What applications do you use?

[MinscFan]

Software

> DMF - during the game.

> Weathermaster for weather, calendars, and time-based events

Prep before a game:

> PC Gen and Buck's NPC gen for NPCs

> Buck's Treasure Generator (I also roll 'til I'm happy)

> Tablesmith for spellbooks and other random items

> MonsterDB for monster management. Allows custom searches and output of stat blocks. Also allows user to enter monsters. Can also apply templates to monsters using this tool.

> PhotoShop and Dungeoncrafter for most maps. Otherwise Campaign Cartographer with Photoshop touch up.

> An HTML / JavaScript experience calculator. I don't know who did it and I can't find the site any more, but it works very well on my laptop. All you need is a browser.

MinscFan

 

[celeborn67]

software tools

i use pcgen for most of my npc's.
for information lookup, such as spells, feats, powers
i use custom Lotus Notes database I created.....
It may be converted to stand alone program some day...

 

[kreynolds]

I use an autocalculating PDF to create my characters but that's about the only thing I use, next to Jamis' generators.

 

[Forsaken One]

Ok guys there is same good programs there but have you even tryed DM Buddy? it does have most of the thing you are useing

 

[Pinnocchio]

Ok guys there is same good programs there but have you even tryed DM Buddy? it does have most of the thing you are useing

I haven't been able to figure out DM Buddy yet. As far as I can tell, the only use it has is for tracking combat and experience. I haven't been able to figure out what all the other worksheets are for other than just lists of feets, skills, etc.

I've got it loaded up right now, and on my desktop PC, I can say that it scrolls too much for my tastes. Up-down is fine, I'm used to that. I hate scrolling left to right though.

Also, I don't use a laptop at the gaming table, so DM Buddy really does me no good.

I have a Handspring Visor, and TinySheet and PCGenView serve my needs. For prep work, I use PCGen and Excel or MSWord.

I've tried DM Buddy, but it just doesn't seem to really do anything I need it to.

M.

 

[gariig]

I've tried DM Buddy, but it just doesn't seem to really do anything I need it to.

these are my feelings exactly, can anyone post what they use DM Buddy for? I'd like to know, the only useful part to me is the combat tracker and I have DMF for that.

Gariig

 

[MonkeyBoy]

...

I've settled to using;

PCGen to do characters (after you trim out the bits you don't use, and... get used to a slightly sedate pace of computing, shall we say... it does the job quite nicely - I think there's a bug in the bonus spells, but I use it only for NPCs, so not a big problem)

InitBrowse (by me!) which does my initiative. I'm lucky in that I gt to use the alpha of version 2, which also does damage tracking for the "monsters", and can automatically add, for example, N orcs when you want them. This program also makes sure that the character sheet or statblock for the entities in the initiative list are always ready for me.

Tablesmith, for random stuff. I basically only use treasure tables.

I also have rather nifty (you guessed; they're by me!) web pages that detail all the spells, feats and (just getting these done now) monsters. Makes looking those up a little faster.

I used to have a program by that nice Mr Gulke which played sound files, but that was on my old PC (which had a HD crash) so I lost it. That's a hint Bruce

 

[Eternalknight]

Well, as one of the creators of DM Buddy, I'll tell you what it is intended for.

The Combat Tracker is designed to ... umm.. track combat. The top part (Initiative) is my favourite part. By typing in the charcters and monsters names, and their initiaive, then highlighting them all and hitting the 'reverse order' command button (it is the Z on top of the A) it shows you in order who's turn is when. If you have the characters and monsters names and hit points typed into the appropriate sperate areas (ie just below the initiative part) then it brings up their Hit points too. Now, the numbers next to the HP column are meant to be for combat rounds. Once some one has had a turn that round, just enter down to the next combatant. If some one takes damage in a round, type a number into the corrosponding round and, voila! their hp goes down.

The characters part, well the Play and Level bit may be a bit confusing. Type in a 0 if the character isn't present, a 1 if they are. Type their level into the level column. Now have a look down a bit, and what you are looking for is effective party level. This is based off a chart in Dungeon. It shows you what the effective party level is of your group.

The Experience section is handy too. When the party defeats a monster, flick over to the Extra Tracking page. The bit you are looking for is on the left hand side. Find the monsters CR and type in how many of then the group defeated. Now go back to the Combat Tracker. You will see that the total XP column has changed, as will have the Overall XP coulmn. An easy way to work out XP for the group. This figure is based on the effective party level. The iNdv. XP is in case you want to reward a single character with XP for doing something clever, etc. Just type in a number and it will add the XP.

The other worksheets are just for reference, thus we call them Reference sheets. I personaly own all of the official WotC books (exception: Masters of the Wild) and hate having to flick through them to find what I am after. So, I made the reference sheets. They are basically just an index. I find them quite time saving myself.

At one point I did think about adding descriptions to all the feats, skills, races, prestige classes, etc... but was unsure wheter this would violate the OGL. Plus, for now, I just want to get them finished.

 

[Eternalknight]

Please be aware that if this doesn't make sense to you, you may need version 0.6 of DM Buddy (the link is in my sig).

Now, having read that, let me say this: We want your help. If you think you can improve on it, let us know!!! We have had some feedback (very little actually) and appreciate every little bit of it!!! Even if you don't like it, let us know what you would change. We have heard some very good ideas, and thanks to Pinnocchio, we are making it so that, you just have to scroll up and down (at least on the combat tracker).

On a side note, it looks like Jamis and PC Gen are gonna win the race

 

[MythosaAkira]

Re: ...

I used to have a program by that nice Mr Gulke which played sound files, but that was on my old PC (which had a HD crash) so I lost it. That's a hint Bruce

I had two programs like that, Digital Soundbook and...Digital Minstrel, I believe the other was called. Not sure if I even have the original source for either anymore (I switched to just playing MP3s via Winamp at one point).

I did recently put together a new sound player - "Campaign Minstrel" - that I use when I DM. It's basically like Campaign Sage, but for MP3s, WAVs, and whatever else the embedded Windows Media Player will handle (yeah, I know, but it was the easiest thing to use, and all my machines have it). Setting it up isn't the most user-friendly thing, but if you'd like, I can put it up on my Web site and you (or anyone else) can play with it.