Like a lot of people, I started playing Dungeons & Dragons at the start of the COVID lockdowns in 2020. I immediately loved being a player, but I couldn't even fathom how you DM a game. There's so much mystery to the game as a player, and so many things going on behind the screen that you don't see. It's hard to wrap your brain around it. DM'ing looked like a lot of work and probably something I would never want to do.
Through the course of playing two campaigns though, I got REALLY into it. I hit the books and learned all the rules and classes and spells and everything. Toward the end of our second campaign, my niece was starting to take an interest in D&D and wanted to learn. As The Cool Uncle of the family, that was the last push I needed to get into DM'ing. Sure it sounds like a lot of work, but lots of people do it. It's not impossible, right?
It's now been two years and I'm reaching the end of my second campaign as DM. What I've found is yes, it's a lot of work, but I've also been lucky to have ideal circumstances for making my path to DM easier. I even discovered some skills I didn't realize I had, doing a lot better than expected in areas I thought I would struggle with. Here are some things I learned that might be helpful for anyone on a similar journey.
Much respect for anyone that has or will attempt to start playing D&D as a DM. While I haven't experienced this myself, I've heard a lot of horror stories about the unprepared DM getting torpedoed by problems they might have anticipated if they had played before. It took me a few sessions to even understand the basic rules, let alone be able to explain them to someone else. I wouldn't have had the courage to try. You are brave souls and I hope things go well for you.
My first campaign was with a group of us from the GLORIO crew, with Iro as our DM. I always thought he was a good DM as a player, but I really appreciated how great he was after being a DM myself. It was more than just having a good knowledge of the rules or the crazy amount of work he put in to make a great VTT experience. It was how he would handle situations that the rules didn't cover, like what checks to call, what things we could and could not get away with, and when to speed up or slow down an encounter. I learned a lot from his example.
I understand not everyone has a friend offering to run a game for them, but getting a lot of playing time with a good DM helped me a lot. Regardless of who is your DM, I also think it's much easier and a lot less pressure learning the game as a player. If you have an opportunity to join a game first, that seems like the best way to go.
The first campaign we played was a combination of Lost Mines of Phandelver and the Essentials Kit series, starting with Dragon of Icespire Peak. When I eventually took an interest in DM'ing, we had completed the campaign and I went back and read both of them. I learned a LOT, particularly seeing what was run direct from the book and what was changed. It also helped me learn how to organize different parts of the adventure and what kind of details you need to run the game. I particularly recommend Dragon of Icespire Peak as a good starting point, I think it's the best organized and has the best DM instructions out of any official module I've read.
I understand some people don't want to run the official modules and you might have a specific type of story you want to tell, but I think this might be the most important step out of anything I'm mentioning here. Even if you don't run the module, it's worth reading them. That's what I ended up doing. I read the modules and wanted to try writing a small oneshot, to test the waters a little without commiting to a campaign. That would eventually be my first real DM experience.
After writing my one shot, I tried running it for my niece and her dad. We were on vacation and this basically took the place of the usual board games or playing cards. The one shot itself is bad. It's a bland, cliche filled encounter where the adventurers are hired to investigate some old ruins and get double crossed in the end. But as a tutorial for learning how to DM and teach my family how to play D&D, it actually worked great. I still think it's cringy, but I'll link a PDF and the ruins map at the end of the post if anyone wants to see it.
I'll admit, at the time I would have been too embarrassed to run this for anyone outside my family. Playing with close family took away the social anxiety and I could just focus on running the game and having fun. Once again, I know I'm lucky to have cool family and this is not possible for everyone, but try it if you can. I think it was very helpful in getting me comfortable and building my confidence as a DM.
Everyone wanted to keep playing D&D after the oneshot, which led to us running two full campaigns over the past two years. I sometimes wonder if I'm getting "real" DM experience since I'm running the game for my family and things are kind of casual, but I would answer "yes" to that question. The mechanics are the same no matter who you're playing with, and just because we're family doesn't mean there are no disagreements or heated moments that come up in the game. In fact, there might be even more BECAUSE it's family. Overall though, it's easier to manage those things when you're comfortable with the people in your group and have no problem communicating.
Everyone will probably have different insecurities going into DM'ing. For me, I've never considered myself a good improvisor, or at least I would say I am very afraid of being unprepared. I'm also not much of an "actor". I have a pretty deep, monotone voice that is hard for me to change. So my main concerns were being able to stay prepared for each session and being able to roleplay all the characters that a DM has to manage. God forbid my players combined both of these fears and tried to talk to an NPC I hadn't planned out, would I be able to handle it?
The short answer is yes, I can handle it and so can you. It just takes practice. In fact, I'm surprised how good I've gotten at rolling with whatever the party is doing and playing whatever character I need to. When we first started I would read and re-read the module over and over, rehearse what I was going to have each NPC say, and try to anticipate every possible move the players might make. But now? I still prepre thoroughly, making sure I've read the material and that I have my maps setup, but after that I know I can trust myself to handle whatever the players decide to do.
As an example, in our current campaign we are running Storm King's Thunder. There are Giant strongholds with huge maps, a lot of different things going on, and no clear way for the players to reach their objective. You basically just throw them into the sandbox and let them figure it out. In the early days of my DM career, my brain would have exploded and I would have died from anxiety after reading these. But now, I think they are some of the best written encounters I've seen in the official modules and they've lead to the most fun we've had yet.
There's really no magic or secret here, experience building confidence is true for anything in life. But sometimes it's nice to remember that when you're diving into something new.
It's easy to feel like the DM is supposed to "put on a show" for the players or like you are solely responsible for everyone having fun. That's not true at all. This is a game and everyone involved is supposed to be enjoying it. DM'ing takes a lot of time and work but for some sickos (including me apparently) that kind of work can be a lot of fun. If you're not enjoying it, then don't do it. It's just a game, it's not your job, you don't owe anything to anyone.
For me, I'm thankful I haven't burnt out yet, but after two years I do feel it wearing on me a little. I think one thing that has been helpful is playing every two weeks instead of weekly. That has given me a comfortable window of time between each session to prepare. I also tend to prepare a lot in one sitting, setting up the next 3-4 sessions and then only needing to make minor adjustments over the next several weeks depending on what the players do. Everyone's work style may vary on that, but that works for me.
As we reach the end of our second campaign, I don't feel like a "new" DM anymore. I have a little bit of confidence. I think I would be comfortable running a campaign with people outside of my family, and it's something I would like to try at some point. Of course, my niece would probably kill me if I don't run another campaign with her, and I don't know if I have the time to manage more than one campaign at a time. But we'll see what happens.
If you're interested in seeing the first oneshot I wrote: