New GM needs help

[SteeleC]

Quick background, I've been role playing for nearly 20 years and DM/GMed most of that time. I've always avoided D&D because the system never really appealed to me (various reasons) until 4th Ed. Been playing that 2-3 times a week for the last 3 years. Now I want to try something new...enter Pathfinder.

So far I really like what I'm seeing (except HP numbers and healing, but simple house rule fixes that). What I need help with is the spontaneous encounter. I don't preplan and prepare most of my encounters. It's the player's game and the world adjusts to whatever they decided to do. Making that work in the story is easy enough for me, but making it work mechanically is prooving very difficult. With Pathfinder there are so many references to abilities it takes me 10 minutes just to understand one stat block. I have all the PDFs and can cross reference thing pretty quickly with searches and such, but when you have to do that 5-20 times (feats, special attacks/abilities, spells, etc) per stat block, it gets crazy time consuming.

What I'm looking for is a utility that inlines the details into the stat blocks. Think something like MtG does with it's rule keywords and then the rules text in parenthcies. Is there anything like that?

I'm sure over time I'll get better at knowing what everything does - but I'm not sure I can invest that much time into someing that is so much work to start with. HELP - I love the writing and stories and most all of the system, how do I simplify the GMing part?!?!?

[proftobe]

The problem is that Pathfinder isn't a shoot from the hip type of gamust. I know what you're tlaking about and no, there's really nothing like that for PF. for now plan the encounters It makes it a LOT easier. If you must be spontaneous have 3-5 "generic" encounters ready for the characters or you can take forever or create 2-5 encounters and have your characters run into them and be flexible HOW they get there.

I'm all for spontaneous gaming. The quick pick up game is actually my DMing forte, but its hard and eventually becomes impossible as levels rise and encounters get progressively harder to run. JUst my two coppers

[Owly]

Start with the bestiary. Pick a simple creature like an Orc or an Owlbear, and go back to your basics: AC, Hp, Movement, Attack and Damage.

Go to the Combat section of the Core rulebook. Read up on movement, and Actions.

Make yourself up three basic encounters you can recycle as needed:
-I thought I heard something
-A cry for help
-Ambush!

[Exle]

I'm with Owly. Start simple, and then add complexity. A quick way to look up rules, etc:
www.d20pfsrd.com

[CalebTGordan]

Have note cards for the most referenced abilities.

You control the content, so limit yourself to a smaller number of creatures, spells, and classes. For example, just use the Core Rulebook and the first Bestiary.

I know that your game is a sandbox, but do what you can to prepare for your games by looking at monsters, spells, and abilities you think are going to used. Take notes and bookmark what you read.

Play a game. This might not happen if you don't have the time, but being a player will help you learn the game in a different way then being a GM. Doing both will benefit you greatly.