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View Full Version : DM Help Trying to get into roleplaying and become a DM. Need help



Yllin
2016-04-12, 07:15 PM
Hello, giantitp forum!

I've been trying to get into the roleplaying for quite some time. Never had luck with a gaming group - the most i could get was playing a few adventures, which were rather boring. I don't think anything is going to change unless i put myself behind the screen.

The only ruleset that i have some knowledge of is Pathfinder. I have two friends willing to play that i'll be comfortable to go with for the first time. They have about as much experience in RP as i do. We've discussed our expectations, and i know that they don't want a lot of random encounters and meaningless fighting, but would rather have some exploration and RP moments. I don't think I'll enjoy mastering a publish adventure. I don't have any storywriting experience also though. I tried to create an adventure, but I'm stuck about some things.

Now, I don't think my friends read this forum, but just in case: if you've been discusing RP games with someone who goes by nickname "odnoglazoe" recently, please don't read this any further.

I borrowed a lot from different sources. This is what i came up with eventually:
The adventure begins at dusk in a small fishing village near a lake. It is located at the edge of a forest.
A boy approaches PCs and asks to find his sister. She probably got lost in the forest. The locals tried to search but unsuccessfully.

The boy can show the place where his sister used to play.

If PCs try to investigate in the village, they will learn:

1) the girl's name
2) that the forest is considered cursed, with people disappearing in it. Thus locals don't usually enter it.
3) some random myth, correct or wrong one

What actually happend to the girl:

A snake lured her into the forest. A psycho tried to captured her, but she managed to escape with the snake's help. The snake then guided her to the serpent king. According to the serpent laws, she had to become the king's wife. (this doesn't imply any intimate involvment, only a social status) The snakes enchanted her to forget everything about her previous life and obey the serpent king. This wedding ritual will continue for X days.

What is there in the forest: (without any particular order)

A witch:

An ugly crone with a bone leg. She lives in an old cabin.
She will challenge PCs with a riddle. (which one?)
If they can solve it, she will feed them, give them potions and something(what?) else
Otherwise she will teleport them into a spiderweb.

Spiders:

They inhabit the dark and creepy part of the wood. Never attack travellers with a bright light source. Never attack those who solved the witches riddle.

The serpent lake:

The snakes dwell here ruled by the serpent king. The lost girl was brought here.
After the wedding begins (first dawn after PCs get the quest):

The girl is sitting here on a wooden throne in a white dress, decorated with pearl. Forest berries and flowers lie around her bare feet. She has lost her name and is slowly forgetting her past. In this condition she believes to be the king's wife. If PCs ask her to leave with them, she will refuse.
The serpent king is occupying the second throne. At least a dozen of snake servants are around.
The king will tell PCs about the girl's condition. He will offer pearls to PCs if they peacefully leave his domain.
The enchantment will temporarily break if the girl is called by her name. In this case she will try to run away and the snakes will attack PCs immediately. Friendly NPCs might come to help PCs.
The enchantment will be broken if the girl spends a few days with her family.
After the wedding is over (X days):

The spell became permanent. The girl forgot her past and followed the snakes into the lake. PCs can find traces of what happened.
Quest failed

A bridge:

A small stone bridge. More decorative than functional.

A snake:

If PCs tell someone about their quest, the snake will hear that. It will then try to interfere with PCs plans: mislead them, arrange traps, steal items, attract hungry vultures...

Wolves:

Wolves inhabit the forest. PCs can hear them howl every night or before they attack.
The wolves don't attack friends of the wood nymph and are ferocious against her enemies.

Speaking birds:

With some luck PCs can encounter two flamboyant birds. If PCs are kind to the birds, they will talk to the charachters and will help to navigate around the forest.

The mole:

A humanoid creature approaches PCs. It is completely blind, covered with black fur, and has long claws on its arms and legs. It offers to guide PCs where they need for the cost of any potion or magic item. If the players agree, the mole guides PCs to a hidden cave entrance. It tells that the cave is impassable for anyone who can see. It asks the characters to turn off all light sources, hold hands, close their eyes, and follow it. During the trip the players will be asked three times if any of them wants to open their eyes. It is pitch blackinside the cave. The characters go deeper. The floor becomes covered with a very viscous liquid. When the substance level reaches PCs' knees, the mole suddenly attacks. It can climb cave walls with its clawed hands to move unaffected by the liquid on the floor. This substance is actually a weak acid. It begins to deal small amount of damage to PCs around this point in time. The mole relies on its smell and hearing, and can navigate the cave freely. It will retreat into the darkness of the cave if takes serious damage.
The cave is a labyrinth. If the players try to trace their way or draw a map, they will discover that the corridors overlap and this structure is physically impossible.
As it was said, the cave is impassable for anyone who can see. PCs can get out if they close their eyes and/or turn off their light source.

The psycho:

A person dwells in a dilapidated cabin. He is dirty, smelly, dressed in rags. Two ingrown into the skin chains cross his chest. His face is damaged with a brand. The man wields a chain, a scourge and a cleaver. He will attack PCs as soon as he sees them.
Traces of the girl can be found around his cabin.

The wood nymph:

A spirit of the forest. She lives on a tiny isle in the middle of a small lake. It is impossible for her to leave the island.
The nymph looks like a beautiful woman.
A single-seater boat is tied to a tree. It is impossible to cross the lake for a person that harmed or corrupted the forest in any serious way.
The nymph is willing to help (how exactly?) anyone who crosses the lake.
She will ask PCs to rid the wood of the (who?) tribe that corrupts it with evil rituals.
When in battle, the nymph relies on magic.

The (who?) tribe

A tribe of small humanoids living in huts on a verge of a stream. They worship evil demigods and offer ritual animal sacrifices. The tribe is ruled by a priest, who is capable of doing some magic.
If PCs establish communication with him, will promise help for killing the wood nymph.

A hollow in a tree:

A tiger's lair. It will attack if PCs act loud our agressively.
Hunts at nights.

A clearing:

PCs reach a well-lit clearing. It is covered with a variety of beautiful flowers.
The flowers are enchanted. If PCs try to cam here, they will have to make saving throws to not fall asleep / wake up.
A spot check can show that it is unnaturally quiet / no bugs can be seen in the flowers.

A wounded deer:

PCs find a dying deer. It was obviously wounded with a sharp tool very recently. The trees around bear bloody marks of an evil ritual.
A bloody track leads to the (who?) tribe village.

The shaman:

A powerful magician who lives inside a cave in the depth of the forest. To traverse the cave, the characters have to challange three spirit incarnations. The spirits can be defeated through combat or through specific actions (what actions exactly?).
The spirits are: a deer spirit, an owl spirit and a fox spirit.

The shaman himself is a skinny old man with green hair and a lot of piercing in his face. His room is filled with smoke that emanates from the grass burning in front of him. He seems to be in some sort of trance when PCs arrive. He will react to the characters after a few hours. He will then help PCs with special items or cryptic advice.

Violet trees:

The soil here contains a special mineral. It makes all trees in the area grow unnatural violet leaves (as well as some other changes).
Dry wood of these trees if extremely hard and burns with bright hot violet flame.


My main difficulties are:
0) Can a story like this be interesting to play? Or is it maybe outright ridiculous? I have no idea
1) How do I guide the players among the locations without constructing a railroad through the forest?
2) How do I wrap all that with mechanics? Is it even possible for two level 1 characters? And if not - is it possible to play a higher-lever character for a novice in RPG realm? What monsters should I use? How do I choose NPC stats, abilities and spells? How much treasure and exp should I hand? How do I balance encounters to be challanging but not overwhelming? How long is the adventure going to take in hours?
3) All the holes that remain in the narrative

Takewo
2016-04-13, 03:07 PM
I would say: try it and don't get too over-concerned. Enjoy the experience and use it to learn. The first time I game mastered I didn't even have a story, plot or anything alike. I just gave the group a map with a few locations to explore. Someone at the end asked about the story, of course, and I don't consider it my very best actuation as a game master. However, from then on I learn new stuff and I improved.

Whenever we want to try a new system, my brother and I normally just try it with a sort of improvised, not very serious adventure to see how it works. I think you could do a bit of the same here, just try this adventure and see how it works. There are so many game mastering styles and preferences that it is impossible to tell you what is going to work best for your table. So I think that the best is just go for it with what you have and evaluate afterwards.

Lorsa
2016-04-13, 03:39 PM
3) All the holes that remain in the narrative

Hello Yllin and sorry to be brief. I will try to reply a bit more tomorrow, but I just wanted to comment on this.

Don't be too concerned with holes in the "narrative". Let your players fill that in for you during play.

In general I think you are doing just fine! Go with the flow and start exploring RPGs. With time you will learn what both you and your players enjoy (and then you'll find that it changes over the decades).

The Fury
2016-04-13, 04:26 PM
Hello Yllin and sorry to be brief. I will try to reply a bit more tomorrow, but I just wanted to comment on this.

Don't be too concerned with holes in the "narrative". Let your players fill that in for you during play.

In general I think you are doing just fine! Go with the flow and start exploring RPGs. With time you will learn what both you and your players enjoy (and then you'll find that it changes over the decades).

Pretty sound advice-- as a player I expect going in that I am not given a complete picture of what's going on. For that reason any "holes" in the narrative can be chalked up to gaps in my own knowledge, so I'm free to speculate on what a more complete picture of events might look like.

BayardSPSR
2016-04-13, 04:41 PM
Important: Don't worry if things don't go as planned. Don't worry if you feel like you're screwing up. Unexpected things will happen, and you will make mistakes, and that's okay. You're doing something difficult, and imperfection is still success.

2D8HP
2016-04-13, 10:35 PM
Years ago I found that as fun as it is for the GM, most players just don't care that much about elaborate "world building ". I remember some of the most successful sessions I GM'd were basically cribbed from movie plots, they don't need to be "high quality films" either (I remember that a mash-up of "Conan the Destroyer" and "Young Sherlock Holmes" worked very well). In fact while it was frustrating at first, I found that the less I pre-prepared, and the more I improvised on the spot, the better the players seemed to like it.
Except for character creation, try to open the rulebooks as little as possible when your actually playing. If you misremember a rule? So what! It's your game! Usually keeping the action flowing is more important. You can cop to your mistake later, or just declare it "home brew".
Good luck, and have fun!

Knaight
2016-04-13, 11:56 PM
I'm just going to drop my usual advice here:

Things will go wrong. You will make mistakes, and on top of that you'll just run into problems with mediocre and uninspired games. You'll run games that you look back at later and just cringe thinking of. All of this is expected of a new DM, and unless your players are jerks about it they will be more than willing to cut plenty of slack. So, don't worry too much about things going wrong. Acknowledge that it happens, learn from your mistakes, and move on.

Laydralae
2016-04-14, 12:03 AM
As a long time DM I think that you having a bunch of events and encounters planned ahead of time is a good idea. But be aware that planning a game for players is like planning a war: no battle plan survives contact with the enemy, or in this case no story outline survives contact with the players. You may find yourself needing to ad lib and come up with content on the spot. Having random charts ready can help with this load. One of my favorite tables is "What are the monsters doing" which has things like "Returning to lair with loot, roll treasure for monster as if it were in lair." or "patrolling territory, hiding and ready to fight." I also have a random taste and smells chart, so when players taste/smell test an unknown potion I can roll once or twice to describe for them what they encountered. It also helps if you keep these consistent, so if you decided that a healing potion tastes like hazelnuts then anytime they encounter a hazelnut smelling/tasting potion they may remember and expect it to be a healing potion. On of my biggest pet peeves I have with other DMs is the assumption that descriptions in the MMs are gospel. Goblins are always evil is one of my biggest complaints. Maybe not do this for every adventure but consider for a moment why more civilized humanoids would consider less so creatures "monsters" or "evil" and wether in your mind that should continue to be true. Remember very few creatures are evil for the sake of evil, and evil and good are often just a point of view.

My biggest piece of advice I can give is make all your answers seem as they are delivered with 100% confidence. Even if you have to ad lib on the spot, say the answer in such a way that it appears as if you had it prepared hours ago in advance. This becomes easier with practice but your players will enjoy it more if they ask a question and they don't get a hesitant answer filled with "uhs" and "ums".

At the end of the day its a game, and meant to be enjoyed by all parties. I often ask my players after sessions what they felt during the game and what they would like to see happen in the future. Work with them to deliver a meaningful story and it will be more enjoyable for everyone.

Knaight
2016-04-14, 12:16 AM
As a long time DM I think that you having a bunch of events and encounters planned ahead of time is a good idea. But be aware that planning a game for players is like planning a war: no battle plan survives contact with the enemy, or in this case no story outline survives contact with the players. You may find yourself needing to ad lib and come up with content on the spot. Having random charts ready can help with this load.

I'd also add that what you need to prep and what you're good at improvising is the sort of thing that varies highly by GM, and that you need to learn what applies to you specifically. There are a few things that come up a lot more than others though, so some quick highlights (any of which might be things you have no issue with).

Names. I'm a heavily improvisational GM, and getting to the point where I was quick with names still took a while.
Jargon. It really can't hurt to just keep a list around of specialized words for a given area, particularly as there's often a large category of words you know but don't think to use.
NPC statistics. This one is pretty game dependant (though as you're using DM as a description, D&D is probably a safe assumption and tends towards needing it).


You'll find your own list though. Maybe names are no issue, but coming up with descriptive titles is a problem. Maybe you want to keep a list of building materials in front of you that are appropriate to the setting, but don't want some sort of broader jargon list. Maybe you need to have a pre-made list of notable factions and people right off the bat, and can pretty much run a game entirely off of prepping that once. Maybe you need to prep a list of quickly accessed insults.

Yllin
2016-04-14, 02:45 AM
You all are restoring my self-confidence bit by bit, thank you :) I don't expect everything to go as planned, and I'm fine with it.

But the obstacles I have the most troubles with still remain unanswered:

1) How do I guide the players among the locations without constructing a railroad through the forest?
2) How do I wrap all that with mechanics? Is it even possible for two level 1 characters? And if not - is it possible to play a higher-lever character for a novice in RPG realm? What monsters should I use? How do I choose NPC stats, abilities and spells? How much treasure and exp should I hand? How do I balance encounters to be challanging but not overwhelming? How long is the adventure going to take in hours?

I would appreciate some advice on theese two a lot

Lorsa
2016-04-14, 02:52 AM
The first time I was a DM (this was not D&D though so perhaps I should call it GM), my adventure was basically like this:

Me: "You are outside in a forest, and it's slowly getting dark, what do you do?"

Player: "I start looking for a place to shelter and gather wood to make a fire."

Me: "Darn it! I was hoping you'd get attacked by wolves!"

<Player feeling rather clever>

Me: "During the night, you hear some strange sounds a bit into the woods, apart from breaking of branches, there are also footsteps and deep voices."

Player: "I go and investigate!"

Me: "A few Orcs are starting to set up camp!"

Player: "Orcs are bad, rawr! Attack!"

...

Then after a bit of forest roaming, my player got to a mysterious Troll cave and explored it. After that we recruited two more players, and most of the game was basically exploring various caves or mazes / labyrinths (dungeons), which held everything from eerie green light (never explained) to walls that teleported you when you touched them and treasure chambers guarded by statues.

Then when we had tons of magic stuff, we also fought hoards of Orcs, a player who was a dwarf got into a bar fight and punched someone in the groin... etc.

After a couple of weeks of this, I actually bought my first rulebook, as trying to use my memory of rules I had only seen briefly while I played for like one hour total at a summer camp was getting too bothersome.

Then I started developing my first story, which was about an evil wizard conquering the land, but could be defeated if you combined three items into one powerful magic thingy. Only the three items were only rumored in song and located in different dungeons on an island a bit off the coast.

The originality is stunning!

In any case, we all had fun, and at least two of us still play RPGs to this day, even though my DMing has gotten A LOT BETTER.

Don't stress too much about things in the beginning. Just jump in and do it!

quinron
2016-04-14, 02:56 AM
Concerning point 1, it's important to remember that railroading means "preventing the players from having agency and choice in how they approach their situation," not "any journey with a linear path from point A to point B." Linear adventures are absolutely brilliant for first-time adventures - you know what the PCs are going to encounter and in what order they're going to encounter it. The key to running a linear adventure, particularly one that you don't want to have to deviate from too much, is giving the PCs adequate motivation to go in the direction you want them to go.

For example, I'm currently between sessions of a two-shot intended to introduce a brand-new player to D&D. The setup was just "the party get robbed." I made the thief tough enough, at least for the level they were starting at, to take as many hits as they could likely dole out, and then ran a chase that ended (as it was planned to) in her escape; didn't have to fudge any rolls, just picked a character that would be able to get away. They spent the rest of the session doing exactly what I intended and tracking her down, but they never for a second doubted that they were in control. It's all about making them want to do what you want them to do.

Kami2awa
2016-04-14, 08:08 AM
This looks excellent, especially for a first-time adventure.

I would probably add something to the bridge encounter as the players will probably assume anything you mention as a detail is important, so if there is nothing to interact with the players may spend a long time searching for things that aren't there. This can end up quite frustrating and wasting a lot of time. Perhaps the bridge has a guardian to fight to get across, or similar.

BayardSPSR
2016-04-14, 06:21 PM
2) How do I wrap all that with mechanics? Is it even possible for two level 1 characters? And if not - is it possible to play a higher-lever character for a novice in RPG realm? What monsters should I use? How do I choose NPC stats, abilities and spells? How much treasure and exp should I hand? How do I balance encounters to be challenging but not overwhelming?

I would suggest putting this particular question to the 3e/3.5/d20 board; people there are likely to have the system-specific knowledge you're looking for.

SirBellias
2016-04-14, 10:32 PM
This looks like a decent set up to me to get newish players rolling. As for getting players to encounters, what are you expecting them to do? If you think they'll just say "I'm exploring the forest," then you have been given the leeway to put whichever encounter you feel like in. If you think they'll take a more systematic approach with directions and such, I'd draw a simple map before hand, and then let them draw their own map as they explore. Or you could not draw your own map, just throw whatever encounter you think will be most interesting at them, and let them mark off where it is.

As for mechanics, I just started running a Pathfinder game recently. I think most of what your are trying is in the bestiary already, but as it stands will be quite a bit dangerous for a party of level one adventurers. I started my players at a bit higher level so they would have some chance standing against interesting enemies. If I remember correctly, the tiger alone could probably TPK a party of level ones, but I haven't actually looked that up. Your ideas sound highly enjoyable, it's just that the system rates tigers and nymphs as a deadly encounter for level ones.
This website may be helpful, it has all the guidelines for balancing encounters and building treasure hoards:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering#Placing-Treasure
The Mole scenario I find especially interesting (may have to use it myself), but I'd shy away from continuous environmental hazards at level one. Constant damage is a lot more dangerous when you have less than 20 hp. It's a great idea though.

I'd like to point out that a lot of what I'm saying may not apply for your group, depending on how you run things. The most important thing is to try it, and if it doesn't work, learn from your mistakes and try again. Becoming a good GM is far more about experience than rules expertise, so don't be afraid to jump right in.

Yllin
2016-04-15, 02:26 AM
Thank yor for your responses, I believe I'm getting somewhere :)


Concerning point 1, it's important to remember that railroading means "preventing the players from having agency and choice in how they approach their situation," not "any journey with a linear path from point A to point B." Linear adventures are absolutely brilliant for first-time adventures - you know what the PCs are going to encounter and in what order they're going to encounter it. The key to running a linear adventure, particularly one that you don't want to have to deviate from too much, is giving the PCs adequate motivation to go in the direction you want them to go.
That's definetely something I need to remember!



As for mechanics, I just started running a Pathfinder game recently. I think most of what your are trying is in the bestiary already, but as it stands will be quite a bit dangerous for a party of level one adventurers. I started my players at a bit higher level so they would have some chance standing against interesting enemies. If I remember correctly, the tiger alone could probably TPK a party of level ones, but I haven't actually looked that up. Your ideas sound highly enjoyable, it's just that the system rates tigers and nymphs as a deadly encounter for level ones.

This is exactly what I'm concerned about. I guess I'll just ask the players to make higher-level characters, even though I've been adviced against it multiple times. The only alternative I see is slaying goblins and alike for a couple of sessions. I know it can be fun, but I don't think I can arrange it, and I don't really want to.

SirBellias
2016-04-15, 06:50 AM
This is exactly what I'm concerned about. I guess I'll just ask the players to make higher-level characters, even though I've been adviced against it multiple times. The only alternative I see is slaying goblins and alike for a couple of sessions. I know it can be fun, but I don't think I can arrange it, and I don't really want to.

I don't see why higher level characters would be a bad thing. There's more room to shoot under their party level than over it, there's usually more interesting monsters to get mauled by, and they're all less likely to die in one hit. If you're going to use the Bestiary stats, Tigers have a CR of 4 and regular nymphs have a CR of 7, so if you want to make these encounters dangerous if handled improperly, I'd recommend level 5 or 6 if you have two Tigers. Or you could have them be level four, and use the stats for the Fire Nymph, while changing all the fire spells to cold damage, or something. Pathfinder's encounter building rules are relatively easy to follow, so you shouldn't have much trouble finding other permutations that work.

Yeah, as far as I can tell, the first few levels in third edition aren't conducive to the more interesting creatures. You can make goblins interesting, but I find it difficult to explain why they only find four or so at a time. That's my experience, at least.