Best Game Aids

[TarionzCousin]

Everybody has mentioned all the good ones already!

A good battle map is very nice, or just a big pad of graph paper. The office supply store will sell these, get the kind you use for flip charts, with 1" squares and lots of room.

Add a nice set of colored pens, preferably watercolor. I still have the three-flip-chart-page map of the first real "dungeon" of my first 3.0 D&D game. It's a nice souvenir.

Plus, all the different colors let you mark lots of different things on the permanent map: water, fire/light sources, furnishings, blood stains of memorable villains, etc.

 

[megamania]

Notes typed out with page referrences

Figures

Mats

Tiles

Dry erase board- tried with mixed results

Index Cards- useful for spells and special gear.

A heavy duty canvas bag to carry everything

Laser pointer "Move Cedious to here and Garrow to here"

 

[Glyfair]

For managing spells I've found nothing better than d20 Spellbook

 

[buzz]

Tac Tiles

I really wish I had picked up a set of these before the company went defunct (effectively).

 

[Garnfellow]

I really wish I had picked up a set of these before the company went defunct (effectively).

I hadn't heard that. Sucky if true, but certainly not for lack of praise around here -- one of the best gaming purchases I ever made.

 

[buzz]

I hadn't heard that.

If you go to their Order Form page, there's a message that one of their suppliers crapped out on them, and thus they'll have no stock until they can find a new one. I think it's been a year already.

 

[ShinHakkaider]

I use quite a few accessories in my game and find the following most useful.

- GameMastery Crit Hit Deck (This one is not out yet, but I have the playtest copy)

Jason Bulmahn
Managing Editor of Dragon
www.paizo.com

D00d, I want this. NOW.

 

[thedungeondelver]

I just couldn't get the job done without TSR9036 DUNGEON MASTER'S ADVENTURE LOG and of course my trusty REF1 DUNGEON MASTER'S SCREEN (the "newer" one - the old yellow one has better art but is poorly laid out for me).

Heh, that's assuming of course you're playing AD&D

 

[dougmander]

I have tons of minis and Dwarven Forge stuff, but I've been using them less and less lately, because of the time they take to set up and keep organized. I'm more apt to just scribble out a diagram on a small whiteboard or a piece of paper.

A single table that lists all the PCs stats in column form is handy. I create them in Excel.

I'm not sure if you would include computer aids, but I have used DMGenie in the past and really liked its flexibility.

That's about it for face to face gaming. Recently I've been using the online game Second Life as an aid for chat-based games, and I find I can create some pretty helpful things there, like minis that put their own monster stats into my chat window when I click on them.

 

[Frost]

Open Mind Games Combat Pad

This looks very cool. What is the size of it though? Couldn't find this info.