What Dnd Book Should I Read First
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How to Read Your D&D Books
by Mike on 15 Apr 2019
"A mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone."
- Tyrion Lannister, Game of Thrones
Over the past year, this topic has shown up in lots of other articles here at Sly Flourish and many of my DM tips on Twitter as well. For some, this seems completely obvious. For others, information technology tin come as a surprise. This big tip?
Read the books.
1 might be surprised by the fact that some haven't read their D&D books all the mode through. I admit, only recently accept I finished reading them all the style through. That is not something I'm proud of.
This isn't a tip only for new DMs. This is a tip for all of us. New or erstwhile. DMs or players. All of us can draw a not bad deal out of this game if we take the time to dig into our D&D books and enjoy what they have to offer.
New DMs, Read the Starter Set Books
If you're new to D&D, start with the D&D Starter Set. The D&D Starter Set is the best way to go into D&D for a low toll and begin to digest what D&D has to offering. Instead of suddenly finding yourself with over a thousand pages of material from the Thespian's Handbook, Dungeon Master's Guide, and Monster Manual, the Starter Gear up comes with just ii books. A main rulebook and the chance Lost Mine of Phandelver. It also includes a gear up of pregen characters which ways you don't have to suddenly know every ability of every race and class plant in the Actor'due south Handbook.
The value of the Starter Set up cannot exist overstated. The adventure, equally written, is awesome, simply it also includes a great prepare of monsters that y'all can use for your own low-level adventures. The maps in Phandelver besides bridge the range of maps you might drop into your ain campaigns including a bandit lair, goblin caves, ruined castle, ruined village, and dwarven mines. These maps are reskinnable for your own adventures as you need them.
Because the Starter Set books are relatively slim, it won't take y'all forever to read them and understand how D&D works. Thus, when yous brainstorm, start with these books before trying to tackle the full set of core books.
A Reading Listing for Dungeon Masters
Every bit y'all get more experienced, or if y'all are experienced already, it's time to get into the core books. While it's definitely worthwhile to read all three books cover to cover, you can triage your reading to the parts of highest directly value while running your games. Here's a reading list:
Player's Handbook. Read the intro, chapters vii, 8, 9, 10, and the appendicies. You can skip over the chapters on races, classes, backgrounds, equipment, customization options, and spells for now. They're definitely worth reading but your players can besides dig into these chapters and tell you lot what you need to know to run a game. Again, you lot'll want to read these eventually.
Dungeon Principal's Guide. You'll desire to give this whole book a solid skim read. You might not have to read it cover to cover right away but you should at least know what you lot take in your hands. There's tons of fantastic stuff in this volume but it does you no practiced if you don't know that y'all take it. When you lot can, read it through. This is also a book worth re-reading every year or so to remind yourself what is in it. Many times you lot might think of an option or sub-organisation for running your game just to discover that information technology'south already in the DMG.
Monster Manual. This book is too worth reading all the way through merely you lot can focus primiarly on monsters you're likely to employ in your entrada. Start with low claiming monsters and work your way up to the ones probable to prove upwardly in future adventures. The monster book is packed with awesome gamble and entrada hooks and then worry less about the stat blocks and more on the lore of monsters. Nosotros can come upwards with hundreds of campaign ideas from this book lonely.
Volo'southward Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. When yous're able, read these all the way through besides. Like the Monster Manual, they're packed with adventure and campaign ideas. Dissimilar the Monster Transmission they spend lots of fourth dimension focused on specific monsters like hags, mind flayers, beholders, and githyanki. Read them. Savor them. Let them seep into your DM's listen castle.
Xanathar's Guide to Everything. Similar the DMG, this book is packed with bully ideas for DMs, both from a mechanics standpoint and from the lore of the game. In an episode of Dragon Talk, Jeremy Crawford mentioned that the design of spells in Xanathar'south (and those in the Thespian'south Handbook too) are designed not but to give toys to players but for the DM to weave into the story. Spells like Druid'south Grove and Mighty Fortress are as interesting to witness from powerful NPCs equally they are when cast by a player character.
Read Published Adventures
If you lot're running 1 of the published D&D adventures (Curse of Strahd and Tomb of Annihilation are my ii favorites) it helps significantly to read through these adventures embrace to cover earlier we run them. Reading the full gamble means knowing which secrets and clues to put in forepart of the players from session to session. It ways knowing how to tie the adventures together. It helps inspire you lot to hack it yourself into the adventure you want it to exist for you and your group.
It takes time to read through a full published adventure only the return is worth the attempt.
A Reading List for Players
If you're playing D&D but you're not the DM, you're reading listing isn't every bit large but can still give you a great deal of enjoyment out of the game if you lot take the fourth dimension.
Role player's Handbook. Read the chapter on your race and your class. Read the spells your grade has access to for level one and the next couple of levels above your current level. Accept note of spell components and depict them when you're playing your character.
If your race is one of the races from Volo'south Guide or Mordenkainen's, information technology'south worth earthworks deep into your race'due south background and history. Learning how the elves are connected to Corellon or how the halflings run across their gods as extended family unit members with legendary exploits tin enrich your grapheme to the full.
Players likely spend a lot of their time focused on the mechanics of their grade only getting into the story and lore of their race, class, and background tin make the whole game much more enjoyable.
Read to Inspire, Not to Memorize
When we're excavation into these books, our goal isn't to memorize every single rule in them. Our goal is to let the worlds of D&D catamenia over and through u.s. so we can drop into it when we're running the game. That sounds pretty hippy simply it works. The more than we digest this game and the worlds it encapsulates, the easier it is to aid u.s. improvise when we're running our game and our ability to improvise may very well be the most important skill DMs tin accept.
Even if it doesn't help us memorize every aspect of the game, reading through the books volition let us know what'due south there so we know what we have and where to discover it when nosotros need information technology during the game.
We don't read these books to memorize them. We read them to let them inspire u.s.a..
Read On the Go
Finding big solid blocks of fourth dimension in our days is, for many of us, quite difficult. Beingness able to sit on our nice couch with expert lighting and read our books for a solid hour may be impossible for a lot of united states. Yet, equally decorated as nosotros are, nosotros find time to surf through Facebook or become enraged past the news or become lost in cat mischief on Reddit. With D&D Beyond it's just equally piece of cake to read a fleck of our core books as it is to read annihilation else on the spider web. Having the core books on our phones means we can read role of information technology whenever we accept free moment. Keep your current book in your browser window and maybe skip the social media for a fleck while yous read up on Merfolk. Every monster clarification is about equally long as a Facebook post already and so it'southward non a stretch to read one monster block at a time all throughout the solar day.
Know the Rules Before You lot Break the Rules
We DMs are oftentimes a super-creative bunch. D&D becomes our outlet to share the stories we've had bottled up in our heads all our lives. Nosotros're too probable to take a unlike game in our head than the ones in the books so we immediately desire to start tweaking and twisting and cutting and pasting all sorts of new firm rules. I see this come up up often on Facebook: "What if we got rid of charisma scores?" or "I'm going to completely redo the fighter class" and the like.
This isn't inherently bad but we should be cautious until we actually know what we're talking about. Of course, in our own games, we can experiment however we desire but information technology helps if nosotros actually know the rules before we pause the rules. Before you commencement rebuilding your own fantastic 5e game, maybe read what the designers accept put in in that location already.
The Hardest Pace for the Lazy Dungeon Chief
Nosotros're all nearly cutting corners hither on Sly Flourish to get the most value out of our game for the least effort. Value, return over effort, is our ultimate goal. Reading over a 1000 pages of rules isn't effortless. It takes a lot of time and a lot of piece of work. Hopefully this article gave yous an thought where to start. Equally much time every bit it takes, the value nosotros gain by reading these books is well worth the attempt. For that reason, reading the books is a cadre staple for the way of the Lazy Dungeon Master.
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