A Brave New Frontier: My Sorta Attempt At Playing The DM
Hello my dear readers. It feels like it’s been awhile since I have written last. I was in a groove and then I was apparently out. With all of our hiatuses I have felt a little out of the writing loop. But with the games back in session so is my muse.
Recently, I have been more carefully watching my husband, our group’s DM, during our game play. And then I decided that I wanted to be just like him… No not over six feet tall and male…. BUT I did want to try my hand at being a DM.
On D&D game day I was intending to play at our local game store but wouldn’t you know it our toddler fell asleep in the car on the way there and I just couldn’t wake him up from his nice little nap. So, while I sent my husband in the store to play for an hour, there I was contemplating my prospects at DMing.
I figured that there was no better day for trying than on D&D game day. I have played a lot over the course of this year. I am very familiar with the 4th edition rules AND we just so happened to have picked up Dungeon Delve. What could be better? There was an encounter/adventure already set up with the bad guys and a plot! Fantastic! I can do this… So I thought…
There were a few perfunctory questions that I had to ask of my spouse before we got started and then I was off and studying the first delve. It looked simple enough. I spent 20 minutes pouring over two pages while I was on the cross country machine. I was ready!
Then I made the mistake of leaving the book open on my desk. My husband, who can’t leave the DMing alone nor his helpfulness, took it upon himself to pull out all the bad guy miniatures I would need and proceeded to tell me which ones would work for which. The only problem here was that I didn’t want him to know what to expect. I really was like a little kid and wanted to do it all on my own.
I told him not to ‘help’ anymore and we got the stuff all out on our living room floor. I was ready to go. I had it all. And then I read my intro at which point he started to give immediate pointers i.e. ‘well if you were running a campaign…blah blah blah’. Honestly, I gave up and there might have been a few tears.
I know he was just trying to help but I felt like I wasn’t even able to get my feet off the ground. I put the stuff away for the night.
Have I given up completely? Absolutely not!
In fact, I have learned a valuable lesson… keep the information in your head or hidden at the bottom of the sock drawer… someplace your intended gamers can’t/won’t find it. I have been working on a very simple idea for a one encounter quasi adventure. I think it’s going to be alright. I am looking forward to sitting behind that DM screen and this time knowing he doesn’t have a clue what’s coming!
Wish me luck!!!!
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Stick to it! You may need to adjudicate your overly helpful husband with a little duct tape, but patiently let him know you’ll ask when you want critique or help. *After The Game*, not during.
I know how this goes as I am also one of those overly helpful husbands….