Joe Manganiello has been running D&D games
for a long time, so I had to ask him, whats
his advice for not only new dungeon masters,
but also ones who have been doing this for
a long time as well.
I still get nervous before I Dungeon Master,
I still get nervous before I DM, I get butterflies,
I get mild, mild forms of panic in the week
leading up to my games.
In the way that I get nervous when I'm about
to go out and do a play on opening night.
It's gonna be live, and I don't care if there
are cameras or not.
I want these people to walk away and remember
these stories, the kids that I DM'd with growing
up, they all remember those stories, we all
do, and every time we see each other we just
recant all of the adventures, and I know that
these are, this game has magic that can live
on in people's brains forever, they saw it,
they were there, even though you weren't you
feel like you were, and there something magic
about that so, I'm cognizant of that and my
advice to DMs is, Like, think big, think cinematic,
think, like, don't hold back.
What's the coolest image you can have in your
mind?
What's the movie that you wanna see?
Go create that, create that situation.
I love describing combat, a lot of times when
we get through a couple of cool rounds of
combat if people have done some really cool
things, I'll recap.
So I'm walking them though and I'm acting
out the combat, And it's "So then it was this,
and then you did this, "and then he hit with
that, and then boom the fireball, "but then
that, but then he fell off the balcony, "and
then the dragon whipped it's tail, "so it's
boom up against the wall, boom." and you know
I'm, and, you know it's story time man and
you're all contributing.
I would also say as a DM, like I cannot prep
enough, like I'm such a prep guy, but I love
it, I come down here, this is like my tool
shed.
I come down here and take time away from you
know, my other work or you know, which is
very intense and all consuming and so this
is my break, I come down here, I build my
sets you know, I take my little trays, my
little Dwarven Forge trays, I build my stuff,
I go and I hide it.
I hide all the rooms in the dungeon and hope
that they get to those rooms that I built.
And so you know I like to prep a lot, because,
when I get into the game, I throw it all out
like I just like to flow I like to see where
it goes and the people the players in your
game are going to unfold the story as well.
And a lot of times that stuff you know that's
worth the price of admission watching them
go off and try to figure out, I love watching
the players try to figure out what to do next
and how we're gonna do it and just kind of
sit back and keep my poker face.
And sometimes great ideas come out of that,
so I would say that you know, just stay engaged.
I also think, you know, I use new players
in my campaigns like, when a new player jumps
in as a guest star, I'll work with them to
write a story, that leads the characters logically
to the next place they need to get to.
So there was a big war ship full of dragon
cultist, they appeared in a war ship, well
when the next character shows up he's gonna
be from the small coastal town and he's gonna
have a piece of information about that war
ship that they saw on their harbor that pulled
in.
And he'll have some piece of information which
then drives the party that way.
You know that can give the illusion that there
is many more choices out there than there
actually are, where they're being nudged in
a certain direction.
Now they may or may not go there.
And you need to be ready so my last piece
of advice is like, just be ready to pull it
out of your ass because a lot of Dungeon Mastering
is pulling things out of your ass.
But you know if you prepare a lot and you
have a lot written out then you've got a lot
of connective tissue.
You've got railroad track, you've got the
material to build the track so the story with
you and there's nothing that says that has
to happen here, it can happen down here, it
can happen there.
So none of your work is gonna go to waste
it's just gonna be railroad track you're gonna
use down the line.
But in the moment, yeah you gotta be ready.
which is why I keep a list of like, fake names
on the inside of my Dungeon Master.
You gotta have names you can call upon, you
gotta you know, and you gotta keep track of
the story.
I'm always calling back, I'm always having
some older character from previous in the
story that come finds it's way back into the
plot line because there's that, "Oh no" moment,
"This guy's back" you know, and like I said
yeah it's like, just like what's cinematic?
I've got a character that been resurrected
twice in my campaign so the second time he
was resurrected he's now a ghost animating
his suit of armor and his body is interred
somewhere else.
There's nothing in the books that says anything
about doing that.
I just think it's cooler.
So let's do it.
It's the books are suggestions.
I take the rules very seriously but I also
just bend them wherever it's cooler.
Thank you Joe so much for the interview, I
am Todd Kenreck your host, thank you so much
for watching.
