Nice Job, DM! Feat. Alena Lane

Most of us haven't been able to achieve the dream that is getting paid to make maps, character art, and handouts for a table of players... but some of us have gotten pretty dang close! Welcome again to Nice Job, DM! where we interview cool DMs with cool day jobs.
 
Today, we're talking to Alena Lane, a graphic designer and marketer who also creates illustrations that can be found at @Alena_Lane on Twitter* and @alenalane_art on Insta. You may even recognize her wonderful style from our site!
 
*I'm old, grumpy, and refuse to comply.

Hi, Alena! Tell us a little about you.


I’m from the middle of nowhere in northern New England and I like art, dogs, hiking in the mountains, and playing TTRPGs -- though I guess that last one is a bit of a given.

We'll get to that soon! Tell us, what is your day job?

I do in-house graphic design and marketing for print and web for a small company, as well as some freelance web development and freelance illustration. My main job duties involve packaging design, brochure and catalog design, logo design, photo editing, and website design/development/maintenance, as well as constructing email marketing campaigns, copywriting, brand identity development... kinda the works! I’m a bit of a design swiss-army knife at this point, and have even learned a bit of video editing on the fly.
 
Boy, that's a lot! What's your favorite part of being a graphic designer and marketer for a small company?

When we need to name new products and I get paid to come up with horrible horrible puns!

But also when I’m given carte blanche to just get playful and creative with a design. I love the early brainstorming stages of developing branding for a new product line or marketing initiative where I get to invent a whole lot of imagery and ideas to throw at the wall and see what sticks. And of course, I’m lucky to have great coworkers who I enjoy collaborating with.

Absolutely can relate. How did your career get started?

I was an art major in college but got a student job in the IT department and the combination of art and computer skills landed me a summer campus gig learning how to do web design and development for the tech department. This turned out to be a marketable skill!
 
What advice do you have for people looking to get into graphic design or marketing?


Learn the basics of good design, get comfortable with learning new software, and remember this is a job about people as much as it is about visuals -- you’re working closely with your client/employer to help figure out what their vision is (even if they aren’t sure yet themselves) and how to make it speak to the end user.

Understanding how to communicate and connect is critical. You’re making an object, telling a story, and crafting an experience all at once.

When and why did you start DMing, and for what systems?


I’ve been playing tabletop on and off since I was 13, starting with D&D 3.5E, but only started DMing a D&D 5E campaign in 2017. A group of very dear friends expressed wanting to play but not having the opportunity to do so or knowing anyone willing to run a game. I had the most experience with playing but hadn’t DMed before, so I reached out to one of my oldest friends (who has been a forever DM since we were in high school together) for advice. With his encouragement, I wound up homebrewing a game to introduce my friends to TTRPGs. And given one of them now works at Dice Envy, I like to think I made an okay impression with it!

How often do you DM?


A few years in we decided as a group to change things up from the 5E campaign, added another player, and I started running an ongoing Monster of the Week game (Powered By the Apocalypse based d6 system). That’s been on ice for a few months now due to some crazy busy life circumstances, but I still DM a handful of 5E one-shots with various groups online and in-person, including an annual Christmas one-shot for my family.

Scheduling is the real BBEG of every game.

What is your favorite part of DMing?

This is gonna sound corny, but I genuinely just love making sure my friends have a good time. Whether we’re all laughing from ridiculous shenanigans or amped up on a really cool fight or just feeling satisfied by a really good bit of character development and narrative exploration, if I’ve put together and executed an experience that’s brought joy to people I love, I’m really really happy.

Can you tell us your best memory from the table?

There have been so many over the years, but one that stands out fondly is the time I had an NPC put their foot in their mouth by outing a piece of a character’s backstory that had been a secret from most of the party. This had a narrative effect on the session akin to tossing a live grenade. For the next 45 minutes, I as the DM got to crack open a cold drink and put my heels up as my players took the wheel with incredibly intense roleplaying --- meanwhile I just enjoyed the show! It was a great reminder of how collaborative an experience that game was, and that while the DM might set up the story, the players are still storytellers; sometimes I get to sit back and let them tell me a story.

Do any skills you use for your day job help you when you DM?
 
I’ve found it’s useful to develop a mindset where I don’t get too attached to my own creative vision. In graphic design, you might come up with an design mockup you think is gorgeous and compelling, only for it to go through dozens of revisions and iterations until it no longer looks anything like what you started with -- because ultimately you’re not designing for yourself, but for your client, and their satisfaction with the end product is the goal. Similarly, when you DM, you can’t get too attached to your own story -- if you want total creative control, you’re better off just writing a book. Just like a client might derail an initial idea for a project by changing up the brief, players will derail the story you thought you’d be telling by surprising you with their decisions. And it’s not worth getting precious about it! My role in my job and as a DM is to be a problem solver and come up with the best and most appealing outcome that meets these new and unexpected parameters. And sometimes, in both, I get surprised when I turn out something I would never have initially envisioned, but end up really loving!
 
What advice or house rules would you share with new DMs?
 
Let your players be cool! They’re the heroes, so give them moments that feel heroic -- describe the outcome of that natural 20 in an epic way (or let them describe it themselves if they clearly have a vision for it -- just don’t put them on the spot if they’re new or anxious). Make the killing blow a memorable moment. Have their backstory matter and integrate into your world. And when they fail or miss, don’t always make it about their ineptitude, but rather the result of a worthy enemy’s skill being even greater than the players’ considerable strengths. It will reduce frustration at bad rolls, and make fight descriptions more interesting and dynamic than simply a bunch of swing-and-misses!
Back to blog

Leave a comment

Please note, comments need to be approved before they are published.