A few weeks back I ran a 4e DnD game at our local gaming convention. Talk about jumping head first into something, right? I volunteered only a week or so after having decided to take on DMing in the first place due to the fact that no one else was volunteering and I wanted to make sure 4e was offered.

Fortunately, I found that DMing for a group of strangers is really a lot like DMing for a group of friends. The planning was the same. Encounters were planned, maps were drawn. I even borrowed some suitable minis from a a couple in one of our gaming groups since I believe they may have every figure ever made. With J’s help, I came up with a pre-made set of characters and a catch to get people interested. I had an advantage in being the only 4e game since several people were specifically wanting to game that system, but I still wanted there to be genuine interest.

Here’s a little personal tidbit about me: I suffer from social anxiety. Not horribly, but enough so that I sometimes get a little panicky in large or new groups of people. The gods of DnD smiled on me that day, and I got an awesome group of gamers. They were open to the setting, great about role playing, and excited about combat. Their PCs asked questions and challenged me without being obnoxious, which made for a good game for everyone.

The experience wasn't without its challenges, however. As we went into the first combat, I realized that for some reason, most of the defense scores for my monsters had failed to print on my notes. I had some ACs, but little else, and even some of those didn’t print. Since I hadn’t dragged my computer or my books with me, I ended up just winging it, and that worked out okay too. No one called me on a wrong reflex save for a goblin or threw their dice at me for possibly not being spot on with an AC here or there. Especially because I tended to favor the players.

I had to cut out part of the encounter for purposes of keeping the game flowing and working within the time frame I was given, but it all managed to work out, and one of the players later told me you couldn't even tell I'd fudged anything. I'd like to think I'd earned at least a B during my first bout with convention game running, which means next time, I'll strive for the big A+.