DM Familiair vs. Campaign Suite vs. others...

This would sound crazy, but has anyone here actually bought a laptop specifically for use in gaming?

I remeber at least 2 people at GenCon buying DM's Familiar from me and then saying "and now have I to go buy a laptop". Gamers have done stranger things I'm sure.
 
Last edited:

log in or register to remove this ad


Re: Design issues and on-going work

Luke said:

Thanks for that smc. I'll explain some things about the current state of RPM, and the approach to in-game issues:
Thanks for the additional insight into RPM, Luke. I have spent some more time on the program, and I am seeing some of the capabilities that I missed before. There are some things that I think are really great, such as the handling of skill rolls and the options which are presented to the DM (which you discussed in your post). I am constantly forgetting modifiers and feeling like I am pulling DC's out of a hat rather than with any logic or rules-base, so the extra information and features you provide for even something as simple as a "spot" roll is pretty helpful and impressive.

I've also given some more thought to the power of your mapping function, and I am starting to "see the light" on that. I am currently running my players through the "Sunless Citadel" module, and it seems like it would be possible to place _all_ of the enocounteres on a scanned-version of a level. This is pretty cool becuse I can actually move opponents around as they respond to the intrusion of the PC's ... for example, if guards move from one area to another as they hear the sounds of combat and join the fray. That's pretty awesome, and gives me an opportunity to treat a map as more of a "whole" than a series of self-contained encounters. So, I can see the potential of using the RPM battlemap for the big picture and using our table map for the minutia of a single battle.

There are some things still eluding me. Try as I might, I just can't figure out map "locations", and there are a couple of other things where I feel like a complete dunder-head. Perhaps I will swing by your forums and see if I can work through any of the sticking points, because I certainly see a great deal of potential with RPM in my games.

Cheers,

smc
 

Re: Re: Design issues and on-going work

smc said:

There are some things still eluding me. Try as I might, I just can't figure out map "locations", and there are a couple of other things where I feel like a complete dunder-head.

Map locations are simply items you create that you can add DM descriptions, player descriptions and items to. They are locations of interest on the map.

You can drag any location from the list onto the BattleMap, and it becomes a clickable marker. When you click on the marker, the BattleMap snaps to the description.

There's a great example of how locations fit into an adventure, in the Adventure printout here .

The interface doesn't currently do the program justice. I'm currently doing some suggested user interface changes, where the adventure, maps, locations and encounter groups are all brought together in a more understandable and friendly way...

Regards,
 

Re: Re: Re: Design issues and on-going work

Luke said:


Map locations are simply items you create that you can add DM descriptions, player descriptions and items to. They are locations of interest on the map.

You can drag any location from the list onto the BattleMap, and it becomes a clickable marker. When you click on the marker, the BattleMap snaps to the description.

There's a great example of how locations fit into an adventure, in the Adventure printout here .

The interface doesn't currently do the program justice. I'm currently doing some suggested user interface changes, where the adventure, maps, locations and encounter groups are all brought together in a more understandable and friendly way...

Regards,

Hmmm, sounds nice. Do you have mailing list? I wouldn't mind if you added Me to it.
 

RPM Mailing list

Lela said:


Hmmm, sounds nice. Do you have mailing list? I wouldn't mind if you added Me to it.
Unfortunately you need to add yourself. It has spam-protection where only the person with the e-mail address can add themselves.

"Mailing List" is available from the website under the obvious link.

Regards,
 

Re: RPM Mailing list

Luke said:

Unfortunately you need to add yourself. It has spam-protection where only the person with the e-mail address can add themselves.

"Mailing List" is available from the website under the obvious link.

Regards,

Got it. I'm doing so now.

Thanks,
 

I use ETools and recently tried DM Familiar and DM Genie

I have mixed emotions about eTools but I'm definitely liking it more now that I downloaded ETHelper and about 50 or 60 other fan-created add-ons. Unfortunately, it doesn't help at all at the table and is still a far cry from what I was expecting from Master Tools.

I tried DM Familiar about a week ago and thought it was definitely a step in the right direction for at-table-assistance. Currently, our group uses a play mat and miniatures and it is taking a very long time to play out these battles. Since it is still very rewarding, I was looking for a way to speed this up. DMF definitely helps.

I downloaded DM Genie two days ago and just finished working through all the tutorials today -- and it is incredible!! I don't want to take anything away from DMF, but DMG does practically everything I wanted to do at the table. I have maybe a few small nits or requests for additional features, but these are really minor. If you haven't downloaded the demo yet, go do so immediately. You have 60 days to decide if you like it.

All in all, I'm still planning on trying some of the other packages listed on this forum before making my final purchasing decision, but I'm definitely happy to see all the various options. For all the software developers out there -- keep up the good work.
 

Campaign Log/Data Storage

Awhile back someone mentioned a simple word processing program that used an expandable tree format (like DMF's Codex Tree). Does this ring a bell for anyone? I took a look, liked it, and saved the link. Since then my system crashed and I lost everything. I am in need of a stand alone program to organize campaign information.

Regards,
Mean DM
 

Re: Campaign Log/Data Storage

Mean DM said:
Awhile back someone mentioned a simple word processing program that used an expandable tree format (like DMF's Codex Tree). Does this ring a bell for anyone? I took a look, liked it, and saved the link. Since then my system crashed and I lost everything. I am in need of a stand alone program to organize campaign information.

Regards,
Mean DM

There are two that come to mind: MyInfo (http://www.milenix.com/myinfo.php) and ActionOutline (http://www.greenparrots.com). Both used to have free versions; I think now they just have trial/commercial ones.
 

Remove ads

Top