Need a good DM Utility

[paulrowejr63]

I am looking for a program that I can use on my laptop at the game session. I do not need a character generator or a combat tracker. I only need to bee able to input my adventure info and be able to keep track of the NPC’s and the monsters that I will be using. I want to be able to have my maps in as well. Is there such a program out there?

 

[kingpaul]

I know you said you don't need a generator, but PCGen has the GMGen utility. You can have your NPCs and monsters ready for use.

I'm not sure about the map feature though. My group doesn't use a laptop at the table, so I don't know all the capabilities of GMGen.

 

[DMFTodd]

DM's Familiar has a full Reference Library - Monsters, Spells, Rules, etc. All quickly searchable so you can find stuff. It then has the Codex Tree where you can write your adventure notes, world notes, etc. Items from the Reference Library can be dragged and dropped. During the game you can just double-click to open one of those items.

DMF does have a combat tracker, but you don't have to use it. I'd really wonder why though, combat tracking is the biggest thing that will improve your game.

 

[azhrei_fje]

I use DM Genie. It has a Campaign manager where the DM can store notes and such, and if you're willing to enter your NPCs/monsters, it will calculate experience for you (this saves a bunch of time for me).

The mapping feature in the Campaign Manager might be enough for your needs; you would need to check it out. I plan to use MapTool from rptools.net to project a map onto a screen (or maybe a battlemat), so that will work separate from DM Genie.

I also use DM Genie for quick lookup of spells, skill descriptions, item descriptions, and so on. About the only thing it doesn't have full descriptions of are the Trip/Grapple/Disarm rules (there are buttons that roll those checks, but not much description behind them).

And it comes with a 60-day evaluation so you have plenty of time to test it out. I'm quite happy with it.

 

[gill_smoke]

There's also Role playing master a program who's webpage is hosted by ENWorld. It has adventure input, layered maping, networking, generators and a couple of other cool gadgets. I like it alot.

I haven't tried Fantasy Grounds but I think it has many of the same features.

 

[talmar]

For Campaign Management I use a program called "The Journal" by DavidRM Software.

www.davidrm.com/thejournal

I love it and it keeps my quite organized.

I have a couple screenshot I could email interested people of how I'm currently using it to organize an adventure called "The Vault of Larin Karr" from Necromancer Games. I bought it as a .pdf and have simply copy pasted the appropriate sections into the tree I created in The Journal. I then went through and have linked all the monsters to thier respective SRD entries. NPC's I've linked to eTools stat blocks, etc etc. It's helped me quite a bit on time and prep and at the table itself.