New 3.5 DM seeking exprienced player's advice

[ludwigprincess]

I am a new DM and new to the 3.5 system of D&D. I have played pathfinder noncommittally. I am using a homebrew world that me and my brother created. I was just wondering if any experienced DMs have any advice or tips and tricks to make the game go smoother.

[HammeredWharf]

Start from a low level (1-3).
Take a look at your players' character sheets before the game and make sure you agree on how everything works.
If someone invested in a niche skill like Heal or Knowledge: Architecture, try to think of some ways in which that skill could help. Similarly, throwing unfit challenges at the group can be fun. Like a social encounter for a bunch of barbarians.
Consider what kind of campaign your players like.
Expect the players not to follow your plan.
Everything your players see can get killed and looted.

[Sacrieur]

I am a new DM and new to the 3.5 system of D&D. I have played pathfinder noncommittally. I am using a homebrew world that me and my brother created. I was just wondering if any experienced DMs have any advice or tips and tricks to make the game go smoother.

If there's one thing that's helped the most, it would be my commitment to accountability and having an open relationship with my players.

Rather than demanding that my word is final, I open up the floor to debate on any single ruling or issue. If it sounds wrong or you think it's wrong, I want to be corrected. And if you think a decision I made was unfair I want to hear any objections so we can work it out diplomatically.

As for accountability, I do limit a lot of information to my players, but I always (if in person) write things out ahead of time and put it on the table so I can't be accused of changing it or when online create an anonymous pastebin and share half the link (pastebins have an 8 character code in the URL, you share half of this for verification purposes when you post the whole link).

But I guess it depends on your players.

[Curmudgeon]

Don't tailor your encounters to the PCs. It does the players a disservice if the enemies are always the sorts they're prepared for.

On the other hand, do (occasionally) tailor the treasure to the PCs' needs. Getting only stuff that needs to be toted to a market for sale gets old fast. Finding that Monk's Belt a PC has been wishing for on the body of a slain enemy can be a very pleasant surprise.

[JBarca]

Don't tailor your encounters to the PCs. It does the players a disservice if the enemies are always the sorts they're prepared for.

On the other hand, do (occasionally) tailor the treasure to the PCs' needs. Getting only stuff that needs to be toted to a market for sale gets old fast. Finding that Monk's Belt a PC has been wishing for on the body of a slain enemy can be a very pleasant surprise.

On the other hand, be wary of tailoring encounters against your players. The occasional Skeleton against a party of Rogues and Beguilers is fine. Throwing a pile of Allips against a group of Barbarians, Fighters, and Rogues... Not so much. You want your players to feel useful. Heightening suspense by making tough enemies sometimes is cool, but if you do it regularly, then yo have a problem.

Talk to your players, as was mentioned before. You don't necessarily have to make every decision debatable in game (that makes for long sessions), but don't shut down creative ideas or arguments.

Don't have a "right answer", except in rare cases. Present a problem, let them figure out how they want to overcome it. Otherwise it become the frustrating game of "Guess what number I'm thinking of!"

Give each character (and, by extension, player) a chance to shine a few times. Have an Illusionist? Let them fight a few dumb brutes now and again. A charger? Give her a wide open battlefield against some mooks. A Rogue? Some concealing terrain (tall grass, shadows, tables, rocks, whatever) now and again would not be unappreciated. Etc. They have builds they wanted to use. If they cant use them, then their effort feels wasted.

On a similar note, give each character/character a chance to fulfill his or her goals. They wrote that background information for a reason. If it's not feasible, let them know ahead of time ("Sorry, friend, but your level two party won't have the opportunity to kill Orcus's Right-Hand-Lich.") so they can adjust expectations. This is a benefit to you anyway. Character-driven arcs write themselves.

I know that's a bunch of random advice, and not everyone will agree with me on every point, but this works well for me and my group.

[TheifofZ]

Remember: The monsters and villains might be against the party, but the DM is strictly neutral.
Also remember that players enjoy it when they get to show off how cool their characters are, giving them moments where they can really strut their stuff and show off their strong points can make players more invested.

Don't be afraid to have your villains ham it up.
Also don't be afraid to kill off PCs. If they know they can't die, they'll get up to all sorts of shenanigans. If it's an unlucky triple-crit in the middle of nowhere, sure. Fudge it and just knock them out. But if the squishy wizard starts to smack-talk the dragon he's standing right in front of, don't be afraid to let him be viciously and messily devoured.

[illyahr]

Remember: The monsters and villains might be against the party, but the DM is strictly neutral.
Also remember that players enjoy it when they get to show off how cool their characters are, giving them moments where they can really strut their stuff and show off their strong points can make players more invested.

Don't be afraid to have your villains ham it up.
Also don't be afraid to kill off PCs. If they know they can't die, they'll get up to all sorts of shenanigans. If it's an unlucky triple-crit in the middle of nowhere, sure. Fudge it and just knock them out. But if the squishy wizard starts to smack-talk the dragon he's standing right in front of, don't be afraid to let him be viciously and messily devoured.

Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

Never make a plan that requires your players to do something. They will not.
Never make a plan that requires your players not do something. They will.
You control everything about the world except how the players react to it. Make sure your plans are flexible enough to take your players' actions into account. You will not expect what they do half the time, so just make sure you can roll with it.

[Scorponok]

I think one of the most important things you have to realize is, yes, your story may be cool, but it is NOT JUST YOUR STORY. D&D is a collaborative storytelling game, and each person in the group, whether DM or player, has a say in shaping the world. Don't force them onto the path that fits the story because it would be inconvenient for them to change. Often, a player's actions will take the story into new and often a much more spectacular outcome than your original idea.

[ludwigprincess]

Everyone's advice has been very helpful! It is a very hard balance to set the players up in situations but allow them to explore the world. I've been having some trouble finding balance in my encounters. I have a five player set up so I cant strictly use the monster manual that is designed for a four party campaign. An encounter I thought would be difficult for the party turned out to be a walk in the park. An encounter I thought would be easy turned out to be a near death experience for two out of the five players. Is there a formula or trick I should know that I am not getting?

[illyahr]

Everyone's advice has been very helpful! It is a very hard balance to set the players up in situations but allow them to explore the world. I've been having some trouble finding balance in my encounters. I have a five player set up so I cant strictly use the monster manual that is designed for a four party campaign. An encounter I thought would be difficult for the party turned out to be a walk in the park. An encounter I thought would be easy turned out to be a near death experience for two out of the five players. Is there a formula or trick I should know that I am not getting?

Yes. The trick is: ignore the formulae given. The CR system in 3.5 is balanced against a very specific playstyle and a very specific group dynamic. Anything that varies away from: tank fighter, sneak attack rogue, healbot cleric, blaster wizard, will throw off the ratings.

Build your encounters based on what you see the players handle. Easy fights are good fun. They let your players show off. Hard fights are good fun also. They push your players into thinking outside the box. It's ok to not have the enemies perfectly balanced against the party as long as everyone is having fun.

What I would recommend is to try to adjust things cosmetically to make things interesting. Ambushed by a single orc in an evening dress? Group stomps it into the ground and then spends 10 minutes wondering why an orc was wearing an evening dress. :smalltongue:

[Strigon]

If there's one thing that's helped the most, it would be my commitment to accountability and having an open relationship with my players.

Rather than demanding that my word is final, I open up the floor to debate on any single ruling or issue. If it sounds wrong or you think it's wrong, I want to be corrected. And if you think a decision I made was unfair I want to hear any objections so we can work it out diplomatically.

As for accountability, I do limit a lot of information to my players, but I always (if in person) write things out ahead of time and put it on the table so I can't be accused of changing it or when online create an anonymous pastebin and share half the link (pastebins have an 8 character code in the URL, you share half of this for verification purposes when you post the whole link).


I've got to disagree here; debates have a place, but in my games the DM has always had the final say. This is mostly to keep things running smoothly; depending on your group, having a half-hour debate over every rule in question can eat up a lot of time. Normally, we have a short debate where everyone explains their viewpoint, and the DM makes the final call once everyone has spoken their piece. After the game, there might be a more thorough examination, but in the middle of the game, we just want to move on. If the ruling goes against what someone was planning, we'll probably give them a chance to retcon their actions, so nobody gets screwed over by a misunderstanding.

This might be especially useful in a newer group, with people who have lower system mastery; of course, if one of your players is a veteran, giving the final say to him/her might be better than giving it to the DM, but there are arguments to be made either way.

Note that this wasn't saying for the DM to be the sole arbiter of the entire game, just that, for time's sake, you can't rely on reaching a consensus every time, and having someone make the final decision is much quicker.


As for accountability, though? Yes. Write things down, prove to them that you aren't screwing them over on the fly; it'll go a long way toward having them trust you.

[Sacrieur]

I've got to disagree here; debates have a place, but in my games the DM has always had the final say. This is mostly to keep things running smoothly; depending on your group, having a half-hour debate over every rule in question can eat up a lot of time. Normally, we have a short debate where everyone explains their viewpoint, and the DM makes the final call once everyone has spoken their piece. After the game, there might be a more thorough examination, but in the middle of the game, we just want to move on. If the ruling goes against what someone was planning, we'll probably give them a chance to retcon their actions, so nobody gets screwed over by a misunderstanding.

If a debate goes on for two long with no clear answer (i.e., more research required) then I'll contemplate the consequences (like does it actually matter?) and rule in a way that either compromises or on the player's side, with the expectation that it's a deferred ruling.

In my experience, the debates that do go on tend to affect two or more members of the party. It can be more important to act as an arbiter than a king, as you don't want to create hostility with your players. Some of the most difficult debates are over questionable instances of metagaming which very often halt the game until they can be resolved. Retconning is really something used as a last resort when you make a grave mistake as a ruling and have to backpedal. It'll happen, because we all make mistakes, but when you retcon you're not only potentially undoing your actions, but all the actions of the players that came after, and some players, if events happened in their favor (especially in the instance of being particularly lucky) they will despise you for it and think you're being unfair.

It's in my opinion that by not embracing an open-attitude, players will simply keep their opinions to themselves below the surface and begin to loathe you for it. That's not a desirable scenario for anyone.



This might be especially useful in a newer group, with people who have lower system mastery; of course, if one of your players is a veteran, giving the final say to him/her might be better than giving it to the DM, but there are arguments to be made either way.

In cases where a ruling is explicit, the rules have ultimate say, unless the DM invokes rule zero, which isn't something that should be touched except in very rare, isolated cases.



Note that this wasn't saying for the DM to be the sole arbiter of the entire game, just that, for time's sake, you can't rely on reaching a consensus every time, and having someone make the final decision is much quicker.

The ability to compromise is absolutely important. The DM may have to get creative to find a solution that both parties can find acceptable and move on until a final decision can ultimately be reached.

[Strigon]

If a debate goes on for two long with no clear answer (i.e., more research required) then I'll contemplate the consequences (like does it actually matter?) and rule in a way that either compromises or on the player's side, with the expectation that it's a deferred ruling.

In my experience, the debates that do go on tend to affect two or more members of the party. It can be more important to act as an arbiter than a king, as you don't want to create hostility with your players. Some of the most difficult debates are over questionable instances of metagaming which very often halt the game until they can be resolved. Retconning is really something used as a last resort when you make a grave mistake as a ruling and have to backpedal. It'll happen, because we all make mistakes, but when you retcon you're not only potentially undoing your actions, but all the actions of the players that came after, and some players, if events happened in their favor (especially in the instance of being particularly lucky) they will despise you for it and think you're being unfair.

I think you misunderstood what I meant; I mean, when there's a disagreement about how a rule works, or interaction between rules, the DM should be able to make a ruling that works out logically, and hopefully not to the detriment of the party's enjoyment.
Retconning is used when the player tried to do something that wouldn't work with the ruling the DM made, and now left him in a vulnerable position, which usually wouldn't be anything more than rewinding from the end of that player's turn to the beginning.

We might be talking about two different scenarios here; what generally happens in my games is this:
Player - "I do X, trying to accomplish Y".
DM - "X doesn't work like that - X does Z".
Player - "No, it does X because (insert argument)"

This goes on for a little bit, potentially with the other players throwing in their opinions, before ending in the DM either saying "All right, that makes sense; go ahead", or "Sorry, it doesn't work like that; what would you like to do instead?''

Edit:
Or a possible third option of "All right, you can use X that way, but just once - everyone take note, this is the only time X is used in this way. All other times, it works as Z."

[HammeredWharf]

Everyone's advice has been very helpful! It is a very hard balance to set the players up in situations but allow them to explore the world. I've been having some trouble finding balance in my encounters. I have a five player set up so I cant strictly use the monster manual that is designed for a four party campaign. An encounter I thought would be difficult for the party turned out to be a walk in the park. An encounter I thought would be easy turned out to be a near death experience for two out of the five players. Is there a formula or trick I should know that I am not getting?

Play through the encounter in your mind. You should know what your players' stats are like, how much damage they do per round, what their saves and CLs are like, which tricks they have up their sleeves, etc. Using this knowledge, you should be able to estimate how tough a fight will be and how long it'll last.

Also, I think many new DMs try to use single monster encounters. Don't. The monsters lose due to having too few actions per round, aka worse action economy. Even in boss fights, I'd recommend having at least a few minions. Of course, fights against single monsters are sometimes ok, too, but you need to think more about the monster's defenses in those cases, as it often gets disabled or killed nearly instantly when five people focus fire at it.

[GreyBlack]

Don't be afraid to have fun with your players. Play with their expectations. Have a guy show up dressed all in black with a scythe, only for him to be the big good.

Don't rely solely on creature encounters. Traps are fun, as are social encounters. At an early level, find an excuse to put your players on trial for something, just to show that their actions do, in fact, have an effect on the world.

But most of all, HAVE FUN. Don't try and railroad the plot, and, if the players think of a plot thread you didn't have in mind, work it in to your framework. I've had players completely ignore the bread crumbs I left to go and join a military resistance to, instead, buy a boat and sail the seven seas as pirates. ENJOY IT!

[Peelee]

I've got to disagree here; debates have a place, but in my games the DM has always had the final say. This is mostly to keep things running smoothly; depending on your group, having a half-hour debate over every rule in question can eat up a lot of time. Normally, we have a short debate where everyone explains their viewpoint, and the DM makes the final call once everyone has spoken their piece. After the game, there might be a more thorough examination, but in the middle of the game, we just want to move on. If the ruling goes against what someone was planning, we'll probably give them a chance to retcon their actions, so nobody gets screwed over by a misunderstanding.

This might be especially useful in a newer group, with people who have lower system mastery; of course, if one of your players is a veteran, giving the final say to him/her might be better than giving it to the DM, but there are arguments to be made either way.

Note that this wasn't saying for the DM to be the sole arbiter of the entire game, just that, for time's sake, you can't rely on reaching a consensus every time, and having someone make the final decision is much quicker.


As for accountability, though? Yes. Write things down, prove to them that you aren't screwing them over on the fly; it'll go a long way toward having them trust you.

When I DM, if a ruling is ever challenged or questioned, I collaborate with the players to see how to best resolve it. It is open-forum, and is more of an objective debate style than a one-on-one argument. All reasonable arguments for and against a certain ruling (as well as propositions for alternate rulings) are accepted. And of course the DM has final say.

Think of it not like a democracy, but a benevolent monarchy. The king has absolute control, but pays heed to his advisors. The players can still voice their opinions and make arguments for their case, and they may persuade the DM to change or alter his ruling, but there's still only one vote that counts.

[jiriku]

Everyone's advice has been very helpful! It is a very hard balance to set the players up in situations but allow them to explore the world. I've been having some trouble finding balance in my encounters. I have a five player set up so I cant strictly use the monster manual that is designed for a four party campaign. An encounter I thought would be difficult for the party turned out to be a walk in the park. An encounter I thought would be easy turned out to be a near death experience for two out of the five players. Is there a formula or trick I should know that I am not getting?

Building challenging encounters comes with practice and observation. Pay close attention to what works and what doesn't; be intentional about using each encounter as a self-teaching opportunity.

A few secrets of the trade:

For a given EL, large groups of weak enemies are more challenging than a few strong enemies.
Many monsters are built with pathetically weak defenses. These monsters perform poorly against players who have mastered the game mechanics. Consider using them as if they were CR-1, or tinkering with them to improve their defenses.
If the PC group has defenses that vary too widely, the game breaks. Watch out whenever you start to see spreads of 10 points or more between the highest and lowest AC and saves across the party.
Owing to a variety of reasons, monsters with class levels often have significantly overstated CR.
Groups of identical monsters are less challenging that groups of monsters with differing, complementary abilities.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Here is a good example of what not to do:
I have a DM who writes up encounter tables long before his players select their builds and, if asked, will give bad advice. The strongest build I have ever seen was Binder into KotSS of Eurynome.
End result is that if you don't play very strong characters his encounters are insanely powerful.
Some horror stories: one character has spent so any combats grapples into uselessness that "Agateving" is now a thing in our group (him being grappled was useful in all situations).
Hitting roll twice and combine twice in a row for a CR 15-17 encounter... against 4 level 10s.
Forgetting how blinds ensemble works and not telling us stuff because of it. He actually tried to punish the player for a battle dragon and was fussing around with him because he had blindsense.

[ludwigprincess]

Should I have my enemies use a lot of combat tricks? If so, what is the best way for me to learn how they work without looking like a complete doofus? All of my players are very experienced with 3.5 and are currently in a campaign with level 10 characters. I want to make this a fun experience for them but I am scared that I am just coming off as a wanna-be DM that bogs down the campaign.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Should I have my enemies use a lot of combat tricks? If so, what is the best way for me to learn how they work without looking like a complete doofus? All of my players are very experienced with 3.5 and are currently in a campaign with level 10 characters. I want to make this a fun experience for them but I am scared that I am just coming off as a wanna-be DM that bogs down the campaign.

At lower levels no. Enemies should not be afraid to flank and surround but keep to simple tactics. As time goes on enemies with improved grab and trip become more common (not to mention enemies with the necessary feats), so it will be good to at least know how to look up those rules (even when I have improved grab I will occasionally need to re-check the grapple rules).

Also if you need practice don't be afraid to ask someone to run a mock combat (even if Skype or Play by Post) to help you practice.

[illyahr]

If you are a new DM and have experienced players, just let them know that you are fairly new. The worst thing you can do in a situation like that is try to pass yourself off as experienced. Let them know that the rules will be fairly relaxed while you work into things. Throw some non-RAW twists that make thematic sense at them occasionally (you're the DM, you're allowed to do that). Don't be afraid to goof off a little bit.