So, you ran your first session. Maybe you wrote your own one-shot or decided to use Dangerous Art from the previous article. Either way, you're on the other side of it now. First of all, congratulations!

When I ran my first session, what I felt more than anything was relief. I had cobbled together a one-shot based on a necromancer quest from a roguelike video game called Tales of Maj'Eyal. It turned into a two-shot because it ran over. I didn't know what I was doing. But when it was over, the overwhelming feeling was: holy crap, I actually ran that. And it looked like they had fun.

Then, as we do when we try something new and give ourselves a moment to breathe, the doubt filters in. Was it as good as I envisioned? Did they have fun? They didn't smile at every reveal. Something must be wrong. I worried a lot in those early days about whether the story was "good" rather than just fun, enjoyable, and silly. The only reason any of it felt stressful was the pressure I put on myself.

So this article is for you. And honestly, it's for anyone who has run a session and wants to debrief.

The Debrief: Reflection, Not Perfection

After you run your first session, your instinct might be to replay everything that felt off. That's a natural response to something new. It's a natural response when we include other people in our fun. But it's not necessarily useful, because it is very easy to spiral. Very easy to feel that initial relief of being done, and then go, oh no, where did I screw up?

Instead, try to think about your work proactively. What went well? Did something feel off? Thinking about it from those angles helps you figure out what to lean into more and what to learn from. If things went well, great. How do you do more of that? If something felt a little off, that's not a failure. It’s a chance to learn and grow.

But more than anything: did you have fun? Because we as STs are not a service that gets dispensed to the people around us. We're players too, just in a different role. Our fun is just as important as everyone else's.

It might feel scary, but you can always ask your players for feedback. It’s all in how you frame it. Don't ask, "Was it good or bad?" Ask about specifics: What did you think when I revealed the villain? How did that puzzle feel? Focus on areas you actually want to improve.

I once introduced this very silly NPC in a professional game, an inter-dimensional guide who looked like he'd just bought an outfit off the rack of Hot Topic. I was convinced this character was too ridiculous for a serious campaign. Turns out, he's now my players' favorite NPC. What I thought was a mistake became a highlight.

Don't let the non-verbal reactions from your players be your only evidence. They could be stone-faced and still have a blast. You only really know when you ask.

The Traps You'll Hit Next

At this point, you may be deciding whether to run another session, and if so, how to adjust. Here are the overcorrections that catch almost every new ST.

Over-prepping

If your players took things in a direction you weren't expecting, you might feel like the fix is to prepare for every possible outcome. To divine everything that could happen. Try hard not to do that. If you end up with pages of contingency plans, you will exhaust yourself and burn out. Remember what we talked about in the first article: notes, not novels. Your prep should be short, sweet, and developed enough to run at the table without too much trouble. The unexpected isn't a problem that needs a solution.

Under-prepping

Maybe the opposite happened. You felt over-prepared, half your notes never got used, and you spent hours on material nobody saw. So you swing the other direction and don't prep anything. Some GMs thrive on minimal notes, and maybe that's you. But it also might not be you. It's better to have some structure than none at all.

The Comparison Trap

You watched Critical Role. You binged Dimension 20. You ran your first session riding that excitement. And then you had a moment to think, and it hit: this was not as good as the shows I saw. Or one awkward moment replays in your head, and suddenly the whole session feels like a disaster. Those comparisons are unfair to us, and that spiral is almost never accurate. No one who starts something new is going to be amazing out of the gate. Nine times out of ten, your players remember the good stuff: the things they got to try, the moments that surprised them, the NPC that made them laugh. We will always remember the rough spots more than anyone else at the table.

Lana Guber, president of Fordham University’s D&D club, put it simply: "What scared me the most about DMing was that I wouldn't be able to keep all of the spells straight, and how much damage they did, thus causing the players to have less fun." That fear, that you'll mess up the mechanics and ruin the experience, is practically universal among new GMs. It's also almost never true.

I see these traps constantly in novice STs. They think everything has to be perfect, or that they need to memorize every spell and ability and never open a book at the table. Those perfectionist tendencies are hard to shake, but they get easier with practice.

When the dice roll, a story gets told. Credit: 4u4undra, Pixabay

Finding Your Voice

It's really hard to figure out what your STing style is until you actually sit down and run a few sessions.

There are many books on game mastering. Countless YouTube series, instructional videos, and articles. I should know. I'm literally writing one right now. But your voice won't come from places like these. You'll learn your voice through running your games. You'll notice patterns: what you love doing, what you don't prefer, what your players respond to. Even after one session, you'll start to pick up on these things.

Maybe you love building lore-rich worlds. Maybe you thrive on improv. Maybe you want tactical combat with powerful monsters and clever terrain. Maybe it's all of the above. Lean into whatever excites you. Every session you run builds on what you learned from the previous one.

When asked what surprised her most about running a game, Lana said: "How little it mattered whether or not the DM plans for everything, because the improv elements made the game all the more fun!" That realization, that the unplanned moments are often the best ones, is something every ST discovers on their own timeline. But it only happens if you keep playing.

You're Not Alone

We have all run our first session and have all thought about how it could be better.

Lana started playing as a teenager but didn't step behind the screen until college. "While at first I was afraid to start," she said, "now I'm volunteering to write campaigns for my friends." That arc, from fear to excitement, from "I can't" to "let me do more," is really a beautiful thing.

Her advice for anyone nervous about STing? "Don't think about it too much, learn the basics, and have fun with it. STing is meant to be a fun activity, so have fun while you run it."

It's always scarier to dip your toe in the water than to actually go for a swim. The nervousness doesn't immediately go away. But if you like this hobby enough, keep trying. Keep applying what you learned. Try something new with it.

The Tavern, Revisited

The tavern exercise from the first article wasn't just a process. It's a metaphor.

I asked you to describe a tavern in three sentences. In the second article, you walked into a real one: the Blue Spruce Tavern, with Big Bo behind the bar and Dorella knowing everyone's business. Now, after running your first session, think about how that tavern has changed. Maybe your players adopted the NPC. Maybe they ignored the grieving husband entirely. Maybe they burned the place down or did something you never planned for.

Those notes you made before the session? They were a framework. The bones of a house, or a tavern, in this case. Once you have a foundation, you add your personal flair, your budding style, your ideas. You make it your own. And that happens through play, not only through planning.

You're Ready for Session Two When...

You had fun (even a little)
You have a vague idea of what might happen next
You jotted down a few notes after the last session
You're curious about what your players will do
You want to try again

If you're reading this article, you've probably already cleared it.

Your Turn

We started this series asking, Can I do this? And now, on the other side, you can confidently say: I'm doing this.

It is far scarier to think about doing it than to actually do it. And now you've done it. So the question isn't whether you're ready for session two. It's how can you put more of yourself into the experience? How can you bring your personal flair into the things you create? Because that's all this hobby is about. Having a good time with the people around us. And that is as pure of an experience as it could ever get.

- Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master by Sly Flourish. This book changed my prep style in more ways than I can count.
- Matt Colville's "Running the Game" series on YouTube. Practical, encouraging, and endlessly rewatchable.
- Storyteller's Forge for settings, adventures, and a community of creators.
- Visit my Substack for updates on my upcoming book Behind the Screen: A Dungeon Master's Guide to Crafting Campaigns (winter 2026).
- D&D Beyond and DMsGuild for free rules, adventures, and tools.

Chris Vicari is an educator, professional Dungeon Master, and the author of the upcoming Behind the Screen: A Dungeon Master's Guide to Crafting Campaigns (2026). He writes about DMing, confidence, and the craft of running great games on his Substack. You can find him at https://behindthescreendnd.substack.com/

Part 3: What Happens Next: Building Confidence and Finding Your Style