Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 wotc_jot Nov 19, 2008 15:11:48	Would you DMs like to share how you use online and digital tools to help you DM? I might or might not be planning to write some articles on the topic, and your input would be helpful. For some of the content, I could draw on my own experience using the Encounter Builder, Monster Builder, forums, and miscellaneous resources on the web (e.g., a list of Greek names). What about you other DMs? How do digital tools help you DM? How does it make your experience easier or better? Concrete examples are better than ideas or inferences. Depending on what sorts of responses I get, I would intend to quote or summarize what people have to say, if the article gets off the ground. In my book, the difference between easy prep and difficult prep can make the difference between playing and not playing. D&D 4E is so easy to prepare for that I can commit to DMing even when I don't have anything ready, and the online stuff just makes it easier. It's no secret that I had us publish Bonus Tools that I wanted to use for my own campaign. So, your thoughts and experiences?
#2 Dralenan Nov 19, 2008 16:06:12	Personally, I like the by-hand approach, however I have gotten spoiled to using the encounter builder and my parcel generator to take the work of creating dungeons. In game, the computer is off. I generally print anything I want to use in a game so I will have it offline.
#3 Mock Nov 19, 2008 16:10:10	My D&D 4th Edition gaming has been 98% digital - my players live hours away, and we do nearly everything virtually. Character Creation / Information Sharing We create characters by hand, or using homegrown character generators, or, when the Character Builder is actually out, I'll definitely be usin that. I also use XML and other interesting things to create / display characters and share them with each other. For instance, we have "monster-style" character sheets available to look at, like this one, that are useful quick references while we're playing. I also tend to use Excel heavily - characters are basically a large collection of nicely formatted math problems, and its easy to create a quick character sheet using it. Brainstorming and General Writing of Adventures I use Word, Wordpad, or Google Docs as I'm preparing the adventure. Google Docs is especially nice, since I can jump into it almost anywhere, if I have a quick inspiration or idea. Maps D&D 4th is map-oriented, and I use Dundjinni to some extent (though I really don't like the interface) and GIMP a lot to generate maps. There are some very nice tools available to automate some of the map creation functions, and then I just draw. Encounters For encounters, I have used the Encounter Builder and the Compendium a bit. The Encounter Builder is sorta useful, but since it doesn't actually generate the entire nicely-formatted encounter + stat blocks, I end up doing a lot of work manually. But the larger point is that while useful, the Encounter Builder's use for me is frequently limited to telling me if an encounter is Easy, Standard, or Hard, so I don't TPK the party. However, pulling stat blocks from the Compendium makes my life a lot easier, so I can't complain there. I generally come up with the encounter, then pop over to the Compendium and quickly call up the various monsters, and paste the essentials into a document. So, take this as a wouldn't-it-be-nice-if: the Encounter Builder should pull stat blocks right out of the compendium and insert them into the final, formatted encounter write up. References and Rules The compendium is excellent for referencing powers and such, but is no good for actual rules. I don't have a digital aid for rules; I keep the books next to me. I would very much like it if the Compendium also had, say, the Combat chapter rules put into it, too. Running the Game We have a weekly session, and we use MapTool to mediate it. MapTool vastly streamlines my part of the game because I can set up tokens with macros to handle all of their powers, manage hit points and healing, and track initiative and conditions. Once I've set 'em up, I just need to click buttons. It also (obviously) handles the digital maps I make, and lets me and my players move the tokens around. I own map tiles and minis, which we use for face-to-face play, but frankly, digital substitutes are much easier to manage. If I got hold of a large LCD display, we'd dump the physical minis entirely. Because we only have a little bit of time during our weekly game sessions, they usually end up being 1 or 2 combat encounters, with very little roleplaying, exploring, or consumption of Mountain Dew. We fill in the weeks between Thursday Night Fights with more freeform roleplaying / storytelling using a web forum that I host. We vary between just writing interesting stuff with no mechanics, to running skill challenges (I don't like skill challenges, but we still do them), to conducting combats using a "Tiny Adventures" style system. We also have a wiki, though that's not all that useful for our ongoing games - there are some character writeups there, but not much else. Digital tools are something I've used since I started gaming, so it's not new to me - I wouldn't, in general, do any of this "longhand," so to speak. I find that regardless of the game, there are plenty of digital tools that can be put to the task of making things run smoothly.
#4 wotc_jot Nov 24, 2008 18:23:41	Here's a draft of an article to give you folks an idea of where I'm heading. I'm looking in particular for very particular anecdotes. Lots of these terms are going to be hyperlinks to other places and threads on the site. Recently, I used the Compendium to build a typical 14th-level encounter, composed of 14th-level standard monsters. I want to take the measure of the PCs. They've just hit 13th level, which is new territory for me, and I want to see what they're capable of. So I built an encounter with all 14th-level monsters. Something Keithric said on the forums got me thinking about calibrating encounters by level. I had been throwing lower-level monsters at the party, so there were lots of hit points on the table and the battles were long, especially when the enemies were brutes. As part of the thread, Keithric said he tended to use lower-level soldiers or higher-level brutes. That got me thinking about how variations in level can exaggerate roles (as with my lower-level brutes with really bad attack bonuses) or soften them (as with Keithric’s higher-level brutes with average attack bonuses). So I decided to pin monsters' levels at 14, to get an accurate read on how the PCs stack up. In addition, I used standard monsters, one per PC, so that I would later have a clear example to compare an elite and a solo to. The Compendium made it easy to find lots of 14th-level, standard monsters. The stats of the dwarf buccaneer and dwarf dark arcanist from Dragon fit my needs perfectly. Three skirmishers for touchstone combatants, plus a caster for battlefield dynamics. I threw in grimlock minions, reflavored as feral dwarves. The minions were extra, on top of a very typical 14th-level encounter, to get a read on how powerful minions are at 13th level. I know Rob TPKd Keith Baker and company with kobold minions, but that was at 1st level. At paragon level, I've found minions to be less formidable. In my campaign, I have a custom background, so the stock background describing a monster isn't as important to me as the raw stats are. Dwarves in my campaign owe something to the dwarves in an obscure RPG, where they are described as more-civilized and better-armed goblins. Plus, the first-ever edition of D&D depicted a goblin with a beard, like an ugly dwarf, so I feel like I'm hearkening back to something original by portraying my dwarves as something like goblins. For my session, I needed the dwarf stats, but didn't need the flavor that went with it, so the Compendium was ideal. The battle went well. The grimlocks should have gotten into the invisibility mushrooms, but the caster was happy there. The fight was a good touchstone against which I compared later, more dangerous battles.
#5 wotc_jot Nov 24, 2008 18:29:41	Personally, I like the by-hand approach, however I have gotten spoiled to using the encounter builder and my parcel generator to take the work of creating dungeons. In game, the computer is off. I generally print anything I want to use in a game so I will have it offline. My D&D 4th Edition gaming has been 98% digital - my players live hours away, and we do nearly everything virtually. . . Thanks for your input. This is material that I can see incorporating into my first or second article. Anyone else out there have a story for how digital tools (especially D&DI tools) help a DM prep and run a good session?
#6 Cinnibar Nov 25, 2008 7:04:31	I've gotten into the habit lately of dropping whole encounters into a single-page word doc, cut-and-pasting the monster stat blocks straight from the Compendium into a two-column document. As of last week, I started using the encounter builder as the header for that single sheet. It's a heck of a lot more convenient than flipping around the monster manual or whatever other resource... plus I can mark up the sheet as monsters are wounded, etc. The other thing I've found useful is that when I distribute magical items, I'll drop the stat block of both the Magic Item description as well as the basic stats for the item into a document along with a description and often a picture. The players have really enjoyed SEEING what that +1 Frost Broadsword looked like... and having both the magic item block and the stats from AV on Broadswords made it useful for them as well. In terms of non-D&DI tools, I particularly like Asmor's Quartermaster... it's great for previewing and assembling a range of parcel options, plus he references current sources(including a direct link to articles, need D&DI to read them), including the latest issues of Dragon/Dungeon, plus adventures. I pop back to the Compendium for any stats for items I'm unfamiliar with... in general, Asmor's stuff is spectacularly useful, user-friendly, and up-to-date... WotC should just hire him as a contract worker, in my opinion, for additional bonus tools.
#7 lostat Nov 27, 2008 8:19:14	I've just recently begun playing with an online group of players, using online tools for the first time. I also GM a regular game with local friends offline. First of all, let me add my voice that I think having the encounter builder incorporate full monster stat blocks from the compendium is, I think, a great idea and one which I would find extremely useful for quick preperation of encounters with my local group of players. The second point I wish to make, is about the use of digital tools, specifically a gametable on a computer screen, which is suitable for use with local players all gathered in the same room as myself (the GM). In my online game, I play with people who all live in different locations. We use maptools for this purpose, with Skype for the voice-chat and have a website to keep updated with each other in-between the weekly gaming sessions. Now, the GM has his GM-version of the map on his computer, and he "allows" the players to see monsters etc as and when we should. So, what about a gametable that a GM could show on a screen to a room full of local players (all in same house), but without the hassle of trying to prevent the players seeing the GM-only material & monsters on the screen. Sorry, I know I've not described the scenario I'm trying to present very well, but I hope you get the jist of what I would like in a local group - a digital map suitable for local players + GM.
#8 Mock Nov 27, 2008 10:46:07	I've just recently begun playing with an online group of players, using online tools for the first time. I also GM a regular game with local friends offline. First of all, let me add my voice that I think having the encounter builder incorporate full monster stat blocks from the compendium is, I think, a great idea and one which I would find extremely useful for quick preperation of encounters with my local group of players. The second point I wish to make, is about the use of digital tools, specifically a gametable on a computer screen, which is suitable for use with local players all gathered in the same room as myself (the GM). In my online game, I play with people who all live in different locations. We use maptools for this purpose, with Skype for the voice-chat and have a website to keep updated with each other in-between the weekly gaming sessions. Now, the GM has his GM-version of the map on his computer, and he "allows" the players to see monsters etc as and when we should. So, what about a gametable that a GM could show on a screen to a room full of local players (all in same house), but without the hassle of trying to prevent the players seeing the GM-only material & monsters on the screen. Sorry, I know I've not described the scenario I'm trying to present very well, but I hope you get the jist of what I would like in a local group - a digital map suitable for local players + GM. This is off-topic, but you can do this, to an extent, with MapTool. You'll need a second monitor and the capability to extend your desktop, but: 1. Set up the second monitor. 2. Start MapTool in GM mode. 3. Start a second instance of maptool, connecting as a player 4. Put the second instance of maptool on the other monitor, where the players can see it. 5. After that, you can move tokens as necessary when the players say what they're gonna do. Also, if they have to come around to your side to check something, you can flip into "Show As Player" mode so any GM-only stuff is hidden. I'm considering messing with this myself, because I've found that the Dungeon Map Tiles are not nearly as useful as I thought they'd be for face to face games - plus, I enjoy making maps of environments and would be able to employ some of the same tools I use for online games in my face-to-face games. I'm curious if WotC's game table will have this sort of offline capability, but I get the feeling it's really for online play.
#9 kalaka Nov 28, 2008 23:19:05	Custom Dungeon Tiles: I use Photoshop and Paint to make custom dungeon tiles. I'm running the Scales of War Adventure Path, and the PDF modules sometimes contain rooms that I know I won't be able to create very well with my collection of Dungeon Tiles. When that happens, I'll copy the rooms to Photoshop, and then increase the image size until each 5' square is one inch. I also edit out the monster start positions, and then print them out on a color printer. For large rooms, I may need to cut and tape multiple printed sheets. Dungeon Re-Writes: I have to sometimes modify the Adventure Path modules, to edit out errors, clean-up omissions, specify treasure / parcel drops, etc. I'll often copy each encounter to a Word document, and then do the edits there. DM Screen: My laptop is my DM screen! I have it on at all times during play, with the Module (in Word) open, along with the PDF original module (if it's needed), and some other tools (detailed below). Wireless connection keeps me connected to the DDi Compendium. Initiative / Encounter Tracker: I have an Excel worksheet that keeps track of initiative in each encounter. One of my players (Ken Wester, aka Hooey) created it, and it's extremely handy to keep track of initiative, as well as Marked / Bloodied creatures, encounter effects, etc. Message Board: We use a PHP Message Board to keep players updated on what transpired each game night. The players find the message board very handy to communicate with each other between games, and also to recall all the places they've been, and things they've done. Each game night is summarized in a single thread by the DM, and there are other threads that track loot, people and places of interest, and more. I also post pictures of the dungeon on the message board, using a layer mask in Photoshop to darken out areas that haven't yet been explored. Getting a summary of each game session, with maps and pictures, really helps spice up the game play, and make players yearning for the next game night ... much more than I thought it would.
#10 wotc_jot Dec 01, 2008 13:04:50	Thanks for the write-ups. I've submitted my first article, but there will be more, and I'll be back here to pick up the information I missed the first time around.
#11 malisteen Dec 04, 2008 16:48:51	As a long-time analog DM starting a paragon-level game and aquiring a new computer at the same time, I am finding this thread ridiculously informative.
#12 Cinnibar Dec 04, 2008 18:05:17	As a long-time analog DM starting a paragon-level game and aquiring a new computer at the same time, I am finding this thread ridiculously informative. If you think THAT was informative, just wait until I tell about the time I used my colonoscopy scans online as visual aids for a dungeon crawl! (Just kidding) But seriously... The web has a wealth of resources in terms of visual aids in terms of setting and mood. Where I can, I'll use art or photos I find online as a display to give the party a better feel for what they're looking at. My descriptive powers aren't bad, I hope... but when I supplement with a picture of a cave or a headshot of an NPC they first meet, I think it gives me a good baseline to build the rest of the description around.
#13 beej_silver Dec 05, 2008 13:50:55	Ever since momsters were included into the DDi, I've been opening multiple windows of it and grabbing my monsters from WotC instead of opening the MM. I still bring the books when the gaming area has no wi-fi, but otherwise DDi is my best friend in that regard. One of the games I run is a bi-monthly Forgotten Realms game, which is a conversion of the Adventure path that began with Keep on the Shadowfell. This one is special because one of the players has a Macbook that has Photoshop (which my own laptop unfortunately can't handle reliably). What I do for this game is; I scan the maps, import some pictures from the internet that best represent the monsters, and add in scans of character sketches that my players did for their character. I also add in red blots for bloodied, blue blots for marked, and purple blots for cursed. I prepare it all on my desktop, then transfer the file on my player's Mac on the day itself. They're now 75% into H2 (Well of Demons), and needless to say, I enjoy running that game the most. I would post some screenshots of the result, but as the maps came from the modules, I think doing that violates copyright laws...? Other than that, I've been toying with custom monsters via the Monster Builder. I will actually start using the custom monsters once I figure out how to save the formatted view of the finished monster. :D
#14 mudbunny Dec 05, 2008 13:54:39	They're now 75% into H2 (Well of Demons), and needless to say, I enjoy running that game the most. I would post some screenshots of the result, but as the maps came from the modules, I think doing that violates copyright laws...? I don't think that it would violate copyright. Please, post them in a thread in the Digital D&D forum with soem explanation of how you use digital aides for your gaming.
#15 beej_silver Dec 06, 2008 8:57:15	Awesome. I'll see what I can do about it when I get back to the desktop. I think I'll show some of the fights from H1, where I even used OotS hobgoblins.
#16 Amaril Dec 08, 2008 12:30:20	MapTool Allows for online virtual play as well as mapping out the adventure by dropping in stat blocks on tokens that are hidden temporarily, notes on clickable objects and markers for room descriptions (there's even a DM-only section). Even if you didn't play online, it's great for a DM with a laptop to easily pill up note descriptions from the maps rather than having to flip to the appropriate page in a book. It's also a great approach since it allows you to consolidate the information to what's in the immediate area rather than having to flip to the encounter spread in one section of a published adventure, statblocks in another location (if customized), and remaining descriptions in the adventure content. NPC descriptions and notes can also be consolidated into the respective token. Google applications I wrote up a whole article about all of the various Google applications and resources on my blog at immaterialplane.blogspot.com. A more recent addition has been the use of Google Sites for creating a wiki, file repository, and campaign blog. Google Sites uses it's own WYSIWYG editor and standard HTML so there's no need to learn wiki markup. Microsoft OneNote Honestly, this local application is great for consolidating and searching your notes. It's so versatile that there's no one way to use it. Just try it out for yourself by downloading the trial from MS. I recommend going through the tutorials that are available when you first open it.
#17 rhianni32 Dec 08, 2008 16:34:18	I've gotten into the habit lately of dropping whole encounters into a single-page word doc, cut-and-pasting the monster stat blocks straight from the Compendium into a two-column document. As of last week, I started using the encounter builder as the header for that single sheet. I want to bring this tip up as its something I have been doing too. This makes things so easy and smooth at game time.
#18 joby Dec 09, 2008 13:56:06	I've gotten into the habit lately of dropping whole encounters into a single-page word doc, cut-and-pasting the monster stat blocks straight from the Compendium into a two-column document. As of last week, I started using the encounter builder as the header for that single sheet. I do something similar. I have an Spreadsheet with two columns for the monster stat blocks and then a third column with check boxes for HP, temp HP, powers (and refresh). This simplifies tracking HP and power usage/refresh.
#19 starvosk Dec 10, 2008 11:14:46	I use Maptool almost exclusively now for DMing. It's pretty much sheer awesome. Quite frankly, I'm not sure if D&D Online Game table can truely hold a candle to it, even if it does come out within the next..few..months? Maptool is great. It has options for multiple games (Hex, Square, etc) measuring tools, and tools for writing on the map Ala paint. You can import your own maps, tokens and other Jpegs. It's lightweight. I use a rather small laptop which I bring into game sessions. I run two instances of maptool, one on the GM side, another on the player side. Usually one of the players has a computer and wifi, so I open up the tool and run it that way. However, I have a convertor that allows me to hook my laptop up to a TV. It's worked quite well. For online games, using Maptool is a no brainer. In Maptool, you can even set status effects, markers, and I use labels to display monster HP and such. From what I've seen (At conventions) D&D gametable simply isn't nearly as flexible. Since it's in 3d, you'd be restricted to pre-made game tiles and crap. Maptool is based on Jpegs and PNGs, easily doable with GIMP. I dunno how GameTable really plans to compete with that, and free.
#20 Amaril Dec 10, 2008 11:46:24	From what I've seen (At conventions) D&D gametable simply isn't nearly as flexible. Since it's in 3d, you'd be restricted to pre-made game tiles and crap. Maptool is based on Jpegs and PNGs, easily doable with GIMP. I dunno how GameTable really plans to compete with that, and free. From what I understand, you're supposed to be able to digitally draw your own maps and import your own images as well as use Dungeon Tiles.
#21 Mock Dec 10, 2008 13:39:48	I use Maptool almost exclusively now for DMing. As do I. I use it for face-to-face and online gaming; in fact, I run a game for my kids and they just look over my shoulder while we play. It's vastly powerful as far as attack resolution, damage, conditions, and automating almost all of an encounter. It has everything except a 3-D map display (which is being looked at for the next release cycle) and it's extremely extendable. I've been working a lot with the latest version to develop a set of "macros" that handle power selection, targeting, attack, and damage resolution, and it has been fun. And if it speeds up encounters, it will be a huge boon. MapTool is likely to replace any tabletop stuff except for one-shot deals or beer-n-pretzels game nights. From what I understand, you're supposed to be able to digitally draw your own maps and import your own images as well as use Dungeon Tiles. I assume they'll have to skin the maps onto the 3-D surface...I wonder how that will work out. Sounds neat, though. I wonder if it will support terrain and elevations...that would be pretty neat. (I'm a horrible pessimist about the GameTable - I have no expectation that it will ever be released - but if it is, I'm hopeful that it will offer much coolness, like elevation, design-your-own-textures, etc.).
#22 Amaril Dec 10, 2008 14:07:28	I assume they'll have to skin the maps onto the 3-D surface...I wonder how that will work out. Sounds neat, though. I wonder if it will support terrain and elevations...that would be pretty neat. (I'm a horrible pessimist about the GameTable - I have no expectation that it will ever be released - but if it is, I'm hopeful that it will offer much coolness, like elevation, design-your-own-textures, etc.). It would be a flat image like most of the tiles. Only a object tiles are 3d, but most are flat. The King's Road poster map used in the D&DXP demos is an example.