Dungeons & Dragons & Dice, Oh My!
 

It's been a long time since I've been able to play. I used to have a Pathfinder group but things sort of fell apart.

But I do have some good stories from my college days, when I was able to play on a regular basis. Kinda disturbing to think about the fact that that was fifteen years ago... I had a couple of friends who were REALLY good GMs. I lost touch with one of them after I graduated from college, and the other one turned into a real jerk a couple years ago, but I still hold on to the good memories.

I've also run a few campaigns myself. I'm nowhere near as good at it, sadly. About the only thing I can really say worked out all right was when I had my Star Wars group visit SR-388.

Being any sort of GM seems super difficult! Having a good group is important. It's all about that balance. I have not played Pathfinder, how much do the game mechanics vary from D&D? as a point of reference I play either 3rd or 5th edition.

Pathfinder follows D&D 3.5 mechanics pretty closely. Some details vary, especially when it comes to feats and skills, but in general you can assume that 3.5 and PF are inter-compatible.

Being a GM isn't difficult because of the mechanical work you have to do. Game balance is rarely a concern. If you've played the game enough to be familiar with how it works, you can generally figure out how much of a threat any given mechanical encounter will be, and if it turns out you're wrong you can throw in a couple more monsters to make it more difficult, or intentionally have the enemies not act optimally to make it easier. (Like... maybe have the dragon not use its breath weapon this turn, even though it could if it wanted to.)

No, what makes being a GM hard is that it requires a ton of creativity. It's more about writing stories and building worlds than it is about actually running the game. An experienced set of players will do most of the work of running the game, but that only works if the GM is able to come up with something for them to do.

I was DM-ing a game around October, two people had irregular schedules which made it hard to commit to the campaign.

One friend doesn't like being handled or blocked from actions, he was also the one allowing the campaign to be hosted at his house and I have a sneaky suspicion he simply didn't like the campaign because I didn't let him do all these crazy huge power-moves.
Then I had one friend who couldn't break out of his DnD anti-social bubble and stayed pretty aloof the whole campaign. What's worse is that if half of the group couldn't make it, we just shelved the game for the next week. Needless to say after numerous delays because of scheduling we just stopped meeting and haven't said a word to each other about the campaign since.

It's hard finding a group that is consistent and willing to commit. DM-ing is a lot of work because, besides the creativity, it's managing a group and maintaining strong communication with everyone.

My friend also had a great analogy about making worlds/huge stories in mind, it's like being a parent buying a super cool/expensive toy and the kids ignore the toy and have more fun with the box & packing peanuts. You find more success in making things up on the spot and just let things happen.

A lot of great tips! Thank you all for sharing!
I really just enjoy being on the player side as of now. I love pouring my all into by bumbling little rogue.

GMIng hard lmao.

Planning and npc building and making sure i learn to balance...

I have issues DMing on the fly, unless I plan for it, paradoxically.

Adulting and D&D tend not to go together that well, sadly. Enough of my family play that we can make a group to ourselves but setting up times is difficult. I've largely taken over DMing from my brother since I've got the time to make stuff. I try to develop little adventures we can play in a weekend or in a day, since a campaign isn't going to happen very easily. It helps to know your players when making adventures. That can influence a lot when it comes to making adventures.

I have to plan things so when i need to improvise my players can tell.

Also yeah i wanna play with my GF but life said nope we busy.