5 edition. I will be running a 3.5 edition game with my brother in law, stepson and stepdaughter and another fellow.
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Post by DM Exitium on Dec 10, 2016 5:18:33 GMT
You know you are having a wild Friday night if you're posting on some D&D forums XD. I was convinced. No. Challenged rather, into being DM. My girlfriend's dad had DMed 2nd and 3rd editions for her growing up and I was of course at first no comparison to her nostalgia. I gave up, and she and one of my roommates stopped playing, but it wasn't just my fault as we were playing 4e...Later, with new roommates, they asked me to DM a 3.5 campaign for 14 people. It was a disaster, but brought my homebrew world to life and gave me the inspiration to breath new life back into it. We didn't continue playing that trainwreck of a campaign since all the chaotic evil characters just wanted to kill the other players to take their stuff. After moving away to graduate school, a group of grads asked me to DM for them, and they even had the 5e books and would let me borrow them as long as I needed. I fell in love with 5e, bought the books for my own and we have been playing this same group, same PCs for 18 months now and they are level 10. I made plenty of mistakes along the way, but more recently the DMB has tailored me in such a way to more subtly and smoothly control the flow of the game and story. No longer a level 0 DM, woot!
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Post by Not Flawful Jerad on Feb 15, 2017 0:18:31 GMT
Mine is even more boring than the classic "older brother played." My best friend in high school texted me one day and said "Hey I know you have a god complex, so do you wanna pitch in for dungeons and dragons 4e books and gm a game?" I already knew what it was and had a general interest in trying it. Fell in love with it and have been running games ever since.
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mightymkins
Squire
Rookie DM looking for advice and hopefully I can help someone else too!
Posts: 31
Favorite D&D Class: Ranger
Favorite D&D Race: Goliath
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Post by mightymkins on Mar 27, 2017 11:06:55 GMT
A friend of mine is huge into tabletop gaming but had never managed to get a group together for D and D. As he was moving back to Scotland after 5 years in Norway I thought this would be a great way to meet up regularly with an old friend.
Being someone that obsesses over any hobby I pick up this seemed to make me perfect choice to DM, finding the DMB podcast and subsequently the forums (sup Blockheads) has helped so much in me DMing as a Newbie to D and D with a party that is all Newbies also. We had our first 3 sessions this month and although we still don't know the basics it isn't stopping us having a great time every session. I love making the maps, planning personalised story lines and the reactions and hilarity of our game nights.
Any tips for a noob will be much appreciated, particularly for drawing my maps out :-)
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Post by tigrannosaurus on Mar 30, 2017 11:11:27 GMT
Played a few games with a friends big brother way back in 83 when i was 11. Then in 85, all growned up at 13 i bought a PHB, DMG, MM in secret (using my hard saved pockent money) and never looked back. Couldnt afford the modules so from session 1 i was dm and we were in my hoebrew world.
About 8 of us hid in the back of our catholic school library all through high school, slaying dragons, casting devils back into the flames and generally being goofy dweebs. played non stop throiugh high school, uni and early working career... then was 'between campaings'for a looong time. but the game never lkeft me and was often a retreat in thought experiments when life got me down
Flashfoward nearly 30 years. 5e is out and I've said to my wife i'd love to get a new group together. open xmas present and there they are, brand new 5e PHB,DMG and MM. Be still my heart. And she says, have a night a month away from us and the kids, i know you loved this. its time to love it again.
Put the call out on FB and 5 of the original group from way back in 83 signed up. some of whom i had not seen for 20 years. but when word got out i was kicking off a campaign they wanted in. we full on jake and elwood put the band back together. it was a humbling experience. we have two extras who started with us at the beginning of this campaign as well and the 'Rage of the Forgotten'is now well into its second year.
The DMB podcast has been awesome too, DMing pre internet was lonley as hell. Now we are a tribe and i am again part of it.
*gives secret dm salute*
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Post by dungeonmastersteve on Jun 29, 2017 4:41:20 GMT
I had a very gradual introduction to roleplaying and DMing. Growing up, I played a few roleplaying video games but put a lot of time into each one. Final Fantasy, Runescape (Food Mage = Culinaromancer?), KotOR, Morrowind.
My first exposure to DnD was during Scout camp. I was there with other older Scouts as a youth leader, and the other older Scouts had a game going. They let me look at the book and for some reason my mind caught on the equipment lists. I liked the idea of playing the game, but I never folowed through. Fast forward to years later. I don't know how or why, but I got hooked on the Order of the Stick. Hilarious. Next, I read Harry Potter and the Natural 20. Also hilarious.
Finally, around this time, we had some friends from church who asked my wife and I if we wanted to play in the campaign they were starting. My wife, who is not a geek (though I am slowly corrupting her) surprised me by accepting, and I was happy to accept it myself. This was just around the time that DnD 5th came out. We started with the Tyranny of Dragons, TPKed twice, it was great. The DM had to create a crazy-powerful NPC villain with a crush on one of our players.
We didn't get very far in the campaign before real life circumstances forced us to move back to California to be near each of our folks. We brought our love of DnD with us though. Her folks had no interest, but my family were up for the idea. Trying to be DM was too much reading and writing for my wife, leaving me as DM by default. We finished a campaign mashing together Mines of Phandelver and Tyranny of Dragons not too long ago, and having been listening to DMB I was inspired to create a campaign instead of buying a new one, and here we are.
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dmdemon
Commoner
Your Friendly Neighborhood Demon
Posts: 19
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Post by dmdemon on Jul 4, 2017 4:01:04 GMT
Met a person at work that slowly became my friend. Found out he played D&D, another friend and I convinced him to show us how to play. I had never seen D&D before. Obsessed for over a week on my first character and at the age of 26 I played my first, super awkward game of D&D. Well my overactive brain took over and a few days later i asked my DM if I could try running some things. He said sure and the next day i had a map draw. He looked at it, then at me and said "yep, you're a DM". I began a series of test games all growing into something larger. For the last 2 years i've been doing a Podcast www.thedemoncast.com with a total of zero followers i have thrown in the towel. the games will continue, but the podcast is dead to me. |
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Post by whodmsthedm on Jul 26, 2017 16:41:03 GMT
Well met!
This is my first post, though I've creeped the forums for a bit.
I have always been aware of D&D, but in my house and the circles my family ran in, it was never a thing. Though all the Stars, Narnia, LoTR, etc were prolific.
Fast forward to 2011, I scoured the interwebs for a copy of Star Wars the Old Republic Collectors Edition and played faithfully for the next 4 years.
Eventually I fell out of love with the game, though the universe and lore are still dear to me. Shortly after quiting the game I saw on YouTube, randomly, Will Wheaton running an RPG and one of his players was Laura Bailey, who voice acted one of my favourite companions in Old Republic. At this time, my company had me out of town spending 2 days at a time just sitting in a hotel room waiting for a call, so I watched Will Wheaton's Titan's Grave.
In the YouTube comments someone mentioned that they liked this, but enjoyed Laura in Critical Role better. So I thought... hey, what's that? I see the episodes are 3-4 hours long and think, I can watch an hour. 4 hours later my ass is numb and I'm clicking play on episode 2.
There are a number of games going in my area, but none were taking new players, finally a friend threw a little game together for me to experience it, I created a wizard who hates wearing pants and wears a cooking pot as a helmet (before ever reading of Pikel.)
I went full character mode, accent, voice change and attitude, it was great fun. The other players at the table thought I was an experienced player just cause I was fully invested and throwing things together all based on the plausibly positive outcomes to the question, "what if?"
Still unable to find a steady group to join and fully up to speed with hundreds of hours of Critical Role, I used Matt's world and history to springboard a homebrew and DM my own game.
Our game just hit its 1 year anniversary:-D
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Post by DM Lord Neptune on Jul 27, 2017 16:41:22 GMT
I accidentally answered this question on my introduction thread. Whoops!
TL;DR version: Started playing Palladium roleplaying games in my youth, and then my friends and I decided to start our own group, eventually deciding to each take a chance at the GM chair to be fair to everyone else. To be honest, almost all of my adventures involved visiting another plane of existence, another world, or something came to the world from another plane since my friends filled the more grounded story lines. We tried D&D at some point, and some in the group didn't like it since it was too different, but we went back to the Palladium system and borrowed the alignment system from D&D, which made things a lot nicer in that system.
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