5 Things I Learned Being a Dungeon Master for Fifth Edition Dungeons and Dragons

I always roll behind the screen!

Since getting back into playing Dungeons and Dragons a few years ago, I have had the pleasure of running games of various sizes. My first couple games in Fifth edition were on the short side, lasting a couple sessions of about four hours a piece. I've run a couple one shots last about four hours, and of course I'm running my Dragon of Icespire Peak campaign.

It's been an interesting experience running those three types of games. I've learned quite a bit from the experience. So in no particular order, here are some of my observations and lessons I picked up from running these games.

1. You are the only one who knows that the players missed that really cool room/treasure/encounter.
• The first adventure I ran was a dungeon crawl that lasted two, four hour sessions. I worked on it for a good couple weeks coming up with traps, cool encounters, interesting non-player characters and a fun boss battle. When we finished the first session it became obvious that I crated too much material. I was actually annoyed that they were going to have to miss some of the fun things I thought up if we were going to end the game the next session. For a while I was disappointed by the experience. But when I talked to the players, they really enjoyed it. I was the only one who felt that it wasn't as good as it could have been, because I was the only one who knew about the stuff they missed. 
2. Nothing is wasted, it just goes into the next adventure.
• That is when I picked up the cool NPCs and plunked them down into the next short session I ran about six months later. I took one of the traps they avoided, and tweaked it for the new setting and used it. Again I made a bit too much material for this second game so some of that stuff got shifted to the one shots I ran almost two years later. Just make sure you keep your notes, because you never know when it will be useful.
3. You control the pace.
• Yeah, learned this the hard way. The second game I ran I set up like an old school

  

  THAC0? We don't need no stinkin' THAC0!

  Mission: Impossible adventure. It was all about setting up the mission and executing. I tried to create tension, but instead I created long periods of waiting around. It got tedious and boring. The thing is, I didn't have to be. The DM controls the timing, and it is fine to just jump ahead to the good parts. There are ways to build tension in Dungeons and Dragons, but they tend to work better in the immediate situations. I've gotten a lot better at pacing since then, but yeah, that was a rough game.
4. Prep for the next session only.
• World building is a blast, and coming up with all these great schemes and villain plans is a lot of fun. But there are so many times that you never get to those moments, or when you do it is six sessions later and so much has changed that your original plan doesn't even work. Even running a published adventure like Dragon of Icespire Peak doesn't guarantee that you will follow the written path. The players will do their own thing, come up with innovative solutions, and take the story in unusual directions. So the best thing to do is to have a very lose outline of your overarching plan. But really focus on prepping for that next session. Don't get lost in the joys of world building when you never get a chance to get out of the village.
5. Handouts



Oh you think you know it all? Well, you haven't even
begun to learn. (insert evil chuckle)

• Players like to have things they can reference, review and dig into. This can be a simple menu for the tavern, or a letter from an enemy or a treasure map. Playing at the virtual table, it can be a bit tricky, but possible to come up with all kinds of written material for the players to interact with. Remember rule 4 and don't spend an outrageous amount of time of these, but do spend some time. When you are playing at the physical table, having physical spell scrolls to hand out, actual inspiration tokens to manipulate and even magic item cards can add to the game. It is one of things I think The Essentials Kit did so well with their box. I love the two sided map and having those cards for the sidekicks has been a lot of fun (since I ended up using about half of them to people Phandalin). 

So there you go, a few things I've picked up, and I'm still learning and picking up new techniques for being a better Dungeon Master.

Do you have any tips you want to share?