First experience GMing thread
What was the first time you GMed? Any painful experiences getting used to the ropes? What system did you run?
OP here, didn't want to clutter the OP with greentext.
>17 years old, at this point I had barely played my first proper RPG and a few online PbP ones.
>Group consisted of online friends group/community
>People were hesitant to join but they had played these shitty Steam RP's before and were interested
>Homebrew sci fi game
>Only stats were skills + stat = # of dice you roll, 5 or 6 for a success.
>First few games hit me hard, realized I needed to plan ahead and not just wing it
>Players started to notice names being changed and forgotten
>Constantly bailed players out of trouble, never let them actually be in danger
>Basically encouraged them to do stupid stuff as it gave me a chance to expand their characters
>Players really weren't that interested at this point, had trouble keeping attendence up
>Even when attendence was up it was online so people would just sit and play games while half listening
>This one edgelord, T, always did the stupidest shit
>Because I always bailed him out he also ended up with the best gear for doing stupid shit
>Couldn't balance for shit so he destroyed everything I put him up against.
>Went on for about a year
>Story got better and better, changed up systems to switch plots from a lovecraftian cult in a system to mercenaries for a banking corp
>Eventually realized homebrew didn't cut it so I ended it in a half assed explosion where a literal DMPC killed them all.
>>44331570
I got extremely lucky. nWoD Werewolf, group of bros who liked to roleplay, took my plot hooks, worked well as a group. The combat was a pushover but no one minded. Most of the players are still with me to this day.
>>44331723
You only because That GM in the last line.
>>44331570
Ran a DnD3.5 game for 5 friends. Campaign went rather well and we got some good recurring characters from it.
Was by far the silliest thing I have ever GM'd though, as it was back in the era of "lol xd so randum".
Case in point, one of the characters had a sofa for a head.
>15 years old
>Only have experience with 3.5
>Think I'm ready to try running a game
>Two cousins and one cousin's college friend
>College friend plays a wizard (I decide level 5 for the one shot) with almost only glitterdust and shaped glitterdust prepared
>Destroys my encounter
>No one falls for the explosive runes on the inside of the mask
I was pretty bad. I still feel like I suck whenever I run. Most times people say they are having fun though. I just can't keep everything straight. I feel like I'm spending a good 25% of the time writing things down. And if I don't write things down one session I contradict myself the next.
That and I can only really think up adventures in fantasy games. And pirate games iff no player knows anything about sailing because fuck trying to compete with that knowledge.
>first time dming
>"you start in a room" (every PC)
>"you meet a female paladin" (NPC)
>rolling ensues
>"she is a gender swapped male who has a random chance to break the fourth wall"
>they leave the room after you spot and ran from a chimera
>they run into a grocer
>"you see a merchant. he only has apples."
>they stab him
>more rolling
>"the farmer does not die"
>they keep stabbing
>he transforms into a goddamn angel and is also flamboyantly gay
>(panic)
>quicky roll an encounter
>have it on random 1-20th level
>big fucking gorilla
>the party runs away while the monsters run from the angel trying very hard to rape them.
>session ends with an orgy tower with the chimera carrying the gorilla while the angel is "mounted" in both of them
>party "WHAT THE FUCK"
First session over.
>>44333262
cont.
2 months have passed.
>the party must search a haunted house
>it's possessed by a ghost
>horror theme
>through illusions and general inexperience, they are scared. the music helped.
>after many general suspense, they break down the last door.
>"you see a small girl giving of a ev-"
>we adopt it
>"what?"
>rolling
>"you can't just-"
>20.
>....
>we name it Mary.
>(fuck it)
>this upsets the paladin, but gives it in literal puppy dog eyes as well as not being good at being a paladin anyway.
>doesn't fall because goddess is a literal pacifist.
end of session
cont.
>>44333368
1 year since the first
>the party learns that their daughteru is a dormant goddess of destruction
>despite the implications, they choose to protect her.
>eventually she is kidnapped by thugs
>they go full detective and find where she is
>they run in guns blazing
>beating down the defenses i put down easily
>and they find her beaten almost to death
>a survivor of the assault approaches
>"do you know what that thing is?"
>The character who adopted her speaks a single word"Yes."
>the man recoils in horror "wait no!"
-crossbow shot-
cont.
>>44333523
>>44333368
>>44333262
Holy crap. Do you really think this story (which covers more than your first experience) deserves this many posts?
>>44333523
2 years from the first session.
>the daughter was kidnapped and awakened to become the goddess of destruction as the legends told.
>they prepare for the final battle with her
>They tracked her down trying to find some way to save her
>at this point, the party is broken between saving her or just killing her as the world was now at stake
>they make it to the temple and manage to get almost slaughtered.
>they survive by the paladin's god taking the final hit for them and teleporting the party far away. Before the goddess of healing died, she gave her powers to the paladin npc.
>she "ascends" and is plucked from existence for an untold amount of time.
>the reminder of the party searches for a way to stop the goddess.
-several sessions later-
>the party finds the "Tomb of Ka-thrall", a powerful coffin that can seal everything for 1,000 years.
>they confront the goddess by going back in time and making a new timeline with the help of all the other gods.
This plays.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ph4f06Q5ItE
>After a long bout involving several raids and a massive death toll, they succeed.
>With the goddess sealed, the party disbands to pursue other goals.
>The party spreads the word about the sealed goddess, making up tales and myths to ensure that their will be heroes to stop the goddess when she returns.
>>44333639
I dunno. This thread seems a little empty. Maybe I misread and saw "first campaign". My bad. Guess I'll go.
>>44333788
Are you perhaps the guy who made the other greentext about how your group saved the person they joined to save and tragically went their own ways?
>>44333841
Do you have a screencap? It's a long shot, but likely not me.
>>44331570
I made horse-cow mutants.
They were skinless and had wet glistening flesh held together by tight metal straps.
They attacked by vomiting spiders.
I was not allowed to DM again.
>>44333874
Fraid not. I read it in a thread a week or two ago.
All I remember is that this was linked: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX_a50rFp5I
Thought you might be the same person.
>>44333892
Ah! That's me! Didn't anyone cared that much.
Reposting, but I just loved my first time DM'ing
>be playing D&D with friends for the first time
>be DM
>party hired to investigate disappearances in a town
>split up to gather information
>bard and paladin go to tavern
>talk to Crazy Steve, resident lunatic sitting in the corner
>bard easily beats persuade check
>Crazy Steve tells them to follow the lights up the mountain
All according to plan. Until…
>bard decides to bring Crazy Steve along
>rolls to persuade him that they’re trustworthy
>critical fail
>Crazy Steve shrieks
>smashes bottle on table, attacks bard
>the paladin, Lawful Good blue Dragonborn, steps in
>uses breath attack
>30ft blast of lightning
>hits Crazy Steve, tavern wall, and random townie crossing the street outside
>misses bard by inches
>Crazy Steve is vaporized
>random outside guy manages to survive with 1hp
>paladin climbs through 5ft wide charred hole in the wall
>lay hands on townie, who runs away screaming
>bard decides to break into song, in memory of Crazy Steve
>terrified townies shower him in coins
>party leaves town as soon as physically possible
I think we’re going to make it
First time GMing for me is in the machine civ that is held on here. Nobody i know irl likes traditional-style games and I don't trust d20 with all of the bad things I've heard about it on here. What system? Well....civilization I guess. I'm having a blast and my players seem to feel the same
>>44333912
I appreciated the story anyhow!
>>44334016
Thanks. the first story was the end of the second campaign.
>What was the first time you GMed?
About a year ago, I had been a player for at least 5 by that point though. The game lasted a whole 2 sessions, but I think people enjoyed it.
>Any painful experiences getting used to the ropes?
Yeah, I learned that I suck ass at managing rules. Crunch has always been my least favorite part of tabletops, so it's not surprising, but I was pretty much just making shit up on the spot most of the time.
>What system did you run?
A Megaman themed game in Gamma World. I'd love to run it again eventually, but time constraints (for me and for potential players) have been preventing me from doing so. Alternatively, I'd like to run a more fantasy-styled game in PTTA.
>>44334056
>Crunch has always been my least favorite part of tabletops
I know exactly what you mean. Me and my friend switch off DMing for our party. I'm good at making a story, and pretty god damn fantastic at making shit up on the fly, but I can't keep track of combat at all. Meanwhile my friend is great at all the ins and outs of combat, knows all the tricks and tactics, but stray off his rails and his story falls apart.
Add us together and you get a great DM. We're considering genetic recombination.
>15 or 16 years old
>Got a group of peeps together from a forum I used to frequent at the time
>Decide to run 3.5 because that's what I'm most familiar with
>Prep takes a long time because I'm inefficient and have no idea what I'm doing
>Intoduction is basically me reading literature I wrote about the scenery to them
>Standard shit, some halfling mayor or something is telling them about an abandoned tower underneath all the shit prose I wrote
>"Go kill 'em"
>Party arrives
>Encounters are fucked to hell and I'm making maps each turn as I go like my first GM did (first GM was a Play By Post game, this game was over Skype)
>Dunno what else to put other than Goblins, on the later floors some of them have PC levels
>Party is bickering all the way up the tower
>Session has to end because some players felt like doing other stuff
>Try for a good couple weeks to get them back together again
>Get in a fight or something with one of the PCs about something unrelated I think
>Pick up and leave altogether, fuck this shit
My memory's a little fuzzy on the details of all this, so some stuff may be a bit off, but this is the gist of it.
I didn't try GMing again until a couple years later with some friends (Tavern Tales) and the game wasn't as cringe on my end (barring a bullshit escape from a villain - I immediately regretted it), but three of those four were new so the mechanics flew over their heads.
>>44333886
Hold everything, there is a comic of edguardo? Sause please. Trying to find it on my own now
>>44334306
Just the picture I'm afraid, but hey. I'm not poster.
>>44331570
oh man you have no idea
>wanted to play shadowrun with my friends
>didn't even have a manual or means to get a manual (i could've searched for the pdf i needed in /srg/ but i didn't because i'm a dumb shit)
>only reference i had at the moment was 5e quickstart rules, 4e fluff, 2e references and archetypes from the butchered pc games
>organized with 3
>another one latched on
>when i was planning, i invited a 5th
>at my friend's house, i get a 6th player
>oh shit.jpg
>i had a pretty good hook but i was too busy explaining my butchered rules on my butchered character sheet to remember to tell them
>when i remember it's too late, they have decided what they want to be
>widlly far away from my hook, i have no idea what to do
>sit 10 minutes in complete silence from my part while i come up with new shit
>new hook is awful, it doesn't hold up on itself
>everyone is evil and edgy and i can't do anything to avoid or control it in-universe
>i stutter the whole time when describing shit
BUT WAITTHERE'S MORE
>we meet up the following week
>i stall for time and we never play
>oh well we'll play next week
>next week comes by
>tell them a couple of days before the day we were playing that stuff came up
>following week they don't even ask
>friend asks if i'm gonna keep going or if he can start a dnd campaign with the same group
>i say yes
never again
>>44333639
This is not how you make friends, anon.
You've scared away someone who was contributing. Shame.
>>44334431
I'm still here. Thanks anyway.
>>44331570
Dnd 3.5
15 years old
My brother was a half-orc barbarian with a 4 in intelligence and similar scores in wisdom and charisma. He kept coming up with astounding arguments and logical plans, so the town made him mayor. I couldn't bring myself to make him roll for any of his social encounters. Then I surrounded him with drow, but they were honorable enough to only attack one at a time. He later defeated magmins by dumping buckets of water on them.
It made sense at the time.
>>44331570
My first time trying to GM didn't go that great. Big problem was I over rewarded the group. It was a dark heresy 2nd edition game and I pretty much gave away power weapons and melta guns for free, and gave them way too much exp. Eventually I realized this and thought "hey I really need to kill of the special weapons expert or the stupidly powerful psyker" So I send some daemons after the group. Group wipes them all out before the daemons could touch them. I realized mistakes were definitely made after that.
>>44333886
Edgardo is always fucking relevant
>>44331570
>first time
>give far too good loot for level
>realize mistake when nothing can hit party
>correct error by sending way way op'd group of gnolls at party
>party is KO'd
>have gnolls strip gear from party and leave them alive
> it was obvious, because the gnolls took only armor weapons and gold
First time DMing went really well, but I made the mistake of confronting a player over their table etiquette.
Three players. Friend, a guy, and his girlfriend. Pulled the girlfriend aside after one session to tell her she's either in the game or not, and that playing minigames on her iPhone and constantly having to ask "What just happened?" "What are we doing?" "Is it my turn?" was no longer going to be permitted, as it was highly disruptive.
This made her quit. Which made her boyfriend quit. So I was down to one PC and missing two PCs who I had tried to make plot important.
>>44331570
I ran Pathfinder.
Then I decided to never use the system again.
I only ever went back on that decision about once.
My first time DMing went...probably really badly. I don't remember it. I mean, I remember why I hated it, but how it went over I couldn't tell you.
I've been a ForeverDM ever since, and I think I've gotten much better, since I actually work at it.
Right now I just joined the first game I've played in years, and it turned out to be a newbieDM so it's probably gonna be miserable, but he's open to advice, so he might improve.
>>44331570
I didn't really understand railroading and ended up railroading the hell out of my campaign.
Cue my players realizing this and getting revenge on me by destroying every plan I had.
Don't even get me started on my evil stupid friend.
>>44334349
have an empathetic cringe anon
>>44331570
The first game I ever ran was DnD 3.5, which was the only game I had ever played at that point. I ran it one night with two friends I knew pretty well to sort of test it out. It was pretty weird.
They rolled up a fighter and a bard. They started out in a village that was raided by bandits Conan style. One guy decided to hide in a wheat field and sat out the whole encounter. Even when his sister got kidnapped he didn't come out and help. The other guy got beat down pretty hard and captured, then managed to escape on the road and come back to the town, where the only person alive and not kidnapped was the bard. They decided they did not care about rescuing the villagers and set off in the other direction.
I had a series of locations and encounters set up for them, and I went through all of them, six if I remember correctly, that were things like, "you see an oasis" or "you see a tower in the distance" or "you see a caravan". They hid from or passed by every single one.
Finally they ended up at a temple in the desert and found a maze inside. The monks told them there was an artifact at the end of the maze, but it was guarded by a monster. The fighter spent, literally, over an hour trying to get the bard to accompany him into the maze. Finally the guy agreed. they went through the maze and got to the end. At the time I figured that would be the end of the game, so I made it an artifact that granted them wishes. I told them they could have anything they wanted. They asked for, I think, a magic sword, and a magic flute. I don't remember exactly, very low level items.
They wandered off in the night and were attacked by redcaps. The bard refused to fight, and just played his magic flute while the fighter got pummeled and killed. Then the bard ran away into the desert.
It was an odd session. Honestly it taught me more about the strange gaming habits of my players than it did about GMing.
>>44331723
I guess if you were 17, it could have been a lot worse.
I had no concept of how long a session takes. Me and five friends set aside an hour after school to play. We almost got through character creation and everyone was bored. Then everybody had to go home.
>>44331570
>That pic
It's like I'm in 2009 again.
>>44340884
Didn't have a related pic so I used google images.
>>44339756
I'll make the point that the game did get a lot better. I had proper plots and everything, the story telling probably wasn't the downside.
Unfortunately this was also my weeb phase. I'm still a weeb but I thought it was a good idea to make an entire subplot similar to the Karen Bee one in Nisemonogatari. Not only was it not a very good story, but it ended with T becoming even more overpowered as he became a vampire's thrall.
> Decide to get together a group to try out the Brand Spanking New D&D 4e. It's my first time trying to DM.
> Pull together some premade maps from online because I forgot to make my own before the session.
> One of the maps is a room with a flow of acid running right down the middle. Had said flow do 1 point of damage each time they stepped in it.
> Put a weak ranged creature with either acid resistance or flight (don't remember which) in the room. Forgot that my entire party was slow, lumbering tanks without any ranged capabilities.
> Was a bit of a rules lawyer when DMing back then, so I didn't lowball the encounter. Besides, the creature was weak enough that it would go down in one or two hits. Easy enough for my players, right?
> Long story short, party killed itself running back and forth on the acid flow trying to catch the creature.
> Retconned that entire encounter and learned my lesson: don't underprepared for a session if you're DMing.
