Dungeons and Dragons. Just those three words (OK, two and an ampersand) are enough to evoke feelings of heroic adventure. Rolling the dice, trying to tame a dog, realizing that the dog is a pole, being eaten by the pole - good times. If you've been a TTRPG hobbyist for a while, you've probably played D&D, and if you're a fan of Dungeon Master yourself, it might be the only game you run.
For some of these people, the mere suggestion of booting another system is daunting to the point of frustration. PC Gamer's Robin Valentine has compiled a list of alternative systems to try from 20 years of rolling dice, and even a list of innocuous suggestions ruffled a few feathers.
So I will offer you an alternative. Your task, if you choose to accept it, is not to finish D&D completely. It's getting out into the world, exploring all that other TTRPGs have to offer, and then (unless you find a new pressure for pen and paper) channel what you've learned into your own DMing style. It will help me - and if you're not convinced, here are some examples of how it helped me.
So I will offer you an alternative. Your task, if you choose to accept it, is not to finish D&D completely. It's getting out into the world, exploring everything other TTRPGs have to offer, and then (unless you find a new pressure for pen and paper) funnel what you've learned into your own DMing style. It will help me - and if you're not convinced, here are some examples of how it helped me.
telling a story is really dard
While plenty of tables are running on a diet of "go dungeon, kill monsters" with the advent of streaming shows like Dimension 20 and Critical Role, gamers might want something a little more textured. Storytelling is, at its core, really hard. You have to have a good handle on your type, avoid clichéd pitfalls, nail character development and pace - and in the case of D&D, you have to do it all while knowing the grappling rules. Unlike other narrative systems, D&D is pulled between its design as a combat-filled dungeon dungeon game and Playerbase's authorship line.
I literally can't think of a worse place to learn how to tell a story than my first D&D set. It's straightforward with two to six of your friends, friends who will expect you to provide three to four hours of entertainment, while also learning how to play a complex war game. It's no wonder we hear so many horror stories about DM-controlled NPCs stealing the show or the bland settings of the cartoon. I don't think the answer to this problem can come from D&D as a system either.
I literally can't think of a worse place to learn how to tell a story than my first D&D set. It's straightforward with two to six of your friends, friends who will expect you to provide three to four hours of entertainment, while also learning how to play a complex war game. It's no wonder we hear so many horror stories about DM-controlled NPCs stealing the show or the bland settings of the cartoon. I don't think the answer to this problem can come from D&D as a system either.
Personally, I think DMG 5th Edition does a decidedly flimsy job of telling you how to run a story-based game. I mean, he's trying to, well, put together some kind of adventure with some random schedule to incite accidents. But the "character involvement" section is about 3 paragraphs long, and most of the book is devoted to optional level lore, magic items, and some awful stalking rules that I haven't seen work well.
There is some effort to tell you how to run downtime, or how to build NPCs, but the book gives you the building materials, not the tools. When does the villain appear? When do you incorporate a personal background? How do you speed up the plot? tell a riddle? Does it reveal evolution? How do you maintain momentum, create excitement, and entertain?
Playing a game or two of narrative-focused games will allow you to skillfully answer these questions. For me, those games were Masks: A New Generation by Magpie Games and Blades in the Dark by Evil Hat Productions.
Masks is a game similar to the Apocalypse (PbtA) system, which is generally based on "moves" with self-contained rules, and usually prompts the player to roll two six-sided dice. Any consequences of an action are usually contained in the motion you used it for, each one drawing an outline of failure or success.
I'm not saying masks: the new generation is the best PbtA system for me to make the point. However, it was the game that convinced me that admins don't have to bog down through twenty sessions before they learn how to spin yarn.
Masks: A New Generation is a game about teenage superheroes and their problems - Teen Titans with dice. It's entirely story focused, with no hit point or armor class in sight. Instead, the Masks give gamers plenty of tools to successfully create their very own comic book with their buds, tools you can use anywhere.
To deal with players, it has two main axes: triangles and game rule moves.
Triangles are very basic, but very powerful. For this recipe, you will need 2 player characters and 1 character. Paste the NPC in the middle, then specify how they relate - for example, Gardath the Warlock is Ignar's brother, and is Meridas' rival. Right off the bat, I've evaded the "this DM just wants to make his self-entry look good" trap by thinking in terms of what's fun for players.
Playbook Actions requires a little more grease to carve onto your home table, since the Masks chapters — called Playbooks — are about stories, not stats. For example, the "Janus" playbook focuses on Spider-Man's style struggle between a superhero's life and the obligations of a secret identity. Each of these manuals comes with its own set of "playbook moves," which act like trap cards that you can flip over anytime you need to raise your ante.
Let's look at some of Janus' guide moves - "Carry Their Obligations", "Make Their Lives Over", "Unmask Them", "Put More Obligations On Them". All of these are great, but also really simple. There are no random tables at work here, the book just gives you a bunch of stories that go above and beyond what a Janus player would want.
This makes you, as the game master, think about the events that matter most to your players. Yes, D&D doesn't have story-based chapters - but if you've been running a game for a while, how difficult is it to write down a handful of "character moves" for each player? Try it.
D&D doesn't handle non-combat scenarios well. This isn't to beat it up ruthlessly - it's a game about fighting monsters and wielding cool spells - but when it comes to anything that isn't a fight to the death, the point is to brush it off and let you figure it out.
Even when you try to offer something else, they tend to fall apart. That chase from DMG Rules is a good example. First you have to roll an initiative to everyone, then you have to explain their unique exhaustion rules, figure out how many times a person can lunge, then at the end of each turn the players have to roll a d20, then the DM has to roll on the table, permission -
It's a complete urgency killer. Chases, escaping from a crumbling temple, escaping from guards, low-stakes brawling - making custom rules for each of these scenarios is just teasing for the Butchers. Blades in the Dark, another system I take a lot of inspiration from, is built entirely around getting rid of that kind of grumbling. Similar to visors, it has a key system that you can easily use elsewhere - watches.
Clocks - first used in the Lumbley Games apocalypse world - are very similar to the skill challenges in D&D 4th Edition. Essentially, players need to succeed a few times before they miss a few times, and their progress is monitored through two racing clock visuals. If they succeed, they fill part of the hour of success, and if they fail, they fill part of the hour of failure.
The watches make the player invest instantly. Let's say your group is trying to sneak around a palace for some blackmail on the local lord. You can put a clock that says "Find info" and one that says "Alert guards," and then put them where the players can see them. Now they know exactly what the stakes are, and are tracking their hands as the literal race against time takes place before their eyes. Plus they work anywhere - running from a rundown temple? Are you looking for information in a crowded casino? Will you try to magical ship before it crashes? Watches have your back.
Watches are amazing for creating urgency. Blades in the Dark wants you to feel the pressure, but it also wants to get you stuck in the action as quickly as possible. And just like Masks, it actually provides tools to help you do just that, rather than burden you with extra.
Blades in the Dark gets you thinking about rhythm in a way that D&D systems don't, and provides you with everything you need to pull it off. It made me a better DM by teaching me that over-engineering rules, especially when they're presented to players right now, will generally be bad. If this isn't something gamers are familiar with, keep it simple.
These are just a few examples of systems that have helped me develop my game, but for your table these inspirations may be different. Running something focused on combat? Create some great magical items by studying how mecha RPG Lancer from Massif Press handles character customization and building diversity. Look at R Games' The Witcher TTRPG. The sky really is the limit.
These are just a few examples of systems that have helped me develop my game, but for your table these inspirations may be different. Running something focused on combat? Create some great magical items by studying how mecha RPG Lancer from Massif Press handles character customization and building diversity. Look at R Games' The Witcher TTRPG. The sky really is the limit.
There are many good systems out there, and if you refuse to play with them out of stubbornness (instead of scheduling difficulties for example - which is fair) then you are hindering your personal growth. Go explore, there is a whole world of dice rolling goodness out there.
