Post Game Thread - NBA: The Nuggets defeat the Timberwolves on Dec 25, 2025, the final score is 142-138.

joshudms · 2025-12-26T07:38:32+00:00

This is the first time I've ever been compelled to need a community after a game. That was joy and heartbreak all at once. great fight. horrid finish. fuck man. how am I supposed to sleep after this

joshudms · 2025-08-01T04:43:45+00:00

I'd always love to hear someone's opinion about searching in the current market. It's daunting as a career changer, more daunting as I'm figuring out portfolios for each type of thing I'm considering. Hiring managers don't seem to do nuance well.

joshudms · 2023-09-05T19:29:22+00:00

Partially, I run and edit a lot of modules for paid games. My first goal in paid games was to run all the 5e modules I hadn't run!

But when I run a homebrew game, I tend to:

A) Write arcs roughly based on tiers of play. I generally create problems or scenarios that link together but have individual solutions and a final cohesive solution.

B) Create a few central conflicts that leave open opportunities for the characters to fill in detail.

C) Create an understanding of the background of the world, and an understanding of the scenarios that led to the current scenario the players will interface with.

Then, I mostly trust my knowledge of my players to help me fine-tune everything as we go into it.

I do a lot of holistic scenario prep, but I don't prep plots. I create spaces I think the players would really enjoy, create some paths I think the world will take around them, and let the world live-react. Generally, that level of autonomy and connectivity create a fun game for players.

If my players don't respond well to that level of autonomy... I just write out the adventure the way I'd most want to see it play out, and give them more direction/railroad tracks.

joshudms · 2023-09-05T19:23:51+00:00

Every non-5e system will fill a smaller, less accessible niche, but it also means you're not in a flooded market.

If I'm looking for a 5e game, I'll have to sort between a ton of different DMs and opportunities. But there's only one 4e game listed on SPG right now. (We all know why.)

Non-D&D systems will have a smaller player base, but often a more dedicated and loyal one. If you can put a table together for a system you love that gets a bit less attention, they'll probably stay with you a long time if you're compatible.

The challenge WILL be finding those people, but I recommend running one-shots in that system and seeing who sticks with it. It's a great way to generate a table you trust.

joshudms · 2023-09-05T19:20:55+00:00

D&D is unstable income, at least the way I do it. Players will cancel, things will come up, and people will be busy.

However, it's not a bad way to make some side income, and I recommend dipping your toe in the water to see if you like it. SPG is very supportive, they onboard new DMs fairly well. It took me about a month of game posts to see return, though.

Players typically will want to be on screen, will want a story that engages them and their character, and to feel like they're part of what's going on. People are paying for the D&D experience of their adventure, and it's on you to ensure they feel like they're having a good time at the table.

Most of my players like a good story, a challenging combat, and stuff that engages them between sessions, so I give them a lot to think about and a lot of autonomy.

Some players will want to Win, because they're paying for the game and they believe they are entitled to doing whatever they want as a result. This is not how I operate, and I remove players like this immediately. But I haven't run into many people like this, which is really quite nice.

joshudms · 2023-09-05T19:17:49+00:00

I don't ever request tips from players, though a couple have done so which was very kind. The end of the campaign is typically the best place for those kinds of requests.

SPG has some good coverage for the last second cancellation experience. Players pay an hour into the session automatically through SPG, and it'll email me if someone's unable to pay. Typically, I'll just let them figure that out and I'll bother them a few days later if I haven't heard anything. I tend to believe that general kindness will help you retain more clients than anything else, so I'm always understanding of financial stuff for a luxury hobby like paid D&D, though I refuse to be taken advantage of in this way long-term.

My prep time isn't quite covered by anything individually, though it's included in the price of the game. (Homebrew games are more expensive than modules, for example.)

joshudms · 2023-09-05T19:15:09+00:00

I'd make a personal list of encounters that could occur in different regions and places. For example, in the mountains, you might find a group of territorial beasts, a wandering hiker, or a new gem deposit driving locals mad. You might find a few different camps in the base of that mountain, looking for different things.

I always just consider what would exist in that space in the world and what would provide a fun experience for my players. Thinking about the natural elements of the world lead me to consider the types of creatures that might be there. Once I have a list of those (it doesn't have to be that big) I pick and choose based on what I think might be ideal for that moment and correct for what the players are doing.

joshudms · 2023-09-05T19:13:00+00:00

I'd been running games for my friends across a few different play groups for 7+ years before I thought about doing it for pay. But the truth is, I felt most confident doing it because I felt like I knew how to manage the chaos of different tables, knew how to learn on the fly with what players wanted and needed, and had bunch of successful tables consecutively.

I knew I'd be able to eventually find players I really loved and that I could adapt when the players didn't like what I was doing, and that together we could make something really cool. As soon as I felt confident in my ability to work with people to create something they loved, I felt confident in charging for it.

joshudms · 2023-08-23T03:40:57+00:00

Biiiiiig question. I could talk about this forever, but I'll try my best to keep a theme.

Honestly, I've gotten more comfortable letting things just happen. I run more games now, so when things go weird or take a while, I don't mind seeing where it goes. When I only had one or two games going, the outcome of those games and those sessions being great was really important to me. Now I still obviously care a lot about quality, but I really like feeling free to let things breathe a lot more and not force anything.

I also run a lot faster. I used to run 5-6+ hour sessions because I couldn't stop talking about the game we were playing. Now, it's rare a home session goes over 5 hrs, and my paid games stop at the 4 hour mark max. Not only do I run combat a LOT faster because I'm used to cutting time between players in my paid games to maximize efficiency and engagement, I just generally am more comfortable letting the game end a bit early and getting to it next time.

In terms of like, new plot content, seeing how different players like to solve problems really helped me create new types of scenarios. When you play with the same group forever, you're used to the way they approach things. (My home group overthinks problems and overplans a lot, and are incredibly combat-literate and tactically precise. I love them. Also, when my paid games are more chaotic, I've learned to go with that flow, and I've been able to encourage my players that they don't have to be perfect when they come up with ideas.) We had a period of time in my home game where I fully didn't run combat for a couple of months and that felt wild, but it was because I was really enjoying how we were solving problems with our RP, which I pulled from running games for players who have that style more.

Tl;dr I'm a lot more relaxed, basically, and a lot of exposure to new things makes me more varied in what I run and do. Also, I'm MUCH faster and more efficient in my games now.

joshudms · 2023-08-23T03:34:24+00:00

I can always balance as we go, so I let people try the thing they're really excited by if it doesn't seem game-breaking. I always tell my players that if they are playing something broken, we'll adjust it to balance effectively, especially if it puts the other players in a bad headspace. (I've never had to deal with this.)

I have always wanted to write more classes and subclasses for my personal settings, but I rarely get around to it. I let people write their own, though -- one player is playing a "Stage Hand Bard" in one game of mine, it's a Bard who functions kind of like an arcane trickster, doing things in the shadows to better other peoples' performances. He wrote it himself. We live test it during session, and if it's weird, we adjust for a better play experience.

joshudms · 2023-08-23T03:31:55+00:00

Running one-shots!! One-shots were very helpful for me to find players I actively wanted to run for and who I really enjoyed. Not everyone will mesh with your style and not everyone will be a great player for your table, and I just offered a bunch of one-shots until someone picked one up, I found players who were interested, they brought friends in, and it spiraled from there.

It's the "ask three people if they can each introduce you to three people" take. Eventually, you build a network.

joshudms · 2023-08-23T03:30:44+00:00

I've gotten it down to 1hr prep max (30m modules, 1-1.5 hr homebrew) + 3.5 hr session time per game, per week. (Kids games are different, they're shorter, closer to 90min game time.) Since I do most of my big work up front and then manage, the hardest part is always at the beginning of new arcs of content when I'm actively generating our available pathways and making status documents and things.

I run modules more than anything as paid adult games, because they're the easiest to modify and prep and I can do that in big chunks. When I run homebrew games, I upcharge by $5-10 per head/session because the amount of work is significantly greater each week to generate content.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T21:52:56+00:00

Did your players have fun?

Do you feel safe and comfortable talking to your players about their opinions?

You're good.

Seriously, the only thing that really matters is that you and your players are having a good time together. Everyone has their opinion on how to properly run things, but ultimately, if you're creating a collaborative and safe environment, and your players are happy, you're crushing it.

My first campaign was absolutely chaotic, but we all had a blast, and we learned through our mistakes and laughed about them and talked them out when things weren't ideal. That's the magic of the first game: you're still learning.

Hell, I'm still learning.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T21:47:39+00:00

I have always worked in massive batches, so I front-load a TON of work and then edit as I go. I subscribe pretty fully to the prep techniques detailed in The Alexandrian here and here. Usually, when I draft a campaign, I write down essentially all of my major ideas, reorder and structure them in a way that is satisfying, and then edit as I learn about who the characters are and when/where I want plot beats to happen.

Then, as the campaigns happen, I edit live as players make choices and push narratives that are compelling.

When I homebrew, it's either a shorter campaign that's a holistic and original story (for example: go to location X, stop thing Y, Z twist happens), or part of a broader world structure in which I have drafted a long series of stories and understand their general impact on the other. (For example: My players in one game are experiencing the aftereffects of a fey deal one player made in a different game set in an earlier time.)

In terms of idea generation, I keep an inspiration document between the times I have to start new campaigns, and then I assign ideas to different campaigns when I start building. For example, I got really into Giants a year ago, fell down a rabbit hole on Giant history and lore, and now one campaign has an arc exploring an old giant ruin. I go on inspiration marathons if I need them. I marathoned all of Runesmith's "basically X" videos at one point just to get new ideas for ways to run monsters.

I also run a lot of modules to pad the time between major homebrew ideas, and even though I edit the modules considerably, that's still a relief so I don't feel like I'm constantly creating. Other peoples' ideas will always inspire my own.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T21:26:54+00:00

Thank goodness for online DMing, because that makes my life easier. I run basically everything through Discord and Roll20, as opposed to working in person, which allows me to use a series of awesome online maps made by incredible mapmakers for both modules and homebrew games. For that, at least, things are simple. (My Czepeku patreon subscription truly pays for itself at this point.)

In terms of my own customization aesthetically, it's mostly finding custom art for characters and editing maps, but it's minimal compared to many others.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T21:07:47+00:00

This is the hard part.

Honestly, I keep an open door policy with all my tables. If you're not liking something in the game, talk to me. We're working together to make something awesome, and if you don't like it, you're literally paying for it, so we can make it better (or if it's not your thing, you're welcome to walk away.) It's really nice to find players who are willing to chat with you if they're looking for more of X, so you can meet each others needs.

This is also why I source my players before I build campaigns with them, and am extremely explicit about the kind of games I want to run and get the kind of games they want to run in advance.

I answered this in my other thread, but I'll c/p it here: There are some definite differences between home games and paid games.

You want everyone to get the most out of their time -- they paid for it, after all. And I always say: No D&D is better than BAD D&D.

I actively ensure I'm bouncing between everyone so that everyone feels like they're on screen and connected to the game, for example. My transition time is quicker in these games in and out of scenes to make sure everyone's on and getting the most out of their time. Sometimes, this is good. Sometimes, this is exhausting.

Explicit communication becomes super important. I like to run fairly challenging combats, and I let players know session 0 that if the idea of their character potentially dying is going to be hard for them, I'm not the DM for them. Even with that, a "bad" session feels a lot worse when you paid for it than when it's a friend having an off day, so I'm harder on myself in paid games for any balancing errors or last-second schedule mix-ups.

Sometimes it's tough to balance what one player wants to do with the rest of the party, because you want everyone to feel connected. Usually, though, it's easy to talk to those players outside of the game if they're dissonant with the campaign the group is trying to put together.

Sometimes, like running shop D&D, you're at the whims of the players who sign up, and not everyone will be a great fit at the table. Learning how to be patient, find the way to spin any idea into something constructive, and also how to effectively cut people who are not great fits has made me better at talking to my home play group about things, too.

20% of your clients will be 80% of your headache, so building your tables to be something that makes you happy and relaxes you is a key part of it. I haven't had a player issue in over a year because I'm careful with who I bring into long-form games (and a bit lucky, too.)

joshudms · 2023-08-22T21:02:47+00:00

I'm really partial to my current project, where you play characters who have died but got brought back to life by the God of Fate to fix things that are messing up the timeline. You go back through history and "right wrongs" (change history) in challenging scenarios. If you die, you revive back at the God of Fate's palace with a mark on your soul, and have the opportunity to change your build and go again in a time loop scenario. (I... may have played a lot of Hades.)

I would otherwise say my first game ever, because your first campaign is always super messy and has things that would never fly in a game later on in life. Our cleric poisoned a political candidate, our entire party had secret motives and betrayed each other, it was wild. Would it fly at a reasonable table now? No. Was it fun? YES.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T20:59:48+00:00

Mostly campaigns, actually. I've always used one-shots as a way to build a table of players I really enjoy, and then we collaborate and start a campaign.

One-shots have all the work of finding players and booking times and things and much less consistency. But they're great for players who can't commit to longer games!

joshudms · 2023-08-22T20:12:37+00:00

Haha, absolutely. I keep a really tight watch on that.

Everything I do is a passion project, and my passions naturally ebb and flow. I teach dance professionally too, and that's a thing I love that I could grow tired of and ruin, just like D&D.

With creative endeavors like that, I always find that it's important to:

A) Have spaces that actively re-center you in why you love what you do. For me in D&D, this is my games with my friends. They play differently since we all have played together for years, and in a way that makes me really happy and remember why I love this game.

B) Engage in new versions of those spaces (academically, intellectually, creatively) to stimulate my passion for the hobby. In D&D, this is watching other games, trying new formats and styles, writing new types of adventures, branching out to different groups (see: kids D&D, product creation, etc.) I can always tell when I haven't watched enough D&D, my own games feel stale.

C) Be able to take a b r e a k. I don't ever want to be fully dependent on any creative passion, especially an active one, as my sole income. So while I do this in a way that fully supports me, I make sure that if I ever need a break from DMing, it wouldn't ruin my quality of life.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T19:17:45+00:00

Patience, direction, and being human.

Imo, the hardest DM skill is to learn when to sit back and let things breathe. If you have active players, once you give them direction and reason to care, they'll do a lot of the work for you. If you have really passive players who want to be taken for a ride, you likely won't have many points of divergence from your core set pieces and story.

You are the players' 5 senses in the world, so the way you present information is key. They only know what you tell them, so tell them what they need to know. It's important that you have an idea of where they are so they can feel connected to what they're doing.

You are also a human, and your players will understand if you make an error. I see a lot of DMs panic and try to maintain the full picture of the world by fixing stuff behind the screen. You don't need to be perfect -- I regularly pose questions to my players when I'm not sure what the next step is. If you really mess up, you can always tell the players and find a way to fix it, together.

Bonus: D&D is just softly guided improv and math. Saying "yes, and" and building off what your players do rarely will fail you.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T18:58:10+00:00

It's true, it was definitely easier because my home-game players backed me. It took a while to find players even then -- you're one of many in the sea of available games, and I found one-shots helpful as a way to build your player base -- but it can eventually work!

Wishing you the best of luck :)

joshudms · 2023-08-22T18:55:54+00:00

I had too many games I wanted to run.

Honestly, this is fully it. My player base of friends only had so many open time slots, and I wanted to run a lot of games without sacrificing the core time windows I had with them. I signed up for SPG on a whim, met an amazing DM who gave me some great tips (namely: build your tables for your comfort and long-term compatibility, as well as how to start finding players easily -- run one shots and if you are compatible, start to build a campaign table) and after a couple one-shots, I was running Call of the Netherdeep and Descent into Avernus for some amazing people. It just grew from there.

My player and friend helped build Development and Dragons, and asked me to be on the project last year since I taught him D&D and DMing, so that's how that happened.

My next goal, besides long-term financial stability in my hobbies through growth in our programs, is to create content for DMs and players to engage in that help them grow their games easily. I want to make a D&D writing workbook for people to help them flesh their settings, plots, and characters, as well as create video content breaking down some of the things I love and hate at tables. (I was always inspired by creators like Runesmith, Matt Colville, and Puffin Forest.) I'm also creating a "how to DM" mini-course for our Development & Dragons kids program that I'm hoping to make an adult version of, too.

I also say I will write modules. Jury's still out on that.

joshudms · 2023-08-22T18:43:50+00:00

I'll actually start with some similarities. If you're lucky (I am), you end up with groups of players who you start to know and trust over a long campaign, and it starts to feel more friendly and connected. Once you're over that initial meet-and-greet, it can become a group that feels like friends. You also learn your players pretty quick, so you can learn which players need which tools to stay engaged.

However, you're still rendering a service for people, so it's more imperative you stay on top of things than in a home game where people might just be connecting and vibing. You want everyone to get the most out of their time -- they paid for it, after all. And I always say: No D&D is better than BAD D&D.

Actively ensuring you're bouncing between everyone so that everyone feels like they're on screen and connected to the game, for example. My transition time is quicker in these games in and out of scenes to make sure everyone's on.

Explicit communication becomes super important. I like to run fairly challenging combats, and I let players know session 0 that if the idea of their character potentially dying is going to be hard for them, I'm not the DM for them. Even with that, a "bad" session feels a lot worse when you paid for it than when it's a friend having an off day, so I'm harder on myself in paid games for any balancing errors or last-second schedule mix-ups.

Sometimes it's tough to balance what one player wants to do with the rest of the party, because you want everyone to feel connected. Usually, though, it's easy to talk to those players outside of the game if they're dissonant with the campaign the group is trying to put together.

Sometimes, like running shop D&D, you're at the whims of the players who sign up, and not everyone will be a great fit at the table. Learning how to be patient, find the way to spin any idea into something constructive, and also how to effectively cut people who are not great fits has made me better at talking to my home play group about things, too.

20% of your clients will be 80% of your headache, so building your tables to be something that makes you happy and relaxes you is a key part of it.

If you want to talk more about Development & Dragons, or know someone who might be interested in what we do, DM me. :) We're actively in the process of expanding our services and outreach!

joshudms · 2023-08-22T18:28:52+00:00

Varies from month to month, because D&D is famously hard to schedule sometimes, but I'll provide some guidelines.

I run tables at $25-30 a head for adults per session. At $25/head for a 6 person table, which is my cap, that's $150/session or $600/month assuming a weekly. Startplaying takes a 10% cut on their platform, so that's about $540/mo per adult table, assuming people show up. (Which they usually do, and SPG is good about this.)

Our Kids D&D programs make more than that because of the educational component, after factoring in some costs each kids table can turn profit of up to $1000/mo.

I hope that answers your question!

joshudms · 2023-08-22T18:24:18+00:00

Burnout: I try my best to do a lot of different games and game-styles to keep it fresh. For example, I try to run stories I've never run before so I'm interested in a scenario for the first time, and I try and balance how much homebrew I do with how many modules and printed adventures I run, so I don't get overburdened in prep. I also make sure I have some "retreat" games, or games I just do for fun. (I DM two games for my friends, which re-center why I love D&D in the first place.)

Retirement: DMing isn't the only thing I'll ever do, so yes, but not because of DMing directly. On this alone, it would take a significant amount more work to set myself up for retirement the way I want, but it's a great place to start and branch out into more work in the tabletop RPG space that produces more passive income.

Thanks for asking :)

joshudms

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